Pierre le Fruitier, called Salmon, secretary to Charles VI and someone who influenced John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, in 1409 wrote a composite text that is simultaneously a mirror for princes, a collection of letters, and an autobiography. Salmon presents the qualities a sovereign needs in order to rule well (see Paris, BnF, fr. 23279). After his withdrawal from court in 1411 and after the change in royal politics towards John the Fearless, around 1412-1415 he presented a second version of the text; today this version is held in Geneva. With an image depicting Charles VI on a blue bed decorated with lilies, in discussion with his secretary, this manuscript is one of the showpieces of the Bibliothèque de Genève. (hoc)

Online Since: 06/23/2014

This manuscript contains a collection of texts in French, mainly in the form of verse or prose excerpts. Among these are fabliaux, a religious poem, a fragment of the Roman de la Châtelaine de Vergi, and proverbs. This manuscript, a veritable collection of texts, was probably written on paper during the 1st quarter of the 15th century, either in Savoy or in French-speaking Switzerland. (rou)

Online Since: 10/08/2020

This medium format bible from northern France arrived at the Bibliothèque de Genève between 1667 and 1701 and is one of the oldest donations to this library, once called the Académie de Genève. Furthermore, this bible was also used as one of the 615 biblical manuscripts collated for Benjamin Kennicott's Vetus Testamentum hebraicum variis lectionibus (1776-1780). (iss)

Online Since: 12/14/2018

This remarkable manuscript, created in the 9th century in the Rhineland, contains the text of the four Gospels in their Latin version, written in Carolingian minuscule. The manuscript is decorated with, among others, two initials embellished with interlace and with canonical tables presented in arcades in vivid colors. (jeg)

Online Since: 06/23/2014

This manuscript, written in the Abbey of Murbach (France, Upper Rhine) about 830, contains the biblical commentaries of Hrabanus Maurus on the Books of Judith and Esther and the Book of Maccabees. The manuscript is valuable for its age as well as for the picture poem inserted into the commentary on the Book of Judith. It depicts Queen Judith, the wife of Ludwig the Pius, sanctified by the hand of God. (jeg)

Online Since: 03/22/2012

The incipit of the temporal (f. 1r: Incipit missale secundum usum maioris ecclesie gebennensis) indicates that this missal was meant for the use of St. Pierre Cathedral in Geneva. This very neat volume, containing no calendar, no Sanctorale and no Commune Sanctorum – with the exception of one erased column of text (f. 145v) – was probably produced in Geneva in the 15th century. According to Huot, this is the oldest liturgical manuscript to have entered the collection of the Bibliothèque de Genève at the end of the 17th century. (rou)

Online Since: 12/14/2018

The calendar of this book of hours for use in Rome contains prayers to Saint Clarus (2 January) and for the dedication of the Church of St. Peter in Geneva (8 October), which are particular to the diocese of this city. At an unspecified time, the manuscript suffered substantial damage: pages were torn out or torn apart, and illuminated initials were cut out. Only two of the original five illuminations have survived, placed at the beginning of the Hours of the Cross (fol. 15r) and the Penitential Psalms (fol. 74v), respectively. They were probably created mid-15th century in Geneva or the immediate surroundings. (rou)

Online Since: 10/04/2018

The Bibliothèque de Genève's Ms. lat. 55 is an exceptional document because it consists of six wax tablets listing the expenditures for the royal household of the French King Philip IV the Fair for the years 1306-1309. Over time, the wax turned black and hard, which makes it harder to read. But the images of the tablets are accompanied by a transcription and by a facsimile prepared in 1720-1742 by the Genevan Gabriel Cramer. Preserved as „Ms. lat. 55 bis“, this handwritten facsimile makes it possible to access the content of the tablets and to compare the current state with that of 1720-1742 and thus to recognize the loss of pieces of the wax. (jeg)

Online Since: 03/17/2016

This manuscript is remarkable because of its contents as well as its age: it is a dictionary of Tironian notes, copied in the 9th century. While puzzling at first glance, this dictionary is written as lists of signs, the "Tironian notes", accompanied by their Latin meanings. This shorthand from antiquity supposedly survived until the Carolingian era. (jeg)

Online Since: 10/08/2015

Cicero's De officiis of is a political work on ethics, used throughout the Middle Ages, from Augustine, to the compilers of his moral sequences, to Christine de Pizan in her Chemin de long estude. Numerous commentaries have been written on this work, as attested by this 15th century paper manuscript. On the last double page (f. 120v-121r) the ethical theme of the Ciceronian text is continued as a schema of virtues. This manuscript was in the possession of the regent of the Collège de Genève, Hugues Lejeune (1634-1707), who donated it to the Bibliothèque de Genève. (rou)

Online Since: 10/08/2020

With a beautiful binding à la "Du Seuil", this 15th century manuscript contains the Policraticus (The government of the state), a work of reflections on the vanities of courtiers, written by John of Salisbury (1115/1120-1180). It was copied in a careful hand, and the text was decorated with a large miniature showing an author reading his text before the king of France. (jeg)

Online Since: 12/18/2014

At the request of his friend Othman Lillo Ferducci of Ancona, Gian Mario Filelfo composed the Amyris in the years 1471-1476. This long Latin poem was intended to thank Sultan Mehmet II for having freed Ferducci's brother-in-law, who had been taken prisoner by the Turcs during the capture of Constantinople in 1453. Gian Mario Filelfo had the manuscript decorated in Florence with "bianchi girari” ornamentation, had it bound in Urbino with a very beautiful Italian Renaissance binding, and then gave it to the Duke of Urbino, Federico da Montefeltro, at whose court he was staying in 1477 and 1478. (jeg)

Online Since: 12/18/2014

This manuscript was probably written in the 15th century in the Waldensian Valleys of Piedmont (Italy). As also with a large part of the remaining Waldensian manuscripts, now dispersed across various European libraries, this is a collection of various treatises, sermons and upraising or doctrinaire texts. This manuscript probably reached Geneva around 1661, where it was brought, together with other manuscripts, by the Waldensian pastor Jean Léger. Classified as a Spanish manuscript by Jean Senebier in 1779, it was not recognized as Waldensian until the middle of the 19th century. (gir)

Online Since: 06/23/2016

This manuscript was probably written in the 16th century in the Waldensian Valleys of Piedmont (Italy). As with a large part of the remaining Waldensian manuscripts, now dispersed across various European libraries, this is a collection of various treatises, sermons and upraising or doctrinaire texts, partly in Latin and partly in the vernacular. This manuscript probably reached Geneva around 1662, where it was brought, together with other manuscripts, by the Waldensian pastor Jean Léger. Initially classified as a Latin manuscript, it was not recognized as part of the Waldensian codices until 1832. (gir)

Online Since: 12/20/2016