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Decretum

Author of text: Gratian (died no later than 1159)
French
Medieval (Gothic)
about 1200–50
Place of Manufacture: France

Medium/Technique Ink and tempera on parchment
Dimensions Overall (page dimensions): 14.2 x 20.5 cm (5 9/16 x 8 1/16 in.)
Credit Line Denman Waldo Ross Collection
Accession NumberRES.17.89
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsEurope

DescriptionSeveral leaves pasted together to make a bookcover, laid on paper. Text is from Gratian's Decretum of ca. 1140, including his Causa II, Q. viii, C. 57/58. Gratian's Decretum (also known as Concordantia Discordantium Canonum) is a collection of papal letters and conciliar decrees, which became the most important law book of the 12th century.

1 column of text and 1 column of commentary are extant, 29 lines extant, all in Latin.

Written in an early Gothic bookhand (commentary in Gothic cursive) in black ink with red rubrics.

Later used with other leaves as a binding, with a Hebrew leaf pasted-down onto the binding's spine. When the Hebrew leaf was removed, it left a mirror-image offset.
ProvenanceBy 1913, Denman W. Ross (1853-1935), Cambridge, MA [see note 1]; 1917, gift of Denman W. Ross. (Accession date: February 15, 1917)

NOTES:
[1] From September 30, 1913 until it was accessioned, this manuscript was on loan to the MFA from Denman W. Ross.