A copy of the grammar textbook De grammatica, composed as a dialogue between the two pupils Saxo and Franco, by Alcuin of York (d. 804), produced during the first half of the 9th century at the cloister of St. Martin at Tours, acquired by St. Gall during the 9th century.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
Educational manuscript from the monastery of St. Gall, produced in the second half of the 9th century, contains Alcuin's De dialectica, selections from works by Cassiodorus and Augustine, assorted glossaries and explications of the Bible and of grammatical terms, as well as a Runic alphabet: the famous St. Gallen Isruna-Traktat (on page 52).
Online Since: 12/09/2008
This composite manuscript from the 9th century was probably produced in Tours. It contains various theological works by Alcuin of York (around 730-804): De virtutibus et vitiis; De fide sanctae et individuae trinitatis; De trinitate et ad Fredegisum quaestiones XXVIII; De animae ratione ad Eulaliam virginem. Also included in the manuscript are the Epitaphium Alcuini (carm. 123) and Alcuin's Carmen 112 Dum sedeas laetus (an inscription for an unknown abbey church), which has been preserved only in this manuscript. On p. 245 there is a brief historical note regarding Charlemagne's Divisio Regnorum from 806. This note is written in the same hand as Alcuin's Carmen 112 and contains a reference to the date of the writing: Anno dcccvi ab incarnatione domini indictione xiiii anno xxxviii regnante karolo imperatore viii idus februarii die veneris divisum est regnum illius iter filiis suis quantum unusquis post illum habet et ego alia die hoc opus perfeci. On p. 247 there is a pen trial of the antiphon Quid vobis videtur de Christo? Cuius filius est? (Hesbert, Corpus antiphonalium officii, no. 4533), the first four words of which are marked with neumes.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
The manuscript consists of two codices bound together (p. 1-149 and 150-279). The first part dates from the second half of the 9th century, the second from the middle of the 9th century. The volume was privately owned by the St. Gall Abbot Grimald (841-872); however, it was probably written not in St. Gall, but at least in part at a scriptorium in the southern region of Germany. It contains various works by Alcuin of York (about 730-804): De fide sanctae et individuae trinitatis; De trinitate et ad Fredegisum quaestiones XXVIII; De animae ratione ad Eulaliam virginem; Dialogus de rhetorica et de virtutibus (with diagrams p. 210-217); De Dialectica (with diagram p. 270). The codex further contains excerpts (chapters 2-11) from De perfectione iustitiae hominis by the Church Father Augustine (in the codex under the titel Adnotatio interrogationum caelesti pelagiani et responsionum sancti augustini). On p. 148 there is a 13th century pen trial of the alleluia Conversus Iesus ad mariam dixit ei fides tua te salvum fecit vade in pace (with neumes); on p. 218 (11th/12th century) the antiphon Conspicit in celis mens prudens Ezechielis (with neumes) as well as the responsorium Martir sancta dei quae flagrans igne fidei (without neumes). On p. 271 there is the figure of a man with sword and shield etched with a stylus; an almost identical figure can be found in Cod. Sang. 175, p. 356 (there as a pen sketch).
Online Since: 12/20/2012
This is an unadorned copy, significant in terms of textual history, of the De ecclesiasticis officiis libri IV (also referred to as Liber officialis) by liturgist and Archbishop Amalarius of Metz († around 850); it was written at the monastery ofSt. Gall around 820, probably under Deputy-Abbot and Abbot Hartmut (872-883). Between book 3 and book 4, inserted on pages 349 to 361, the manuscript contains five letters by Amalarius of Metz to various addressees.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
Copy of the first part of the work Collectanea ex Augustino in epistolas Pauli, a compilation of works by the church fathers (mainly those of Augustine) by the scholar Deacon Florus of Lyon († about 860), produced in the second half of the 9th century in the monastery of St. Gall, with numerous glosses written by the monk Ekkehart IV. (about 980 - 1060) in the 11th century. This volume includes commentaries on the Epistle of Paul to the Romans.
Online Since: 12/23/2008
Copy of the Collectanea ex Augustino in epistolas Pauli, combined from works by the early Church fathers (especially Augustine) by the scholar Deacon Florus of Lyon († about 860), produced under Abbot Hartmut (872-883) in the monastery of St. Gall, with numerous glosses by the St. St. Gall monk Ekkehart IV. (about 980 -1060). This volume includes the commentaries on the two Epistles of Paul to the Thessalonians, on the two Epistles to Timothy, and on the Letter to the Hebrews.
Online Since: 12/23/2008
A copy of the commentary of Hrabanus Maurus on the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; also called the five books of Moses), produced in the 9th century in the abbey of St. Gall, with a scribe's verses at the end: "Accipe nunc demum scripturam..."
Online Since: 12/23/2008
A copy of the work De institutione clericorum (On the institution of the clergy) by Hrabanus Maurus, most likely produced in 850 in the Cloister of St. Emmeram in Regensburg and probably obtained by Abbot Grimald (841-872), who was also Ludwig the German's royal chaplain. The manuscript also contains a letter from Charlemagne to Alcuin from 798 as well as Canon 145 of the Synod of Aachen in 816.
Online Since: 12/23/2008
The manuscript consists of two codices bound together (part 1: pp. 1-198; part 2: pp. 199-210), written by several hands. At least the first, older part was probably produced in St. Gall. It contains various various glossaries (Latin-Latin as well as Latin-Old High German) of the Bible, of hagiographic texts (Abdias, Historica Apostolica; Sulpicius Severus, Vita S. Martini), grammatical works (Priscian, Institutio de arte grammatica; Donat, Ars grammatica), and writings by Christian authors (Prudentius; Sedulius; Sedulius Scottus, De greca), furthermore glossaries of herbs, a medical paper, and an incomplete astronomical treatise.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
Latin biblical glossary (Latin terms explained in Latin), written in a Carolingian minuscule script in about 900, probably in the Abbey of St. Gall. There are numerous quill tests at the beginning and the end of the glossary.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
Manuscript of collected texts, includes two Bible glossaries, a Psalter glossary, and a directory explaining Hebrew and Greek names, produced in about 900 at the Abbey of St. Gall.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
A three-part composite manuscript containing texts from the 9th century: (1) Canons from the collection of the diocese of Mainz under Hrabanus Maurus, (2) a Biblical glossary, (3) a copy of the Synonyma by Isidore of Seville. Part 1 was apparently produced in Mainz (in about 850), the other two parts at the Abbey of St. Gall.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
Compilation of various types of glossaries: Biblical glossaries, glossaries of texts by Church Fathers (such as the Letter of Jerome to Marcella or Pope Gregory the Great's homilies on the Gospels). A Latin word from the respective text is followed by a Latin explanation or by a vernacular (Alemannic) translation. The manuscript also contains glossaries of technical terms (such as of the canons, of birds, fish, medicine, kinship terms). These glossaries, which were compiled by several monks from the monastery of St. Gall in the second half of the 9th century, are among the oldest records of the German language. The majority of the parchment pages in the first half of the manuscript are damaged at the top edge.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
Copies of the Ambrosiaster (commentaries by a Pseudo-Ambrosius on the letters of the apostle Paul), produced in the second half of the 9th century at the Abbey of St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
German language lectionary with the Epistles and Gospel readings according to the Church year (Proprium de tempore; Proprium de sanctis and Commune sanctorum) from the Dominican Cloister of St. Katharina in St. Gall, copied in the year 1483 from a model belonging to the Cloister of St. Katherine in Nurnberg by Elisabeth Muntprat, one of the convent's most diligent scribes. Texts from the manuscript were read aloud during the Dominican nuns' meals. Several colored woodcuts are pasted into the manuscript, which came to the Abbey Library of St. Gall around 1780.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
The manuscript contains principally the chants for the liturgy of the Hours (response and antiphones), and also some chants of the Ordinary (in a part with tropes), hymns, and sequences, and spiritual chants in Latin and German. In all, six chants (p. 87-89, 103, 107) are for two or three voices. In this case, the voices are not noted one under another, but one after another. The spiritual chants are written with a mensural notation, and the other liturgical pieces in German plainsong notation, the so-called German “Hufnagelnotation”.
