YALE UNIVERSITY
BEINECKE RARE BOOK AND MANUSCRIPT LIBRARY
GENERAL COLLECTION OF RARE BOOKS AND
MANUSCRIPTS
PRE-1600 MANUSCRIPTS
Beinecke MS 240 Italy, s. XV^^1
Aristotle, Ethica Nichomachea (in Greek)
ff. 1r-132v [Greek]. [text:] [Greek]. [explicit:] [Greek].
B. M. W. Knox has listed variant readings between Beinecke MS 240
and the OCT for 1094a to 1097a (Ziskind Catalogue, pp. 45-46); I.
Bekker, Aristotelis opera (Berlin, 1831) v. 2, 1094al-1181b23.
Parchment, ff. ii (nearly contemporary paper) + 132 + ii (nearly
contemporary paper), 209 x 144 (151 x 92) mm. Written in 27-28 long
lines, ruled with hard point on hair side; double vertical and
horizontal bounding lines, full across; prickings in outer and upper
margins.
I-XII^^10, XIII^^12. Catchwords in center of lower margin; quires
signed in Roman numerals along lower edge (many have been trimmed).
Written by two scribes. Scribe 1: ff. 1r-120v; Scribe 2: ff. 121r-
132v. On paleographical grounds, Scribe 1 can perhaps be identified as
a pupil of Manuel Chrysolaras. D. Harlfinger, Die Textgeschichte der
pseudo-aristotelischen Schrift...(Amsterdam, 1971) p. 420, identifies
the hand of Scribe 1 in Beinecke MS 240 with that of a manuscript in
Florence, Laurentian Conv. Supp. 47 (=AF 2755). For the hand of
Chrysoloras and Palla Strozzi, see R. Barbour, Greek Literary Hands
400-1600 A.D. (Oxford, 1981) p. 24.
Headings in red. Latin interlinear glosses in red (ff. 1r-25v), in
humanistic cursive script.
Folio 1r is rubbed and barely legible.
Binding: s. xix. Rigid vellum case, in the same manner as Beinecke
MSS 257 and 264.
Written in Italy in the first half of the 15th century; according
to P. Moraux it was acquired by Guillaume Pellicier probably between
1539 and 1542, then in 1573 by Claude Naulot. Belonged to the Jesuit
College of Clermont, Paris, (no. 247; notes on f. 1r: "Coll. Paris.
Societatis Jesu," and "Paraphe au desir de l'arrest du 5. juillet 1763.
Mesnil"). Acquired by Gerard and Johann Meerman, ca. 1773, Bibliotheca
Meermanniana v. 4, p. 46, no. 291 (on spine); sale to Sir Thomas
Phillipps (8 June-3 July 1824; stamp with no. 6764 on f. i, recto).
Purchased from Laurence Witten with funds from the Jacob Ziskind
Charitable Trust in 1957 (MS 7).
Bibliograpy: Faye and Bond, p. 45, no. 240.
Ziskind Catalogue, pp. 45-46.
Barbara A. Shailor