The King in the Manuscript: The Presentation

Inscription of the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée

KATHERINE H. TACHAU University of Iowa

Abstract Bible moralisée’s hitherto unknown history between its early

thirteenth-century creation and the 1730s, when it was re-

t
For over 125 years, historians have speculated about the in- bound for the library of Prince Eugene of Savoy.
tended, presumed Capetian royal recipients of the four earliest
Bibles moralisées, four of the most significant manuscripts
from Gothic Paris. Of these codices, only Vienna, Österreich- his is a tale of how imaging technology
ische Nationalbibliothek (ÖNB) MS 1179, the Vienna Latin can digitally excavate new, otherwise ir-
Bible moralisée, contains a written presentation inscription. recuperable information for historians,
Erased long ago, it has nevertheless frustrated scholars’ efforts enabling us to solve long-standing but
to read it. Multispectral Imaging now reveals the name of the apparently intractable puzzles.1 Our story concerns Vienna,
non-Capetian intended recipient. This article offers an expla- ÖNB Codex 1179, one of the two earliest thirteenth-century
nation of why, when, and for whom the manuscript may have manuscript books known as Bibles moralisées, or Moralized
been produced, revealing it as a witness to Denmark’s greater Bibles, which have been the object of scholarly investigation
role in Capetian territorial ambitions and diplomacy than his- for over 125 years. Housed today in the Austrian National Li-
torians have generally appreciated. In the course of establish-
brary together with ÖNB Codex 2554 (the Old French Bible
ing for whom the manuscript was made, the article explains why
moralisée), Codex Vienna MS 1179, known as the Vienna
the long-accepted argument for dating this manuscript to 1219
or later is invalid, and proposes an earlier terminus post quem
Latin Bible moralisée, is the later of these single-volume
of 1208 for both the earlier Old French Bible moralisée and this manuscripts.2
codex. Historians owe the term Bible moralisée to Léopold Delisle,
Implicitly, these discoveries undermine assumptions regard- who first demarcated a genre of illuminated manuscripts for
ing the recipients of the other supposed Capetian Bibles moral- which he proposed that name as a better descriptor than the
isées. Finally, this study provides evidence of the Vienna Latin labels given hitherto in inventories: emblèmes bibliques, Bibles

The research in Vienna on which this article is based was generously funded by the University of Iowa Internal Funding Arts & Human-
ities Initiative from the Office of the Vice President for Research, to whom I here express my gratitude. In addition to colleagues in that
office, I am indebted to Elizabeth A. R. Brown, Paul Dilley, Andrea Gayoso, Grethe Jacobsen, Sara Lipton, Elizabeth Riordan, John Beldon
Scott, and Susan Walsh for their help and advice at many stages of this project.

1. The medievalist John F. Benton was an early proponent of such technologies. See John F. Benton, Alan-R. Gillespie, and James M. Soha,
“Digital Image-Processing Applied to the Photography of Manuscripts,” Scriptorium 33, no. 1 (1979): 40–55. In my transcriptions from man-
uscripts in what follows, I use the conventional angle brackets (< >) to indicate insertions and square brackets ([ ]) for letters that, for sense,
should be omitted.
2. The other two thirteenth-century Bibles moralisées are three-volume sets, which were largely produced together. One of these, Toledo,
Tesoro del Cabildo de la Catedral, MSS I–III, is missing its final quire, which is now New York, The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.240.
The other is commonly referred to as the Oxford-Paris-London Bible moralisée, after the three libraries that possess a twin to one of the
Toledo volumes: Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 270b; Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France (hereafter BnF), MS lat. 11560; London,
British Library, MSS Harley 1526 and 1527. Tanya Alfillé first noticed the evidence on the unpainted sides of the first and second volumes of
these three-volume Bibles moralisées that, when John Lowden was able to confirm their existence in the Toledo manuscripts, demonstrate
that they had been prepared together. See Tanya Alfillé, “The Psalms in the Thirteenth-Century Bible Moralisée: A Study in Text and Image”
(PhD diss., University of London, Courtauld Institute of Art, 1992), 33–38; John Lowden, The Making of the Bibles Moralisées 1: The Man-
uscripts (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000), 119–27, 167–80. On the priority of the Old French Bible moralisée, see
note 10 below.

Gesta v60n1 (Spring 2021).

0031-8248/2021/7703-0001 $10.00. Copyright 2021 by the International Center of Medieval Art. All rights reserved.

v60n1, Spring 2021 The King in the Manuscript D 1

historiées, or Bibles allégorisées.3 A Bible moralisée is recog- the historic moment for the intended reader-viewer, who is
nizable by the layout of its folios (Fig. 1). With the exception shown and told what the biblical passage signifies, as the mor-
of an opening full-page frontispiece image, almost every painted alization normally states explicitly (Old French senefie; Latin
page of the thirteenth-century Moralized Bibles presents, significat).
within an enframed space, two columns of four circular me- The makers of Vienna MS 1179 used lavish materials, suit-
dallions each, which are set against a patterned background, able for books made for royalty to possess: even after being
alternately blue or rose, with accompanying texts alongside.4 trimmed for binding, the manuscript consists of large sheets
The images and text are composed in pairs; thus, every page of high-quality parchment, illuminated and written on only
of eight medallions comprises four pairs. Within each, the top one side of each folio. Ink and pigments were likewise of high
image and text paraphrase selections from the Bible, and the quality—over the centuries little has faded or flaked off. Also
text accompanying the biblical medallion usually begins with expensive was the gold ground of every medallion and the
“here” (Old French ici; Latin hic), a verbal reminder that this gold enframement of each folio’s illuminated and written space,
medallion depicts the action that this text tells. The lower pair which are all gold leaf. In addition, the illuminators painted
of text and image provides an interpretation of the world or of shell-gold decorative elements in the patterned surfaces against
which the medallions are set. Little wonder, then, given the
costliness of the materials and the great skill of those who illu-
3. Léopold Delisle, “Livres d’images destinés à l’instruction reli- minated the manuscript, that scholars have generally shared
gieuse et aux exercises de piété des laïques,” Histoire littéraire de la Delisle’s certainty with regard to all the thirteenth-century Bi-
France 31 (1893): 213–85, at 236. Unfortunately, Delisle differenti- bles moralisées that “the royal origin of [such a] book is beyond
ated between these codices and Vienna MS 2554, which he assigned debate.”5 Nevertheless, with the exception of the Vienna Latin
to a different genre, that of the “Bible historiée toute figurée.” Before
Delisle, Gustav Heider had identified a genre of “Picture Bibles,”
Bible moralisée, which bears the remnants of an erased in-
Bilderbibel or Biblia picturata, in his “Beiträge zur christlichen Typo- scription in the right margin of the last illuminated folio, the
logie aus Bilderhandschriften des Mittelalters,” Jahrbuch der Kaiserl. thirteenth-century Bibles moralisées contain only indirect in-
Königl. Central-Commission zur Erforschung und Erhaltung der dications of their intended recipients. For that reason, scholars
Baudenkmale 5 (1861): 1–128, at 33–35. Heider includes in this genre have sought ever since Delisle to discover evidence internal to
the two Vienna Bible moralisée manuscripts and two more in Paris,
the manuscripts—that is, contained in the images, their ac-
one of which is now BnF MS français 167 (a mid-fourteenth century
Bible moralisée), the other unspecified. The earliest known use of the companying texts, or the material aspects of the codices them-
title “Bible moralisée” comes from ca. two hundred years after the selves—that would permit us to ascertain the order and dates
making of Vienna MS 1179, in Ghent, Universiteitsbibliotheek, of production of the four extant Bibles moralisées, as well as the
MS 141 (made in Paris in the first two decades of the fifteenth century), identities of their intended recipients. Researchers have pieced
fol. 12r. Reiner Haussherr established the significance of this manu- together a history of medieval illuminators’ styles and tech-
script’s description of its content as a “bible moralisee translatee de
latin en francois,” in a rubric on that folio in his “Drei Texthand-
niques, endeavoring to locate the Bibles moralisées within it;6
schriften der Bible moralisée,” in Festschrift für Eduard Trier zum
60. Geburtstag, ed. Justus Müller Hofstede and Werner Spies (Berlin:
Mann, 1981), 35–65, at 58. Nevertheless, despite being the earliest 5. Delisle, “Livres d’images,” 236: “Dans tous les cas, l’origine roy-
witness to the name “Bible moralisée,” because Ghent MS 141 is not ale du livre est mise hors de toute contestation.” Nevertheless, Georg,
structured to provide an image for each text or moralizing passage, Graf Vitzthum, Die Pariser Miniaturmalerei: von der Zeit des hl. Lud-
Lowden, Making, 1:2–3, excludes this and similar codices from the wig bis zu Philipp von Valois und ihr Verhältnis zur Malerei in
contemporary “Bible moralisée” genre. Nordwesteuropa (Leipzig: Quelle & Meyer, 1907), 3–4, did contest
4. In Vienna MS 1179, not uncommonly—as here in Fig. 1—there this description, on the grounds that the royal images in Vienna
was not enough space for the planned text, so it spilled beyond the MS 1179, fol. 246r, and the Morgan fragment (fol. 8r) established be-
borders intended to enclose it. This is a result of the highly unusual yond doubt only that those two manuscripts were made for royalty.
production of the early Bibles moralisées. Unlike almost all other sur- 6. After Delisle, “Livres d’images,” see especially Arthur Haseloff,
viving medieval manuscripts, for any given bifolium (if not, indeed, “La miniature dans les pays cisalpins depuis le commencement du
for an entire gathering), all images and gold-enframed painted back- XII jusqu’au milieu du XIV siècle,” in Histoire de l’art depuis les pre-
grounds against which they were set had been completed before miers temps chrétiens jusqu’à nos jours 2, pt. 1: Formation, ex-
scribes began their work. At the point of writing the planned text, pansion, et évolution de l’art gothique, ed. André Michel (Paris:
scribes—who did not compose what they wrote—sometimes discov- Librairie Armand Colin, 1906), 297–371; Vitzthum, Pariser Mi-
ered images for which they had been given no planned text; more of- niaturmalerei; Hermann Julius Hermann, Die westeuropäischen
ten, they faced the opposite situation, namely, too much text for the Handschriften und Inkunabeln der Gotik und der Renaissance mit
images on the page. See Lowden, Making, 1:22–33, 42–47, 76–77, and Ausnahme der Niederländischen Handschriften, pt. 1: Englische und
my forthcoming study, Bible Lessons for Kings: Scholars and Friars in Französische Handschriften des XIII. Jahrhunderts, Beschreibendes
Thirteenth-Century Paris and the Creation of the Bibles Moralisées, Verzeichnis der illuminierten Handschriften in Österreich 8: Die
chap. 1. illuminierten Handschriften und Inkunabeln der Nationalbibliothek

2 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

have scrutinized heraldic shields;7 hunted for textual allusions sions of the last five decades: historians have reached a
to contemporary events;8 and interpreted iconographic con- consensus that the Old French tome was created before the Vi-
ventions within these manuscripts.9 To summarize the conclu- enna Latin manuscript;10 that these four Bibles moralisées were

in Wien (Leipzig: Hiersemann, 1935), 29–47; Robert Branner, “The

‘Soissons Bible’ Paintshop in Thirteenth-Century Paris,” Speculum
44, no. 1 (1969): 13–34; Branner, Manuscript Painting in Paris during no. 4 (1992): 362–77; Lipton, Images of Intolerance: The Representa-
the Reign of Saint Louis: A Study of Styles, California Studies in the tion of Jews and Judaism in the Bible moralisée (Berkeley: University
History of Art 18 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977). of California Press, 1999); Gerald B. Guest, commentary, “Co-
7. Alexandre-Léon-Joseph, comte de Laborde, La Bible moralisée dex 2554 and the Moralized Bible Tradition,” Bible Moralisée Codex
illustrée conservée à Oxford, Paris, et Londres: reproduction intégrale Vindobonensis 2554, Vienna, Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek
du manuscrit du XIIIe siècle, accompagnée de planches tirées de Bi- (London: Harvey Miller, 1995); Guest, “Queens, Kings, and Clergy:
bles similaires, 5 vols. (Paris: Pour les membres de la Société fran- Figures of Authority in the Thirteenth-Century Moralized Bibles”
çaise de reproductions de manuscrits à peintures, 1911–27), 5:32, (PhD diss., Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 1998); Tracy
first called attention to Toledo, II, fol. 78r (D). Branner, “‘Soissons Chapman Hamilton, “Queenship and Kinship in the French Bible
Bible,’” 23, and Manuscript Painting, 64, follows de Laborde in iden- moralisée: The Example of Blanche of Castille and Vienna ÖNB 2554,”
tifying two heraldic shields as those of Champagne and Navarre; in Capetian Women, ed. Kathleen Nolan (New York: Palgrave Mac-
Lowden, Making, 1:130, disputes Branner’s reasoning as not taking millan, 2003), 177–208; Katherine H. Tachau, “God’s Compass and
into account what Lowden (without providing a source for his iden- Vana Curiositas: Scientific Study in the Old French Bible moralisée,”
tification of the heraldry) states are “the [additional] arms of Anjou, Art Bulletin 80, no. 1 (1998): 7–33. Also essential among many stud-
Artois, Bar.” De Laborde, Branner, and Lowden are all refuted by ies are Jean-Michel V. Tuchscherer, “Sponsus–Sponsa/Christus–
Philippe Büttner, Bilder zum Betreten der Zeit: Bible Moralisée und Ecclesia: The Illustrations of the Song of Songs in the Bible moralisée
Kapetingisches Königtum (Allschwil: Gissler Druck, 2002), 79–99. de Saint Louis, Toledo, Spain, Cathedral Treasury, Ms. 1 [sic!] and
Whether the presence of the ensemble of heraldic shields is unmis- Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Ms. lat. 11560” (PhD diss., McGill
takable evidence for dating the Toledo manuscript (and thereby University, 1996); Patricia Stirnemann, “Note sur la Bible moralisée
the other early thirteenth-century Bibles moralisées) remains an open en trois volumes conservée à Oxford, Paris et Londres, et sur ses
question. copies,” Scriptorium 53, no. 1 (1999): 120–24; Ramón Gonzálvez
8. Notable contributions include numerous works by Reiner Ruiz, ed., The Bible of Saint Louis 2: Commentary (Barcelona: Mo-
Haussherr, but especially Bible moralisée: Faksimile-Ausgabe im leiro, 2004); Yolanta Zaluska and François Boespflug, “Les sacrements
Original-format des Codex Vindobonensis 2554 der Österreichischen dans la Bible moralisée de Tolède” in “Tout le temps du veneour est
Nationalbibliothek, 2 vols. (Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlags- sanz oyseuseté”: Mélanges offerts à Yves Christe pour son 65ème an-
anstalt, 1973), with vol. 2 including his commentary (hereafter niversaire par ses amis, ses collègues, ses élèves, ed. Christine Hediger
“Kommentar”) on the manuscript; Haussherr, “Sensus litteralis (Turnhout: Brepols, 2005), 249–92.
und sensus spiritualis in der Bible moralisée,” Frühmittelalterliche 10. Stork, Bible moralisée, 43, appears to have been the first stu-
Studien, Jahrbuch des Instituts für Frühmittelalterforschung der Uni- dent of the genre to argue that Vienna MS 2554 was produced before
versität Münster 6 (1972): 356–80; Haussherr, “Eine Warnung the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, and hence was the earliest of the
vor dem Studium von Zivilem und Kanonischen Recht in der Bible four Moralized Bibles of the early thirteenth century. I concur,
Moralisée,” Frühmittelalterliche Studien 9 (1975): 390–404; Hauss- “God’s Compass,” 7, as do Lowden, Making, 1:50–52; Yves Christe,
herr, “Ein Pariser martyrologischer Kalendar aus der ersten Hälfte “Les Bibles moralisées et les vitraux de la Sainte Chapelle: le vitrail de
des 13. Jahrhunderts,” in Festschrift Matthias Zender, Studien zur l’Exode,” Bulletin monumental 157, no. 4 (1999): 329–46, at 330;
Volkskultur, Sprache und Landesgeschichte 2, ed. Edith Ennan Christe, “Un autoportrait moral et politique de Louis IX: les vitraux
and Günter Wiegelmann (Bonn: Röhrscheid, 1972), 1076–1103; de sa chapelle,” in La Sainte-Chapelle de Paris. Royaume de France
Haussherr, “Petrus Cantor, Stephan Langton, Hugo von St. Cher ou Jérusalem céleste?: Actes du Colloque (Paris, Collège de France,
und der Isaias-Prolog der Bible moralisée,” in Verbum et Signum: 2001), ed. Christine Hediger (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), 251–94, at
Friedrich Ohly zum 60. Geburtstag überreicht 10. Januar 1974, 251; Laurence Brugger, “Les ‘paraphrases bibliques’ moralisées,
2 vols., ed. Hans Fromm, Wolfgang Harms, and Uwe Ruberg (Mu- l’exemple du livre de Job,” Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartes 162,
nich: Fink, 1975), 2:347–64; Haussherr, “Zur Darstellung zeitgenoss- no. 1 (2004): 75–96, at 75; Klaus Reinhardt, “The Texts of the ‘Bible
ischer Wirklichkeit und Geschichte in der Bible moralisée und in of Saint Louis,’” in Gonzálvez Ruiz, Bible, 267–321, at 277; François
Illustrationen von Geschichtsschreibung im 13. Jahrhundert,” in Il Boespflug, “La dénonciation des clercs luxurieux dans la bible
medio oriente e l’occidente nell’arte del XIII secolo. Atti del XXIV moralisée à la lumière de la ‘Bible de Saint Louis’ (vers 1230),” Revue
Congresso internazionale di storia dell’arte 2, ed. Hans Belting (Bo- Mabillon, n.s. 25 (= t. 86) (2014): 135–64, at 137. At present, no Bible
logna: Cooperativa Libraria Universitaria Editrice Bologna, 1982), moralisée antecedent to the Old French Bible moralisée has been
211–17. Also, Hans-Walter Stork, Die Wiener französische Bible discovered. We do not know how soon after its making the Vienna
moralisée Codex 2554 der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, Saar- Latin Bible moralisée was begun, but the span of time was not large
brücker Hochschulschriften 18 (St. Ingbert: Röhrig, 1992); James and, given the many portions in which the Latin texts simply trans-
Michael Heinlen, “The Ideology of Reform in the French Moralized late the Old French (with corrections) and retain the images up to
Bible” (PhD diss., Northwestern University, 1991). where the first manuscript ends, the planners of the second Bible
9. Sara Lipton, “Jews, Heretics, and the Sign of the Cat in the Bible moralisée probably had the Old French codex before their eyes.
moralisée,” Word & Image, A Journal of Verbal/Visual Enquiry 8, Lowden, Making, 1:8, 90–94; 2:206.

