The purpose of these reflections is to check agreements and
disagreements among the editors’ introductions to the various
volumes, and also the website, to see whether we have together
presented a coherent account of the history of the Dialogus and its transmission.
1 Dial. 1-5, ABMA vol.
35
1 Dial. 6, ABMA vol.
41
1 Dial. 7, ABMA vol.
42
2 Dial., ABMA vol.
20
3.1 Dial., ABMA vol.
20
3.2 Dial., ABMA vol.
33
Since the order of volumes
does not correspond to the order of the parts and tracts of
the Dialogus, references by volume may
cause confusion. I have therefore linked every mention of a
volume to the list above.
(N.B. For sigla see Witnesses
to
the Text: Sigla and Descriptions.)
When John Scott and I began this project in
1993 we had no idea which were the better manuscripts or how the
manuscripts were related. (There are more than 40 manuscripts of
some part or all of the Dialogus.) We had lists
of manuscripts and searched
for more, but as far as we could discover no one had published a
general survey of the manuscript tradition. There can be no
presumption that the oldest manuscripts are the best, and in any
case dating is often uncertain. So we decided that the best method
was to sample. Once we had microfilms, Scott and I made collations
of manuscripts for sample passages. We took these samples from
various parts of the Dialogus,
because manuscript relations
may not be the same throughout the work. We collated: 1 Dial.
1
(later elaborated), 1 Dial.
3.1-5, 1 Dial.
4.1-5, 1 Dial.
7.1-3. We did
not sample 2 Dial. There were only a few sources for 3.1 Dial.
For 3.2 Dial. there were many manuscripts, and we sampled 3.2
Dial. 1.1-5.
Some time later we made a study of the different endings of 3.2
Dial., in the hope that this might further clarify manuscript
relationships for 3.2 Dial.
We found that indeed manuscript relations are not
the same throughout the work. This is presumably because of changes
in exemplars,
or because a manuscript includes corrections (or what were
thought to be corrections) taken from several sources; see vol. 35,
pp.xiii-xiv. Nevertheless, in 1 Dial. and 3.2 Dial. it is
possible to distinguish a number of more-or-less stable groups
and sub-groups.
For 1 Dial. our collation of sample passages showed 4 or 5
groups. George Knysh had noticed that there were groups of
manuscripts that in some places used different placenames (eg. VcVfOxAv
used placenames from the Ancona region); groups distinguised
in that way corresponded to the groups revealed by our sample
collations.
Later we re-worked a draft edition of 2 Dial. made by Jan
Ballweg. His and our studies suggested that there are two main
groups among the manuscripts. The sub-groups of the two main
groups are not as clearly distinguished as the sub-groups are
for 1 Dial. and 3.2 Dial. See vol. 20,
p.14, and my translation of Ballweg
“Witnesses to 2 Dialogus.
When preparing the printed volumes we posted on the website
comments on problem passages, which often throw light on
manuscript relationships. See comments on the text of 1 Dial.
1-5,
2 Dial., 3.1 Dial. In the
apparatus of the printed volumes we refer readers to website
discussion of the problem passages and also to Scott’s study of
omissions/additions (see below).
The manuscripts of 1 Dial., 2 Dial, 3.1 Dial. and 3.2 Dial.
have different family relationships, which suggests that these
components were put into circulation separately. (However,
manuscripts containing the two tracts of 2 Dial. descend from an
archetype that contained both tracts (vol. 20,
p.11), which suggests that the two tracts were put into
circulation together). The filiations of components grouped
together in the one codex are often different; for a suggested
explanation see vol. 35,
pp.xvi-xix (endorsed by Ubl and Heinen, vol. 33,
p.lx).
