Walters Ms. W.388, Pseudo-Aurelius Victor (?), De Viris Illustribus; Cornelius Nepos, De Excellentibus Ducibus Exterarum Gentium; Plutarch, Regum et Imperatorum Apophthegmata Unidentified Text Title Page, Table of Contents, and Index De Viris Illustribus De excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae Dedicatory letter preceding Plutarch's Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata Collection of texts by Pseudo-Aurelius Victor (?), Cornelius Nepos, and Plutarch Pseudo-Aurelius Victor Nepos, Cornelius Plutarch Principal cataloger Berlin, Nicole Cataloger Walters Art Museum curatorial staff and researchers since 1934 Editor Herbert, Lynley Contributor Emery, Doug Contributor Tabritha, Ariel Contributor Vinson, Aubrey Contributor Wiegand, Kimber Conservator Polidori, Elisabetta Conservator Quandt, Abigail The Walters Art Museum

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 Written in Italy in the second quarter of the fifteenth century, this manuscript contains works by Pseudo-Aurelius Victor (?), Cornelius Nepos, and Plutarch. The first text, De Viris Illustribus, concerns the history of the Roman Empire and dates to the fourth century CE. It gives short, concise biographies of important men from Rome's long history. It is one of many such texts that fall within the genre of Roman exemplary literature, the most famous of which is Suetonius' early second-century CE work "De Vita Caesarum" or “The Lives of the Caesars.” In the manuscript tradition, the author of De Viris Illustribus has been given as both Pliny Secundus Veronesis, otherwise known as Pliny the Younger, who was writing in the late first century CE, or as Aurelius Victor, a fourth-century CE historian. The Walters text adopts the former, naming the author as "Pliny Veronesis." Most scholars have dismissed both Pliny and Aurelius Victor as potential authors and instead prefer to say he was a late antique scholarly commentator working in the fourth or early fifth century CE. The second text, De excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium, is written by the first-century BCE Roman biographer Cornelius Nepos. He was a prolific author, as attested by contemporary authors such as Cicero and Catullus. We now only have preserved parts of his book De Viris Illustribus, from which De excellentibus comes. The text was composed of biographies grouped into pairs, the first of which was usually reserved for those of Greek or foreign origin, and the second for Romans. It has been determined that categories such as generals, historians, kings, and poets organized a number of the pairs. The only extant pairing is that of great commanders and generals, which is preserved in the Walters manuscript. The biographies of Atticus, a prominent first-century BCE Roman statesman, and Cato the Elder, a late third- to early second-century BCE Roman senator and historian, are also preserved, but not in the Walters manuscript. For centuries it was believed that Aemilius Probus, a late fourth- to early fifth-century CE grammarian, was the author of Nepos' text because of an epigram that names Probus and appears in a number of versions of the text (including that of the Walters). This error was corrected beginning in the sixteenth century. The third text is the Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata of Plutarch, a first-century CE Greek writer. It is one part of a much larger group of dialogues, essays, and recorded speeches collectively known as the Moralia. The Regum text is organized into two parts with the sayings of Greek and foreign kings and commanders coming first followed by those of Roman origin. Francesco Filelfo first translated the Greek text into Latin sometime during the life of Filippo Maria Visconti, Duke of Milan (1392-1447), to whom the translation is dedicated. Baltimore The Walters Art Museum W.388 The primary language in this manuscript is Latin. 1r - 128v Collection of texts by Pseudo-Aurelius Victor (?), Cornelius Nepos, and Plutarch i,r - i,v Unidentified Text Virgo deus cel(?) virgo(?) Likely a prayer to the Virgin ii,r - vi,v Title Page, Table of Contents, and Index Plinius de viris illustribus Fol. ii, r is a title page listing the three texts, fol. ii, v is a table of contents and lists the three texts along with their location (foliation); Fols. iii-v, r serve as an index and give a list, in alphabetical order, of the different people discussed in the three texts along with their locations The relationship of this text to the rest of the manuscript is unclear; based on the hand, was perhaps contemporary with the manuscript itself or added within a century of its creation 1r - 25v De Viris Illustribus Plinius de viris illustribus incipit Proca rex albanorum amulium et numitorem filios habuit Text detailing the lives of illustrious Romans 26r - 85v De excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae (?)...ab(?) aemilio probo Non dubito fore plerosque Attice qui hoc genus scripturae leve This text is the only preserved book (of approximately 16) of Nepos' longer work De Viris Illustribus. It contains the biographies and descriptions of famous commanders and generals. Originally the text was believed to be written by Aemilius Probus, a late fourth- to early fifth-century grammarian, based on an epigram that appears after the "Life of Hannibal" naming him. Later scholars found evidence that the text was in fact written centuries earlier and, in addition, discovered two biographies from Nepos' book on Roman historians (on Cato and Atticus) in the letters of Cicero. Though other copies of Nepos' text include the biographies of Cato and Atticus alongside those of the commanders and generals, the Walters' text concludes after the life of Hannibal and following epigram. At the end of the text is a twelve line epigram that was added by Aemilius Probus to Nepos' text as described above. 86r - 87v Dedicatory letter preceding Plutarch's Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata Apothegmata plutarch...(?) Lectitanti mihi nuper grece quedam princeps optime Dedicatory letter from Francesco Filelfo to Filippo Maria Visconti (1392-1447) 87v - 127v Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata Cum Artaxerxi Persarum regi

Sections of paper are interspersed with periodic bifolia of parchment throughout the manuscript; the pastedowns and flyleaves are composed of modern paper; the original flyleaves are palimpsests from a re-used Carolingian(?) manuscript