The King in the Manuscript D 3

Figure 1. Final page with presentation, Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, fol. 246r, ca. 1210–19, Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek
[ÖNB], MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB). See the electronic edition of Gesta for color versions of most images.
made in Paris for royalty,11 all of them Capetian;12 that the any of their work on parchment completely because ink and
manuscripts were completed before the middle of the thir- pigments (along with their binding agents) were absorbed to
teenth century, and almost certainly before 1235;13 and that some degree by the material to which they were affixed. For a
Vienna MS 1179 was produced for a king of France, probably scribe writing on parchment, the only method of removing
Louis VIII.14 text once it had dried was to scrape it off the writing surface
The deliberately erased inscription on fol. 246r of Vienna with a knife.16 Nevertheless, what may have been rendered in-
MS 1179 has so far remained a tantalizing but mostly unread- visible at the time has often slowly re-emerged as a faint and
able direct witness to one Bible moralisée’s expected recipient partial shadow of its former self. Only because of long-term
(Fig. 2).15 Medieval scribes and illuminators could rarely erase chemical processes do we see that there were words that have
been scraped away, as is the case on this folio. The abraded
11. Stork, Bible moralisée, 49: “Daß die Bibles moralisées als presentation inscription stretches alongside the final two me-
königliche Handschriften in Paris selbst hergestellt wurden, steht dallions, which depict the appropriate hierarchy of recipient
heute außer Frage.” There are notable exceptions to this conviction, to maker. In the upper medallion of the two, a king ensconced
beginning with Branner, Manuscript Painting, 3, who was willing to on his throne holds in his hand an open book that is readily
countenance the possibility that Vienna MS 2554 might have been
recognizable as a Bible moralisée, with painted roundels on
made “for a grandee of the [Capetian] court,” who wanted a book
like Vienna MS 1179, which Branner supposed was for Philip II Au- gold-framed grounds and two dangling leather straps with
gustus. See, too, the intellectual historian Beryl Smalley, The Becket metal clasps for closing it. In the lower roundel we see the
Conflict and the Schools: A Study of Intellectuals in Politics (Totowa, painter of the pages that the monarch displays to the viewer.
NJ: Rowan & Littlefield, 1973), 206, who thought that the Toledo Bi- The illuminator sits while he paints on the page, on which
ble moralisée was made for “some wealthy laymen, to whom ex- golden medallions are visible within vertical rose-colored
pense was no object”; and Michael Camille, who argued that the
Bibles moralisées were made for educated clerical readers, in his “Vi-
rectangles.17
sual Signs of the Sacred Page: Books in the Bible moralisée,” Word &
Image, A Journal of Verbal/Visual Enquiry 5, no. 1 (1989): 111–29, at
118, 126. rized. Thus, Hermann, Handschriften, 30, 46, writes of “dedication
12. But see the valuable discoveries in Stirnemann, “Note,” 121, portraits” (Dedicationsbilder) but, 46–47, refers to the marginal
123, who proposes that at least the Oxford volume of the Oxford- writing simply as ten distichs (couplets) and texts (Distichen; Texte);
Paris-London Bible moralisée had as its “premier destinaire . . . le Stork, Bible moralisée, 36, refers to the “dedication portrait” and its
roi d’Angleterre Henri III, pendant une période de détente entre “corresponding text” (Widmungsbild; entsprechende Texte); Bütt-
les deux royaumes.” ner, Bilder, 28, prefers “inscription” (Inschrift); Lipton, Images of
13. Branner, “Soissons Bible,” 23; Branner, Manuscript Painting, Intolerance, 145n1, terms the final pair of images on fol. 246r “ded-
48, 64–65; Lipton, Images of Intolerance, 152–53; Lowden, Making, ication/presentation portraits” and consistently calls the accompa-
1:8, 90–94, 132; Büttner, Bilder, 82–99; Brugger, “Paraphrases bib- nying marginal writing a “dedicatory inscription,” e.g., 6, 8, 145n1,
liques,” 75; Reinhardt, “Texts,” 277; Boespflug, “Dénonciation,” 137– and 150n31; Lowden, “The Apocalypse in the Early Thirteenth Cen-
38. tury Bibles moralisées: A Re-assessment,” in Prophecy, Apocalypse,
14. Haussherr, “Sensus litteralis,” 365, proposes Louis VIII as the and the Day of Doom, Proceedings of the 2000 Harlaxton Symposium,
king represented on fol. 246r; he is less certain whether the image ed. Nigel Morgan, Harlaxton Medieval Studies 12 (Donington: Paul
is of Philip II or Louis VIII in his “Kommentar,” 33. Stork, Bible Watkins, 2004), 195–219, at 201, opts for “a visual colophon.” We
moralisée, 37, 39, opts for Louis VIII. Camille, “Visual Signs,” 124, prefer the description of the erased writing as a “presentation inscrip-
deems it “plausible” that the image is of Louis VIII, although pre- tion,” to highlight its function as a record of a planned presentation.
sumably as a patron, given that Camille asserts, 124, 126, that the Bi- That is because, as in other known presentation volumes (such as
bles moralisées must have been “financed from the [royal] treasury” those of notes 65–66 below), the presentation image and all other
and, 128, that these were produced “under royal patronage.” Lipton, illumination, decoration, and text had to be completed before the
Images of Intolerance, beginning her study with the words, “Some- actual presentation itself could occur.
time between the years 1220 and 1229, a book was made for the king 16. The physical marks of deliberate scraping of text are typically
of France,” (1), argues specifically that the intended recipient was visible to the naked eye, as they are in this codex on fol. 246r.
Louis VIII, 5–8, and 148n22–151n44. Lipton’s arguments are deci- 17. Nearly all scholars have incorrectly described the figure in the
sive for Lowden, Making, 1:50–51, 88–94; again, Lowden, “Les rois lower medallion as a scribe. The iconography for scribes was well es-
et les reines de France en tant que ‘public’ des Bibles moralisées: une tablished by the twelfth century, commonly showing a penknife in
approche tangentielle à la question des liens entre les Bibles moral- the scribe’s left hand and a writing implement in his right. The pen-
isées et les vitraux de la Sainte-Chapelle,” in La Sainte-Chapelle, knife served to trim the pen nib, to scrape errors or rough patches
345–62, at 347. Büttner, Bilder, 111–14, concurs. I was once equally from the parchment, or simply to hold the latter flat while writing.
convinced that Louis VIII was the recipient of the Vienna Latin Bible The figure in this image holds instead what is recognizably a brush
moralisée; see “God’s Compass,” 7. with both hands, and he is not writing. There is an image of an illu-
15. Scholars have generally considered the final two roundels of minator similarly supporting his brush hand with the other in the
Vienna MS 1179 to be dedication images, but disagreed as to how “Hamburg Bible,” Copenhagen, Det Kongelige Biblioteket, MS Gl.
this inscription alongside them in the margin should be catego- kgl. Saml. 4 27, vol. 3, fol. 208r, illustrated in Jonathan J. G. Alexander,

The King in the Manuscript D 5

Figure 2. A king looks at a Bible moralisée in upper roundel, a lay illuminator paints the book in lower roundel, with text alongside and
below the images, and (erased) in right margin, detail, fol. 246r, Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB).

Like others who have studied the Bibles moralisées closely, Latin codex, or that further clues could be obtained by ascer-
I have hoped that explicit evidence could be found, such as ar- taining its whereabouts between the time of its thirteenth-
chival documentation of the intended recipient of the Vienna century creation and its entry into the library of Prince Eugene
of Savoy by 1736.18 As early as 1906, Arthur Haseloff pointed
to the possibility of identifying the king depicted on fol. 246r
Medieval Illuminators and Their Methods of Work (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1992), 22, fig. 33. On the depiction of scribes,
see: Albert d’Haenens, “Écrire, un couteau dans la main gauche. Un 18. Delisle, “Livres d’images,” 243, mentions that Vienna
aspect de la physiologie d’écriture occidentale aux XIe et XIIe MS 1179 was once number two of the “fonds du prince Eugène.” A lauded
siècles,” in Clio et son regard: mélanges d’histoire, d’histoire de l’art patron of scholars, the arts, and of architects—in no small measure
et d’archéologie offerts à Jacques Stiennon à l’occasion de ses vingt- thanks to the wealth he acquired as the Habsburg’s stellar military
cinq ans d’enseignement à l’Université de Liège, ed. Rita Lejeune commander, diplomat, imperial governor, and councilor—Prince Eu-
and Joseph Deckers (Liège: Pierre Mardaga, 1982), 129–41; Randall gene was also an acquisitive bibliophile, who left over 15,000 books
A. Rosenfeld, “Iconographical Sources of Scribal Technology: Select and 237 manuscripts at his death in 1736. The proof that he owned
Catalogue of Non-Formulaic Depictions of Scribes and Allied the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée is its early eighteenth-century bind-
Craftsmen (Western Europe, s. VII ex.–XIV in.),” Mediaeval Studies ing, the work of the celebrated Étienne Boyet, who moved from Paris,
65 (2003): 319–63. where his father was the royal binder, to Vienna in order to become

6 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

of the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée if the effaced marginal He faced limitations not only in the sensitivity of available
inscription beside him could be deciphered.19 The comte de films but also in the clarity with which his photographs would
Laborde (1927), too, saw the potential importance of the erased be printed by the publisher of his study. In retrospect, however,
text, as did Julius Hermann (1935), who described the un- the reflected ultraviolet and x-ray photographs (his figs. 4 and
readable text as “distichs” that are written in alternating pairs 5) revealed more of the blue first line than was apparent at the
of red and blue lines. Hermann included in his catalogue de- time.
scription the tentative readings of Rudolf Beer (1912) and de Sara Lipton brought new interest to the single legible phrase
Laborde, both of whom had managed to make out the words in 1999, construing it as “not merely a generic assemblage of
of the first pair of red lines visible to the naked eye, reading: words in praise of a king” but “a learned classical quotation”
“rex attavis natus regibus orbis honor” (king born of ancestral of the opening line of Horace’s first Ode, which he dedicated
kings, the honor of the world).20 to Gaius Maecenas, a patron renowned for his generosity and
In 1981, Franz Mairinger reported his attempt to read the learning.22 Recognizing “rex attavis natus regibus” as an altered
erased lines by means of ultraviolet, infrared, and x-ray pho- form of Horace’s “Maecenas atavis edite regibus,” Lipton drew
tography. Beyond revealing that the parchment had indeed attention to Rigord’s use of the same Horatian compliment in
retained more text than is visible to the eye, Mairinger thought his dedication of his De gestis Philippi Augusti of ca. 1200 to
that his photographs yielded insufficiently greater legibility.21 the youthful Louis VIII.23 Also in the circle of Prince Louis VIII,
as Lipton noticed, Étienne of Tournai, bishop of that city (after
having been abbot of Sainte-Genèvieve in Paris), and Louis’
Prince Eugene’s librarian and bookbinder in 1713. Hermann, Hand- godfather, alluded to the same words in a sermon (which Louis
schriften, 29, identifies the binding as that of Étienne Boyet, concern-
presumably would not have heard).24
ing whom see Ernest Thoinan, Les relieurs français (1500–1800):
biographie critique et anecdotique précédée de l’histoire de la com- Since Mairinger’s photographic experiments at different
munauté des relieurs et doreurs de livres de la ville de Paris, et d’une wavelengths, so far as I know, no further attempts have been
étude sur les styles de reliure (Paris: Paul, Huard et Guillemin, 1893), made to recover the erased text through imaging. It seemed to
218–19; for Prince Eugene’s library, see Otto Mazal, ed., Bibliotheca me that the advances in digital visualization technologies
Eugeniana. Die Sammlungen des Prinzen Eugen von Savoyen. Aus- since 1981 might yield greater success. In October 2018, there-
stellung der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek und der Graphischen
fore, I was joined at the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek
Sammlung Albertina (Vienna: Österreichische Nationalbibliothek,
1986). by a team of specialists in digital Multispectral Imaging (MSI)
19. Haseloff, “La miniature,” 338: “Dans le médaillon supérieur
trône un roi avec un manuscrit ouvert; dans le médaillon inférieur,
un copiste ou un peintre (un laïque) est au travail; nous sommes 22. Lipton, Images of Intolerance, 7–8; she had, in fact, made this
donc en présence d’un livre royal. Mais quel est ce roi? Une longue point already in her earlier “Jews in the Commentary Text and Illus-
inscription marginale paraît avoir contenu la réponse; elle est effacée trations of the Early Thirteenth-Century Bibles moralisées” (PhD
et n’a pas encore été déchiffrée.” diss., Yale University, 1991), 12–14. Lipton cites Mairinger’s study
20. Hermann, Handschriften, 32: “Leider sind die rechts neben and de Laborde’s attempt at reading the erased presentation inscrip-
diesen beiden Miniaturen stehenden, abwechselnd in roter und tion in Images of Intolerance, 150n31.
blauer Farbe geschriebenen Distichen, die vermutlich eine Klarstell- 23. Lipton, Images of Intolerance, 150n34, cites Michel-Jean Jo-
ung ergaben, so stark abgerieben, dass eine Entzifferung nicht mehr seph Brial’s edition of Rigord’s Gesta Philippi Augusti, Regis Franco-
möglich ist.” Again, 46–47: “Rudolf Beer . . . sich bemüht hat, diese rum, in Recueil des historiens des Gaules et de la France 17 (Paris:
Distichen zu lesen, konnte nur den Pentameter (den zweiten Vers!) 1818), 2, for the words “atavis edite regibus” for which Brial identi-
des ersten Distichons ‘Rex attavis natus regibus orbis honor’ mit fies the Horatian source. See now the critical edition in Rigord,
Sicherheit entziffern.’” Hermann offers a side-by-side comparison Histoire de Philippe Auguste, ed. and trans. Élisabeth Carpentier,
of Beer’s and (Hermann thought more fallible) de Laborde’s partial Georges Pon, and Yves Chauvins, Sources d’histoire médiévale 33
decipherment of the mostly erased inscription, 47. See, too, Stork, (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2006), 112nIII.
Bible moralisée, 36. Late twelfth- and early thirteenth-century scribes 24. Lipton, Images of Intolerance, 150nn33–34. Étienne of Tour-
almost always capitalized and separated the first letter of each line of nai addresses Louis VIII as his godson—“de sacro fonte suscepto
verse from the rest of the word and line. These practices are not pre- filliolo domini regis primogenito . . . salutem”—in a letter of “about
sent in the presentation inscription; equally unusual, at least twice 1199,” in Lettres d’Étienne de Tournai, ed. Jules Desilve (Valenci-
(lines 3–4, 5–6) a word continues across two lines; hence, each pair ennes: Lemaitre Libraire-Éditeur; Paris: Alphonse Picard Éditeur,
of lines constitutes one verse; the ten verses thus would constitute five 1893), 367, letter 293. Like Abbot Odo (Eudes) of Sainte-Geneviève,
couplets of a single stanza. godfather to Philip Augustus at his baptism in 1165, Étienne’s role as
21. Franz Mairinger, “Physikalische Methoden zur Sichtbarmach- one of Louis VIII’s godparents was due to his position as abbot of
ung verblasster oder getilgter Tinten,” Restaurator, International Sainte-Geneviève at the time of the royal prince’s birth. At that ab-
Journal for the Preservation of Library and Archival Material 5 bey, he presided over a notable community of scholars, introduced
(1981–83): 45–56, at 49, 55. Stork, Bible moralisée, 36n160, concurs at notes 73–79 below; see Moshe Sluhovsky, Patroness of Paris, Rit-
in Mairinger’s assessment; see, too Büttner, Bilder, 28–29. uals of Devotion in Early Modern France (Leiden: Brill, 1998), 20.

