Registrum Gregorii
| Title | Registrum Gregorii |
|---|---|
| Alternative title | Registrum epistolarum |
| Wikidata Item no. | Q128501710 |
| Century | saec. VII |
| Place of origin | Rome |
| European region of origin | Central Italy |
| Author | Christof Rolker |
| Structure | chronological |
| No. of manuscripts | very many (100+) |
This collection of 684 (Ewald: 686) letters of Gregory the Great, according to John the Deacon derived from the register itself, is the largest collection of Gregory's letters extant in any manuscripts. Like the lost original register, the letters are divided into 15 indictiones. Commonly, it is copied in two volumes with the first containing 391 (Ewald: 393) letters written during the first seven years of Gregory's pontificate (indictiones VII-XV) and the second containing 293 letters from the second half of his pontificate (indictiones I-VII), respectively. A number of copies contain only letters of either half, and sometimes the two parts are copied in the wrong sequence (thus beginning with letters written in the first indictio).
Ewald and Norberg refer to more or less complete copies of the Register tradition as R, and use r for copies containing only the first part of R; copies of the second part only are ρ in Ewald but e in Norberg.
Manuscripts
According to Ewald, Studien p. 445, there are seven manuscripts that surely represent the pure (and complete) form of R:
- "Codex Casinensis 71" (saec. XI) = R1 = Montecassino, Archivio dell’Abbazia, 71.
- "Codex Parisiensis 2281" (saec. XI/XII) = Paris, BnF, lat. 2281
- "Codex Urbnias 99" (saec. XV) = Città del Vaticano, BAV, Urb. lat. 99
- "Codex Trevirensis 171" (saec. X) = R2 = Trier, Stadtbibliothek, 171/1626.
- "Codex Carpentoractensis 213" (saec. X/XII) = Carpentras, BM, 39 (!)
- "Codex Laurentianus, Conventi soppressi 541" (saec. XI/XII) = Firenze, BML, Conv. soppr. 541
- "Codex Matritensis B 12" (saec. XII) = Madrid, BNE, MSS/215
In addition, he counted 25 manuscripts which contain some version of R (including nine incomplete copies like Sankt Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 670 = R3). In his count, there are five (or six) copies of r and ten of ρ.
Norberg mainly used R1 ("quasi fundamentum editionis", Praefatio p. X), and additionally drew on R2 and (for the 36 letters found there) R3; he does not discuss any other copies of R. In the Praefatio, he only mentions six manuscripts containing either half of R:
- Paris, BnF, lat. 2279 = r1
- Paris, BnF, lat. 11674 = r2
- Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, C. 238 inf. = e1
- Paris, BnF, nouv. acq. lat. 1452 = e2
- Paris, BnF, lat. 2278 = e3
- Trier, Stadtbibliothek, 170/36 = e4
Mixed versions and "other" manuscripts
As for mixed versions which combine R or ρ with C (= Collectio CC epistolarum) and/or P (= Collectio Pauli), Ewald lists seven manuscripts containing ρ+P (p. 488), one for C+P+ρ (p. 491), five for R+P+C (p. 496), some 20 for R + additions (pp. 499-502), and two of a specific version of R+P+C he dubbed "Mailänder Codification" (p. 502). Finally, in his count there are 18 other manuscripts containing a substantial part of Gregory's epistolary (pp. 506-509).
Literature
Ewald, Studien.- Ewald/Hartmann, MGH Epp. 1 (edition), MGH Epp. 2 (introduction and edition).- Hartmann, De codicibus pp. VII-XXXVII.- Norberg, Praefatio.
