A catalogue of Western manuscripts at the Bodleian Libraries and selected Oxford colleges

MS. Canon. Misc. 172

Summary Catalogue no.: 19648

Latin works of L. B. Alberti; Italy, c. 1487

Contents

L. B. Alberti
1. (fol. 2)
Canis
Incipit: Erat in more apud majores
2. (fol. 8)
Apologi centum
Incipit: (argumentum) Leo Baptista cum ei rethor quidam Cinus
Incipit: (dedication) Si quis tibi amicus
Incipit: (text) Egre ferebat pila
4. (fol. 15)
Musca
Incipit: (dedication) Incideram in febriculam
Incipit: (text) Philosophum nescio quem celebrem
4. (fol. 21v)
De equo animante
5. (fol. 29 )
Amator
Incipit: Seripsere veteres vario multiplicique plerumque motu
6. (fol. 38)
De iure
Incipit: (dedication) Etsi ἃ vestris jurisconsultorum scriptis
Incipit: (text) Jurisconsulti officium est
7. (fol. 45)
Trivia senatoria
8. (fol. 48v)
Epimenides Diogeni
Incipit: (preface) Quando me virtuti deditum
Incipit: (text) Qualis mihi esse homo videatur
9. (fol. 50)
Intercoenales
Incipit: (dedication) Places tu quidem oratione soluta
Incipit: (text) Cepi nostras intercenales redigere in parvos libellos, quo inter cenas et poeula commodius possent perlegi."
10. (fol. 94v)
Pontifex
Incipit: Paulus Albertus pontifex vir sanctissimus et Albertus jurisconsultua disertissimus Cipriani equitis
Colophon: Baptista Albertus ceperat edere hoc opusculum die dominica hora vigesima die xiij. Octobris mcccc.xxxvij. ; completum est die Jovis circa meridiem, die xvij. ejusdem mensis, Bononie.
11. (fol. 118v)
Psalmi precationum
Incipit: Laudate pueri Dominum
12. (fol. 121)
Momus
13. (fol. 211)
Intercoenales

Extract: de annulo libellus

Incipit: Minerva; Adesne, Geni, et quid sit
Colophon: Finis xxx. Juli 1487.
14. (fol. 218)
Leonis ad Cratem philosophum
Incipit: Quod seribis assuescite panem
15. (fol. 221)
Elementa picturae

Alberti's Latin translation of his own Italian treatise, with prefatory epistle to "Theodore"

Incipit: Num evenire uspiam posse
Incipit: Quo scribendo sim brevis
16. (fol. 225v)
De statua
Incipit: Artes eorum, qui ex corporibus
17. (fol. 233)
Descriptio urbis Romae
Incipit: Murorum urbis Rome

Followed by later transcript of two edicts.

Language(s): Latin

Physical Description

For codicological description see De Poli and Regoliosi (Bibliography); the manuscript is composed of two contemporaneous codicological units, fols. 1-220 and 221-238.
Form: codex
Support: paper

Hand(s)

Fols. 1-220: Gothic hybrida.

Fols. 221-238: humanistic cursive; scribe identified by Albinia de la Mare (reported in De Poli and Regoliosi) as the hand of Genoa, Bibl. Univ. G IV 29.

Decoration

Fols. 221–238 (Pächt and Alexander iii. 1341):

Good drawing.

Good diagrams.

History

Origin: 15th century, end (probably 1487, at least in part) ; Italian

Provenance and Acquisition

Date: see fols. 45r, 218r and cf. fol. 119v (1437): the date 1437 relates to the texts; De Poli and Regoliosi suggest the scribe inadvertently altered this on two occasions to the year of copying. Not listed in A. G. Watson, Dated and Datable Manuscripts in Oxford Libraries. De Poli and Regoliosi suggest a possible origin in Padua.

Pierleone da Spoleto, -1492 (?): annotations in his hand in the first codicological unit (identified by Albinia de la Mare, as reported in De Poli and Regoliosi)

Matteo Luigi Canonici, 1727–1805: lent by him to Jacopo Morelli of the Bibliotheca Marciana, returned 1805 (fol. 1r).

Giuseppe Canonici , -1807

Purchased by the Bodleian in 1817

Record Sources

Description adapted by Matthew Holford (March 2024) from the following sources, with additional reference to published literature as cited.
H. O. Coxe, Catalogi codicum manuscriptorum bibliothecae Bodleianae, pars tertia, Codices graecos et latinos Canonicianos complectens (1854)
Otto Pächt and J. J. G. Alexander, Illuminated Manuscripts in the Bodleian Library Oxford, III (1973), no.1341

Availability

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Digital Images

Digital Bodleian (full digital facsimile)
Digital Bodleian (5 images from 35mm slides)

Microfilm

Microfilm available in the open shelf collections in the Weston Library (R. Films 101)

Bibliography

    Alessandro De Poli and Mariangela Regoliosi, in Leon Battista Alberti: la biblioteca di un umanista (Florence, 2005), cat. 15 (pp. 282-6)

Last Substantive Revision

2024-03: Description revised to include all information from Quarto catalogue and reference to published literature.