Add MS 42113

With Add. MSS. 42139- 42140, 42181 L, M, Z, 43730-43733, 43857, and 44950-44966, and Add. Ch. 67560-67570, form a collection presented or bequeathed, 1930-1937, by Bernard Page Scattergood, Esq., F.S.A.

42113. SCATTERGOOD COLLECTIONS. Vol. I. Astronomical tables of lunar cycles, solar and lunar eclipses, etc., with canons, late 14th cent. Latin. For the most part derived from the Hebrew of the 14th cent. Spanish astronomer, Jacob ben David ben Yomtob Poël, called Sen Bonet Bongoron, of Perpignan (cf. Hist. litt. de la France, xxxi, 1893, p. 701; G. Sarton, Introduction to the Hist. of Science, iii. 2, 1948, p. 1516). Other Latin versions are in Oxford, Bodleian MS. Canonici Misc. 27, and, of the canons alone, in Cambridge, Trinity College MS. 0. 3. 13, art. 4 (formerly belonged to Thomas Gale) and Paris, Bibl. Nat. MS. Lat. 7287, f. 158 (see M. Steinschneider, Die Hebraeischen Uebersetzungen des Mittelalters, 1893, pp. 614-16). The final table (art. 8 below), however, which with art. 7 is not found in the Bodleian MS., is ascribed to the 14th cent. French mathematician and astronomer, Immanuel ben Jacob, called Bonfils, of Tarascon. The contents of the MS., which is briefly noticed by E. Narducci, Catalogo di manoscritti ... posseduti da D. B. Boncompagni, 1892, no. 204, are as follows:-

(1) Canons, beg. 'Incipiunt canones super tabulas inferius ordinatas editas ab onesto uiro judeo subtilissimo mathematico. Dixit iacob filius dauid bondiei [i.e. Jacob ben David ben Yomtob] eo quod scientia mathematicalis'; ends 'et salui erimus'. ff. 1-20b.

(2) Tables (31), without further title, of conjunctions and oppositions of the moon for a cycle of thirty-one years, based on the year 1361 (cf. 11b). ff. 21-36.

(3) 'Tabula equationis solis et argumentum latitudinis in aliis circulationibus a prima.' ff. 36b-37b.

(4) 'Tabula diuersitatis in longitudine.' ff. 38-39b.

(5) 'Tabula eclypsis solis in media distantia.' ff. 40-43b.

(6) 'Tabula eclypsis lune in media distantia.' f. 44.

(7) Table, without title, of the latitudes, longitudes, etc., of about 40 towns in Spain and elsewhere in the Mediterranean. ff. 44b-45.

(8) Table, with colophon 'Explicit tabulam (sic) qua[m] edidit magister bonfilius de tarascone [i.e. Immanuel ben Jacob] ad sciendum quantitatem cuiuslibet meridiei in horis et minutis et hoc in quocunque gradu zodiaci sol fuerit'. ff. 45b-46. Vellum; ff. iv + 47. 6.5/8 in. x 4½ in. Late XIV cent. Written probably in Spain. Gatherings of 10 leaves (iii⁸, iv⁸), the first with catchword. Sec. fol. 'inuestigare reuolutionem'. Blue and red initials, etc., and rubrics. Contemporary limp vellum cover. Belonged, 19th cent., to Prince Baldassare Boncompagni (MS. 204, see printed 'ex libris' (f. ii) and Narducci, loc. cit.; formerly MS. 38, see the number in red on the spine of the cover (f. i) and Steinschneider, loc. cit.). No. 2.10 (f. iii) and 176 (f. iv) in unidentified (19th cent.?) catalogues or libraries. A letter of Mrs A[nnie] S[cott] D[ill] Maunder, editor of the Journal of the British Astronomical Association to B. P. Scattergood, with copies of two letters to the former from J[ohn] L[ouis] E[mil] Dreyer, the astronomer, relating to the MS., 1923, are now Add. MS. 42181 Z.