11th Century & Timaeus

The Eleventh-Century Shift in the Reception of Plato's "Timaeus" and Calcidius's"Commentary"Author(s): Anna SomfaiReviewed work(s):Source: Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 65 (2002), pp. 1-21Published by: The Warburg InstituteStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4135103 .

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THE ELEVENTH-CENTURY SHIFT IN THE RECEPTION OF PLATO'S TIMAEUS AND CALCIDIUS'S COMMENTARY*

Anna Somfai

T he Timaeus is the only one of Plato's dialogues to have been continuously available in

Latin translation in the West from the time of classical antiquity.' Two Latin versions, both incomplete, circulated in the period prior to the Renaissance: one by Cicero from the

first century BC (Timaeus, 27D-47B, with some passages omitted), the other by Calcidius from

around 400 AD (Timaeus, 17A-53C), accompanied by his Latin Commentary. In his Middle

Platonic commentary Calcidius does not provide a detailed explanation of each theme which

arises in the Timaeus. Instead he discusses selected issues dealt with in the portion of the

dialogue which he translated and considered by him to be in need of further explanation. The Commentary was often copied and bound together with Plato's dialogue in medieval manu-

scripts. Scant knowledge of Greek in the Middle Ages blocked access to Plato's original text

and the extant Greek commentaries and scholia. Calcidius's Commentary consequently became

the most important tool for the interpretation of the Timaeus. The manuscript evidence shows

that the Commentary was annotated by its earliest medieval readers long before the dialogue itself became the object of scrutiny. The twelfth-century glosses on the Timaeus, attributed to

Bernard of Chartres and William of Conches, also relied on Calcidius as their chief source.

And even this new twelfth-century hermeneutic apparatus did not displace the Commentary, which attained renewed popularity during the Renaissance. In order to understand the medi-

eval reception of the Timaeus, therefore, we have to explore the transmission of Calcidius's

Commentary. There are in total 156 extant medieval manuscripts of the two translations, many

equipped with marginal and interlinear glosses and diagrams which were produced and later

augmented by generations of scholars. These annotations, some dating from the ninth century and still found in fifteenth-century manuscripts, were often copied together with the texts.

Their presence made possible a variety of readings and interpretations, generating an ongoing

dialogue with the texts of Plato and Calcidius. Apart from registering the impressions of

readers, the glosses outline the main currents of interpretation. The central aim of my inquiry is to determine how the transmission and interpretation

of Plato's Timaeus and the Commentary of Calcidius changed over the course of the eleventh

* Archive abbreviations used in this article:

Bamberg: Staatsbibliothek = SB Berlin: Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin Preussicher Kultur-

besitz = SBPK Brussels: Bibliotheque Royale Albert Ier = BR

Cologne: Erzbisch6fliche Di6zesan- und Dombibliothek = Dombib.

El Escorial: Real Biblioteca = RB Florence: Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana = Laur. Leiden: Universiteitsbibliotheek = UB

London: British Library = BL Milan: Biblioteca Ambrosiana = Ambr. Munich: Bayerische Staatsbibliothek = BSB Oxford: Bodleian Library = Bodley Paris: Bibliotheque nationale de France = BnF Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana = BAV Vienna: Osterreichische Nationalbibliothek = ONB

1. I am grateful to Charles Burnett, David Juste and Jill Kraye for reading and commenting on drafts of this article.

JOURNAL OF THE WARBURG AND COURTAULD INSTITUTES, LXV, 2002



2 ANNA SOMFAI

century. I shall argue, on the basis of a close study of the manuscripts and of some late tenth-

and eleventh-century texts, that an important shift in the reading pattern of the dialogue and

its commentary occurred at this time. Many of the new tendencies generally associated with

the twelfth-century revival of Platonic thinking, in fact, emerged during the period of transition

from the Carolingian era to the twelfth century, characterised in modern literature as the two

'Renaissances' of the Middle Ages.2 The mistaken belief that the twelfth century produced the first significant medieval in-

terpretation of Plato's text has so far gone almost completely unchallenged, since little effort

has been made to uncover the reception of the Timaeus and of Calcidius's Commentary from

the ninth to the late eleventh century. Raymond Klibansky introduced the concept of the con-

tinuity of the Platonic tradition during the Middle Ages, briefly touching on the Arabic and

Byzantine heritage as well.3 He outlined a reception history, identified tendencies present

throughout the transmission and suggested future lines of research. Some twenty years later

Tullio Gregory, in his study of the Timaeus and of medieval Platonism, drew on quotations from

anonymous twelfth-century marginal annotations, as well as from the glosses of Bernard of

Chartres and William of Conches.4 Jan Hendrik Waszink's outstanding edition of Calcidius's

translation and commentary, with a thorough introduction including a study of the manu-

scripts, gave new impetus to research in this area.5 EdouardJeauneau, in a series of articles,

published a selection of twelfth- to fourteenth-century glosses.6 Following in his footsteps,

Margaret Gibson edited the glosses of four eleventh-century manuscripts, making the first

major exploration of the transmission prior to the twelfth century.7 She omitted, however, annotations which were not common to all four manuscripts and limited herself to the first

part of the Timaeus. Neither Jeauneau nor Gibson paid attention to the interlinear anno-

tations and to the gloss to Calcidius's Commentary or to the several variants of its original set

of explanatory diagrams. These elements, however, are of great importance as evidence for

changing attitudes towards the texts of Plato and Calcidius.

As a result of the growing interest of modern scholarship in these manuscripts and their

annotations, two independent twelfth-century glosses, one by William of Conches,8 the other

by Bernard of Chartres,9 were identified, edited and studied. Lately, moreover, along with a

new focus on twelfth-century Platonism, scholarly attention has turned to the periods before

2. The reception of Platonic thought during this

period is outside the scope of this article, so I shall not discuss other Latin sources such as Boethius or Macrobius.

3. R. Klibansky, The Continuity of the Platonic Tra- dition during the Middle Ages, London 1939, repr. 1950, rev. ed. with a new preface and four supplementary chapters, 1981.

4. T. Gregory, Platonismo medievale: studi e ricerche, Rome 1958.

5. Plato, Timaeus a Calcidio translatus commentarioque instructus, ed.J. H. Waszink (Plato Latinus, Iv), London and Leiden 1962, repr. 1975 (hereafter Calcidius, Timaeus and Commentary).

6. E. Jeauneau, 'Gloses sur le "Timee" et commen- taire du "Timee" dans deux manuscrits du Vatican', Revue des etudes augustiniennes, viii, 1962, pp. 365-75;

idem, 'Gloses marginales sur le "Timee" du Platon, du manuscript 226 de la Bibliotheque d'Avranches', Sacris Erudiri, xviI, 1966, pp. 71-89; idem, 'Gloses sur le "Timee", du manuscript Digby 217 de la Bodleienne, A Oxford', ibid., pp. 365-400; these three articles are reprinted in E. Jeauneau, 'Lectio philosophorum': Recherches sur l'Ecole de Chartres, Amsterdam 1973, PP. 193-264. See also idem, 'Extraits de Glosae super Platonem de Guillaume de Conches dans un manuscrit de Londres', this Journal, Lx, 1977, pp. 212-22.

7. M. Gibson, 'The Study of the "Timaeus" in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries', Pensamiento, xxv,

1969, pp. 183-94- 8. William of Conches, Glosae super Platonem, ed. I.

Jeauneau, Paris 1965- 9. The 'Glosae super Platonem' of Bernard of Chartres,

ed. P. E. Dutton, Toronto 1991.



PLATO'S TIMAEUS AND CALCIDIUS'S COMMENTARY 3

and after the twelfth-century Renaissance. Michel Huglo, with an eye to the musical diagrams of the Commentary, surveyed ninth- and tenth-century manuscripts.'0 Rosamond McKitterick,

too, briefly considered the Carolingian codices when excavating the historical background to, and genesis of, Valenciennes, Bibliotheque Municipale MS 293.11 Paul Dutton traced the

fortune of the texts from the twelfth to the fifteenth century, with an emphasis on the thir-

teenth,1'2 and James Hankins studied their reception in the early Italian Renaissance.13 The

most recent studies of the medieval reception of the Timaeus and the Commentary of Calcidius

have been devoted to philological and philosophical questions. Instead, however, of providing an overview of the medieval tradition, as they seem to promise, they focus on late antiquity and the 'School of Chartres', omitting the tenth and eleventh centuries and barely touching either on the ninth century or anything beyond the twelfth.14

In this article I shall firstly provide a brief introduction to the texts of Plato and Calcidius

and to their pre-eleventh-century manuscript transmission. I shall then examine the shift which

occurred in the interpretation of Plato in the eleventh century, through a comparison based

on forty-eight extant Plato and Calcidius manuscripts, ranging from the ninth to the fifteenth

centuries, paying particular attention to the glosses and the diagrams, which often furnish the

only evidence we have of how medieval scholars read the texts and attempted to untangle Plato's concepts.15 Finally, I shall explore the various levels of textual transmission and inter-

pretation in relation to each other in order to outline a history of the reception of the Timaeus

and of Calcidius's Commentary on it.

