Luxeuil Script: a leaf from the book of Isaiah, from ‘The Luxeuil Prophets’, in Latin, decorated manuscript on vellum[France (Burgundy, probably Luxeuil Abbey), early 8th century (c. 720–30?)]
a fragmentary leaf, c. 285 × 210 mm, blind-ruled, the rulings framing the text-space with double verticals and single horizontals at top and bottom, but not for the individual horizontal lines of text, written in two columns of 30–31 lines, c. 255 × 195mm, the text comprising Isaiah 21:13–24, each verse starting a new line with an enlarged initial, about 45 in total, each usually using two colours from a palette of green, orange, yellow, and dark red; recovered from use as a pastedown in a binding, with consequent damage and imperfections, including a rusty hole probably caused by the pin of a strap-and-pin fastening; the margins cropped with some loss of text at the left edge of the recto, but neither side affected by glue, suggesting that this was a flyleaf not a pastedown; in a card folder, in a cloth case with gilt title label
PROVENANCEWritten very probably at Benedictine Abbey of Luxeuil in Burgundy (about half-way between Langres and Mulhouse), founded by the Irish St Columbanus, c. 590. It was perhaps written for export, as was a significant proportion of the other surviving manuscripts written in Luxeuil script (itemised by Ganz, 1991, pp. 111–12).The manuscript was probably from an early date at Weltenburg Abbey in Lower Bavaria, on the Danube downstream from Regensburg, which was founded c. 696 from Luxeuil by the Frankish monk St Rupert (d. c. 717), apostle of Bavaria and Austria; the manuscript was actively used until at least the 10th century: there are Carolingian corrections and 10th/11th-century neumes added to the Lamentations of Jeremiah; and was apparently dismembered in the 12th century: the sister-leaves now in the USA were removed from the bindings of 12th-century manuscripts that had been at Admont Abbey since at least the 14th century; other leaves were found in books from Stadtamhof Abbey, Regensburg.The present leaf was found, with three others, in a binding in the Furstenberg library at Donaueschingen, and identified for the first time when they appeared in the Donaueschingen sale in our rooms, 21 June 1982, lot 2; bought by Breslauer; thence to:The Beck Collection, Stuttgart, MS 1 (Heinzer, 1995): sold in the Beck sale in our rooms, 16 June 1997, lot 1; bought by FerriniThe Boehlen Collection, Bern, MS 700
TEXTIsaiah 21:13–22:24: ‘in Arabia [in] saltu ad vesperam dormietis … aquam piscinae veteris et [verso:] non suspexistis ad eum … omnem gloriam domus patris eius’.
Isaiah chapters 21 and 22 concern the destruction of Babylon and Isaiah’s lament for the devastation of Judah; the present leaf includes the famous line: ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die’.
Readings from the Prophets are unique to the early Gallican liturgy, and the text here of Isaiah 22 is particularly significant because its marginal lection markings are proof of the importance of the feast of the Epiphany in the Gallican Rite (Babcock, 1993).
SCRIPT‘The script is the characteristic minuscule of Luxeuil, which is found in twenty-two surviving manuscripts and fragments, as well as five entries in earlier manuscripts … to master Luxeuil minuscule required a sense of form achieved through monastic discipline and an awareness of calligraphic excellence’ (Ganz, 1991, pp. 108–09). The classic study of the origins of the script is that by E.A. Lowe (1953, 1972); for a broader and more recent study of its origins, see Rosamund McKitterick (1981, 1994); the most recent assessment of the script, including an analysis of characteristic letter-forms, and extensive bibliography, is by Paolo Cherubini (2021).
Luxeuil Minuscule script is extremely rare: only about 30 specimens are known (Ganz, 2001), of which no more than three are privately owned; one was sold from the Schøyen Collection in our rooms, 10 July 2012, lot 16.
COMMENTARYAs stated when it was last sold, this remarkable biblical leaf comprises what is probably THE SECOND OLDEST SURVIVING MANUSCRIPT OF THE LATIN TEXT OF THIS PART OF ISAIAH, perhaps preceded only by the Codex Amiatinus, written in Northumberland and taken in the summer of 716 by Abbot Ceolfrith to Europe, and now in Florence. No complete manuscript or even substantial fragment of the Prophets in Latin is extant from before the 8th century; the present manuscript dates from the early 8th century.
Fifteen leaves from the present manuscript are known, with portions of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea and Haggai; the parent volume could in theory have been part of a Bible, or an Old Testament, but is more likely to have comprised Major and Minor Prophets, from Isaiah to Malachai, and the group is therefore known as ‘The Luxeuil Prophets’. The other leaves are now in the library at Stiftsbibliothek, Admont; the Bayerisches Staatsbibliothek, Munich; the Library of Princeton University; the Beinecke Library, Yale University; the Newberry Library, Chicago; and the Morgan Library & Museum, New York. The primary study of the group, published before the Donaueschingen leaves were known, is by E.A. Lowe (1959), and the most detailed study since their discovery is by David Ganz (1991).
REFERENCESE.A. Lowe, Codices Latini Antiquiores, IX, (Oxford, 1959), p. 29 no. 1337.
