Papal bull issued by Pope Martin V to the Benedictine Abbey of St. Bertin at St. Omer, granting permission for the monks...
Catholic Church. Pope (1417-1431 : Martin V)
Martinus ... : Papal bull issued by Pope Martin V to the Benedictine Abbey of St. Bertin at St. Omer, granting permission for the monks to elect their own confessors.
Rome, January 3rd, 1421.
1 vellum sheet with seal, matted : 49 x 31 cm.
Acquired through the Kenyon Law Starling Fund.
Founded in the 7th century, the French Benedictine Abbey of St. Bertin was rebuilt in the 14th century, becoming one of the finest Gothic buildings in Europe. In the late Middle Ages it was esteemed as a center for learning, known especially for its manuscript production. Single sheet (vellum), with brown ink; sixteen lines, opening word “Martinus” capitalized with large decorated initial; lead seal impressed “Martinus” attached. Martin V (Odonne Colonna, 1368-1431) descended from an important Roman family, a family which had seen more than twenty of its members become cardinals of the church.
Notebook on rhetoric and poetics : manuscript codex, ca.1610.
1 v. (105 p.)
Acquired through the Antoinette and Warren R. Howell Fund.
Written in Latin, perhaps in Italy, and divided into sections with blank leaves between sections, and blank leaves at beginning and end. Covers the arts of rhetoric and poetics and also includes instruction on the composition of speeches and letters, especially consolatory letters for various calamitous events. The longest section is a treatise on oratory, divided into 19 chapters.
Bound in limp vellum with arms stamped on upper and lower covers (Virili family?), and M M stamped on either side on upper cover.
A notebook covering the art of rhetoric and poetics, including the composition of speeches and letters (especially consolatory letters sent after various calamitous events). The longest section is the treatise on oratory, divided into nineteen chapters. Fifty leaves, with eight blank leaves at the end, bound in contemporary limp gilt panelled vellum and with a gilt armorial device on cover. The device may be that of the Virili family and this manuscript may have belonged to Cardinal Luca Antonio Virili (1569-1634, cardinal from 1629).
Bulla de indulgencia plenaria concedida para las animas de los fieles difuntos, per la santidad de Paulo Quinto . . .
Catholic Church. Pope (1623-1644: Urban VIII)
[Madrid, 1633].
Acquired through the Kenyon Law Starling Starling Fund.
Single sheet ; folio
A plenary indulgence (in Catholic doctrine, an indulgence which remits the entire temporal punishment resulting from a sin so that no further expiation is required in Purgatory) issued by Pope Urban (Maffeo Barberini, 1568-1644) in 1633. The recipient’s name is inked in; the indulgence is signed and authorized by Antonio de Sotomayor (d. 1648), Royal Confessor and Archbishop of Damascus. Single sheet, with papal woodcuts and the woodcut seal of Sotomayor. Pope Urban VIII was the last pope to practice nepotism on a grand scale, and many of his relatives benefited from his generosity. He canonized Elizabeth of Portugal and Andrew Corsini and issued the papal bull of canonization for both Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier, both of whom had been canonized by Urban’s predecessor, Gregory XV. Urban VIII patronized art and learning on a large scale, bringing the polymath Athanasius Kircher to Rome, along with such painters as Nicolas Poussin and Claude Lorrain. Despite a friendship with Galileo and encouragement for his teachings, Urban summoned Galileo to Rome in 1632 to answer questions concerning the doctrines expounded in Galileo’s Dialogo, which had been published that same year in Florence, and which would result in a sentence of imprisonment for the rest of Galileo’s life.
[Legenda Aurea]
[Legenda Aurea]
Jacob of Voragine.
Lyon: De Gaselle, scribe, September 1, 1468.
Acquired through the Allan Morgan Standish, the Ross H. Chamberlain, and the Stanford University Bookstore Funds.
Jacob of Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa and medieval hagiographer, was born at Viraggio (now Varazze), near Genoa, about 1230;
he died on 13 July, about 1298. In 1244 he entered the Order of St. Dominic, and soon became famous for his piety, learning,
and zeal in the care of souls. His fame as a preacher spread throughout Italy, and he was called upon to preach from the most
celebrated pulpits of Lombardy. After teaching Holy Scripture and theology in various houses of his order in Northern Italy,
he was elected provincial of Lombardy in 1267, holding this office until 1286, when he become Definitor of the Lombard province of Dominicans.
Jacob of Voragine is best known as the author of a collection of legendary lives of the saints, which was entitled "Legenda Sanctorum"
by its author, but soon became known as Legenda Aurea (Golden Legend). The body of the work, which contains 177 chapters
(according to others, 182), is divided into five sections: from Advent to Christmas, from Christmas to Septuagesima, from Septuagesima
to Easter, from Easter to Octave of Pentecost, and from the Octave of Pentecost to Advent. The chief object of Jacob of Voragine and
of other medieval hagiologists was not to compose historically accurate biographies but to write books of devotion. The work enjoyed an
immense popularity and its influence is seen in the prose and poetic literature of many nations. It became the basis of many passionaries
of the Middle Ages and religious poems of later times. Longfellow's "Golden Legend," which, with two other poems, forms the trilogy entitled
Christus, owes its name and many of its ideas to the Golden Legend of de Voragine.
First printed in Basel in 1470, two years after this manuscript, the Golden Legend was a medieval best seller, so that by 1500 at least
seventy-four Latin editions had been published as well as three translations into English, five into French, eight into Italian, fourteen into
Low German, and three into Bohemian. More than a thousand manuscript copies of the work survive. It was one of the first books William Caxton
printed in the English language, Caxton’s version appearing in 1483. Written in simple, readable Latin, the book was read in its day for its stories;
it is the closest thing we have to an encyclopedia of the lore of the saints in the late Middle Ages and as such it is invaluable to art historians
and mediaevalists who seek to identify saints depicted in art by their deeds and attributes.