The Timaeus and its Commentary

In the cosmological monologue of the interlocutor Timaeus, Plato presents a scientific model

of the cosmos by means of a narrative of the creation of the body and soul of the universe

and of man, along with a description of their structure and operations. Creation is described as

the imposition, by the divine artifex or craftsman, of a mathematical order on matter, which has

10o. M. Huglo, 'Trois livres manuscrits pr6sent6s par H61isachar', Revue binddictine, Ic, 1989, pp. 272-85; idem, 'La r6ception de Calcidius et des Commentarii de Macrobe A l'6poque carolingienne', Scriptorium, XLIV, 1990, pp. 3-20; idem, 'D'H61isachar A Abbon de Fleury', Revue benidictine, civ, 1994, pp. 204-30. Because he was primarily concerned with the musical

diagrams, Huglo excluded the 9th-century Vatican

City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. io68 from his study, since it does not contain the Commentary. He failed to realise, therefore, that the manuscript contains two of the standard musical diagrams in its margins and an additional 1 th-century musical diagram on the fly- leaf.

1 i. R. McKitterick, 'Knowledge of Plato's Timaeus in the Ninth Century: The Implications of MS Val. Bibl. Munic. 293', in From Athens to Chartres: Neoplatonism and Medieval Thought: Studies in Honour ofEdouardJeauneau, ed. H.J. Westra, Leiden 1992, pp. 85-95.

12. P. E. Dutton, 'Material Remains of the Study of the Timaeus in the Later Middle Ages', in L'enseigne- ment de la philosophie au XIIe siecle, ed. C. Lafleur, Turnhout 1996, pp. 203-30.

13. J. Hankins, 'The Study of the Timaeus in Early Renaissance Italy', in Natural Particulars: Nature and the

Disciplines in Renaissance Europe, ed. A. Grafton and N.

Siraisi, Cambridge, MA 1999, pp. 77-119-

14. B. Bakhouche, 'La transmission du Timie dans le monde latin', in Les voies de la science grecque, ed. D.

Jacquart, Geneva 1997, PP. 1-31; P. Annala, 'The

Theory of Designation in the History of the Latin Timaeus from Late Antiquity to the Twelfth Century', in Philosophical Studies in Religion, Metaphysics, and Ethics:

Essays in Honour of Heikki Kirjavainen, ed. T. Koistinen and T. Lehtonen, Helsinki 1997, pp. 198- 213.

15. For a detailed study of the 9th- and loth- century manuscripts, with their glosses and diagram variants, and a discussion of Calcidius's Commentary, see A. Somfai, 'The Transmission and Reception of Plato's Timaeus and Calcidius's Commentary during the Carolingian Renaissance', Ph.D. diss., University of

Cambridge 1998. It includes an edition of the glosses of the five extant 9th- and oth-century manuscripts and the diagram variants of some 24 codices, ranging from the 9th to the 15th century, discussed within the intellectual context of the quadrivium.



4 ANNA SOMFAI

previously existed in a state of chaos, but is now transformed into the four elements: fire,

air, water and earth. These elements constitute both the cosmic and the human body and soul

and are joined together through a mathematical bond: the continuous geometrical proportion. It is within this mathematical construction that metaphysical questions arise about the

relationship between the creator, the eternally existing model of creation and the constantly

changing created universe. The cosmological account is prefaced by a series of mythological and historical narratives about creation and destruction. These narratives present Timaeus's

description of creation against the background of Plato's chief concern: the political structure

and moral fabric of the ideal state and its ideal citizens, as well as the laws which govern them.

The exploration of the laws of nature in the Timaeus is the counterpart of the search for

positive law in the Republic and Laws. The long history of Platonic philosophy is marked by an

alternation between two different approaches to the Timaeus: one based on mathematics, the

other on metaphysics, with a distinct preference, in most periods, for the latter.

The fragmentary rendering of the Timaeus by Cicero leaves out the introductory mytho-

logical stories, as well as those passages which discuss time, the model of the created universe, the motion of the soul's circles and the description of the human body (Timaeus, 37C-38B and 43B-46A), and it begins instead with the mathematical exposition of Timaeus.16 Cicero's version thus offers a cosmological account of the constitution of the universe, removed from

the context of Plato's discourse on the various aspects of law and political order, hence its

medieval title: De mundi constitutione.17 Cicero's method of translation often borders on para-

phrase, with his hesitations over introducing new terminology and his use of synonyms or

brief clauses to approximate the original meaning. It was this version of the Timaeus, taken out

of its original context, which was known to the Latin Church Fathers of late antiquity and

which formed the basis for the influential judgements of Augustine and Ambrose on Plato's

philosophy.s8 Calcidius's Middle Platonic Commentary consists of two parts, corresponding to his division

of the translated portion of the Timaeus (17A-39E and 39E-53C).19 In order to better under-

stand the responses of medieval readers to Calcidius's text, I present my own interpretation of

the structure of the Commentary, which differs fundamentally from the generally accepted view

of modern scholars, who regard it as an encyclopedic work and no more than a Latin vehicle

for the transmission of Greek sources. Read without such preconceptions, however, it reveals

a coherent structure and original concepts. Calcidius, in his introduction, suggests that the

ancients regarded the Timaeus as a difficult text on account of their inappropriate approach to it. Each question which arises in a text has to be addressed in terms of the specific discipline to which it belongs. The puzzles posed by the Timaeus are related to the sensible world and

16. Cicero, De divinatione, De fato, Timaeus, ed. R. Giomini, Leipzig 1975 (hereafter Cicero, Timaeus), pp. 177-227.

17. In addition to the missing passages, the preface to the translation ends abruptly. It is therefore assumed that, in its present form, it is a fragment. The nature of the missing passages and the absence of the only sentence which interrupts Timaeus's monologue-- Socrates's exhortation for him to continue his exposition-allows, however, for another conclusion: Cicero

may have wanted to create a version focused solely on cosmology, possibly as a preparatory study of the theme or as a text to be included in one of his own

dialogues. 18. See especially Augustine, De civitate dei, x and

Ambrose, Hexaemeron libri sex, I.1. 19. In the prefatory letter, Calcidius states that if the

completed sections meet the approval of his addressee, Ossius, he will continue the commentary. If he ever did so, the text does not survive.




therefore have to be studied by means of the four mathematical disciplines.20 The first part of

the Commentary thus provides an introduction to the philosophically relevant concepts of the

quadrivium. Calcidius does not give his readers a lesson in elementary mathematics, instead, he introduces them to a method of thinking. The study of the quadrivium serves, in a Platonic

fashion, as a path for the mind to ascend from sense perception to abstract concepts, from the

basics of the liberal arts to pondering complex philosophical and theological questions. This

section contains twenty-five diagrams related to the four disciplines of the quadrivium: they function as mathematical proofs and help the reader to follow the argument. The diagrams are an organic part of the Commentary, and scribes copied them into the body of the text.

Medieval readers developed variants of the diagrams which helped them to visualise Calcidius's

concepts more easily and which accommodated their own interpretations. Within this math-

ematical part Calcidius inserted two metaphysical sections concerning the nature of time21 and that of the soul.22

The second part of the Commentary addresses the structure of the created universe and

the forces at work within it. It follows Plato's description of the created beings which populate the heavens, the earth and the sea. Building on his introduction to the quadrivium in the first

part, Calcidius discusses the various opinions of Greek philosophical schools and thinkers on

several topics in Plato's dialogue, such as the nature of created beings, the definition of fate,

necessity, providence and matter and their relation to each other. In this way, he manages to

combine the mathematical and metaphysical readings that are inherent in the dialogue. The

two parts of the Commentary correspond roughly to these two approaches, but with many cross-

references and an interweaving of various sections and methods. The medieval marginal and

interlinear glosses and the diagrammatic annotations follow this twofold approach, not only in their content but also in their visible form, revealing a sensitive reading of the Commentary, as I shall suggest below.

Unlike Cicero, Calcidius translated the introductory stories and, by doing so, gave his

medieval readers a fuller context. He also refers to this section in his Commentary, treating the discussion in the Timaeus as a continuation of the Republic and drawing a parallel between

Socrates's search for positive law and that of Timaeus for natural law.23 Calcidius's decision

not to comment on the mythological and historical narratives, together with their absence in

Cicero's version, determined the early medieval understanding of the Timaeus. Manuscript evidence indicates, however, that in the eleventh century scholars began to take a new

approach, turning directly to the dialogue and to the previously neglected narratives and

hence to the original moral context of the cosmological account.

The Ninth- and Tenth-Century Manuscripts

The first extant medieval manuscripts of the two Latin versions of the Timaeus, as well as of

the Greek original,24 date from the ninth century. There are five manuscripts of Cicero's

translation and three of Calcidius's, two of which also contain his Commentary. These early

manuscripts provide the most significant evidence for the presence of an interest in the

dialogue and its late ancient interpretation.

