Category: Information access

I’ve started to read the English translation of Montfaucon, and some of his remarks seem curiously relevant even now.

What a singular favour, and token of your extraordinary generosity was it, that you should cause that catalogue of manuscripts [of the Laurentian library] composed by men excellently learned with great care and industry, whereof there was but one copy, to be delivered into my hands, and permitted to be carried into France! — p.iv, dedication to Grand Duke Cosimo III of Tuscany.

For you allow all natives and strangers that have attained the reputation of learning, and employ their labour and industry in the advancement of literature and service of men addicted to it, an easy access to that mighty collection, thinking it unreasonable that so many and such valuable volumes, brought together by your own and your ancestors’ care, at so vast an expense, should lie in obscurity eaten up with dust and kept from public use.  I could heartily wish that all those who have libraries of manuscripts were of the same mind; some of whom, led away by an incredible mistake, imagine that famous books become the more valuable by lying concealed and lose of their price by being exposed for public use; whereas, on the contrary, if they lie hid, they are of no use to themselves, their owners and the learned world; and if made public, they gain themselves and their owners renown, and are an improvement and a help to literature. — p.v.

Lynne Brindley and the directors of the British Library — this means YOU.

…in some places I cut short, and applied myself the less, lest I should be obstructed in my design by longer delays, forasmuch as those in whose power the libraries were had no inclination to see me upon that work.  — p.ii, discussing the detail of his lists of mss.

I had at first designed to visit not only the Roman, Milanese, Venetian and Florentine libraries, but also those of Calabria and Sicily.  For I have been informed… by the accounts of many creditable persons that there is a considerable number of Greek manuscripts in those parts.  For the Greek tongue having been not long since used in those countries; now that has worn out, there are still many Greek manuscripts neglected and unregarded in the libraries of churches and monasteries.  But unexpected business and occasions calling me away, I laid aside that design, and yet it were worthwhile to go make a search in those parts, for as I have been certainly informed, in the remoter parts of Calabria and places far from the Great Road, there are many manuscripts perishing, eaten up with worms and destroyed in filthy uses.  And during my stay in Venice… I was preparing to pass over to the coasts of Dalmatia and the Morea.  For not far from Ragula is a Grecian monastery full of Greek manuscripts, and in several parts of the Morea there are still manuscripts, which may be bought for a small matter from the Greeks now living in misery and ignorance. — preface, v.

Would that we could go and find those manuscripts now.

The next day, we went to the Ambrosian libray and embraced the renowed Antony Muratorius, one of the two chief library keepers, with whom I had been familiarly acquainted and conversant by letter.  He always made it his principal care to forward our designs… — ch.2, p.16.

Imagine meeting Muratori himself.  Then follows a list of authors and works, including

Emanuel Paleologus, the emperor, his disputes concerning the faith with a learned Persian. …

There were enough among the Greeks that applied themselves to the vain and dangerous study of judiciary astrology.  There are three authors of that sort in one volume, under false names, in all likelihood because perhaps it was not lawful openly to profess that art….

There is a much greate number of authors in a book of the art of making Gold, number 193.  modern and silk.  Stephanus Oecumenius de Physica consideratione.  An epistle to Theodorus; the abridgement of the holy art; instructions to the emperor Heraclius;…

The alchemical manuscripts that contain Stephanos of Alexandria are all collections of bits by various authors,  but this is clearly the lectures of Stephanos.

Some years ago I photographed some early editions of Tertullian in Norwich Cathedral Library.  The library was a shed on the roof of the cloister; in fact a ruinous medieval room, which had been reroofed.  In it stood a perfect 18th century library, shelves and books, and leaded-glass windows.

It was the sort of place where you would see books which you only ever see in footnotes.  Great folios of 16th and 17th century writers, little octavos of long forgotten divines, and so forth.

Among the books there was the “Diarum Italicum” (1702) of Bernard de Montfaucon, one of the Maurist fathers.  He made a trip into Italy, listing books and antiquities of all kinds, and providing a mass of research material for all of us.  The book was translated twice into English, and the library had a copy of that also.

It’s all rather different today.  The library room has been turned into a ‘rare books’ room, and so made inaccessible to us, while a new room has been built in front of it to hold a modern theological library.  Doubtless the latter is more comfortable, but I mourn the old days, the charm of the old room and its shelves of old books.  I never did get to read Montfaucon’s book — I was always busy with something else, and Norwich isn’t as easy to get to as it might be.

But I had occasion to remember the book, and idly looked for it on Google Books.  And… THERE IT WAS!  I downloaded it instantly.  Then I recalled the English translation.  And… THAT WAS THERE TOO!

Let us reflect that we are among the most fortunate of men, and offer our thanks to God for Google Books.

I was musing last night about Stephen of Alexandria, the philosopher and alchemist at the court of Heraclius.  He was known to contemporaries as the “Universal Philosopher”.  But you will read through the Patrologies in vain to hear about him.  Indeed in what handbook of late antique literature would we find him?

We’re accustomed to the idea that all late Greek literature is ecclesiastical and therefore in the Patrologia Graeca.  But this is untrue.  Technical and scientific and medical works, in particular, are omitted.  There are whole rafts of works, therefore, which certainly never cross my mind and probably don’t feature in the minds of anyone else.  Nor is it a simple matter to translate works of that kind.  Unless you know alchemy, or medicine, how can you make a translation?

Yet how unrealistic this is!  Doesn’t this silence, this omission, give us a quite misleading idea of Greek literature in the period?  What can be done to recover these things from the specialist collections in which they lie, immured and forgotten?

In the 1930’s Sherwood Taylor, the editor of the journal Ambix, translated into English and printed 3 of the 9 lectures of the work of Stephen of Alexandria on alchemy in that journal.  I scanned these, then realised they were in copyright and had to remove them.  But I did compose a Wikipedia article from what I learned, as a sort of bucket in which to dump this info.  Likewise there was a translation of another alchemical work by Zosimos.

Something about the last article made me suspect that he had perhaps translated more.  A visit to the Oxford Museum of Science in Broad Street allowed me to search through his papers, including multiple hand-written and type-written drafts of the first 3 lectures.  There I found a translation of the 4th lecture, unseen by anyone since Taylor’s death, not even by the archivist and tucked inside a packet bound with a pink ribbon.  It was hand-written, unrevised; and, to me, unreadable.  But I got a photocopy which I have at home.  Perhaps one day I’ll have another go at decyphering his handwriting!

An interesting article in the NY Times on the problems caused by very high textbook prices, and a revolt against traditional academic publishing:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/15/technology/15link.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

I suspect the very low quality of many textbooks — compared to commercial products operating in a free market — is also a factor.