Glossae Aurelianenses super Statium, Book 1
Toronto Medieval Latin Texts 38 • xii, 188 pp. • ISBN 978-0-88844-488-2 • Paper • $29.95
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The Glossae Aurelianenses super Statium were the most widely diffused medieval commentary on the Thebaid, itself one of the most popular epics of the High Middle Ages. The commentary on Thebaid 1 is edited here from its earliest witness, Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Ms. lat. fol. 34.
The glosses were broadly influential, shaping the adaptation of Statius’s masterpiece in the first Old French romance, providing Peter Abelard with historical information used in his theological writing, adorning the margins of Boccaccio’s personal copy of the epic, and even supplementing the Glossa Ordinaria in Nicholas of Lyra’s Biblical Postillae. In addition to furnishing copious examples of how grammar, rhetoric, cultural history, astronomy, and moral philosophy were applied to the explication of poetry in the twelfth century, the layout and sequence of the text as preserved in this manuscript provide the reader with privileged insight into the ways in which medieval magistri reworked the texts of ancient epics to enable progress in their students’ Latinity.
Author
Anthony J. Fredette studied classical philology at Fresno Pacific University before pursuing an M.A. and Ph.D. at the University of Toronto’s Centre for Medieval Studies. His work has centred on the editing of medieval Latin commentaries on classical poets and the influence which these texts exerted on medieval Latin, French, and Occitan literature. His dissertation, “The Medieval Thebaid,” applied these general concerns to the specific context of Statius’ epic poem on the theme of the Seven Against Thebes, revealing the crucial role played by medieval methods of reading and teaching the Thebaid on – among other genres – the birth of the Old French romance.
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