a note on the latin translators of ibn ezra

A Note on the Latin Translators of Ibn EzraAuthor(s): Raphael LevySource: Isis, Vol. 37, No. 3/4 (Jul., 1947), pp. 153-155Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/225567 .

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Who wrote Quadrans Vetus? 153

land, while it is not certain that John, to whom the Old Quadrant was so often ascribed, was a native son of Montpellier, since he is called Inglicus with fair frequency. So far as internal evidence is concerned there is about equal reason for associating either work with Montpellier or with Paris."5 Per- haps both authors taught at both universities, but neither that, nor the circumstance that John too is sometimes called dnglicus, is sufficient reason for identifying them, although it may show that they have been confused.

One further minor point should be noted, although it may be of slight significance. Symon de Phares, writing in I498, spoke of a "maistre Jehan de Londres" who flourished at Paris, commented on the Old Quadrant, and composed a treatise which opened, "Geometrie due sunt species. *" 16

Symon obviously misdates him in I I57, as he did in the case of many other past writers, while he depicts him as commenting on rather than composing the Old Quadrant, although he gives its incipit. But Symon seems to have considerable information concerning his literary activity, since he ascribes to him a translation from Hebrew into Latin of the Saphea with a different incipit from that of the Safiha of Arzachel by Profatius Judaeus and John of Brescia in I263, or from the earlier translation of the same by William of England, as well as a treatise "sur le Quart de l'astrolabe," whose incipit is practically identical with that of Petrus Peregrinus, Nova com-

'Isis, XXXIV (I943), 467b, notes 5 and 6. 16Recueil des plus celebres astrologues, edited by Ernest

Wickersheimer, Paris, 1929, p. 187.

positio astrolabii." Also there was a copy of the Tractatus super quadrantem which opened, "Geo- metriae duae sunt partes . . ." in Symon's library and which was not condemned by the Sorbonne, although it immediately followed three tracts which were condemned in MS 20 of Symon's library.18 At any rate, Symon associates the name John rather than Robert with the Old Quadrant, but it is not John of or in Montpellier or Anglicus, it is John of London. He does not mention either John of Mont- pellier or Robertus Anglicus. But what he says of John of Sacrobosco is all wrong,19 so that we cannot put much trust in either his silence or his utterances so far as our present problem is concerned.

Conduding the whole matter, it would seem that Robertus Anglicus must be distinguished from John of Montpellier as well as from Robert of Chester, Robert Grosseteste, and Robert Kilwardby. They were different persons, although John may have come from England, and although Robert may have taught for a time at Montpellier. The Quadrans vetus, opening, "Geometrie due sunt partes . . . ," has been attributed to both, but a greater proportion of the manuscripts of that work, as well as learned tradition and several other bits of evidence, support the claim of John of Montpellier. For the present therefore it will be safer to think of Robertus Angli- cus merely as the commentator on the Sphere of Sacrobosco. Columbia University

1T Recueil, pp. 18 7-8 8 . 'Du Plessis d'Argentre, Collectio iudiciorum de novis

erroribus, 1755, I, ii, 328-30. 'Recueil, p. 207.

A NOTE ON THE LATIN TRANSLATORS OF IBN EZRA

By RAPHAEL LEVY

THE most comprehensive survey of the Latin manuscripts of all the important translators of the astrological treatises composed originally in Hebrew in II48 by Abraham ibn Ezra is that which Professor Lynn Thorndike has just published in Isis, XXXV (I944), pp. 293-302. It is an enlargement of his bibliography appended to X History of Magic and Experimental Science, II pp. 9I7-928. A separate list of the manuscripts containing the Latin translations by Henri Bate was compiled by Gaston Wal- lerand, Henri Bate de Malines: Speculum divinorum et quorundam naturalium (Louvain, I93I), pp.

I4-I8, and it was supplemented by P. Glorieux, Repertoire des Ma'tres en Theologie de Paris au treizi.me siecle, I (Paris, I933), pp. 409-4II. The most recent list of Latin manuscripts containing the translations by Peter of Abano is that of Leo Norpoth, Kyklos, III (1930), pp. 300-3I3, which was analyzed by Thorndike, Bulletin of the History of Medicine, XV (I944), p. 202. An article de- voted to Arnoul de Quinquempoix was published by Ernest Wickersheimer, Dictionnaire biographique des medecins en France au moyen age, I (Paris, I936), p. 52. Thorndike also discussed the works



'54 Raphael Levy

of Louis de Angulo in Al History of Magic and Experimental Science, II (New York, I929) p. 878, and IV (New York, I934) p. 554.