The King in the Manuscript D 7

of rare manuscripts: Michael B. Toth of R. B. Toth Associates the viewer of the royal image that “Waldemar, here, is a great
LLC and William Christens-Barry of Equipoise Imaging LLC, king and the highest of powers; a king born to ancestral kings,
supported by Annette T. Keller of Phase One A/S Germany.25 the honor of the world; whom a crown makes dazzling as do
Our goal was to capture digital “stacks” of images of the nearly the acts he has done; who here adorns the end of the work, and
erased text in the margin using a medium-format, 100 Mega- whom the[se] eleg[aic verses] adorn” (Fig. 3). Other words,
pixel-count camera to take a series of high-quality images, each long illegible, can also be read, but with lacunae that leave
illuminated by a different wavelength of light in a darkened scansion and a reliable translation yet to be achievable:29
room. To provide the desired narrowband illumination, the
team used multiple low-heat emitting diodes (LEDs) in distinct
been readily familiar from the eleventh century onward to every
ultraviolet, visible, and infrared narrow spectral bands. Through educated monk and cleric who had studied Latin grammar, rheto-
synchronizing the LED illumination with the movement of a fil- ric, and poetry to the extent that Étienne of Tournai and his cler-
ter wheel containing high-quality optical glass filters, the team ical correspondents had all done. This is because the works of
increased the range of image information by also capturing Horace were foundational textbooks in an era when scholars typ-
the faint fluorescence from the materials on the folio. The cam- ically memorized copious amounts of what they read and referred
to writings by their incipits. For brief introductions to the role of
era, illumination, and filter systems were all integrated with cus-
Horace’s oeuvre in high medieval monastic and cathedral educa-
tomized image-processing software for the capture, processing, tion, see Karsten Friis-Jensen, “The Reception of Horace in the
and exploitation of the spectral images obtained. As captured, Middle Ages,” in The Cambridge Companion to Horace, ed. Ste-
the images of the carefully stabilized manuscript are mono- phen Harrison (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007),
chrome, but the integrated processing software can convert 291–304, reprinted along with his other work in Karsten Friis-
them into a collection of colored digital images, which can be Jensen, The Medieval Horace, ed. Karen Margareta Fredborg, Minna
Skafte Jensen, Marianne Pade, and Johann Raminger, Analecta Ro-
virtually enhanced as well as shuffled and stacked like a deck mana Instituta Danici, Supplementum 46 (Rome: Edizioni Quasar
of transparent cards.26 di Severino Tognon, 2015); Birger Munk Olsen, “Comment peut-
By experimenting with different combinations of digitally on déterminer la popularité d’un texte au Moyen Âge? L’exemple
processed images, significantly more of the marginal writing des oeuvres classiques latines,” Interfaces 3 (2016): 13–27, at https://
on fol. 246r that is no longer visible to the eye can now in fact doi.org/10.13130/interfaces-7591. For examples of the wide use of
this incipit in the years when Étienne of Tournai and Rigord quoted
be read.27 Most important of our discoveries is that the two
it (notes 23–24 above), which were also the decades during which
faintly discernible, hitherto illegible blue lines of text that the iconographers of the first Bibles moralisées learned their Latin,
precede the long-deciphered red “rex attavis natus regibus see the Parisian theological Disputations of Simon of Tournai
orbis honor” confirm that this is indeed a textual record of (ca. 1130–1201), who twice deployed it to illustrate a distinction be-
the planned recipient—but not of a Capetian.28 Instead, the tween two senses of “voluntary sin” in his Disputations 50 and 60,
first eight lines, which can now be read in their entirety, tell in Les Disputationes de Simon de Tournai, texte inédit, ed. Pierre-
Joseph Warichez, Spicilegium sacrum Louaniense, Études et Doc-
uments 12 (Leuven: Spicilegium sacrum Louaniense, 1932), 146,
25. We were graciously assisted throughout by Dr. Andreas lines 6–10 and 171, lines 3–9, respectively. Earlier, in 1156–59,
Fingernagel (Director), Dr. Katharina Kaska, Harald Weiland, and John of Salisbury, Policraticus, Lib. 8, c. 15, in Joannis Saresberiensis,
their colleagues of the Sammlung von Handschriften und alten postea episcopi Carnotensis, Opera omnia, ed. John Allen Giles, in
Drucken, as well as by Dr. Christa Hofmann (Head) of the Conser- Patrologiae cursus completus: Series latina, ed. J.-P. Migne (hereafter
vation Department; we also thank Manfred Schuster and Michael Migne, PL), 221 vols. (Paris: Migne, 1844–80), 199: col. 773; again,
Exner of DigitalStore Vienna. Roger of Pontigny, O. Cist., quotes Becket’s allusion to the incipit
26. 365 nm (UV); 385 nm (UV); 410 nm (Violet); 420 nm (Violet- in the (ca. 1176) Vita II S. Thomae Cantuariensis, in S. Thomae Can-
Long); 450 nm (RoyalBlue); 480 nm (LongBlue); 510 nm (Cyan); tuariensis Archiepiscopi et Martyris nec non Herberti de Boseham
530 nm (Green); 550 nm (Lime); 600 nm (Amber); 630 nm (Red- clerici ejus a secretis Opera omnia . . . , ed. John Allen Giles in Migne,
Orange); 640 nm (Red); 660 nm (LongRed); 740 nm (IR); 850 nm PL 190: col. 72: “Et archiepiscopus ‘Revera,’ inquit, ‘non sum atavis
(IR); and 940 nm (IR). At several of these wavelengths more than editus regibus, sicut nec beatus apostolorum princeps Petrus’.” Yet
one image was created by using different UV bandpass, visible again, the Cistercian Henry of Marcy (note 58 below), writing
bandpass, and longpass filters to also capture fluorescence. 1187–89, refers to the Virgin Mary as “atavis edita regibus,” in De
27. I am grateful to Susan Walsh, Technical Director for the Small peregrinante civitate Dei in Clementis III pontificis Romani Epistolae
Animal Imaging Core at the Iowa Institute for Biomedical Imaging, et Privilegia ordine chronologico digesta in Migne, PL 204: col. 341.
for an introduction to and instruction in ImageJ, an open source 29. The term “elegus” at the end of the eighth line (i.e., the end
image-processing program that has proven ideal for working with of the fourth verse, thus the concluding verse of the first two cou-
these images. Likewise, I appreciate and enjoyed the paleographic plets) signals that these are indeed elegiac couplets. Such couplets,
assistance of Monica Brinzei, William Duba, Russell Friedman, for which medieval authors had numerous models in the oeuvre of
and Christopher Schabel during our May 2019 reunion. Catullus, Ovid, Martial, Venantius Fortunatus, and other poets, con-
28. In fact, the incipit (opening words) of Horace’s first ode (to sist of a hexameter “rising” line, followed by a pentameter “falling”
which Martial referred in his Epigrammata 1, 3, line 2), would have line. Thus, Hermann’s hypothesis as to the couplets’ structure, in

8 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

 1. Waldemar hic30 est rex
2. magnus apexque31 potentum
3. Rex at[t]avis natus regi-
4. bus32 orbis honor33
5. Quem diadema facit fa-
6. ciunt et facta cor[r]uscum34
7. Qui hic finem operis
8. quemque decorat elegus
9. Nec minus sui operis
10. magni nichil †————†at magister
11. Quam cui/tua sit †————†-ales
12. regibus apta sic †————†vis/-nus
13. Ut rex ergo viis opus
14. hoc magnalibus †–†addas
15. Materie finalis aberuit
16. arte manus
17. Hic quia digne voca/vota
18. lector studiose35 notabit
19. Hic res scrip†ta ————†
20. certa figura36 †—†s

30. For a Carolingian presentation inscription (for Charles the

Bald) that similarly begins with a third person description of the
ruler in an image using “hic” (here), see note 65 below.
31. Latin poets in the twelfth–thirteenth centuries often larded
their verses more or less skillfully with quotations of and allusions
to other texts. Here “rex magnus apexque” is the first of several ap-
parent allusions to poetry by Classical or late antique authors that
were well known to educated clergy in the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries; see “rex regionis apex” in Venantius Fortunatus, Carmina
append. 5, line 1, in Venanti Honori Clementiani Fortunati presbyteri
Italici opera poetica, ed. Friedrich Leo, Monumenta Germaniae His-
toricae Auctorium Antiquissimorum 4.1 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1881),
279.
32. As stated in notes 22–23, 28 above, “rex at[t]avis natus
regibus” alludes to the incipit of Horace, Carmina 1; see also Martial,
Epigrammata 1, 3, line 2, in Martial, Epigrams, ed. and trans. David
Roy Shackleton Bailey, Loeb Classical Library 480 (Cambridge: Har-
Figure 3. Composite pseudo-color image of right margin, three vard University Press, 1993), 94.
wavelengths, fol. 246r, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: R. B. Toth Associ- 33. For “orbis honor,” see Venantius Fortunatus, Carminum liber 5,
ates/Equipoise Imaging). 18, line 2 (where Venantius uses a synonym for “apex,” writing “culmen
orbis honor”); ibid., lib. 6, 10, line 68, in opera poetica, ed. Leo, 122, 152.
34. For “diadema coruscum,” see Venantius Fortunatus, Vita
Martini 1, line 134, in Venance Fortunat Oeuvres 4: La vie de Saint
Martin, ed. and trans. Solange Quesnel (Paris: Les Belles Lettres,
which each hexameter line is written in blue and subsequent pen- 2002), 12.
tameter in red (note 20 above) is not only correct, but suggests that 35. For “lector studiose,” see Martial, Epigrammata 1, line 4 in
the alternation of colors is designed to make the elegiac form clear. Epigrams, ed. Shackleton Bailey, 42.
In my transcription, in addition to the conventions indicated in 36. For “certa figura,” see the riddles and their solution at the re-
note 1 above, I use the following: words or portions in bold have union of Apollonius and his long-lost daughter in the Historia
not hitherto been read by Beer or de Laborde, as reported by Her- Apollonii regis Tyrii, widely known from the early Middle Ages on-
mann, Handschriften, 47; words in italics seem probable as readings; ward, and available in Paris no later than the outset of the thirteenth
cruces (††) indicate unreadable letters. I anticipate that technologi- century in Paris, BnF, MS lat. 17569 (where the riddles are on
cal and computational advances will ultimately make the remaining fol. 10va). See the critical edition in George A. A. Kortekaas, The
text largely or entirely legible. Story of Apollonius, King of Tyre: A Study of Its Greek Origin and an

The King in the Manuscript D 9

 Waldemar have been flattered with the (inaccurate) description as
“great.” Nevertheless, on stylistic grounds alone, one can as-
Because a paleographical comparison of distinctive letter
sert with near certainty that the Vienna Bible moralisée could
forms in the presentation inscription with those used by the
not have been produced so late.40
copyists employed in the writing of the main text of Vienna
Unlike these two Waldemars, the Danish King Walde-
MS 1179 confirms that the inscription’s scribe was one of
mar II—since the sixteenth century called “the Victorious”
them,37 the Waldemar named in it should be accepted as the
(Valdemar Sejr)—was by every measure a “great king,” for
intended recipient. Yet, to which King Waldemar (or Valde-
under him, Denmark reached a medieval zenith. Like his
mar) does this inscription refer? If we confine ourselves to
father, King Waldemar I (d. 1182), and his older brother,
the thirteenth century,38 there are a total of three possibilities:
Knud VI (ruled 1182–1202), Waldemar II commanded a
King Waldemar II of Denmark, who ruled 1202–41; Walde-
mighty navy and military, with which all three pursued an ex-
mar “the Young” (“den Unge”) of Denmark; and King Walde-
pansionist agenda, including crusades against the Slavs and
mar Birgersson of Sweden, who ruled 1250–75.
other neighbors around the Baltic.41 Upon Waldemar I’s
Waldemar the Young can easily be eliminated: at his fa-
death, the Danish realm comprised not only Jutland, Zealand,
ther’s urging, the Danish nobility elected him “co-king” in
Bornholm, Funen, Skåne (at the time including Halland
1215, when he was six or seven years old; crowned three years
and Blekinge), and Schleswig, but also the island of Rügen,
later, in 1218, he was imprisoned with his father in 1223–26
brought under Danish suzerainty as a principality by his cru-
by Count Henry I of Schwerin, and died in 1231, at the age of
sade against the Wends.42 Knud VI in turn gained control over
nineteen or twenty. The practice of a king naming his heir
parts of Pomerania, adding the “king of the Slavs” (Slavorum
and having him crowned as a co- or junior-king had been
Rex) to the royal titles in 1185, and launched a crusade against
borrowed from the Capetians, who hoped thereby to ensure
the Estonians in 1197. Knud was sufficiently powerful to re-
a smooth transition of power when the ruler died; the process
fuse to recognize the German emperor as his suzerain.43
normally did not entail a full sharing of power between the
During the years of Knud VI’s kingship, his younger brother
king and his son.39 Thus, Waldemar the Young, who died a
and successor, Waldemar II, was, from the age of twelve, duke
decade before his father, never ruled alone in his own right, so
of Schleswig, where he protected the realm and Knud from a
it is unlikely that a book made in Paris and given to (or com-
series of plots by various German nobles and their Danish al-
missioned by) him would have described him as a “great
lies. Indeed, when Knud VI died and Waldemar II came to the
king.”
throne in late 1202, the new king had already absorbed Lü-
King Waldemar of Sweden is also an improbable choice:
beck (in autumn 1201) and the rest of Holstein into the duchy
an eleven-year-old when he came to the throne in 1250, he
was able to exercise real power only after his father, Birger
Jarl—the paradigmatic “power behind the throne”—finally 40. In addition to Vitzthum, Pariser Miniaturmalerei, 3–7, see
died sixteen years later. From 1266 to 1275, when he was de- Haseloff, “La miniature,” 338–39; Hermann, Handschriften, 32;
posed by his younger brother, Waldemar Birgersson might Branner, Manuscript Painting, 3–4, 22–32; see also note 63 below.
41. See Inge Skovgaard-Petersen, “The Danish Kingdom: Consol-
idation and Disintegration,” in The Cambridge History of Scandina-
via, ed. Knut Helle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003),
Edition of the Two Oldest Latin Recensions, Mnemosyne, Bibliotheca 353–68, especially 353, 359–60, 367; Hans-Otto Gaethke, “Knud VI.
Classica Batava, Supplementum 253 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 221. und Waldemar II. von Dänemark und Nordalbingien, 1182–1227.
37. See Appendix below. Teil I,” Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Schleswig-Holsteinische Ge-
38. No one has suggested that any of the Bibles moralisées could schichte 119 (1994): 21–99.
have been made before 1182, when a fourth possible King Walde- 42. Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 1:33–44. Jutland,
mar, namely the first of that name on Denmark’s throne, died. As Zealand, Bornholm, and Funen are today part of Denmark; Skåne
discussed at notes 58–64 below, I believe we can establish that this is in modern Sweden; Central and Southern Schleswig as well as
manuscript was not produced before 1208. Rügen are part of Germany.
39. Waldemar I had arranged for Knud VI to be crowned co- 43. Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 1:33–34, explains that,
king (medkonge) in conjunction with the translation of his newly having come to power at the end of a period of civil war, Walde-
canonized grandfather, Knud Lavard, in Ringsted in 1170, effec- mar I’s submission to the emperor was an effort to shore up the
tively making “the legitimacy of his kingship . . . intimately con- legitimacy of the king’s position; for Knud’s refusal to recognize
nected with the sainthood of his grandfather,” in the words of the overlordship of the emperor, 44. See also Alan V. Murray, “The
Frederik Pedersen, “Danes and the Marriage Break-up of Philip II Danish Monarchy and the Kingdom of Germany, 1197–1319: The
of France,” in Adventures of the Law, Proceedings of the Sixteenth Evidence of Middle High German Poetry,” in Scandinavia and Eu-
British Legal History Conference, Dublin, 2003, ed. Paul Brand, rope, 800–1350: Contact, Conflict, and Coexistence, ed. Jonathan Ad-
Kevin Costello, and W. N. Osborough (Dublin: Four Courts, 2005), ams and Katherine Holman (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), 289–307, at
54–69, at 57. 291–92.

10 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

of Schleswig, thereby expanding his lands south to the Elbe, Hence, in a period when kings across Europe were jockey-
uniting the historical duchy of Nordalbingia under direct ing to expand and stabilize the lands under their effective rule
Danish rule.44 For the next two decades, Waldemar II contin- at the expense of their neighbors, Knud VI and especially
ued to increase the Danish realm, seizing Schwerin in 1208, Waldemar II were particularly successful, so that, during their
conquering Hamburg in 1216, and, through crusade, North- respective reigns, the Danish king was one of the greatest pow-
ern Estonia in 1219. There Waldemar II founded Reval (now ers in Europe. All of this began to change in 1223, when Wal-
Tallinn) as a fortress, initiating 127 years of Danish rule.45 demar II’s vassal, Count Henry I of Schwerin, abducted him
Moreover, Knud VI and Waldemar II were not yet looking and his son, Waldemar the Young.47
to expand their realm only eastward and to the south. Chron-
iclers of the time make clear that the ruling houses of En-
The Royal Portrait
gland and France were well aware that the Danish kings
had never abandoned their claims to the throne of England, With the knowledge that the presentation inscription on
which they had asserted since their canonized predecessor, the final folio of Vienna MS 1179 names a Danish king, let
King Knud IV, had assembled a fleet with which to retake En- us return to the royal image itself and ask whether its icono-
gland from the Normans in 1085. Although events impeded graphic elements are signifiers exclusively of Capetian mon-
Knud VI and Waldemar II from launching an invasion of archs (Fig. 2). The king in the upper medallion wears a crown
England, contemporaries believed at crucial moments that and is dressed in a rose-purple mantle over an ultramarine tu-
one or the other intended to do so.46 nic; holding a scepter with a fleur-de-lis, as in Caskey head,
he sits on a high-backed throne. The colors of the royal mantle

44. In a document confirming the rights and freedoms of Lübeck

in August 1203, Waldemar styles himself “Ego Waldemarus dei gra-
tia Danorum Slavorumque Rex, Dux Jutie, Dominus Nordalbingie,”
in the Codex Diplomaticus Lubecensis: Lübeckisches Urkundenbuch; Danish royal court. There they reinforced the roles of Knud den
Urkundenbuch der Stadt Lübeck, Verein für Lübeckische Geschichte Store and Knud IV as ideal models for Danish kings, and encour-
und Altertumskunde (Lübeck: Asschenfeldt, 1843), 1:16, item XI; aged the restoration of the empire of the former, as the latter had
again, May 1213, 1:21, item XIV; thereafter, the final two titles are planned to do (33–41). Thus, 41: “Saxo, Knýtlinga saga og liturgien
omitted. For which of the surviving documents in the Codex Diplo- og beretningerne om Knud den Hellige viser, hvor centralt mindet
maticus can be accepted as indubitably genuine, and which are for- om England stod i den historiske bevidsthed i 1200-tallets Danmark.
geries, see Hans-Otto Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II. von Som nævnt ovenfor var den samme ret til England ifølge samtidige
Dänemark und Nordalbingien, 1182–1227. Teil II,” Zeitschrift der kilder også blevet brugt i forhandlinger med Filip 2. Augustus under
Gesellschaft für Schleswig-Holsteinische Geschichte 120 (1995): 7– Valdemar 2.s bror, Knud 6. På denne baggrund forekommer Mat-
76, at 70–72. On these years, see Oliver Auge, “Pomerania, Meck- thew Paris’ efterretning om, at Valdemar 2. selv, ‘ofte’ talte om sin
lenburg and the ‘Baltic Frontier’: Adaptation and Alliances,” in ret til den engelske trone, ikke usandsynlig.” See, too, Thomas K.
The Origins of the German Principalities, 1100–1350: Essays by Ger- Heebøll-Holm, “A Franco-Danish Marriage and the Plot against
man Historians, ed. Graham A. Loud and Jochen Schenk (London: England,” Haskins Society Journal 26 (2014): 249–70, esp. 261–65.
Routledge, 2017), 264–79, at 268–69; Gaethke, “Knud VI. und In addition, Jenny E. M. Benham, “Philip Augustus and the Angevin
Waldemar II.,” 1:61–66, 81–99. Empire: The Scandinavian Connexion,” Mediaeval Scandinavia 14
45. Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 2:18–33, 50. On the (2004): 37–50, at 46–49, assembles considerable evidence that the
conquest of Hamburg in 1216, see Annales Valdemarii, in Dan- kings of England pursued policies in Norway that countered the in-
marks middelalderlige Annaler, ed. Erik Kroman (Copenhagen: terests of Denmark until 1204, perhaps as a way of neutralizing “the
Selskabet for udgivelse af Kilder til dansk Historie, 1980), 79, danger of Danish military assistance to France” (48).
lines 31–38; Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 2:26–27. 47. By 1220, the king of Denmark ruled over areas that today
46. Lars Kjaer, “Valdemar 2. Sejr, Matthew Paris og den engelske comprise parts of Estonia, Poland, Germany, and Sweden in addi-
invasionsfrygt, 1240–41,” Historisk Tidsskrift 118 (2018): 21–50, tion to Denmark; this gave the Danes the major control over trade
convincingly refutes long-standing historiographic traditions ac- between the Baltic and North Seas through the Øresund, the Great
cording to which Danish kings Waldemar I, Knud VI, and Wal- and Little Belts, and the Kattegat. On Count Henry’s kidnapping of
demar II should be assumed not to have had serious intentions of Waldemar II and his son, see Grethe Jacobsen, “Wicked Count
invading England with the aim of retaking from the Normans the Henry: The Capture of Valdemar II (1223) and Danish Influence
crown once worn by Knud II “den Store” (Canute the Great). Kjaer in the Baltic,” Journal of Baltic Studies 9, no. 4 (1978): 326–38; Lars
shows that the English chronicler Matthew Paris was probably well Kjær, “Tilfangetagelsen af Valdemar II Sejr i Dunstableårbogen,”
informed when he asserted that as late as 1240–41 Waldemar II was Historisk Tidsskrift 113, no. 2 (2013): 341–49; on the fruitless inter-
preparing to attack England (see especially 28–30); that the archives ventions of Pope Honorius III and the emperor Frederick II for their
of Henry III, and the Diplomatarium Danicum contain confirming freedom, Hans-Otto Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II. von
evidence (30–34); and that the writings of the court historians Saxo Dänemark und Nordalbingien, 1182–1227. Teil III und Schluß,”
Grammaticus and Sven Aggesen, as well as the liturgy for (Saint) Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Schleswig-Holsteinische Geschichte
Knud IV and the Icelandic Knýtlinga Saga, were influential at the 121 (1996): 7–44, at 7–25.

