The vast number and variety of sequences, those liturgical interpolations which in the middle ages commonly followed the repetition of the Alleluia in the Mass, and the freedom of their development, show that they were an outlet for the creative talents of musicians and poets. A sample of sequences from successive periods allows the literary historian to trace the development of rhyme and accentual meter, and a musicologist has described the sequence ‘as the parent of oratorio and the grandparent of modern drama.’ But while a view which encompasses centuries reveals to us variety and change, the compositions of any given time were largely shaped by inherited traditions. Not the least value of studies on the early history of the sequence is their demonstration of the close connection between various Alleluia melodies and their sequences and the way in which appropriate texts were fitted to melodies for specific feasts.

The two poems edited here celebrate the English victories in 1346 over France (Crecy) and Scotland (Durham) in the early part of the Hundred Years War. Together with another on the siege of Calais in 1346–47 (Cantica leticie) they are by a writer I have labeled the “Anonymous of Calais.” They were first printed in 1859, but Wright's edition is flawed not only by errors of transcription and a clear failure to follow the sense (notably by accepting Valeys “Valois” at Crecy 272, where Kaleys “Calais” is essential), but also by his textual procedure, which implies that there was a single authorial original from which the manuscript witnesses deviated. I have tried to show here that there are two distinct versions, one an adaptation of the other.

In July or August 1474 in Senigallia, a town on the coast of the Adriatic sea, a translation into Hebrew was completed of the Ars brevis, a work by the medieval Christian philosopher, mystic, and missionary Ramon Llull. Within a couple of years, this translation had been copied a number of times, and from the colophon of one of these copies, it appears that this work was rated very highly by its Jewish readers as an aid for achieving mystical experience. Any interest shown by the adherents of one faith in the texts of another is important for shedding light on common intellectual interests and contacts. This translation is of especially great significance in that there appears to have been in Italy in the fifteenth century a circle of Jewish scholars willingly engaging with a Christian text in order to achieve divine illumination. Here, I will try to shed some light on this group of Jewish savants and to situate their interests within the wider context of the Renaissance.

In the intellectual history of the Latin West, Aristotelianism holds a unique position. From Boethius to Galileo — from the end of the classical civilization to the scientific revolution of the seventeenth century, and in some circles even beyond — the influence of the Philosopher was decisive not only for the development of theology, philosophy, and the natural sciences, but also for the university structure and system of education. The vast amount of scholarly writing published each year on aspects of this history is an obvious measure of its significance. However, a natural division between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance has led to an unfortunate dichotomy in the way historians have dealt with the intellectual history of this era. Students of medieval thought have concentrated on the philosophy of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and have generally regarded as decadent the scholasticism of the following period. Renaissance scholarship, on the other hand, has focused its attention on the humanism and Platonism of that time, and tended to regard Italian Aristotelianism as an unimportant holdover from the medieval period. Furthermore, because the influence of Aristotle was so all-pervading, historians have, of necessity, treated aspects of his thought during this time —his significance in logic and philosophy, the repercussions of his thought in theology and the natural sciences, and so on. Nevertheless, in recent years a tendency in research seems to be developing toward an attempt at understanding philosophy and theology in the way in which they were understood in the medieval and Renaissance period and toward bridging the gap between Aquinas and Descartes. One who undertakes a survey of this research is naturally confronted with a large number of works dealing with different aspects of this history, but to make this brief survey possible I have restricted its scope to a very few recent books which either illuminate the various significant turns that the Aristotelian tradition took or seem to contribute to a sense of continuity within this period.

The metropolitans of Seleucia-Ctesiphon for the fourth century comprise Papa, Simeon bar Sabbae, Shahdost, Barbashmin followed by a long vacancy, Tomarsa, Qayuma, and Isaac. The parallel Sassanids were Sapor II (309-379), Ardashir II (379-83), Sapor III (383-88), Bahram IV (388-99) and Yezdegerd I (399-420).

The list of catholici is preserved in a number of different writers: PsEN (c. s. x), ChrS (c. 1036), Mari (c. 1150), PsED (c. 1260), BarH (1286), Amri (c. 1350), Sliba (c. 1350), and others.

The chronology has already been studied by G. Westphal in connection with his investigation of the sources and reliability of Mari, Amri and Sliba. He bases his dates principally on the Syriac acts of the Persian martyrs, but, as the present paper attempts to prove, this cannot be done: we must work the other way around, settle first the succession of the catholici and then turn to the acts. Furthermore, since the publication of his excellent work, the very valuable ChrS has been discovered and a critical edition of PsEN has appeared.

Like the Preacher, son of David, Nicholas of Cusa knew that wisdom excels folly as light excels darkness and he gave his heart to search it out. In phrases reminiscent of the classical definition of philosophy, the wisdom literature of the Old Testament, and medieval venery, he pictured his intellectual life as a venatio sapientiae and himself as a keen and pious hunter. Virtually all his important philosophical and theological works, from the De docta ignorantia of 1440 to the De venatione sapientiae of 1463, document the chase. Wisdom is the principal subject of the dialogues Idiota de sapientia. And when the Pseudo-Petrarch incorporated most of the first of these two dialogues in his De vera sapientia (put together around 1470 and printed in all the collected editions of Petrarch's works), his definition of wisdom was given added publicity and authority.

