New Acquisition: Confessionale, 1462

A new acquisition to the special collections is Antoninus Florentius, Confessionale and other texts, written in 1462. This manuscript has works in both Latin and Italian, is from Northern Italy, and is written on paper. It is written in brown ink and has evidence of four hands, with hand 1 being the primary scribe of the text. It is a single column text of 25 lines, with rubrication; there are some catchwords found at the bottom center of some of the pages.

A confessionale was a text used to assist the confessor in his tasks. Antoninus Florentius (1389-1459) was a Dominican friar and archbishop of Florence. He had a reputation for his theological knowledge and assisted as a papal theologian at the Council of Florence. He wrote many works including a guide for confessors which was highly regarded. Antoninus was canonized on May 31, 1523.

This particular confessionale is notable for including an extract on women’s dress codes, and a model of confession in the vernacular. The watermarks and vernacular indicate that the book was copied and decorated in Italy. The manuscript also contains two colophons which give the year of completion as 1462. This date was misread as 1402 as the “6” is quite abraded; 1402 is an impossible date as this work was not composed until c. 1437.

The manuscript contains the following sections:

1. 1-23v: Antoninus Florentinus, Confessionale, “Liber primus: De instruction confessoris” (Book 1: On the instruction of the confessor)
2. 23v-95v: Antoninus Florentinus, Confessionale, “Liber secundus: Interrogatorium” (Book 2: Interrogation)
3. 96r-101r: Commentaries on deadly sins and the five senses
4. 101v-102v: Excerpts of canonical and patristic texts
5. 103r-104v: Excerpt from Antoninus Florentinus, De ornatu et habitu mulierum (On the ornamentation and dress of women)
6. 105r-108r: Anonymous, Compendium de doctrina Christiana (Compendium of Christian doctrine)
7. 108v-109v: A model for confession in Italian The first page of the manuscript shows much wear, and the book contains some water damage, ink stains, and later corrections to the text.

There are red under-linings and marginal notes, indicating that this was a much-used manuscript. The pagination is corrected after f. 19; it appears that the original numbering skipped a page as there is no evidence of missing leaves. A later reader went in and corrected the numbers to reflect the correct pagination. The manuscript is that it is bound in vellum manuscript waste of a choir book. This waste also dates from the 15th century. The manuscript also has a 17th century label on the spine.

— Patricia McCall, Special Projects Archivist/Doctoral Candidate, UO History of Art and Architecture