The King in the Manuscript D 11

and tunic mirror those of God as he creates the world in the
same manuscript’s frontispiece (Fig. 4), surely not by chance:
the folio that contains this royal image concludes this Bible mor-
alisée’s treatment of the Apocalypse, binding together the be-
ginning of time and its end, and the duty of terrestrial kings
to be righteous agents of the heavenly king.48 The color com-
bination (though reversing those of mantle and tunic) can be
found in coeval Parisian manuscripts in representations of
kings who are definitely not Capetians, as, for instance, in
the image of Ptolemy, mistakenly shown as a king of Egypt
despite the accompanying text, in a Latin Almagest com-
pleted in 1213 (Fig. 5).49 It is unlikely, therefore, that the ul-
tramarine tunic should be seen as the royal blue solely of
French kings.
Similarly, the throne (or cathedra) upon which the painted
king sits should be understood to be a generic representation
of a high-backed throne. If it is similar to the queen’s (but not
the king’s) throne in the famed double royal image in the
Morgan Library & Museum’s quire from the Toledo Bible
moralisée (Fig. 6), this throne is entirely unlike the lion-
headed and -footed “Throne of Dagobert” depicted on the of-
ficial seals of Philip II Augustus and Louis VIII (Figs. 7–8).50
By contrast to theirs, Waldemar II’s seals show him seated on
an ornate, high-backed throne (Fig. 9) that is similar to that of
Ptolemy in the Almagest manuscript (Fig. 5), a cathedra that,
like those of the Vienna Latin and Morgan presentation im-

48. This is a strong theological reason for placing the images of

the king and, below him, the illuminator at the end of the volume,
rather than at the beginning, where—if the royal image were not to Figure 4. God using a compass to create the orb of the world,
interrupt the sequence of God’s actions in creating the world—the frontispiece, fol. Iv, Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179
presentation images would have had to precede the full-page image (photo: ÖNB).
of God using a compass to delimit the universe.
49. Paris, BnF, MS lat. 16200, fol. 1ra. On this manuscript and its
colophon, which states that it was copied in 1213 from an original in ages, is architectural. More important, perhaps, is the scepter
Saint-Victor’s library (now Paris, BnF, MS lat. 14738), see François
Avril, “À quand remontent les premiers ateliers d’enlumineurs laics
that the Danish king holds in his right hand, for it, too, cul-
à Paris?” Les dossiers de l’archéologie 16 (1976): 36–44. Both Paris minates in a fleur-de-lis—a reminder that the latter was a
manuscripts contain Gerard of Cremona’s 1175 Toledan translation common emblem of royalty not only in France, but elsewhere
of Ptolemy’s Almagest, which is prefaced by an accessus ad auctorem in Europe as well.51 Nothing in the royal image on Vienna
that includes the correction by Abu al-Wafa al-Buzjavi (“Albu- MS 1179’s final folio, therefore, constitutes unambiguous evi-
guafe”) of Abu Ma’shar’s assertion that the author of the Almagest
dence that would visually contradict that of the presentation
had been one of Egypt’s Ptolemaic rulers. Thus, fol. 1ra begins:
“Quidam princeps nomine Albuguafe . . . dixit quod hic Ptholomeus text: hence, we may be confident that the intended possessor
fuit vir in disciplinarum scientia prepotens . . . Ptholomeus vero of this manuscript was a king Waldemar, with only the sec-
hic non fuit unius regum Egypti qui Ptholomei vocati sunt, sicut ond Danish king of that name as a plausible candidate.
quidam exstimant” (my transcription and punctuation). Despite
this accessus, the Almagest’s author continued to be depicted wear-
ing a royal crown for many more centuries.
50. On the throne used by Louis VII and his successsors on their 51. For Waldemar II’s official seals, see [Karl Nikolaj] Henry
seals of majesty, see Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, “Suger and the Symbol- Petersen, Danske Kongelige Sigiller samt Sønderjydske Hertugers og
ism of Royal Power: The Seal of Louis VII,” in Abbot Suger and andre til Danmark Knyttede Fyrsters Sigiller, 1085–1559, ed. Anders
Saint-Denis, A Symposium, ed. Paula L. Gerson (New York: Metro- Thiset (Copenhagen: Reitzel Boghandel og Forlag, 1917), nos. 6, 7, 9,
politan Museum of Art, 1986), 95–103. described p. 1, images Table 2.

12 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

Figure 5. Historiated initial Q with King Ptolemy crowned and
seated on his throne with regalia, detail of fol. 1r, 1213, Claudius
Ptolemy, Almagest, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France,
MS lat. 16200 (photo: Bibliothèque nationale de France). Figure 6. Enthroned queen and king above university master dic-
tating text to scribe below, fol. 8r, ca. 1226–34, final folio of the
How Early Could the Vienna Latin Bible Toledo Bible moralisée, now New York, The Morgan Library,
moralisée Have Been Made? MS M.240 (photo: The Morgan Library & Museum. Purchased by
J. Pierpont Morgan [1837–1913] in 1906).
Before taking up the questions of why and when this Bible
moralisée was produced for Waldemar, it is useful to establish
the point after which it must have been made (the terminus thirteenth-century manuscripts must all postdate 1219, and
post quem). For many decades, we have considered such a his proposed terminus post quem has been widely accepted
date to be well established, thanks to Reiner Haussherr. In the up to the present.53
early 1970s, Haussherr connected moralizing images and texts
deploring the loss of theologians to the study of law in Bo-
et Iudeis eas receperunt.” (b) “Filii Israel venientes inter paganos
logna in all four early thirteenth-century Bibles moralisées to
arma sua componentes significant pravos scolares qui relinquunt
Super speculam, the papal bull of November 1219 that forbade evangelium et theologiam et intrant Boloniam ut possint leges et
the teaching of civil law at Paris.52 Thus, he concluded, the decreta discere quibus ipsismet [ipsis scr. et del.] confundantur”
(emphasis added). Note that both the Old French and Latin versions
refer to the study of “laws and decreta,” i.e., civil law and decrees of
52. Haussherr, “Eine Warnung,” 391–95, 403. See Vienna canon law.
MS 2554, fol. 90: (B) “Ici vont li fill israel en la terre de paenie si en- 53. Stork, Bible moralisée, 38, 40, disagrees, arguing that depic-
portent fer et la baillent as paiens por armes feire et li paien lor font tions of heretics being burned at the stake (as in Vienna MS 2554,
espees et haches et totes armens et lor baillent et cil les prennent fol. 30v) would not have occurred before Louis VIII’s decision to ex-
[l scr. et del.] et les emportent.” (b) “Ce qe li fil israel alerent en paenie ecute heretics in this manner in 1226. Stork’s view is unconvincing.
por armes avoir et li sarrazin lor fistrent et lor baillerent senefie les Heretics had been burned to death in the Île-de-France since the
mauves escoliers qi leissent les euvangiles et la devinitei et vont a eleventh century, and followers of the academic Amaury of Bène
Bologne por aprendre lois et decrez et cil lor baillent et lor ensegnent had died at the stake in Paris in 1210. Stork also errs in asserting
tel chose qi les confont et destruit.” Again, Vienna MS 1179, fol. 89v: (38, 44) that the monastic “gent de blanc ordene” in the Old French
(B) “Filii Israel venerunt inter paganos et atulerunt ad eos ferrum Bible moralisée were Dominicans (rather than, as Haussherr correctly
et tradiderunt et pagani eis arma paraverunt enses et alias armaturas stated, Cistercians), whose order was approved by Honorius III in

The King in the Manuscript D 13

Figure 7. First Great Seal of Philip II Augustus, obverse, Paris,
1180–1209, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Cabinet des
Médailles Côte 3446 (photo: Bibliothèque nationale de France). Figure 8. Great Seal of Louis VIII, cast of original, obverse, Paris,
1223–25, Paris, Archives nationales, Collection moulages de Douët
Yet, Haussherr’s argument for dating all the Bibles moral- d’Arcq D 40 (photo: SIGILLA Base numérique des sceaux con-
servés en France).
isées is not as solid as historians have taken it to be. As he
himself mentioned, Super speculam was not the first papal or-
dinance discouraging or prohibiting clergy from studying the study of civil and canon law that Haussherr treats at greatest
law.54 In reading the Bibles moralisées as alluding to the length, because Bologna as a center of such studies is mentioned
1219 prohibition, he and other scholars have given insuffi- by name. Although Haussherr quotes (396–97) Stephen Langton’s
explication of this passage as being “against lawyers” (contra advo-
cient weight to the fact that the writings of the twelfth- and catos) in his biblical lectures of the 1190s, because Langton did not
early thirteenth-century Parisian theologians whose oeuvre name Bologna, Haussherr discounts the significance of Langton’s
constituted the most ubiquitous sources of the early Bibles words for establishing a terminus post quem. Instead, Haussherr as-
moralisées’ moralizing texts were already replete with hostil- serts (403) that there was no reason to mention Bologna at Paris be-
ity to the study of law.55 Not at all obvious is why warnings in fore 1219 when interpreting this passage: “Erst nach 1219 war ein
aktueller Anlaß gegeben, den Ortsnamen Bologna in die Auslegung
von 1 Reg 13,19–20 einzufügen.” Nevertheless, in the context of
1216. See Haussherr, “Sensus litteralis,” 371, and the refutation of the dangers posed by legal study, scholars at Paris had named Bolo-
Stork in Büttner, Bilder, 72–79. gna from the mid-twelfth century onward. Among the earliest such
54. Haussherr, “Eine Warnung,” 400. On the relationship of Ho- mentions is letter 26 from Peter of Blois, now dated ca. 1155, when
norius III’s bull Super speculam to earlier prohibitions against clergy (as Peter indicates) he has recently arrived in Paris. This letter, along
and monks studying medicine or Roman law, as well as to its teach- with Peter’s lengthier revision of 1184, is in The Letter Collections
ing and study at Paris both before and after 1219, see now Chris of Peter of Blois: Studies in the Manuscript Tradition, ed. Lena
Coppens, “Le droit romain à Paris au début du XIIIe siècle, intro- Wahlgren, Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia 58 (Gothen-
duction et interdiction,” in Les débuts de l’enseignement universitaire burg: Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis, 1993), 72–74, 75–80:
à Paris (1200–1245 environ), ed. Jacques Verger and Olga Weijers, “Vester vobisque devotissimus operam theologiae Parisius indulgeo,
Studia Artistarum 38 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), 329–47. The Bononiensis castra militiae crebro suspirans, quam vehementer
ties—and competition—between Paris and Bologna had grown ever citius et praemature deserui. . . . Lex enim Domini lex immaculata,
stronger from the mid-twelfth century onward, as shown most re- convertens animas; meque praevaricatorem legis divinae constitue-
cently by Nathalie Gorochov, Naissance de l’université: les écoles rem, nisi cum qualiquali theologiae notitia, nisi cum pugillo similae
de Paris d’Innocent III à Thomas d’Aquin (v. 1200–v. 1245) (Paris: thus offerem. Lex equidem saecularis gloriosa suppellectili verborum,
Honoré Champion, 2012), 211–55; Gorochov, “Les relations entre lepidaeque orationis urbanitate lasciviens vehementer allexerat et
les studia de Paris et de Bologne et la naissance des premières inebriaverat mentem meam, sed abhorret Propheta aureum calicem
universités d’Europe (XIIe siècle–début XIIIe siècle),” Annali di Babylonis, ubi designatus est lepor eloquentiae aedificans ad Ge-
storia delle università italiane 17 (2013): 433–46. hennam” (italics for biblical quotations in original). The later ver-
55. The Bibles moralisées’ interpretation of the episode from sion of the letter, which goes much further in condemning the
1 Kings 13:19–20 (note 52 above) is the example of warnings against study of canon and civil law, has also been published in Chartularium

14 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

 the Bibles moralisées against the study and practice of both
civil and canon law should be understood in relation solely
to the banning of civil law, when canon law was not only
not banned at Paris, but continued to flourish.56 Finally, even
if one were inclined to read the denigrations of the study of
law in the Bibles moralisées as veiled references to the exclu-
sion of the study of civil law at Paris by statute, 1219 is six
years too late: the first statutes expressly limiting the study
of civil law at Paris were issued by Cardinal Robert of
Courson in 1213, under the aegis of a provincial church coun-
cil over which he presided in his role as papal legate.57
There is, however, a better candidate for a terminus post
quem, namely Innocent III’s first unequivocal calls for a cru-
sade against the Albigensian heretics in 1204, 1205, and 1208.58

loco dominationis; et quidam in studio Bononie aut Salerni aut Parisius

decepti accurrunt ad hos nummularios ut eliciant ab eis quocumque
modo quocumque obsequio sive debito sive indebito beneficia
spiritualia. De quibus queritur utrum omnes tales incurrant labem
simonie.” Haussherr, “Warnung,” 403, cites Baldwin’s transcriptions.
(These passages can be found, with slight variations, in Paris, BnF,
MS lat. 14524, fols. 33rb, 36ra, and Paris, BnF, MS lat. 3259, fols.
40rb, 44rb. Both manuscripts are written in early thirteenth-century
Parisian hands.)
56. For example, as Haussherr, “Warnung,” 395, also noticed, in
addition to the moralization that mentions Bologna, the moraliza-
tion alongside the image immediately above the royal presentation
image in Vienna MS 1179, fol. 246r, lists “false Decretists,” i.e., teach-
ers of canon law, among the damned: “Hic sunt excommunicati et
maledicti judei, qui negant veritatem et veram expositionem sacre
scripture; et heretici, qui in ea suas falsitates admiscent; et falsi de-
cretiste, qui sacram scripturam inducunt ut per eam litigent de ter-
renis.” Étienne of Tournai (note 24 above and notes 73–74, 76, 78–79
Figure 9. Seal of Waldemar II, obverse, attached to charter dated
below) was the most famous Decretist of twelfth-century Paris. Hav-
1 May 1216, Lübeck, Archiv der Hansestadt Lübeck, 7.1–3.12
ing died in 1203, he presumably did not approve this moralization.
Danica 4 (photo: courtesy of Archiv der Hansestadt Lübeck).
57. Denifle and Chatelain, Chartularium 1:77–78, no. 19. Hauss-
herr, “Warnung,” 398, refers to this Council.
58. Haussherr himself remarks, “Warnung,” 403, that “Der Kampf
Universitatis Parisiensis sub auspiciis consilii generalis facultatum gegen die Albigenser . . . ist auch eines der Leitmotive der Kom-
Parisiensium 1, ed. Heinrich Denifle and Émile Chatelain (Paris: mentare in der Bible moralisée.” Henry of Marcy, O.Cist., abbot of
Delalain, 1889), 32. Peter the Chanter objects to the Decretalists’ teach- Clairvaux and cardinal bishop of Albano, on his own authority be-
ing at Bologna in the long version of his Verbum abbreviatum, c. 53, of came “the first papal legate to himself raise an army” to fight a noble
1191–92, for which see the early thirteenth-century Parisian manu- supporter of Albigensians in 1181. This may be the point at which the
script, now Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica MS Reg. lat. 106, fol. 66va. idea of an actual crusade first materialized; yet, papal support for a
Likewise, writing in 1204–8, Robert Courson (under whom the 1213 crusade became clear only under Innocent III. See Marco Meschini,
prohibition would occur), Summa, VII, 3–VIII, 6, states, as quoted “Innocenz III. und der Kreuzzug als Instrument im Kampf gegen die
in John W. Baldwin, Masters, Princes, and Merchants: The Social Häresie,” Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 61, no. 2
Views of Peter the Chanter and His Circle, 2 vols. (Princeton: Prince- (2005): 537–83. In May 1204, Innocent III sent several letters from
ton University Press, 1970), 2:58–59n143: “Apud deum est duplex the Lateran Palace in Rome, in which he promised, and authorized
remuneratio, eterna et temporalis. . . . Temporalis qua videmus deum others to promise, “the very same indulgences for the redemption
usualiter remunerare in temporalibus temporalia querentes, sicut of all sins that we provide in aid of those who go to the Holy Land
studentes Bononie vel alibi in lucrativis scientiis qui non addiscunt [on crusade] to the king, the prince, and all counts, viscounts, and
finaliter nisi ut venentur prebendulas ab indignis prelatis remunerat barons in the region” who assist in the destruction of the heretics. In-
conferendo illis talia que ipse dat iratus. . . . (VIII, 6) Istos siquidem nocent III, Epistola 77 (216), 31 May 1204 (2 Kal. Junii), and Epistola
nummos sive ista nummismata iterum exponunt nummularii templi 79, 28 May 1204 (5 Kal. Junii), in Die Register Innocenz’ III 7, 7.
in claustro, in studio, in foro, in choro, in cucilla, in bulla, et in omni Pontifikatsjahr, 1204/05, Texte und Indices, ed. Othmar Hageneder,

