YEARBOOK OF THE ALAMIRE FOUNDATION

88 LUMINITA FLOREA
instance, on folio 11v of Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Digby 90. 40 Finally, when
consonances are shown on the monochord by means of semicircular shapes, their
gradual addition over several chapters amounts to very complex final diagrams,
encompassing all the intervals that can be generated on the monochord. 41
The medieval illuminator had a fondness for circular diagrams; so did the illustrator
of music theory manuscripts. The world was known to be round, thus the Creator
was sometimes shown using the compass to generate it, as on folio 14r of Paris,
Bibliothèque Sainte Geneviève, MS 1028 – a fifteenth-century manuscript of the
French translation, by Jean Corbechon, of the Liber de proprietatibus rerum, the
immensely popular encyclopedia authored by Bartholomeus Anglicus (1190–1250). 42
Like many a medieval encyclopedia, this one, too, included brief sections on music,
which were often illustrated with diagrams that could have easily found their source
in the non-musical sections of the work. 43 Similarly, in a cosmic scheme from a
Catalonian atlas drawn in the fourteenth century in Mallorca (now Paris, Bibliothèque
Nationale, MS f.fr. 135) the Earth is personified by an astronomer holding an astrolabe;
the illustration includes the whole repertory of circular signs found in countless
other manuscripts of astronomy and natural science. 44 Sometimes the schemes
of the world, while always remaining circular, would develop into intricate, labyrinthlike
structures, with a multitude of intersecting circles, as in the diagrams from a 1512
manuscript containing a French translation of Lambert’s Liber floridus, now The
Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, MS 128 C4. 45
40 The image can be seen by following the Bodleian Library link at Early Manuscripts at Oxford.
41 See, for instance, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Digby 90; and MS Bodley 842. Both manuscripts can
be seen by following the Bodleian Library link at Early Manuscripts at Oxford. For a catalogue description
of the latter, see RISM B/3/4, p. 110–115.
42 For a digital reproduction see Paris, Expositions virtuelles, Le Ciel et La Terre – Le mystère des origines
– Mythes et Sciences – Le créateur – Création par le compas.
43 See Bethesda, Maryland, National Library of Medicine, MS 7 – a book copied in England in the fourteenth
century and including, on folios 287–288, a section on ‘the instruments of music’, which is normally
presented at the end of Book 19 of the Liber; and on folios 288v–289, ‘musical consonances’;
see also Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University, The Houghton Library, MS Lat. 216 (Phillipps
24270); and Boston, The Boston Medical Library, MS Ballard 15 (De Ricci 17) for other copies of the
Liber including the section on the instruments of music; for catalogue descriptions, see RISM B/3/4,
pp. 145-146 and 147. Versions of the Liber are also known to lack completely the section on the instruments
of music, as attested in MS Cambridge, MA, Harvard University, The Houghton Library, Riant
89 – for a description of which see RISM B/3/4, p. 149.
44 For a digital reproduction, see Paris, Expositions virtuelles, Le roi Charles et son temps – Manuscrits
– Atlas catalan, XIVe s.
45 See The Hague, Handschriften. The basic scheme of the world is expanded here to encompass: the four
seasons with their corresponding attributes or ‘qualities’ – le printemps (spring) is moiste (humid),
lhivers (winter) is froit (cold), and so on; the four elements; the signs of the zodiac; and the twelve
months of the year according to the solar/lunar calendar.