Online Since: 12/19/2011
The Liber Benedictionum by Ekkehard IV.: a collection of his personal poetic works that he probably began during his time as a monastery pupil and constantly revised until the end of his life. The manuscript is written completely by Ekkehard IV. and is one of the few known autographs of the early Middle Ages (ca. 1010-1060). It contains, among other items, the Benedictiones super lectores per circulum anni (poetry for the different feast days of the year), the Benedictiones ad mensas (benedictions of different foods and drinks), the Versus ad picturas domus domini Mogontinae (verses on the projected picture series for the Cathedral of Mainz), Versus ad picturas claustri sancti Galli (verses for the [projected] picture series for the cloister [?] in the monastery of St. Gall) and the Latin translation of the Old High German Galluslied by Ratpert.
Online Since: 06/12/2006
Personal reference handbook (vade mecum) of Grimald of St. Gall (Abbot 841-872). This manuscript collection contains items of poetic, liturgical, computational, natural scientific, and historical content, including a calendar, an horology table (orologium), word explanations and definitions from various fields of knowledge, the names of the nymphs and muses, and a provincial directory for the area of St. Gall. About 40 different scribes added texts to this manuscript.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
146 sermons from Easter to the last Sunday after Pentecost.
Online Since: 06/12/2006
Ritual for the personal use of Prince-Abbot of St. Gall Diethelm Blarer (1530−1564; cf. his coat of arms on p. 8 and the stamp for his personal library on p. 7); written by the St. Gall monk Heinrich Keller (1518−1567) and illustrated around 1555 by an unknown illuminator from the area of Lake Constance. The St. Gall manuscripts Cod. Sang. 357 and Cod. Sang. 439 were illuminated by this same artist at the same time. The small-format volume contains liturgical texts on the administration of the sacrament of baptism (pp. 9-107), on the readmission of a woman into the circle of believers after giving birth (pp. 107-114), on marriage (pp. 114-141), as well as on the distribution of wine on October 16th, the feast day of Saint Gall, the founder of St. Gall (pp. 144a-154).
Online Since: 09/23/2014
The book was written in 1541 by the St. Gall calligrapher and cathedral organist Fridolin Sicher (1490–1546). Organized according to the ecclesiastical calendar, this volume contains German-language instructions for the preparation of the altars and ceremonies of the St. Gallen Monastery on the individual Sundays and holidays. In addition, it offers an alphabetical listing of all the altars in the post-Reformation monastery district of St. Gall. At that time, the duties of a sacristan were in the hands of a lay brother, who cleaned the church, lit the candles and monitored them while they burned, and rang the church bells (hence the name "Läuterbuch").
Online Since: 10/07/2013
Meant for daily use in the chapter office, this volume was written in 1542/43 by the secular cleric Fridolin Sicher (1490−1546), born in Bischofszell, for St. Gall Prince-Abbot Diethelm Blarer (1530−1564; cf. his coat of arms on p. 5 and p. 8 as well as p. 268); later the volume came into the possession of the monastic community of St. Gall. Before as well as after the Reformation, Fridolin Sicher was cathedral organist and calligrapher for St. Gall Abbey. In the front of the volume there is a Latin copy of the Rule of Saint Benedict (pp. 5-72), followed in the later part by an abridged version, consolidated into a single draft, of the Martyrologium Romanum and a necrology related to St. Gall Abbey (pp. 83-267). Under Prince-Abbot Bernhard Müller (1594−1630), this chapter office book was replaced with a new necrology begun in 1611 (cf. Cod. Sang. 1442) that no longer contained the Rule of Saint Benedict.
Online Since: 09/23/2014
The second-oldest surviving chapter office book of the Abbey of St. Gall, begun in the 12th century and maintained, with the addition of many entries, until early modernity. This volume contains, among other things, lists of the bishops of Constance (736-1318) and the abbots of the cloisters at Reichenau (724-1343) and St. Gall (719-1329), records of brothers who became members of the Abbey of St. Gall, readings and homilies for Sundays and holy days in the chapter assembly of the monchs, a copy of the Rule of St. Benedict, a martyrology complete with death records, tables and explanations for figuring the dates for Easter, and a copy, with continuation, of the St. Gall Annals found in Cod. Sang. 915. At the very back: two printed lists of St. St. Gall monks from 1757 and 1798.
Online Since: 06/22/2010
A copy of the martyrology of Ado of Vienne († 875). As an appendix the manuscript also contains vitae of ancient saints, possibly written by Notker Balbulus himself around 880/890.
Online Since: 12/12/2006
The song book of Chaplain Johannes Heer of Glarus: a collection of 88 folk-, students-, love-, drinking- and joke songs, among them 40 unique items; from the pre-reformation period (1510-1520).
Online Since: 12/31/2005
Songbook compiled by the universal scholar Aegidius Tschudi (1505-1572) from the middle of the 16th century. The volume contains 215 musical scores in measured notation using the five line staff, mainly by contemporary French, Dutch, and German composers such as Josquin Desprez, Adrian Willaert, Jacob Obrecht, Heinrich Isaac, and Ludwig Senfl. The descant (or soprano) parts are found on the left-hand pages, with the alto (or tenor) parts on the right-hand pages.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
This composite codex belonged to Kemli, a monk of St. Gall who had the parts, some of which come from the fourteenth century, bound together and interspersed with blank pages, which he and other writers then filled in. For this reason, the manuscript features numerous different hands and a constantly changing layout. The larger blocks of related text are a collection of sermons (Liber Sagittarius, pp. 3–61), a confessors' manual (pp. 71a–92b), commentaries on hymns and sequences (pp. 118–217b), as well as a collection, apparently assembled by Kemli himself, of ancient historical exempla, which in part are taken from the Gesta romanorum (pp. 226–357). The leather binding dates from the fifteenth century.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This small volume contains liturgical fragments. They come from six different manuscripts (overwhelmingly breviaries/psalters), of which sometimes multiple leaves, sometimes only a few lines survive. The first fragment (ff. 12r-34v) is written in Latin, but has German rubrics, which suggests a breviary for private use. As a note on f. Ar in his own hand indicates, Ildefons von Arx likely assembled this volume.
Online Since: 04/25/2023
This manuscript of collected items with twelve historiated initials and prayers in the German language was written by Dorothea von Hof (1458-1501), daughter of Heinrich Ehinger and Margarethe von Kappel. The codex contains the Officium parvum BMV as well as assorted prayers (mainly Marian prayers and prayers from the Passion of Christ), the Hundert Betrachtungen ("Hundred Meditations") from the Büchlein der ewigen Weisheit ("Book of Eternal Wisdom") by Henry Suso, and prayers ascribed to Thomas Aquinas. This manuscript on paper, completed in 1483, was presumably owned by the sisters of the Dominican cloister of St. Katharina in St. Gall, of which Dorothea von Hof is listed as a patroness.
Online Since: 12/21/2010
A German-language allegory about indulgences (fol. 63v–67v) is inserted into this Latin Officium defunctorum (fol. 1r–104r). Following on fol. 104v–141r are German prayers (partly prayers on indulgences) for the deceased. The copyist, Cordula von Schönau, who is named on fol. 141r, is attested to have been at the St. Katharinen Convent of Dominican nuns from 1492 to 1498.
