Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-03T08:55:18.425Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

5 - The Latin Bible, c. 900 to the Council of Trent, 1546

from Part I - Texts and Versions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2012

Richard Marsden
Affiliation:
University of Nottingham
E. Ann Matter
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
Get access

Summary

Modern scholars know a good deal more about the state of the Vulgate Bible text before and during the Carolingian renaissance than in the five centuries after 900. In an essay published in 1984, Laura Light pointed out that very little systematic study had been done on manuscripts of the Bible dating from after the tenth century, and the little work that had been done either dealt mainly with art-historical questions of manuscript production and illumination, or treated the texts primarily as witnesses to pre-900 traditions, rather than placing them within their own historical context. Despite progress in some fields, such as the study of the so-called ‘Paris’ Bible and the biblical correctoria of the thirteenth century, this state of affairs has not fundamentally changed over two decades later. This chapter will give an overview of the textual history of the Latin Bible (in the version which became known later, in the sixteenth century, as the Vulgata) after the Carolingian renaissance, tracing it through the periods of ecclesiastical and monastic reform, the rise of scholasticism and the first printed Vulgate edition in 1452/1456, until the first critical editions that were brought about by the Renaissance and the Counter-Reformation. The latter led to the text as it would be printed, with modifications, in the Sixto-Clementine edition in 1592, which would remain the standard text of the Latin Bible for centuries.

