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Spring 1999



December 1998



Summer 1998

Among the professors from Roman universities who attended the presentation of Paleografia latina medievale at the Bessi Foundation in Rome were Guglielmo Cavallo (La Sapienza) and Fabio Troncarelli (Tor Vergata). Paleografia latina medievale is the Italian edition of Medieval Latin Palaeography by Leonard E. Boyle O.P., with a bibliographical supplement 1982-1998 and an introduction by Fabio Troncarelli. The publisher is QUASAR (Rome). For ordering information, click on Book News. If you are at Kalamazoo for the 34th International Medieval Congress, don't miss the Medieval Congress Special - use the white order form for a hefty discount on the regular price.

If you are at Kalamazoo for the 34th International Medieval Congress, come and meet Boyle and Bosio - the books, not the persons - on Thursday, 6. May, at 5:00 p.m.in Stinson Lounge (Valley III). Boyle and Troncarelli need no introduction - we can only rejoice in the additional sixteen years of medieval bibliography (or should we say, medieval culture seen through the prism of medieval palaeography), conveniently wrapped up in the attractive new edition by Edizioni Quasar.

Antonio Bosio was a man of the Renaissance who made the study of Roman catacombs his lifework. Roma sotterranea is his magnum opus, lavishly illustrated and published posthumously (Rome 1623). The facsimile edition prepared by Quasar Publishers of Severino Tognon is a feast for the eye of any lover of art and/or rare books. For those, in considerable lesser number, who are interested in the history of Rome in the early Middle Ages, Roma sotterranea might yield interesting data, for those Roman graves, not mute at all, were not only cemeteries, but could convey strong doctrinal messages, with effects in the social and political history of the city.

If you walked along the Viaranda (the old Roman road, partly hidden by asphalt, that leads from the Torrefazione Guglielmo on the old Highway 106 to the hilltop village of Staletti), you used to see the silhouette of the Casino Pepe, an example of Calabrian country residence with architectural and historical value in its own right. In addition, the building is situated on the grounds of the monasterium vivariense of Cassiodorus, quite close to the Ionian shore and the fishponds. The structure, now a shell, was to be restored with funds from the European Community. Work on the site began on September 24, 1998, and is to be completed by September 24, 1999, or else all monies have to be returned.

We shall see. In February, when I last visited the site, I was told that work had stopped since November, and none too soon, I hasten to add, because one of the inner arches, which I remembered standing tall in happier times, when the only inhabitants of the Casino were chicken and pigs, had collapsed. Beneath the arch, the ground had been dug up, and then covered again. What's worse, the ancient masonry which made the Casino attractive has been covered with something that looks like greysh cement. Thus, we can no longer see the fragments of late antique material re-used for the construction of Casino Pepe, or the openings in the outer walls, useful to fire a few shots on briganti and other unwelcome guests. Restoration, demolition, or white-washing? It's hard to tell, because the person responsible for the works, whose name - ANTONIO MOSCA - was conspicuously displayed at the site, has been dead for a while (so I am told), and other persons, whose names do not appear in print, have been doing the work. Meanwhile, Emanuela Bocchino, who wants to restore the former church of Sancta Maria Dei Genitrix (Santa Maria de Vetere), whose roof collapsed long ago, is still awaiting a building permit.

* Click on Site of Vivarium for the text of the letter of inquiry sent to Giorgio Ceraudo, of the Soprintendenza ai Beni AA. AA. AA. SS. of Cosenza. For further details on the grounds of the monasterium vivariense, click Site of Vivarium after June 30, 1999. At that time a copy of the report on Casino Pepe and vicinities, sent to the same Soprintendenza by Luciana Cuppo Csaki in 1998, will be on line.

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Good News Department

Learning Latin in Rome: New Quarters for the European Diploma in Medieval Studies.

The Angelicum is the new home of the European Diploma in Medieval Studies, sponsored by the F.I.D.E.M. (students from Canada and the USA are welcome, too). A program that actually teaches medieval Latin is cause for rejoicing, and so are other courses offered: medieval palaeography and codicology, diplomatics, textual criticism - in sum, the tools required to understand what a text really says, rather than what generations of scholars said that it said.

The faculty include Leonard Boyle, Jacqueline Hamesse, and Fabio Troncarelli. Classes convene Monday through Friday from 3:00 to 6:00 p.m., from approximately October 15 to the end of May. For further information contact the F.I.D.E.M., c/o Accademia Belgica, Via Omero 8, 00197 ROMA, tel. (06) 320.18.89, fax 320.83.61, e-mail: accademia.belgio@hella.stm.it.