E.A. Lowe, ‘The Script of Luxeuil: a Title Vindicated’, Revue Benedictine, 63 (1953) pp. 132–42, reprinted in his Paleographical Papers (2 vols, Oxford, 1972), II, pp. 389–98.
B. Bischoff and V. Brown, ‘Addenda to Codices Latini Antiquiores’, Mediaeval Studies, 47 (1985), pp. 317–66 at 359.
R. McKitterick, ‘The scriptoria of Merovingian Gaul: a survey of the evidence’, in Columbanus and Merovingian Monasticism, ed. by H.B. Clarke and M. Brennan (Oxford 1981), pp. 173–207, esp. 184–92; reprinted in R. McKitterick, Books, Scribes, and Learning in the Frankish Kingdoms, 6th–9th Centuries (Brookfield, VT, 1994).
D. Ganz, ‘The Luxeuil Prophets and Merovingian Missionary Strategies’, Yale University Library Gazette, XLVI, Supplement: Beinecke Studies in Early Manuscripts (1991), pp.105–17, citing the present leaves throughout.
R. Babcock, ‘The Luxeuil Prophets and the Gallican Liturgy’, Scriptorium, 47 (1993), pp. 52–55.
F. Heinzer, ‘Die Neuen Standorte der ehemals Donaueschinger Handschriftensammlung', Scriptorium, 69 (1995), pp. 312–19 at 318 and n. 23 (‘Deutscher Privatbesitz’).
D. Ganz, ‘Texts and Scripts in Surviving Manuscripts in the Script of Luxeuil’, in Ireland and Europe in the Early Middle Ages: Texts and Transmissions, ed. by P.N. Chatháin and M. Richter (Dublin, 2001), pp. 186–203.
B. B. Tewes, Die Handschriften der Schule von Luxeuil: Kunst und Ikonographie eines frühmittelalterlichen Skriptoriums (Wiesbaden, 2011), pp. 137–140 (citing the present leaf as ‘Bern Privatbesitz’).
D. Ganz, ‘L’écriture mérovingienne de Luxeuil: développement ou pluralités?’, Les Cahiers colombaniens (2016), pp. 46–59 at 47, 50, 54, and 59.
P. Cherubini, ‘Luxeuil’, in The Oxford Handbook of Latin Palaeography, ed. by F. Coulson and R. Babcock (Oxford, 2021), pp. 185–92.
L. Nees, ‘Illuminated Manuscripts from Luxeuil and Bobbio’, in Illuminating the Word in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2023), pp. 228–350 at 253, 284, 286, 300.
Luxeuil Script: a leaf from the book of Isaiah, from ‘The Luxeuil Prophets’, in Latin, decorated manuscript on vellum[France (Burgundy, probably Luxeuil Abbey), early 8th century (c. 720–30?)]
a fragmentary leaf, c. 285 × 210 mm, blind-ruled, the rulings framing the text-space with double verticals and single horizontals at top and bottom, but not for the individual horizontal lines of text, written in two columns of 30–31 lines, c. 255 × 195mm, the text comprising Isaiah 21:13–24, each verse starting a new line with an enlarged initial, about 45 in total, each usually using two colours from a palette of green, orange, yellow, and dark red; recovered from use as a pastedown in a binding, with consequent damage and imperfections, including a rusty hole probably caused by the pin of a strap-and-pin fastening; the margins cropped with some loss of text at the left edge of the recto, but neither side affected by glue, suggesting that this was a flyleaf not a pastedown; in a card folder, in a cloth case with gilt title label
PROVENANCEWritten very probably at Benedictine Abbey of Luxeuil in Burgundy (about half-way between Langres and Mulhouse), founded by the Irish St Columbanus, c. 590. It was perhaps written for export, as was a significant proportion of the other surviving manuscripts written in Luxeuil script (itemised by Ganz, 1991, pp. 111–12).The manuscript was probably from an early date at Weltenburg Abbey in Lower Bavaria, on the Danube downstream from Regensburg, which was founded c. 696 from Luxeuil by the Frankish monk St Rupert (d. c. 717), apostle of Bavaria and Austria; the manuscript was actively used until at least the 10th century: there are Carolingian corrections and 10th/11th-century neumes added to the Lamentations of Jeremiah; and was apparently dismembered in the 12th century: the sister-leaves now in the USA were removed from the bindings of 12th-century manuscripts that had been at Admont Abbey since at least the 14th century; other leaves were found in books from Stadtamhof Abbey, Regensburg.The present leaf was found, with three others, in a binding in the Furstenberg library at Donaueschingen, and identified for the first time when they appeared in the Donaueschingen sale in our rooms, 21 June 1982, lot 2; bought by Breslauer; thence to:The Beck Collection, Stuttgart, MS 1 (Heinzer, 1995): sold in the Beck sale in our rooms, 16 June 1997, lot 1; bought by FerriniThe Boehlen Collection, Bern, MS 700
TEXTIsaiah 21:13–22:24: ‘in Arabia [in] saltu ad vesperam dormietis … aquam piscinae veteris et [verso:] non suspexistis ad eum … omnem gloriam domus patris eius’.