It seemed to us (Kilcullen and Scott) at first that the most suitable leading manuscript was Vc, to which Vf was very similar. (Originally we called these Rc and Rf.) I emailed the then Prefect of the Vatican Library, Leonard Boyle, who replied that Vc was a 14th century manuscript. According to Etzkorn also (Iter Vaticanum, pp.88-9) Vc is a 14th century manuscript; however, according to Scholz (Unbekannte Kirchenpolitische Streitschriften, p.143) Vc belongs to the 15th century. According to both Etzkorn (p.211) and Scholz (p.144) Vf belongs to the 14th century. However, from similarities in presentation it seemed to us that Vc and Vf must be of about the same date (see vol. 35, pp.xx-xxi, 340). We now believe that both MSS were made toward the end of the 15th century, at about the same time as the two incunabula editions were published: we were persuaded of this late date by the identification of the Vc artwork (see Miethke, “Marsilius und Ockham: Publikum und Leser ihrere Politischen Schriften im Späteren Mittelalter", Medioevo 6 (1980), p.559 n.54).
In our early communications with George Knysh we found that
he disagreed with our view that VcVfOxAv and Ba
were the best manuscripts; he seemed to prefer BbAnFi.
According to him VcVfOxAv were late manuscripts
containing material added by some editor(s) after Ockham’s
death. We have come to accept a late date, but we are not
persuaded that the material found in VcVfOxAv (and also
in We) and not in other manuscripts was the result of
extensive rewriting by someone other than Ockham. In our opinion
these passages are, at least in in 1 Dial. 1-5, in almost every case not
additions made to Ockham’s text but omissions of parts of his
text by the copyists who made the other manuscripts. Scott made
a study of
the omissions/additions in 1 Dial. 1-5; he gave individual
consideration to these passages and assigned to each a number
indicating his assessment of genuineness. A few passages may have been added by someone
else, e.g. marginal comments taken into the text (cf. passages 7, 12, 22), but
most of them he assessed as authentic. See also vol. 35,
pp.xv-xvi.
In some manuscripts there may be more non-genuine material
in some sections of Dialogus than in others; we do not
reject Knysh’s view that in 1 Dial. 6 and 7 some passages found
in We are “elegant improvements” or otherwise
inauthentic; see vol. 41,
p.6 and vol.
42,
pp.136-142, the variants underlined. Similarly, there is some
inauthentic material in 1 Dial. 4 in the manuscript Fr (see vol.
35,
p.xxvii n.92).
At
first Scott and I and Knysh supposed that We was a
manuscript of the late 15th century. We all three of us changed
our view of We as a result of Eifler’s
study
(enter “Weimar Q 23”), according to which We is an early
manuscript, 1340-1345 (though Knysh dates We to
1355-1360 – see below). The text of VcVfOxAv, and also
Ba, resembles the text of We because (we now
believe) those manuscripts descend from some ancestor(s) that
were corrected against a manuscript or manuscripts like We.
For our (Kilcullen and Scott) current view of the families
for 1 Dial. 1-5 see vol. 35,
pp.xii-xvi. We postulate a great deal of “contamination” and
also probable intermediate ancestors (vol. 35,
pp.xxi, xxii-xxiii, xxxi), but we have not attempted to
construct a stemma. In our opinion there were non-extant
intermediaries between all the extant manuscripts and the
manuscript Ockham (or someone else) first released for copying,
since there are omissions or other errors peculiar to each
manuscript.
Our lead manuscript is We. We do not regard it as
infallible. “We follow We other things being equal [e.g.
in word order, choice among synonyms – the “accidentals”]; often,
but not always, we follow We even against all or most
other manuscripts” (vol. 35, pp.xix-xx).
Sometimes we follow other manuscripts against We; vol. 35,
p.xx n.48. We also put high value on Ba (vol. 35,
p.xxiii). We report representative manuscripts from all
families.
Knysh’s current view of the families for 1 Dial. 6 and 7 is
like ours for 1 Dial. 1-5 (vol. 41,
pp.6-7), with some differences that may well be due to changes
in exemplar or source of corrections. He notes (vol. 41,
p.5) that between 1 Dial. 1-5 and 1 Dial. 6 and 7 Fr, Ax
and Na change their affiliations, and that, apart from Ba
itself, the members of the group to which Ba belongs
deteriorate in quality. He notes (vol. 42,
p.5) that after 1 Dial. 7.44 VcVfOxAv show no sign of
correction from a We-type source. Such variations are to
be expected in a much-contaminated text tradition.