The state of modern research

Most of the modern research into the textual transmission of the Vulgate was inspired by the monumental editing project that was undertaken to replace the Sixto-Clementine edition of 1592. Between 1889 and 1954, John Wordsworth and Henry White published their critical edition of the Vulgate New Testament, based on the oldest extant gospel manuscripts, most of which dated from the ninth century. In 1907, Pope Leo VIII commissioned the complete critical edition of the Vulgate Old Testament, and entrusted the project to the Benedictine order; the first volume was issued from the abbey of S Girolamo in Rome in 1926 and the project was completed in 1994. The editing principles of the project were set out by Dom Henri Quentin in his Mémoire of 1922. The main aim was to establish the text of the Vulgate as Jerome had conceived it in the fifth century. Thus manuscripts written after c. 900 were considered unreliable witnesses, and for this reason, the more recent manuscript tradition of the Vulgate received only scant attention.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Light, L., ‘Versions et révisions du texte biblique’, in P. Riché and G. Lobrichon (eds.), Le moyen âge et la Bible, Bible de Tous les Temps 4 (Paris: Beauchesne, 1984), pp. 55–93, at p. 56
Bogaert, P.-M., ‘La Bible latine des origines au moyen âge. Aperçu historique, état des questions’, Revue Théologique de Louvain 19 (1988), 137–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cherubini, P. (ed.), Forme e modelli della tradizione manoscritta della Bibbia, Littera Antiqua 13 (Vatican City: Scuola Vaticana di Paleografia, Diplomatica e Archivistica, 2005)Google Scholar
Novum Testamentum Domini nostri Iesu Christi latine secundum editionem sancti Hieronymi, ed. Wordsworth, J. and White, H. J., 3 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1889–1954).
Quentin, H., Mémoire sur l’établissement du texte de la Vulgate. Première partie: Octateuque, Collectanea Biblica Latina 6 (Rome: Desclée / Paris: Gabalda, 1922)Google Scholar
Rand, E. K., ‘Dom Quentin's Memoir on the Text of the Vulgate’, HTR 17 (1924)
de la Vulgate’, , Studi Medievali 2 (1961), 363–77
Berger, S., Histoire de la Vulgate pendant les premiers siècles du moyen âge (Paris: Hachette, 1893Google Scholar
Gameson, R. (ed.), The Early Medieval Bible. Its Production, Decoration, and Use, Cambridge Studies in Palaeography and Codicology 2 (CambridgeUniversity Press, 1994)Google Scholar
Maniaci, M. and Orofino, G. (eds.), Le Bibbie atlantiche. Il libro delle Scritture tra monumentalità e rappresentazione (Milan: Centro Tibaldi, 2000)Google Scholar
Branner, R., Manuscript Painting in Paris During the Reign of Saint Louis. A Study of Styles, California Studies in the History of Art 18 (Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 1977)Google Scholar
de Hamel, C. F. R., Glossed Books of the Bible and the Origins of the Paris Booktrade (Woodbridge: Brewer, 1984)Google Scholar
Glunz, H. H., History of the Vulgate in England from Alcuin to Roger Bacon, Being an Inquiry into the Text of some English Manuscripts of the Vulgate Gospels (CambridgeUniversity Press, 1933)Google Scholar
Weber, R., ‘Les interpolations du livre de Samuel dans les manuscrits de laVulgate’, in Miscellanea Giovanni Mercati. Vol. i: Bibbia-letteratura cristiana antica, Studi e Testi 121 (Vatican City: BAV, 1946), pp. 19–39Google Scholar
Weber, R., ‘Deux préfaces au psautier dues à Nicolas Maniacoria’, RB 63 (1953), 3–17Google Scholar
Peri, V., ‘“Correctores immo corruptores”, un saggio di critica testuale nella Roma del XII secolo’, Italia Medioevale e Umanistica 20 (1977), 19–125Google Scholar
Martin, J. P. P., Saint Étienne Harding et les premiers recenseurs de la Vulgate latine, Théodulfe et Alcuin (Amiens: Rousseau-Leroy, 1887)Google Scholar
Lang, K. P. A, Die Bibel Stephan Hardings. ein Beitrag zur Textgeschichte der neutestamentlichen Vulgata (Bonn: Neuendorff, 1939)Google Scholar
Cauwe, M., ‘Le Bible d’Étienne Harding’, RB 103 (1993), 414–44Google Scholar
Smalley, B., ‘Gilbertus Universalis, Bishop of London (1128–34), and the Problem of the Glossa ordinaria’, RTAM 7 (1935), 235–62Google Scholar
Gibson, M. T., ‘The Twelfth-Century Glossed Bible’, in E. A. Livingstone (ed.), Papers Presented to the Tenth International Conference on Patristic Studies Held in Oxford 1987, Studia Patristica 23 (Leuven: Peeters, 1989), pp. 232–44Google Scholar