20. Commentary, I-II, p. 57, 1. 1-p. 58, 1. 12. 21. Commentary, XXIII-XXV. 22. Commentary, XXVI-XXXI.

23. Commentary, V, p. 59, 11. 3-5 and VI, p. 59, 1. 14-p. 60, 1. 3-

24. Paris, BnF MS grec. 1807.



6 ANNA SOMFAI

Cicero's version was transmitted by means of two different manuscript traditions. Firstly, it appeared in the Leiden Corpus, a collection of eight of Cicero's philosophical works, prob-

ably assembled in late antiquity.25 Secondly, a series of excerpts from this collection formed

part of a compilation in the ninth century, known as the Collectaneum Hadoardi and extant in

a single contemporary copy.26 The Cicero texts are glossed throughout, strikingly, however, the text of the Timaeus received no contemporary annotation in either version, save for a few

notes, some in Tironian shorthand.27 The collection of excerpts made by Hadoard reflects

the personal tastes of an enthusiastic reader of classical texts.28 It shows his keen interest in

the mathematical disciplines, while the exclusion of the Topica, on the other hand, suggests an

indifference towards logic. Hadoard's alterations to the text of the Timaeus reveal a subtle

attempt to Christianise Plato's concept of creation. By skilful editing, he removed the signs of

polytheism from the Timaeus, changing the plural dei to the singular deus. In addition, he

replaced the word gignere (to come into being) with creare (to create) in order to make the

account of creation from pre-existing matter more acceptable. Probably critical of the anthro-

pomorphic tendencies in Plato's creation myth, he also left out the description of the universe

as a 'Living Creature'.29 The text of Plato's dialogue in Calcidius's translation,30 like its Ciceronian counterpart,

received no ninth-century annotation, with the exception of a few notes to the introductory section in Lyons, Bibliotheque municipale MS 324. The Commentary, on the other hand,

acquired in both ninth-century copies a gloss, with a handful of notes in common, suggesting that they were present in the pre-Carolingian exemplar.3" In both manuscripts the gloss to

the Commentary consists primarily of marginal indexing of philosophical and mathematical

terminology and of the names of some of the philosophical schools and authors referred to or

25. The Leiden Corpus contains De natura deorum, De divinatione, Timaeus, De fato, Topica, Paradoxa stoicorum, Lucullus (Academica priora) and De legibus. The

9th-century manuscripts include Leiden, UB MSS Voss. Lat. F. 84 and F. 86; Florence, Laur. MS San Marco

257; and Vienna, ONB MS Lat. 189. 26. Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1762. This

manuscript was based on Florence, Laur. MS San Marco 257, which in turn was made from a careful collation of the two Leiden manuscripts. The compilation contains excerpts from the works in the Leiden

Corpus, with the exception of the Topica, and from the Tusculanae Disputationes, De officiis, De amicitia, De oratore, De senectute, Sallust's Catilina and Jugurtha, Macrobius's

Commentary on the Somnium Scipionis and Martianus

Capella's De nuptiis (only the books on geometry and arithmetic).

27. This lack of annotations remained a feature of the transmission; see, e.g., the 13th-century Paris, BnF MS lat. 6333. The glosses to the rest of the texts in the Leiden Corpus reveal an interest in logic, which

may provide an explanation for the relative absence of interest in the Timaeus with its focus on metaphysics. I have examined the two Leiden manuscripts, the Timaeus section of the Vienna manuscript and the Vatican copy of the Collectaneum Hadoardi. Leiden, UB

MS Voss. Lat. F. 86 is a particularly heavily annotated

manuscript with notes on logic (fols 136r-v, 137r) and

drawings of logical diagrams in the margins (fols 103', o104r, lO9v, 110o-').

28. Hadoard may have been the librarian at Corbie

(he refers to himself as custos), as suggested by Bischoff and Ganz, though he could have been based at Tours, as proposed by Beeson. See B. Bischoff, 'Hadoard and the Manuscripts of Classical Authors from Corbie', in

Didascaliae: Studies in Honor of Anselm M. Albareda, ed. S. Prete, New York 1961, pp. 41-57; D. Ganz, Corbie in the

Carolingian Renaissance, Singmaringen 199o, esp. pp. 92-93; C. H. Beeson, 'The Collectaneum of Hadoard',

ClassicalPhilology, XL, 1945, pp. 201-22.

29. Compare Vatican City, BAV MS Lat. 1762, fol. 13r, 'de dei natura ortuque mundi' with Cicero, Timaeus, 3.8, p. 182, 11. 8-9, 'de deorum natura ortuque mundi'. For the 'Living Creature' see Cicero, Timaeus,

6.17-19, p. 190, 1. 22-p. 192,1. 22.

30. Valenciennes, Bibl. municipale MS 293; Lyons, Bibl. municipale MS 324; Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1068 (dialogue only).

31. I am currently preparing an edition of the

glosses found in the five extant 9th- and ioth-century manuscripts.




quoted in the text. In Valenciennes, Bibliotheque municipale MS 293, there are several brief

marginal headlines which serve as pointers to concepts, topics and definitions. In addition, there are notes expressing the annotator's opinion, such as criticism of certain pagan philosophers.32 The marginal indexing and headlines acted as a running guide to the text, creating a reader-friendly edition of the Commentary, while the critical remarks served as pointers for Christian readers.

After the initial ninth-century effort to produce copies of the Timaeus written in the new, more legible Carolingian minuscule script-a sign that it was considered to be an important text-only two extant manuscripts, both preserving Calcidius's translation and his Commentary, can be dated to the tenth century.33 Although no tenth-century manuscript of Cicero's version

survives, it was not unknown at this time.34 The quantitative decline in manuscript production, part of a general trend in the transmission of classical texts,35 does not reflect the intensity and quality of scholarly attention which was devoted to the study of Calcidius's Commentary. It was during this period, as both manuscripts testify, that a standard gloss to the Commentary first took shape. Building on the useful material in Valenciennes, Bibliotheque municipale MS

293, but making up for its lack of annotation to most of the second part of the Commentary, the tenth-century annotators enlarged the gloss. The new themes include the nature of time, motion, matter, elements, forms, the syllogism and the division of philosophy. From then on, the standard gloss was copied together with the text. It grew continuously in the same style and remained part of the transmission of the Commentary throughout the later Middle Ages and the

Renaissance.36 A previously unstudied codex, Brussels, BR MS 9625-9626, contains a gloss to the first part of the Commentary, which explores the mathematical philosophy of Calcidius by means of a close reading, providing diagram variants, along with additional diagrams, as part of the marginalia.37 By deconstructing and reconstructing Calcidius's diagrams, the annotator not only entered into the argument, but also gave other readers a practical tool for use in the

study of geometry. Figure i shows the page layout of a folio with one of Calcidius's diagrams which explains the concept of the continuous geometrical proportion. The diagram is a

32. See, e.g., Valenciennes, Bibl. municipale MS 293, fol. 76r, 11. 14-15, 'de insana sententia platonicorum'.

33. Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164; Brussels, BR MS 9625- 9626.

34. The annotator of Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164 remarked that the term translated by Calcidius as analogia competens was elsewhere rendered as proportio. See Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164, fol. 28va, 11. 34-36 for Calcidius, Commentary, XVI, p. 68, 1. 1 and see Cicero, Timaeus, 4.13, P. 186, 1. 25-p. 188, 1. 1 for proportio. Both ioth-century manuscripts contain another com- parative note: while Calcidius translated the definition of time as simulacrum evi (Commentary, XXIII, p. 74, 1.

13), Cicero rendered it as similitudo eternitatis (Cicero, Timaeus, 3.8, p. 182, 11. 2-8). See Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164, fol. 29gb, 11. 22-23 and Brussels, BR MS 9625- 9626, fol. 14', 11. 36-38.

35. For a summary of the general tendencies see Texts and Transmission: A Survey of the Latin Classics, ed. L. D. Reynolds, Oxford 1983, esp. p. xxvii. For a brief

analysis of the dynamics of book production during the ioth century see J. Vezin, 'La Production et la circulation des livres dans l'Europe du xe siecle', in Gerbert I'Europien: Actes du colloque dAurillac ... 1996, ed. N. Charbonnel and J.-E. lung, Aurillac 1997, PP- 205-18.

36. See, e.g., Paris, BnF MSS lat. 10195 and 6282; Vatican City, BAV MSS Reg. Lat. 13o8 and 1861; Cologne, Dombib. MS 192; Bamberg, SB MS M. V. 15 (Class. 18) (1 1 th century); London, BL MS Add. 19968 (11 th/1 2th century); Vatican City, BAV MS Barb. Lat. 21 (12th century); Oxford, Bodley MSS Canon. Lat. 175 and 176 (15th century).

37. For this manuscript and its gloss see my forth- coming article 'The Brussels Gloss: a Tenth-Century Reading of the Geometrical and Arithmetical Passages of Calcidius's Commentary (ca. 400 AD) to Plato's Timaeus', to appear in the proceedings of the confer- ence Ecrire dans les marges: une expression de la pensie scientifique (antiquiti tardive-Renaissance), held at the

Warburg Institute in April 2001.



8 ANNA SOMFAI

0 0 (5)(6)

(8)0 0

(3)(4)

(7) 3 i#

(1)2 -----(2)

Figure 1. Brussels, BR MS 9625-9626, fol. 13r, page layout

geometrical proof in which two extreme

cubes are bound by two middle ones: (1) marks the standard diagram, in (2) the

scribe has separated the four cubes, and (3) to (8) represent squares which make up the

cubes. Glosses are added inside the squares to instruct the reader about the process of

creating cubes from squares. This gloss reflects the skill and knowledge of a scholarly circle with a predilection for the subjects of

the quadrivium and a mathematical approach to the Timaeus.

