Lycophron's Alexandra (Cambridge, University Library, MS Dd.6.84)
The manuscript contains Lycophron's Alexandra (3rd c. BCE), a poem in iambic trimeters characterized by laboured style and obscure vocabulary, which enjoyed a great success in antiquity and Byzantine times chiefly because of its use in education.
The text is accompanied by a synoptic Latin translation, by the classical scholar Willem Canter (1542-1575), and a summary of the text in poetry (Epitome) with a Latin translation by the same author.
The manuscript has been copied by a non-Greek person. Considering the texts, it was probably copied from a printed edition. Three editions of the 16th-17th c. contain the Greek text of the poem alongside with Canter's translation and Epitome: the edition by Oporinus (Basel 1566), Commelin (Heidelberg 1596) and Paul Estienne (Geneva 1601).
The scribe, probably to be placed in the 17th century, possibly copied the text for study purposes.
Dr Erika Elia
Information about this document
- Physical Location: Cambridge University Library
- Classmark: Cambridge, University Library, MS Dd.6.84
- Alternative Identifier(s): Diktyon 12163
- Subject(s): Lycophron. Alexandra
- Date of Creation: in the first half of the 17th century
- Language(s): in Greek and Latin
- Extent: Codex 2 + 74, Leaf height: 140 mm, width: 90 mm.
- Collation:
The manuscript consists of 9 quaternions and a final quire of 5 leaves, whose structure is difficult to determine. The quires have been sewn very tightly and there is no numbering.
- Quires 1-98 pp. i-142
- Quire 10 pp. 143-152
- Material: pp. i-152 Western paper, folded in octavo. Watermark: Two columns, with clover and spirals, surmounted by grapes ( Watermark height: ca. 68 mm, width: ca. 46 mm. ) in the upper or lower part of the leaf, cut, near the gutter, comparable to a group of watermarks ( it is not possible to see the complete watermark in the manuscript), present in the repository Gravell Watermark Archive, as e.g. COL.053.1 (1387) of 1651, and COL.075.1 (1942) of 1631, dated in the first half of th 17th c..
- Format: Codex
- Condition: The codex is in good condition. Humidity has made the ink smudge in some pages, but the text is readable (see e.g. pp. 59, 65, 68). Paper strips have been glued on the leaves at pp. 8, 69, 144, apparently in order to substitute the text written below. There are tears at pp. [20], 151). Scribbles in pencil are present at p. ii and on the right pastedown.
- Binding:
Modern western full leather binding over couched-laminate boards. Tooled borders on both boards, traces of green in the edges. Rebacked, with gold tooled shelfmark. Earlier leather labels with shelfmark are glued on the right pastedown.
Binding height: 150 mm, width: 101 mm, depth: 21 mm.
- Script:
Both Greek and Latin texts are written by the same western European hand. As the Latin one, the Greek handwriting is characterised by chiaroscuro effects. The Greek script is a minuscule; vertical and diagonal strokes tend to be rounded or sinuous, some forms are traced rigidly, and in general the ductus is slow. The handwriting can be dated to the 17th century.
The text is written in brown ink.
The scribe also wrote some scholia in the margins.
- Foliation:
The leaves are paginated i-iv, 1-152 in the top right hand corner recto and in the top left hand corner verso. The numbers 1-145 are in brown ink, original to the production of the manuscript. The numbers i-iv, 147-152 are later, in pencil, in Arabic numerals; pp. [19], [20], [146], [148] and [150] are not numbered: i-iv + 118 + [19] + [20] + 21-145 + [146] + 147 + [148] + 149 + [150] + 151-152
- Layout: pp. 1-145 The layout is not regular. One single column of 15-25 lines (mostly 20). Written height: 125-135 mm, width: 80 mm. On pp. 1-7 the Greek and Latin text alternate in the same page; from p. 8 the Greek text is written on the left page, the Latin translation on the right. pp. [146]-152 Two columns, 25 lines. Written height: 130 mm, width: 80 mm.
- Additions:
At p. i the main scribe wrote pen-trials and random annotations: " Die Martis | Key | Pitts 39 | Tucker" (the last word is repeated several times), "S. Conduit", "the foolish", "[JCuno/JPune]"
At p. 1 he writes a brief note about how Helena is said by Lycophron to be τριάνωρ : " Helena a Lycophrone dicitur τριάνωρ quod Theseo Menelao Paridi nupsisset", then there is a reference to Scaliger (who published a translation of the Alexandra), now difficult to read, and a reference to the page of this manuscript, where the passage concerning this definition is to be found (p. 82)
- Origin:
The text was copied probably in the first half of the 17th century by a non-Greek person, probably a scholar, from a printed edition of the 16th-17th century.
- Acquisition: On the left pastedown is glued the engraved bookplate made by John Pine for the Royal Library (1737). The manuscript should therefore have been presented to the University Library in 1715 by George I.
- Funding: The Polonsky Foundation
- Data Source(s): Description (2019) draws partly on A catalogue of the Manuscripts preserved in the Library of the University of Cambridge, vol. 1, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1856, pp. 316-317.
- Author(s) of the Record: Erika Elia
- Bibliography:A catalogue of the manuscripts preserved in the library of the University of Cambridge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1856) 1: Dd.