Online Since: 10/08/2015
Most likely intended for the convent of Dominican nuns of St. Catherine in St. Gall, this tiny psalter (11 x 8 cm) reveals its Dominican use already in the calendar (ff. 2r-7v), which includes Dominican saints, such as Thomas Aquinas and Peter Martyr. Copied in a single column of textualis by a regular hand, the text is punctuated by alternating red and blue initials, sometimes with pen flourishes, and in different sizes according to the textual divisions (psalm, verse). In addition to Latin notes, the margins contain instructions in German on how to recite the Psalms. After the litany of saints and prayers (ff. 151r-159v), a paper quire has been added, dating from the end of the fifteenth century and containing hymns (ff. 160r-170v).
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This small manuscript contains the summer part of a breviary, copied in an elegant textualis, probably in France, as suggested by the entries in the fragmentary calendar (for example, the anniversary masses for the King of France and for the Countess of Blois). At the end of the codex (f. 261v), annotations in German, written probably in the fourteenth century, and others from the fifteenth century relative to St. Gall (ff. 174v-175r) indicate that, early on, it was present in the German-speaking region and in St. Gall. Various reasons, including the script of one of the later hands, suggest that, at a very early date, the manuscript belonged to the convent of Dominican nuns of St. Gall.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This manuscript, probably from a nuns' convent in St. Gall, contains a cycle of prayers and meditations through the liturgical year, beginning with Advent and on through Christmas, Easter, Pentecost to the Assumption of Mary. The visions of the Nativity of Jesus of Saint Bridget of Sweden and a rosary, among others, are interspersed. This codex is written by a single hand which, along with others, can also be found in the sister manuscript Cod. Sang. 510.
Online Since: 10/04/2018
According to the scribe, this manuscript originally is from the Dominican convent of St. Katharina in St. Gall, later Wil; it contains a cycle of prayers and meditations through the liturgical year, beginning with Advent and on through Christmas, Easter, Pentecost to the Assumption of Mary. The visions of the Nativity of Jesus of Saint Bridget of Sweden and a rosary, among others, are interspersed. One of the scribes of this manuscript also wrote the entire sister manuscript Cod. Sang. 509.
Online Since: 10/04/2018
This small-format prayer book in German contains prayers to Christ, on the Passion and on Communion, to Mary, Mother of God, and to various saints, further prayers on various topics, reflections on the Passion, and devotions according to Johannes Gerson. On f. 38v and 39r there are two full-page miniatures. They depict Christ on the cross with Mary and John (f. 38v) and the Pietà with the instruments of torture (Arma Christi, f. 39r). The manuscript was probably written for a women's convent or for female users, although some male forms also appear in the prayers. According to the ownership note on f. 185r, in the 17th century the book was owned by the Benedictine Convent St. Wiborada in St. Georgen above St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/10/2020
Composite manuscript containing mainly theological texts and, as the largest part (pp. 61–212), the Vocabularius Ex quo. The remaining works are a commentary on the hymnal, where each verse of a hymn alternates with the corresponding explanation (pp. 1–56), a short treatise De humani cordis instabilitate (pp. 57–60), sermons (pp. 212–229, 240–268 and 268–273), the life of Albert of Trapani (Albertus Siculus) (pp. 230–239), the Speculum humanae salvationis (pp. 274–335), a short treatise on virtues and vices called Etymachia or Lumen animae (pp. 335–345), excerpts from Jerome, Augustine and others (pp. 346–368), as well as the Speculum ecclesiae by Hugo de S. Caro (pp. 370–391). The latter is written on a parchment palimpsest , the underwriting (“scriptio inferior”) is in Rotunda script. Four red and bleu fleuronné initials from the underwriting have survived (p. 372, 373 and 375). The last pages contain responsories for Christmas (Descendit de celis deus verus), the Feast of Saint Mark (Beatissimus Marcus discipulus) and Commune plurimum martyrum (Viri gloriosi sanguinem fuderunt), and also the Easter trope (Quem queritis) with melodies in square notation on four lines (pp. 392–394). The manuscript consists of parchment and paper, sometimes even mixed within one quire. This codex has been at the monastery of St. Gall at least since 1553/64 (library stamp p. 60).
Online Since: 06/23/2016
An organ tablature by the St. Gall cathedral organist and calligrapher Fridolin Sicher (1490-1546). Starting in 1512, while he was a pupil of the organist Hans Buchner in Konstanz, Sicher gathered 176 pieces by 94 composers (including Paul Hofhaimer, Hans Buchner, Jacob Obrecht, Josquin Desprez, Matthaeus Pipelaere) together in this volume. Two thirds are sacred vocal pieces, the rest are originally secular songs. The descant is in measured notation on a five line staff, while the remaining vocal parts are indicated with alphabet letters and rhythmical symbols. Some of the compositions may be found only in this particular organ book.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
Great collection of St. Gallen tropes and sequences by Father Joachim Cuontz († 1515), compiled for Abbot Franz Gaisberg (1504-1529) shortly before the beatification of the St Gall monk Notker Balbulus († 912) in the year of 1513. Important document of late medieval choral history. Many of the melodies are, for the first time in St. Gall, provided with musical notation on five staves.
Online Since: 05/24/2007
A manuscript compilation from the second half of the 9th century, produced in the south German region, not at the Abbey of St. Gall. It contains the life story of Saints George, Felix and Regula, and Michael, the so-called Reichenau and Murbach “Briefformeln” (letter-forms), the Book of Pennance (Poenitentiale) by Pseudo-Cummean as well as selections from a grammar book.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
A manuscript of collected texts, including the lives of Church fathers and founders of monastic orders, written in an early Carolingian script, probably shortly before 800 in a scriptorium in northeastern France.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
A collection of vitae of various saints from around 900, among them the vita of St. St. Gall monk Notker Balbulus from the early 13th century, written by an unknown monk. The manuscript also contains the so-called "St. Galler Schularbeit" (earlier known as "Ruodpert's Letter") from the 11th century.
Online Since: 12/12/2006
Sulpicius Severus (ca. 363-420), Vita of Saint Martin of Tours. One of the most elaborate hagiographic texts in the St. Gallen library.
Online Since: 06/12/2006
A manuscript compilation from the time around and after 800, presumably produced at the Abbey of St. Gall. The manuscript contains, among other items, the Lives of the monastic fathers Antonius (by Athanasius), Paulus, Hilarion and Malchus (all by the church father Jerome), 12 homilies (Predigten) by Caesarius of Arles as well as the piece De correctione rusticorum by Martin of Braga (Bracara).
