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      • Adelaide Bennett Hagens
    • Activities
      • Events
      • Congress Activities
        • Sponsored Conference Sessions (1993‒)
          • Panels at the M-MLA Convention
        • Co-sponsored Conference Sessions (2006‒)
    • History
      • Seals, Matrices & Documents
      • Genealogies & Archives
  • Bembino
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  • Congress
    • Sponsored Conference Sessions (1993‒)
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      • Abstracts Listed by Year
    • Kalamazoo Archive
    • Panels at the M-MLA Convention
      • Abstracts of Papers for the M-MLA Convention
  • Events
    • The Research Group Speaks: The Series
    • Seminars, Workshops, Colloquia & Symposia (1989–)
      • Seminars on ‘The Evidence of Manuscripts’
      • Symposia on ‘The Transmission of the Bible’
      • The New Series
        • 2019 Anniversary Symposium Program: The Roads Taken
        • 2019 Anniversary Symposium Registration
        • 2019 Anniversary Symposium Registration Open
    • Abstracts of Papers for Events
      • Abstracts of Papers for Seminars on ‘The Evidence of Manuscripts’
      • Abstracts of Papers for Symposia, Workshops & Colloquia
    • Receptions & Parties
    • Business Meetings
    • Photographic Exhibitions & Master Classes
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    • Journal Description
    • ShelfMarks: The RGME-Newsletter
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      • “Insular, Anglo-Saxon, and Early Anglo-Norman Manuscript Art at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge” (1997)
        • Mildred Budny, ‘Catalogue’
        • The Illustrated Catalogue (1997)
      • The Illustrated Handlist
      • Semi-Official Counterfeiting in France 1380-1422
      • No Snap Decisions: Challenges of Manuscript Photography
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Specimens of Ege Manuscript 40 in the Ege Family Portfolio
Otto F. Ege: Fifty Original Leaves from Medieval Manuscripts, Leaf 40, Printed Label, Special Collections and University Archives, Stony Brook University Libraries.
Otto Ege Manuscript 40, Part II: Before and After Ege
rivate Collection, Koran Leaf in Ege's Famous Books in Nine Centuries, Front of Leaf. Reproduced by permission.
Otto Ege’s Portfolio of ‘Famous Books’ and ‘Ege Manuscript 53’ (Quran)
J. S. Wagner Collection, Early-Printed Missal Leaf, Verso. Rubric and Music for Holy Saturday. Reproduced by Permission.
Carmelite Missal Leaf of 1509
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Opening of the Book of Maccabees in Otto Ege MS 19. Private Collection.
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“Gutenberg and After” at Princeton University Library
J. S. Wagner Collection. Leaf from from Prime in a Latin manuscript Breviary. Folio 4 Recto, Initial C for "Confitimini" of Psalm 117 (118), with scrolling foliate decoration.
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Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, MS 1183. Photograph courtesy Kristen Herdman.
2019 Anniversary Symposium Report: The Roads Taken
Detail of illustration.
Sanskrit and Prakrit Manuscripts
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Leaf 41, Recto, Top Right, in the Family Album (Set Number 3) of Otto Ege's Portfolio of 'Fifty Original Leaves' (FOL). Otto Ege Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Photograph by Mildred Budny.
More Discoveries for ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 41’
Augustine Homilies Bifolium Folio IIr detail with title and initial for Sermon XCVI. Private Collection, reproduced by permission. Photograph by Mildred Budny.
Vellum Bifolium from Augustine’s “Homilies on John”
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2019 International Congress on Medieval Studies Program
Libro de los juegos. Madrid, El Escorial, MS T.1.6, folio 17 verso, detail.
2018 International Congress on Medieval Studies Program
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Bembino Version 1.5 (2018)
Lower Half of the Original Verso of a Single Leaf detached from a prayerbook in Dutch made circa 1530, owned and dismembered by Otto F. Ege, with the seller's description in pencil in the lower margin. Image reproduced by permission.
A New Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 214’?
Slice of Brie. Photograph by Coyau via Wikipedia Commons.
Say Cheese
Verso of the Leaf and Interior of the Binding, Detail: Lower Right-Hand Corner, with the Mitered Flap Unfolde
A 12th-Century Fragment of Anselm’s ‘Cur Deus Homo’
Reused Leaf from Gregory's Dialogues Book III viewed from verso (outside of reused book cover) Detail of Spine of Cover with Volume Labels. Photograph © Mildred Budny.
A Leaf from Gregory’s Dialogues Reused for Euthymius
Detail of the top of the verso of the fragmentary leaf from a 13th-century copy of Statutes for the Cistercian Order. Reproduced by permission.
Another Witness to the Cistercian Statutes of 1257
Initial d in woodcut with winged hybrid creature as an inhabitant. Photography © Mildred Budny
The ‘Foundling Hospital’ for Manuscript Fragments
Decorated opening word 'Nuper' of the Dialogues, Book III, Chapter 13, reproduced by permission
A New Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 41’
Close-Up of The Host of 'The Library Cafe' in the Radio Studio. Photography © Mildred Budny
A Visit to The Library Café
Invitation to 'Canterbury Manuscripts' Seminar on 19 September 1994
Seminar on the Evidence of Manuscripts (September 1994)