The Eleventh-Century Shift: The Manuscript Evidence

From the eleventh century, we have twenty-five extant Timaeus manuscripts: twenty-three

containing Calcidius's version,38 and two with Cicero's.39 Although in absolute terms more

manuscripts were produced both in the twelfth century and in the fifteenth, the rate of growth in the eleventh century was never again matched and only in the fifteenth century do we find

a similar interest in Calcidius's Commentary (see Figure 2).40

Calcidius's Calcidius's Calcidius's Cicero's Timaeus and Timaeus only Commentary TOTAL Timaeus

Commentary only

gth century 2 1 - 3 5

1 oth century 2 - - 2 -

I ith century 17 5 1 23 2

12th century 5 45 3 53 -

13th century 3 12 15 4

14th century 2 6 1 9 1

15th century 11 18 6 35 4

TOTAL 42 87 11 140 16

Figure 2. The chronological distribution of manuscripts of Plato's Timaeus in Cicero's translation and in Calcidius's translation with his Commentary

38. Of the 1 ith-century manuscripts which I have studied closely, the following contain glosses: Leiden, UB MS Voss. Lat. Q. lo; London, BL MSS Add. 156o0i, Add. 19968, Harley 261o; Paris, BnF MSS lat. 6280, lat. 6282, lat. 10195; Vatican City, BAV MSS Reg. Lat.

1308, Reg. Lat. 1861; Cologne, Dombib. MS 192; and

Bamberg, SB MS M. V. 15 (Class. 18). Other manu-

scripts are thinly glossed; these include London, BL MSS Add. 15293 and Harley 2652. The following

manuscripts do not contain any gloss at all: Vatican

City, BAV MSS Barb. Lat. 22 and Reg. Lat. 123. 39. Leiden, UB MS Voss. Lat. Q. io and Munich,

BSB Clm 528.

40. The table is based on the manuscript descrip- tions in Waszink's edition (as in n. 5, pp. 106-31) and includes excerpts but not fragments. I have added more recently discovered manuscripts based on P. O. Kristeller, Iter Italicum II, London and Leiden 1967,




The geographical distribution of the manuscripts also reveals an increasingly widespread interest in these texts. All ten manuscripts from the ninth and tenth centuries were written in

northern France. At least eight eleventh-century manuscripts of Calcidius's version and one of

Cicero's, however, were produced in Germany, while an excerpt from the Commentary was

copied in Spain. In the German manuscripts the Timaeus is always accompanied by Calcidius's

Commentary,41 implying a reading of the dialogue which relied heavily, or entirely, on the late

ancient interpretation.

During the eleventh century, various changes occurred on different levels of manu-

script production, transmission and reception, involving page layout, the distribution of the

annotations between Plato's dialogue and the Commentary, the location of the glosses and

their character, the interpretation of the texts and the appearance of a new readership. The

shift is manifest most clearly in the production of a larger number of Timaeus manuscripts without the Commentary. In addition, after a break of a century, two copies of Cicero's version

were produced. While previously it was almost always the Commentary which was glossed, in the

eleventh century the Timaeus attracted most of the new annotations.42 The tendency to anno-

tate the Timaeus was not restricted to new copies of the text: a ninth-century codex, Vatican

City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 10o68, the only one from before the eleventh century without the

Commentary, now received an elaborate gloss. The dominant feature of the period, therefore, was a shift of interest from Calcidius's Commentary to the Timaeus itself.

A closer look at the glosses in eleventh-

century manuscripts reveals a new geography of the page. While the gloss to the Commentary had been located, and remained, in the mar-

gin, the new gloss to the Timaeus included

both marginal and interlinear annotations.

Although the introduction of the interlinear

gloss was seemingly only a formal change, a

wide range of phenomena derived from the

differences between marginal and interlinear

annotations. Marginal notes were used to

index themes and sources, to highlight points of interest and, on a deeper level, to engage with the text by giving longer explanations

animae vis

ratio appe nabilis tibilis

intel opi cupi iracun

lectus nio ditas dia

Figure 3. Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164, fol. 56vb, 11. 47-52

pp. 503, 558-59, and 264, and on Dutton, 'Material Remains' (as in n. 12), esp. pp. 204-05. Having studied the manuscripts myself, I redated Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164 from the 9th to the ioth century, and Cambridge, St John's College MS 107 from the 11th to the 12th

century. For the sake of clarity I have divided the period into centuries rather than 50-year intervals as used by R. W. Southern, Platonism, Scholastic Method, and the School of Chartres, Reading 1979, p. 14, and Dutton, 'Material Remains', p. 205.

41. The only exception is London, BL MS Harley 2652, held at some stage in the library of Nicolaus of Cusa. It contains only a very brief fragment of the

Commentary with the folios of the Timaeus bound in the

wrong order, suggesting that the loss of text occurred

during transmission.

42. There was also a structural change in the

arrangement of the two texts. In the earliest Calcidius

manuscripts each of the two parts of the translation is followed by the relevant sections of the Commentary, with reference numbers connecting the text of Plato to its exposition. Starting in the 1 ith century, in some

manuscripts the entire Commentary follows the entire Timaeus, with the reference numbers still in place. This

change paved the way for the independent circulation of the two texts.



10 ANNA SOMFAI

and more substantial interpretations. They are very visible and catch the eye immediately, even if a reader is merely flicking through a manuscript. By virtue of their position they emphasise vertical connections and often accommodate logical tree diagrams, as in the gloss to the Com-

mentary. These diagrams, consisting of words with lines establishing logical links between them, make verbal connections visual (see Figure 3).

Interlinear annotations, on the other hand, are squeezed between the lines and become visible only when one reads the text carefully. They present the horizontal approach of the

annotator, explaining individual words, suggesting synonyms, specifying meanings or giving brief definitions. They enter the body of the text, restating and rephrasing parts of it rather than engaging with it. They explain grammatical problems or offer factual information. The introduction of interlinear annotations to the formerly neglected text of the Timaeus signals an attitude towards glossing which catered for a new readership, one that needed, and wanted, basic facts. The synonyms facilitated an easier reading of the dialogue, whose Latin must have been by then, if not antiquated, certainly in need of explanation, while the mythological char- acters and geographical names were unfamiliar. The nature of the explanations points to a school environment. The appearance of interlinear notes in the dialogue, but usually not in the Commentary, suggests that they were subject to different reading practices. The Commentary was now read more as an exposition of the Timaeus and not seen primarily as an object of study in itself.

The marginal glosses to the Timaeus are also different from those to the Commentary. The

dialogue, being much shorter than the Commentary, has less need for an index. The anno-

tations, moreover, are visibly longer than those in the Commentary and usually do not merely highlight important points or convey favourable or dismissive comments but instead provide summaries and explanations. They engage with the text on a new level, tapping into the argument of the dialogue, as we shall see.43 During the course of the eleventh century the new gloss to the Timaeus became standardised, just as that of the Commentary had done a century earlier. Both the marginal and the interlinear notes were copied into newly produced manuscripts, where they continued to develop. The standard gloss to the Commentary also kept growing throughout the period.

The glosses to the Timaeus and to the Commentary both contain diagrams, indicating the

importance of visual aids in the reading of these texts. Attempts at problem-solving found their

expression not so much in the often meagre verbal notes as in the diagram variants. These constitute the most original contribution to the pre-twelfth-century analysis of Calcidius's

interpretation of the Timaeus. The diagrammatic annotations to the Commentary were either medieval variants of Calcidius's standard diagrams, inserted into the body of the text, re-

placing the original versions, or else new diagrams created by medieval readers specifically to

explain Calcidius's text, usually copied in the margin. Diagrams, selected from the standard

ones in the Commentary, were occasionally introduced into the Timaeus gloss as well, in the

margin or sometimes at the end of the text. They, thus, functioned in the same way as the textual quotations. The diagrams most often used in this way were the three musical ones.44

43. Signs of closer reading appear even on the level of textual editing. In Paris, BnF MS lat. 6282 para- graph marks were added to the texts-a seemingly minor addition which none the less signals an attempt

to structure the dialogue. Another such novelty in Paris, BnF MS lat. 10195 and Vatican City, BAV MS

Reg. Lat. 123 is the use of colours to highlight important expressions in the text and annotations.




They were designed to express the musical proportions on which the harmony of the Platonic world soul is based. Since the section in the Timaeus on musical harmony (Timaeus, 35B-36B) is complicated and requires background knowledge, when Calcidius's Commentary no longer accompanied the dialogue, some other form of explanation was needed; hence, the incorpor- ation of the diagrams into the gloss to the dialogue.

Calcidius's diagrams were used in the glosses of other texts as well. Since the Timaeus on its own, without the Commentary, is a short text, it was usually copied or at least bound together with other works. During the eleventh century it quickly became part of what was considered to be a Platonic corpus in the wider sense, including Macrobius and Boethius, and this, in turn, had an impact on the circulation of the Commentary. On some occasions when the dialogue was still accompanied by the Commentary, they were both copied together with texts which tended to be combined with the Timaeus when it circulated separately. For instance, Paris, BnF MS lat. 10195 contains, in addition to the Timaeus and the Commentary, Cicero's Somnium

Scipionis with Macrobius's commentary, as well as excerpts from Sallust's Catilina and Jugurtha. In the second book of Macrobius's commentary, where he discusses Plato's views on the creation of the world soul and on musical harmony, the annotator copied two of the standard musical diagrams from Calcidius's Commentary in the margin.45 The first of Calcidius's musical

diagrams is also copied in the same place in another eleventh-century manuscript, London, BL MS Harley 2652.46 Such diagrammatic intertextuality is a visual counterpart to the use of textual quotations.

