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The true history of this remarkable and priceless volume is as follows:

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About the middle of the sixteenth century it belonged the Cardinal Ridolfo Carpi, a contemporary of Pope Paul III., who died in 1549. From him it passed into the hands of the Cardinal del Monte, to whom the Grand Duke Cosmo I. sent his physician, Baccio Bandini, prefect of his library, for the express purpose of obtaining the volume. The letter of the Duke to the Cardinal, then at Rome, dated January 24, 1567, is still preserved. The manuscript thus travelled in a very legitimate manner from Rome to Florence, and never belonged to the Vatican, from which library Aldus Manutius, writing in 1561, falsely asserted that it had been stolen.

It is a moderate sized quarto volume, of a square form, written on vellum, in perfect preservation, and consists of 440 leaves written on both sides, in capital Roman letters, elegant and massive, with the bases, cross, and top-strokes rustic and short; a few of the down-strokes reaching below the line, and some of the letters taller than the rest; with the words not separated from each other. The first three lines of each book are written in vermilion; the abbreviations B. signifying BUS, and Q. QUE.

The scholars of Italy have regarded this manuscript as earlier than the fourth century, but this opinion is not followed by those of other countries. Luke Holstein referred it to the end of the fourth century, about the time of the Emperors Valens and Theodosius; at all events, it is certain that the manuscript was in existence at the close of the fifth century, since it bears an inscription at the end of the Bucolics, stating that Turcius Rufus Apronianus Asterius had revised and corrected this copy of the works of Virgil. This note is not in the same hand as the text of the volume, but it is

* Catalogue of the Latin MSS. of the Mediceo-Laurentian library, by Bandini, tom. ii. col. 285.

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known that the most ancient manuscripts were usually corrected immediately after the copy had been completed, and Apronianus Asterius, who corrected this manuscript, was Consul in the year 494. Hence this volume has been more generally referred (even in Italy itself) to the fifth century*. The whole of the poet's works are not contained in the manuscript. The Georgics and Eneid are entire, but a great portion of the Eclogues is wanting. The fac-simile is copied from the second page of the 87th leaf of the manuscript, being the commencement of the 4th book of the Æneid, which is to be read,

*

AT REGINA GRAVI JANDUDUM SAUCIA CURA,

VULNUS ALIT VENIS, ET CAECO CARPITUR IGNI.
MULTA VIRI VIRTUS ANIMO, MULTUSQ. RECURSAT
GENTES HONOS; HAERENT INFIXI PECTORe vultus,
VERBAQ. NEC PLACIDAM MEMBRIS DAT CURA QUIETEM.
POSTERA PHOEBEA LUSTRABAT LAMPADE TERRAS,
UMENTEMQ. AURORA POLO DIMOVERAT UMBRAM;
CUM SIC UNANIMAM† ADLOQUITUR MALESANA SORORE:
ANNA SOROR, QUAE ME SUSPENSAM INSOMNIA TERRENT?
QUIS NOVUS HIC NOSTRIS SUCCESSIT SEDIB. HOSPES?
QUEM SESE ORE FERENS? QUAM FORTI PECTORE ET ARMIS?
CREDO EQUIDEM, NEC VANAT FIDES, GENUS ESSE DEORUM.

DEGENERES ANIMOS TIMOR ARGUIT. HEU QUIBUS ILLE
JACTATUS FATIS! QUAE BELLA EXHAUSTA CANEBAT!

SI MIHI NON ANIMO FIXUM IMMOTUMQ. SEDERET,

NE CUI ME VINCLO VELLEM SOCIARE JUGALI,

POSTQUAM PRIMUS AMOR DECEPTAM MORTE FEFELLIT, etc.

Catalogue of the Latin MSS. of the Mediceo-Laurentian library, by Bandini, tom. ii. col. 292.

+ Two corrections occur in this word; a second A is surmounted by a point and stroke, to indicate that it is to be struck out, and an A is written over the E, to shew that the E is to be replaced by the A. [It must be remarked, that MM. Champollion have entirely mis-stated the nature of these corrections, but I have taken the liberty to set them right. -ED.] The form unanimam is adopted in the best editions.

Another correction occurs in this word.

The text is in a state of remarkable purity, which is an additional proof of the antiquity of the volume. It is, in fact, of inestimable value, as a monument of Latin literature, and it is not therefore surprising that an exact fac-simile of it (printed with types made to represent the letters of the text) should have been published at Florence, in 1741, by P. Fr. Foggini, a Roman prelate, and prefect of the Vatican, with this title, P. VIRGILII MARONIS CODEX ANTIQVISSIMVS, QUI NVNC FLORENTIAE IN BIBLIOTHECA MEDICEO-LAVRENTIANA ADSERVATVR, BONO PVBLICO TYPIS DESCRIPTVS. Florentiae, typis Mannianis. A copy of this work printed on vellum is in the Bibliothèque Royale at Paris.