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A Leaf of Deuteronomy from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’ in the Rosenbrook Collection

February 8, 2022 in Manuscript Studies, Uncategorized

Brent Rosenbrook Collection, Leaf from Ege Manuscript 14, ‘Recto’ (original Verso), top: Running title.

An Old Testament Leaf
from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’
with part of Deuteronomy
in the Rosenbrook Collection

Large-format Latin Vulgate Lectern Bible
made in France
late 13th- or early 14th century

Single Leaf within a matted frame
Double columns of 50 lines

Maximum measurements circa 16 1/8″ × 10 11/16″ <written area circa 11″ × 7 3/8″>

Deuteronomy 11:21 ([quam iuravit] /) dominus patribus)
– 14:15 (strutionem ac noc-(/tuam et larum])

With bichrome running titles and chapter numbers,
polychrome decorated initials and border ornament with geometric and foliate motifs,
and added lection marks

[Posted on 8 February 2022, with updates]

Virginia Lazenby O’Hara Fine Books Division, Dallas Public Library, Framed Leaf from Otto Ege MS 14, ‘Recto’ (original Verso).

Brent Rosenbrook Collection, Matted Leaf from Otto Ege Manuscript 14, ‘Recto’ (original Verso).

Continuing the series of posts for our blog on Manuscript Studies, Mildred Budny describes another leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’, a large-format copy on vellum of the full Latin Bible in the Vulgate Version.

A leaf from this manuscript recently reached the collection of Brent Rosenbrook, who generously sent images and information about it, in response to the blogpost reporting More Discoveries for ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’.

A similar response several months ago brought to our attention the Dallas Leaf from the same manuscript, now kept at the Virginia Lazenbury O’Hara Fine Books Division of the Dallas Public Library in the City of Dallas, Texas. A report of that leaf, which carries the end of the Book of Joshua and the beginning of Judges in the Old Testament portion of the manuscript, appears in our blog on A Leaf in Dallas from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’.

The ‘new’ leaf likewise comes from one of the early Books of the Old Testament. In the sequence, it stood one Book ahead.

Otto Ege Manuscript 14 and Manuscript Studies

Some discoveries for the manuscript have been reported in our blog.

  • A New Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’
  • More Discoveries for ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’
  • A Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’ and Ege’s Workshop Practices
  • Updates for Some ‘Otto Ege Manuscripts’ (Ege MSS 8, 14, 41, and 61)
  • Some Leaves in Set 1 of ‘Ege’s FOL Portfolio’ (Ege MSS 8, 14, 19, and 41)
  • Patch Work in ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’
  • A Leaf in Dallas from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’.

See also The Illustrated Handlist (Number 4).

Brent Rosenbrook Collection, Leaf from Ege Manuscript 14, ‘Recto’ (original Verso), middle right: Deuteronomy 14 opens.

The Rosenbrook Leaf

When contacting me about the Leaf, its collector described the origins of his collecting spirit and the development of his book-collecting.

I wanted to give you a little bit of backstory and brief history. I am a layman in this field but have always been a collector of things since my childhood. I was a bibliophile long before I ever heard the term or would have understood its meaning. And although I am new to collecting illuminated manuscripts, I have always felt drawn to the beauty of them. As a teenager and young man I was especially stuck by the intricate, amazing imagery and knotwork in the Book of Kells. In 1998 I was fortunate to have visited Trinity College in Dublin and see it firsthand along with other books on display. It was a moment of wonder to finally be in the presence of that book. Although I never lost that sense of awe, for the next many years that was the extent of my experience and attention concerning manuscripts.

