Our new web address is
www.earlymedievalmonasticism.org!
The Monastic Manuscript Project is a database of
descriptions of manuscripts that contain texts relevant for
the study of early medieval monasticism, especially monastic
rules, ascetic treatises, vitae
patrum-texts and texts related to monastic reforms.
We provide lists of manuscripts for each of these texts,
which are linked to manuscript descriptions. The purpose is
to offer a tool for reconstructing not only the manuscript
dissemination of early medieval monastic texts but also to
give access to the specific contexts in which a text
appears.
The database supports current edition projects and draws attention to understudied texts and the transmission of fragments, excerpts and florilegia. It is designed to facilitate the work of students and scholars who are interested in the history and reception of texts and who want to work with manuscripts rather than rely on modern editions.
Most pages provide links to a number of web resources, such as manuscript catalogues, online texts and translations, digitized manuscripts and repertoria. Manuscript descriptions are usually based on published manuscript catalogues and secondary literature. We hope to replace these often incomplete and inaccurate descriptions with new ones that are based on hands on studies of the manuscripts themselves.
The Monastic Manuscript Project is conceptualized as a
'Wiki' project. Every student or scholar who works on
monastic manuscripts is invited to contribute new manuscript
descriptions, to fill in gaps and to submit additions and
corrections to existing pages. Eventually the project will
become a forum for collaborative work and the presentation
of new research.
The database currently can be searched for authors, texts,
manuscripts, incipits, genres, and provenances. Other
inquiries, about scripts or on CLA numbers, for example, can
be carried out with the site search function (below).
Request for evaluation: we
are constantly improving our website and database and
adding new functions. Please tell us about additional
search functions and information you would like us to
provide. We appreciate suggestions for entering specific
sets of texts and/or manuscripts. We would be happy to
know how and for which purposes you use this website.