Whereas Eifler dates We to 1340-1345, Knysh dates
it to 1355-1360; see vol. 41,
pp.7-10, 15-16. And he argues for an early date of Bb,
namely 1343/1344; see vol. 41,
p.6; vol.42, pp.6-8. (His argument regarding Bb turns on
two documents concerning Francis de Ascoli: he does not quote
them and I have not been able to access them.)
I do not think that much turns on the dating of We
and Bb. Both are copies of non-extant manuscripts (both
omit passages found in other MSS), and in any case I do not
believe that older manuscripts are always better: “Since
manuscripts are durable, a later [i.e. a manuscript from a late
date] manuscript may be a [direct] copy of an early exemplar”.
On the other hand, “Even an early manuscript might be a copy of
a copy of a copy” (vol. 35,
p.xv).
Knysh: “These two oldest manuscripts, taken together,
correct one another well (We as to lost words or
homoioteleutons in Bb, and Bb as to a few
elegant improvements to the original in We) and offer a
text which probably comes very close to the one Ockham released
for publication” (vol. 41, p.6). So Knysh treats Bb as the lead manuscript
and uses We to fill gaps. There is a difference of
policy here: Kilcullen and Scott follow We mainly and do
not give Bb any special place.
To sum up: Knysh, Kilcullen and Scott agree pretty much on
the filiations of the manuscripts of 1 Dial. It is a complex and
contaminated tradition (cf. vol. 35, pp.xix-xxx), in which some manuscripts change families,
and what is true in relation to one section of the work may not
be true elsewhere. Our apparatus records the variants so that
scholars can reconsider our choices.
Witnesses to 2 Dial. and to 3.1 Dial. are discussed in only
one volume (vol.
20)
so there is no agreement/disagreement among editors.
Offler had already noted the value of Na and Ve,
“The Three Modes of Natural Law in
Ockham”, Franciscan Studies 37 (1977), pp. 207-218. In
translating the sections of 3.2 Dial. included in LFMOW
we had made use of 11 manuscripts, including Na, Ve, Vd, Ba, Mz
(LFMOW, pp.339-340) and Offler’s text of 3.2 Dial. 3.6 (p.368).
The sampling made by Scott and Kilcullen of 3.2
Dial. 1.1-5 and study of the endings confirmed
that Na and Ve (which we then called Re)
were the most convincing manuscripts, and they also had the
longest text. Mz also seemed good. All the other
manuscripts seemed inferior. It seemed that Vd (then
called Rd) had been partially corrected against some
manuscripts akin to NaVeMz. Sub-groups among the
inferior manuscripts were noted: ArPzLy, BaDiToEsMw, AuPbFrPeCa.
There seemed to be a connection between Fr and Mw.
Following on these studies, Scott made a corrected text of
3.2 Dial. (Prol.
1.1-5,
6-17, 18-31; 2.1-29; 3.1-4, 5-7, 8-23), with
accepted variants asterisked, using mainly NaVeMz, also Pe,
Pz and Ly, also sometimes Es (then called
Md), and sometimes other manuscripts. After Ubl and
Heinen published their edition (vol. 33),
Scott revised
the English
translation that had earlier (1999) been presented in parallel
columns with his corrected text.
The analysis of the text tradition presented by Ubl and
Heinen in vol.
33
is very thorough. Their conclusions are in line with those
arrived at by John Scott. They show that the manuscript
tradition has three branches, one consisting of VeNa,
another consisting of Mz, the third containing all the
other manuscripts, among which they distinguish various
sub-groups and note some “contamination”. To explain
resemblances not due to direct copying they postulate several
non-extant intermediate ancestors. They distinguish eight
classes according to distance from the original text (vol. 33, p.xliv).
Their analysis is neatly summarised by a diagram on p.xliii.
