DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.15918#0051
The (Early'! Lorsch scriptorium
45
for things. A single photograph (in natural size) tells more
than a dozen pages of description.
But let me record my admiration for what I would al-
most call (par excellence) the calligraphic Lorsch minuscule
of Adalung's time, I mean the script exhibited in the plate
from Pal. lat. 1753 which accompanies my article in Classical
Philology XI 270. It is a free, uncramped, rounded type;
and the letter in it which always catches my eye is the p,
with a sweeping curve which suggests to me the 1 pout' of
a pouter-pigeon (I call this form of the letter ' pouter-pigeon
p '). And the scribe of this elegant minuscule (he has written
the greater part of the MS.) was no mean scholar, if I am
right in supposing him to be the author (as the majuscule
addition suggests) of the epitaph (fol. 116v) on his teacher
Dombercht, an Englishman and favourite pupil of St Boniface.
The full poem is printed (but wrongly dated) by Duemmler
in Mon. Germ. Poetae 119. (It begins: Funereo textu scri-
buntur facta priorum). I quote parts here:
Hie iacet egregius nivea sub mole sacerdos
Qui meritis caeli vivit in arce suis,
Eloquio fulgens sacro cognomine dictus
Dombercht qui mundi clara lucerna fuit
Grammaticae studio, metrorum legibus aptus
Plurima percutiens funere corda suo.
Artibus et meritis fulgens Bonifatius almus
Pro Christo gladiis qui sua membra dedit,
Hunc magno studio docuit nutrivit amavit
Complens quod sonuit vatis in ore pium.
Francorum ad patriam tremulas venere per undas
Anglorum pelagi germine de nitido.
At the end the scribe has written in uncials: rogo te do-
mine pater ut emend as (sic) et corrigas. Was it Dombercht,
this world-famed authority on Latin Grammar and Verse-
composition, who brought to Lorsch the uncial texts of the
grammarians transcribed in Pal. lat. 1753, etc. ? At any rate,
we are reminded of the debt the Lorsch library and the
Lorsch college (not to mention the Lorsch scriptorium) owed
to English missionaries. Duemmler (p. 2 1. c.) suggests iden-
tification with Tumbert, abbot of Glastombury 744 A. D.
45
for things. A single photograph (in natural size) tells more
than a dozen pages of description.
But let me record my admiration for what I would al-
most call (par excellence) the calligraphic Lorsch minuscule
of Adalung's time, I mean the script exhibited in the plate
from Pal. lat. 1753 which accompanies my article in Classical
Philology XI 270. It is a free, uncramped, rounded type;
and the letter in it which always catches my eye is the p,
with a sweeping curve which suggests to me the 1 pout' of
a pouter-pigeon (I call this form of the letter ' pouter-pigeon
p '). And the scribe of this elegant minuscule (he has written
the greater part of the MS.) was no mean scholar, if I am
right in supposing him to be the author (as the majuscule
addition suggests) of the epitaph (fol. 116v) on his teacher
Dombercht, an Englishman and favourite pupil of St Boniface.
The full poem is printed (but wrongly dated) by Duemmler
in Mon. Germ. Poetae 119. (It begins: Funereo textu scri-
buntur facta priorum). I quote parts here:
Hie iacet egregius nivea sub mole sacerdos
Qui meritis caeli vivit in arce suis,
Eloquio fulgens sacro cognomine dictus
Dombercht qui mundi clara lucerna fuit
Grammaticae studio, metrorum legibus aptus
Plurima percutiens funere corda suo.
Artibus et meritis fulgens Bonifatius almus
Pro Christo gladiis qui sua membra dedit,
Hunc magno studio docuit nutrivit amavit
Complens quod sonuit vatis in ore pium.
Francorum ad patriam tremulas venere per undas
Anglorum pelagi germine de nitido.
At the end the scribe has written in uncials: rogo te do-
mine pater ut emend as (sic) et corrigas. Was it Dombercht,
this world-famed authority on Latin Grammar and Verse-
composition, who brought to Lorsch the uncial texts of the
grammarians transcribed in Pal. lat. 1753, etc. ? At any rate,
we are reminded of the debt the Lorsch library and the
Lorsch college (not to mention the Lorsch scriptorium) owed
to English missionaries. Duemmler (p. 2 1. c.) suggests iden-
tification with Tumbert, abbot of Glastombury 744 A. D.