Online Since: 12/21/2009
A copy of the Life of the Saint and Pope Gregory I. by Johannes Diaconus (825-880/882), produced at the Abbey of St. Gall around the year 900.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
A manuscript compilation written in the 9th century at the Abbey of St. Gall. The manuscript contains, among other items, the Lives of monastic father Antonius (by Athanasius), Paulus, Hilraion and Malchus (all by the church father Jerome), 12 homilies (Predigten) of Caesarius of Arles, additionals tracts by Caesarius and by Pseudo-Caesarius as well as the dicta of Martin of Braga addressed to Polemius entitled De correctione rusticorum3. The manuscript contains a very large number of quill tests, including two alphabetical verses (“Adnexique globum…” and “Ferunt ophyr…”) and a scribal saying: Scribere discce puer…
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The bulk of this manuscript is constituted by lives of the Apostles taken from the Elsässische Legenda Aurea, an important Upper German rendition of James of Voragine's Legendary (pp. 1–259, largely identical to the abridged legendary in Cod. Sang. 594). There then follows the mystical treatise Christus und die sieben Laden (pp. 260–277). The last two quires (pp. 281–328) contain a collection of spiritual, mostly mystical excerpts (Meister Eckhart, Jan van Ruusbroec) and, on the final pages, an indulgence prayer intended to be recited before an image of St. Gregory (indulgence promise dated 1456, pp. 326–328). Several pages before this prayer, there is an explicitly-connected accompanying prayer (pp. 319–320). Scarpatetti believes the scribe was Sister Endlin of the Franciscan convent St. Leonard in St. Gall. Later, the manuscript came into the possession of Johannes Kaufmann (ownership marks, p. 1, p. 277, and on the upper piece of the book block), and, even later, it belonged to a lay brother of the monastery of St. Gall (p. 328). Simple red initials provide the only decoration. The binding is red-colored pigskin of the fifteenth century, with clasps and with six of ten original bosses still in place. Some fragments used as quire guards can be seen (e.g., p. 52/53).
Online Since: 09/22/2022
A German language edition of the life history of the St. Gall patron saints Gallus, Magnus, Otmar and Wiborada. Includes color portraits of saints Wiborada and Otmar (the latter bound into the wrong location in the manuscript; the portraits of Gallus and Magnus have been lost). The manuscript also includes a German translation of the Proverbs ("Sprüche der Altväter") as well as some brief spiritual texts for nuns, written down and most likely translated into German by Friedrich Kölner (or Colner), a Reformist monk originally from the cloister of Hersfeld in Hessen, who was a member of the Cloister of St. Gall between 1430 and 1436.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
The paper manuscript from the second half of the fifteenth century contains three saints' lives in German: St. Benedict (pp. 1-57), St. Gall (pp. 63-294) and St. Otmar (pp. 299-372). While the first of these three lives is the German version taken from the Dialogues of Pope Gregory I, the two that follow resemble, at least partially, the translations of the Benedictine Friedrich Kölner. The texts are carefully copied in a single column by a single scribe and decorated with simple initials painted in red. The brown-leather binding, dating from the fifteenth/sixteenth century, is blind-stamped. At the latest by the sixteenth century, this copy belonged to the community of lay brothers of the abbey of St. Gall (p. 374).
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The oldest German language version of the life history of St. Gall patron saint Notker Balbulus († 912), produced by Hans Conrad Haller (1486/90-1525), a member of the St. Gall religious community, for the Benedictine nuns of the Cloister of St. George above St. Gall in the year 1522. With decorated initials and borders. Following the vita are German prayers as well as a German translation of the tract Exhortationes ad monachos ("Von der geistlichen Ritterschaft der Mönche" or the "Exhortations to Monks") by Abbot Johannes Trithemius of Sponheim (1462-1516).
Online Since: 12/09/2008
This German-language manuscript gathers together a series of strongly mystical stories and prayers. The first two thirds (pp. 1–259) are taken up by three translations of texts by Elisabeth of Schönau, all of which have as their object St. Ursula and the eleven thousand virgins. Then follows the legend of St. Cordula (pp. 260–264). The remaining texts, with the exception of an excerpt from Mechtild of Hackeborn (pp. 295–302) are all prayers, mostly addressed to Mary and often with extensive instructions for the prayer. The book is rubricated throughout, and it has two simple pen-flourished initials (p. 1, 162); the rubric on p. 1 is written in a display script. Inside the book can be found a bookmark made of four thin cords knotted at the top. The binding comes from the fifteenth century and is decorated with stamps and decorative lines. In 1794, Ildefons von Arx purchased the manuscript from the collection of the dissolved convent of Poor Clares of St. Dorothea of Freiburg im Breisgau (ownership marks p. 1 and p. 320; purchase note, p. 1).
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This manuscript contains selections from the Elsässischen Legenda Aurea, an important Upper-German rendition of James of Voragine's legendary. The selections are largely limited to the saints of the summer section. The first part of the manuscript (pp. I–64) is written in a hand that copies the legends of John, Peter, and Paul. A second, somewhat less skilled, hand writes the rest, beginning with the only verse text of the manuscript (the Barbara-legend, starting on p. 66). This verse text is the only text that the Baroque label on the spine mentions. Also from the Legenda Aurea is the account of the Einsiedeln Engelweihe (pp. 191–196). Both parts contain rubrics and restrained rubrication in a hand different from those used for the text. The beginning and end of the manuscript are missing; the binding, restored in the nineteenth century, dates from the fifteenth century.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This manuscript contains German-language lives of the saints: the “Lives of the Fathers” (Vitaspatrum) (pp. 5a–482a), the Life of Saint Meinrad (pp. 482a–501b) and the Life of Saint Fridolin, a translation of the Latin Vita of Fridolin written by Balther von Säckingen (pp. 502a–541a). The main scribe of this codex was Johannes Gerster, citizen of Säckingen, who identifies himself on p. 361 and p. 541, each time including a date. Several pen drawings: tree with blossoms and fruit (p. 361), young man in secular clothing (p. 482), sketches of dragons (p. 528 and p. 541), rosette (p. 541). In the 17th century, this manuscript was in the possession of the Convent of the Poor Clares in Freiburg i. Br. (note p. 3); only in the 18th century was it purchased for the Monastery of St. Gall.
Online Since: 10/08/2015
German version of the life of Jesus according to the four gospels, in an Alemannic recension. With colorful initials and 21 filled initials, drawn in pen and usually colored. The scribe and probably also first owner, Rudolf Wirt, gives his name at the end of the text on p. 463 as well as the date of the completion of the manuscript on January 9, 1467. The volume originated in one of the women's cloisters of St. Gall and came to the St. Gall Abbey Library between 1780 and 1792.
Online Since: 06/23/2014
Legendary of St. Gall: contains, among other items, the German lives of the St. Gallen Saints Gallus, Magnus, Otmar and Wiborada, illustrated with 142 vivid images.
Online Since: 06/12/2006
Collection manuscript, 15th century, from the Dominican convent of St. Katharina in St. Gall. This German-language manuscript is made up of five fascicles and contains a treatise on the Passion of Christ (“Vierzig Myrrhenbüschel vom Leiden Christi‟): the story of the foundation of the Dominican convent of St. Katharinental near Diessenhofen; the "Diessenhofener Schwesternbuch" and the "Tösser Schwesternbuch"; the legends of saints Elizabeth of Hungary, Margaret of Hungary, Ida of Toggenburg and Louis of Toulouse as well as a short excerpt from the Liber specialis gratiae of Mechthild of Hackeborn in German translation.
Online Since: 12/12/2006
This manuscript, probably written in the Benedictine Allerheiligen Abbey in Schaffhausen, contains, besides many shorter, often later added texts, a number of German-language lives of the saints (Maurice and the Theban Legion, Mary Magdalene, Elizabeth of Hungary), meditative texts (on Maundy Thursday, on the Passion of Christ, the Steinbuch of a certain Volmar), and the Book of Founders of Allerheiligen Abbey. The latter is a free adaptation of the 12th century legend of the founding of the Abbey on the Rhine. Using the cut leather (cuir-ciselé) technique, an artist cut central figures of the foundation legend (probably St. Benedict, Eberhard of Nellenburg, Burkhard of Nellenburg, Wilhelm of Hirsau?) into the front and back of the cover. On p. 204, there is a pen sketch of the saints Benedict and Bernard. At an unknown date, the manuscript came into the possession of the scholar Aegidius Tschudi of Glarus and, together with his literary estate, was bought by the Monastery of St. Gall in February 1768.