Their analysis and Scott's agree on the division of the
manuscript tradition into three branches and
on the superior quality of Na and Ve.
It seems, then, that in respect of both 1 Dial. and 3.2
Dial. there is a reasonable consensus among the editors about
manuscript relations and leading manuscripts.
See my remarks on dating,
vol. 20, pp. 110, 113, and the
quotation from Offler, p.113 n.24.
Kilcullen: “Ockham
could have begun to write 1 Dial. at any time after he left
Avignon (May 26th, 1328),
but perhaps it became the main focus of his attention after
he completed OND (mid-1332, according to Professor Offler)…. It
must have been finished before (or soon after) the death of John
XXII in 4 December 1334, since in several places John is
referred to as being still pope and his successor is nowhere
mentioned. The most likely time of composition is, therefore,
1332-1335”; vol.
35, pp.ix-x.
Knysh:
Ockham began the Dialogus in 1331 (vol. 42, p.12);
he revised it in 1332 (vol. 42, p.13,
14); he completed it no later than 1333 “as to the overwhelming
majority of its textual streams” (vol. 41, p.31);
he revised it again in 1342 and published it in 1343 (vol. 42,
p.21). So according to Knysh, Ockham worked on 1 Dial., though
not continuously, from the early 1330s until 1343.
Ubl
and Heinen: “Ockham conceived the project of writing the Dialogus
in the early 1330s, shortly before the death of his nemesis Pope
John XXII on December 4th 1334”; vol. 33,
p.ix. This is a starting date; they do not give an end date.
So
there is some disagreement here: finished by 1335
(Kilcullen); substantially completed 1333 but revised again in
1342 (Knysh).
Kilcullen: “the first tract seems to have
been written during 1334 and the second sometime through the
period between 1 November 1331 and 2 December 1334”; vol. 20,
pp.11-12. The other
editors do not comment on the date of 2 Dial.
Both tracts of 3 Dial. as they survive are
incomplete. See vol.
20,
p.108-9, and comments highlighted in pink in the analysis
of
3.1 Dial. and the analysis
of
3.2 Dial. There
are three possibilities (vol. 20,
p.113): (1) these tracts were completed and the
ends lost, or (2) they were abandoned, or (3) Ockham continued
working on them until he died or could no longer work. I regard
(3) as most likely. (From a work put into circulation
uncompleted, end pages may also have been lost.)
We cannot be sure that 3.1 Dial. was begun before 3.2
Dial. or vice versa: Ockham may have worked back-and-forth on
both of them (“We are not entitled to assume that he never had
more than one piece of work in progress at any particular time”;
Offler, quoted vol.
20,
p.113 n.24).
Kilcullen: See vol. 20,
pp.110-113. Relying
on Professor Offler’s suggestions about the dates of other works
and their relations with Dial.3, it seems “likely that Ockham was
working on 3.1 Dialogus from 1339 or 1340”; vol. 20,
p.111. “Ockham was
working on both tracts [not well expressed: I do not mean that
it is certain that he worked back-and-forth on both, but
rather that he began to work on one or the other or
back-and-forth on both] of 3 Dialogus from the early
1340s… he may have continued to work on them… even to the end
of his life in 1347 or 1348”; vol. 20, p.113. This
means a gap of some six years between Ockham’s completing 1
Dial. and his beginning 3 Dial.
The other editors do not mention the date of 3.1
Dial. except incidentally.
Ubl
and Heinen: Ockham “resume[d] writing the Dialogus
around the year 1340”; vol. 33, p.xi.
“It is generally assumed that Ockham began to resume writing the
Dialogus [i.e. 3 Dial.] during the years 1337/38, at the
latest before the death of Benedict the 12th (April 25 1342)”; vol. 33, p.xiv.
They say that according to Miethke Dial. 3.1 was completed
before 1342, so the composition of 3.2 Dial has to be dated to
the years 1341 to 1346 (p.xv).
