Add MS 24914

This 12th-century theological miscellany was owned and may also have been produced by the Benedictine abbey of Sint-Truiden (St Trond), also known as St Trudo’s Abbey. The larger part of the manuscript is composed of biblical commentaries by Bede the Venerable (d. 673, d. 735), St Jerome (b. 347, d. 420), and Haimo of Auxerre (d. c. 865), a monk from the Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Germain d'Auxerre. It also includes saints’ lives by Hildebert of Lavardin (b. c. 1055, d. 1133), bishop of Le Mans and archbishop of Tours, and Marbod (b. c. 1035, d. 1123), archdeacon at Angers and Bishop of Rennes. The manuscript also includes two unique Latin poems: one is a metrical life about Frederick I (b. 815/816, d. 834/838), bishop of Utrecht, by an anonymous author; the other is a poem about Theodoricus (b. c. 1060, d. 1107), abbot of Saint-Trond, written by Rudolf, (b. c. 1070, d. 1138), who was a chronicler of and also an abbot of Saint-Trond.

Contents:

ff. 3r-58v: Bede, Super Parabolas Salomonis Allegorica Expositio (Allegorical Exposition on the Book of Wisdom).

f. 59r: Bede, De Dei Judicie (On God's Judgement), beginning ‘Versus Domini Bede Presbiteri a penis’.

f. 59r: Rudolphus of Sint-Truiden (for this attribution see ‘The Narrative Sources from the Medieval Low Countries’ [accessed 6 June 2018]), Untitled poem on baptism and the Eucharist, beginning ‘Hac triplici causa plebs insignita lavacro’.

ff. 59v-94v: St Jerome, In Ecclesiasten (On Ecclesiastes).

ff. 94v-108r: Anonymous, Commentarius in Cantica Canticorum (Commentary on the Song of Songs), in 12 homilies.

f. 108r: Anonymous and unidentified poem with the title ‘De Fide quae nos Deo commendet’ (On the Faith that we commit to God’), added in a 16th- or 17th-century hand, beginning: ‘Hoc est officium fidei meritumque probatum’.

ff. 108v-112r: Hildebert of Lavardin, Vita Beate Marie Egyptiace (Life of St Mary of Egypt).

ff. 112r-113v: Marbod of Rennes, Vita Sancti Laurentii (Life of St Lawrence).

f. 113v: Marbod of Rennes, De Adnuntiatione Beatae Mariae (On the Annunciation to the Blessed Mary).

ff. 113v-114r: Anonymous, Vita Metrica Sancti Friderici Episcopi Leodiensis (Metrical Life of St Frederick, Bishop of Liège).

f. 114r: Frederick I of Schwarzenburg (b. c. 1075, d. 1131), Archbishop of Cologne, Epistola ad Clerum Leodiensem (Letter to the Clergy of Liège).

f. 114v: Rudolf of Saint-Trond (Radulphus Trudonensis), Carmen de Theoderico Trudonensi Abbate (Poem on Theodoricus, Abbot of Saint-Trond).

ff. 115r-135r: Haimo of Auxerre (Pseudo-Cassiodorus), Expositio super Cantica Canticorum (Exposition on the Song of Songs).

The manuscript contains a later addition:

f. 136r: a note in French by Joseph Kervyn de Lettenhove (b. 1817, d. 1891), historian and politician.

[ff. 1v, 2v, and 136v are blank].

Decoration:

5 large interlace initials with foliate decoration, some with zoomorphic heads, outlined in red ink against a ground of green, blue, and/or purple (ff. 3r, 20r, 43v, 59v (2x)). 2 large interlace initials with foliate decoration outlined in brown ink against a ground of brown, red and yellow (ff. 94v, 135v). Medium initials in red, sometimes with yellow highlights, foliate decoration or linear forms of decoration (f. 115r). Small initials in red and one-line capitals highlighted in red throughout the manuscript. Rubrics in red. Line-fillers and underlining in red. Quotation marks in brown ink. A drawing of a dragon and a man lying down (Adam?) has been added in brown ink on f. 135v.