Also added to the texts in the eleventh century were two accessus: one on Plato and another on Calcidius. The need for these introductory passages arose when the philosopher and his commentator began to exist as authors of separate texts.47 The fact that they were written at this time indicated not only an interest in the two ancient thinkers themselves but also a wish to, in some way, define and place them among the authors who were read in the schools. The information in the accessus, furthermore, gave them human dimensions and made them more acceptable to Christian readers by connecting Plato to Christian authors and to the Bible, and by placing Calcidius within the Church hierarchy.

The first occurrence of the accessus on Plato known to me is in a late tenth- or early eleventh-century hand in the ninth-century codex, Valenciennes, Bibliotheque municipale MS 293 (fol. iv). The same text can also be found in two eleventh-century manuscripts: London, BL MS Harley 2652 (fol. 61r) and, in a longer version, Leiden, UB MS Voss. Lat. Q. 10 (fol. 3r). The accessus contains excerpts from Ambrose and Jerome. The text from Ambrose is his account of the journey which Plato made to Egypt in order to study the laws of Moses and the words of the prophets, so that later he could turn them into dialogues on virtue.48 The passage from Jerome describes Plato's capture by pirates on the Egyptian journey which

44. Commentary, XXXII, p. 82, XLI, p. 9go, XLVIII, p. 98. See, e.g., London, BL MSS Add. 19968 and 15601 and Paris, BnF MS lat. 6282.

45. Paris, BnF MS lat. 10 195, fol. 27v. 46. London, BL MS Harley 2652, fol. 12r

47. In some of the earlier manuscripts, not only were the texts copied together but the incipits and

explicits, separating the two texts, were also missing. See, e.g., Lyons, Bibl. municipale MS 324, fol. 45r, 1. 8,

Brussels, BR MS 9625-9626, fol. 39r, 1. 1, and Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164, fol. 43va, 1. 19, 'Platonis pars prima

explicit feliciter', marking the explicit of the first part of Calcidius's Commentary.

48. Ambrose, Expositio Psalmi CXVIII, 18.4.2, in his Opera (Corpus Christianorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum [hereafter CCEL], LXII), ed. M. Petschenig, Leipzig 1913, v, p. 398, 11. 3-8.



12 ANNA SOMFAI

he took in pursuit of knowledge.49 In the Leiden manuscript (fol. Ir) a third excerpt, from Claudianus Mamertus, was added and placed before the texts from Ambrose and Jerome. It describes Plato as the prince of all philosophers, who should be admired because, despite living centuries before Christ, he sought the one God.50 The inclusion of this excerpt took the accessus beyond the narrative approach and furnished it with a theoretical dimension. The reference to the Old Testament and the emphasis on the one God presented an image of Plato

which, without attempting to Christianise him, made him suitable for a Christian readership. In this way, it helped to generate a new interpretation of the Timaeus. In London, BL MS Add.

15601 (fol. 88r), the compiler added another text after the Timaeus. He drew on Augustine for the opinions of Ambrose and Jerome on Plato, once again emphasising his excellence among pagan philosophers and his acceptability to Christians.51

From the eleventh century, a scribal note was copied into some manuscripts describing Calcidius as the deacon or archdeacon of Ossius, Bishop of Cordoba.52 The note, our only evidence for this information, served as an accessus, to which, in later manuscripts, more details were added. The ecclesiastical rank with which Calcidius was credited helped to increase his

authority by placing him among Christian philosophers and defending him from negative associations with pagan thinkers. It is this accessus which lies behind the assumption of modern scholars that Calcidius was considered to be a Christian during the Middle Ages. The only evidence, however, for this from the early medieval period is the statement of a tenth-century annotator who was puzzled at Calcidius's discussion of the soul and expressed his surprise that 'a Christian thought in this way'.53 The Commentary itself offers no signs that it was written by a Christian. The philosophical concepts, range of quotations and vocabulary indicate a pagan background with strong Greek influences. Calcidius's presumed Christianity does not hold

against the evidence of the text.54 By the twelfth century, however, his connection with Bishop Ossius was taken for granted and incorporated into the glosses on the Timaeus by Bernard of Chartres55 and William of Conches.56

Leiden, UB MS Voss. Lat. Q. io, with its longer and more theoretical accessus to Plato,

preserves a unique collection of Platonic works. It contains the two translations of the Timaeus

by Cicero and Calcidius, copied in the same hand, also the De dogmate Platonis, De philosophia, Cosmographia and De deo Socratis of Apuleius, and a Latin translation of Hermes Trismegistus's Ad Asclepium, attributed to Apuleius. The Timaeus translations of both Cicero and Calcidius

appear in this manuscript in a new context: rather than being copied in the Leiden Corpus or

49. Jerome, Letter 53, 1, Epistulae (CCEL, LIv), ed. I. Hilberg, Vienna 1996, I, p. 443, 11. 13-16.

50. Claudianus Mamertus, De statu animae, 11.7 (CCEL, xI), ed. A. Engelbrecht, Vienna 1885, p. 128, 11. 8-11 (paraphrase) and p. 122, 11. 11-20.

51. Augustine, De doctrina christiana, II.io7-08 (CCEL, Lxxx), ed. G. M. Green, Vienna 1963, p. 64, 11. 11-26 (paraphrase).

52. See El Escorial, RB MS S. III. 5; and Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 3815-

53. See the loth-century marginal note (to Com- mentary, XXVI, p. 77, 1. 15) in Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164, fol. 30r, 1. 48, 'miror sic sapuisse hominem chris- tianum'.

54. The only Christian author to whom Calcidius refers by name is the Greek Father, Origen. The Commentary contains no references to classical Latin authors, apart from Cicero, nor to Latin theological sources. Calcidius's use of the Bible in chapters CCLXXVI-CCLXXVIII of the Commentary is so unusual that the 1oth-century annotator of the Brussels manuscript added a longer source-mark in the margin: 'hinc de divina scriptura sumit testimonium' (Brussels, BR MS 9625-9626, fol. 75r, to Commentary, CCLXXVI, p. 280, 1.4).

55. 'Glosae' of Bernard of Chartres (as in n. 9), p. 142,

1. 4. 56. William of Conches, Glosae (as in n. 8), p. 63.




together with the Commentary, they are part of a Platonic corpus.57 Yet the compiler was familiar

with the Commentary and, in a long incipit, or rather accessus, to Calcidius's Timaeus translation,

expressed his high opinion of Calcidius as commentator.58 There are only a few marginal and

interlinear annotations in the manuscript, but simple versions of the first two musical diagrams are present in the margin of the Calcidius translation. This is a book designed for the study of

Platonic thought, approached, not, as previously, by means of commentaries such as those

of Macrobius and Calcidius, but rather at first hand and in the context of Apuleius's philo-

sophical writings. This manuscript reveals a specific interest in the Timaeus and a new concern

to disentangle Plato's text from the late ancient and earlier medieval traditions.

Like the Timaeus, the Commentary of Calcidius, too, embarked on a separate career. The

field within which it made an independent appearance was astronomy, a topic which receives

very little attention in the Timaeus but which is given ample space in the Commentary. Plato

merely refers to the celestial bodies as aids in the creation of time. He lists the earth, moon,

sun, Mercury and Venus, then points out that it would be a waste of time to discuss the rest

of the planets.59 This brief, uninviting statement, certainly not an inspiration for an elaborate

discussion, prompted Calcidius's lengthy digression on the subject.60 There is an excerpt from the astronomical section of the Commentary in Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 123.61 The

manuscript is of Catalan origin and was compiled around the middle of the eleventh century at Ripoll by a monk named Oliva.62 It is usually considered to be an astronomical collection.

Yet the excerpts centre on different aspects of 'time' and go well beyond the themes of

astronomy and computus. The compilation progresses from liturgical time (religious festivities,

ecclesiastical dates), through historical time and the philosophy of history (ranging from local

history to the six ages of the world) to time considered within an astronomical and philoso-

phical framework. There are several annotations in various hands throughout the manuscript,

dating from the eleventh to the sixteenth century, indicating that the manuscript remained in

use from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance.

The arrangement of the compilation follows the encyclopedic tradition.63 It is divided into

four books and structured around a sequence of opinions or narratives by various authors

concerning a single topic, or by a single author on diverse subjects.64 The excerpts in the first

57. An awareness in the I1th century of 'Platonisms' (as opposed to 'Platonism' in the singular) is reflected not only in the nature of this compilation but also in the gloss found in other manuscripts. The standard annotation, 'de insana sententia platonicorum' (to Commentary, CXXXVI, p. 176, 11. 15-17: see Valen- ciennes, Bibl. municipale MS 293, fol. 76r, 11. 14-15; Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164, fol. 48ra, 11. 24-25; Brussels, BR MS 9625-9626, fol. 49r, 11. 5-6), was altered in London, BL MS Add. 19968, fol. 61r, 11. 26-28 to 'de insana sententia quorundam platonicorum'.

