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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$scae [sanctce] D[e\i eccl\esi\ae n\ost\rorv[m]q[ue\ p\rae\- sentiu\m\ scilicet et futuroru\m\ universitas.—Beneath is the signature of the king, written by the notary or chan¬ cellor, Signum (monogram), Hlotharii, gloriosi regis. This is a charter of King Lothaire, in favor of the nunnery of Saint Peter at Lyons, executed in the eighth year of his reign, corresponding with the 18th of May, A.D. 863. The third specimen, at the end of the ninth century, relates to the same province of Lorraine, which was one of those which, originating in the dissensions of the empire, descended from the rank of a kingdom to that of a province. Among its kings is found Zuentibolch or Zuentibold, a natural son of Arnulfus, nephew of Charles le Gros. Called to the Crown in 895, Zuentibold was killed in a battle against Louis of Germany, in the year 900, after a reign of five years. It is, of course, natural to find the diplomatic writing of France in this diploma of a King of Lorraine. We see, in fact, in the first line, the cursive Carlovingian writing, with the letters tall and close together, the words half divided, and ornamented with a forest of gigantic pointed top-strokes, curved towards the right. After the usual monogrammatic flourish, we read,—In nomine sc [sanctae] et individuae Trinitatis, Zuentebolchus, divina ordinante procidentia rex.— Quanto propensius . . . . tanto dni daementiam regnum nobis caelitus commissum latius diffundere, etc. The signature of the king below is to be read,—Signum domni Zuenteboldii (monogram) gloriossimi regis, the letters of which resemble those of the top line, but in the second and third lines the writing slopes like an Italic text*; with the a open, like u; e re¬ sembling entirely the Lombardic e, in bulls; and p elongated, * It does not slope more than in either of the preceding charters.— Ed. VOL. II. I$

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