Giorgio Ceraudo of Cosenza, Soprintendente ai Beni AA.AA.SS. for Calabria and responsible for the preservation of sites determined to have architectural, artistic or historical value in that region, has proposed to the Ministry in Rome the vincolo ex lege 1497/39, to include almost all the township of Stalettì and some adjoining areas. The proposal for a vincolo, when done by the regional authorities in charge, automatically freezes all attempts at unchecked development. In the case of Stalettì, a warehouse for coffee beans and a shopping center were planned right over the likely site of the monasterium vivariense of Cassiodorus. The proposal came in the nick of time; may it sail smoothly, and godspeed.

A Literary Park for the Gulf of Squillace.

Giovanni Maria Calabretta, mayor of Soverato (province of Catanzaro, Calabria) gathered his colleagues from nearby town halls to formulate plans for a parco letterario ("literary park") on the Gulf of Squillace. Literary parks, sponsored by the Foundation Ippolito Nievo, are sites related to some historical or literary figure that have preserved their pristine appearance through time. Cassiodorus is, of course, the historical figure related to the Gulf of Squillace, and we have been saying for some time that one of the unrecorded miracles of Cassiodorus is the fact that his land has remained practically untouched for fifteen hundred years. We plan to visit Mayor Calabretta and hear more about the project. For a progress report, visit our web site after January 31^st, 1999.

In the press: QUASAR Publishers have chosen the 11^th of March, 1999, for presentation of Paleografia Latina Medievale - Introduzione bibliografica, di Leonard E. Boyle, O.P., at the Foundation Marco Besso in Rome. The volume is more than a simple translation of Medieval Latin Palaeography, for the bibliography has been updated to 1998 and Fabio Troncarelli has written a substantial introduction. For additional information contact QUASAR, Via di Monte del Gallo 26a, 00165 ROMA, tel. (06) 63.49.44, fax (06) 63.46.18, e-mail: quasar@mail.xplre.it, website http://pub.xplore.it/quasar/index/htm.

Off the press: Melanges offerts au Père L.E. Boyle à l'occasion de son 75e anniversaire, ed. Jacqueline Hamesse (Louvain-la-Neuve 1998). One thousand pages of essays by medievalists with names from A to Z. Sponsored by the F.I.D.E.M., distributed by Brepols.

Also off the press: Vivario. I libri, il destino, by Fabio Troncarelli (Brepols, Turnhout 1998). A summa of Troncarelli's work on Cassiodorus.

Off the press, but still on the truck: Acta of the XIII International Congress for Christian Archaeology. There are three volumes, with the third one still being delivered. For further information, contact: Pontificio Istituto di Archeologia Cristiana, Via Napoleone III, 1, 00185 ROMA, tel. (06) 44.65.574, fax (06) 44.69.197.

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THE SITE OF VIVARIUM: AN UPDATE

When news of the latest building projects for the proposed site of the monasterium vivariense of Cassiodorus at the Coscia di Stalettì (to include a warehouse for the coffee beans of local entrepreneur GUGLIELMO and yet another cement trap called "villaggio turistico") reached the Societas internationalis pro Vivario, the documentation gathered so far on the historical and ecological value of the site was submitted to (respectively) the Ministero per i Beni Culturali, Via San Michele 22, 00154 Rome, and to the Ministero per i Beni Ambientali, Piazza del Popolo 18, 00184 Rome.

No reply from Via San Michele yet, but the Ministero per i Beni Ambientali acted quickly. A vincolo paesaggistico is now being placed on the site, meaning, among other things, that no new constructions will be allowed. Furthermore,the responsibility for landscape planning for the whole region of Calabria is being removed from local control and given to the Ufficio Centrale per i Beni Ambientali e Paesaggistici at Naples, Castel dell1Ovo.

This is good news indeed. Thank you letters may be sent to arch. Antonella MOSCA, Ministero per i Beni Ambientali, Piazza del Popolo 18, 00184 ROMA.