(Barcelona, El Escorial, Gerona, Huesca, Lérida, Madrid, Montserrat, Pamplona, Poblet, Seo de Urgel, Silos, Tarazona, Toledo, Tortosa, Vallbona de las Monjas, Vich)

This article is mainly concerned with Office Books, but does not include books for the Mozarabic rite. A few books for the Mass etc. were included as a result of earlier incorrect descriptions; these were inspected and eliminated without further investigation.

The amount of research and publication on the problem of Herodotus' historicity has been gigantic. Recently Jameson's publcation of the newly discovered ‘Themistocles Decree’ has added a new phase to this ever vital controversy. The present paper, however, will evaluate another incident in the Histories and in the history of the Histories: the debate preceding the accession of Darius the Great to the Persian throne in 522 B.C.

Fundamental to Christianity is the belief in the redemptive death of Christ. But not always has there been complete agreement among theologians as to the precise reason or reasons for Christ's death. For centuries the soteriology of the Church may be said to have been in large part demonocentric. The devil had certain rights over fallen man, rights which could not be violated, still less taken away. If his dominion over man was to be destroyed, it must be done not by any arbitrary exercise of the divine Omnipotence, but in a manner reasonable and just. Some theologians even spoke of Christ's death as a ransom paid to the devil for man's release. With varying nuance such ideas as these were dominant from the days of St. Irenaeus of Lyons' until the very end of the eleventh century, when St. Anselm of Canterbury struck out upon entirely new lines of thought. In his Cur Deus Homo new concepts were introduced into the discussion of the problem. By sin man had offended the infinite majesty of God: God's rights had been violated. Satisfaction must be made, and that by man, for it was he who had sinned. But since the infinite offence which we call sin could not really be atoned for by a finite creature, the necessary satisfaction called for a God-man.

The present town of Bertrée lies about mid-way between Liège and Louvain on the undulating plateau of Hannut, toward the center of the ancient region of the Hesbaye, where the rich soil, temperate climate, and relative flatness have attracted settlers since the earliest times. It lies south of the Roman road (later known as the chaussée Brunehaut) between Boulogne and Cologne and is surrounded by the remains of Roman and Gallo-Roman habitations, tombs, and cemeteries. Nearby there were roads to Nivelles and Bavay. In the Middle Ages it belonged both politically and ecclesiastically to the province of Liège, though it was situated almost in an enclave between the counties of Louvain to the north and west, Looz to the north and east, and Namur to the south and west. Nothing specific is known about its history, however, before Walter of Trognée established a priory there in 1124.

One of the earliest works of the Majorcan Ramon Lull (1230/35–1315/16) was a Compendium logicae Algazelis (1271/72), a work based on the first section of the Maqâsid al-falâsifa (that is, “Opinions of the Philosophers”) of the great Muslim theologian, Abû Ḥâmid al-Ghazâlî (d. 1111). Algazel was Persian and his Maqâṣid an Arabic form of a Persian work by the celebrated philosopher Ibn Sînâ (d. 1037), known to the Latins as Avicenna. Algazel summarized the philosophy of Avicenna with the intention of refuting it in his Tahâfut al-falâsifa (that is, “Destruction of the Philosophers”). As is generally known, the Cordovan philosopher and jurist, Averroes (Ibn Rushd, d. 1198), sought to refute this latter work in his Tahâfut al-tahâfut or “Destructio destructionis.”

It is now almost three hundred years since Dom Garet published as part of the complete works of Cassiodorus the last printed edition of Cassiodorus' treatise On the Soul. The present edition is intended to offer a critical text of the work based on a study of the manuscript evidence. The restrictions of this publication make it impossible to give an explanation of the entire history of the text transmission. The apparatus criticus does, however, represent the readings of the best specimens of the various manuscript families which constitute the major evidence for the text. It is my hope that it will be possible at some future time for me to defend in greater detail my choice of the MSS used here, and to outline the history of the transmission from the ninth through the twelfth century.

English grammatical miscellanies, of which numerous examples survive from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, are a major source of the history of education in later medieval England. We mean, by miscellanies, collections of treatises and exercises relating to the study and teaching of Latin. Works of this kind were compiled for their use by university scholars, members of the religious orders, and the masters and pupils of ordinary grammar schools. The study of such works today, most of whose contents have yet to be printed, adds greatly to our knowledge of medieval English life and thought. The Latin treatises on grammar which they contain reveal the history of the study and usage of Latin in England. They make it possible to reconstruct the grammar curriculum of the English schools and universities, for which other evidence is rarely available. They contain the earliest grammatical treatments of the English language, too, in the form of English glosses and translations of Latin grammatical works, long before the publication of the first definitive grammar of English in 1586. Of wider interest still, the miscellanies contain numerous school exercises which aimed to teach Latin to pupils through references to the speech, activities, and surroundings of everyday life. Such texts are especially valuable, since they preserve many illuminating details of English social history that have not survived elsewhere.

