Codicology

Notes

The only way that we know that a graphic artist– or studio– in the fifth century drew a large-scale chart of biblical history and genealogy is from later copying of that work onto parchment manuscripts during the medieval period. Of the 25 such copies surviving, all bound with other works into codices, the following seven offer the best evidence of the original:

• The Plutei Stemma
• The Roda Stemma
• The San Juan Stemma
• The Facundus Stemma
• The Millán Stemma
• The Ripoll Stemma
• The Foigny Stemma

Digital surrogates of all of the above have been posted online with open access, so that anyone in the world can examine them.

This late antique graphic masterpiece has no standard title, but Gryson and Frede's Beuron directory of early Christian authors gives it the code PROL gen. The Great Stemma is not listed in Stegmüller's Repertorium or the Clavis Patrum Latinorum.[*]Gryson, Roger, Répertoire général des auteurs ecclésiastiques latins de l'antiquité et du haut moyen âge (Freiburg: Herder, 2007).

The tabulation below lists all 25 manuscripts, whereby the amber-gold cells indicate high-resolution images online. The paler yellow cells mark low-resolution images or snippets only.

By following each column downwards, one can easily compare names and patterns in the matching folio of each witness. Click in the columns at left to find catalogues and in some cases information about the monasteries that created these documents.

The first three columns of the table provide: (1) a numbering for the purpose of this edition, (2) the recension or group codes based on the Załuska scheme, and (3) the sigla used by Załuska, derived from that of Wilhelm Neuss. The table is divided into sections according to codex type, and each section is in order of date of creation. The years of creation are not precise dates, but approximations applied as a unified notation to establish an order in the table.

Notes

Lost Manuscripts

1. A Great Stemma copy was evidently in the now-lost bible of Oña made in 943, of which only a few pages (without the stemma) now exist.[*]John Williams argues that Oña was the model for both León bibles, but notes Ayuso's argument that both León bibles derive from yet another other lost bible known as Legionense supuesto: 'A Model for the León Bibles.' Madrider Mitteilungen VIII (1967): 281-286. See also Klapisch-Zuber, 63.

2. There was almost certainly another lost codex at León which Ayuso terms the Legionense supuesto. In the early 1950s he even gave in a siglum, Leg 3. It is described as containing the genealogical table.[*]The only question that has been raised about this lost bible is whether it might not have been identical with Oña. On balance that seems implausible. Descriptions of Legionense supuesto are extant from Manuel Risco and José María Eguren. Williams (1965) quotes the latter: Contiene este códice, como el anterior [Bible of 960], la genealogia de Jesucristo desde Adam, y en dos espacios circulares de noticia de la época en que empezaron a profetizar los profetas mayores y menores; concluye la genealogia de Jesucristo, y al fin de la misma hay una miniatura que representa Anunciación, y dentro de un círculo se lee: colligitur omne tempus ab Adam usque ad Christum VCXCVIIII (5199). En la misma miniatura se ve el catálogo de los reyes de Roma ... Es completo y bien escrito de letra del siglo IX. No consta el año en que se hizo, ni el nombre del transcriptor.

3. Given its history, an Iota stemma would be expected in the Bible of Arnstein an der Lahn (British Library, London, MS Harley 2798-2799, digitized). In many other respects it is similar to the Parc and Floreffe Bibles above, but parts are now lost.

4. Two Italian miscellanies appear to have once included the Great Stemma, but those codices are now incomplete: See the online article New Found Manuscript by Jean-Baptiste Piggin.

A Note on Method

The table was inspired by the Beatus tabulation and folio numbering which was compiled by the late John Williams and another listing by Christiane Klapisch-Zuber. [*]Klapisch-Zuber's text refers in the past tense to the two chronicles and eight Spanish bibles known to have contained genealogies. She offers no explicit listing of those bibles, but apparently counts Le, Ma, Le2, Ca, Ac, Burgos, Ávila and the fragmentarily extant bible Oña bible, making eight without the lost León bible (L. supuesto). Załuska's second article [*]Załuska, Composition. authoritatively confirmed that the sum total then discovered of extant specimens of the Joachimite Stemma (including the Avila derivative, which I set apart above) was 19. No further manuscripts of the Great Stemma have been discovered since.