Online Since: 12/13/2013
This composite manuscript from the estate of the humanist Aegidius Tschudi (1505-1572) of Glarus consists of 12 individual sets of papers, purchased by the monastery ofSt. Gall in 1768 and bound in the years thereafter. This volume, mostly written by Tschudi himself, contains, among others, lists of bishops and other important office holders in the dioceses of Konstanz, Strasbourg, Basel and Chur; documents concerning the history of the Monasteries of St. Gall, Einsiedeln, Muri, Pfäfers, Engelberg and their abbots; a German copy of the vita of St. Meinrad; copies of documents of several southern German monasteries; and – the most important text – the only surviving copy of excerpts from the "Reichsgutsurbar" of Churrätien from the first half of the 9th century. The original did not survive; it was no longer available at the time of Tschudi, who instead copied an incomplete version from the 10th to 12th century.
Online Since: 12/20/2012
The two main components of this manuscript are the lives of the house saints of St. Gall (Gallus, Otmar, Wiborada and Notker Balbulus) and of the apostles and early Christian saints and martyrs, and the Chronicle of the Abbey of St. Gall, from the Casus sancti Galli by Ratpert (612-883) to the Continuatio by Conradus de Fabaria (1204-1234). St. Gall reformer Vadian added marginal notes, some of them quite detailed and critical, to the text describing the history of the cloister. The codex also contains chronicalistic notes about St. Gall and Switzerland (14th/15th centuries), the Reise in das Heilige Land by Steffan Kapfman, and computistic, medical, astronomical and theological texts. On two previously empty pages (pp. 324-325) St. Gall abbey librarian Idelfons von Arx added four recipes for making faded handwriting legible.
Online Since: 06/22/2010
This manuscript, written in the 15th century by a "sehr routinierten und stilsicheren Schreiber" (Scarpatetti, S. 194; "a very practiced and stylistically confident copyist"), contains the first four parts of the great St. Gall historical work Casus sancti Galli: the history of the monastery by the Monk Ratpert (pp. 3-39), the Casus sancti Galli by the Monk Ekkehart IV (pp. 40-257), the Casus sancti Galli by the anonymous continuators for the years 975 to 1203 (pp. 259−301), and the continuation of the history of the monastery of St. Gall by Conradus de Fabaria from 1232/35 (pp. 317−370). The manuscript contains numerous annotations in the hand of the Swiss scholar Aegidius Tschudi (1505−1572), but it is not part of his collection of books, which came to the St. Gall Abbey Library in 1768. Tschudi must have consulted and studied the manuscript during a visit to the Abbey Library of Saint Gall.
Online Since: 10/13/2016
This codex contains Konrad of Würzburg's Trojan War, a tremendous unfinished late work by the German lyric and epic poet, who died in 1287 before completing the work. The author recounts the story of the Trojan War in verse in an expansive construction of historiographic narration, forward and backward references, and encyclopedic digressions. Defective in the beginning and later supplemented with an inserted leaf, the work extends from p. 4 to p. 893. This is followed on pp. 895-897 by a fragment of an anonymous prose retelling of Conrad's Trojan War. The text of Conrad's Trojan War is written by a scribe, who probably is identical to the rubricator responsible for the red Lombard initials, the black Gothic initials and the decorated majuscules at the beginnings of the columns, and who put the date 1471 on p. 893. The prose fragment is from a later hand. The manuscript's place of origin is not known. The codex was found in 1739 at the Haldenburg, a St. Gall fief in the Allgäu, and then became part of the Abbey Library, as indicated by a note on p. 894.
Online Since: 06/13/2019
St. Gallen copy of Paulus Orosius' history of the world from Adam to the year 417 from the 9th century, with numerous glosses and several maps, written by the monk Ekkehart IV. in the 11th century.
Online Since: 09/14/2005
A copy of the excerpts made by Junianus Justinus from the lost history of the world (Historiae Philippicae) by the Roman historian Pompeius Trogus, produced in the 9th century, probably at the Abbey of St. Gall. At the end of the text is the famous Old High German St. Gallen scribal verse: Chumo kiscreib filo chumor kipeit.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
A copy of the Alexanderroman (Romance of Alexander) by physician, translator and poet Johannes Hartlieb (1468) of Munich. This is the exemplar that Hartlieb had produced for Duke Albrecht III. of Bavaria (1451-1460) and his wife Anna of Braunschweig by calligrapher Johannes Frauendorfer of Thierenstein in the year 1454, using a professional Bastarda script. It is illustrated with 45 six-by-thirteen-line fully colored initials, possibly by the hand of Bavarian miniaturist Hans Rot. Decorations include numerous simple and intricate vine borders with acanthus leaves, in which a wide variety of animals frolic, and in which one can find many of the flowers of the region. The Romance of Alexander remained one of the most popular prose romances in the German language until 1500.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
A copy of the work Bellum Judaicum (the Jewish War) by the Jewish author Flavius Josephus (1st century AD), produced in the 9th century, probably not at the Abbey of St. Gall, by the hands of eight different scribes.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
The largest part of this voluminous manuscript consists of an abbreviated version of the Universal Chronicle of Platterberg/Truchseß, completed in 1459 (pp. 3−796), which in the older literature is also referred to as the “St. Gall Universal Chronicle.” This chronicle also contains the so-called St. Galler Cato (pp. 259−260; Disticha Catonis; Von Catho dem weysen und seinen spruchen), a partial German translation of the work De officiis by Marcus Tullius Cicero (pp. 263−265); as well as more quotations from other works by Cicero (pp. 265−271). Next are a German version of the fictional correspondence between Alexander the Great and Dindimus, King of the Brahmins, written by Meister Wichwolt (pp. 809−815); Cronica Allexandri des grossen konigs), the German version of the History of the Three Kings (Historia trium regum) by John of Hildesheim (pp. 816−854); and the report about Jean de Mandeville's travel to India in the German translation by Otto von Diemeringen (pp. 854−917). At the end (pp. 918−940), the volume contains an incomplete version of the travelogue of Johannes Schiltberger (1380 – after 1427) from Bavaria, who had been taken captive by the Ottomans. The book decoration consists of numerous red and blue Lombard initials. In 1570, the volume was owned by Luzius Rinck von Baldenstein (p. 940), brother-in-law of Prince-Abbot Diethelm-Blarer (1530-1564) of St. Gall; at the latest by the 17th century, the volume became part of the holdings of the monastery library of St. Gall (p. 3: Liber Monasterii S. Galli).
Online Since: 06/23/2016
Manuscript compilation containing a collection of fables (Ulrich Boner's Edelstein), decorated with simple pen drawings, farcical stories – preserved only here – by the so-called "Swiss Anonymous" as well as chronicle notes on the history of Zurich and Glarus.
Online Since: 12/12/2006
The Cantonal Secretary of Schwyz Hans Fründ († 1469), originally from Luzern, wrote a chronicle of the Old Zurich War in about 1447. This carefully written copy illustrated with the flags of the cantons of the Confederation was made by Rorschach chaplain and former Schwyz schoolmaster Melchior Rupp in the year 1476. The manuscript, in the final pages of which are transcribed certain records and documents from the years 1446 through 1450 related to the Old Zurich War, made its way into the possession of Glarus scholar Aegidius Tchudi (1505-1572) and from there, in the year 1768, into the Abbey Library of St. Gall.
