Volume 2

Universal palaeography, or, Fac-similes of writings of all nations and periods, copied from the most celebrated and authentic manuscripts in the libraries and archives of France, Italy, Germany, and England / by M.J.B. Silvestre ; accompanied by an historical and descriptive text and introduction by Champollion-Figeac and Aimé Champollion, fils ; translated from the French and edited, with corrections and notes, by Sir Frederic Maddan ... in two volumes.

Joseph-Balthazar Silvestre

Date:: 1849-1850

Credit: Universal palaeography, or, Fac-similes of writings of all nations and periods, copied from the most celebrated and authentic manuscripts in the libraries and archives of France, Italy, Germany, and England / by M.J.B. Silvestre ; accompanied by an historical and descriptive text and introduction by Champollion-Figeac and Aimé Champollion, fils ; translated from the French and edited, with corrections and notes, by Sir Frederic Maddan ... in two volumes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$which is not larger than that of the text, but is distinguished by its long and superfluous flourishes above and below. Pro¬ bably also, in the confused mass of strokes at the end of the name, some Tironian notes may occur. Rather lower, to the right, is the discolored spot where the seal was placed, which bore the imprint of the ring of Childebert III. To fix this seal, a star-shaped aperture was made in the parchment, the ends of which are still bent back on the dors of the document. The date occurs in the bottom line. In the previous cen¬ tury (the sixth) the date preceded the signature. The writing of this date, an essential part of every public act, is not in taller letters than those of the text, but they are more con¬ fused, and the words rather more separated. It is to be read: Datum quod ficit mw[sis~\ abrilis dies ter\Jia\, an[no~\ tertio regni n[ostf\% Conpendio, in d\e]i nomene felic[iter], which gives as the date of this diploma, the 3rd of April, in the third year of the reign of Childebert III., A.D. 697. The fac-simile exhibits the precise width of the parch¬ ment on which this document is written, but it is five inches longer. On the dors are various ancient memoranda, one of which is of the eighth century. This diploma, which contains the donation of the forest of Cormeille to the monastery of Argenteuil, forms part of an acquisition recently made by the Bibliotheque Royale at Paris.$

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