The grid above is organized according to the common, 14-codex-page order of the Great Stemma in the Roda Codex and Beatus manuscripts, and each column displays a "tool tip" which is visible when the cursor is hovered over it. For the order of the 14 folio faces, see for example the thumbnails with the RAH copy. The content is disposed as follows:

1. Adam, and his family. [Epsilon compresses the first two pages into one.]
2. Jareth, down to Lamech, as well as Jubal, father of players of the lyre and flute.
3. Noah, and his non-Semite descendants.
4. Sem and Joktan.
5. Peleg-Terah and Lot's Sin.
6. Abraham and the Ismaelites (his secondary descendants).
7. Esau (and his descendants) and the Horrites (a large "political" section devoted to the neighbouring people of Mount Seir).
8. Leah (with her children sired by Jacob) and kings of Edom. [Spread over two pages in Epsilon.]
9. Zelpha, Rachel and Bara and their children sired by Jacob.
10. Judges and Saul. [Spread over two pages in Epsilon. Usually with the Levites too, but Beta places them on the preceding page.]
11. Prophets I and Disunity (the division into northern and southern kingdoms). Commencement of the parallel ancestries of Christ, as stated in Mt 1, 6-16 and Lk 3, 24-31. [Spread over two pages in Epsilon. Usually with David, but Beta shifts David and family back to the previous page.]
12. Prophets II and Exile.
13. Rome: an account of the kings, the Achaemenid rulers during the Exile, and the parallel ancestries continued.
14. The Incarnation.

The content of the seven-page, 16-page and 18-page manuscripts was then fitted to this scheme, either doubly filling cells or leaving some empty.

An earlier partial transcription of the first nine pages, collated from four of the bibles, was published by Bonifatius Fischer in his 1951-1954 edition of the Vetus Latina Genesis.[*]Fischer, Genesis. Fischer omitted all material that was not demonstrably biblical, such as glosses and the commentary on Lot, and suppressed such apocryphal details as the names of Noah's daughters in law. Wilhelm Neuss had published a transcription in 1931 of the panels on the first two pages. Załuska collated many of the stemmata, but did not publish her collation. The transcription for this edition, initially issued in 2010 on Piggin.net without the present analysis, was the first beginning-to-end typographical publication of the core content of the Great Stemma. The second, a transcription of the Saint-Sever Beatus has been online in France since 2013.

Załuska rightly excluded a 14th- or 15th-century bible at the University of Barcelona which Ayuso claimed to be one of the series, but is in fact the Compendium historiae in genealogia Christi of Peter of Poitiers. Ayuso's 1943 article terms it Barc1, but it later became Barc3 in his peculiar sigla series. This is in Sig. Ms. 762, a codex which also contains an Interpretationes Hebraicorum Nominum. See the Macro-Typography blog for more discussion of the Compendium.

The Manuscripts: Further Details

Most of the codices have been subject to extensive study by art historians on account of the illuminations they contain. The Morgan Library, for example, has enormous hand-managed bibliographies for its two Beatus codices. Links above lead to these. The following list contains some brief additional notes on each manuscript, but only scratches the surface of the mass of published material about the illuminations.

