Details

Other Title:

Ars magna cabalistica.

Subjects:

Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, 1463-1494.
Cabala -- Early works to 1800.
Cabala.
Gematria -- Early works to 1800.
Mathematics -- Early works to 1800.
Mathematics.
Algebra -- Early works to 1800.
Algebra.
Gematria.

Form/Genre:

Codices.
Diagrams.
Tables (documents)
Treatises.
Manuscripts, Latin.
Manuscripts, European.

Language:

Latin, with some Hebrew characters.

Summary:

17th- or 18th-century copy of a treatise dated to 16th-century Frankfurt am Main (1564, f. 1r; 1569, f. 37r) on cabalistic gematria (the mystical interpretation of language), in which strings of letters, in this case Latin sentences, are assigned a numerical value. The first part begins with a dedication to Maurice Hassia, Landgraf of Katsenelnbogen, Dietz, Zitgen-Hain, and Nidda from 1592 to 1627, in which the author cites Giovanni Pico della Mirandola and Johannes Reuchlin as transmitters of the cabalistic tradition in western Europe, and the main text explains gematria using Hebrew letters. The first 3 of the 6 tables at the end of the first part have values, and the remaining 3 are blank (f. 33r-35v). The first part also has a table of contents at the end (f. 36r). The second part begins with a letter by Joannes Theodorus de Bry (1561-1623?), in which he refers to the second part as a posthumous work; another authorial letter of dedication to a descendant of Maurice Hassia; and a table of contents without folio numbers before a presentation gematria using Latin equivalents for Hebrew letters. The dates of the dedicatees and of Joannes Theodorus de Bry suggest that the 16th-century dates of the supposed source material on the title pages of the first and second parts are unlikely. A bifolium and single leaf of related calculations and notes in Italian, in a late 18th- or 19th-century hand, is laid in the second part (after f. 73).

Notes:

Ms. codex.
Title from title page (f. 1r).
Collation: Paper, 80; 1-12⁶ 13⁸; [i], 1-34 (Part 1), [i-ii], 1-42 (Part 2), [i]; contemporary foliation in ink, upper right recto; modern foliation in pencil, lower right recto. References in this record are to modern foliation. Catchword lower right verso on most leaves.
Layout: Written in 40-41 long lines; possibly ruled using a frame pressed into the page with pricking along the side margins.
Script: Written in cursive script by a single hand.
Decoration: Diagrams and tables throughout; a few manicules of different readers (f. 3r, 17r (with later note), 32r, 43v, 45r).
Watermarks: Fleur-de-lis enclosed in a circle surmounted by a smaller circle (similar to Heawood Watermarks, no. 1573 (1752); see nos. 1566-1573 (Italy, 1690-1752)).
Binding: Not bound but wrapped in a contemporary (late 17th- or 18th-century) leather folder (perhaps once the leather covers of the binding of another volume), blind-tooled, with a flap extending from the back to fold over the front decorated with an undulating edge.
Origin: Probably written in Italy between 1690 and 1750 (based on similar watermarks; Les Enluminures).

Penn Provenance:

Possible ownership stamp: Vachini[?] (f. 1r, 37r).
Sold at auction at Tajan (Paris), 14 May 2004, lot 90.
Sold by Les Enluminures (Paris and Chicago), 2013.

Cited as:

UPenn Ms. Codex 1636.

Contributor:

Bry, Johann Theodor de, 1561-1623.
Hassia, Maurice, dedicatee.

OCLC:

847711160

Access Restriction:

Access to this item is restricted.