Vacations/Summer courses at S. Maria de Vetere

After long years, the former chapel of S. Maria de Vetere - now a landmark building, but falling apart, and used by the previous owners as shed for farm tools - has been recognized as the property of the BOCCHINO family. The Bocchinos plan to restore the building and turn it into a museum, with facilities for lectures or classes. Three new apartments and a family restaurant are already on the property, available to individual faculty members and students, or to groups, for study and/or vacation (the Ionian beach is a few yards down the hill). Until the church is restored, arrangements may be made with the Institute for Studies on Cassiodorus (Squillace) for use of the library and seminar room. For rental information, contact: Ristorante BOCCHINO - S. Maria de Vetere - 88069 Stalettì (Italy), telephone (0961) 91 13 53.

Just received

GALONNIER, Alain, ANECDOTON HOLDERI OU ORDO GENERIS CASSIODORORUM, with a preface by Fabio TRONCARELLI (PHILOSOPHES MÉDIÉVAUX tome xxxv, Éditions PEETERS, Louvain-la-Neuve 1997).

The publication of ANECDOTON HOLDERI OU ORDO GENERIS CASSIODORORUM: ÉLÉMENTS POUR UNE ÉTUDE DE L'AUTHENTICITÉ BOÉCIENNE DES OPUSCULA SACRA, by Alain GALONNIER with a preface by Fabio TRONCARELLI (Philosophes Médiévaux tome xxxv, Louvain-la-Neuve 1997) should be a cause of rejoicing for any friend of Late Antiquity, Boethius, or Cassiodorus. I say this without having seen the book yet (I only have in front of me a copy of the preface), on the strength of Troncarelli's very positive comments, but also because a perusal of the table of contents makes it clear that everything that should be treated in the history of a text has been treated, and this is in itself an achievement.

In his preface, Troncarelli places the Anecdoton in the context of the manuscript tradition of the Institutiones II, drawing the conclusion that a work like the Ordo generis Cassiodororum can only be properly understood in the context of the aristocratic circle of Roman émigrés at Constantinople. It is a new development of the thesis of Momigliano, formerly viewed with scepticism by some scholars. Yet, if the Ordo was (as it was) addressed to an aristocratic audience, and if it was also a postface to the Institutiones saecularium litterarum, the conclusion seems unavoidable that the Institutiones were originally written not for monks at Vivarium, but for a circle of intellectuals at Constantinople, and that this first edition of the work (the D recension) was a luxury edition. Startling? Truth always is.

In the press

TRONCARELLI, Fabio, VIVARIUM: I LIBRI, IL DESTINO. Publisher: BREPOLS. Forthcoming in the fall1998.

A summa of Troncarelli's work on Cassiodorus. For a preview, come to the business meeting of the S.I.P.V. at the International Medieval Congress, Leeds.

Also in the press

Roma, magistra mundi - Itineraria culturae medievalis, Mélanges offered to Father Leonard E. Boyle for his 75th birthday (Louvain-la-Neuve 1998). These three volumes, published by the Fédération Internationale des Instituts d'Études Médiévales, will appear in time for Father Boyle's birthday. Two essays deal directly with the world of Cassiodorus (F. TRONCARELLI, Una pagina di Cassiodoro in una pagina dell'Amiatina, and L. CUPPO CSAKI, Roma magistra historiae: The Year 680 as 3"caput saeculi" in Cas. 641. A third essay, G. PUIGVERT, El manuscrito Vat. Reg. 123 y su posible adscripción al scriptorium de Santa Maria de Ripoll, discusses the attribution of a famous manuscript that contains, among many works on computus, some derived from Felix of Squillace.

Forthcoming

HALPORN, James, "After the Schools: Grammar and Rhetoric in Cassiodorus." Plans are underway for the publication of this paper, originally presented at a panel sponsored by the Medieval Latin Studies Group at the Annual Meeting of the American Philological Association in December 1997, by the Catholic University of America Press. The editor is Carol LANHAM, who organized the Medieval Latin panel in 1997.

Spanish Translation of the Institutiones, Book 1

Thanks to Lorenzo VISCIDO for sending title page and table of contents of La iniciación a la Biblia en las Institutiones Divinarum Litterarum de Casiodoro , by Pio B. Santiago Amar (Romae 1995). A translation is always welcome, particularly that of a text such as the Institutiones, where angels fear to tread. Any remarks based on title and table of contents would, of course, be premature. While awaiting a review copy, however, we are left wondering: why translate the title of chapter 29, de positione monasterii vivariensis sive castellensis, with "monasterio de Vivarium y Castellense"? It was the monastery "of the fish-ponds and/or the castellum", which makes perfect sense if the castellum was the terminal point of an aqueduct, often connected with the Roman vivaria .

e-mail us at: vivario@geocities.com

Updated: April 23, 1999

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