1. Made at Tábara(?); illuminated by Maius. Believed to have been ordered for either the Monastery of San Miguel de Escalada or that of San Miguel de Moreruela. Print facsimile: A Spanish Apocalypse, with introduction by John Williams.
2. San Salvador de Tábara; illuminated by Maius and Emeterius.
3. Origins in the Kingdom of Léon, probably San Salvador de Tábara; illuminated by Emeterius and Ende. Print facsimile: Comentario al Apocalipsis (OpenLibrary).
4. Origins in the Kingdom of Léon. The Archivo de la Catedral is attached to the Museu Diocesà d'Urgell. Print facsimile: Beatus de Liebana Codex Urgellensis (WorldCat) with introduction by Peter Klein.
5. León royal scriptorium, executed by Facundus on commission by King Fernando I and Queen Sancha of Léon. Print facsimile: Beato de Fernando I y Sancha (WorldCat) (Barcelona, Moleiro: 2006).
6. From a monastery in Gascony in a town, Saint-Sever-sur-l'Adour, which is today located in France. Executed by Stephanus Garsia Placidus. The codex was ordered by Abbot Gregory. The codex and its contents have received an excellent and comprehensive description since 2013 on the CEHAG website. Print facsimile: El "Beato" de Saint-Sever (OpenLibrary).
7. From Catalonia, probably Ripoll. The full name of the library is Biblioteca Nazionale Universitaria di Torino.
8. From Burgos, San Pedro de Cardeña? At the John Rylands Library. Online, previously issued as a print facsimile: Beato de Liébana codice de Manchester (OpenLibrary), edited by Peter Klein.
9. The reason for the peculiar number of the last folio is that IV, V and XIV have been separated and are now owned by the Metropolitan Museum in New York. Print facsimile: Beato de Liébana (OpenLibrary ).
10. From Santa María de Las Huelgas in Burgos? The manuscript in the "Kilroy" look. Facsimile: Beato del Monasterio de Santa Maria la Real de Huelgas de Burgos (WorldCat), edited by Peter Klein (Valencia, Scriptorium: 2004).
11. From Kingdom of León. Neuss guessed this fragment came out of a bible. Some Spanish scholars have suggested the fragment is a missing section from the Valladolid illustrated Beatus dated to 970. Załuska disagrees. Williams, not entirely seriously, suggests it be allocated to the Beatus camp simply because these comprise a majority of the extant forms.
12. From SS Pedro (y Paul?) twin monasteries at Valeranica, near Burgos. Executed by Florentius, Sanctius. Five double plates. Briefly described by Ayuso and Neuss. Genesis part transcribed (with gaps) by Fischer. Description on Guía del Arte Prerrománico Español. Print facsimile: Biblia Visigótico Mozárabe (OpenLibrary ) (FHVL/Lancia: 1998).
13. Former signature: A.2. Only six pages extant, as far as the roundel: Elisaba filius David. Neuss estimated the lost final section comprised a single folio. Genesis transcribed by Fischer. See Bordona: the bible ends at Ecclesiastes.
14. This bible is a close copy of Le. Also from León? José Carlos Martín advises after an examination on site that the final section of the Great Stemma (in the first of the three volumes) is missing: its final roundel extant is that with the text Resa genuit Anna.
15. Genesis transcribed by Fischer. Martín advises that the end of this manuscript copy is also missing: 7v finishes with Naum genuit Amos and the two large circles on the prophets. The opening spread is published in Historia de Calahorra (Amigos de la Historia de Calahorra, 2011. ISBN 978-84-939155-06) and the image can be purchased from RicardMN Photography.
16. From San Millán de la Cogolla Monastery. Full name of depository: Real Academia de la Historia. The catalogue description is in a large (20MB) PDF file. Detailed description by Williams in JWCI. Genesis transcribed by Fischer.
17. Executed under the direction of Sisebut, bishop of Pamplona. This codex contains histories of the Visigothic Kingdom, Asturia and Navarre. Full name of depository: Real Academia de la Historia.
18. Załuska, Composition accepts that this 16-page version is the principal witness to the tradition preceding α and β. From Bandini, there is only a seven-word description. It has an entry in tlion.
19. The Bible of Ripoll at the Vatican (BAV, Vat. lat. 5729) is described thus by Załuska: En introduction au Nouveau Testament, fol. 359-361v, la Bible de Ripoll contient des généalogies bibliques qui, contrairement à celles dont nous avons traité jusqu'à maintenant, ne sont pas disposées en médaillons, mais sont écrites comme un texte continu. Ce texte se poursuit sur un peu plus de cinq pages et il présente une très étroite parenté avec celui du groupe Parc-Floreffe-Foigny-Burgos. Toutefois le texte de Ripoll est plus court et les longs développements typologiques n'y figurent pas. For a recent survey of the art-history literature on this bible with a variety of images of its illuminations see Castineiras (2009).
20. Found in the first codex of a three-volume bible. Köllner mistakenly gives the shelfmark "14789". See Sarah Biggs' talk suggesting that this Stemma dates from about 50 years after the rest of the bible.
21. In the first codex of a two-volume bible. The final page is missing. 27r illustrates Köllner's article.
22. In the first codex of a four-volume bible. Peculiarly, Mandragore has indexed this, but presents no matching images (yet). 5r illustrates Köllner's article.
23. From San Pedro de Cardeña Monastery, Burgos? Referred to as the Burgos Romanesque Bible to distinguish it from other bibles of Burgos. The Cistercian monastery at Vileña/ Villeñas has been proposed as an alternative origin to San Pedro. A later page is included in an English description of the library. Print facsimile: Biblia Romanica de Burgos (WorldCat).
24. This is a most peculiar version, compressing all the material from Noah to the Horrites onto two sides of a single folio. The image of Noah's Ark is charming and elaborate. One suspects that two or so folios have become lost and that this stemma was originally spread over about six pages. If this is so, a previous left side of a double-page spread would have once depicted Adam, and perhaps three further pages were allotted for the names from Jacob to Jesus, ending in a right-side illumination of the Incarnation. Załuska uncertainly categorized this as belonging to recension β.
25. Almost certainly drawn at San Salvatore, Monte Amiato, Italy. It mentions a post-1039 king, hence the scholarly estimate of its date of creation. Melville published a schematic copy. Description by Klapisch-Zuber. See the author's blog for further discussion.

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The Great Stemma: A Graphic History in the Fifth Century by Jean-Baptiste Piggin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.