In December of 2016 my wife and I were visiting a friend’s home for the holidays when I noticed on the wall a large framed musical page of some sort. I could tell that it was hundreds of years old, handwritten, on animal skin. He knew little about it other than it belonged to a relative down the line and that at some point it was gifted to him. It was of course an antiphonal as I later discovered by searching online. It was (is) likely early 16th century and had one very large, but simple rubricated initial. Although it wouldn’t be considered elaborate or rare to a person knowledgeable in such things, for me the affect was basically “Wow, that’s really cool. I’ve got to figure out what that is. I want one of those”. The collector bug bit me again. . . .

Brent Rosenbrook Collection, Leaf from Ege MS 14, ‘Verso’ original Recto), bottom left.

My interest and enjoyment of looking at and learning about illuminated manuscripts (especially Bibles with historiated and zoomorphic initials) grew as I visited multiple websites over many weeks and scrolled through countless images of various western manuscripts. In March 2017 I acquired my first true illuminated leaf when I bid on and (unexpectedly) won a large Bible leaf which was from a manuscript previously owned by the famous collector Chester Beatty. As far as the Otto Ege leaf, it was a spontaneous purchase.

I received a notification . . . when this page was listed recently by Rodger Friedman Rare Book Studio. It wasn’t on my radar (or necessarily in the budget) to make a purchase but after glancing at the listing throughout the day I committed to buying it. I only knew the name Otto Ege vaguely through my reading up on manuscripts.

When I received the package and saw the leaf for the first time it evoked a lot of emotion. Although I knew its measurements when I purchased it, I still wasn’t prepared for the size and beauty of seeing it firsthand – it is stunning. It was only in the last few weeks after this acquiring this that I began reading up on and watching video postings about this famous biblioclast and the sets he sold off. . . . It was just this past Thursday night when I came across the RGME website and decided to reach out to you.

As for the Leaf itself, the collector reports that “It remains in the original matting that Ege used when he compiled these books.” Thus, this specimen qualifies for the group of survivors from the manuscript which circulated on their own, as a ‘Rogue Leaf’. Many of them traveled within one of Ege’s standard mats of a uniform size, accompanied by Ege’s printed Label giving a generic description of his Leaf 14. They resemble the presentation designed for specimen leaves from various manuscripts in Ege’s ‘FOL’ Portfolio of Fifty Original Leaves from Medieval Manuscripts, in which leaves from the dismembered Lectern Bible have the position of Number 14.

Now, with the collector’s permission, the Leaf might begin to assume its place within the virtual Reconstruction of the manuscript, as known from its fragments.  Brent Rosenbrook observes:

I think it’s nice for others to know that there are those who aren’t necessarily part of academic institution but still would like to contribute what they can to the advance of manuscript study.

We greatly admire this view!

A Note on the Photographs of the Leaf 

The images here show the Leaf and its details under several forms of light, taken at different times and at different angles. Their variety shows multiple aspects, including some 3-dimensional features which views at an angle can reveal of the curvature of the surface(s) of the animal skin and the furrows of the ruled lines upon it in drypoint.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: 'Fifty Original Leaves from Medieval Manuscripts', Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Book of Deuteronomy, Brent Rosenbrook Collection, Dallas Public Library, Ege's FOL Portfolios, FOL Portfolio Set Number 39, Latin Vulgate Bible, Lectern Bible, Medieval Manuscript Fragments, Otto Ege, Otto Ege Collection, Otto Ege Manuscript 14, Reconstructing Manuscripts Virtually, Running Titles, Stony Brook University Library
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Updates for ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’

August 12, 2020 in Manuscript Studies, Uncategorized

A Glimpse of
‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’
While It Was Still Intact

Portable Quarto Bible in the Latin Vulgate Version
Italy, circa 1275, with Illuminations made apparently in Paris

Double columns in 48 lines
circa 235 × 170 mm <written area circa 153 × 107 mm>

[Posted on 12 August 2020]

Opening of the Book of Maccabees in Otto Ege MS 19. Private Collection.

Opening of the Book of Maccabees in Otto Ege MS 19. Private Collection.

Continuing to explore the tracks of manuscripts dispersed by Otto F. Ege (1888–1951), we gain access to the Sotheby’s catalogue for the auction in 1936 from which the manuscript mostly known as ‘Ege Manuscript 19’ came to him.  For the name, see  Scott Gwara, Handlist, Number 19 (page 124).

For access to the elusive catalogue, we thank Stephen Massey, Bruce McKinney, and our Associate, Eric White, for help with the quest while libraries remain closed through months in 2020.