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- Physical Location: Cambridge University Library
- Classmark: Cambridge, University Library, MS Dd.6.84
- Alternative Identifier(s): Diktyon 12163
- Subject(s): Lycophron. Alexandra
- Date of Creation: in the first half of the 17th century
- Language(s): in Greek and Latin
- Extent: Codex 2 + 74, Leaf height: 140 mm, width: 90 mm.
- Collation:
The manuscript consists of 9 quaternions and a final quire of 5 leaves, whose structure is difficult to determine. The quires have been sewn very tightly and there is no numbering.
- Quires 1-98 pp. i-142
- Quire 10 pp. 143-152
- Material: pp. i-152 Western paper, folded in octavo. Watermark: Two columns, with clover and spirals, surmounted by grapes ( Watermark height: ca. 68 mm, width: ca. 46 mm. ) in the upper or lower part of the leaf, cut, near the gutter, comparable to a group of watermarks ( it is not possible to see the complete watermark in the manuscript), present in the repository Gravell Watermark Archive, as e.g. COL.053.1 (1387) of 1651, and COL.075.1 (1942) of 1631, dated in the first half of th 17th c..
- Format: Codex
- Condition: The codex is in good condition. Humidity has made the ink smudge in some pages, but the text is readable (see e.g. pp. 59, 65, 68). Paper strips have been glued on the leaves at pp. 8, 69, 144, apparently in order to substitute the text written below. There are tears at pp. [20], 151). Scribbles in pencil are present at p. ii and on the right pastedown.
- Binding:
Modern western full leather binding over couched-laminate boards. Tooled borders on both boards, traces of green in the edges. Rebacked, with gold tooled shelfmark. Earlier leather labels with shelfmark are glued on the right pastedown.
Binding height: 150 mm, width: 101 mm, depth: 21 mm.
- Script:
Both Greek and Latin texts are written by the same western European hand. As the Latin one, the Greek handwriting is characterised by chiaroscuro effects. The Greek script is a minuscule; vertical and diagonal strokes tend to be rounded or sinuous, some forms are traced rigidly, and in general the ductus is slow. The handwriting can be dated to the 17th century.
The text is written in brown ink.
The scribe also wrote some scholia in the margins.
- Foliation:
The leaves are paginated i-iv, 1-152 in the top right hand corner recto and in the top left hand corner verso. The numbers 1-145 are in brown ink, original to the production of the manuscript. The numbers i-iv, 147-152 are later, in pencil, in Arabic numerals; pp. [19], [20], [146], [148] and [150] are not numbered: i-iv + 118 + [19] + [20] + 21-145 + [146] + 147 + [148] + 149 + [150] + 151-152
- Layout: pp. 1-145 The layout is not regular. One single column of 15-25 lines (mostly 20). Written height: 125-135 mm, width: 80 mm. On pp. 1-7 the Greek and Latin text alternate in the same page; from p. 8 the Greek text is written on the left page, the Latin translation on the right. pp. [146]-152 Two columns, 25 lines. Written height: 130 mm, width: 80 mm.
- Additions:
At p. i the main scribe wrote pen-trials and random annotations: " Die Martis | Key | Pitts 39 | Tucker" (the last word is repeated several times), "S. Conduit", "the foolish", "[JCuno/JPune]"
At p. 1 he writes a brief note about how Helena is said by Lycophron to be τριάνωρ : " Helena a Lycophrone dicitur τριάνωρ quod Theseo Menelao Paridi nupsisset", then there is a reference to Scaliger (who published a translation of the Alexandra), now difficult to read, and a reference to the page of this manuscript, where the passage concerning this definition is to be found (p. 82)
- Origin:
The text was copied probably in the first half of the 17th century by a non-Greek person, probably a scholar, from a printed edition of the 16th-17th century.
- Acquisition: On the left pastedown is glued the engraved bookplate made by John Pine for the Royal Library (1737). The manuscript should therefore have been presented to the University Library in 1715 by George I.
- Funding: The Polonsky Foundation
- Data Source(s): Description (2019) draws partly on A catalogue of the Manuscripts preserved in the Library of the University of Cambridge, vol. 1, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1856, pp. 316-317.
- Author(s) of the Record: Erika Elia
- Bibliography:A catalogue of the manuscripts preserved in the library of the University of Cambridge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1856) 1: Dd.
- Title: Lycophron's Alexandra with Latin translation by W. Canter
- Descriptive Title(s): Lycophron's Alexandra with Latin translation by W. Canter
- Title: Translation in Latin of Lycophron's Alexandra
- Descriptive Title(s): Translation in Latin of Lycophron's Alexandra
- Associated Name(s): Canter, Willem, 1542-1575
- Title: Epitome of Lycophron's Alexandra, Greek and Latin
- Author(s): Canter, Willem, 1542-1575
- Note(s): The Greek and Latin text are presented in parallel on two columns in the same leaf: the Greek text is written in the left column, the Latin text in the right one.
- Excerpts:Rubric: p. [146] Epitome Cassandrae Graecolatina versibus Anacreontiis conscripta per Gulielmum Canterum Ultr.
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