Medieval Manuscripts in Cambridge Libraries: Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.3.9

Codex Galeanus

Diktyon no.: Diktyon 11980

Introduction: This manuscript, probably produced in the 12th century, is the oldest surviving copy of the Lexicon of Photios I, Patriarch of Constantinople (c. 820-c. 891), sometimes called the Codex Galeanus. One of the most important figures in Byzantine intellectual and religious history, Photios engaged in serious power-struggles with both the emperor and the papacy, the repercussions of which included a brief schism between the Eastern and Western Churches in the 860s. He played a prominent role in the early stages of the literary revival in 9th and 10th-century Byzantium known as the Macedonian Renaissance, and his erudition in both Christian and pagan literature is reflected in his best-known work, the Bibliotheca, a list of the works he had read, including a considerable number of texts that have since been lost. This wide range of sources available to the Patriarch and his assistants is reflected in the compilation of this lexicon, which synthesises all of the various lexica mentioned in the Bibliotheca. This manuscript was copied by several different scribes, who appear to have shared the work as part of a single project. The transitions between the different individuals' work often occur naturally at the break between quires, but on occasion one takes over from another in the middle of a page, or in the transition from recto to verso of the same folio. An early owner of the manuscript was one Niketas Lychnos, mentioned in two notes on f. 1r. The first of these, referring to the manuscript as his "gift to Christ", presumably records his donation of it to a religious institution. The other is now substantially illegible, but as previously transcribed it records the death of Lychnos, dating this to 1198/9, and identifies him as a holder of the Byzantine court titles of proedros and protonotarios. While the manuscript may have formed part of the collection of Cardinal Niccolò Ridolfi in the 16th century, its securely documented modern history begins with its acquisition in Florence in 1598 by the Cambridge theologian Richard Thomson. During the 17th century it passed through the hands of a series of important collectors before being left to Trinity as part of the Gale collection. It was studied by leading scholars including Joseph Scaliger, Isaac Casaubon, Richard Bentley, Johann Reiske and Richard Porson. Most of the early part of the manuscript is lost: while two folios survive from the first quire, including the first folio of the text, the rest of the first thirteen quires is missing. Nineteen more survive in whole or in part, along with a single folio appended at the end of the manuscript. These losses greatly affected the past study of the text, since until the discovery of a complete copy in the Monastery of Zavorda in Macedonia in the late 19th century, this was the only known copy of the lexicon, forming the basis for editions and numerous modern manuscript copies. On the basis of apparent interpolations in the text by copyists, it has also been identified as the exemplar, through intermediate copies, of the other two known manuscripts of the Byzantine period, the Zavorda manuscript and a copy formerly in Berlin, lost since the Second World War. Dr Christopher Wright

Language(s): Greek

Photios I, Patriarch of Constantinople (c. 820-c. 891), Lexicon

Defective at the beginning, with some lacunae due to the loss of folios after ff. 1, 2, 8, 41 and 148.

Filiation: The second and third oldest copies of this text, in Zavorda, Monstery of St Nicholas, MS 95 and the now lost Berlin, Deutsche Staatsbibliothek, MS gr. oct. 22, were derived from this manuscript, probably through intermediate copies. Through the former, it was also the source for this text in Athens, National Library of Greece, MS 1083. It was the basis for the 17th and 18th-century apographs Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Auct. F.3.19, Leipzig, Universitätsbibliothek, MS gr. 28, Trinity College MS B.13.21, and probably London, British Library, MS Burney 115. Via the Bodleian manuscript, it was the basis for an extensive tradition of further copies, and via a lost copy, made by Porson, for London, British Library, MS Burney 512. Through Trinity MS B.13.21, also made by Porson, it was the basis for Dobree's edition, and was the main authority for the Theodoridis edition for those portions of the text which survive here.

Rubric: f. 1r Φωτίου τοῦ ἁγιωτάτου πατριαρχοῦ Κωνσταντινουπόλεως λεξέων συναγωγὴ. ἢ μᾶλλον τῶν ἄλλων· ῥήτορσι καὶ λογογράφοις. ἀνήκουσιν χρείαν· προσπεφώνηται δὲ Θωμᾶ πρωτοσπαθαρίω καὶ ἄρχοντι τοῦ Λυκοταμίου. οἰκείωι μαθητῆι

Incipit: || f. 1r Πρόλογος τοῦ λεξικοῦ δι'ὧν ῥητόρων τε πόνοι· καὶ συγγραφέων· ἐξωραΐζονται μάλιστα. Αἱ τῶν λέξεων πλείους· περὶ ἃς τὸ ποιητικὸν νέμεται ἔθνος

Explicit: f. 149v Ἡράκλεις καὶ μᾶλλον ἐν τῆι χρήσει

TLG 4040.029-4040.030, 4040.32-4040.33

Physical Description

Form: codex

Support: Parchment (FHHF), of medium thickness and good quality.