Vellum document with the great seal of King James I : deed, 8 May 1615.
England and Wales. Sovereign (1603-1625 : James I)
Latin deed consisting of 52 lines in chancery hand, regranting the lands of the late William Rogers in England and Wales to his son of the same name. The great seal of James I in high relief (150 mm. in diameter) is the second state of the seal designed by Charles Anthony in 1603.
Acquired through the Kenyon Law Starling Fund.
In this document James I (1566-1625) re-grants lands in England and Wales of William Rogers, deceased, to Rogers' gentleman son and heir, also named William Rogers. The seal, still present, is large, intricate, and very well preserved. It was designed by the Royal Minter Charles Anthony in 1603, was used a few times by James' son Charles I (1600-1649), and was the seal held by Francis Bacon as Keeper of the Great Seal from 1617-1622. This land grant, dated 1615, is on vellum, fifty-two lines in a large chancery hand.
Brancaccio family account book; being a ledger of rents and taxes collected : manuscript codex, January 1624 to April 1637.
Brancaccio family.
[Rome?]
1 volume (126 leaves) ; 4to
Acquired through the Kenyon Law Starling Fund.
This account book, identified on the upper cover as a "Review of things" and as the property of Leonardo, Maria, and one other member of the family, contains detailed descriptions of monies and goods collected, possibly on behalf of the church. The ledger gives detailed descriptions of rents collected for houses and lands, some paid with money, others paid with grain and goods, plus taxes collected, also paid in money and goods. Several notable names appear throughout the ledger, including that of Medici, Piti, and Borgia.
The Brancaccio family line was established in the 13th century. Seven family members were appointed as Cardinals of the Catholic Church. Members of the family founded the Brancacciana Library in Naples. At the time this ledger was kept the Brancaccio family included Francesco Maria (1592-1675), a young priest promoted to Bishop in 1627 and Cardinal in 1634. He is best remembered for having authored a treatise arguing that the consumption of chocolate in liquid form does not interrupt fasting.
Informatio pro instructoribus F.F. novitiorum Ordinis Minorum Recollectorum : manuscript codex, 1715.
[Belgium?]
1 v. (241 leaves)
Ms. codex.
Calligraphic title with hand-drawn ornamental border in colors; praemonitio on leaf 1 in water color border.
A manual for teachers of the noviates to the Recollect branch of the Franciscan Order, perhaps written in Belgium. The work contains the statutes and regulations of the Order; a treatise on the use of the breviary; texts to be used; festivals; offices of the Order; questions to be asked of prospective novices; discussion of the sacraments, etc. An appendix (leaves 146-153) discusses saints' days and how to calculate them, using tables and a lunar calendar from 1700-1800.
Acquired through the Kenyon Law Starling Fund.
Latin American Women Writers
Latin American Women Writers currently includes nearly 50,000 pages of poetry, prose and drama written by women in all of Latin America, mainly in the original Spanish and Portuguese (with a small amount of original French and English writings), and spanning a period from the colonial era to the present day. This collection includes large number of in-copyright materials, as well as previously unpublished works from writers' archives, and ephemera like pamphlets, flyers and performance programs. The collection will be of value to students and scholars of Spanish and Portuguese at all levels. Sample titles include Influencia de las Ideas Modernas by the early twentieth-century anarchist Puerto Rican writer Luisa Capetillo, and A Mulher na Construção do Mundo Futuro, a forward-thinking feminist treatise by the later twentieth-century Brazilian activist Rose Marie Muraro.
Twentieth Century Advice Literature: North American Guides on Race, Gender, Sex, and the Family
Twentieth Century Advice Literature: North American Guides on Race, Gender, Sex, and the Family offers a fascinating look into the values of twentieth-century Americans, "bringing together the instructional, prescriptive, behavioral, and etiquette literature that defined standards of personal conduct for millions of Americans and reflected the prevailing social mores across the twentieth century," as the editors describe it. Sample titles include How to Write Interesting Letters to Your Men in the Service and the wonderfully illustrated Guide to Wartime Cooking, both from 1943, illustrating an almost forgotten life on the WWII home front. How to Fascinate Men (1953) and Woman and Girl: A Manual of Personal Hygiene (1959) offer a more intimate look at what was called, in perhaps a less fair age, "the fairer sex."
Abrahami Ortelii Antverpiani Thesaurus geographicus, recognitus et actus ...
Ortelius, Abraham, 1527-1598.
Title: Abrahami Ortelii Antverpiani Thesaurus geographicus, recognitus et actus ... obiter multi in hoc opere auctorum veterum loci corrupti, falsi, dubij, & discrepantes, emendantur, arguuntur, enodantur & conciliantur.
Other title: Synonymia geographica
Antverpiae : Ex Officina Plantiniana, 1596.
[363] leaves : ill. ; 36 cm.
This work is a revised and enlarged edition of Ortelius' Synonymia geographica, published in Antwerp, 1578.
Acquired through the Antoinette and Warren R. Howell Fund.
The revised and definitive edition of this valuable text which first appeared in 1578 with the title “Synonymia Geographica.” The work is an alphabetical dictionary of ancient place-names, taken from literary and historical sources as well as contemporary authorities. Included are numerous references to America under the entries for “Atlantis insula,” “India,” “Oceanus Atlanticus,” “Ophir,” and “Pila Terrae.”