Ɵ Three cuttings from an exceptionally early manuscript of Paul the Deacon's Homiliary, in Latin, on parchment [Rhineland, late eighth or early ninth century]

Two near complete leaves (each trimmed at head or foot with loss of a line or so there) and another cutting of a single column (again trimmed at foot with similar loss), these bound in slightly erratic order (should be in order leaf 1+3 [with consecutive text and probably once a bifolium], followed by leaf 2), ruled in blind for a single column of up to 22 lines in a splendid early Carolingian minuscule, using the et-ligature integrally within words, an nt-ligature, dotted 'y' and both open and closed 'g', first leaf with a single red rubric and a simple penwork initial of red designs over brown grounds, the second cutting with an apparent gathering letter 'h' at the foot of its verso, a few words on first leaf copied over by later hand, all recovered from a later binding and hence with pentrials and scrawls, scuffs, tears and losses to edges, folds and small stains, overall in presentable condition, 220 by 190mm., 190 by 182mm. and 219 by 95mm.; together in cloth-covered binding

This text is one of the fundamental building blocks of the Carolingian renaissance, as important as the tours bible or the Carolingian glossed psalter, and these leaves offered here are the earliest recorded examples, perhaps written during the lifetime of the author and almost certainly within the lifetime of Charlemagne

Provenance:
1. Written in a Rhineland scriptorium (identification by Bischoff, his letter to Rosenthal of 22 July 1988 included), by a scribe apparently working at the dawn of the Carolingian script revolution (see below). Later reused in a binding.

2. Bernard Rosenthal (1920-2017) of California, his I/248 and I/249.

3. Quaritch cat. 1088 (1988), no. 1, sold to Martin Schøyen (his MS. 83) and thereafter kept in his London library.

Text:
The Homiliary of Paul the Deacon (c. 720-99; also known as Paul Warnefrid) formed an important part of the revival of Christian learning under Charlemagne from the 780s onwards. This 'renovatio' was a process driven by books and reading, and thus careful correction and compilation was needed to enable the European populace to correctly follow the Christian path. The Admonitio generalis of 789 called for the careful correction of the Psalms, the songs, the Calendar and the Catholic books, 'because often some desire to pray to God properly, but they pray badly because of faulty books', and the Bible came into a stable form under Alcuin in Tours and was disseminated from there with the support and backing of the Carolingian court. However, while these were correction campaigns, the work of Paul the Deacon was different and far greater in scope - an attempt to compile a homiliary that would replace the clutter of previous efforts (for comment on these see our sale, 7 December 2021, lot 14). Its scope was grand and stemmed from Charlemagne himself, who commended Paul in a letter for the task of having 'read through the treatises and sermons of the various Catholic Fathers, culled all the best things and offered us two volumes of readings, suitable for each separate festival throughout the whole course of the year and free from errors'. It was of fundamental importance to the Carolingian renaissance, and remained so for much of the Middle Ages.

These leaves are the earliest recorded witness to this crucial text, perhaps even written within the lifetime of the compiler, and almost certainly during the lifetime of Charlemagne and the intellectual hustle and bustle of the early Carolingian revival. The most recent and comprehensive study of the text is that of Z. Guiliano, The Homiliary of Paul the Deacon, 2021, where he lists some twenty seven codices definitively of the ninth century, and a further nineteen fragments, none of which date as early as the present leaves (see his handlist of manuscript witnesses on pp. 269-76, where only Freiburg im Breisgau, Universitätsbibliothek Hs. 483.6 is dated to s. ixinc, but this elsewhere dated to the second quarter of the ninth century). Bischoff identified these leaves as from einem sehr guten rheinischen Skriptorium, placing them in the region to the immediate east of Aachen and Charlemagne's court, and we might speculate that these leaves were once part of a codex used by the court-scholars and just perhaps Charlemagne himself.

Alongside the fragment of a Tours Bible sold in the Schøyen sale at Sotheby's 10 July 2012 (lot 28, realising £25,000 hammer), the cutting from a Carolingian Glossed Psalter sold in the same sale (lot 30, realising £28,000 hammer), and just perhaps the leaf with the Admontio generalis of 789 sold in our rooms on 6 July 2017 (lot 1, realising £36,000 hammer), the present leaves are the most important witnesses to the early Carolingian renaissance to come to the market in living memory.

The scribe:
The three leaves here were originally given two inventory numbers by Rosenthal, and on first glance they appear to be by two different scribes. The first and third leaves here have continuous text and probably were once a bifolium. These leaves have an early, but more mature, version of Carolingian minuscule with a closed 'g', only one occurrence of a nt-ligature and a notably round and tall et-ligature. The second leaf here, which comes from later in the parent volume, is most probably in the same hand (with a shared 'z', a dotted 'y' and use of uncial N within words), but has more pre-Carolingian features, such as frequent use of the nt-ligature, an exclusively open 'g' and a more angular et-ligature. All three leaves were ruled using the same ruling pattern. Unless we are looking at two scribes trained in the same scriptorium with hands so close as to be occasionally mistaken for each other, then this appears to be the work of a scribe who had learned the new Carolingian minuscule, and was on his 'best behaviour' on the first and third leaves here, as he began a new section, but later in the same book slipped back into older forms of letters. If correct, then this is a valuable paleographic record of the arrival of Carolingian minuscule and the practicalities of the adoption of it in its earliest years.

A theta symbol (Ɵ) indicates that the lot is a zero rated item and therefore not subject to VAT on the buyer’s premium. This applies to bound books (manuscripts and printed), unframed maps and albums.