I
have a minor disagreement with this. I don’t think we can be
sure that Ockham did not begin work on 3.2 Dial. until he had
completed 3.1 Dial. (he may have worked back-and-forth on both),
and we do not know when or whether he did complete 3.1 Dial. So
I would say that 3.2 Dial. was begun in the early 1340s and may
never have been completed.
Given
the size and complexity of the components of the Dialogus,
there must have been various plans, revised plans, draft texts
and revised texts. Knysh is the only one of the editors to have
offerred an account of stages of composition of 1 Dial. See vol. 42, p.11ff.
He suggests that at first Ockham envisaged a small work, a tractatulus.
[In fact it is not Ockham but Discipulus who says, near the end
(p.360), that he had thought the work would be a tractatulus
– this may be part of the fiction of the dialogue, not a
statement of Ockham’s own original plan.] Knysh dates the tractatulus
to 1331 (p.12). Ockham made a major revision in 1332 (pp.13,
14); he did not at that time envisage immediate publication,
because of his disagreements with Bonagratia (p. 15 n.59). The Dialogus
was a personal theoretical project, and the Master’s desire
several times expressed (pp.14-15) to complete it quickly does
not imply a desire to publish it soon (pp.20-21). The work was
substantially complete in 1333, but Ockham did not publish it
then but left it in his archives (p.21). Nine years later, in
1342, he took it up again in response to Clement VI’s attack on
Ludwig, and he made another round of revisions and published 1
Dial. early in 1343 (p.21). Knysh lists material he judges
(tentatively) to have been inserted in the pre-publication
revision of 1342 (vol.
42,
pp.14-16, 21-26).
Knysh
regards Bb as the earliest extant manuscript; he dates
it 1343-1344 (vol.
41, p.6, vol.
42, pp.
6-8). Though he dates Bb to about the same time as he
believes 1 Dial. was published, Knysh does not suggest that Bb
is the manuscript then published. (And it can’t be, since it
omits material other manuscripts have: vol. 35, p.xxiv
n.80.)
Knysh
postulates that after Ockham’s death the surviving members of
the Munich dissident group engaged in another round of editorial
activity, prompted by their plan to re-unite with the main body
of the Franciscan Order. He suggests that from this activity We
emerged 1355-1360 (vol.
41, p.16).
These hypotheses cannot be regarded as established. My present opinion is that Knysh's account is speculative and needs much further discussion.
By “publication” I mean the decision (by the author, or by
someone else in control of the author’s copy) to release the
work to be copied and disseminated. I do not regard the date of
the earliest extant manuscript as the publication date, since
there could well have been earlier copies that have perished –
indeed that seems to be the case for all parts of the Dialogus, since every
early manuscript has omissions others do not have.
My
view is that 1 Dial. would have been published soon after it was
completed (in 1334 or soon after), but I think we do not know
when or by whom 2 Dial., 3.1 Dial. and 3.2 Dial. were published.
“Since 1 Dial. was written to influence an ongoing controversy,
there is no reason why it would not have been published… as soon
as it was finished, without waiting for the other Parts of the Dialogus
to be completed; the different manuscript affinities of the
several components [i.e. Parts and their Tracts] suggest that
they were put into circulation separately”; vol.
35, p.ix. I have not suggested any
date of publication for 2 Dial.; it was not published together
with any of the other components, because its manuscript
affinities are different. “For the two tracts of 3
Dialogus we have no evidence of when they were put into
circulation”; vol. 20, p.113. We also do not know
who put the two tracts of 3 Dial. into circulation:
presumably not Ockham himself, if he never finished them.
Knysh:
“It is only then, sometime in late 1342 or early 1343, that the
text [of 1 Dial.] shelved some ten years earlier saw the light
of day”; vol.
41, p.32.
According to Knysh Ockham could not publish 1 Dial. until
Michael and Bonagratia died, vol.
41, pp.31-2.
Thus there is disagreement between me and Knysh on the
publication date of 1 Dial.: I think there was no reason for
delay, Knysh thinks there was a reason. Whether his reason is
convincing depends on whether we think Ockham’s disagreements
with Bonagratia and Michael would have prevented him from
publishing his views; see vol.
