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The Poema Biblicum of Onulphus
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
The attention of students of mediaeval drama has often been arrested by a short dramatic text from a Vienna manuscript published by DuMéril among the examples of the liturgical Epiphany play in his Origines Latines du Théâtre Moderne. Among the mediaeval Latin plays of Epiphany this slight specimen is unique in its rhetorical form, in the names of the dramatis personæ, and in the absence of liturgical elements. The play is composed of thirteen leonine hexameters, which provide thirty-one speeches, each of the last ten hexameters being divided among three speakers. The first three lines, in the nature of an invitatory, are assigned to Stella as a speaking character, and the Magi appear under the names of Aureolus, Thureolus, and Myrreolus. The play bears no marks from the liturgy. Although the introductory rubric Ad adorandum Filium Dei per Stellam invitantur Eoy might serve well enough for launching a liturgical play, there is no concluding rubric to indicate a liturgical association, and the text itself contains no formulae reminiscent of the liturgy.
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1915
References
1 E. DuMéril, Les Origines Latines du Théâtre Moderne, Paris, 1849, pp. 151-152.
2 M. Denis, Codices Manuscripts theologici bibliothecae palatinae vindobonensis latini aliarumque occidentis linguarum, Vol. i, Part iii, Vienna, 1795, col. 3054-3056. Denis numbers the manuscript 841. DuMéril's No. 941 is apparently a misprint.
3 DuMéril speaks of the text as follows: “Il y avait aussi dans un ms. du xive siècle, de la Bibliothèque de Vienne, N° 941 [misprint for N° 841], un mystère sur ce sujet, dont il ne resteraifc plus que l'argument, selon Denis, Codices manuscripti theologici, t. i, col. 3049; mais nous croirions volontiers que la pièce est complète.” This statement misrepresents Denis, who in his remark (col. 3054), “Verum hujus Scenae non nisi Argumentum superest,” refers not to the play before us, but to the dialogue “Inter Magos et Herodem,” which in the manuscript follows immediately upon our play, and of Which the manuscript preserves only part of the argumentum, as may be seen in my complete text printed below.
4 W. Köppen, Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Weihnachtsspiele, Marburg, 1892.
5 W. Meyer, Fragmenta Burana, Berlin, 1901, pp. 38-48.
6 E. K. Chambers, The Mediœval Stage, Vol. ii, Oxford, 1903, p. 51.
7 H. Anz, Die lateinischen Magierspiele, Leipzig, 1905, pp. 9-49.
8 W. Creizenach, Geschichte des neueren Dramas, Vol. i, Halle, 1911, p. 56.
9 Denis, col. 3054-3056.
10 DuMéril, pp. 151-152.
11 In preparing this text I have had the great advantage of consultations with Professor Grant Showerman and Professor E. K. Rand, to whom I am deeply grateful for generous assistance. To Professor Rand I owe numerous editorial suggestions, a few of which I have been able to acknowledge specifically below. Professor Rand, however, should not be held responsible for any errors that I may have committed in my use of his suggestions.
The manuscript is described by Denis, col. 3049-3058, and in Tabulae codicum manu scriptorum in Bibliotheca Palatima Vindobonensi Asservatorum, Vol. i, Vienna, 1864, p. 185. The press-mark of the manuscript given by Denis as 841, is now “1054. [Theol. 452].” Cod. 1054 is a miscellany of 40 folios, containing some ten separate entries written in hands of the twelfth and fourteenth centuries. The entry with which we are concerned is written in double columns in a hand of the fourteenth century, and occupies the lower two-thirds of folio 30 recto and all of folio 30 verso. In my text, asterisks mark the beginning and end of the part printed, from Denis, by DuMéril.
12 In the manuscript this word is preceded by a false stroke.
13 Ms. diamate.
14 Ms. clauus.
15 Horace, Ars Poetica, line 94.
16 The manuscript appears to have antydotū, altered to antydoto.
17 Ms. quod.
18 Ms. perrexerat.
19 Ms. maiestati.
20 The manuscript may read promendo.
21 Since Professor Rand has called my attention to Ovid, Fasti, vi, 519, Appulerat ripae vaccas Œtæus Hyberas, I can suggest the emendation uaccas.
22 Ms. quamque.
23 Professor Rand suggests the conjectural emendation Me liceat.
24 Ms. scribende corrected to scribendi.
25 Ms. qua.
26 My difficulty in this line may be due to a scribal error.
*-* Reprinted from Denis by DuMéril.
1-1 Omitted by DuMéril. Before the word Stella Denis interpolates the word Interlocutores.
27 I. e., Phryx.
28 Ms. Laurus.
29 Thus the fragment ends at the bottom of the second column of fol. 30v. At the top of fol. 31r another hand begins a separate work Tinder the rubric: Incipit prologus super commento Apocalipsis.
30 As to the formation of Old Testament cycles see Hardin Craig, The Origin of the Old Testament Plays, in Modern Philology, Vol. x, pp. 473-487.
31 See A. Potthast, Bibliotheca Historica Medii Aevi, Vol. ii, Berlin, 1896, p. 1532; U. Chevalier, Répertoire des Sources Historiques du Moyen Age: Bio-Bibliographie, Vol. ii, Paris, 1907, col. 3420.
32 Concerning Onulphus Spirensis I have no information beyond that given by W. Wattenbaeh, Magister Onulf von Speier, in Sitzungsberichte der königlich Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, 1894, Part I, pp. 361-386, and by M. Manitius, Zu Onulfs von Speier Rhetorici Colores, in Neues Archiv der Gesellschaft für ältere deutsche Geschichtskunde, Vol. xx (1894), pp. 441-443. These references are used by Chevalier (Répertoire, Vol. ii, col. 3420), who, however, assigns Onulphus to the twelfth century.
33 Chevalier, Vol. i, col. 27.