![TERENCE, Andria, in Humanistic script written by Giuliano di Antonio of Prato, in Latin, manuscript on vellum [Italy, Florence, c.1450-60]](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2019/CKS/2019_CKS_18152_0456_001(terence_andria_in_humanistic_script_written_by_giuliano_di_antonio_of060001).jpg?w=1)
![TERENCE, Andria, in Humanistic script written by Giuliano di Antonio of Prato, in Latin, manuscript on vellum [Italy, Florence, c.1450-60]](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2019/CKS/2019_CKS_18152_0456_000(terence_andria_in_humanistic_script_written_by_giuliano_di_antonio_of055951).jpg?w=1)
Details
TERENCE, Andria, in Humanistic script written by Giuliano di Antonio of Prato, in Latin, manuscript on vellum [Italy, Florence, c.1450-60]
Fine Humanistic script by a documented Florentine scribe, on a leaf from a classical text by the great Roman playwright Publius Terentius Afer.
A single leaf, c.250×175mm, blind-ruled for 30 lines written below top line, in verse, in a fine Humanistic minuscule, ruled space c.170×115mm, rubrics in Square Capitals, decorated with three three-line initials in blue (with a vertical pleat and some dark staining at the fore-edge, overall in fair condition). Bound in grey buckram by Bøthuns Bokverksted, Tønsberg, Norway, 2018.
Provenance:
(1) Written in Florence, c.1450–60; the script was first attributed by A.C. de la Mare to the Florentine scribe ‘Messer Marco’, but she later revised this opinion and attributed it to the accomplished scribe Giuliano di Antonio of Prato (see L.L. Brownrigg and M.M. Smith, eds., Interpreting and Collecting Fragments of Medieval Books, 2000, at p.57).
(2) A leaf now at Rutgers University is inscribed with the 15th/16th-century name ‘Petrus Colom’(?).
(3) The incomplete parent volume of 103 leaves was sold at Sotheby’s, 28 May 1934, lot 100, bought by Marks (of 84 Charing Cross Road fame), presumably on behalf of:
(4) Dawson’s, Los Angeles bookdealers, from whom it was bought in 1935 by:
(5) Otto Ege (d.1951), of Cleveland (see de Ricci, Census, II, 1937, p.1947 no 65; S. Gwara, Otto Ege’s Manuscripts, 2013, Handlist no.78), broken-up (and apparently shared with Phillip Duschnes) by September 1936. The present leaf:
(6) Bruce Ferrini (d.2010), with his pencil annotation ‘VM5474’.
(7) Bernard Quaritch, cat. 1088 (1988), no 90.
(8) Schøyen Collection, MS 648.
Seven leaves remaining in the Ege estate were sold at Sotheby's, 26 November 1985, lot 78, bought by Quaritch, the source of some or all of the leaves sold by them in their catalogues 1088 (no 90), 1147 (no 117), 1270 (no 124), and 1422 (no 92). J. Boffey and A.S.G. Edwards, Medieval Manuscripts […] at the University of Colorado at Boulder, 2002, pp.60–61, describe five leaves at Boulder (Hayes 9) and list a dozen others, including single leaves at Vassar, Rutgers, and Columbia Universities, and Sweet Briar College.
Text:
Terence (c.190-159 B.C.) was one of the great early Roman comic playwrights. Only six of his comedies survive, and they establish him as a thoughtful writer focused on careful characterisation and subtle comedy, less topical and slapstick than his contemporary rival Plautus. Adapted from a Greek play by Menander, Andria was Terence's first play to be presented publicly and is rife with the kind of plot twists, mistaken identities, and dei ex machina that would so influence later playwrights like Molière. It became the first of Terence's plays to be performed post-antiquity, in Florence in 1476, a little more than a decade after the present manuscript was produced. The text here comprises Andria, I.3.16–I.5.43 (‘civem Atticam esse hanc […] inhumanum aut ferum’)
Script:
This is an extremely regular script, similar to ‘Roman’ printing type, and thus easily legible to modern readers. The letter ‘i’ is always dotted to avoid confusion with adjacent minims, letters are kept separate and do not fuse (even ‘pp’: see ‘opprimat’, line 7), letters with ascenders or descenders are considerably taller than others, and the only ligature is the elegantly ‘ct’.
Fine Humanistic script by a documented Florentine scribe, on a leaf from a classical text by the great Roman playwright Publius Terentius Afer.
A single leaf, c.250×175mm, blind-ruled for 30 lines written below top line, in verse, in a fine Humanistic minuscule, ruled space c.170×115mm, rubrics in Square Capitals, decorated with three three-line initials in blue (with a vertical pleat and some dark staining at the fore-edge, overall in fair condition). Bound in grey buckram by Bøthuns Bokverksted, Tønsberg, Norway, 2018.
Provenance:
(1) Written in Florence, c.1450–60; the script was first attributed by A.C. de la Mare to the Florentine scribe ‘Messer Marco’, but she later revised this opinion and attributed it to the accomplished scribe Giuliano di Antonio of Prato (see L.L. Brownrigg and M.M. Smith, eds., Interpreting and Collecting Fragments of Medieval Books, 2000, at p.57).
(2) A leaf now at Rutgers University is inscribed with the 15th/16th-century name ‘Petrus Colom’(?).
(3) The incomplete parent volume of 103 leaves was sold at Sotheby’s, 28 May 1934, lot 100, bought by Marks (of 84 Charing Cross Road fame), presumably on behalf of:
(4) Dawson’s, Los Angeles bookdealers, from whom it was bought in 1935 by:
(5) Otto Ege (d.1951), of Cleveland (see de Ricci, Census, II, 1937, p.1947 no 65; S. Gwara, Otto Ege’s Manuscripts, 2013, Handlist no.78), broken-up (and apparently shared with Phillip Duschnes) by September 1936. The present leaf:
(6) Bruce Ferrini (d.2010), with his pencil annotation ‘VM5474’.
(7) Bernard Quaritch, cat. 1088 (1988), no 90.
(8) Schøyen Collection, MS 648.
Seven leaves remaining in the Ege estate were sold at Sotheby's, 26 November 1985, lot 78, bought by Quaritch, the source of some or all of the leaves sold by them in their catalogues 1088 (no 90), 1147 (no 117), 1270 (no 124), and 1422 (no 92). J. Boffey and A.S.G. Edwards, Medieval Manuscripts […] at the University of Colorado at Boulder, 2002, pp.60–61, describe five leaves at Boulder (Hayes 9) and list a dozen others, including single leaves at Vassar, Rutgers, and Columbia Universities, and Sweet Briar College.
Text:
Terence (c.190-159 B.C.) was one of the great early Roman comic playwrights. Only six of his comedies survive, and they establish him as a thoughtful writer focused on careful characterisation and subtle comedy, less topical and slapstick than his contemporary rival Plautus. Adapted from a Greek play by Menander, Andria was Terence's first play to be presented publicly and is rife with the kind of plot twists, mistaken identities, and dei ex machina that would so influence later playwrights like Molière. It became the first of Terence's plays to be performed post-antiquity, in Florence in 1476, a little more than a decade after the present manuscript was produced. The text here comprises Andria, I.3.16–I.5.43 (‘civem Atticam esse hanc […] inhumanum aut ferum’)
Script:
This is an extremely regular script, similar to ‘Roman’ printing type, and thus easily legible to modern readers. The letter ‘i’ is always dotted to avoid confusion with adjacent minims, letters are kept separate and do not fuse (even ‘pp’: see ‘opprimat’, line 7), letters with ascenders or descenders are considerably taller than others, and the only ligature is the elegantly ‘ct’.
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