Online Since: 12/19/2011
A copy made in 1520 of the so-called “Klingenberger Chronik” (Klingenberg Chronicle) originally composed in 1450. It is the history of the Appenzell Wars (1401-1429) and of the Old Zurich War (1440-1446) from the point of view of the losing side: the eastern Swiss nobility. Illustrated with several color sketches of battle scenes and coats of arms. In addition this codex contains copies of legal documents, chronological notes, songs, and in the very front an incompletely preserved 1520 Strasbourg print edition by Sebastian Brant (1457/58-1521) of the biographies of Roman emperors Titus and Vespasian. This volume was obtained by the Abbey Library of St. Gall from Glarus humanities scholar Aegidius Tschudi (1505-1572) in 1768.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
The oldest copy of the Chronicle of Konstanz by Gebhard Dacher, made between 1458 and 1472 by the author himself and illustrated with a series of colored pen sketches, among them the oldest known view of the city of Konstanz. Obtained by the Abbey Library of St. Gall in the 18th century, at the latest.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
This manuscript, written in the second half of the 15th century, probably shortly after 1450, contains first (pp. 1−46) the Constance World Chronicle from the end of the 14th century. This is followed by the Zurich Chronicle from the beginnings to the start of the 15th century (pp. 47−121), a continuation of the Zurich Chronicle about the years 1420/21, 1436 and 1443−1450 (pp. 121−132), and a abbreviated edition of the Chronicle of the Council by Ulrich of Richenthal (pp. 132−228). Based on an examination of the handwriting, in the older literature it is considered that the early humanist Felix Hemmerli (1388/89−1454) from Zurich may have been the scribe. The manuscript was owned by the Swiss scholar Aegidius Tschudi (1505−1572) and was sold to the monastery of St. Gall by his family in February 1768. Tschudi added various marginal notes and corrections to the texts.
Online Since: 06/23/2016
German translation of a history of the First Crusade (1095/96-1099; Historia Hierosolymitana), composed by the monk Robertus Monachus from Reims. Written and illustrated with 22 colored pen drawings in the year 1465. As an appendix, the manuscript also contains around 9000 verses from the Österreichische Reimchronik (rhymed chronicle of Austria) by Ottokar of Steiermark describing the siege and destruction of the Crusaders' fortress in Akkon in the year 1291.
Online Since: 09/14/2005
Five codicological units make up this paper manuscript; the text was written by one or more hands in the fifteenth century. The longest texts in the manuscript are the Tractatus de vitiis capitalibus, which is probably to be ascribed to Robert Holcot, the Dialogus rationis et conscientiae of Matthew of Krakow, and the Dialogus de celebratione missae by Henry of Hessia the Younger. The remaining texts are shorter, including sermons, spiritual instructions, and astrological and medical treatises. In addition, there are added numerous documents related to the Council of Constance (1414—1418) that deal with the condemnation of John Hus and with the question of Communion under both kinds.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This paper manuscript has cardboard binding from the 18th/19th century. It was probably written entirely by the secular priest, Mattias Bürer, whose books devolved after his death (1485) to the Abbey of St. Gall. The manuscript contains chiefly a verse summary, ascribed to Adam von Aldersbach, of the famous textbook of canon law and pastoral theology by Raymund of Peñafort (pp. 7–123). In addition to interlinear glosses, a thick apparatus of glosses can be found in certain places in the margins. After two short texts follows a long commentary on the preceding versified work (pp. 135–264).
Online Since: 04/25/2023
This paper manuscript brings together various texts of pastoral theology on the sacraments, and particularly on confession, as well as commentaries on the doctrine of the faith as well as sermons. Among these texts are the Summula de summa Raimundi of Magister Adam [Adamus Alderspacensis] (pp. 99–138) and the Liber Floretus (pp. 139–151), both written in verse. The scribe identifies himself as Johannes in a colophon on p. 138. The manuscript presents numerous annotations from the hand of the learned and wandering St. Gall monk Gallus Kemli (1480/1481).
Online Since: 04/25/2023
This voluminous paper manuscript was written by Gallus Kemli († 1480/81) approximately in the period 1466 to 1476. It transmits tools, compendia, and summaries of theology, canon law, liturgy, and confession and penance, as well as prayers and chants with German Plainchant (Hufnagel) notation for the mass, a rituale, and, finally, further prayers, blessings, sermons and exhortations, partly in Latin and partly in German. The manuscript is bound in a limp wrapper with a red leather cover. Gallus Kemli, monk of Saint Gall, who led an erratic itinerant life outside the abbey, left at his death a large collection of books, including this one.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
The manuscript chiefly transmits a 1481 Landgerichtsordnung (procedural and penal ordinances) for the Abbey-Principality of Kempten, which was possibly copied before the end of the fifteenth century. The manuscript was used by Ulrich Degelin, Chancellor under Abbot Johann Erhard Blarer von Wartensee (1587–1594) and author of a new Landgerichtsordnung for Kempten. Thereafter, the manuscript passed successively into the possession of the Lindau legal scholars Johannes Andreas Heider († 1719) and Johann Reinhard Wegelin († 1764), before Johann Nepomuk Hauntinger acquired it for St. Gall Abbey between 1780 and 1792.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
A compendium of 39 medical texts by known and unknown authors, produced in the second half of the 9th century, most likely in northern Italy, already obtained at an early date by the Abbey Library of St. Gall. This codex includes—sometimes in unique exemplars—an alphabetically ordered Greek-Latin herbal glossary, the treatise De re medica by one Pseudo-Plinius (Physica Plinii), and a longer medical tract entitled Liber Esculapii.
Online Since: 12/23/2008
Collection of medical manuscripts from the monastery of St. Gall, written in about 900, with five longer and several shorter medical-pharmaceutical treatises, representing in some cases the best, or even the only surviving copies worldwide. Among these may be found, for example, Pliny the Younger's chapter on medicine, the Medicinae ex oleribus et pomis (Medicines from vegetables and fruits) by the Roman agrarian and medical author Gargilius Martialis (3rd century), and the treatise Oxea et chronia passiones Yppocratis, Gallieni et Urani, which is found in very few manuscript copies. This manuscript also includes (on page 82) a magic sphere for predicting life and death.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
Collection of German medical texts. The beginning is missing, then the Ordnung der Gesundheit for Rudolf von Hohenberg (pp. 3-60); various recipes for medicine, magic and food (pp. 63-101), among them a treatise on vultures and verbena from the Bartholomäus (pp. 64-69); “Verworfene Tage” (pp. 69-71); a recipe for vinegar (pp. 73-76); an excerpt from the Buch der Natur by Conrad of Megenberg (pp. 82-85); recipes making use of “Schwalbenstein” (pp. 89-90); prognostics for the new year and for thunder (pp. 90-94); recipes for wine (pp. 95-101). Herbal book with excerpts from the Macer Floridus by Odo von Meung (pp. 101-146); medical recipes (pp. 146-147); applications for medicines according to the Macer Floridus (pp. 147-161); recipe against the ritten (p. 162). At the end on p. 164 there is a colored sketch of Agrimonia (Odermennig). The manuscript, originally from the library of Aegidius Tschudi (no. 117), is related to the 2° Cod. 572 of the Staats- und Stadtbibliothek Augsburg.
Online Since: 09/23/2014
Collection of German medical texts. Recipes for medicines (pp. 1-148) with an index (pp. 149-157), more recipes added later (pp. 158-168), instructions for bloodletting (pp. 169-184), German and Latin incantations (pp. 185-186), excerpts from De pestilentia by Theobaldus Loneti (pp. 187-188). The manuscript is from the library of Aegidius Tschudi (no. 118).