41,
pp.22-30.
Ubl
and Heinen: “After finishing [they do not specify a date] the
first Part on heresy, he put the project [of writing the Dialogus]
on the shelf for several years”; vol. 33, p.ix.
This does not mean that 1 Dial. was not published but put on the
shelf; it means that after completing 1 Dial. he did not begin
to work on 3 Dial. for several years.
Concerning
3.2 Dial. Ubl and Heinen refer to a “gap between this date
[Ockham’s death] and the beginning of the circulation of 3.2
Dial. in Paris three decades later”, i.e. in the 1370s (vol.
33,
p.xix). “3.2
Dial. first surfaced in Paris during the 1370s” (vol.
33, p.lxi).
“First surfaced in Paris” does not mean first put into
circulation anywhere. This is consistent with my view that we do
not know when or where 3.1 and 3.2 Dial. first began to be
copied.
In my opinion the authenticity of 2 Dial. is doubtful, but
it seems possible that some parts may have been written by
Ockham (though other members of the dissident group held similar
views and could have expressed them in the same way). See vol.
20,
pp.9-10, 12-13. The
other editors have not commented on the authenticity of 2
Dial.
As for 1 Dial. 1-5, though a few reader’s or copyist’s
comments may have been taken into the text (see above), we
do not believe there is reason to regard any of the manuscripts
as generally suspect, with the exception of Fr, which includes
material we believe to be inauthentic (vol.
35,
p.xxvii).
Knysh holds that We is based on a
revision made after Ockham’s death, including “improvements”
made to make the work more intelligible to non-expert readers; vol.
41,
pp.14-15 (“Of course this is a speculative scenario only”). In
his edition he rejects various passages he considers inauthentic
in favour of the readings of Bb; see vol.
41,
p. 6, and vol.
42, p. 136ff
(underlined We variants). In my opinion it is possible
that someone not Ockham inserted some material into We,
but I do not believe that this happened to any extent in 1 Dial.
1-5.
Miethke “Ein
neues Selbstzeugnis”, pp.26-7, accepts prologus primus
as authentic and dates it to 1335-1338. Knysh rejects it as
inauthentic (vol.
41,
p.12), and dates it to the period (after Ockham’s death) during
which the Munich Franciscans were recovering from the plague (vol.
41,
p.14). I am not convinced by Knysh’s suggestions as to the purpose
the prologus primus might have served (vol.
41,
pp.11-14). In the introduction to a transcription
Scott and I posted on the web early in the project we said: “The
following preface is unlikely to be authentic”. In vol. 35, p.xi, after
various objections to the idea that the Dialogus was
originally anonymous I say: “Two manuscripts, however, include a
preliminary note [prologus primus]… that says that the Dialogus
was originally meant to be anonymous. In Fr the note seems
to have been inserted as a late addition... Fr is a late
manuscript and it contains other probably inauthentic material,
and this note, which is not as well-written as Ockham’s work
usually is, could be dismissed as also inauthentic. We,
however, contains it as an integral part of the manuscript, which
is early and generally reliable.” In the text we relegate prologus
primus to a footnote (vol.
35, p.1).
I now think that the
statement that the prologus primus is “an integral part of
the manuscript” is not true. The first gathering of We
does not match the other gatherings of the manuscript; see Knysh,
vol.
41,
p.9. The existing codex was not bound until the late 15th
century (“aus der Werkstatt des Erfurter Universitätsbuchbinders
Ulrich Frenckel (tätig ca. 1456-1480)”, Eifler). My current
position is that I do not know whether prologus primus is
authentic.
“Class 2 ‘Ancona’
manuscripts… appear to have utilised … elements from the Pp for
their Tabula Alphabetica introductory remarks”; Knysh, vol.
41, p.16. If this were true, it would strengthen the
suggestion that the “Ancona” manuscripts were influenced by We
(or by a similar manuscript that also included the prologus
primus). However, I do not see anything in those
remarks that could not have come from the prologus
secundus and/or other parts of the Dialogus.
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