The King in the Manuscript D 15

It is not a simple matter to establish precisely when the appeals consequent decision to take up arms and his vow to destroy
for armies to suppress the Cathars were ultimately conceptu- Nabal and his line signify accordingly (in the words of Vienna
alized as a crusade, but Pope Innocent III was using technical MS 1179) that “good princes take up the [crusader’s] cross,
vocabulary for describing crusaders by the middle of October and promise that they will kill all the Albigensians and all their
1208, stating that they “have taken or will take the sign of their progeny” (Fig. 10).61
[military] allegiance to Christ,” and “shall have placed on their Other historians have discussed the call for crusade
breasts the sign of the living cross.”59 The early Bibles moral- against the Cathars at this juncture in the Bibles moralisées.62
isées, including the two in Vienna, explicitly assert the duty of Until Haussherr proposed 1219, students of these manu-
rulers to crusade against the Albigensian heretics in passages scripts had debated when in the thirteenth century they were
that arguably echo the actual casus belli upon which Inno- made, but no one had established that they could not have
cent III relied in his call for crusade in 1208, namely the mur- been products of the last decade or so of the twelfth century.
der in January of that year “in the land of the Albigensians” Because Haussherr’s argument for 1219 is unpersuasive, it be-
of Pierre de Castelnau, one of the papal legates sent to con- comes important to have some evidence beyond the debated
vert the heretics. The pope blamed the count of Toulouse evolution of illuminators’ styles and techniques that the Bibles
for the murder.60 Commenting on verses from 1 Kings, the moralisées under consideration here are indeed all the work of
moralization in all four Bibles moralisées decodes the return thirteenth-century illuminators and iconographers.63 The
of King David’s envoys from the enclave of a wealthy Philis-
tine, Nabal, who report that he had insulted and degraded
them, as signifying the nuncios of Christ, “who return from
the Albigensians and relate their evil ways and false beliefs 61. Vienna MS 2554, fol. 40v: “(D) Ici retornent li message et
vienent devant David et li content lotrage et la vilenie qe Nabal avoit
(mescreandise) to princes and good Christians.” King David’s respondu et dient qe il avoit blasmei et mesdit de lui, et David iura qe
il ocirroit et destruirot et lui et tote sa lignie. (d) Ce qe li message
Andrea Sommerlechner, Herwig Weigl, et al., Publikationen des his- content a David lotrage et la folie Nabal et David sarma et iura qe
torischen Instituts beim Österreichischen Kulturinstitut in Rom, 2. il destruiroit et lui et sa lignie senefie les boens messages iesucrist
Abteilung: Quellen, 1. Reihe (Graz: Böhlaus Nachf., 1997), 122–25, qi repairent dAbigeos et content as princes et as boens crestiens la
at 124, lines 25–125, line 6, and at 127–29. Ever since the call to the mauvestie et la mescreandise des Abygeos et tuit li ami Deu prennent
First Crusade in the eleventh century, plenary indulgences and other la croiz et dient qe il les ocirront et destruront toz”; Vienna MS 1179,
guarantees had been required for a real (rather than merely meta- fol. 96r: “(C) Redierunt nuncii ad David et dixerunt ei responsum
phorical) crusade. Nabal et quod eum turpiter fuerat conviciatus et David iuravit quod
59. Innocent III, Epistolae 151 (156)–154 (158), 8–11 October eum cum sua posteritate destrueret. (c) Nuncii redientes ad David
1208, in Die Register Innocenz’ III 11, 11: Pontifikatsjahr 1208/ et dixerunt ei stultum responsum Nabal et David iuravit quod eum
09, Texte und Indices, ed. Othmar Hageneder, Andrea Sommerlech- interficeret significat nuncios Iesuchristi qui redeunt de terra Albi-
ner, et al., Publikationen des historischen Instituts beim Österreich- gensi et dicunt principibus et prelatis et bonis christianis quod deum
ischen Kulturinstitut in Rom, 2. Abteilung: Quellen, 1. Reihe (Graz: ignorant in terra Albigensi et boni principes suas cruces accipientes
Böhlaus Nachf., 2010), 241–45. See, in Epistola 151, at 241: “dilecti promittunt quod interficient omnes cum tota sua posteritate Albi-
filii ad obsequium Christi signati contra Provinciales hereticos vel genses.” Toledo MS I, fol. 111 A–a and Bodleian MS Bodley 270b,
signandi . . . vivifice crucis signum . . . in pectoribus suis susceperint”; fol. 143v A–a, retain this episode and moralization from 1 Sam-
also the rubric to Epistola 152, at 242: “Universis clericis ad obse- uel/Kings 25:5–34, with various wording. On “cruces accipientes”
quium Christi signati contra Provinciales hereticos vel signandis.” as a technical description of crusaders, see Michael Markowski,
60. See Innocent III, Epistolae 26–31, in Register Innocenz’ III 11, “Crucesignatus: Its Origins and Early Usage,” Journal of Medieval
11: 35–42. Pierre de Castelnau travelled with a second legate, Bishop History 10, no. 3 (1984): 157–65.
Navarre of Couserans, who was not murdered. The events are nar- 62. Stork, Bible moralisée, 38; Heinlen, “Ideology,” 140–41; Lip-
rated in Pierre des Vaux-de-Cernay’s Historia Albigensis, where he ton, Images of Intolerance, 8, 132–33, and passim; Büttner, Bilder,
simply quotes Innocent III’s account. The notes to the English trans- 77–79. Christoph T. Maier, “The Bible moralisée and the Crusades,”
lation, however, provide a useful discussion of the events and of in The Experience of Crusading 1: Western Approaches, ed. Marcus
what sources tell us about how Innocent III and other prelates at Bull and Norman Housley (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
his curia may have learned of them. See The History of the Albigen- 2003), 209–22, at 219–21. Maier evidently assumes that the moral-
sian Crusade: Peter of les Vaux-de-Cernay’s Historia Albigensis, izing text and image are historical, referring to Louis VIII’s early cru-
trans. W. A. Sibly and M. D. Sibly (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, sading activity, rather than being hortatory, i.e., intended to persuade
1998), 31–35, at 31n4. One of the reviewers of this article suggests a king to crusade.
that the moralization may refer instead to the (even earlier) return 63. Illuminators’ styles, the development of skill in laying and
of the Cistercian abbot Guy of les Vaux-de-Cernay and his fellow decorating gold leaf in manuscripts, and the evolution of filigrained
preachers to the kingdom of France sometime in 1207, as their mis- initials, have all been dated by scholars relatively and not absolutely.
sion to convert the Albigensians was proving fruitless. For Peter’s Such evidence, therefore, can lend support for but cannot provide a
account of his uncle Guy’s efforts and return home, see the Historia secure terminus post or ante quem for any of the Bibles moralisées.
Albigensis, trans. Sibly and Sibly, 28–29. See Bernd Rau, Die ornamentalen Hintergründe in der französischen

16 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

 Why a Bible moralisée for Waldemar II?
Marriages and Re(g)alpolitik
The fact that the final folio of the Vienna Latin Bible
moralisée contains not only the image of a king above that
of an illuminator making the codex that the king handles,
but also the erased inscription, is evidence that when the vol-
ume was complete, it was prepared for presentation as a gift.
As successors to Charlemagne, the kings of France and of the
Germans were also heirs to the practice on momentous occa-
sions of giving and receiving fine copies of biblical books
which might have presentation miniatures or inscriptions,
sometimes on the last folio.65 At the Capetian court itself
around 1200, at least one manuscript bearing a presentation
text together with an image of the manuscript’s bestowal was
offered to a Capetian recipient in the years just before the
making of the Bibles moralisées. Thus, the 1201–3 presenta-
tion copy of Giles of Paris’s Karolinus, a lengthy poem he had
composed for Louis VIII, shows, alongside the gift inscrip-
tion, the youthful prince receiving the completed book from
its author.66

the Moralized Bibles. Given their prominence and positive role in

Figure 10. Envoys return from Nabal and princes vow to crusade the three-volume Bibles moralisées, the utter absence of Dominicans
against Albigensians, detail (C–c), fol. 96r, Vienna Latin Bible and Franciscans from the Vienna codices is strong evidence that
moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB). they were completed before the Toledo and Oxford-Paris-London
tomes.
possible allusion to the murder of a papal legate and the 65. Early examples include the San Paolo Bible, Rome, Abbazia di
San Paolo fuore le Mura MS, in which the presentation image, orig-
definitive call to “take the cross”—to crusade—against the Al-
inally placed on the verso of the last folio, 337v, was moved to the
bigensians is, I believe, the best evidence we have at present front of the volume during rebinding; and Louis the German’s Psal-
of a terminus post quem of 1208, which is consonant with ter, Berlin, Staatsbibliothek MS Theol. lat. fol. 58, which retains the
Branner’s style-based suggestion that the first two Bibles mo- royal presentation image on the last folio. What Riccardo Pizzinato
ralisées could have been made as early as 1212–15.64 terms the “dedicatory poem” above the imperial portrait of Charles
the Bald in the Codex Aureus of St. Emmeran (Munich, Bayerische
Staatsbibliothek, Clm 14000) opens with a description of the ruler in
gotischen Buchmalerei (Stuttgart: Cantz, 1975), at 21–37, 130–40; third person, i.e., “Hic residet Karolus diuino munere fultus,” for
Patricia Stirnemann, “Fils de la Vierge: l’initiale à filigranes paris- which see Riccardo Pizzinato, “Vision and Christomimesis in the
ienne: 1140–1314,” Revue de l’art 90 (1990): 58–73. Also significant Ruler Portrait of the Codex Aureus of St. Emmeram,” Gesta 57,
for dating the two Vienna Bibles moralisées is the use by some of the no. 2 (2018): 145–70, at 147, 150.
scribes in each of the two manuscripts of the Tironian “et” sign with 66. Marvin L. Colker, “The ‘Karolinus’ of Egidius Parisiensis,”
a horizontal stroke through the vertical stroke. Stirnemann observes Traditio 29 (1973): 199–325. Colker notes, 203, that the author’s
that although scribes in England began adding the optional horizon- customary captatio benevolentiae was “strangely placed” at the
tal stroke to the Tironian “et” in the twelfth century, that stroke does end of the manuscripts of the Karolinus. Andrew W. Lewis, “Dynas-
not appear in manuscripts written in France before 1210, in Patricia tic Structures and Capetian Throne-Right: The Views of Giles of
Stirnemann, “A Family Affair: The Psalters of Ingeborg of Denmark Paris,” Traditio 33 (1977): 225–52, confirms that London, BL MS
and Blanche de Castille and the Noyon Psalter,” Revue Mabillon, Add. 22399 is the original presentation manuscript; its dedication
n.s. 29 (= 90) (2018): 101–30, at 110. page, with a roundel in which Giles presents his work to Louis VIII,
64. Branner, Manuscript Painting, 48. The three-volume Toledo is reproduced in Branner, Manuscript Painting, fig. 22. Also useful is
and Oxford-Paris-London Bibles moralisées were demonstrably Céline Billot-Vilandrau, “Charlemagne and the Young Prince: A Di-
produced after the Dominicans and Franciscans had arrived in dactic Poem on the Cardinal Virtues by Giles of Paris (c. 1200),” in
Paris, the former by October 1217 and the latter in 1219; these man- Virtue and Ethics in the Twelfth Century, ed. István P. Bejczy and
uscripts contain hundreds of images of friars in their early habits (no Richard G. Newhauser (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 341–54. Presentation
longer in use by 1250), and the members of the new mendicant or- texts/images may still have been uncommon in early thirteenth-
ders are shown as the solution to the problems decried in all four of century manuscripts made for Capetian readers (unlike those made

The King in the Manuscript D 17

 Because the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée is the work of ries. Unfortunately for Ingeborg, Knud VI was not in a posi-
Parisian workshops and Waldemar II evidently never went tion to send the dowry that Philip II had demanded—the
to Paris, we may safely assume that he did not commission use for a year of an army and a naval fleet with which to invade
this manuscript; rather, by the time it was well underway, if England in King Richard the Lionheart’s absence69—because
not from the outset, it was intended as a diplomatic gift for Knud found himself fighting the fleet of the prince-archbishop
the Danish king.67 To understand why such a sumptuous tome of Bremen, a would-be usurper who was trying to claim the
would have been prepared for this purpose, it is necessary to crown for himself.70 When Philip II, having married Ingeborg
consider the roles of Knud VI and Waldemar II in the mar- on 14 August 1193, learned that Knud had sent money rather
riages of their younger sisters, Ingeborg and Helena. First than ships and warriors, and that the ransom of the English
came the fateful offer of marriage to Ingeborg extended by
Philip II Augustus, king of France. Negotiated by William,
abbot of Æbelholt and other prelates in the circle of Étienne 69. Philip II also wanted the dowry to include the conveyance of
of Tournai, Philip II’s bid had been accepted by Knud VI in the Danish kings’ right to the English throne (which would legiti-
1193.68 At that point, both kings evidently shared an interest mize his planned conquest of England and allow the marriage’s off-
spring to inherit it). The contemporary English chronicler, William
in preventing the German emperor’s designs on their territo-
of Newburgh, recounts the objections of the Danish monarch’s
councilors to the dowry that Philip II had requested: William of
Newburgh, Historia rerum Anglicarum, ed. Richard Howlett, in
from the mid-fourteenth century onward for their Valois succes- Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen, Henry II and Richard I 1: The
sors). Aside from the London manuscript of the Karolinus and its First Four Books of the Historia rerum anglicarum of William of
copy in Paris, BnF, MS lat. 6191, there appear to be no other surviv- Newburgh, Rolls Series 82 (London: Longman, 1884), at 368–69:
ing manuscripts contemporaneous with the Vienna Latin Bible “Igitur rex Francorum missis ad regem Dacorum viris honoratis,
moralisée that have a presentation text (as opposed to a captatio germanae ejus laudatissimae virginis nuptias sollemniter expetivit.
benevolentiae) for a Capetian ruler from the first two decades of Rex autem Dacorum magnifice legatos suscipiens, petitionem quo-
the thirteenth century. Thus, we cannot establish whether there were que, de optimatum suorum consilium, libenter amplexus est. ‘Et
iconographic conventions for presentation images and texts at the quid,’ inquit, ‘dominus vester vult sibi dari dotis nomine?’ Illi vero,
time of Vienna MS 1179’s completion. prout in mandatis acceperant, ‘Antiquum,’ inquiunt, ‘jus regis Da-
67. While the possibility that Waldemar commissioned the Bible corum in regno Anglorum, et ad hoc assequendum classem exerci-
moralisée via his diplomatic agents in Paris cannot absolutely be tumque Daciae anno uno.’ . . . Cumque super hoc regni sui inclitos
ruled out, the question would then be how he/they would have seorsum consuleret, responderunt: ‘Satis nobis negotii est contra
known of the Old French manuscript as a model in the earliest paganam et nostris vicinam finibus gentem Wandalorum. Illisne
years of its existence (when it was simply labeled a “Bible” rather ergo dimissis, hostiliter aggrediemur Anglorum gentem Christianam
than Bible moralisée), unless he or they had seen it. atque innoxiam, duplici nosmetipsos periculo immergentes? Nam si
68. On the the role of William of Æbelholt and others in the circle Anglos aggredimur, ferocissimis, qui juxta nos sunt, barbaris fines
of Étienne of Tournai, see notes 73–79 below. No less an historian nostros exponimus. . . . Proinde aliud petat rex Francorum, si
than John W. Baldwin expressed perplexity regarding Philip II Au- voluerit, dotis nomine: cum tu, rex, non debeas cum propriae gentis
gustus’s choice of a Danish princess for his second wife. See, for ex- periculo germanae tuae honorabiles nuptias providere.’ Placuit regi
ample, Baldwin, The Government of Philip Augustus: Foundations of consilium sobrium, jussitque legatos aliud dicere, si quid haberent.
French Royal Power in the Middle Ages (Berkeley: University of Cal- Illi vero, exspirante petitione prima, decem marcarum argenti millia
ifornia Press, 1986), 82; Baldwin, The Language of Sex: Five Voices petierunt.” (The “gens Wandalorum” to which Knud’s advisors refer
from Northern France around 1200 (Chicago: University of Chicago are the Wends.) See also the still valuable Robert Davidsohn, Philip II
Press, 1994), xiii. This history may seem well known, even notori- August von Frankreich und Ingeborg (Stuttgart: Kröner, 1888), 21–
ous, but the Danish side of the marriage alliance (and Scandinavian 22.
historiography) with its vicissitudes is far less well known outside of 70. On the ambition of the prince-archbishop Waldemar Knud-
Scandinavia. Yet, the choice of a French spouse for an Estridsen sen and his efforts with Staufen assistance to overthrow Knud VI, even
princess was far more unusual than the reverse, as it broke with over while regent to then-duke and future Waldemar II, see Heebøll-Holm,
a century of strategic marriage alliances around the shores of the “Franco-Danish Marriage,” 252; Oliver Auge, “Konflikt und Koexis-
Baltic, with Saxony and Bohemia, and with Russian principalities tenz. Die Grenze zwischen dem Reich und Dänemark bis zur
along the trade routes to Constantinople. Rather than speculate over Schlacht von Bornhöved (1227) im Spiegel zeitgenössischer Quellen,”
Philip’s purported distaste for his new bride (which may have been in 1200 Jahre Deutsch-Dänische Grenze. Aspekte einer Nachbarschaft,
distaste for the marriage alliance itself), it is useful to look at the ed. Martin Krieger et al. (Neumünster: Wachholtz, 2013), 71–93, at
geopolitical considerations as they appeared at the time. See Thomas 80. Waldemar Knudsen invaded Denmark with Norwegian and
Riis, “Autour du mariage de 1193: l’épouse, son pays et les relations Swedish troops in autumn 1193, while Count Adolph III of
franco-danoises,” in La France de Philippe Auguste: le temps des mu- Schauenburg and Holstein, a vassal of the Staufens, supported the
tations. Actes du Colloque international organisé par le C.N.R.S. invasion from the south: Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,”
Paris, 29 septembre–4 octobre 1980, ed. Robert-Henri Bautier, Col- 1:78–80. Given the role of the Staufens in trying to prevent his acces-
loques internationaux du Centre national de la recherche scien- sion to the throne, Waldemar II was predisposed to ally with their
tifique 602 (Paris: Éditions du CNRS, 1982), 341–62. Welf opponent, Otto IV of Brunswick (Braunschweig).

