Authentic Witnesses: Approaches to Medieval Texts and Manuscripts by Mary A. Rouse, Richard H. Rouse (review)

STUDIES IN THE AGE OF CHAUCER and how much remains to be done in the study of later-medieval manu­ script and early printed materials. These remain extraordinarily fruitful areas for research. At a time when there seems to be a renewed interest in "historicizing" the text, one hopes that the example ofthis volume will be attended to very carefully. For, before the text can be profitably histor­ icized, the circumstances of its physical survival and transmission must be understood as fully as possible. The best ofthese essays suggest how much can be achieved through such understanding. I note a few minor errors: p. 107, no. 145: for "Yale University Library" read "Beinecke Library"; p. 108, under "Reynys": for "146" read "147"; p. 146 and n. 6: The claim that this Polychronicon translation is unique is incorrect: it appears also in Trinity College, Dublin, manuscript 489 and Cleveland Public Library manuscript W q09.92-C468: see E. D. Kennedy, A Manual of the Writings in Middle English (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1989), 8, Yale University Press, 2,878 [25]. A. S. G. EDWARDS University of Victoria MARY A. ROUSE and RICHARD H. ROUSE. Authentic Witnesses: Ap­ proaches to Medieval Texts andManuscnjJts. Publications in Medieval Studies, vol. 17. Medieval Institute. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1991. Pp. viii, 518. $59.95. This volume contains thirteen previously published articles written mostly by both authors together, but a few by Richard Rouse alone. The subject matter they cover consists ofmanuscript books and their presentation from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries in northwest Europe. They are con­ cerned with the history of the manuscript book, and all exhibit a similar methodology through which surviving manuscripts and documents yield as much information about this topic as possible. Most essays are very detailed in their analysis of the evidence, and this makes it difficult to provide a comprehensive overview of their findings in a short review. They are, however, arranged into groups as follows: "Form and Function," "An­ cient Authors and Medieval Readers," "Flonlegia," "Content and Struc­ ture," "Book Production: Stationers and Peciae," "Medieval Libraries," "Backgrounds to Print," and "Epilogue." Some of these sections contain 274 REVIEWS only a single essay, but they do reveal the areas covered. There is a brief introduction; a subject index and a manuscript index complete the volume. The first article deals with twofragments of a roll containing Reinmar von Zweter's Spriiche found in a binding. Reinmar was a minnesinger, and the evidence suggests that the fragments were part of a singer's or per­ former's roll that he carried around for use in performance. Most poems survive today in codices, produced for courtiers and often elaborately written and illustrated. Such codices may represent the second stage ofthe written production of poetry, the rolls being the first. If so, this has important implications for editors ofmedieval poetry, since rolls very rarely survive. If we try to re-create the text of the earliest codex, that may not reflect in any way the genesis of the original poem or poems. The second group of essays deals principally with Philip ofBayeux and his library; Philip was bishop ofBayeuxfrom 1142 to 1163. Philip was not a writer, but he had a library of140 books, which he left to the abbey ofBee. Although most of these books have not been identified, a catalogue of them provides us with some idea of how he acquired his books and ofthe importance ofmen like him in the preservation ofclassical texts. One ofthe most important points to arisefrom these essays is that the survival ofmany classical texts was assured by copying in twelfth-century northern Europe, and it was this copying that provided the texts to Italy that promoted its renaissance. Also, the history ofa particular text can often be followed by tracing the history of the other texts with which it often shared a codex. The third group, which examines the history of the florilegia, and particularly the Flonlegium Angelicum, has links with the second. This florilegium was written in the third quarter ofthe twelfth century and is a book of maxims in which beauty of expression is more important...