Online Since: 09/23/2014
Composite manuscript in Latin and German. The texts, which are presented in no systematic order, can be grouped as follows. Geomancy: Latin treatise with schematic drawings (pp. 1-152, 163-169); other geomantic schemata (185, 236, 263 [incorrectly paginated as 262]). Medicine: recipes, in German (pp. 153-162 and 197-198); examination of the blood after bloodletting and instructions for bloodletting, in German (pp. 193-196, 255-261). Iatromathematics: lunarium, in Latin (pp. 169-172); planets and the attributes of their corresponding hours / of the persons born under their sign, in German, partly in rhymed verse (pp. 173-175, 178-179, 218, 240); tables for determining which planets govern which hours (p. 200, 240); signs of the zodiac, their characteristics and their influence on the people born under them, in Latin (pp. 180-185, 186 [hexameter]) and German (pp. 187-192), directions and tables for calculating the position of the moon in the zodiac (pp. 177-178, 213-214, [215b]-216 [for the years 1406-1480]); diagram of the zodiac (p. 262); drawing of the parts of the fingers correlated with signs of the zodiac, temperaments and elements (p. 264 [incorrectly paginated as 263]); monthly rules, in Latin (p. 215-[215a]). Astronomy: calendar (pp. 201-212); tables for calendar calculations (pp. 237, 241-242, 254); table of lunar eclipses for the years 1422-1462, with drawings of the respective degree of coverage (pp. 238-239 and 243). Prognostication: prognostics for thunder, in German (p.199); prognostics for the new year, in Latin (p. 217). Alchemy: recipes for alchemy, in Latin (pp. 219-220) and in German (pp. 221-228). Treatise on chiromancy, in German, commencing with a colored pen drawing of two hands with the lines of the hands (pp. 244-254). Other items: incantations, in German (p. 156) and in Latin (p.219); four hexameters about the quality of wine, in Latin (p. 264 [incorrectly paginated as 263]). The manuscript, written in various hands, is from the library of Aegidius Tschudi (no. 104).
Online Since: 09/23/2014
This miscellany begins with a few short medical texts: pp. 5–6 Johannicius (Hunain ibn Ishāq), Isagoge ad Techne Galieni (a reworking of Galen's Ars Parva, in the Latin translation of Constantinus Africanus), § 1–9; pp. 6–7 and 8 have a few verses from the Regimen sanitatis salernitanum, a didactic poem in hexameter on medicine; pp. 7–8 contains a short text on the proportions of combined medicatons, inc. Gradus est sedecupla proporcio; pp. 9–10 a text on bloodletting, with the title in red De flebotomia, inc. In flebotomia quedam generales condiciones sunt; pp. 10–11 a Latin-German glossary of plant names, with the rubric title Nomina herbarum, inc. Plantago Wegerich; pp. 11–12 a text on uroscopy, the beginning of which a later hand in the margin indicates with in the margin with the title De urinis, inc. Si urina alba fuerit. Pages 12–14 are written in a later hand and contain, contrary to Scherrer, not further medical material, but rather an exemplum or exempla from the Vitaspatrum (In vitas patrum legitur quod quidam interrogavit senem quare cogitaciones prave inpedirent oraciones [?]). After the medical part comes on pp. 15–89 a Latin version of the Lumen animae, a collection of natural history exempla for preaching. On the margins of the page appear small diagrams concerning the contents of the chapter as well as additions to the authorities named in the text. The Lumen animae is the only text in the manuscript to begin with a larger red initial and ends on p. 89 with the rubric colophon Finito libro sit laus et gloriae Christo. The next two pages (pp. 90–91) contain, among other things, calendar verses and a text on the planets. Pages 92–97 have a Latin version of the “Letter from Heaven” or the “Sunday Letter”, a letter supposedly that fell from heaven concerning the celebration of Sunday, inc. Incipit epistola dei de celo vere missa petro apostolo ab omnibus diebus dominicis qualiter sit colendus dies dominicus. A prayer follows on pp. 97–98, inc. O dilecte Iesu Christus, felix est qui te amat. The final pages (pp. 98–101) contain further exempla written in the same later hand as pp. 12–14, inc. Legitur quod quedam mulier […] venisset ad beatum Hillarionem pro sterilitate tollenda. The manuscript is bound in a grey cardboard binding from the eighteenth century; the earlier parchment binding with a spine label bearing the shelfmark 758 survives, but it has been cut apart and stapled to the first and last quires, respectively (p. 3 and between p. 24-25; p. 102 and between p. 88-89).
Online Since: 12/20/2023
This manuscript, illustrated with numerous colored pen drawings, originated in a secular environment in Southern Germany or in Switzerland around the middle of the 15th century. It describes the signs of the zodiac, the planets, the four temperaments, and the four seasons regarding their influence on human health. This is followed by dietary guidelines primarily regarding bloodletting, but also regarding eating, drinking, sleeping, waking, resting and moving, as well as, in concrete terms, regarding bathing (illustration p. 101) or defecating (illustration p. 120). Most likely an amateur doctor with an interest in astronomy, from the Southern region of Germany, wrote the original text around 1400 and assembled it into a compendium. Later the text was repeatedly supplemented and modified. The last part (from p. 128 on) contains a prose and a poem version of the so-called letter from Pseudo-Aristotle to Alexander the Great, in which the Greek universal scholar advises the king on maintaining good health.
Online Since: 09/23/2014
The manuscript is composed of various fascicules, of which many carry at the end the ownership mark of Johannes Engler, canon of St. Leonhard (p. 140, 168, 304). After a calendar (pp. 4–24) comes the Summa rudium (pp. 25-140). The next quire (pp. 143–168) contains the synodal decrees of Marquart von Randeck, bishop of Constance (the decrees, and not the copy, date from 1407, p. 165). The remaining quires contain observations, sermons, a Latin-German vocabulary (pp. 290–304), recipes and calendar-related texts, as well as various spiritual and lay short texts. Among the latter are two collections of fables (pp. 141–144 and 266–275). The quires frequently start at the beginning of a text and often have blank pages at the end, a phenomenon that, along with the multiple ownership marks and worn outer leaves of quires, points to the individual quires being used for some time without a binding. Fifteenth-century leather binding, containing several bosses. On the pastedowns, the offset of a German-language charter can be seen.
Online Since: 09/22/2022
This Latin-German miscellany focuses on sermons. It is comprised of five parts of varying formats (Part I: pp. 5–48; Part II: pp. 49–84; Part III: pp. 85–108; Part IV: pp. 109–144; Part V: pp. 145–156), written by varying hands in Gothic minuscule script of varying size. The following constituent works have been identified. Part I transmits the Latin sermons of Berthold von Regensburg, namely four Sermones de dominicis (pp. 5-17, one column) as well as a further Sermo de dominicis, five Sermones de sanctis and a Sermo ad religiosos (pp. 21a-28b, two columns). Part II begins with the sermon Quando hominem… about John 18:1 (pp. 49a–67b, Hamesse 25446). Part III contains five Latin-German sermons alongside a prayer for a Pope Benedict (pp. 98-108). Next, part IV presents the Dialogus Beatae Mariae et Anselmi de passione Domini (pp. 109-124), which was attributed to the Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury in the Middle Ages. The pasteboard binding from the seventeenth or eighteenth century has a white leather cover with doubled scudding decoration as well as two green laces whose ends can still be seen. The table of contents by Pius Kolb has been extended by Ildefons von Arx (p. 1).
Online Since: 09/06/2023
De casibus reservatis by Hermannus de Praga makes up the majority of this volume (pp. 2-119). Latin proverbs (pp. 119-120) and prayer instructions for the ninth hour in German follow (p. 120). The text is a textualis written in one column with red lombards and titles. The following text (pp. 121-136) begins in an even smaller script (30 lines per page): according to the title, it is a commentary on Gal 6:14. Pages 137-154 are paper leaves; pp. 137-145 contain writing in a later hand. On p. 147 appears the entry: Balthassar Schmid von Diessenhofen … 1549. Offsets from the compactly written text are visible on the pastedowns. The wooden board binding is covered in red leather with remains of an eyelet fastening with a single leather strap.