Berndt, R., ‘Neue Forschungen zur Glossa der Bibel’, Archa Verbi 2 (2005), 177–82Google Scholar
Haastrup, N., ‘Zur frühen Pariser Bibel – auf Grund skandinavischer Handschriften’, Classica et Mediaevalia 24 (1963), 242–69Google Scholar
Châtillon, J., ‘La culture de l’école de Saint-Victor du XIIe siècle’, in M. de Gandillac and E. Jeauneau (eds.), Entretiens sur la renaissance du XIIe siècle, Decades du Centre Culturel International de Cerisy-la-Salle, ns 9 (Paris and The Hague: Mouton, 1968), pp. 147–60; Tischler, ‘Dal Bec a San Vittore’.
Nip, R. I. A. and van Dijk, H. (eds.), Media Latinitas. A Collection of Essays to Mark the Occasion of the Retirement of L. J. Engels, Instrumenta Patristica 28 (Steenbrugge and Turnhout: Brepols, 1995), pp. 249–53Google Scholar
de Sancto Victore, Andreas, Expositio super Duodecim Prophetas, ed. F. A. van Liere and M. A. Zier, CCCM 53G (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), pp. xxi–xxviGoogle Scholar
Andreas de Sancto Victore, Expositio hystorica in librum Regum, ed. van Liere, F. A., CCCM 53A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1996), p. 11, line 226; p. 39, line 1115; p. 71, lines 12–14; Andreas de Sancto Victore, Super Duodecim Prophetas, p. 9, lines 125–34.
de Sancto Victore, Andreas, Expositiones historicae in Libros Salomonis, ed. R. Berndt, CCCM 53B (Turnhout: Brepols, 1991), pp. xvii–xviiiGoogle Scholar
Bacon, Roger, Opus minus in Opera quaedam hactenus inedita. Vol. i, ed. J. S. Brewer, Rerum Britannicarum Medii Aevi Scriptores 15 (London: Longman, Green, Longman and Roberts, 1859; repr. London: Kraus, 1965), p. 333Google Scholar
Rouse, R. H. and Rouse, M. A., Manuscripts and Their Makers. Commercial Book Producers in Medieval Paris, 1200–1500 (Turnhout: Harvey Miller and Brepols, 2000)Google Scholar
Schmid, O., Über verschiedene Eintheilungen der Heiligen Schrift insbesondere über die Capitel-Eintheilung Stephan Langtons im XIII. Jahrhunderte (Graz: Leuschner and Lubensky, 1892)Google Scholar
Saenger, P., ‘The Anglo-Hebraic Origins of the Modern Chapter Division of the Latin Bible’, in F. Javier Burguillo and L. Meier (eds.), La fractura historiografica. Edad Media y Renacimento desde el tercer milenio (Salamanca: Seminario de Estudios Medievales y Renacentistas, 2008), pp. 177–202Google Scholar
Rouse, R. H and Rouse, M. A., ‘The Verbal Concordance to the Scriptures’, Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 44 (1974), 5–30Google Scholar
, Light, ‘French Bibles c. 1200–30’, p. 490, and ‘Roger Bacon and the Origin of the Paris Bible’, RB 111 (2001), 483–507.
Lerner, R. and Müller-Luckner, E. (eds.), Neue Richtungen in der hoch- und spätmittelalterlichen Bibelexegese, Schriften des Historischen Kollegs, Kolloquien 32 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1996), pp. 1–15CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, Bogaert, ‘La Bible latine’, pp. 298–99; Bogaert, ‘Le livre de Baruch dans les manuscrits de la Bible latine. Disparition et réintégration’, RB 115 (2005), 286–342.
Bogaert, P.-M., ‘Les livres d’Esdras et leur numérotation dans l’histoire du canon de la Bible latine’, RB 110 (2000), 5–26Google Scholar
Denifle, H. and Ehrle, F. (eds.), Archiv für Literatur- und Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters (Freiburg: Herder, 1888), pp. 263–311Google Scholar
Dahan, G., ‘La critique textuelle dans les correctoires de la Bible du XIIIe siècle’, in A. De Libera et al. (eds.), Langages et philosophie. Hommage à Jean Jolivet, Études de Philosophie Médiévale 74 (Paris: Vrin, 1997) pp. 365–92Google Scholar
Greitemann, N. T. J., De windesheimsche vulgaatrevisie in de vijftiende eeuw (Hilversum: Brand, 1937)Google Scholar
Schmidt, W. and Schmidt-Künsemüller, F. A. (eds.), Johannes Gutenbergs zweiundvierzigzeilige Bibel. Faksimile-Ausgabe nach dem Exemplar der Staatsbibliothek Preußischer Kulturbesitz Berlin. Kommentarband (Munich: Idion, 1979), pp. 9–31Google Scholar
Smit, J. O., De Vulgaat. Geschiedenis en herziening van de latijnse bijbelvertaling, Bijbelse Monographiën (Rome: Roermond and Maaseik, 1948), pp. 61–2Google Scholar
Bentley, J. H., Humanists and Holy Writ. New Testament Scholarship in the Renaissance (Princeton University Press, 1983), pp. 70–111Google Scholar
Höpfl, H., Beiträge zur Geschichte der Sixto-Klementinischen Vulgata nach gedruckten und ungedruckten Quellen, Biblische Studien 18.1–3 (Freiburg: Herder, 1913)Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×