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LJS 267 - De ludo schacchorum seu de moribus hominum et officiis nobilium ... [etc.]
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Information about this record
Title: |
De ludo schacchorum seu de moribus hominum et officiis nobilium ... [etc.] [manuscript].
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Origin: |
[Italy], 1409.
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Physical description: |
175 leaves : parchment, ill. ; 190 x 122 (130 x 75-80) mm. bound to 200 x 135 mm.
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Summary: |
Compilation, mostly in Latin, of religious, literary, historical, and natural-historical works, including classical and contemporary
selections, as well as letters by humanist writers Francesco Petrarca and Donatus Albanzani. Over a quarter of the manuscript
is devoted to the De ludo scachorum of Jacobus de Cessolis, a collection of sermons about the proper relationships between
a king and various classes of subjects, compared to the rules of chess (f. 1r-56r). Other moderately substantial texts include
descriptions of various geographic regions from Honorius of Autun's De imagine mundi (f. 61r-71r); a brief history of the
Roman civil wars (f. 71v-92r); and the Computus of Bono da Lucca, which deals with the calendar, lunar cycles, and calculations
for determining the date of Easter (f. 109r-124v). The manuscript is a palimpsest, with the lower text from the 14th century,
probably legal.
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Notes: |
Ms. codex.
Title for manuscript from closing rubric for predominant work (f. 56r).
Collation: Parchment, ii (18th-century paper) + 175 + ii (18th-century paper); 1¹⁰(-1) 2-3¹⁰ 4⁸(+1) 5-17¹⁰ 18⁸(-1); [1-175];
modern foliation in pencil, lower left recto. Catchwords lower center on the last verso of gatherings 1-15 except for gathering
11 (f. 108v).
Layout: Written in 26-42 long lines; ruled in lead and faint ink.
Script: Written in Italian Gothic script, mostly in the hand of Franciscus Gennay (f. 56r, 71r, 92r, 124v).
Decoration: 11 ink drawings illustrating the De ludo scachorum: the author in monastic habit at his desk (f. 1r); king and
king chess-piece (f. 4r); judge and bishop chess-piece (f. 10r); knight and knight chess-piece (f. 12v); carpenter and pawn
chess-piece (f. 24v); builder and pawn chess-piece (f. 27r); scribe and pawn chess-piece (f. 28v); merchant (f. 32v); innkeeper
(f. 38r); city guard (?) with key and pawn chess-piece (f. 40v); and wasteful rogue with dice and perhaps coins (f. 43r).
5-line initial in red with infilling and ground of penwork in ink (f. 109r); 3-line initial in blue (f. 117r); rubrics and
2-line initials in red throughout; paragraph marks in red in De ludo scachorum and Computus (f. 1r-56r, 109r-124v); capitals
touched with yellow throughout; occasional manicules added by later readers (for example, f.46v-47r).
Binding: 18th-century leather over pasteboards, spine and board edges gilt, marbled endpapers.
Origin: Written in northern Italy in 1409 (f. 71r).
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Cite as: |
LJS 267
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Manuscript location: |
Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts University of Pennsylvania LJS 267
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