18 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

king, Richard, was being raised so swiftly that he would soon permitted Philip II to repudiate her that autumn.75 In Denmark,
be back in England, the French monarch’s rationale for the mar- Étienne’s connections included both (St.) William of Æbelholt
riage vanished. Perhaps that was the real reason for Philip II’s and the latter’s powerful friend, Absalon, who became bishop
insistence that his marriage to Ingeborg be annulled;71 what of Roskilde (1158–92), archbishop of Lund (1178–1201), and
several chroniclers recounted, however, was that he “was said” counselor first to Waldemar I and then to Knud VI.76 William
to have done so immediately after the wedding night and her had arrived in Denmark at the invitation of Absalon, whom he
coronation the next day, from some personal animus toward had known in Paris, to be abbot of and reform the canons of a
his new bride. Meanwhile, he kept the dowry, because the community that would become the abbey of the Paraclete in
Danes did not accept the humiliating repudiation of Inge- Æbelholt. Absalon had also brought William into the circle of
borg.72 Whatever his reason, he sent her away, initially to ecclesiastics who advised and served the Danish kings.77 Étienne
the monastery of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, and then to a mon-
astery in the diocese of Tournai where Ingeborg remained episcopal see of Tournai in February 1192, see Ysebaert, “Ami, cli-
Philip II’s prisoner. In essence, the French king treated her ent,” 452.
as his hostage while negotiations proceeded back and forth, 75. Ysebaert, “Power of Personal Networks,” 168, summarizes the
importance of Guillaume aux Blanches Mains (1135–1202), also
for and against annulment, among Philip II, the papal curia,
known as Guillaume de Champagne. Brother of Adèle of Cham-
and the Danish king—all mediated by a network of Paris- pagne, King Philip II Augustus’s mother, Guillaume’s ecclesiastical
educated ecclesiastics.73 career was consequently illustrious: bishop-elect of Chartres (1164),
The schools at the Parisian monastery of Sainte-Geneviève archbishop of Sens (1168/69), then archbishop of Reims (1176), Guil-
were where the lives of several ecclesiastic mediators and laume was papal legate during the Becket affair, and, from 1179, a
agents first intertwined. In France, the most eminent included cardinal. He served at Philip II’s right hand from 1182, in his presence
“at most recorded events throughout the 1180s and 1190s.” When
Étienne of Orléans (d. 1203), more generally known from his Philip II Augustus left on crusade, he appointed Guillaume and Adèle
episcopal title as Étienne of Tournai. A master of canon and co-regents. Guillaume was also a patron to whom some of the most
civil law who was abbot of Sainte-Geneviève (1176–92), Étienne important scholars of his age dedicated their works; see, too, Patricia
became bishop of Tournai in 1192, at the instance of Philip II’s Stirnemann, “En quête de Sens,” in Quand la peinture était dans les
maternal uncle, Guillaume aux Blanches Mains, archbishop of livres. Mélanges en l’honneur de François Avril, ed. Mara Hofmann
and Caroline Zöhl (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), 303–11, 463, at 308–10.
Reims, who nine months later officiated at Ingeborg’s corona-
76. Absalon (d. 1201) had studied in Paris where he probably first
tion at Amiens.74 Guillaume also presided over the council that became acquainted with Étienne (d. 1203), and certainly William
(d. 1203), then a canon of Sainte-Geneviève. On Absalon, see Per-
71. This is the argument of Benham, “Angevin Empire,” 41–44. ron, “Metropolitan Might,” 187–92; Michael Kræmmer, Den hvide
72. Heebøll-Holm, “Franco-Danish Marriage,” 264–68. klan: Absalon, hans slægt og hans tid (Copenhagen: Spektrum, 1999);
73. Heebøll-Holm, “Franco-Danish Marriage,” 255–61, argues Inge Skovgaard-Petersen, “Saxo’s History of the Danes: An Interpreta-
that members of this network were the true agents of the marriage; tion,” Scandinavian Journal of History 13, nos. 2–3 (1988): 87–93.
see too, Pedersen, “Danes and the Marriage Break-up of Philip II,” 77. As sub-prior, William had been among the canons from the
58–60. For Ingeborg’s stay first in Saint-Maur-des-Fossés and then, abbey of Saint-Victor who reformed Sainte-Geneviève of Paris, bring-
as related by Étienne of Tournai, in the monastic house of Cysoing ing it under the Augustinian rule; he also authored a work that would
(Cysonium) in his diocese, see Torben K. Nielsen, “Celestine III later be described as a Life of Saint Geneviève, at note 100 below. This
and the North,” in Pope Celestine III (1191–1198): Diplomat and may have been instead the Tractatus beati Guillermi de revelatione
Pastor, ed. John Doran and Damian J. Smith (Farnham: Ashgate, capitis et corporis beate Genovefe, in Vitae sanctorum danorum, ed.
2008), 163–82, at 169. Martin Clarentius Gertz (Copenhagen: Gad, 1908–12), 378–82, and
74. Étienne’s collections of his letters reveal that as abbot of extant in a Parisian manuscript copied in William’s lifetime, Paris,
Sainte-Geneviève he was already a client to his patron, Guillaume BnF, MS lat. 5667, fols. 29r–30v, in which it immediately follows a
aux Blanches Mains, and an intermediary on behalf of the latter liturgically arranged Life and miracles of that saint. See, too, Nanna
with Étienne’s former students and other alumni of that monas- Damsholt, “Abbot William of Æbelholt: A Foreigner in Denmark,”
tery. See Walter Ysebaert, “Ami, client et intermédiaire: Étienne in Medieval Spirituality in Scandinavia and Europe: A Collection of
de Tournai et ses réseaux de relations (1167–1192),” Sacris Erudiri Essays in Honour of Tore Nyberg, ed. Lars Bisgaard et al. (Odense:
40 (2001): 415–67; Ysebaert, “The Power of Personal Networks: Odense University Press, 2001), 3–19, at 7–8. As abbot, William
Clerics as Political Actors in the Conflict between Capetian France moved the community, which he reformed along the lines of the
and the County of Flanders during the Last Decade of the Twelfth (Victorine) Sainte-Geneviève, from Eskilsø to Æbelholt, renaming
Century,” in Aspects of Power and Authority in the Middle Ages, ed. their abbey for the Paraclete. He led the community from 1165 until
Brenda M. Bolton and Christine E. Meek (Turnhout: Brepols, his death in 1203. By 1193, therefore, he had been the abbot of
2007), 165–83; Anthony Perron, “Metropolitan Might and Papal Eskilsø/the Paraclete at Æbelholt for almost 30 years, and he wrote
Power on the Latin-Christian Frontier: Transforming the Danish that he had encouraged Knud VI to accept Philip II’s marriage pro-
Church around the Time of the Fourth Lateran Council,” Catholic posal to protect the Danish kingdom from the German emperor.
Historical Review 89, no. 2 (2003): 182–212. On the role that Guil- Thus, Epistolae abbatis Willelmi de Paraclito, lib. II, ep. 23, in Diplo-
laume aux Blanches Mains played in the election of Étienne to the matarium Danicum, ser. 1, vol. 3, part 2, Epistolae abbatis Willelmi,

The King in the Manuscript D 19

knew, too, and communicated with Absalon’s younger relative, For Philip II, it must have been obvious that so long as ne-
Peder Sunesen, who had entered Étienne’s ambit at Sainte- gotiations persisted over his marriage to Ingeborg, Knud VI
Geneviève when he was abbot. After Peder and his brother would prefer to continue to conquer his neighbors to the south
Anders Sunesen had completed their studies abroad, Absalon and east, to the harm of the German emperor and his vassals,
arranged for the former to succeed to the bishopric of Roskilde rather than to turn his military might against France on his
(1192) and for the latter to be appointed chancellor to Knud VI sister’s behalf. Thus, their interests continued to converge
and, later, archbishop of Lund (1201–24).78 All these clerics (at Ingeborg’s expense) until 1200, when Knud VI indicated
were involved in the marriage of Philip II Augustus to Ingeborg his willingness to ally himself to one of two claimants to the
and its long aftermath.79 German kingdom, Otto IV of Brunswick, count of Poitou,
whom Innocent III also preferred.80
By 1202, Waldemar II, as duke of Schleswig, had con-
ed. Carl Andreas Christensen, Herluf Nielsen, and Lauritz Weibull quered Holstein, and Otto IV recognized a diplomatic oppor-
(Copenhagen: C. A. Reitzels, 1977), 504 line 26–505 line 2: “Non est, mi tunity to gain a valuable, well-armed ally in his fight for the
domine, paruus honor, quo offertur gratiae uestrae, quod tamen uobis imperial throne. Otto therefore negotiated with Waldemar
in aure loquimur, quia si copulatum uestris amicitiis habueritis regem
the marriage of his (and Knud’s) younger sister, Helena, to
Francorum, non erit de caetero uobis formidini cupiditas et auaritia
Romanorum.” See Benham, “Angevin Empire,” 39–41; Heebøll-Holm, Otto’s younger brother, Duke William of Lüneburg, in 1202.81
“Franco-Danish Marriage,” 259–61; Davidsohn, Philip II und Ingeborg, In addition to the mutually helpful political alliance estab-
16–28. lished by this marriage, both sides must have recognized its
78. Absalon, Peder Sunesen (d. 1214), and Anders Sunesen economic advantages because it brought together control of
(d. 1228), the sons of Absalon’s first cousin Sune, were all members two towns essential to the well-known, long-standing, and
of the powerful Danish Hvide family, and all, positioned in the
archepiscopal see of Lund, the episcopal see of Roskilde, or (in Ab-
highly lucrative trade in salted herring from Danish territories
salon’s case) in both, served as counselors to the sons of Waldemar I. and the Baltic: Lübeck, whose merchants salted and traded it,
On Peder, who studied with Étienne of Tournai at Paris, and his and Lüneburg, which provided the salt.82 At the same time, by
brother, Anders Sunesen, who studied in both Paris and Bologna
and, as archbishop of Lund, would crown Waldemar II, see Lars Boje Rome to obtain the intervention of Celestine III in Ingeborg’s situa-
Mortensen, “The Sources of Andrew Sunesen’s Hexaemeron,” Ca- tion, and then, armed with papal letters, fled Philip Augustus’s surro-
hiers de l’Institut du Moyen-Âge Grec et Latin 50 (1985): 113–216; gates, only to be captured and held prisoner by the duke of Burgundy
Andreae Sunonis filii Hexaemeron, post M. Cl. Gertz, ed. Sten Eb- for a week. When William and Anders were able to continue toward
besen and Lars Boje Mortensen, part 1, Praefationem et textum the Île de France, they had been stripped of the papal documents that
continens, Corpus Philosophorum Danicorum Medii Aevi XI (Co- they had been carrying, as Nielsen recounts, “Celestine III,” 170–71.
penhagen: Gad, 1985), 29–33; Torben K. Nielsen, “Vicarius Christi, William produced the genealogy of the Danish kings that was used to
Plenitudo Potestatis og Causae Maiores: Teologie og jura hos Pave refute Philip II’s allegation that his marriage to Ingeborg was invalid
Innocens III. (1198–1216) og Ærkebiskop Anders Sunesen (1201– on the grounds of consanguinity. William’s genealogy is preserved in
1223),” Historisk Tidsskrift 94, no. 1 (1994): 1–29; Nielsen, “Arch- a letter of 1194 to Pope Celestine, in Epistolae abbatis Willelmi de
bishop Anders Sunesen and Pope Innocent III: Papal Privileges Paraclito, lib. II, ep. 22, 501–3. Of this ecclesiastical network, only
and Episcopal Virtues,” in Archbishop Absalon of Lund and His Peder and Anders Sunesen were still alive and involved when Inge-
World, ed. Karsten Friis-Jensen and Inge Skovgaard-Petersen (Ros- borg was finally set free in 1213 (see below).
kilde: Roskilde Museums Forlag, 2000), 113–32. Some historians 80. Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 1:87; Benham, “An-
have supposed that during his student years at Paris, Anders may gevin Empire,” 44. Otto IV was also (via his father, Henry the Lion,
have known the future pope Innocent III as a fellow student; see duke of Saxony), the half-brother of Knud’s wife, Gertrude of Ba-
Pedersen, “Danes and the Marriage Break-up of Philip II,” 59. varia. The elected position of German king or, from the eleventh
79. William of Æbelholt, who later regretted encouraging Knud VI century, Rex Romanorum, designated the heir apparent to the po-
to accept the marriage proposal (see notes 68 and 73 above), along sition as emperor.
with Peder Sunesen, then bishop of Roskilde and the king’s chancel- 81. Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 1:92–95; also Murray,
lor, led the entourage who accompanied Ingeborg to Amiens for her “The Danish Monarchy,” 291–92. On the relationship between Wil-
marriage and coronation. The author of the Gesta Innocentii III re- liam of Lüneburg and Otto IV, see also Jonathan R. Lyon, Princely
ports that Knud VI sent Ingeborg to France with “Peter, bishop of Brothers and Sisters: The Sibling Bond in German Politics, 1100–
Roskilde,” and a suitable retinue ( frater eius transmisit cum ea Pe- 1250 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012), 136–45.
trum, roschildensem episcopum, cum idoneo comitatu), in David R. 82. Carsten Jahnke, “The Medieval Herring Fishery in the West-
Gress-Wright, “The Gesta Innocentii III: Text, Introduction and ern Baltic,” in Beyond the Catch: Fisheries of the North Atlantic, the
Commentary” (PhD diss., Bryn Mawr College, 1981), 69, lines 20– North Sea and the Baltic, 900–1850, ed. Louis H. J. Sicking and
21; Davidsohn, Philip II und Ingeborg, 31–32. William then became Darlene Abreu-Ferreira, Northern World 41 (Leiden: Brill, 2009),
deeply involved in the effort to prevent Philip II Augustus from re- 157–86, at 168–74; Jahnke, “The City of Lübeck and the Internation-
pudiating Ingeborg. At times, this involvement was personally dan- ality of Early Hanseatic Trade,” in The Hanse in Medieval and Early
gerous. At a later stage of the affair, for example, William of Æbelholt Modern Europe, ed. Justyna Wubs-Mrozewicz and Stuart Jenks,
and Anders Sunesen, by then Knud VI’s chancellor, travelled to Northern World 60 (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 37–58, at 44–46.

20 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

arranging Helena’s marriage with Duke William, Waldemar Ingeborg as his lawful wife in order to resuscitate the Danish
(wittingly or not) also took steps toward countering the tragic alliance originally contemplated in 1193, his advisors would
situation of Ingeborg, by then rejected and already imprisoned have recognized—even if he did not—that after holding the
for nine years by her husband Philip II; both Otto IV and Danish monarch’s sister prisoner for twenty years, more would
Duke William were sons of Matilda of England and, through probably be required to persuade Waldemar to be an ally, or
her, grandsons of Philip II’s foremost enemy, Henry II of En- even to refrain from entering a war between Philip and the
gland. Having grown up in Henry’s court and that of his son, Angevins.
their uncle Richard the Lionheart, Otto and William were de- As it turned out, Philip II won a decisive victory over a co-
termined to prevent the Capetian king’s conquest of Angevin alition of his enemies led by King John of England and
land. In the new alliance forged by this marriage of Ingeborg’s Otto IV at the battle of Bouvines at the end of July 1214, and
sister, Denmark’s navy became a potential threat to Philip, five months later Frederick II rewarded Waldemar by for-
should the Danish sovereign use it in aid of Henry II’s Angevin mally ceding to him all of the territories north of the Elbe
descendants on either the English or the Imperial throne. and Elde Rivers that he, his brother, and their father had con-
Combined, the three powers nearly encircled France, and could quered.86 In April 1213, however, none of this could be fore-
cut off access to any trade from the Baltic and North Seas.83 seen. The Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, having been made in
Philip II was again contemplating an invasion of England France and bearing a presentation inscription to Waldemar,
in April 1213, when he finally accepted Innocent III’s demand may be evidence of the diplomatic efforts by the ecclesiastical
that Ingeborg be released from the strict confinement in network to resolve Philip II’s problems with the pope, his An-
which he had held her, and be officially restored to and treated gevin opponents, and his marriage. If so, the likeliest time of
according to her status as queen of France and his wife.84 By this manuscript’s production would have been in the two
then, the alliance between Waldemar II and Otto IV had years or so leading up to 1213.87
run aground, and Philip II may have expected he could take
advantage of Waldemar’s shift of allegiance to the Staufen, dependent upon the efforts of Innocent III; consequently, after the
Frederick II.85 If indeed Philip II decided to acknowledge pope’s excommunication of Otto IV in March 1211, Waldemar also
ceased to support him. In 1212, Otto formed an alliance against
Waldemar with Albrecht of Brandenburg and several other German
83. This is not the view of Pedersen, “Danes and the Marriage nobles. Despite Otto’s overt hostile acts, Gaethke believes that Wal-
Break-up of Philip II,” 65, who asserts that “[t]he succession of demar remained neutral during the contest between Otto IV and
Ingeborg’s other brother, Valdemar II (‘the Victorious’) to the Dan- Frederick II for the German (and, hence, imperial) crown in the years
ish throne also meant a change in the Danish outlook. Valdemar, immediately leading up to the battle of Bouvines. For all of which, see
Anders Sunesen (who had now become archbishop of Lund) and “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 2:17–23; Diplomatarium Danicum,
Peder Sunesen (who had taken over from Anders as Valdemar’s ser. 1, vol. 5, 1211–1223, ed. Niels Skyum-Nielsen (Copenhagen: Ejner
chancellor) realised that the best outcome they could hope for was Munksgaard, 1957), 27–30, item 17; Benham, “Angevin Empire,” 49.
that the case [of Philip’s effort to annul his marriage to Ingeborg] 86. Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 2:23–24; Diplomat-
did not jeopardise their crusading and empire-building in the Baltic. arium Danicum, ser. 1, vol. 5, 75–79, item 48. No chronicle account
Thus, the case of Ingeborg came to take a back seat by comparison of Bouvines mentions Waldemar, and even if he only maintained
with larger European imperial concerns.” If so, they were accepting neutrality between Otto IV and Frederick II, his lack of aid to the
of Philip II’s imprisonment of Ingeborg in a monastery in the dio- former helped the latter (and Philip II Augustus).
cese of Tournai since 1193, then in the cellars of the royal manor 87. Certainly no later than July 1223, when Philip II died and
of Étampes for six years, from which she was released only to remain Waldemar II had been imprisoned by the duke of Schwerin for over
confined to the manor for another six years. See instead Heebøll- two months. After Waldemar II’s kidnapping, it becomes increas-
Holm, “Franco-Danish Marriage,” 268, for whom Philip Augustus’s ingly unlikely that presentation verses would have described him
behavior toward Ingeborg was “a critical miscalculation on the part as “apex potentum” (note 31 above) because he no longer was, and
of the French king . . . [that] did nothing to further Philip’s political there was considerable bitterness over the captivity of 1223–26 and
plans. Quite the contrary, it eventually caused a prolonged conflict the defeat at Bornhöved in 1227. Scholars have generally offered sim-
with . . . the papacy. It pushed the Danes into the arms of Philip’s ilar guesses as to how long the making of a Bible moralisée required;
enemies, the Angevins and the Welf, thus aiding the consolidation thus, Lowden, Making, 1:94, suggests “two or three years at the very
of an anti-Capetian coalition.” least” for Vienna MS 1179; Branner, Manuscript Painting, 64, pro-
84. Davidsohn, Philip II und Ingeborg, 249–50. poses about a decade for the three-volume Toledo Bible moralisée.
85. The alliance between Waldemar II and Otto IV was already The negotiations over Ingeborg and the preparations for a war with
strained by summer 1208, when Otto chose to support the Danish England may have provided enough time, but if not, then whoever de-
dynasty’s nemesis, the prince-archbishop Waldemar Knudsen (see cided upon the appropriate diplomatic gifts would have sought some-
note 70 above) whom Waldemar II had reluctantly released from thing already at hand that was either complete or could be completed
prison at Innocent III’s request. Whatever other reasons Waldemar quickly. For that reason, we cannot completely exclude the possibility
had for changing sides in the ongoing German civil war, he was well that the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée was already in production for a
aware that for Ingeborg to prevail in the marriage dispute, she was Capetian reader, and was “repurposed” for the sake of the diplomatic