Online Since: 09/06/2023
A composite manuscript consisting mainly of historiographic and hagiographic content. The texts were written between 1450 and 1550, then assembled as a volume in 1573 by St. St. Gall monk Mauritius Enk. In addition to transmitting an anonymous Dialogus de sectis, numerous legends about the saints in German, portions of the Strassburg Chronicle by Jakob Twinger von Königshofen, as well as records from the Constance Synod of 1491, the manuscript also contains, on pages 283 through 288, without a title and almost seamlessly continuing into the following text, 30 short accounts recorded in about 1500 of the gruesome deeds of the Wallachian Count Vlad III Tepes ("the Impaler", 1431-1476), who as member of the Order of the Dragon also held the title of Dracula. This Dracula text is only transmitted in three other manuscripts: one at the library of Lambach Abbey in upper Austria, one at the British Library in London, and one at the Municipal Library of Colmar in France.
Online Since: 03/31/2011
A copy of Aristotle's Categoriae (Categories) and De interpretatione (On interpretation) in Latin with commentaries by Boethius, with translation into Old High German and additional commentaries by St. St. Gall monk and teacher Notker the German († 1022); written during the 11th century at the Abbey of St. Gall. In addition, the manuscript includes copies of two works by Cicero, the Topica and De optimo genere oratorum.
Online Since: 04/15/2010
A school manuscript from the Abbey of St. Gall containing texts for the subjects of dialectic and rhetoric. The manuscript provides copies of the commentaries of Boethius on the Categories and on the Hermeneutics of Aristotle, a selection of the rhetorical tract by Alcuin († 804) with many schematic diagrams, and copies of Cicero's works De inventione and De optimo genere oratorum. The texts were copied around the end of the 9th century and during the 10th century and contain a multitude of Latin and Old High German glosses as well as numerous glosses in dry point from the 10th through 12th centuries.
Online Since: 12/21/2009
Notker the German, Old High German translation of and commentary on De consolatione philosophiae of Boethius. Latin text with Old High German translation and commentary on the work "De consolatione philosophiae" (on the consolation of philosophy) of Boethius by the St. St. Gall monk Notker the German († 1022) in the only extant copy from the first half of the 11th century; incomplete copy of Notker's translation and adaptation of the Categoriae (categories) of Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius (ca. 480-524).
Online Since: 12/12/2006
This composite volume, written between 1425 and 1425 in the Lake Constance regions, though not at the Abbey of St. Gall, contains Latin versions of a great many computistic/astronomical/cosmographical treatises, including the widely disseminated work De sphaera mundi by John of Sacrobosco and his arithmetical foundation work Tractatus de algorismo. The manuscript, organized according to the calendar, also contains illustrations: the twelve signs of the zodiac, a map of the winds, sketches of the ecliptics of the sun and moon, planets and constellations, a diagrammatic guide for bloodletting, a set of early medieval Terra Orbis-type world maps, and (on pages 265 and 266) twelve simple illustrations for the months with brief rhyming proverbs in German derived from the nature- and landscape-dominated everyday life of the people of the late middle ages.
Online Since: 10/04/2011
A composite manuscript from the 11th century, possibly written at the Abbey of St. Gall. The main content of the codex consists of commentaries by Boethius on Cicero's Topica and on the Isagoge by the neoplatonic philosopher Porphyrius († after 300), Porphyrius's Isagoge itself and assorted other texts. Among these are, for example, small pieces by Walahfried Strabo (Regulae metricae; a letter with the incipit Domino meo benedictus salus et vita) and by Marius Victorinus, a 4th century Roman scholar (De generatione divina).
Online Since: 04/15/2010
Copy of De consolatione philosophiae by Boethius, produced in the 10th century in the monastery of St. Gall, with various Latin and Old High German glosses.
Online Since: 12/09/2008
A copy of a commentary on the first four books of the work De consolatione philosophiae by Boethius († 524), written by many hands in the Abbey of St. Gall near the end of the 10th century or the beginning of the 11th century. The manuscript contains a multitide of Latin and Old High German glosses, of which the Old High German glosses are written in the so-called bfk-Geheimschrift (secret script).
Online Since: 12/21/2009
This manuscript (also called the “St. Galler Epenhandschrift”) is written in two columns in a very uniform manner by three anonymous primary scribes and four secondary scribes; it offers a fine version of a unique collection of Middle High German heroic and knightly poetry. It contains “Parzival” (pp. 5−288; version D) by Wolfram von Eschenbach, the Song of the Nibelungs (pp. 291−416; version B) with the following lament (pp. 416−451; version B), the poem “Karl der Grosse” (pp. 452−558; version C) by der Stricker, the verse narrative “Willehalm” (pp. 561−691; version G) by Wolfram von Eschenbach, as well as five sung gnomic verses by Friedrich von Sonnenburg (p. 693; version G). Until 1768, when the manuscript was purchased by the Monastery of St. Gall, this volume certainly also contained fragments of the epic poems “Die Kindheit Jesu” by Konrad von Fussesbrunnen and Unser vrouwen hinvart by Konrad von Heimesfurt. These two works were removed from the manuscript of epic poems before 1820 and are now held in the Staatsbibliothek Preussischer Kulturbesitz in Berlin (mgf 1021) and the Badische Landesbibliothek in Karlsruhe (Cod. K 2037), respectively. The manuscript, illustrated with 78 uniformly executed initials by unknown artists from the miniature painting school of Padua, was commissioned by a wealthy client who was interested in Middle High German epic poems. The first owner known by name was the Swiss polymath and universal scholar Aegidius Tschudi (1505−1572) from Glarus, whose estate of manuscripts the Monastery of St. Gall was able to acquire in 1768.
Online Since: 10/08/2015
Part 2 of the commentary by the late Roman grammarian Servius (ca. 400) on the works of Virgil, including books 9 through 12 as well as a biography of Publius Vergilius Maro, produced in about 900 in the Abbey of St. Gall. Part 1 of this widely disseminated commentary on Virgil is found in Cod. Sang. 861.
Online Since: 07/31/2009
A much-used school manuscript containing the 15 books of the Metamorphoses by Publius Ovidius Naso with many interlinear and marginal glosses in Latin. The parchment shows signs of heavy use as well as dirt, and it is sewn in various places. Before the first pagination of the manuscript by the assistant librarian Ildefons von Arx around 1780, the text from Book 8, V. 564, to Book 10, V. 429, was missing, as noted on p. 62. At the end of the manuscript, there are pen trials, some of them of historical content, such as the mention of an earthquake on September 4, 1298 on p. 112 or the mention of a scribe by the name of Johannes (Qui me scribebat Iohannes nomen habebat).
Online Since: 06/23/2014
An anonymous commentary, written in tiny script (up to 110 lines on pages only 14.5 cm in height) on the odes, epodes, Ars poetica, letters, and sermons of Horace. It is preceded by lives of Horace by Pseudo-Acro and Suetonius as well as, on the very first pages, documents (including one from 1252). The pages at the end contain a commentary on the Satires of Persius, of which the first part is in poor condition.
Online Since: 06/22/2010
This manuscript contains all 16 satires by the ancient poet Juvenal, in the order 1-14, 16, and 15. Satires 1-3 and 10-14 are glossed (among them 7 Old High German glosses); for satires 3 and 14 only the beginning is glossed, for satire 10 only the end, which is probably due to the fact that these glosses were added to the respective quires before the manuscript was bound.
Online Since: 12/13/2013