Bulletin de Philosophie Médiévale

The opinion according to which Thomas Aquinas was the original owner of ms. Vat. lat. 718 has proved wrong and cannot serve anymore for dating the codex before Thomas’ departure to Italy (1259). The Parisian tradition of De progressu animalium and De motu animalium integrated Moerbeke’s two translations not only into the Aristotelian Corpus recentius of zoological treatises, but also into the corpora recentiora of the parua. It is probable that De historia animalium (University exemplar of the zoological treatises in Greco-Latin translation) was augmented with Book X in a secondary stage of its circulation. As far as the university tradition of De motibus animalium et aliorum paruorum is concerned, not all questions regarding three successive exemplaria, and more precisely those of the exact contents, composition and number of peciae are definitively resolvable for the moment. R.-A. Gauthier’s position regarding the composition of the exemplar of the psychological parua in Np³ must be corrected after new examination of the manuscript witnesses (De sensu, De somno). Several Italian witnesses do not depend on the university text, but regularly attest to the existence of independent traditions. Moerbeke’s Greek codex used in his first version of the Latin translation (De motu animalium) has some similarities with the Greek codex used by the Anonymous whose translation became the basis of Albert the Great’s De principiis motus processivi. This latter Greek codex is not preserved, but it had some striking similarities with ms. Firenze Laur. LXXXVII.21, which originated in the monastery of Hagios Nikalaos in Casole near Otranto. Moerbeke’s Greek model was certainly not identical with that used by the Anonymous and was, indeed, obviously better.

In this essay, I examine the reception and use of Aristotle’s four causes (efficient, formal, material and final) by twelfth- and thirteenth-century Latin Christian theologians, primarily at Paris. I pay special attention to the early thirteenth century, when Aristotle’s works on natural philosophy (the libri naturales) were officially prohibited in the French capital. By looking at a wide range of texts from both prominent and obscure theologians, I hope to contribute to an expanded view of the ways in which intellectuals in the Latin west received and appropriated Aristotle’s ideas.

In this essay, the structure and content of the Abstractiones, a mid-thirteenthcentury collection of sophismata ascribed to a ‘Magister Ricardus’, are described. It is then argued that the text of the Abstractiones itself together with its “descendant” works present us with a case of textual evolution: the main text appears itself to be the result of patchwork and development, with each manuscript in effect a variation of the work; the descendant works continue the job of modifying the text, now so selectively and radically that they can no longer be described as versions of the Abstractiones itself.

The Cistercian Humbert de Preuilly (†1298) played an important role as an early intellectual guide for the members of his Order. He delivered his lectures on the Sentences at Paris around 1290, from which we have the first Cistercian commentary on the Sentences in the form of Conclusiones that summarize the views of Giles of Rome in Book I and of Thomas Aquinas in Books II-IV. Preserved in some 46 manuscripts, Humbert's Conclusiones super librum Sententiarum clearly served as an introduction to systematic theology for the White Monks. This article presents a new catalogue of manuscripts, a transcription of the Prologue and the tabula questionum.

Himbert of Garda was a little-known Franciscan theologian who studied at Paris around 1320 and probably served as Francis of Meyronnes’ secretary. His commentary on the Sentences provides precious insights on the development of Franciscan thought at Paris, connecting Francis of Meyronnes’ refined presentations of doctrine with raw academic debates between bachelors and masters in the Faculty of Theology. An appendix presents Himbert’s discussion of intrinsic degrees in Book I d.36, and both redactions of his treatment of the formal distinction in the context of the divine attributes in Book I d.8, as well as parallel texts from Francis of Meyronnes. A second appendix provides a full question- and citation-list for Himbert’s commentary on the Sentences.

The importance of Richard Kilvington’s thought has already been brought to light by historians of science and philosophy. His ethical and theological views, however, still await analysis. This edition of one of Kilvington’s ethical questions, “Utrum prudentia sit habitus cum recta ratione activus circa hominis bona et mala,” is intended to be a first step in reviving Kilvington’s ethical and theological writings. The question testifies to the uniqueness of Kilvington’s methods of argumentation, which can best be described as ‘argumentative sophistication’, and to the originality of his philosophical concepts.

In 1991, Benoît Patar published a set of anonymous commentaries (an expositio and a commentary per modum quaestionis) on Aristotle’s De anima. He argued that both works should be ascribed to John Buridan and, taken together, constitute the first of Buridan’s three series of lectures on De anima. Even though Patar’s proof of the authenticity of the commentaries has not been unanimously accepted, his attribution of the works to Buridan turned out to be persistent. This article examines the question of the authenticity of the two anonymous commentaries. It argues that there is no conclusive reason to attribute the works to Buridan. The texts are closely related to works by Buridan, but they bear the same relation to commentaries written by Nicole Oresme. As a consequence, the works should be considered to be exactly what they are: anonymous commentaries on Aristotle’s De anima, written in the same context and around the same time in which the commentaries by John Buridan and Nicole Oresme were also written.

This article presents for the first time complete descriptions of four codices of the Austrian National Library at Vienna, viz. 1617, 5237, 5248 and 5377. Cod. 1617 is a fragment of Henry Totting of Oyta’s 13 Quaestiones Sententiarum, comprising part of q.7 and qq.8-13 in 198 ff.. The other three manuscripts contain mainly logical texts, e.g., Albert of Saxony’s Sophismata in Cods. 5237 and 5377, his Insolubilia in Cod. 5248, and his Quaestiones Posteriorum in Cod. 5377; 11 of the 12 Tractatus by Peter of Spain in Cod. 5248; an apparently unnoticed copy of Porphyry’s Isagoge translated by Boethius and treatises by Thomas Manlevelt, Richard Billingham and John of Holland along with several anonymous texts in Cod. 5248; a fragment of John Buridan’s Quaestiones breves veteris artis in Cod. 5377. The latter codex has also two interesting sets of anonymous Quaestiones quodlibetales and an erratic leaf with questions on Peri heremeias. Charters or charter-like texts are to be found in Cods. 1617 (first leaf) and 5248 (first and last leaf), which may be of value for the prosopography of the fourteenth century.

Past and recent historiography on the fifteenth-century Wegestreit described early Parisian Albertism as an intellectual trend internal to the Arts Faculty and almost exclusively identified with the figure of Johannes de Nova Domo. Although historical documents hinted at the existence of a more established school, no further evidence could be provided. In this contribution we focus on the manuscript Brussel, Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, ms. 760, which contains a commentary to the Sentences given at Paris by Lambertus de Monte, albertista magnus, around 1423. This previously unnoticed source turns out to be the first important witness of the presence of Albertism in the Faculty of Theology at Paris, and testifies to a significant reception and development of the ideas of Johannes de Nova Domo. Moreover, the manuscript evinces an interesting constellation of marginalia, some of which bear traces of unknown works of the Albertist Heymericus de Campo. The article aims to present the source from a textual and material perspective, insofar as it investigates also some peculiar aspects of the history of the manuscript. The codex came from the Augustinian Canons’ Convent of Korsendonk, where it was partially copied, as we discovered, by the erudite Johannes de Meehrout.

Harvard Ms lat. 162 contains theological questions disputed at the University of Vienna between 1426 and the mid 1430s. The article identifies the respondents in these disputations, conducted under Petrus Reicher de Pirchenwart, regent master in theology. Although some of these theologians, such as Johannes de Gmund, Narcissus Hertz, and Thomas Ebendorfer are well known, most have not left any surviving theological writings. This makes these disputations particularly valuable for the intellectual history of the University of Vienna in the second quarter of the fifteenth century.