We began to study the manuscript when the owner of one of its leaves, J. S. Wagner, contacted us on account of our blog, which reported discoveries for some other Ege manuscripts.  For example,

  • A New Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’
  • More Discoveries for ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’
  • A Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’ and Ege’s Workshop Practices
  • Updates for Some ‘Otto Ege Manuscripts’ (Ege MSS 8, 14, 41, and 61)
  • Some Leaves in Set 1 of ‘Ege’s FOL Portfolio’ (Ege MSS 8, 14, 19, and 41)
  • More Leaves from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 51’
  • More Discoveries for ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 14’

Our discoveries for Ege MS 19 are reported here:

  • A Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’ and Ege’s Workshop Practices
  • Some Leaves in Set 1 of ‘Ege’s FOL Portfolio’ (Ege MSS 8, 14, 19, and 41)

Now we examine the written record for the Provenance and the state of the volume before Ege.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: Ege Manuscipt 51, Ege Manuscript 14, Ege Manuscript 19, Fragmentology, History of Binding, Interpretation of Hebrew Names, Interpretationes Hebraicorum Nominum, Latin Vulgate Bible, Manuscript studies, Medieval Manuscript Fragments, Otto F. Ege, Sothebys
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Some Leaves in Set 1 of Ege’s FOL Portfolio

June 19, 2020 in Manuscript Studies

Leaves from
‘Otto Ege Manuscripts 8, 14, 19, and 41’
In a Newly Discovered Portfolio
of Fifty Original Leaves (“FOL”)

[Published on 18 June 2020]

[Update on 22 January 2021:  This set, sold at auction at Christie’s in London on 8 December 2020, has been acquired by the Houghton Library at Harvard University, as announced by John Overholt.]

Continuing our series of blogposts (see our Contents List) on some manuscripts dismembered and dispersed by Otto F. Ege (1888–1951) in various Portfolios or by other means, we report on selected leaves which emerge into view in a newly discovered set of the Portfolio of Fifty Original Leaves (“FOL”). 

Set 1 of Ege's FOL Portfolio, Leaf 14 recto: Initial for Lamentations.

Set 1 of Ege’s FOL Portfolio, Leaf 14 recto: Initial for Lamentations.

Among the numbered sets, the ‘new’ one has the Number 1.  This “previously-unknown” set of Ege’s “Fifty Original Leaves” in private hands is reported by our Associate Lisa Fagin Davis in her blog: Manuscript Road Trip: Otto Ege, St. Margaret. and Digital Fragmentology, Part 2 (June 7, 2020), following her Part 1 describing her own and other scholars’ work — ours included — on the FOL manuscripts:  Manuscript Road Trip: Fragmentology in the Wild (July 14, 2019).

We thank the owner and Lisa for allowing us to see images of the relevant leaves in the new set, resulting in updates for the manuscripts which we have already considered within Ege’s FOL Portfolio.  A complete set of the Portfolio contains ‘Ege MSS 1–50’, as numbered both by Ege and by Scott Gwara in his book on Otto Ege’s Manuscripts (2013). 

Here, augmenting our work already on survivors from some of those Fifty manuscripts in other settings (sets of the FOL Portfolio and elsewhere), we focus on Ege MSS 8, 14, 19, and 41.   This post contributes to our on-going study of Ege’s manuscripts and other materials, medieval and other, Western and more.  So far:  Ege MSS 8, 14, 41, 51, 56, 61, and 214 (see our Contents List). Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: Christie's, De tribus diebus by Hugh of Saint-Victor, Dialogues of Gregory the Great, Dispersed Manuscript Leaves, Ege's FOL Portfolios, Epistles of John Chrysostom, Fragmentology, History of Manuscripts, Houghton Library, Hugh of Saint-Victor, Latin Vulgate Bible, Medieval Manuscript Fragments, Meditations of Saint Anselm, Otto Ege, Otto Ege MS 14, Otto Ege MS 19, Otto Ege MS 41, Otto Ege MS 8, Otto Ege Portfolios, Wilton Processional
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A Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’ and Ege’s Workshop Practices

May 1, 2020 in Manuscript Studies, Uncategorized

An Old Testament Leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’

And Ege’s Workshop Habits
in Assembling His Portfolios

Opening of the Book of Macabees in Otto Ege MS 19. Private Collection.

