Beinecke MS 526
France (?), s. XIII/XIV
Ps.-Dionysius Areopagita (fragment)

ff. 1r-4v	[text 1:] // Calefacientes igitur nominantur et Troni et fusio sapiencie, manifestatio 
deiformium ipsorum habituum ... existentem et exterminativam Seraphyn cognominatio 
manifestative docet. [gloss :] Positis in temptationibus duorum hebreorum nominum et dicto 
quod prima celestis celestis [sic] ierarchia constituitur ex supremis substanciis ... ad actum nisi per 
virtute per se et eternaliter agentis.

f. 5r-6v	[texts 2-4:] Est autem et faciens [corrected from faciens et] extasim divinus amor 
non sinens sui ipsorum esse amatores ... Audendum autem et hec pro veritate dicere quoniam et 
ipse omnium causa ... Quid autem totaliter theologi volentes aliquando quidem amorem et 
dilectionem ... et amatum ipsum vocavit ut pulchrum et bonum amorem a.// [gloss :] Dicto quid 
est amor divinus et in Deo et in amantibus Deum ... Dicto quod divinus amor in amantibus divine 
Deum facit extasim ... amatum videlicet et amor propter pulchrum et bonum, ut satis est supra 
tactum.

Ps.-Dionysius Areopagita, De caelesti hierarchia, translated into Latin by Robert Grosseteste (d. 
1253), with his commentary, chapters 7??-... The text is edited  without the commentary  PL 
122.1050-?? See Sharpe, pp. 546-547 (about the editions); S.H. Thomson, The Writings of Robert 
Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln 1235-1253 (Cambridge, 1940), ??


Parchment, 6 ff., 215 x 165 mm.

I 10 (-5, -8, -9, -10). Signatures 1-4 in the lower corner of the rectos of ff. 1-4.

Pricking in the upper, lower and outer margins. Ruled with brown ink for two columns of 38 
lines of gloss below top line (19 lines of text), type 46, 163 x 119 mm., intercolumnar space 9 
mm.

Written in Northern Gothica Textualis Libraria in two sizes. The large script used for the text 
itself is written every two lines. The cursive r-abbreviation could point to England, the z standing 
on the line and the occasional use of j instead of i reminds us of Spain, the "horn" at the head of 
r is especially typical of German scribes.

The decoration consists of plain late Romanesque initials in red (2 lines).

The manuscript belonged up to the early twentieth century to the Franciscan convent  
(Minoritenkloster) in Vienna and had a chained binding. In 1946 it was dismembered by a New 
Jersey book dealer into six parts. Two of these are still missing, one was acquired by the Catholic 
University of America at Washington DC (MS 183), and two by the University of North 
Carolina at Chapel Hill (MSS 96-97). Our MS belonged to S. Harrison Thomson (MS 13). See 
Stephan Kuttner, "??", Miscellanea Pio Paschini (Rome, 1949), v. 2, pp. 39-81, and a note by the 
same "Reconstructing a Dissected Manuscript: An Appeal" in Academy News published by the 
Medieval Academy of America, November 1981. See also Christensen's Rare Book Catalogue of 
1949??
Purchased in 1972 from S. Harrison Thomson on the Beinecke Endowment Fund.

Albert Derolez

Updated 28.11.2007