58. Leiden, UB MS Voss. Lat. Q. o, fol. 3', 'Incipit prologus In Timaeum platonis de greco in latinum

petente iosio a chalcidio viro claro translatum et miro

ingenio commentatum et elucidatum'.

59. Timaeus, 38D-38E. 6o. Commentary, LVI-CXVII. 61. There had been some interest in the astro-

nomical portion of the Commentary during previous

centuries, as can be seen from short excerpts, amount-

ing to only a few folios: e.g., a 9th-century collection of scientific texts compiled at Corbie or Fulda, and extant in Paris, BnF MS lat. 13955. From the late loth

century another excerpt, made by Abbo of Fleury, is

preserved in Berlin, SBPK MS Phill. 1833. 62. See A. Wilmart, Codices Reginenses latini, 2 vols,

Vatican City 1937, 1, pp. 289-92 and E. Pellegrin, Les

manuscrits classiques latins de la Bibliotheque Vaticane, II.1, Paris 1978, pp. 35-38.

63. The main sources include Augustine, Jerome, Ambrose, Isidore, Bede, Pliny the Elder's Naturalis

historia, Hyginus's Astronomica, Aratus's Astrologia, Macrobius's Commentary on Cicero's Somnium Scipionis, Calcidius's Commentary, with shorter excerpts from various other authors.

64. Throughout most of the manuscript, the source of each passage is provided in the margin and is high- lighted in colour. Each book, with the exception of the



14 ANNA SOMFAI

book, De sole (fols 1 r-53v), proceed from 'micro-time' to 'macro-time', from minutes and hours to the six ages of the world based on Isidore of Seville and the Venerable Bede, with occasional references to Augustine. The second book, De luna (fols 54r-1 22v), contains several tables of calendars, with excerpts again from Isidore and Bede. The third book, De natura rerum (fols

123r-50o), draws primarily on Bede, Isidore and Pliny the Elder, with some references to Macrobius. The absence of Plato's Timaeus in this section would seem odd were it not for a

quotation from Bede: 'In the beginning of creation the sky, the earth, the angels, the air, and the water were made from nothing' (fol. 124r).65 Given this standpoint, it is hardly surprising that the compiler did not refer to the Timaeus with its account of creation from pre-existing matter. The quotation from Bede is, nevertheless, intriguing. Angels appear to be a part of a cosmological structure which otherwise contains only the four elements. Calcidius in his discussion of demons associated angels with aether, the fifth element. Though the compiler does not mention Calcidius here, he probably made use of his Commentary in this section.66 He followed Isidore (fol. 128v) by relating the universe etymologically to the Latin mundus67 and the Greek cosmos,68 and by using the Greek yle and its Latin equivalent, rerum prima materia, that is, silva, for matter.69 Next he considered the elements with their qualities and used two

diagrams, based on Isidore, to accompany his text. The fourth book, De astronomia (fols 152r-219'), draws on a wider range of source

material. Although Isidore, Bede and Pliny are still the most frequently quoted authors, new names appear. Hyginus and Fulgentius are cited for their mythological stories about the con-

stellations, Macrobius occurs in connection with the ten circles of heaven, and Aratus is quoted on the zodiac. Finally, there is a long excerpt from the first part of Calcidius's Commentary. It is

preceded by a passage from the third book of the Etymologiae, in which Isidore discusses astro-

nomy. The compiler, after providing mythological stories and splendid colour illustrations of the constellations, quotes Isidore on the 'insane pagan habit of transferring animals into the

sky'.70 In the same passage Isidore refers to the Timaeus, connecting the creation of the celestial bodies by God to motion and time. Plato appears here condemning astrology, and Isidore, very much in accordance with Calcidius's perspective, points out that knowledge of astronomy and of the seven liberal arts in general aids the ascent of the soul towards higher contemplation. The astronomical chapters from Calcidius's Commentary follow a warning about the dangers of slipping from the true path of astronomy to the false science of astrology.71 The section

first, starts with a table of contents. The contents include the chapter number, title and the authority cited. The manuscript begins with a description of symbols used in the reckoning of time and provides astronomical tables.

65. Bede, De natura rerum, II, in his Opera (Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, cxxIIIA), ed. C. W. Jones, Turnhout 1975, p. 192, 1. 17-P. 193, 1. 1.

66. Commentary, CXXXIV, p. 175, 11. 8-11, CXXXV, p. 175, 11. 16-18. See A. Somfai, 'The Nature of Demons: a Theological Application of the Concept of Geometrical Proportion in Calcidius' Commentary to Plato's Timaeus (4oD-41A)', in Ancient Approaches to Plato's 'Timaeus' (Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, supplement 78), London 2003, pp. 129-42.

67. According to Isidore the term mundus originated from moveo, since the universe is in constant motion; see his Etymologiarum sive originum libri XX, xiII.i.1, ed. W. M. Lindsay, 2 vols, Oxford 191 1 (hereafter Etymologiae).

68. The compiler linked cosmos with the Latin ornamentum; see Etymologiae, XIII. 1.2.

69. 'Ylen graeci rerum quendam primam materiam dicunt' (fol. 128'); see Etymologiae, xIII.3.1.

70. Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 123, fol. 205v; see Etymologiae, 1II.71.32, 'Et miranda dementia gen- tilium, qui non solum pisces, sed etiam arietes et hircos et tauros, ursas et canes et cancros et scorpiones in celum transtulerunt'.

71. The excerpt on fols 205-18 8 includes Commen- tary, LIX-LXIII, p. 10o6, 1. 19-p. 111, 1. 2 with diagram




excerpted starts with the discussion of the spherical shape of the body of the universe.72 Apart from a few missing sections,73 it covers the whole of the astronomical portion of the first part of the Commentary, including the standard diagrams.

This compilation reveals a new attitude towards the Commentary. The astronomical section is treated as an independent treatise, without any indication of its origin as a commentary on

Plato's Timaeus. It appears separately from Plato's text and is used as part of a context with

which it has intellectual affinities. Previously the Commentary was only copied together with the

Timaeus, and in Paris, BnF MS lat. 2164 with Claudianus Mamertus as well. Now it is associated

with, and complements, the natural scientific works of Isidore and Bede.74 The existence of

excerpts is a measure of its popularity. By the middle of the eleventh century, Calcidius's

Commentary was used as a textbook for the mathematical disciplines and other related subjects. While remaining the chief tool for studying the Timaeus, the Commentary also took on a life of

its own.

So, the production of copies of the Timaeus without the Commentary, while reflecting an increased interest in Plato's dialogue, does not necessarily imply a lack of interest in Calcidius's text. The growing number of separate copies could, moreover, have resulted, at least in part, from teaching practice. It may have been sufficient for students to have an annotated text in their hands, while the teacher needed to have a copy of the Commentary at his disposal. The

Commentary was not indispensable to a beginning reader of the dialogue, who would have

received more help from the marginal and interlinear annotations and the diagram variants

-produced by contemporary scholars with a contemporary readership in mind-together with the explanations of a master.

Beyond the Physical Evidence: Reading the Glosses

The new gloss to the Timaeus gravitated around the first part of the dialogue, although there are some exceptions, such as in London, BL MS Add. 15601, where the second part of the

Timaeus contains a large number of interlinear notes and logical tree diagrams.75 The main

themes which received annotations were the world soul, time, the elements, proportions, and the nature of the soul, motion and matter. Some of the glosses cite or refer to authors such as

Boethius (London, BL MS Harley 261o) or Calcidius (Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1o68). The gloss in BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1068 epitomises the new phenomena involved in glossing the

Timaeus. Its author uses Calcidius and possibly Macrobius. He provides interlinear synonyms for words in order to aid students who were struggling with the technical terminology,76

io; LXIX-LXXXIX, p. 116, 1. 1-p. 142, 1. 9 with diagrams 12-19; LXIV-LXVIII, p. 111, 1. 3-P. 115, 1. 19 with diagram 11 (the order of the chapters is altered); XC-XCVII, p. 142, 1. 9-p. 150, 1. 7 with diagrams 20-22; CX-CXVIII, p. 157, 1. 6-p. 164, 1. 3 with diagrams 23-24.

72. Commentary, LIX, p. 10o6, 1. ig9. 73. Commentary, XCVIII-CX, pp. 150-57, containing

philosophical passages on space, motion and time, and

diagram 25 in Commentary, CXVI.

74. This manuscript, containing texts by both Calcidius and Bede, may provide the explanation for the presence of some of the Calcidius diagrams,

together with their textual explanations, in the glosses of Bede's De natura rerum and De temporum ratione, an

example of the diagrammatic intertextuality mentioned above. See Patrologiae cursus completus. Series latina, ed.

J.-P. Migne, Paris 1844-64, xc, cols 203-04, 217-18.

75. Though most of the glosses were written by con-

temporary hands, some manuscripts remained in use and were glossed in later hands as well. Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1861, for example, contains annotations from the 11 th to the 13th centuries, and BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1308 was glossed up to the 15th century.

76. See, e.g., fol. 23r, 1. 21, 'id est studio et

augmento' to 'impendio'.



