A leaf from a Homiliary or a Martyrology, in Latin, manuscript on vellum [France, first half 11th century].

Pseudo-Abdias
A leaf from a Homiliary or a Martyrology, in Latin, manuscript on vellum [France, first half 11th century].
A leaf from a Carolingian homiliary containing a rare witness to Pseudo-Abdias’s apocryphal Passion of St James.

c.290 x 190mm. 28 lines written in a large, sloping Caroline minuscule, the text readings from the lives of James the Apostle (25 July) and John the Baptist (23 June), beginning: ‘[...] accipe penitentem’ and ending ‘[...] et lectione evangelica’, one initial in red, one rubric in red (‘In vigilie S[an]cti Iohannis baptiste’), one 13th?-century marginal note directing the reader to f.12 of the parent manuscript if they want to read about St Christopher (25 July): ‘de S[an]cto Xr[ist]pforo vide sup[ra] ad xii folia et ibi lege si velis’ (some creasing and marginal staining, small incision to lower margin, not affecting text). Modern cloth binding.

Provenance:
Colker MS 316; acquired in 1983 from Maggs.

The text of the reading for James the Apostle (beginning ‘accipe penitentem’ and ending ‘virtus & imperiu[m] in s[e]c[u]la s[e]c[u]loru[m] amen’) is condensed from Pseudo-Abdias’s Passio Sancti Iacobi, a New Testament apocryphal text found in a collection of manuscripts at the Bibliothèque nationale de France containing Latin translations of the lives of the Apostles (see Codex Apocryphus Novi Testamenti: The Uncanonical Gospels [...]. 1852, pp.330-1). The attribution to ‘Pseudo-Abdias’ is based on the mention of a disciple called Abdias, who is presented as the companion of the two apostles Simon and Judas Thaddeus on the way to Persia.

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