Felice Squares

A monument in the history of typography has just arrived online: the original manuscript of the first book demonstrating how to create Roman square capital letters geometrically. This is the work of Felice Feliciano, and as you can see in this extract for K and L, the letter proportion is based on the square or half-square:

Vat.lat.6852 is the original copy of Alphabetum Romanum, his treatise on the geometrical construction of Roman capital letters using the square and circle. It was digitized and issued online a few days ago. It is part of the Renaissance movement that created Antiqua, the new lettering based on Roman models.

Of course we do not now like to see a square K as wide as it is high, but it is part of the slow process of experimentation that brought microtypography to where it is today. Enjoy.

Here is my full list of new releases. eTK refers you to the Thorndike and Kibre index. I must remain brief, as my left hand is still in a cast after surgery, and typing is difficult.

1. S.Maria.in.Via.Lata.I.45, the Evangeliary of S. Maria in Via Lata, battered, mouldy and a thousand years old. The canon tables pages are classic in style.

   New uploads from @DigitaVaticana HT @JBPiggin and among them a true jewel: the 9thC evangeliary of Santa Maria in Via Lata is one of the very few manuscripts we can locate in early #medieval Rome and it's even more exceptional because we know it was used by a female community pic.twitter.com/Hc4s5lmhN5

   — GiorgiaV (@ParvaVox) January 15, 2018

2. S.Maria.in.Via.Lata.I.45.pt.A, jewelled cover and bookmarks of above, some items seemingly even older
3. Vat.lat.168
4. Vat.lat.207 homilies of Origen in Latin translation; NB: error in Trismegistos: not TM 67902 = Lowe, CLA Suppl. 1769 = Rome, "Vatican, Biblioteca del Vaticano Lat. 207" which is in fact Pal.lat.207 (Lorsch; 750-825).
5. Vat.lat.339
6. Vat.lat.434.pt.1
7. Vat.lat.434.pt.2
8. Vat.lat.435.pt.1
9. Vat.lat.454.pt.2
10. Vat.lat.527.pt.1
11. Vat.lat.527.pt.2
12. Vat.lat.618
13. Vat.lat.765
14. Vat.lat.771

    A less spectacular presentation of Aquinas' commentary on Aristotle's "De Anima". HT @JBPiggin as often.https://t.co/bYUv7uWUzb pic.twitter.com/KiCom7osLL

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) January 14, 2018

15. Vat.lat.788

    All out Thomas Aquinas in @JBPiggin latest release of MSS from @DigitaVaticana. Thread of various MSS containing the "Summa contra Gentiles"https://t.co/6LidAO73rj pic.twitter.com/CO0JzOP1ku

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) January 14, 2018

16. Vat.lat.790
17. Vat.lat.791
18. Vat.lat.851
19. Vat.lat.1008.pt.1
20. Vat.lat.1008.pt.2
21. Vat.lat.1101
22. Vat.lat.1162.pt.1
23. Vat.lat.1162.pt.2
24. Vat.lat.1162.pt.3
25. Vat.lat.1175.pt.1, a great 12th-century work that uses stemmata to organize the teaching material: Radulfus Ardens, Speculum universale
    
26. Vat.lat.1232
27. Vat.lat.1250.pt.2
28. Vat.lat.1304
29. Vat.lat.1306
30. Vat.lat.1314
31. Vat.lat.1315
32. Vat.lat.1568
33. Vat.lat.1626
34. Vat.lat.1898
35. Vat.lat.1951.pt.1
36. Vat.lat.1953
37. Vat.lat.1961
38. Vat.lat.1973
39. Vat.lat.1985
40. Vat.lat.1988
41. Vat.lat.2009
42. Vat.lat.2051
43. Vat.lat.2053
44. Vat.lat.2061
45. Vat.lat.2076
46. Vat.lat.2081
47. Vat.lat.2116
48. Vat.lat.2144
49. Vat.lat.2156

    Another popular medieval commentary on the same treatise "De Anima" was written in the early 14th c. by John of Jandun.https://t.co/ghr5MKzTGb pic.twitter.com/IfyDSK65X8