16 ANNA SOMFAI

explains mythological, historical and geographical terms,77 and expands phrases for clari-

fication.78 Some remarks are of a more philosophical nature.79 The longer marginal notes

concern the model of the universe and the nature of the soul, matter and the elements. The

musical diagrams are copied in the margin of the dialogue, and interlinear notes provide help in grasping the concept of proportion. On the final folio there is a very complex figure: a com-

bination of the three standard musical diagrams with the one on the creation of the world

soul, supplemented by features which express the relation between the creation of the soul

and musical harmony. The standard gloss to the Commentary was expanded during the eleventh century. In

addition to the topics in the dialogue which were annotated, there are several notes on logic,

especially the syllogism. Although the same themes often attracted attention in both the

Timaeus and the Commentary, in certain cases we encounter a marked absence of annotations

in one or the other. Paris, BnF MS lat. 10195, for instance, contains an unusually elaborate

mathematical gloss to the first part of the Commentary, yet the corresponding sections of the

Timaeus are without annotation. The earlier interest in the mathematical portion of the Com-

mentary remained a feature of its eleventh-century reception. A number of annotators took

over the mathematical gloss found in the Brussels manuscript. Particularly complex versions

of it are present in Paris, BnF MS lat. 10195 and Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 13o8, both of

which use coloured diagrams, while a partial version appears in Paris, BnF MS lat. 6280,

London, BL MS Add. 15293 and Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1861. An interest in mathe-

matics is also apparent in the glosses of Cologne, Dombib. MS 192 and Bamberg, SB MS M. V.

15 (Class. 18). Marginal annotations were added to the geometrical, arithmetical and musical

diagrams, new variants of which were developed as well. The tradition of using intra-diagrammatic annotations, present in the Brussels manuscript, was also followed here. These consist

of glosses placed within geometrical diagrams in order to explain their structure or the con-

nection between their components. Figure 4 provides an example of an intra-diagrammatic annotation which makes it easier to comprehend how two extreme triangles are joined

through a middle one. These diagrammatic variae lectiones, which have been completely

ignored in modern editions and in the

scholarly literature, are an invaluable aid

to understanding how the Commentary was

interpreted. They reveal a grasp of concepts which cannot be found in textual glosses. Some of the previous diagrammatic dis-

crepancies were corrected80 and imaginative

graphic designs were introduced together with new ornaments.

A F

primus triangulus

tercius ABr

triangulus ABA B

secundus triangulus ABE

A E

Figure 4: Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 1308, fol. 8v

77. See, e.g., fol. 11v, 1. io, 'mediterraneum' to 'fretum'; and fol. 29v, 11. 17-18, 'ante urbem conditam' to 'ante novem milia'.

78. See, e.g., fol. 29v, 1. 15, 'scilicet creatore' to 'a se'.

79. See, e.g., fol. 17r, 1. 12, 'scilicet sensilis mundi

qua ipse animatur' to 'anima'. 80o. See Somfai (as in n. 15), chap. 3.




The emerging interest in astronomy can be detected, not only in the astronomical excerpt found in Vatican City, BAV MS Reg. Lat. 123, but also in the way in which the gloss and the

standard diagrams evolved. In Paris, BnF MS lat. 10195, which contains a large number of

marginal notes, the astronomical diagrams are in colour, rendering phenomena such as the

lunar eclipse more visible and intelligible. Such features again emphasise the attraction which

Calcidius's diagrams held for the medieval mind.

The gloss, too, evolved, incorporating a growing number of logical tree diagrams,

especially in the second half of the Calcidius commentary, as well as references to Aristotle

and explanations of the nature of syllogisms. The addition of such diagrams to this portion of

the Commentary, which calls for a gloss on logic, reflects the acute sense which medieval readers

had of the connection between form and content, as well as their keen interest in employing visual aids to deepen and enhance their comprehension of a text. The general trend of turning to logic, and the debate which began to take shape around the use-or abuse-of it within

the discipline of theology, was a fundamental feature of the contemporary scholarly scene.

From Peter Damian, Manegold of Lautenbach and Gerard of Csanid to Anselm of Canterbury, the fight against the application of logical methods to other fields approached its peak at this

time. The tenth century seems to have been less aware of the problem it was creating by intro-

ducing logic and mathematics into theology, while the twelfth century was apparently better

equipped to deal with this approach or less troubled by self-doubt. The notable presence of

logic in eleventh-century interpretations of Plato and Calcidius was part of an awakening interest in the possibility of explaining doctrines which appeared to be in opposition to the

Christian faith by means of an ingenious use of syllogisms and the Aristotelian categories.81 The standard diagrams in the Commentary became more elaborate in eleventh-century

manuscripts, as additional features and brief textual explanations were added to them. The

musical and astronomical diagrams, in particular, were closely studied and evolved into com-

plicated visual interpretations. The connection between the creation of the soul, the harmony of musical proportion and the creation and motion of the celestial bodies was better under-

stood and more clearly depicted in the new I

diagrams and diagram variants. Additional

diagrams were produced to explain issues

relating to other disciplines as well. A dia-

gram which first appeared during the tenth

century,82 and expressed the link between the

elements through their qualities, was copied into new manuscripts.83 Figure 5 is a twelfth-

century, ornamented version of the diagram.

Diagrams created as part of the tenth-century

geometrical and arithmetical gloss, together

IGNIS - - acutus subtilis

AER mobilis

AQUA obtusa corpulenta el

TERRA immobilis mn

Figure 5. Paris, BnF MS lat. 6281, fol. 19r

81. The most obvious case in point is the Eucharist debate. For a good introduction to this topic see The

Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval

Philosophy, ed. A. H. Armstrong, Cambridge 1967, esp. pp. 6oo-o8.

82. Brussels, BR MS 9625-9626, fol. 14r. 83. See, e.g., Paris, BnF MS lat. 6282, fol. 1 or.



18 ANNA SOMFAI

with a few astronomical and musical diagrams, followed the same path as the textual anno-

tations: they were copied into new manuscripts and became standardised.

The increasing number of logical tree diagrams, combined with the careful attention

given to both the standard diagrams from Calcidius and the newly invented ones, mitigated the

predominantly verbal nature of the glossing tradition. The anonymous annotators moved

the discourse from the text to the margins. The eleventh-century glossing of the Timaeus and

the Commentary was the prelude to the cosmological and metaphysical analyses which became

prevalent in the following century. It also underlines the existence of a critical community which required, and produced, a new interpretation of these works.

Beyond the Margins: Reading the Timaeus and the Commentary

Although evidence, apart from the glosses, for the reading of the Timaeus and the Commentary is scarce, it is clear that by the late tenth century they were known and available to at least

a small circle of students. Around that time Abbo of Fleury and Gerbert of Aurillac studied

both the dialogue and the Commentary and referred to Calcidius in the exposition of their

mathematical philosophy.84 Abbo's interest in the quadrivium and in logic is apparent in the use he made of the

Commentary, especially Calcidius's concept of numbers, geometrical bodies and sense per-

ception. The structure of his commentary on the Calculus of Victorius of Aquitaine and his

handling of diagrams exhibit a considerable knowledge of Calcidius's Commentary. He refers

to the Timaeus and discusses one of Calcidius's musical diagrams, along with its textual explanation. He praises the first musical diagram because it wonderfully expresses the subtleties

of the disciplines of the quadrivium.85 He directs his readers to Calcidius and Macrobius, an-

nouncing that their commentaries contain various explanations related to these disciplines.86 These comments suggest that Abbo assumed Calcidius and his Commentary were known to his

readers and needed no further introduction.87

Gerbert of Aurillac relied on Calcidius when he connected mathematics to theology by means of numbers and geometrical forms. Mathematics, in his view, was a pathway for the

mind's ascent to comprehension of the incorporeal. In addition, Gerbert, who was interested

in the use of diagrams and in the possibility of constructing three-dimensional visual aids, refers to Calcidius and to the Timaeus in his discussion of plane geometry.88

84. For Abbo see esp. G. R. Evans and A. M. Peden, 'Natural Science and the Liberal Arts in Abbo of

Fleury's Commentary on the Calculus of Victorius of

Aquitaine', Viator, xvi, 1985, pp. 109-27. For Gerbert see esp. Gerberto. Scienza, storia e mito. Atti del Gerberti Symposium, Bobbio 1985; P. Riche, Gerbert d'Aurillac. Le

pape de l'an mil, Paris 1987. 85. Berlin, SBPK MS Phill. 1833, fol. 9va, 11. 18-20,

'Idque manifesta predicta psicogonie figura arith- metice geometrice musice et astronomie subtilitatibus contenta ac hoc modo mirabiliter expressa.'

86. Ibid., fol. 9va, 11. 27-28, 'De quibus omnibus

quam chalcidii et macrobii commenta multiplicam absolutionem continent.'

87. Abbo may also have drawn on several of Calcidius's astronomical diagrams and provided an

annotated version of the one which depicts the creation of the world soul. Ibid., fols 38r, 39r-v and 36v. Since, however, these diagrams are not described or referred to in Abbo's text and moreover are copied together in

groups in just a few folios, it is possible that they were not his own addition but rather were produced by another scholar who stood behind the Berlin manuscript.

