Ɵ Commentary on Cato, Distichs I:19-20, in Latin, manuscript on paper [Italy, 15th century]

Ɵ Commentary on Cato, Distichs I:19-20, in Latin, manuscript on paper[Italy, second half of the fifteenth century] Single leaf, with single column of 61-63 lines in an Italian semitextualis libraria strongly influenced by cursive and secretarial letterforms, 3 lines of text from Cato's Distichs ("Exiguum munus cum dat tibi pauper amicus accipito placate, pleneque laudare memento") in larger more angular and formal script, manicula marks pointing out significant readings, traces of running titles at head of leaf in thin penwork (these partly trimmed), paragraph marks in red or blue, single red initial touched in purple penwork, chainlines but no watermark, good condition, 380 by 250mm; in cloth-covered binding Provenance: 1. Philip Bliss (1787-1857; on whom see lot 56 above); this leaf from an album of leaves and fragments assembled by him from Oxford bindings and elsewhere, the album sold at Sotheby's, 21 August 1858, lot 100/119.2. Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872), the single greatest manuscript collector to have ever lived; this his MS 15,659, passing after his death to his heirs and ultimately the Robinson brothers; the album sold by them at Sotheby's, 24 April 1911, lot 390/391.3. E.H. Dring (1863-1928), of Quaritch, passing in turn to his son E.M. Dring (1906-1990); sold after his death to Quaritch, and then this leaf their cat. 1147, Bookhands of the Middle Ages V, 1991, no. 118; 4. Schøyen Collection, London and Oslo, their MS 1379, acquired from Quaritch in June 1991. Text: As the Renaissance began to re-examine the works of pagan Rome, Christian theologians stumbled onto the thorny problem of the finding of apparent wisdom in accord with their own values in pre-Christian texts. They moved to solve this by producing guides or commentaries to these texts to offer the medieval reader a Christian context for these pagan works. The present text is a commentary on a lengthy collection of two-line proverbs, composed by its otherwise unknown author in the third or fourth century AD., identified by J.C. Scalinger (1484-1558) as Dionysius Cato from a now lost manuscript (and to be clearly distinguished from Cato the Elder, d. 149 BC.). Its text mainly advocates common morality and the individual's responsibility to educate themselves, and was of great popularity during the Middle Ages. The two most popular commentaries in the fifteenth century were those of Philip of Bergamo and Robert of Euremodio, both authors of the last decades of the fourteenth century, and condemned by Erasmus in his edition of Cato's work in 1514.