Marston MS 16     Germany, 1459
Ovid, Metamorphoses

1. ff. 1r [Title:]  Ouidius methamorphoseos.  ff. 1v-2r blank; f. 2v Short
table of proper names in alphabetical order, with book numbers and folio
references to individual books, both of which refer to the same sequence
written in upper right corner of each text leaf.

2. ff. 3r-201v In noua fert animus mutatas dicere formas/ Corpora dij
ceptis.  Nam uos mutastis et illas/...Ore legar populi perque omnia secula
fama/ Siquid habent veri vatum presagia viuam.  [colophon:]  Explicit Anno
1459.  ff. 202v-207v blank

W. S. Anderson, ed., Teubner (1977); a new critical edition by R. J.
Tarrant is in progress (for additional information on the manuscript
tradition, see Texts and Transmission, pp. 276-82).  The text of Marston
MS 16 contains interlinear and marginal notes throughout.  Lactantian
tituli
and narrationes in margins; see D. A. Slater, ed., Towards a Text of the 
Metamorphosis of Ovid [Oxford, 1927]).

	Paper (watermarks:  unidentified bull's head and mountain), ff. ii 
(paper, ff. 1-2) + 204 (modern foliation, 3-207, omits no. 168), 344 x 235 
(212 x 108) mm.  Ca. 30-37 lines of verse.  Leaves folded lengthwise for 
vertical bounding lines.
	I 2, II-XVIII 12.  Gatherings of twelve signed with Arabic numerals
along lower edge near gutter, verso.
	Written in a small neat gothic text hand with hybrida features.
	Plain red 5-line initial, in outline only, f. 3r; two smaller
initials of similar style, ff. 3v-4r.  First letter of each verse stroked
with red, ff. 3r-4r.  Spaces left for decorative initials remain unfilled
elsewhere in codex.
	Binding:  Germany, s. xv.  Adhered vellum stays on the inside of the 
quires.  Original wound sewing on three wide, tawed skin, slit
straps laced through tunnels in the edges of beech boards
to channels on the outside and pegged.  Natural color endbands, caught up
on the spine, are sewn to tawed cores laced into grooves on the outside of 
the boards.  Front pastedown:  reused paper manuscript with text side pasted 
face down.
	Quarter bound in blue, tawed skin with a strip, now wanting, nailed 
along the edge.  Two leaf-shaped catches with three five-petalled flowers on 
them on the lower board and the upper one cut in for kermes pink straps
attached with metal plates; damage from a chain fastening at the head of this 
board, and the board broken; outer edge wanting.  Title, in same [?] hand as 
on f. 1r, on upper and lower boards:  "Ouidius methamorphoseos."  

Written in Germany in 1459 (see colophon in art. 2).  Acquired by Brother
Henricus Karrer [?] in 1469 for the Franciscan convent of Villingen in
Strasbourg, inscription on front pastedown:  "Hoc opus procurauit frater
henricus Karr [followed by abbreviation stroke] minister [or magister?]
prouinciae argentinensis pro conuentu Viligensi fratrum minorum ac
studiosis filijs eiusdem Conuentus.  1469."  Monogram in the same [?]
hand directly above the inscription, partially effaced:  "b. w. h. k." 
Belonged to Pietro Girometti (MS. 1), whose manuscripts were bought by 
Prince Baldassarre Boncompagni in 1856 (E. Narducci, Catalogo di manoscritti 
ora posseduti da D. B. Boncompagni [Rome, 1892]; nos. 221 (296) in the 
Boncompagni collection (both numbers on spine, the first on a small paper
label, the second in bright red ink).

Unidentified inscriptions include note on f. 1r, crossed out and illegible; 
below in ink:  "C. 1-207./ 1-202, 203, 203-206/ C. (204)-(207);" round 
white paper label with saw-toothed edge on spine: "S II F/ Ouidius Ms. 
1459/ fol. 21930;" on front pastedown, in pencil:  "302" and "200." 
Remains of large square paper label wrapped around spine. Unidentified 
Latin note, s. xix-xx, pasted inside front cover.  Purchased  from C. A.
Stonehill in 1949 by Thomas E. Marston (bookplate).

secundo folio:  Proxima

Bibliography:  Faye and Bond, p. 66, no. 16.
	F. Munari, Catalogue of the Manuscripts of Ovid's Metamorphoses, 
University of London, Institute of Classical Studies, Bulletin Supplement 
no. 4 (London, 1957) p. 40, no. 183 (cited without shelf number).

Barbara A. Shailor