The title of the comprehensive bibliography is "The Latin Translations of the Astrological Tracts of Abraham Avenezra." Thorndike prefers the Latinized form Abraham Avenezra to the Hebrew form Abraham ibn Ezra, but he wonders (page 294a) whether the appellation Abraham Additor found in several manuscripts refers to a supplemen- tary composition either by Abraham Avenezra or by a later editor or whether it indicates a different person and an entirely independent writer. It is neither. As is stated in The Astrological Works of Abraham ibn Ezra - Johns Hopkins Studies Rom. Lit. Lang., VIII (1927), pages 2I, 32, and 39, the Latin Additor is merely an elliptical paraphrase of magister adjutorij which corresponds to the French maistre de aide; this latter translation repre- sents a superfluous attempt to explain the Hebrew name Ezra in the colophon of the French manuscript of Le Commencement de Sapience. The Latin cognomen Additor has been analyzed properly by Steinschneider (cf. The Astrological Works .... p. 32 note 2), but the French form eluded both Steinschneider and Sacerdote; it set them off on a tangent in quest of Maitre Deiade, as is discussed in The Beginning of Wisdom -Johns Hopkins Studies Rom. Lit. Lang., Extra Volume XIV (1939), p. 25 note 28.

This French translation of Ibn Ezra's astrological treatises by Hagin le Juif is earlier than those in Latin, Catalan, or English. Its date of 1273 is too late for it to have fallen into the hands of Richard de Fournival, as was implied by A. Birkenmajer (cf. The Astrological Works . . . , p. 6 i ). Surely it would be folly to assume that Richard might have read the treatises in the original Hebrew. Chronol- ogy was ignored by Birkenmajer when he made that implication anent the Latin manuscript I6648 in the Bibliotheque Nationale of Paris. Thorndike lists that manuscript, together with the copies in Erfurt and in the Bodleian (page 30Ia), to show that the Abraham Iudeus to whom the work is attributed is not Abraham ibn Ezra. He hesitates to choose be- tween the Jew Abraham bar Hiyya ha-Nasi and the Arab Albumasar as the writer of the original; I should prefer to choose the former, whose Form of the Earth is said to be extant in Latin in the Vatican manuscript Ottobon. 2079 (cf. The Be- ginning of Wisdom . . ., ibid.).

Likewise a translation by Henri Bate is errone- ously considered to be the remainder of Abraham ibn Ezra's Principium Sapientie (page 296a). It

covers folios 37r-49v of the Leipzig Universitats - Bibliothek manuscript I466. The author's name is concealed in the title, Ysagoge magistre Abrache Ducis seu Principis vocati hebrayce nati Hezkia, which presents an ambiguous paraphrase of Abraham bar Hiyya ha-Nasi (cf. The Beginning of Wis- dom . . . , ibid.). The entire manuscript, includ- ing the treatises translated by Henri Bate from the Old French version of Ibn Ezra, was attributed to this so-called Abraham Dux by E. Zinner, Verzeich- nis der astron. HS. des deutschen Kulturgebietes (Munich, I925), item i 8o.

A few details may require further comment. One of the manuscripts which Thorndike was unable to consult is that of the Erfurt Stadtbiucherei, codex Amplonius Octavo 89 (not 87 which is a misprint on page 302). That is why he assigns the special title De Iudiciis Signorum to the treatise extending from folio 5r to folio i 9v, and remarks that it is ascribed neither to Henri Bate nor to Peter of Abano. As is noted in The Astrological Works..., p. 32, it is a copy of Peter's translation of the Principium Sapientie.

The Latin manuscript 10269 of the Bibliotheque Nationale is mentioned (on page 295b) in connec- tion with Henri Bate but not with reference to Peter of Abano; the copying of it was completed in 1490 by the renowned printer Arnold de Steccato of Brussels (cf. The Astrological Works . . . , p. 39 note 2), who had been trained as a copyist as early as 1445, according to Thorndike, A History of Magic and Experimental Science, IV, p. 235 note 8.

Since A. Van de Vyver, Revue beige philologie hist., XI (1932), p. 172, has complained about Delisle's inadequate cataloguing of this manuscript, I wish to list the Ibn Ezra treatises translated into Latin: if. 88r-99r Liber de Mundo vel seculo with a misleading incipit ascribed to Peter of Abano and with an ascription to Henri Bate (which is accepted properly by Thorndike on page 295b) in the explicit; if. I36r-I57v Liber de Nativitatibus by Henri Bate in I 274; ff. I r-38r Principium Sapientie "translatus per Petrum Paduanum de hebraico translatus in gallicum per quemdam et per ipsum Petrum traduc- tus in latinum;" ff. 39r-5 3v Liber de Rationibus by Peter of Abano; ff. 54r-70v, book I of the Liber de Nativitatibus et revolutionibus earum, and ff. 7 ir- 74r, book II, with the explicit "quem Petrus Padu- anus ordinavit in latinum ex hebrayco in ydeoma gallicum translatum;" ff. 74v-82r Liber de Inter- rogationibus by Peter of Abano; ff. 82v-87v Liber de Electionibus by Peter of Abano; ff. i i i r-i i 6r Liber de Luminaribus also by Peter of Abano. On the other hand, I see no justification (on page 297b)



