Haymo of Halberstadt, Homily LXXI for Easter Monday, C11th, manuscript on parchment, France

Fragment of a bifolium from Haymo of Halberstadt, Homily LXXI for Easter Monday, in Latin, manuscript on parchment

Fragment, c. 320 × 213 mm, comprising a large part of one leaf with most of two columns of text, preserving 26 lines each, and a small part of the conjoint leaf, preserving a narrow part of a single column, blind-ruled and written in a very fine Caroline minuscule script, the text of the more complete page comprising “[duo]decim apostolis non fuerint … quando illum in sepulchro collo[catum]” (pr. by Migne, Patrologia Latina, CXVIII (1852), col. 457 line 7 – 458 line 2); doubtless recovered from use as binders’ waste, with consequent hold and other damage, but the surviving text mostly very clear and easily legible.

Features of this handsome 11th-century script are the use of tall ‘s’ (which descends slightly below the line) except as capital letters when the round form is used, the use of both sloping and upright ‘d’, the frequent use of ‘st’ and ‘ct’ ligatures, the ‘r’ which descends slightly below the line, the use of the ampersand within words to stand for ‘et’ e.g. ‘quilib&’ and occasional (inappropriate) use of the ‘ae’ ligature e.g. ‘ævangelista’.