Editing and Illuminated Arabic-Latin Masterwork of the Fifteenth Century. Manuscript Vat. Urb. Lat. 1384 as a Philological Challenge
Résumé
The manuscrit Urb. Lat. 1384 represents an exceptional testimony to the interest of Renaissance Italian Courts towards Islamic culture. A richly ornamented, bigraphic/bilingual Arabic-Latin anthology probably conceived between 1478 and 1482, it contains an astromagical and an astronomic treaty, a Qur’ānic anthology, two explanatory prefaces and two Arabic-Latin glossaries. It was conceived by the Sicily-born humanist Guglielmo Raimondo Moncada (alias Flavius Mithridates) for the duke of Urbino, and was decorated by some of the best miniaturists of the time. This paper examines the already published works that generally deal with a single section of this ensemble. While trying to complete or correct our knowledge on some aspects of this book, it tries to capitalize on these preceding works and to propose a possible strategy to achieve a much needed global complete edition.