The King in the Manuscript D 21

 A Diplomatic Gift for a Danish King:
Did It Reach Him?
Having been inscribed for Waldemar, the Vienna Latin
manuscript would have had to be transported to him; the ob-
vious next question is whether the tome reached him. Danish
records do not appear to tell us. Nevertheless, once the query
has been posed, material indications of provenance on the
unpainted sides of the first and final folios take on new signif-
icance. Until the present, only Hermann has correctly recog-
nized and remarked upon the presence in Vienna MS 1179 of
small, fifteenth-century woodcut stamps of ownership with
the arms of the City of Lübeck (Fig. 11), which de Laborde
had mistaken for ownership stamps of the Imperial Hofbib-
liothek.88 Otherwise, there is no hint of the manuscript’s
whereabouts between the time of its creation and its entry
into Prince Eugene’s Library, as noted above.89 With the knowl-
edge that the codex once bore a presentation inscription to
the Danish king, Waldemar II, the overlooked indications of
Lübeck connections are not only explicable, they are impor-
tant for confirming that the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée ac-
tually made its way into Danish royal possession.
Lübeck’s earliest heraldic insignia had been established by
1226, as evidenced by seals affixed to surviving documents
from that year. Possession and use of the town seal was ini-
tially limited to the town’s self-governing council (Rat).90 In
the mid-fifteenth century, Lübeck’s city officials replaced the Figure 11. Imprint of Lübeck City Council woodcut stamp,
civic seal with that found in the stamps in Vienna MS 1179— ca. 1460–65, detail, fol. Ir, Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, ÖNB
namely, a black, double-headed imperial eagle bearing a MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB).

lübsche shield, divided horizontally into white (upper) and

efforts. We have no documentary evidence that could be a basis for
determining who commissioned the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, red (lower) halves, on its breast—to represent more effec-
who decided to use it as a diplomatic gift, and whether these were tively the city’s dual status as an Imperial Free City and as a
the same person(s). member of the Hanseatic League. The earliest surviving ex-
88. Hermann, Handschriften, 29, correcting de Laborde’s as- amples of Lübeck’s double-headed eagle with the lübsche
sumption that these seals with the double-headed imperial eagle shield on its breast are the council’s chancery (Ratskanzlei)
were ownership marks of the Hofbibliothek, pointed out that they
were earlier than Prince Eugene’s binding, and the manuscript en-
stamps in manuscripts left to Lübeck’s council in the wills
tered the Imperial Library after his death. Instead, Hermann stated, of the city syndic Simon Batz, who died in 1465.91 A comparison
because of the shield, horizontally divided into red and white halves,
on the Imperial Eagle’s chest, the seal could be, “for example,” an in- 91. Paul Hasse, “Das grosse und das kleine Wappen der Stadt
dication of Lübeck’s ownership. Lübeck,” Mitteilungen des Vereins für Lübeckische Geschichte und
89. At note 18 above. Altertumskunde 12 (1905–6): 186–89, at 186. On Batz, and the books
90. The Rat had come into existence by 1201, when consules could he left to the Rat in his wills of 1459 and 1464 (with a list attached to
speak for the citizens and chose Waldemar II as overlord: Tore the latter), see Robert Schweitzer and Ulrich Simon, “ ‘Boeke, gude
Nyberg, “Kreuzzug und Handel in der Ostsee zur dänischen Zeit unde böse . . .’: Die Bibliothek des Lübecker Syndikus Simon Batz
Lübecks,” in Lübeck 1226: Reichsfreiheit und frühe Stadt, ed. Olof von Homburg: Rekonstruktionsversuch anhand seines Testaments
Ahlers, Antjekathrin Graßmann, Werner Neugebauer, and Wulf und der Nachweise aus dem Bestand der ehemaligen Ratsbibliothek
Schadendorf (Lübeck: Hansisches Verlagskontor, 1976), 173–206, in der Stadtbibliothek Lübeck,” in Das Gedächtnis der Hansestadt
at 181. Lübeck’s early seals feature a ship within which stand two Lübeck: Festschrift für Antjekathrin Graßmann zum 65. Geburtstag,
men; surrounding the central image is the statement that this is ed. Rolf Hammel-Kiesow and Michael Hundt (Lübeck: Schmidt-
the “seal of the burgers of Lübeck” (sigillum burgensium de lvbeke). Römhild, 2005), 127–58. Still useful is Gerhard Neumann, “Simon
See Georg Fink, “Die Lübecker Stadtsiegel,” Zeitschrift des Vereins Batz, Lübecker Syndikus und Humanist,” Zeitschrift des Vereins
für Lübeckische Geschichte und Altertumskunde 35 (1955): 14–33, für Lübeckische Geschichte und Altertumskunde 58 (1978): 49–73,
at 15, and his fig. 1. at 54.

22 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

between the woodcut stamps in his books and those in the
Vienna Latin Bible moralisée establishes that the same stamp
matrix was used, and therefore that the Vienna codex was in
Lübeck’s council library as late as the 1460s (Figs. 12–13).92
This does not mean, however, that the Vienna tome had been
part of Batz’s library, for although he had a degree in “both
[canon and civil] laws” from Erfurt, he never became a wealthy
man; the manuscripts he left to what was probably already a
small Ratsbibliothek consisted primarily of scholarly textbooks
he had bought as a student and master.93
Certainly, the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée could have
come into the possession of a citizen of Lübeck, or even into
that of the Rat, considerably earlier. In the thirteenth century
there was an occasion when it was particularly likely that the
Vienna Latin Bible moralisée came into the hands of a Lü-
becker family as the spoils of conflict between that city and
the Danes: during the three years that Count Henry of Schwe- Figure 12. Imprint of Lübeck City Council woodcut stamp, 1465,
rin held Waldemar II and his heir for ransom, the citizens of detail, fol. 1r, Marsilius of Inghen, De insolubilibus and other
Lübeck, who had welcomed Waldemar II’s overlordship in logical texts, olim Simon Batz, Lübeck, Stadtbibliothek, MS
philos. 87 2 (photo: Lübeck Stadtbibliothek).
1202, took the opportunity to free themselves of his rule. Led
by members of the town council, the citizens of Lübeck evicted themselves from Danish recapture, the Lübeckers sought pro-
the Danish garrison from the castle at the north end of the city tection from the Staufen emperor, Frederick II, who pro-
in 1226. The townspeople promptly looted the castle and, lest it claimed the city an Imperial Free City.94
be reoccupied by Danish or other troops, razed it. To protect A second, much less probable occasion in the thirteenth
century may have arisen during the raid on Copenhagen that
Lübeck’s fleet carried out in 1249, when they burned the Dan-
92. In addition, the stamps on two of Batz’s manuscripts provide
crucial evidence that the red pigment of the lower half of the shield ish city and sacked its castle. Waldemar I, however, had granted
was added by hand independently of the stamp: Lübeck Stadtbib- Copenhagen to Absalon, at the time bishop of Roskilde, in
liothek MS jur. 27 12, the Commentarius in Institutibus <Iustiniani> 1160. Until King Eric VII succeeded in ending the suzerainty
liber IV, 1r infra, has no red at all; the collection of logical texts that of the bishops of Roskilde and brought the city under the Dan-
begins with Marsilius of Inghen’s De insolubilibus, Lübeck Stadtbib. ish crown in 1416, Copenhagen’s castle was episcopal, not
MS philos. 87 2 (formerly Ee V 71), fol. 1ra, has a red diagonal slash
royal. Yet, given the roles played by Absalon and his successor
rather than a carefully colored half shield. It should be noted that use
of the same woodcut stamp matrix probably dates the presence of in the See of Roskilde, Peder Sunesen, and by Peder’s brother,
the manuscript in the Ratskanzlei’s collection within a decade of Anders, in the negotiations over Ingeborg’s marriage and as
Batz’s donation. This is because woodcut stamp matrices, like other counselors to the Danish kings, the possibility of the Vienna
wood blocks for printing, generally did not last more than a few Bible moralisée’s presence in Copenhagen cannot be entirely
years in their pristine condition.
excluded. Indeed, a letter from Innocent IV concerning the
93. Neumann, “Simon Batz, Lübecker Syndikus,” 49, 57. On the
early libraries in Lübeck, and the eventual 173 printed volumes raid of 1249 includes books among the looted items carried
and 91 manuscripts in the Stadtbibliothek that, in the early seven- off from churches by the attackers.95 At any rate, if someone
teenth century, had come from the Ratsbibliothek (but not all from
Batz’s gift), see Günther Wiegand, “Zur Frühgeschichte der Stadt-
bibliothek Lübeck,” Zeitschrift des Vereins für Lübeckische Geschichte 94. On the welcome that Lübeck gave Waldemar II in 1201, the
und Altertumskunde 61 (1981): 51–79, at 52, 59. Batz’s will of 1464 events of 1226, and Frederick II’s proclamation, see Nyberg, “Kreuz-
listed 397 texts, many of them short, most bound in composite man- zug und Handel,” 181; Erich Hoffmann, “Lübeck im Hoch- und
uscripts with other works, only a few of them separately bound. Of Spätmittelalter: Die große Zeit Lübecks,” in Lübeckische Geschichte,
these texts, at least 101 can be identified with certitude and 27 with ed. Antjekathrin Graßmann (Lübeck: Schmidt-Römhild, 2008), 79–
high probability in the contemporary Stadtbibliothek. Of the 91 man- 340, at 116–17, 120; Gaethke, “Knud VI. und Waldemar II.,” 3:24–
uscripts that came from the Ratsbibliothek into the Stadtbibliothek at 34.
its founding in 1616–22, 55 came from Batz’s legacy, according to 95. Maria R. D. Corsi, “Piracy or Policy? Lübeck’s 1249 Attack on
Schweitzer and Simon, “‘Boeke, gude unde böse . . .’,” 134. Their re- Copenhagen,” Viking and Medieval Scandinavia 8 (2012): 53–70, at
construction of his library, at 135–57, based on his 1464 will, includes 53, quotes a letter from Innocent IV from the Diplomatarium Da-
a biblia parva, but nothing as large and elaborate as the Vienna Bible nicum: “sanctorum reliquiis ac libris priuilegiis et ornamentis alta-
moralisée. rium aliisque bonis ibidem inuentis exinde nequiter asportatis.”

The King in the Manuscript D 23

 the new city library.97 Fourth in his list of manuscripts from
the council library was a parchment tome that contained, in
addition to Flavius Josephus’s The Jewish War, three additional
works: History of the Antiquity of the Kings of Norway com-
posed by Theodoricus Monachus between 1177 and 1188;98
History of the Danes’ Journey to Jerusalem of circa 1200;99
and a Life of the Virgin Saint Geneviève attributed to Abbot
William of Æbelholt, whom we have already encountered
among the clergy most involved in the long troubles of
Ingeborg’s marriage to Philip II.100
As with William of Æbelholt, so too the History of the
Danes’ Journey had a direct connection with Knud VI, for
it recounts a joint Danish-Norwegian effort, led by five Dan-
ish magnates close to him, to join the Third Crusade in 1190.
It is unlikely that this tale of their venture, which is not known
from any other medieval manuscript, would have held inter-
Figure 13. Imprint of Lübeck City Council woodcut stamp, 1465,
est beyond the courts of the Norwegian and, especially, Dan-
fol. 1r, detail, Commentarius in Institutibus liber IV, olim Simon ish rulers.101 Similarly, the work of Theodoricus Monachus
Batz, Lübeck, Stadtbibliothek, MS jur. 27 12 (photo: Lübeck
Stadtbibliothek).
97. Johannes Kirchmann, Zugangsbuch der Stadtbibliothek bis
1641 (catalogue), Lübeck Stadtbibliothek MS Lub. 27 682, fols. 18r–
gained possession through either incident of such an obvi- 18v. Kirchmann, the first librarian of the Stadtbibliothek, prepared
ously costly volume as Vienna MS 1179, we might finally have his inventory of books—organized by the collections from which
an explanation for the puzzling fact that the presentation in- they came into the library—in the decades immediately after the
scription was scraped away. Such a possessor could well have Library’s foundation, completing it in 1620–41, as recounted by
Wiegand, “Frühgeschichte,” 54–59. Having been inventoried by
erased it, because it identified the rightful owner on the final Kirchmann, this manuscript disappeared sometime after the seven-
folio—someone who was, moreover, an enemy ruler. teenth century, by which point three transcriptions had been made
The later presence in Lübeck of at least one additional as well as a first edition of its contents, according to Karen Skovgaard-
manuscript closely connected to the Danish royal circle sup- Petersen, A Journey to the Promised Land: Crusading Theology in the
ports the supposition that the Danish monarch had kept valu- Historia de Profectione Danorum in Hierosolymam (c. 1200) (Copen-
hagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2001), 7.
able books in the castle in Lübeck, from which they were
98. Historia de antiquitate regum Norwagiensium, ed. Gustav
then looted in 1226.96 Now lost, this codex had arrived in the Storm, in Monumenta Historica Norvegiae: Latinske Kildeskrifter
Lübeck Stadtbibliothek from the Ratsbibliothek in 1620, when til Norges Historie i Middelalderen, ed. Storm (Kristiania [Oslo]: Trykt
Johannes Kirchmann undertook to inventory the holdings of hos A. W. Brøgger, 1880), 1–68. The work is dedicated to Eystein
Erlendsson, 1158–88, archbishop of Nidaros, who had been educated
at the abbey of Saint-Victor in Paris (which had close ties to Sainte-
Pope Innocent was responding to the letter from the bishop of Ros- Geneviève). See Sverre Bagge, “Theodoricus Monachus—Clerical
kilde alerting the papal curia of the damage from the Lübeckers to Historiography in Twelfth-century Norway,” Scandinavian Journal
the episcopal (not royal) properties. of History 14, no. 3 (1989): 113–33.
96. It seems to me that the odds are lower—or the explananda 99. Historia de profectione Danorum in Hierosolymam. In addi-
greater—for both manuscripts having been in the loot from Copen- tion to Skovgaard-Petersen, Journey, see Vegard Skånland, “Einige
hagen, for both having survived the sea journey home to Lübeck (not Bemerkungen zu der historia de profectione Danorum in Hierosoly-
a given) where they both remained, with neither being sold for cash mam. I. Mandant und Verfasser,” Symbolae Osloensis 33, no. 1 (1957):
outside of Lübeck by the merchants who did the looting of Copen- 137–55, and 36, no. 1 (1960): 99–115.
hagen in the first place. Moreover, in this era when Danish rulers, 100. As titled by Kirchmann, fol. 18v: Vita Beatae Genovefae Vir-
like most royalty, spent time traveling through their domains, doc- ginis edita a domino Wilhelmo abbate de Paraclito (for whom see
uments issued by Waldemar II from Lübeck establish that he and his notes 68, 77, 79 above.)
administration spent time there; see, e.g., Diplomatarium Danicum, 101. Skovgaard-Petersen, Journey, 77. The two-year journey of
ser. 1, vol. 5, 88–90, item 57. In addition, Waldemar II had brakteat these crusaders had an anticlimactic end: having reached Jerusalem
coins minted in Lübeck (see, for example, Lübeck, Archiv der Han- after peace had been declared, the Danes under Knud VI’s leader-
sestadt, Münzsammlung, Brakteats 0015, 0016, 0017, 0018, 0019, ship and the Norwegians under the nobleman Ulf of Lauvnes, visited
0021, 0022, 0023). Nevertheless, documents from his long reign the holy sites before heading home. The usefulness of Josephus’s De
are relatively sparse; when he was not crusading, Waldemar’s move- bello judaico to crusaders because of its account of the geography
ments before 1223 are rarely documented. and history of the Holy Land helps to explain the presence of this

24 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

would have had value for both Knud VI and Waldemar II, Indeed, what can historians now accept as certain about
given their involvement (and that of their archbishops) in the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée? First, its production need
the civil wars in Norway between rival claimants to the Nor- not postdate the issuance of Super speculam in 1219. Second,
wegian throne.102 medieval books presented as gifts to royal recipients might
Kirchmann’s inventory gives us one additional fact: noth- bear images or written inscriptions on either the first or the
ing resembling a large Bible appears in it, so we know that by last folio of a book, and the last pair of images and accompa-
1641, the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée no longer remained in nying marginal text on the final folio of Vienna MS 1179 con-
the city council’s collection and therefore had not entered the stituted a record of the intended recipient. Third, the codex
new city library. Instead, sometime between the 1460s and was not inscribed for presentation to a Capetian, but rather,
1620, the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée had been carried away to a Danish king Waldemar who, given the era of the tome’s
by a new owner. construction, must have been Waldemar II. Fourth, during
the reigns of Knud VI and Waldemar II, there was a network
of Paris-educated bishops and abbots in Denmark who trav-
Conclusion
elled between the Danish and French domains from 1194 un-
From the foregoing, we must infer that it is unlikely, de- til at least 1213, trying (among other things) to solve the
spite scholarly consensus, that the Vienna Latin Bible moral- problem of Ingeborg’s and Philip II’s marriage. Fifth, such
isée remained in Paris into the 1230s or later (where some envoys often conveyed diplomatic gifts, and at least one other
historians have thought that it directly served those working Bible moralisée—that in Toledo—was in fact given as just
on Capetian architectural and artistic commissions).103 We such a gift from one king to another.105 Sixth, Lübeck was
should further infer that, regarding the dates, places of pro- an important city under Waldemar II’s control from 1201 un-
duction, purposes, and intended recipients—to say nothing til 1226, and he spent some time there; the Vienna Latin Bible
of the commissioners—of the other early thirteenth-century moralisée, which was dedicated to Waldemar, was in Lübeck’s
Bibles moralisées, our theories, being an even more unstable Ratsbibliothek in the 1460s or soon thereafter. Seventh, as
latticework of inferences, merit considerable skepticism.104 late as the seventeenth century, a codex with twelfth- and
thirteenth-century content related to the Paris-educated net-
work and to the Danish royal interests remained in Lübeck.
work in the same codex as the Historia de profectione Danorum; see
Eva Matthews Sanford, “Propaganda and Censorship in the Trans- Finally, the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée somehow became
mission of Josephus,” Transactions and Proceedings of the American
Philological Association 66 (1935): 127–45, at 141–42.
102. Waldemar II, like his brother and father, involved himself in of the Toledo Bible moralisée (our Fig. 6). Scholars have proposed
the Norwegian civil wars; in supporting Erling Magnusson Stein- three possibilities for the royal couple represented: Blanche of Cas-
vegg, Waldemar II placed himself on the side of the archbishops tille and her husband, Louis VIII (Branner, Manuscript Painting, 4);
of Nidaros. Archbishop Absalon of Lund had welcomed Erik Ivars- Blanche of Castille and her son, Louis IX (Haussherr, “Sensus litte-
son, the successor of Eystein Erlendsson (the dedicatee of the Historia, ralis,” 364–65; Stork, Bible moralisée, 37; Tuchscherer, “Sponsus/
note 98 above) as archbishop of Nidaros (modern Trondheim), to Sponsa,” 15; Guest, “Queens, Kings,” 14; Lowden, Making, 1:127–
Skåne in 1196, where Erik Ivarsson helped form the Bagler faction that 32); or Marguerite of Provence and her husband, Louis IX (Delisle,
supported the Magnusson pretenders. From that point on, the Danish “Livres d’images,” 236; Vitzthum, Pariser Miniaturmalerei, 3; Bran-
crown was understood to be allied with them. On Absalon, see ner, Manuscript Painting, 4; Lowden, Making, 1:132). Moreover, to
notes 76–78 above; for Waldemar II’s invasion of Norway in support the extent that the issuance of Super speculam in 1219 has been used
of Erling Magnussen in 1204, see, in Kroman, ed., Danmarks Annaler: to date not only the Vienna Bibles moralisées but also the work of
Annales Waldemarii, 77, lines 65–71; Annales Sorani vet., 91, lines 57– illuminators and flourishers connected to them, the invalidation of
60; Annales Ryenses, 168, lines 68–70. that terminus post quem may require some revision of our chronol-
103. Pace, e.g., Christe, “Un autoportrait”; Christe, “Vitrail de ogy of Parisian illumination.
l’Exode”; Christe, “Le livre d’Esther dans les Bibles moralisées et les 105. The recipient was Alfonso X of Castille and León, for which
vitraux de la Sainte-Chapelle—IIère partie,” Arte Cristiana 89 see Büttner, Bilder, 44–52; Gonzálvez Ruiz, Bible. For the possibility
(= 802) (2001): 17–22; Lowden, “Les rois et les reines,” 346–47: “Au that the Oxford Bible moralisée may have been given to Henry III of
moment de la consécration de la Sainte-Chapelle en 1248 . . . et England, see note 12 above. In addition, the Vienna Latin Bible
déjà lors de l’acquisition de la couronne d’épines en 1239, les rois moralisée is far from the only manuscript made for or conveyed
et les reines de France possédaient au moins quatre Bibles moral- to the royal Danish offspring of Waldemar I by ecclesiastics with ties
isées.” Lowden cautions against assuming that volumes in a royal to Saint-Victor and Sainte-Geneviève, for which see Stirnemann, “A
household would have been accessible to any artists. Family Affair”; Stirnemann, “The Copenhagen Psalter Reconsidered
104. E.g., the use of the heraldic imagery in one image of the To- as a Coronation Present for Canute VI (Kongel. Bibl., MS Thott 143
ledo Bible moralisée, both to date that manuscript, as summarized 27),” in The Illuminated Psalter: Studies in the Content, Purpose and
note 7 above, and to support various theories as to the identities of Placement of Its Images, ed. Frank O. Büttner (Turnhout: Brepols,
the queen and king depicted on what was originally the final folio 2004), 323–28, and figs. 294–301.