 Foliation: i+i-vi+128+i20.5 14.0 15.0 9.5 Black ink foliation, upper right corners, rectos

i+Quire 1: 6 (prefatory material, fols. i-vi), Quires 2,3: 14 (fols. vi-27); Quire 4: 18 (fols. 28-45); Quire 5: 16 (fols. 46-61); Quire 6: 14 (fols. 62-75); Quire 7: 12 (fols. 76-87); Quire 8: 16 (fols. 88-103); Quire 9: 18 (fols. 104-121); Quire 10: 8 with 7th folio missing (fols. 122-128) Written in blank ink on bottom right verso After front flyleaf i, there are six folios of prefatory text that have been foliated i-vi

 Unclear if the rubric is original or added later, but the handwriting suggests it is roughly contemporary Unclear if rubric is original or was added later, but the handwriting suggests it is roughly contemporary Written in humanist cursive; likely the same hand for all three texts The initial for each text and/or section left blank except for on fol. 1r; text in black ink with some added decoration in red ink on fol. 1r Rubric and incipit for Pseudo-Aurelius Victor's De Viris Illustribus Pseudo-Aurelius Victor's De Viris Illustribus Text page

Original fifteenth century Italian binding in brown sheep(?) leather; the gatherings in paper with parchment bifolio between each; blind tooled rectangular design, the central panel with four-petaled flowers and the external frame with interlocking half circles; the original flyleaves palimpsests from a re-used Carolingian(?) manuscript; two strap clasps now mostly missing, only scarlet stubs remain; impressions of now-missing rosette-shaped catch plates preserved; re-backed ca.1900-1930(?) when the boards were interchanged and machine-made paper inserted at the beginning and end of the text; the manuscript title on the fore edge in caps

 Second quarter of 15th century CE Italy Created in Italy in the fifteenth century CE Henry Walters, Baltimore, purchased from Leo S. Olschki (bookseller, Florence) before 1931 (inv. no. 30176; list ca. 1912, no. 26(?)) Walters Art Museum, 1931, by Henry Walters' bequest Relevant Works Nepos, Cornelius and John Carew Rolfe. On great generals; On historians. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1929. De Ricci, Seymour. Census of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the United States and Canada. Vol. 1. New York: H. W. Wilson Company, 1935, p. 838, no. 471. Sherwin Jr., Walter K. "De Viris Illustribus: Two Unexamined MSS in the Walters Art Gallery." Classical World 65, no. 5 (1972): 145-146. Marshall, Peter K. The manuscript tradition of Cornelius Nepos. London: Institute of Classical Studies, 1977, p.65. Sage, Michael M. "The 'De Viris Illustribus' Authorship and Date." Hermes 108 (1980): 83-100. Titchener, Frances. “Cornelius Nepos and the Biographical Tradition.” Greece & Rome 50, no. 1 (2003): 85–99. Pryzwansky, Molly M. “Cornelius Nepos: Key Issues and Critical Approaches.” Classical Journal 105 (2009): 97–108. Meer, Tineke ter. Apophthegmatum. Libri I-IV Libri I-IV. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Art Medicine Museum Poetry Script Muhammad, the Prophet Kashmiri Horses Walters Art Museum Document Astrology Devotion History Legal Literature -- Poetry Literature -- Prose Liturgy Philosophy Science Science -- Medicine Scripture Sufism Theology Mineralogy Logic Geography Geomancy Cosmology Cartography Fortune-telling Koran Qur`an Firman Palimpsest Prayer Bible Gospels Psalter Missal Lectionary Book of Hours Antiphonary Homilary Processional Horologion Breviary Hymnal Chronicle Maghreb Sub-Saharan (West) Africa Turkey Afghanistan Central Asia Egypt England India Iran Iraq Pakistan Germany France Austria Netherlands Ethiopia Armenia Flanders Greece Mamluk Mughal Ottoman Ottonian Armenian Byzantine Abbasid Qajar Rajput Christian Arabic Austrian Dutch Egyptian Fatimid German Indian Islamic Persian Safavid Timurid Turkish Umayyad English French Flemish Ethiopian Carolingian Calligraphy Colophon Headpiece Illumination Illustration Medallion Miniature Ornament Painting Early Abbasid script Ragini Romanesque Gothic Watermark Grotesques Historiated initial Inhabited initial White-vine lettering Textura Batarda Humanistic Uncial Accordion book Album Book Codex Manuscript Heraldry Saint's Life Drawing Grisaille New Abbasid style Musical notation Russia Romania Charter Russian Genealogy Mass book Prayer book Gospel Lectionary Psalter-Hours Treatise Grammar Gloss Pontifical Private devotional text Gradual Protective scroll Scroll 10th century 11th century 12th century 13th century 14th century 15th century 16th century 17th century 18th century 19th century 20th century 8th century 9th century Block book Caroline minuscule Central Arab lands (Near East) Chart English secretary hand Kufic Gothic book hand Original binding Treasure binding Gospel Book Spanish Spain Italian Italy Coptic Scrapbook American United States Maryland Historical Society Friendship book Friendship Biography Judaism Talmud Collection of Sermons Notable Notable binding Textbook Scholarly compendium Ancient Greece Ancient Rome Literature Liturgical Devotional Scriptural Theological Legal Historical Scientific Scientific -- Medical Literary -- Prose Literary -- Poetry Philosophical Astrological Sufi English Chronicle Italian Book Codex Walters Art Museum Italy 15th century History Sufism Scholarly compendium Ancient Greece Ancient Rome Humanistic Original binding Textbook