Extent: Codex: iii + 8 + 149 + 4 + iii leaves. 285 × 225 mm. f. 103 is slightly wider than the rest of the folios, probably having been cropped less closely in order to preserve the marginal note on f. 103v.

Foliation: The manuscript is foliated with the numbers [i-iii] + [iv-xi] + 1-149 + 150-153 + 154, [xii-xiii], in Arabic numerals, in pencil, recto, upper right.

Foliation: ff. 1r-149v are also paginated with the numbers 1-298, in Arabic numerals, in brown ink, recto, upper right.

Foliation: ff. 33r-44v have been foliated with the numbers 1-12 in Arabic numerals, in black ink, recto, upper centre.

Collation

The manuscript consists of 21 quires, of which one is a single folio and the rest are quaternia. Apart from the survival of a single bifolium from the first quire, the first 13 original quires have been lost.

Quire 1^8-6 ff. 1-2 All but the first and last folios have been lost, with loss of text.
Quire 2^8-2 ff. 3-8 The first and last folios have been lost, with loss of text.
Quires 3-6⁸ ff. 9-40
Quire 7^8-4 ff. 41-44 The third to sixth folios have been lost, with loss of text.
Quires 8-19⁸ ff. 45-140
Quire 20⁸ ff. 142-148 This quire has been reassembled out of order, but foliated for its original order, while the earlier pagination, originally following the present order, was amended to reflect the original sequence. The present sequence runs ff. 142-143, 146-147, 141, 144-145, 148
Quire 21¹ f. 149

There are early quire signatures in Greek numerals, in brown ink, on the first folio of each quire, recto, lower left. Most have been lost to cropping. They survive on Quires 5, 15, 17 and 19 (ιζʹ, κζʹ, κθʹ, λαʹ). Traces survive also on Quires 4, 8-9 and 13. Quire signatures in Greek numerals, in pencil, have been added where the early signatures have been lost. These are present on Quires 2-4, 6-14, 16, 18 and 20 (ιδʹ-ιϛʹ, ιηʹ-κϛʹ, κηʹ, λʹ, λβʹ). The modern signature for Quire 20 appears on its original first folio, f. 141r.

Condition

There is are substantial tears to the edges of ff. [iii] and 153 and occasional smaller tears elsewhere (e.g. ff. 72, 148). Damage in the gutter at the foot of ff. 1-2 have been repaired with parchment patches. There are a few worm-holes in ff. [iv-v] and 1-2 and some other small holes (e.g. f. 3). There is some cockling and creasing. Some folios have been signifcantly affected by ink-gall corrosion producing brown stains (e.g. ff. 22v-23r), which seriously affects the legibility of f. 1r. There is staining due to mould on ff. 4r-8v. Drops of black ink or paint have stained the edges of many folios, particularly the fore-edge of ff. 6v-29r. There is mild water staining and some drops of wax.

Layout

Two columns of 35-39 lines. 232-242 × 162 mm. Pricking sometimes survives in the lower margin, but has mostly been lost to cropping. Ruled in hardpoint, system Leroy 1, type Leroy 11C2b or 12C2. Text sometimes hangs from the lines and is sometimes guided by them. The outer ruling lines in the outer and lower margins are distant from the written area and have mostly been lost to cropping. Since the upper margin has been cropped more closely, it is possible that an outer line previously existed here as well, hence the uncertainty as to the ruling type. Vertical lines on ff. 71r-75r have been ruled over with brown crayon.

Hand(s)

The designation of hands here concurs with that of James, retaining Dobree's designations but identifying Hands A and B as a single hand (therefore no Hand B appears in this sequence). Tsantsanoglou identifies Hand C with Hand H, and Hand E with Hand G, but this does not appear to be justified.

ff. 1r-24v were copied by Hand A in mixed minuscule script, slanting slightly to the right, in brown ink, with modest variation in letter size.

Syllabic abbreviations appear throughout the line, while superscript word endings are not used. Breathings are angular and mute iota is absent or adscript. Use of the double dot is functional only, and there is accentuation of all lengths of nomina sacra . The double grave accent is in use.

Punctuation used includes the middle and upper points and full stop.