88. See Gerbert of Aurillac, De geometria, 2.6 and 6.7, in his Opera mathematica, ed. N. Bubnov, Berlin 1899, p. 56, 11. 6-13 and p. 93, 1. 15-p. 94, 1. 4. Although the work is not consistently attributed to Gerbert in the

manuscripts and some internal evidence suggests that, as a whole, it may be a later compilation, the first section, which contains all the references to Calcidius and to specific approaches to geometry, is likely to have been written by him.




The explicit use which Abbo and Gerbert made of the Commentary, and their knowledge of both its mathematical arguments and the basic concepts expounded by Calcidius, are

unique. Since the extensive mathematical gloss to the Commentary in Brussels, BR MS 9625-

9626 displays a similar understanding of the text, I would suggest that it might be linked

to the circles of Abbo or Gerbert, or to Gerbert himself. Both scholars had an unusual interest

in collecting manuscripts and a large circle of students. As we have seen, Paris, BnF MS lat.

10 195 and Cologne, Dombib. MS 192, both of German provenance, contain the standard gloss and display an interest in the mathematical disciplines. It was probably through Gerbert's personal influence and through his students, such as the future emperor Otto III, that Calcidius's

translation and Commentary began to be copied in Germany during the eleventh century. It may also have been Gerbert's influence in Cologne which resulted in an interpretation

of the Timaeus and of Macrobius by a local scholar, Wolfelm, whose views were strongly op-

posed by Manegold of Lautenbach. Manegold, an Augustinian canon regular, born in Alsace,

travelled and studied in France and Germany. His writings reflect his pro-papal stand during the increasingly acrimonious controversies between the papacy and empire and his philoso-

phical arguments are infused with references to current ecclesiastical politics.89 Manegold's attack on Wolfelm for his reading of Macrobius was equally directed against Plato and against

attempts to discover a harmony between pagan philosophy and Christian theology. Like many a worthy critic, Manegold managed to acquire a knowledge of Plato and Macrobius which was

deeper than that of some of the authors whose Platonism he attacked. In the course of reject-

ing Macrobius's interpretation of Plato's cosmology, he refers to both Plato and Calcidius.

The occasion for his polemical treatise was a walk in the gardens of Lautenbach, during which he and Wolfelm had discussed Macrobius. Manegold assumed that Wolfelm was aware

of the dangers inherent in Macrobius's text and that he only pretended to be ignorant of its

heretical nature.90 Manegold engaged with the creation myth as described in the Timaeus,

including the role of numbers and the nature of the Living Creature, though he found its

argument excessively obscure.91 He was fiercely opposed to any attempt to accommodate

elements of the Platonic creation narrative within Christian speculation. He especially disap-

proved of the Platonic creation of the world soul, the theory of transmigration, attributed to

Pythagoras, and the concept of matter pre-existing the creation. Manegold's treatise is, never-

theless, imbued with Platonic vocabulary and theories. He drew a subtle parallel, for instance,

between hot and cold, the qualities of the elements, and the moral qualities of good and bad.92

Manegold's work is extant in a single manuscript.93 Though his approach was taken up by some

twelfth-century scholars, it does not seem to have had any impact on their reading of Plato.

Instead, they interpreted the Timaeus and the Commentary in line with the tradition present in

the anonymous glosses which they found in their manuscripts. This development shows that

the glosses were not merely passively copied but were also actively read together with the texts.

They exercised an influence which extended beyond the immediate context of manuscript

transmission at a time when Platonic treatises, the 'secondary literature' of the period, were

either unavailable or ignored.

89. See Manegold of Lautenbach, Liber contra Wolfel- mum, ed. W. Hartmann, Weimar 1972, pp. 46-47. See the preface for a general introduction to Manegold's life and work.

9o. Ibid., p. 41,11. 9-11.

91. Ibid., p. 48. 92. Ibid., p. 40, 1. 12-p. 41, 1. 2.

93. Milan, Ambr. MS N. 118. sup.



20 ANNA SOMFAI

The writings of two eleventh-century churchmen reveal an altogether different use of

the Timaeus and Calcidius's Commentary. Lanfranc, who taught at the abbey of Bec, where

his students included Anselm of Canterbury, experimented with methods and texts which

transcended disciplinary boundaries, applying grammar and logic to theological issues. In his

annotations on Augustine's De civitate Dei he first quotes Cicero's translation of the Demiurge's

speech in the Timaeus, 41A-41B, referring to it as 'the sentence which St Augustine took from

Plato's Timaeus and put into the thirteenth book of this work'.94 He then turns to Calcidius, whose version of the same passage he introduces with the revealing comment: 'one can find

this in the translation of the Timaeus which we use now and which is explained by Calcidius'.95

This remark suggests that by the time of Lanfranc, Calcidius's translation was the one in use

and that Cicero's rendering, though still known, was a text associated with the bygone patristic era. Lanfranc used these quotations as examples rather than for their philosophical content,

indicating that Plato's work had entered the curriculum and was starting to be read by scholars

whose primary interest was outside philosophy. The other eleventh-century churchman to deal with the Timaeus was Gerard of Csanaid,

an Italian who went to the court of King Steven of Hungary and became a bishop. Gerard

refers to Plato in an exegetical work entitled Deliberatio. This encyclopedic text shows traces of

knowledge of Greek and touches on various topics which can be broadly defined as falling within the realm of philosophy, though he does not use philosophical methods or address

issues of philosophical interest. Gerard was educated in Italy and then in France, where he

came across a copy of Calcidius's Commentary, an event which he presents as a distant memory: 'I am certain that once, while in France, I read in Plato some argument about the God of the

Hebrews and about the heavenly souls'.96 Despite the vagueness of his wording, it is clear that

he had read Plato together with the Commentary. Although Gerard's brief encounter with these

works does not seem to have had much effect on his later thinking or writing, it provides further evidence that the Timaeus and the Commentary were read as part of a school curriculum.

Conclusion

During the eleventh century a many-layered shift took place in the reading of Plato's Timaeus

and the Commentary of Calcidius. In previous centuries the Timaeus had been read through the Commentary. Now, however, the dialogue started to emerge as the main focus of attention

and Plato and Calcidius each acquired an accessus. The two texts began to circulate separately and while for most of the time they were still studied together, they also embarked on distinct

careers, providing material for textbooks in subjects to which they lent themselves when read

independently. This produced new interpretations of both texts and ensured them wider

readership.

94. M. Gibson, 'Lanfranc's Notes on Patristic Texts', Journal of Theological Studies, xxvii, 1971, pp. 435-50, at p. 439, 11. 3-4: 'Sententia quam beatus Augustinus de Tymeo Platonis sumit et in tercio decimo huius operis libro ponit'. See for Timaeus, 41A-41B, Cicero, Timaeus, p. 214, 11. 8-17.

95. Ibid., p. 439, 11. 7-8: 'Sic in ea translatione

Tymei qua nunc utimur et a Calcidio exponitur in-

venitur'. See for Timaeus, 41A-41B, Calcidius, Timaeus, p. 35, 11. 9-17.

96. Gerard of Csandid, Deliberatio supra hymnum trium puerorum (Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Medi- evalis, xix), ed. G. Silagi, Turnhout 1978, Iv, p. 41, 11.

104-07: 'In Platone quippe disputationes, quondam apud Galliam constitutus, quasdam deo Hebreorum confidenter fateor me legisse et celestibus animis.'




These trends were paralleled by changes on the micro-level of manuscript transmission

and in glossing technique. Both the Timaeus and the Commentary developed an ever-expanding

gloss, which gradually became standardised and included both textual and visual elements.

Alongside the standard gloss, instances of individual glossing in the increasing number of

manuscripts prove the existence of explorative new readings. The medieval glosses to the

Commentary followed Calcidius's complementary mathematical and metaphysical approach by

providing diagram variants, new diagrams and a verbal mathematical gloss for the first part, and a marginal index of terms, logical tree diagrams and a metaphysical gloss for the second

part. The tenth- and eleventh-century interpretation and visual glossing of the Timaeus and

the Commentary gave precedence to the mathematical over the metaphysical reading, but also

paved the way for the latter. By the end of the eleventh century the interest in the mathematical

aspects of the dialogue and the commentary slowly began to give way to a more verbal, less

visual, metaphysical reading. This was part of a general development within Western philo-

sophy, which was turning increasingly towards logic and metaphysics. This change coincided

with the introduction of Arabic and Greek sources of mathematics and logic, which provided more appropriate tools for the study of the mathematical disciplines. It was not until the

Renaissance that a more theoretical and theological mathematics drew attention once again to the mathematical aspects of the dialogue and the Commentary.97 Within the Timaeus itself,

the topics which emerged in the eleventh century as the focus of attention were similar to those

which had intrigued scholars in late antiquity and would do so again in the Renaissance.

The increasing number of manuscripts and the new readings of Plato and Calcidius in the

eleventh century reflected a new milieu within which the texts were studied. They were no

longer read by only a few isolated scholars and in a small number of centres, instead they found

their way to a larger audience. It was this intellectual and philosophical context which led to

the genesis of the twelfth-century Renaissance.

Warburg Institute

97. It is worth noting in this respect that during the

15th century, when the mathematical interpretation returned, more separate Commentary copies were made than during the whole of the Middle Ages. Nicolaus of

Cusa, whose application of mathematics to theology drew heavily on Plato and on Calcidius, owned more than one copy of the texts (Paris, BnF MS lat. 6282 and London, BL MS Harley 2652).



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