In a recent article on the Florentine synodal constitutions of 1327, I took note of the rubric de testamentis et ultimis uoluntatibus, which ordered executors to pay directly to the bishop one-third of all legacies left indistincte ad pias causas seu pro anima. Another third of such bequests was to be paid directly to the testator's parish rector, while the remainder supposedly was to be distributed by the executors to pious causes. Under pressure from the commune, this mandate was struck in 1330. I stated the reasons for communal opposition, and made a limited attempt to show the canonical background of the bishop's unsuccessful ordinance. Citing the European-wide use by the secular clergy of the decretal Super cathedram (1300) to recoup income lost to the friars, the article concluded that Florence's demand for direct payment of a third on indistincte was an extreme — but not unique — formulation of a trend within one contemporary school of jurisprudence to amplify the testamentary rights of the secular clergy. The bishop's attempt was bad law, and even the lawyers whose opinions had encouraged the bishop in his formulation — before all, the great canonist Giovanni d'Andrea — crushed such attempts on indistincte with strong and decisive consilia.

Critical approaches to alliterative poetry can and do include all the approaches imposed on literature in general. But to these must be added approaches particular to the fact that we confront a body of literature defined by a distinctive, some would say peculiar, metrical form. Alliterative poetry has been accorded a separate status precisely because it is alliterative, flourished in a relatively short time-frame, and is associated with a geographic region. For most of this century, the Alliterative Revival has reigned as an historical fact — a nationalistic metrical response, fostered by the North West Midlands baronial families, to the increasing power of the Court in the East Midlands and the pernicious influence of foreign, mainly French fashions, particularly poetic. In the last fifteen years, and at a galloping pace in the last ten, we have seen one of the massive certainties of literary history first quietly mined by the late Elizabeth Salter, and then besieged, assaulted, and overrun by an increasing band of scholarly invaders numbering among them Norman Blake, Derek Pearsall, T. Turville-Petre, and David Lawton. The Theory of the Alliterative Revival, once a Castle of Truth, now lies in ruins, picked over by its destroyers for useful material with which to build a new Tower on a Tofte. While the orthodox view of the alliterative revival has been disestablished, and no single creed has yet emerged as an authoritative substitute, there is currently underway a major re-assessment of alliterative poetry, which has both been caused by and also generated a substantial increase in scholarly knowledge of the field. The questions that have been posed and continue to be explored are mainly of the following kind: Was there a revival or simply a continuation? How and where was this revival/continuation generated and located? Should we distinguish sub-groups of alliterative poetry according to metrical variants? How do we scan alliterative verse? What are the origins of or influences on the metres and rhythms of the great alliterative works of the late fourteenth century?

In the mid-thirteenth century, Louis IX of France established the enquêteur, a roving commissioner whose assignment was to hear complaints against the local officers of the crown and take remedial action. This new official, known variously as the enquêteur-réformateur or (later) simply as réformateur, was an outgrowth of Louis' desire to protect the rights of his subjects against all encroachments. Although they were originally intended as a check upon royal fiscal officers, historians have long agreed that these enquêteurs were employed quite differently under subsequent French kings. By the reign of Philip IV (1285–1314) their assignments often stressed the investigation of alleged usurpations of royal rights. Perverting the function envisioned by St. Louis, they now sought to remedy abuses by the king's subjects as well as those by royal officials. They became another arm of the fiscal administration, searching for new or neglected sources of revenue for the crown.

In this article I propose to examine the Trinitarian controversy that developed in the years 1308 to 1325 between the Dominican Durandus of St Pourçain (ca. 1275–1334) and his order, especially in the connection between this controversy and the growth of a Dominican sense of corporate identity. The connection is not at first obvious, but we shall see how the evolution of Durandus's theological thought reflects to a great degree the doctrinal transformation of his order, a transformation which is also illustrative of the doctrinal preoccupations of fourteenth-century Scholasticism.

Comme la plupart des œuvres de Jean Chrysostome, le texte dont l'incipit est ‘Ιατρών μεν παίδες nous est parvenu à travers une tradition extrêmement riche. Sans prétendre avoir identifié tous les manuscrits qui le contiennent actuellement, je donne ici la description des soixante manuscrits que j'ai consultés, soit en lecture directe, soit en microfilms, pour établir l'édition critique de ce texte. J'ai été amenée ainsi à apporter quelques corrections et plusieurs précisions aux catalogues sur les points suivants:

Dans la tradition manuscrite du Xe au XIIe siecle, le texte qui nous intéresse fait partie d'un ensemble que les catalogues designent tantôt par Adversus Anomoeos, tantôt par De incomprehensibili. J'ai adopte uniformement cette seconde formule, pour eviter toute confusion.