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) January 14, 2018

50. Vat.lat.2157 HT to @LatinAristotle: second copy of the above commentary by John of Jandun
51. Vat.lat.2161 eTK
52. Vat.lat.2164

    Also online @DigitaVaticana & in @JBPiggin's latest list. Anonymous commentary (ignore the caption in the top margin) on Aristotle's zoological books.https://t.co/MEOIhTFkHJ pic.twitter.com/68jj2ROh3n

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) January 14, 2018

53. Vat.lat.2174

    To conclude an afternoon on the playground of @JBPiggin's list of @DigitaVaticana MSS: Peter of Abano's commentary on the Aristotelian "Problemata".https://t.co/QejpexSgD2 pic.twitter.com/Qlf7A0Q7WM

    — Pieter Beullens (@LatinAristotle) January 14, 2018

54. Vat.lat.2197
55. Vat.lat.2200
56. Vat.lat.2220
57. Vat.lat.2223
58. Vat.lat.2270
59. Vat.lat.2301
60. Vat.lat.2310
61. Vat.lat.2327
62. Vat.lat.2329
63. Vat.lat.2371 eTK
64. Vat.lat.2372 eTK
65. Vat.lat.2373 eTK
66. Vat.lat.2387
67. Vat.lat.2391
68. Vat.lat.2404
69. Vat.lat.2457, Constantine the African: Pantegni

    Ah, this is a sight to behold: the earliest copy of @EgoConstantinus's #Pantegni in the @DigitaVaticana collection. (H/t @JBPiggin for notice: https://t.co/FZYNkMG8HM.) The #Pantegni is translation of 'Ali ibn al-'Abbas al-Majusi's 2-part encyclopedia of medicine. Here's incipit. pic.twitter.com/0EWewsYsls

    — Monica H Green (@monicaMedHist) January 14, 2018

70. Vat.lat.5309
71. Vat.lat.5699, a de luxe version of Ptolemy's Cosmography, dated 1469, translated from Greek to Latin by Iacobo Angelo. In the maps section, here is the Gulf of Athens. Note how each of the islands is a different colour, like confetti:
    
    There are wonderful idealized town views, like this of Florence: pick out the Ponte Vecchio and try to find the Duomo: in fact it is marked in historicizing fashion as Santa Reparata:
    
    Anthony Grafton noted for the Rome Reborn exhibition how the view on the next page showed Rome with the Castel Sant'Angelo, the Borgo and Saint Peter's at bottom right, separated from the city by the Tiber: "Within the city proper, the ancient monuments rise, without modern buildings and urban sprawl. The Pantheon, the Forum, the Capitoline and Palatine hills, and the Colosseum dominate the central space."

    Fascinating! I was moved to see Ognisancti abbey, the church favored by the Vespucci family. Amerigo was 15 when this map was drawn, and probably still attended mass there from time to time. Thanks! pic.twitter.com/pYgtjGWgTq

    — Historia y Mapas (@LRoblesMacias) January 25, 2018

72. Vat.lat.5845, the late antique Collectio Dionysiana and Collection of Cresconius in an important 10th-century South Italian composite manuscript in a Beneventan hand

    Another fascinating early #medieval #manuscript online thanks to @DigitaVaticana HT @JBPiggin: a canon law collection (Dionysiana&more) copied by Montecassino monks in exile (Capua 915-934) also integrating vestiges of a debate between the pope & #Carolingian missi (pic no. 4) pic.twitter.com/MVgLgCeLta

    — GiorgiaV (@ParvaVox) January 16, 2018

73. Vat.lat.6852, the original copy of the Alphabetum Romanum (above).
74. Vat.lat.13152.pt.2
75. Vat.lat.14936

    https://t.co/nvxFdwgGFC.14936 - Book of hours from 1561. Use of Rome and most likely Parisian calendar, it announces that it was made for Catherine de Medici on f.1v

    — AaronM (@gundormr) January 16, 2018

76. Vat.lat.14937
77. Vat.lat.15294.pt.2

This is Piggin's Unofficial List number 144. If you have corrections or additions, please use the comments box below. Follow me on Twitter (@JBPiggin) for news of more additions to DigiVatLib.