Collection ID: 0002 | Metadata type: TEI | TEI XML | Data

Title

Passion of Christ and apocryphal stories, including translations from the Nicodemus Gospel

Other related names

• Martini, Giuseppe, 1870-1944, former owner

Call number

Oversize Ms. Codex 340
(3420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6206., University of Pennsylvania, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts)

Alternate identifiers

• bibid: 9915809713503681
• http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/122614688
• http://hdl.library.upenn.edu/1017/d/medren/1580971

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania

Language

Italian

Origin

Date

between 1450 and 1499

Place

Lombardy

Summary

Anonymous Italian version of the Passion story told according to the Gospels. In the later portion there are many miraculous stories based on apocryphal literature, such as the Gospels of Peter and Nicodemus. End appears to be missing. This is a devotional work evidently intended for lay people. The story of the resuscitation of the two young men, for which the source is the Nicodemus Gospel, is of particular interest because it shows what could happen when an apocryphal legend was transformed into a popular novel. In the early Christian Latin text, the two men who report what they saw in the Inferno have appropriate Roman names, Carinus and Lucius. Here they are Rainero and Lenzo. The spurious letter of Pilate to the Emperor Claudius, in which he apologizes for his role in the crucifixion, is fairly exactly translated from the Nicodemus Gospel.

Notes

• Ms. codex.
   
• Title supplied by cataloger (Zacour-Hirsch).
   
• Incipit (f. 1r): Aprosimando la festa de la pasqua ...
   
• Blank folio at beginning and several folios at end appear to be missing. This manuscript was once part of a larger volume.
   
• Some leaves soft and fragile; edges worn and fraying. Leaves stained. Various smudges. Some red and blue initials wearing through the paper.
   
• Bookseller's description (H. P. Kraus) on file in the Library.
   
• This text is apparently unpublished.
   

Extent

69 leaves : 290 x 210 (180 x 110) mm. bound to 297 x 207 mm

Foliation

Paper, i (modern paper) + 69 + i (modern paper); 48-116; contemporary foliation in ink, bottom center recto; modern foliation in pencil, upper right recto.

Support

Paper.

Binding

Modern half vellum.

Layout

Written in 33 long lines; ruled in drypoint.

Script

Written in a single cultivated humanist hand. A few notes on f. 69v in a later hand.

Provenance

• Sold from the collection of Giuseppe Martini to H. P. Kraus, ca. 1948.
   
• Appears in H. P. Kraus's list 189 (1956), no. 208.
   
• Sold by H. P. Kraus, 1960.
   

Subjects topical

• Catholic Church--Discipline
• Christian literature, Early
• Devotional literature, Italian--Early works to 1800
• Italian literature--Early works to 1800
• Spirituality--Catholic Church

Genres

• Codices
• Manuscripts, Italian--15th century
• Manuscripts, Medieval
• Manuscripts, Renaissance

Keywords

• 15th century
• Christian
• Italy
• Devotion
• Paper

Licenses

• Text

  These images and the content of Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts Oversize Ms. Codex 340: Passion of Christ and apocryphal stories, including translations from the Nicodemus Gospel are free of known copyright restrictions and in the public domain. See the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark page for usage details, http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/.

  URL

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• Text

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  URL

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