A Note on the Latin Translators of Ibn Ezra 155

to consider folios 83v-87r of the Bibliotheque Na- tionale Latin manuscript 10270 as perhaps belong- ing to Peter of Abano; the explicit reads: "De revolutionibus nativitatum liber primus translatus de greco in latinum."

The statements describing four of the treatises forming part of the magnificent manuscript, which now bears the codex-number 5 in the Bibliotheque de l'Universite in Ghent, need clarification. The attribution (on page 30ia) of the original of the Liber de occultis and Liber de significationibus septem planetarum to Abraham ibn Ezra is quite doubtful. On the other hand, the doubt expressed (on pages 298b and 299b) as to the authorship of the Liber de questionibus and Liber de electionibus can be removed at once. Sometime before I326, Arnoul de Quinquempoix translated into Latin the French version which had been made from the Hebrew original of the two treatises, as he clearly asserts in the prologue (quoted in The Astrological Works . . . , p. 47). Apparently he did so with- out realizing that Peter of Abano had done likewise in 1293 under the titles Liber interrogationum and Liber electionum.

On pages 295, 298, 299, 300, Thorndike lists four relevant manuscripts in the National-Bibliothek of Vienna with a reference to F. Saxl's Verzeichnis astrol. und mythologischer illustrierter HS. des lat. Mittelalters, II (Heidelberg, I927), p. I58. As is

pointed out in The Beginning of Wisdom .

p. 26 note 38, A. Z. Schwarz described seven Vienna manuscripts containing Latin translations of Abra- ham ibn Ezra's treatises in the Abhandlungen zur Erinnerung an H. P. Chajes (Vienna, I932),

p. 205. In the concordance (on page 302), Thorndike

left a blank for the Tractatus de Nativitatibus, which Louis de Angulo translated in I448 through the intermediary of a Catalan version. It is extant in the manuscripts of Lyons, fonds latin 329, folios 2I4-226, and of Paris, fonds latin 732I, folios 87-I i6. Thorndike gives a recent reference (on page 293) for another work by Louis, which is entirely independent of the treatises by Abraham ibn Ezra and which is entitled De figura seu imagine mundi; a description of it dated I788 is quoted in The Astrological Works . . ., p. 54.

There was a real need for a competent scholar to undertake the classification and completion of the scattered bibliographies dealing with an important aspect in the history of medieval science. Professor Lynn Thorndike's compilation in Isis fills that lacuna, and offers a plethora of valuable material based on a remarkable proficiency in Latin paleog- raphy and reflecting a keen understanding of vast documentation.

The University of Texas

THE THEORY OF CONCENTRIC SPHERES: EDMUND HALLEY, COTTON MATHER, & JOHN CLEVES SYMMES

By CONWAY ZIRKLE

IN his most interesting article, "The Theory of Concentric Spheres," (Isis, 33:507-5x4), Dr. William Marion Miller traces the history of John Cleves Symmes' weird fantasy that "the earth is hollow, habitable within; containing a number of solid, concentrick spheres; one within the other, and that it is open at the pole twelve or sixteen degrees." Dr. Daniel Norman (Isis 34:29) reports that this notion still exists among the semi-literate and has been used recently in some of the pot-boilers of Ed- gar Rice Burroughs. Dr. George Sarton (Isis 34:30) calls attention to the fact that once such an error has been introduced it can never be completely eradicated and, recently, Mr. I. Bernard Cohen

(Isis 35:333) quotes a passage in Edna Kenton's The Book of Earths (I928) in which she raises the question as to where Symmes got his ideas. Several Indian tribes believed that the earth was hollow and at least three Americans have developed "concave" cosmogonies, i.e., Symmes (I 8I8), Cyrus Read Tweed (I870) and Marshall B. Gardner (1913). The object of the present note is to make available in Isis some further data concerning the origin and development of this hypothesis.'

1We may cite two post-Symmesian accounts of a subter- ranean country on a literary level somewhat higher than the romances of Edgar Rice Burroughs. In I864 Jules Verne published Voyage au centre de la terre, an opus sufficiently



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