Isaiah chapters 21 and 22 concern the destruction of Babylon and Isaiah’s lament for the devastation of Judah; the present leaf includes the famous line: ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die’.
Readings from the Prophets are unique to the early Gallican liturgy, and the text here of Isaiah 22 is particularly significant because its marginal lection markings are proof of the importance of the feast of the Epiphany in the Gallican Rite (Babcock, 1993).
SCRIPT‘The script is the characteristic minuscule of Luxeuil, which is found in twenty-two surviving manuscripts and fragments, as well as five entries in earlier manuscripts … to master Luxeuil minuscule required a sense of form achieved through monastic discipline and an awareness of calligraphic excellence’ (Ganz, 1991, pp. 108–09). The classic study of the origins of the script is that by E.A. Lowe (1953, 1972); for a broader and more recent study of its origins, see Rosamund McKitterick (1981, 1994); the most recent assessment of the script, including an analysis of characteristic letter-forms, and extensive bibliography, is by Paolo Cherubini (2021).
Luxeuil Minuscule script is extremely rare: only about 30 specimens are known (Ganz, 2001), of which no more than three are privately owned; one was sold from the Schøyen Collection in our rooms, 10 July 2012, lot 16.
COMMENTARYAs stated when it was last sold, this remarkable biblical leaf comprises what is probably THE SECOND OLDEST SURVIVING MANUSCRIPT OF THE LATIN TEXT OF THIS PART OF ISAIAH, perhaps preceded only by the Codex Amiatinus, written in Northumberland and taken in the summer of 716 by Abbot Ceolfrith to Europe, and now in Florence. No complete manuscript or even substantial fragment of the Prophets in Latin is extant from before the 8th century; the present manuscript dates from the early 8th century.
Fifteen leaves from the present manuscript are known, with portions of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea and Haggai; the parent volume could in theory have been part of a Bible, or an Old Testament, but is more likely to have comprised Major and Minor Prophets, from Isaiah to Malachai, and the group is therefore known as ‘The Luxeuil Prophets’. The other leaves are now in the library at Stiftsbibliothek, Admont; the Bayerisches Staatsbibliothek, Munich; the Library of Princeton University; the Beinecke Library, Yale University; the Newberry Library, Chicago; and the Morgan Library & Museum, New York. The primary study of the group, published before the Donaueschingen leaves were known, is by E.A. Lowe (1959), and the most detailed study since their discovery is by David Ganz (1991).
REFERENCESE.A. Lowe, Codices Latini Antiquiores, IX, (Oxford, 1959), p. 29 no. 1337.
E.A. Lowe, ‘The Script of Luxeuil: a Title Vindicated’, Revue Benedictine, 63 (1953) pp. 132–42, reprinted in his Paleographical Papers (2 vols, Oxford, 1972), II, pp. 389–98.
B. Bischoff and V. Brown, ‘Addenda to Codices Latini Antiquiores’, Mediaeval Studies, 47 (1985), pp. 317–66 at 359.
R. McKitterick, ‘The scriptoria of Merovingian Gaul: a survey of the evidence’, in Columbanus and Merovingian Monasticism, ed. by H.B. Clarke and M. Brennan (Oxford 1981), pp. 173–207, esp. 184–92; reprinted in R. McKitterick, Books, Scribes, and Learning in the Frankish Kingdoms, 6th–9th Centuries (Brookfield, VT, 1994).
D. Ganz, ‘The Luxeuil Prophets and Merovingian Missionary Strategies’, Yale University Library Gazette, XLVI, Supplement: Beinecke Studies in Early Manuscripts (1991), pp.105–17, citing the present leaves throughout.
R. Babcock, ‘The Luxeuil Prophets and the Gallican Liturgy’, Scriptorium, 47 (1993), pp. 52–55.
F. Heinzer, ‘Die Neuen Standorte der ehemals Donaueschinger Handschriftensammlung', Scriptorium, 69 (1995), pp. 312–19 at 318 and n. 23 (‘Deutscher Privatbesitz’).
D. Ganz, ‘Texts and Scripts in Surviving Manuscripts in the Script of Luxeuil’, in Ireland and Europe in the Early Middle Ages: Texts and Transmissions, ed. by P.N. Chatháin and M. Richter (Dublin, 2001), pp. 186–203.
B. B. Tewes, Die Handschriften der Schule von Luxeuil: Kunst und Ikonographie eines frühmittelalterlichen Skriptoriums (Wiesbaden, 2011), pp. 137–140 (citing the present leaf as ‘Bern Privatbesitz’).
D. Ganz, ‘L’écriture mérovingienne de Luxeuil: développement ou pluralités?’, Les Cahiers colombaniens (2016), pp. 46–59 at 47, 50, 54, and 59.
P. Cherubini, ‘Luxeuil’, in The Oxford Handbook of Latin Palaeography, ed. by F. Coulson and R. Babcock (Oxford, 2021), pp. 185–92.
L. Nees, ‘Illuminated Manuscripts from Luxeuil and Bobbio’, in Illuminating the Word in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2023), pp. 228–350 at 253, 284, 286, 300.
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