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Notes on Manuscripts of the Prophécies de Merlin

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Lucy Allen Paton
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Extract

The thirteenth-century French prose romance, Les Prophécies de Merlin, of which we have no later edition than the sixteenth century, has hitherto received little attention. Notices of some of the manuscripts; appear in the printed catalogues of manuscript-collections, but none convey an idea of the contents of the romance except the description of two manuscripts in the British Museum given by Ward in his Catalogue. Practically only two other writers have entered upon any discussion of the Prophécies:—Sanesi, in the introduction to his edition of the Storia di Merlino, an Italian version of the romance, and Taylor, who in a recent dissertation on political prophecy, substantially repeats the information given by Sanesi. Both of these works are so important for the student of the Prophécies de Merlin that it is a pity to allow certain statements made by the authors to remain unsupplemented by facts which naturally have come to the notice of anyone who, like myself, is preparing an edition of the French text of the Prophécies.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , 1913 , pp. 121 - 139
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1913

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References

1 Paolino Pieri, Storia di Merlino, ed. Ireneo Sanesi, Biblioteca storica della letteratura italiana, iii, Bergamo, 1898; see especially, pp. lvii ff.

1 Rupert Taylor, The Political Prophecy in England, New York, 1911, pp. 140, 141, 150-152.

2 Additional 25434 and Harleian 1629. Ward, Catalogue of Romances in the British Museum, London, 1883, i, pp. 371-374.

1 No. 593. Catalogue général des Manuscrits des Bibliothèques publiques de France, xxiv, pp. 238 ff.; D. Maillet, Description des MSS. de la Bibl. publique de Rennes, Rennes, 1837, pp. 112 ff.

2 Fonds français, 98, 350, 15211. Omont, Catalogue général des MSS. français, s. n. For 98 and 350, see also P. Paris, MSS. français de la Bibl. du Roi, Paris, 1836, i, pp. 129 ff. (No. 6772); ii, p. 367 (No. 6970). For a brief analysis of parts of 350, see also Löseth, Le Roman de Tristan, Paris, 1890, p. 490.

A brief list of the manuscripts owned by the Connétable de Lesdiguières (ob. 1626), made in 1633, contains as one item, Les prophécies de Merlin, vieux roman, “un manoscritto,” Sanesi says (p. lxi), “non so se smarrito, o passato con altri manoscritti dal conestabile medesimo alla biblioteca de Tours.” The collection of manuscripts of Lesdiguières was bought in 1716 by the Abbey of Marmoutier, and after the Revolution was acquired by the Bibliothèque of Tours. Some of the manuscripts in the list of 1636 are found in the catalogue of the Bibliothèque of Tours by Dorange, published in 1875; others have been identified by Delisle as among the famous booty that Libri stole from Tours about 1842. The Prophécies de Merlin, however, appears neither in the Tours catalogue nor among Delisle's identifications (Delisle, Notices et Extraits, xxxi, ie Pte., MSS. disparus de la Bibliothèque de Tours; P(aul) M(eyer), Romania, xii (1883), pp. 336 ff.). B. N. 15211 has the name of Lesdiguières on the fly-leaf, but not the word propia, which is frequently inscribed upon the manuscripts' once owned by him. Omont in his description of 15211 says, “provient de Lesdiguières, puis de Caumont.” The greater part of the manuscript is taken up with Provençal poems (ff. 68-280), but since the Prophécies occupies the first 68 folios, the manuscript would naturally be cited under its title. In the lack, then, of evidence to the contrary, 15211 would appear to be the manuscript of Lesdiguières' list.

3 No. 5229. Catalogue des MSS. de la Bibl. de l'Arsenal, v, p. 169.

4 No. 644. Musée Condé, Chantilly, Cabinet des Livres, Manuscrits, Paris, 1900, ii, p. 384.

5 No. 388. Hagen, Catalogus Codicum Bernensium, Berne, 1875, p. 359.

1 No. xxix. Ciampoli, I Codici francesi della Bibl. di S. Marco, Venice, 1807, pp. 151 ff.

2 Regina 1687. Langlois, Notices et Extraits, xxxiii, pp. 219 ff.

3 Bonnardot, Romania, xvi (1887), p. 178.

4 Brunet, Manuel du Libraire, iii, p. 1654.

5 Palatino 39. Ulrich, Zeits. für rom. Phil., xxvii (1903), pp. 173 ff.

6 Palatino 949. See below, section ii.

7 Brunet, Manuel, iii, p. 1658.

1 Ed. Ad. Bordlla y San Martin in Libros de Caballerias, I a parte, (Nueva Biblioteca de Autores Españoles, vi) Madrid, 1907.

1 Pp. lxvii ff.

2 P. lxx.

3 Palatino 949 reads gramadega; the Storia (c. 55 r) says it was translated from the Hebrew (cf. c. 1 r ff.)

1 Pp. 141, 150.

2 Frauenfeld, 1838, p. 86.

1 See G. Castelli, La Vita e le Opere di Cecco d'Ascoli, Bologna, 1892, pp. 151-155; Giorn. Stor. xv (1890), p. 254; Lozzi, La Bibliofilia (Olschki), iv (1902-03), p. 292.

2 Published with the rest of Appiani's Vita by Domenico Bernino, Istoria di tutte le eresie, Venice, 1745, p. 459.

3 Giammaria Mazzucchelli, Gli Scrittori italiani, Brescia, 1753, i. pte. 2, pp. 1156; Biblioteca Picena, Osimo, 1790-1796, v, p. 231; Cantalamessa Carboni in Memorie intorno i Letterati e gli Artisti della città di Ascoli, Ascoli, 1830, p. 62, refers to the manuscript under the obviously erroneous number 4049; see also Bariola, Rivista europea, xv, p. 615, note 2. For further references see Castelli, Vita di Cecco d'Ascoli, p. 156. Castelli unfortunately gives the impression here that all the sources to which he refers cite the manuscript as 4049 instead of 9049, which he suggests should be read.

1 See Castelli, pp. 47, 151:—“ queste profezie, che si sarebbero dovute trovare, secondo i biografi, enteo il codice vaticano 9049, si ricercano invano da anni.”

2 On various errors of Appiani see Bibl. Picena, v, pp. 231 ff.

3 Giorn. stor., xxi (1890), p. 391.

4 Poesie italiane inedite di dugento Autori, Prato, 1846, ii, pp. 133 ff.

5 See Trucchi, l. c., Mazaatinti, Propugnatore, xv, ii (1882), p. 40; Renier, Lirici edite ed inedite di Fazio degli Uberti, Florence, 1883, p. cccv; Pulignani, Giorn. stor. i (1883), pp. 215 ff.; also in Miscellanea francescana, ed. Faloci-Pulignani, Foligno, 1901, p. 84.

1 The edition of Tommasuccio's works promised by Mazzatinti, and of the Acerba by Bariolo, so far as I can learn, have never appeared.

2 Cecco lectured on astrology at the University of Bologna. The devout close of the poem, is, needless to say, conventional.

3 Cf. Mazzatinti and Pulignani as above.

4 Vasari (ii, p. 251) says that Orcagna put Cecco among the damned in his Last Judgment in Santa Croce in Florence, now destroyed. Cf. Palermo, I manoscritti Palatini di Firenze. Florence, 1860, ii, pp. 235 ff.

1 The following text is transcribed accurately from the manuscript; a few periods have been introduced, and words separated for the sake of clearness. The scribe's errors, which are very obvious, are not corrected.

1 Trucchi reads, tenor.