Beinecke MS 257               Italy [?], s. XVI^^2
Nicetas of Heraclea, Catena on Job (in Greek)

1. ff. 1r-225r[Beginning of text is missing; heading:]
[Greek].  [text of prologue begins:]
[Greek].  [This prologue is not the same
one that is printed in the PG reference cited below; the Catena
of Nicetas of Heraclea follows immediately after this introduction:]
[Greek].  [text begins:]
[Greek].  [followed by a folio
written in geometric configuration that ends:]
[Greek].
ff. 225v-227v blank

     PG 93.17-470, attributed to Olympiodorus.  There are a number of breaks
in the continuity of the text which seem to indicate that the scribe was
copying a defective exemplar.  He left what he considered to be the proper
amount of space for the missing passages.

2. f. 228r An unidentified and incomplete Christian text: // [Greek]// f. 228v blank.

     Paper (polished; watermarks similar to Briquet Chapeau 3467, 3486, 3488,
3489 and 3507; unidentified crossbow), ff. ii (paper) + 220 (foliation runs
from 9 through 228) + ii (paper), 300 x 211 (210 x 122) mm.  Written in 28 long
lines; double inner and outer vertical bounding lines
with additional outer line that was used to demarcate a narrow column
for marginal notations.  Ruled in hard point; no prickings visible.
     I^^8 (now entirely missing), II-XXVII^^8 (IV has been misbound after f. 40),
XXVIII^^12.  Quire signatures are letters of the alphabet
located along the lower edge of folio, on recto; catchwords (partially
legible) are perpendicular to text in the gutter.
     Written by a single scribe who is the same as Scribe 2 in Beinecke MS 289,
as Scribe 3 in MS 290, and as Scribe 1 in MS 490.
     Floral headpiece, in red, on f. 9r; elaborate initials, 10- to 2-line, in
red, throughout text, many with accompanying floral motifs.  Headings and
most marginalia in red.
     Binding:  s. xviii.  Edges spattered red and blue/green.  Rigid vellum
case.  According to J. L. Sharpe this manuscript was bound at the Jesuit
College of Clermont, Paris (see Provenance).

Written in Northern Italy [?] in the second half of the 16th century.
Belonged to the Jesuit College of Clermont, Paris (note on f. 1r:  "Paraphe
au desir de l'arrest du 5 juillet 1763.  Mesnil").  Acquired by Gerard and
Johann Meerman, ca. 1773, Bibliotheca Meermanniana, v. 4, p. 5, no. 36
(number written in ink on spine).  Martin Joseph Routh, 1755-1854,
president of Magdalen
College, Oxford, from 1791-1854; bought from him by Sir Thomas Phillipps (no.
14041, on spine; autograph note inside front cover:  "5/15/6.  Ex Bibliotheca
Meermann no. 36. fol. 217. Empt. anno. 1824.  Codices MSSti Bibliothecae
Meermannianae olim penes fuerant Bibliothecam Collegii Soc. Jesu Claremontini
Paris; quorum dicitur fuisse Monasterii Corbeiensis prope Ambianos."). According
to W. Nichipor there is no evidence in the manuscript to suggest it was ever
at Corbie.
Purchased from L. C. Witten with funds from the Jacob Ziskind Charitable Trust
in 1957 (MS 38).

Bibliography:  Faye and Bond, p. 46, no. 257.
     Ziskind Catalogue, p. 51.

Barbara A. Shailor