Portable Bible in the Latin Vulgate Version
Italy, circa 1275, with Illuminations made apparently in Paris

Double columns in 48 lines
circa 235 × 170 mm <written area circa 153 × 107 mm>

End of Malachi (within 2:13 – 4:10),
Jerome’s Prologue to Maccabees, Argumentum,
and Opening of I Maccabees (1:1 – within 1:21)

J. S. Wagner Collection

[Posted on 1 May 2020, with updates]
A detached leaf from ‘Otto Ege Manuscript 19’, now in the J. S. Wagner Collection, provides the transition from one Old Testament Book to the next.  In reporting its survival and setting it into the context of its former manuscript and the known patterns of Otto Ege’s distribution of his dismembered manuscripts, we examine the leaf, its presentation as part of a larger series (initially as Ege’s Number 19, altered for some reason to a Number 13), and Ege’s evolving “workshop practices” in mounting and distributing manuscript leaves to wider audiences.

[Note:  This post began as the report of a Leaf from one of the manuscripts dispersed by Otto F. Ege, to follow our earlier reports for some other manuscripts of his.  It grew into a report also of Ege’s varying workshop practices over time in assembling or reassembling his Portfolios of specimen Leaves extracted from manuscripts and other books.  Selected specimens would be mounted in mats, often with identifying labels or inscriptions in print or pencil, arranged in groups (notably in the Portfolios, but also in other batches) or distributed as left-overs, and sold far and wide.  Mercifully, apart from cutting the individual leaves out of the books, Ege did not crop them except by the rectangular windows of their mats.

As reported in other posts on this blog (see the Contents List), our cumulative examination of various Portfolios, individual sets thereof, and individual leaves either extracted from Portfolios or distributed on their own (as “Strays”), has yielded detailed grounds for conjectures about Ege’s evolving and revolving practices over an extended period of intense activity dedicated to maximizing the teaching (and commercial) potential of his collection.  We share some results of that research here.]

Opening of the Book of Macabees in Otto Ege MS 19. Private Collection.

Wagner Leaf from Ege Manuscript 19, verso, detail.

With thanks to the present collector, J. S. Wagner, who drew this find to our attention on account of our blog (You are Here), we present the images, front and back, of a detached leaf from a small-format 13th-century Vulgate Latin Bible dispersed by Otto F. Ege (1888–1951).  The leaf was formerly part of Ege Manuscript 19 (Gwara, Handlist, No. 19, page 124).

Already, in our blog on Manuscript Studies (You are Here), we have considered leaves from other manuscripts distributed by Ege.  See our Contents List for the series of discoveries, which so far principally concern Ege Manuscripts 8, 14, 41, 51, 61,  and 214; we begin work also on Ege Manuscript 56 in Armenian.

This new opportunity opens the possibility to consider another of Ege’s dismembered manuscripts showcased in his Portfolio of Fifty Original Manuscripts (= “FOL”), for which a core study was developed with the website devoted to a group of its survivors as ege.denison.edu, and for which work has continued to advance apace in multiple centers.

This Portfolio is one of several which Ege devoted to specific titles or genres of books in manuscript and/or print (such as the Bible in several languages).  Ege gave this one the title of Fifty Leaves from Medieval Manuscripts, XII–XVI Century [sic for the plural].  Ege numbered its Leaves as “1–50”, in the sequence which he chose for their presentation there.  Their source manuscripts, accordingly, in Scott Gwara’s Handlist of Ege’s manuscripts are known as “Ege Manuscripts 1–50” (of at least 1–325, and counting).  A provisional summary of the contents of this Portfolio and some of its known sets appears online in The Otto F. Ege Palaeography Portfolio: Towards a Virtual and Interactive Reconstruction of Fifty Dismembered Manuscripts.  Virtual reconstructions of one and another of its manuscripts continue to emerge, as with FOL Leaf 15, the 14th-century Beauvais Missal.

J. S. Wagner Collection. Leaf from from Prime in a Latin manuscript Breviary. Folio 4 Recto, Initial C for "Confitimini" of Psalm 117 (118), with scrolling foliate decoration.

Already, in this blog, we have presented 2 leaves from the J. S. Wagner Collection:

  • The Penitent King David from a Book of Hours
  • A Leaf from Prime in a Large-Format Breviary .

Now we turn to the Ege Leaf in that Collection.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: "Fifty Original Manuscripts", Bible Manuscripts, Charles Carmichael Lacaita, Ege's Portfolios, Ege's Workshop Practices, J.S. Wagner Collection, Latin Vulgate Bible, manuscript fragments, Otto Ege, Otto Ege Manscript 61, Otto Ege Manuscriipt 23, Otto Ege Manuscript 13, Otto Ege Manuscript 14, Otto Ege Manuscript 19, Otto Ege Manuscript 41, Otto Ege Manuscripts, Portable Bibles, Sir Joseph Lacaita
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