{"id":579,"date":"2023-12-14T13:44:02","date_gmt":"2023-12-14T13:44:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/?p=579"},"modified":"2024-08-06T11:44:02","modified_gmt":"2024-08-06T10:44:02","slug":"secretum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/secretum\/","title":{"rendered":"The Secretum Secretorum of Louis the Great"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Hertford’s rare books cataloguer, Sophie Floate<\/strong>, writes about one of the library’s oldest items: Hertford MS 2. This beautifully illuminated 14th century manuscript was commissioned by King Louis the Great of Hungary.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Hertford College Library has a small number of medieval manuscripts, currently housed at the Bodleian. Hertford College MS 2 is a copy of the \u2018Secretum Secretorum\u2019, a pseudo-Aristotelian work with an uncertain background. It purports to be, in part, a series of letters from Aristotle to Alexander the Great, advising him on matters of leadership, statecraft along with a miscellany of medical, health and astrological information. Though early translations claim to be from a lost Greek original, it is now thought more likely to be an Arabic work composed during the 10th<\/sup> century, known as \u2018Sirr al-asr\u0101\u2019. Though it purports to be translated by Yahya ibn al-Bitriq, this is also doubtful. The text of the copy at Hertford was certainly translated from the Arabic by Philip of Tripoli in the 12th<\/sup> century. By the 14th<\/sup> century, when this manuscript was produced, the work was very widely read in medieval scholarly circles and there are believed to be over 300 extant medieval copies today. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hertford College MS 2 was commissioned by Louis the Great, King of Hungary and Croatia (and later Poland) from 1342-1382. Louis succeeded his father as King when he was only 16 and launched many military campaigns during his reign. He evidently showed some interest in cultural affairs too, as after his occupation of Naples he had King Robert\u2019s library brought to him. He commissioned this manuscript and another, the \u2018Illuminated Chronicle\u2019 (now in the National Sz\u00e9ch\u00e9nyi Library in Budapest), which were both produced in a Hungarian workshop. Mikl\u03ccs Meggyesi, son of Hertul the court painter of Louis, has traditionally been identified as the illuminator, though there is no real evidence for this.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many manuscripts copies of \u2018Secretum Secretorum\u2019 have illuminations depicting either Aristotle or Alexander, or both, but the Hertford manuscript depicts King Louis instead, on the first folio. It is a \u00be length portrait within an illuminated letter \u2018H\u2019; Louis is shown holding a sword and sceptre while his shield has the ostrich-headed crest associated with his reign. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In the lower margins of the page are diamond-shaped heraldic coat of arms \u2013 the Hungarian coat of arms on the left, those of Arpad and Angevin in the middle, with those of Poland of the right. Stylistic analysis and comparison with the \u2018Illuminated Chronicle\u2019 date this manuscript to the 1360s.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The manuscript has some marginal annotations in a contemporary hand and it has been suggested by Laura Fabian (in her article \u2018L\u2019image du roi sage en Occident au XIVe si\u00e8cle et un exemple concernant la Hongrie \u00e0 l\u2019\u00e9poque angevine\u202f: le Secretum secretorum de Louis le Grand de Hongrie\u2019, 2018) that these might have been by Louis\u2019 official biographer, John of K\u00fck\u00fcll\u0151, since he quotes several passages from the \u2018Secretum Secretorum\u2019 in his work \u2018Chronica Hungarorum\u2019 and some of the passages marked \u2018NB\u2019 with a manicule in the manuscript match the sections quoted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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How it came to leave Louis I\u2019s library is unclear; in fact, its journey is completely unknown until it came into the possession of Edmund Hall, a priest who had matriculated at Pembroke College, Oxford, in 1636. Hall left Oxford before finishing his degree in order to fight with the Parliamentarians, returning to Oxford in 1647 after the army became too radicalized for his Presbyterian views. He was the author of several pamphlets and was once imprisoned for his criticism of the government. It\u2019s not clear why he gave this manuscript to Magdalen Hall in 1658 but he is listed in the Benefactors Book as giving the manuscript along with several printed books. The manuscript has marginal notes in a 17th<\/sup> century hand, presumably that of Hall.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Now that this item has been added to the Medieval Manuscripts in Oxford Libraries catalogue<\/a>, it can be more easily found by researchers. We hope that this will lead to further research into the item and its history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further reading<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Williams, S. J. (2022). “Chapter 12 The Pseudo-Aristotelian Secret of Secrets as a Mirror of Princes: A Cautionary Tale” in A Critical Companion to the \u2018Mirrors for Princes\u2019 Literature<\/em>. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1163\/9789004523067_014<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

F\u00e1bi\u00e1n, Laura (2017) L’image du roi sage en Occident au XIVe si\u00e8cle et un exemple concernant la Hongrie \u00e0 l’\u00e9poque angevine: le Secretum secretorum de Louis le Grand de Hongrie.<\/em> In: \u201cM\u2019en anei en Ongria\u201d. Relations franco-hongroises au Moyen \u00c2ge II. Memoria Hungariae (4). MTA, Debrecen, pp. 83-103. ISBN 9789635088461 [Accessed 14 December 2023.] http:\/\/real.mtak.hu\/71099\/ <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Links<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Hertford MS 2, Weston Library, Oxford. Listed in the Medieval Manuscripts in Oxford Libraries catalogue https:\/\/medieval.bodleian.ox.ac.uk\/catalog\/manuscript_15981 <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Information about our upcoming Library renovation project<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rare Books and Archives at Hertford<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hertford Archives’ guide to the history and records of Hart Hall, Magdalen Hall and Hertford College<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Related posts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Treasured Donations<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Early Modern Library<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cataloguing at Hertford College Library<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hertford’s rare books cataloguer, Sophie Floate, writes about one of the library’s oldest items: Hertford MS 2. This beautifully illuminated 14th century manuscript was commissioned by King Louis the Great of Hungary. Hertford College Library has a small number of medieval manuscripts, currently housed at the Bodleian. Hertford College MS 2 is a copy of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":594,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[10,9,26,25,30],"class_list":["post-579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rare-books","tag-17th-century","tag-donation","tag-library","tag-magdalen-hall","tag-manuscripts"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/12\/MS-2-header.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":609,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579\/revisions\/609"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.hertford.ox.ac.uk\/library-archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}