PLATE CII.

ROMAN RUSTIC CAPITAL WRITING.

VTH CENTURY.

THE VATICAN VIRGIL, ORNAMENTED WITH MINIATURES,
NO. 3867.

THE present is another of the most celebrated manuscripts of classic literature, and has been consulted and studied by some of the most distinguished critics from the period of the revival of Latin learning; Valeriano Bolzani (better known under his latinized name of Pierius Valerianus) published from it, in 1532, a great number of various readings of the text of Virgil; and Aldus Manutius the younger selected a number of examples as authorities, which he inserted in his work published in 1561, under the title of Orthographiæ ratio, in which he endeavoured to establish a complete and rational

VOL. I.

T

system of Latin orthography, founded upon antique inscriptions, medals, and the best manuscripts.

The importance and value of this manuscript was thus established in the sixteenth century, and it was then known by the title of Codex Romanus. It would, however, have been more just to have styled it Codex Gallicus, as it formerly belonged to France, where it was preserved long before it crossed the Alps. The French origin of this manuscript was first pointed out by the illustrious Bernard de Montfaucon, at the end of the seventeenth century; that celebrated palæographer having when at Rome discovered on the fourth leaf, the words, Iste liber est Beati Dyonisii, in a hand of the thirteenth century. No doubt can exist as to the locality to which the manuscript belonged, since on the seventy-sixth folio (where the tempest is described which Æneas sustained,) is the following note in old French, of a nearly coeval date with the preceding, "Vechy comme les gens lezquiex estoient en la mer, estoient tourmentez pour le péchié d'une seule, chest à savoir, Juno." The name of Jehan Courtois also occurs in the volume, page 78, thus proving, beyond question, that it belonged formerly to the monastery of St. Denis in France*.

Mabillon subsequently gave a fac-simile of a few words of this manuscript, (a tracing of which he had received from Cardinal Casanata,) as a specimen of the most ancient Roman writing of the second aget; and the authors of the Nouveau Traité de Diplomatique afterwards inserted in their work a more exact fac-simile of five entire lines, for which they were indebted to the Cardinal Passioneit.

In the plate which accompanies this notice is presented for the first time a fac-simile of an entire page of the manu

* See Montfaucon, Diarium Italicum, Paris 1702, 4to. p. 277, and Bibliotheca Bibliothecarum Manuscriptorum, Paris, 1739, 2 vols. fol.[See fac-similes of these memoranda in D'Agincourt, Hist. de l'Art, etc., tom. v. pl. lxiv.-ED.]

+ De Re Diplomatica, pp. 352, 353.

Tom. iii. pp. 61, 62, pl. 35.

script, with one of its miniatures representing three shepherds engaged in discourse, surrounded by their flocks, whose names appear on the top line of the text, taken from the third eclogue of the poet of Mantua. This top line, as well as the names of the speakers introduced into the text, is written in red, the use of which is a mark of antiquity. The letters are of the same form and size throughout the manuscript; they are of the kind termed Roman rustic, or negligent capitals, and of a rectangular form, as distinguished from the round uncial letters. They are taller than broad; rather narrow, but elegant, with the bases, cross-strokes, and summits circumflexed. The V is rather rounded at bottom; the horizontal strokes of the E are very short; A is without the middle stroke, and the thick stroke is elevated above its junction; the T without a clearly defined top-stroke; P with a very small and rather open bow; L without a cross-stroke at the top; F and B with strokes exceeding the ordinary height of the lines; the vowels OE and AE always separated; Y not dotted; the tails of L and Q prolonged beneath the lines; and at the ends of lines the letters of a smaller size. The words are not separated and the punctuation which occurs after each word (often faulty by confounding the syllables,) has been added by a later and unskilful hand; entire pages being found without any stops. Mabillon and Montfaucon regarded this manuscript as one of the oldest known; Bottari, librarian of the Vatican, considered it anterior to the fourth century; but the authors of the Nouveau Traité de Diplomatique hesitate to assign it even to that date. It does not appear, however, to be later than the fifth century; the paintings belong evidently to the period of the decline of art*.

*

These miniatures are attributed, most absurdly, by D'Agincourt to the twelfth or thirteenth century. No reliance can be placed on a guide who commits an error of this magnitude. Hist. de l'Art, tom. ii. p. 74. tom. iii, p. 69, fol. 1823.-ED.

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