The King in the Manuscript D 25

Figure 14. Folio after the explicit of Job, fol. 162r, Vienna Latin Bible moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB).
a part of Prince Eugene of Savoy’s collection, and thereby should be sought in the decade leading up to 1219 rather than
came into the library where it now resides. after that date.
These discoveries leave open many further routes for re-
search. The proposed setting of the Vienna Latin Bible moral-
Appendix: Paleographic Considerations
isée’s production earlier in time—and, hence, that of the prior
Old French manuscript as well—gives us some indication of With the possible exception of John Lowden, who opined that
when and where we should seek documentation (which nev- the presentation inscription has “something of the character
ertheless may not exist). We do not know, for instance, who of a postscript,” scholars have not queried whether the blue
commissioned these books;106 who proposed the intellectual and red lines of text designate the original intended posses-
program of these Bibles moralisées;107 how closely in time sor.110 So long as the ruler depicted alongside was assumed
the Old French and Vienna Latin manuscripts were made to be a Capetian and the text remained unreadable, the ques-
or for whom the former was intended;108 nor who decided tion did not arise; now that MSI reveals a non-Capetian king’s
to give one to Waldemar II.109 But it is now clear that evidence name, a skeptic might inquire whether the manuscript was
originally made with a Capetian recipient in mind, and if so,
whether the inscription was added at some later time for a
106. Although Vitzthum warned in 1907 that the images of royal
recipients in Vienna MS 1179 and what is now Morgan Library & new recipient.
Museum MS M.240 establish that royalty were the recipients but To answer these questions entails considering the paleo-
not that they were also the commissioners (note 5 above), scholars graphic evidence presented by the scribal hands in Vienna
have generally assumed that, for each Bible moralisée, the recipient MS 1179, although a full paleographic study far exceeds the scope
was also the commissioner. The unusual expensiveness of these of this article and cannot yet provide complete certitude as to
manuscripts has undergirded this assumption, which has long
seemed to me dubious, but the great probability that this is not the
a date.111 There are several reasons why this remains the case.
case for Waldemar’s Bible moralisée should encourage us to abandon
this assumption until there is solid evidence for it.
107. Heinlen, “Ideology,” argues throughout (but especially at 8, 110. Lowden, Making, 1:88, asserts regarding the written presen-
150–95, 238–42) that the Bibles moralisées were conceived and their tation inscription: “Although we lack a context for these words, their
content planned by scholars at Paris who shared the theological likely meaning is not in doubt. They complement the image and
views of Peter the Chanter and his “circle”; I concur in “God’s Com- describe the ruler shown there. . . . Despite the erasures, therefore,
pass,” 7. Lowden, Making, 1:9; 2:9, 200–208, who notes that errors of enough remains for the general thrust of the text to be beyond ques-
biblical understanding in the early Bibles moralisées, rule out the tion: in some way these two medallions and the accompanying [in-
participation of “Parisian intellectuals” (1:9) or involvement by scription] verses record a royal connection with the production of
“any distinguished university master or theologian” (2:9) in their this book” (emphasis added). At Making, 1:94, however, concerned
making. Yet, this is not a conclusive argument. Beyond the “best with fitting the production of both Vienna Bibles moralisées into the
and the brightest,” we know that there were considerably more po- years between 1219 (Haussherr’s terminus post quem) and 1226, and
tential authors in the early thirteenth century at Paris, given the nu- (in his own words) proceeding “to build one hypothesis on another,”
merous students and masters who left no surviving written works, Lowden proposes that Vienna MS 1179 could “well have been begun
often because they were mediocre (or worse); see Gorochov, Nais- before Louis [VIII] was crowned in 1223, or perhaps in celebration
sance, 71–72, 84–111, 152–53, and passim. of his coronation,” but, given the time needed to make such a tome,
108. There has long been speculation on both points. For the later might not have been completed by Louis VIII’s untimely death three
three-volume Bibles moralisées, there is good evidence that they years later. In that case, Lowden concludes, “the verses alongside the
were made simultaneously for the most part (see note 2 above). image on folio 246r, which have something of the character of a
There is no such evidence for, and some against, the simultaneity postscript, might have been added shortly after Louis VIII’s death.”
of the two Vienna manuscripts’ production, but both presuppose Lowden does not state why he makes this suggestion, but he appears
the papal call to crusade against the Albigensians. Heinlen, “Ideol- to think that the manuscript would have required more than three
ogy,” 3, 8–10, provides plausible reasons for suggesting that Philip II years to complete. Nor is it clear to me why Lowden so describes
Augustus was the intended recipient; many scholars have believed the presentation inscription, but coming at the end of a chain of hy-
that the Old French Bible moralisée was made for Blanche of Cas- potheses that start from the assumption that there is a firm terminus
tille, notably Hamilton, “Example of Blanche,” and Guest, “Queens, post quem of 1219, this description as akin to “a postscript” bears
Kings, and Clergy.” But see Lowden, Making, 1:52. weight less well than his statement on p. 88.
109. If the “reformist” ideological content of the Bible moralisée 111. Specific letters and abbreviations tend to be diagnostic for a
was a factor in this decision, as I believe it was, then we should look given script (the scribal equivalent of a printer’s font), and close ex-
to the ecclesiastics involved in the negotiations to free Ingeborg and amination of the distinctive forms of these letters along with the ha-
to their connections among their peers in Paris and in the entou- bitual angle of writing, ductus, weight, and spacing of characters is,
rages of Philip Augustus and Louis VIII. Otherwise, the field is much at present, the principal means for distinguishing among scribes
wider. The ideological preoccupations that to our eyes focus on Paris using a given type of script in the same or related manuscripts. I have
probably seemed universally applicable to those who articulated been engaged in a paleographic study of the early thirteenth-century
them, as they did to Robert Courson or Innocent III. Bibles moralisées while writing a monograph concerning them, but

The King in the Manuscript D 27

 Figure 16. Portion of text at (b), detail, fol. 162r, Vienna Latin
Bible moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB).

enough, many scribes were proficient in more than one type

of script, each of which they might write with relatively little
variation over a lifetime of copying books and/or writing doc-
uments.113 Moreover, several illuminators were involved in the
production of the 246 folios in Vienna MS 1179; likewise, as
Lowden correctly observed, “a variety of scribes were certainly
Figure 15. Portion of text at (c), detail, fol. 162r, Vienna Latin
Bible moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB). enced assessment of Raymond Clemens and Timothy Graham, In-
troduction to Manuscript Studies (Ithaca: Cornell University Press,
2007), 121. Computational technologies offer the promise of greater
First, professional scribes were capable of maintaining such precision in dating; see, e.g., Rombert Stapel, “The Development of a
stability in their writing over decades that, absent other, Medieval Scribe,” in Kodikologie und Paläographie im digitalen
non-paleographic evidence, even the most skilled paleogra- Zeitalter 3/Codicology and Palaeography in the Digital Age 3, ed. Ol-
pher would hesitate to pinpoint the decade in which a scribe, iver Duntze, Torsten Schassan, Georg Vogeler, et al., Schriften des
whose work may have encompassed two or three dozen years, Instituts für Dokumentologie und Editorik 10 (Norderstedt: Books
on Demand, 2015), 67–86.
penned a given undated manuscript.112 If that were not 113. On digraphism and multigraphism, see Peter A. Stokes,
“Scribal Attribution across Multiple Scripts: A Digitally Aided Ap-
a thorough such study may not be completely achievable until AI proach,” Speculum 92, no. S1 (2017): S65–S85. In early thirteenth-
can be successfully applied to the digital study of individual scribal century Paris, for example, a scribe might write equally competently
hands in medieval manuscripts. Current directions of research are a formal text script (textualis formata), a more rapid book script
discussed in Mike Kestemont, Vincent Christlein, and Dominique (littera textualis libraria or littera scholastica) that contemporaries
Stutzmann, “Artificial Paleography: Computational Approaches to knew as “littera Parisiensis,” and a documentary script. For the early
Identifying Script Types in Medieval Manuscripts,” Speculum 92, thirteenth-century label “littera Parisiensis,” see the inventory of
no. S1 (2017): S86–S109; Claudio De Stefano, Marilena Maniaci, books in Alfred Hessel and Walther Bulst, “Kardinal Guala Bichieri
Francesco Fontanella, and Alessandra Scotto di Freca, “Layout Mea- und seine Bibliothek,” Historische Vierteljahrschrift: Zeitschrift für
sures for Writer Identification in Mediaeval Documents,” Measure- Geschichtswissenschaft und für lateinische Philologie des Mittelalters
ment 127 (2018): 443–52. 27, no. 3 (1932): 772–94, at 781–82. Despite many medievalists’ efforts,
112. Rather, the rule of thumb remains that “all assessments of the paleographic terminology is not yet standardized; here I use the no-
date of a script are no more than approximations and that when dat- menclature of Albert Derolez, The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript
ing a manuscript on paleographical grounds, one should factor in a Books from the Twelfth to the Early Sixteenth Century (Cambridge:
possible margin of error of a quarter century or so,” in the experi- Cambridge University Press, 2003).

28 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021

at work” in order to write its many folios of text, “and a divi-
sion of labor by quires is sometimes obvious.”114 Consequently,
a comparison of the distinctive letters of the presentation
text to the writing within the framed space on the same leaf
(fol. 246r) is insufficient for establishing whether this inscrip-
tion was written coevally with the rest of the manuscript or by a
scribe employed in its production. Finally, a paleographer
needs to take into account factors beyond the hand itself,
which cannot be done if one simply extracts the presentation
inscription from the rest of the manuscript context.115
With those caveats in mind, I believe that we can safely
conclude that one of the scribes responsible for writing the
text of the Vienna Latin Bible moralisée also copied out the
presentation inscription. The most distinctive letter forms
in the latter are the capital N in “Nec” at the start of line 9;
the uncial d of “Waldemar” in line 1;116 the capital Q of lines 5
and 7; the final R of “Waldemar” in line 1 and “honor” in
line 4; and the g of, for example, “magnus,” in line 2, “regibus”
in line 12, and “figura” in line 20 (Fig. 3).117 In Capetian realms,
the majuscule N formed from what looks like the number 2
joined to a J-descender on the right by a pair of slightly diag-
onal or horizontal lines (which we may call a “2-N”) apparently
was introduced into Parisian bookhands by clerics at the
abbeys of Saint-Victor and Sainte-Geneviève as well as Notre Figure 17. Left margin at text and medallion (A) “Explicit Liber
Dame, who had also been trained to write official documents Tertius <Regum>”; at (B) “Incipit Liber Quartus <Regum>”
(abbreviations expanded), detail, fol. 125v, Vienna Latin Bible
for the royal family. The evolution of this capital “2-N” letter
moralisée, ÖNB MS 1179 (photo: ÖNB).
form can be traced in acts issued in the name of Louis VII from
1175 and Philip Augustus from the 1180s through at least ter of the thirteenth century and onward.119 The scribes of Vi-
1217,118 as well as in books produced in Paris in the first quar- enna MS 1179 were more inclined to use a capital uncial N,
but in the text on fol. 162r, an unusual page that follows the
conclusion of the book of Job, we find not only the 2-N of
114. Lowden, Making, 1:77.
115. Indeed, as Patricia Stirnemann points out, “Dating, Placing,
the presentation inscription, but also its scribe’s uncial d, as
and Illumination,” Journal of the Early Book Society for the Study of well as his capitals Q and R (Figs. 14–16).120
Manuscripts and Printing History 11 (2008): 155–66, at 160, in try-
ing to date manuscripts, “any dating should always be based on sev-
eral elements [such as ornamentation, illumination, elements of scribe M (1202–1206), scribe N (1203–1205), scribe O (1207–
script, material], not just one. The visual argument must have a log- 1208), scribe N (1207–1217), in Françoise Gasparri, L’Écriture des
ically reasoned coherence based on as much evidence as possible actes de Louis VI, Louis VII et Philippe Auguste, Hautes études
taken from all aspects of the production.” médiévales et modernes 20 (Geneva: Librairie Droz; Paris: Minard,
116. The scribe also uses another form of d—one with a straight 1973), 80–94, 105–6, and plate XXXIX facsimile 42 (1175), “notum”
ascender—as at the beginning of “diadema” in line 5 (with the sec- in line 1; plate XLVIII facsimile 53 (1189), “noverint” in line 1,
ond d being the uncial form). The inconsistent use of more than one “Noviomensis” in line 2. See, too, her discussion of the relationship
available form of a given letter when a particular script provides the of the royal chancellery and scribes associated with documents and
possibility is a common scribal practice. Compare, on this same books at Notre-Dame and Saint-Victor in her “Études sur l’écriture
fol. 246r, in the text that continues from the left text column beyond de la chancellerie royale française de Louis VI à Philippe Auguste
the text frame into the lower margin (Fig. 2), three d shapes (the d’après vingt-cinq actes originaux jusqu’ici inconnus,” Bibliothèque
third with a straight ascender) in the second line from the bottom: de l’École des Chartes 126, no. 2 (1968): 297–331. What we are calling
“debet alios ad bene operandu(m).” the “2-N” derives from Insular pointed hands.
117. Both this g (and slightly different forms of the letter) and 119. See, for example, BnF, MS lat. 17907, Petrus Riga Aurora,
capital Q can be found on the same fol. 246r, in the text of the lower fol. 4, illustrated in Branner, Manuscript Painting, fig. 59 (Nam 7
margin (Fig. 2): see for example “sanguine” and “agni,” line 2; “gen(us) lines from end, Nam last line).
david,” end of line 5; and “Qui” in line 6. 120. Fig. 15, Vienna MS 1179, fol. 162r, detail: portion of text at (c):
118. See the work of scribe B (1182–90), scribe D (1186–88), “-bus se exaltant regnum celorum percipere nequeunt et qui in celesti
scribes E and F (1190), scribe K (1195–1211), scribe L (1199–1201), fide positi toto desiderio terrena querunt. Nolite fratres karissimi

The King in the Manuscript D 29

 The manuscript itself offers contextual evidence—beyond elements of biblical and other high-quality manuscripts pro-
the alignment with the presentation images—that the red and duced in Paris and northern France from the late twelfth cen-
blue lettering of the presentation text was written at the same tury onward, such running heads, incipits, and explicits—as
time as the rest of the codex. In addition to this marginal text well as alternating red and blue initials of major divisions of
written in letters that are larger than those within the the text and, in the Bibles moralisées, of each biblical and mor-
enframed space of the page, one or more scribes wrote, in al- alizing passage—were integral to the completion of the man-
ternating blue and red ink, the names of the biblical books in uscript. Deploying Ockham’s razor, one may safely conclude
running heads on every page (Fig. 14). Less regularly, scribes that the best explanation of the evidence is that the presenta-
indicated the beginning and end of specific books in alternat- tion inscription on fol. 246r, being written at the time of the
ing red and blue letters of approximately the same size as manuscript’s completion, names the original intended recip-
those of the presentation inscription (Fig. 17).121 As standard ient for whom it had been commissioned.

proximis vestris elemosinam verbi subtrahere. Mecum vos ammoneo

ut ab osioso <rev: otioso> sermone parcamus, et inutiliteR loqui
declinemus.” (abbreviations expanded). Fig. 16, detail: portion of text
at (b), “-nibus lugeant quem finiri eisdem suis percussionibus non
ignorat. Namque scriptum est, Quicumque voluerit amicus huius seculi
esse inimicus dei constituituR. Unde . . .” (abbreviations expanded). The
2-N of Fig. 16 is less precisely that of the presentation inscription than is
the 2-N of Fig. 15 (a quarter column later on the same page), which il-
lustrates the variability of the same scribe’s ductus. It is also worth not-
ing that both the scribe who wrote this inscription and the (apparently)
different scribe who wrote the text on fol. 246r (Fig. 1) wrote the r within
and at the end of words sometimes as a minuscule, sometimes as a
capital R, which was not an uncommon practice in the early thir-
teenth century. The text is drawn from Gregory the Great’s Homiliae
in Evangelia, Liber I, including from Homilia 1 and Homilia 6, in
Gregorius Magnus Homiliae in Evangelia, ed. Raymond Étaix, Cor-
pus Christianorum series Latina 141 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1999), 7, 44.
121. Vienna MS 1179, fol. 125, left margin: Explic(it) L(iber) IIIus
<Regum> (alongside the first medallion); Incipit L(iber) IIIIus
<Regum> (alongside the third medallion).

30 E Gesta v60n1, Spring 2021