Miscellaneous 15th-century Italian manuscripts

Catalogue information | Bodleian filmstrips | Image captions | Image quality | Image sizes

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Images scanned from various Bodleian filmstrips and slides

© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti, Trattato della Pudicizia, in Latin Italy, Bologna; c. 1487 [MS.] Broxb. 85.7 fol. 1v
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Diogenes Laertius, Vitae philosophorum, in the Latin translation of Ambrogio Traversari Italy; 15th century, 3rd quarter MS. Bywater 1, fol. 1r
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Diogenes Laertius, Vitae philosophorum, in the Latin translation of Ambrogio Traversari Italy, Urbino; dated 1452 MS. Bywater 2, fol. 2r
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Diogenes Laertius, Vitae philosophorum, in the Latin translation of Ambrogio Traversari Italy, Urbino; 15th century MS. Bywater 3, fol. 1r
© Source: Roll 262.1 frame 221 Small \| Medium \| Large	Leonardo Bruni, De bello Italico adversus Gothos; Poggio Bracciolini,De nobilitate; imperfect, in Latin Italy, Bologna(?);15th century, third quarter MS. Lat. class. d. 27, fol. 1r
© Source: Roll 262.1 frame 222 Small \| Medium \| Large	Leonardo Bruni, De bello Italico adversus Gothos; Poggio Bracciolini,De nobilitate; imperfect, in Latin Italy, Bologna(?);15th century, third quarter MS. Lat. class. d. 27, fol. 1r (detail)
© Source: Roll 166I frame 2 Small \| Medium \| Large	Cicero, De oratore, Orator, and De optimo genere oratorum, in Latin Italy, Florence (fols. 1-37); 15th century 1413, and additions after 1421 MS. Lat. class. d. 37, fol. 4r
© Source: Roll 184E frame 6 Small \| Medium \| Large	Cicero, De oratore, Orator, and De optimo genere oratorum, in Latin Italy, Florence (fols. 1-37); 15th century 1413, and additions after 1421 MS. Lat. class. d. 37, fol. 4r (detail)
© Source: Single slide B981 Small \| Medium \| Large	Cicero, De oratore, Orator, and De optimo genere oratorum, in Latin Italy, Florence (fols. 1-37); 15th century 1413, and additions after 1421 MS. Lat. class. d. 37, fol. 34r
© Source: Roll 262.1 frame 58 Small \| Medium \| Large	Honorius Augustodunensis, Expositio in cantica canticorum, in Latin Italy, Venice(?); 15th century, early MS. Lat. th. c. 14, fol. 1r (detail)
© Source: Roll 262.1 frame 60 Small \| Medium \| Large	Honorius Augustodunensis, Expositio in cantica canticorum, in Latin Italy, Venice(?); 15th century, early MS. Lat. th. c. 14, fol. 5r
© Source: Roll frame Small \| Medium \| Large	Honorius Augustodunensis, Expositio in cantica canticorum, in Latin Italy, Venice(?); 15th century, early MS. Lat. th. c. 14, fol. 5r (detail)
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Andrea Biglia of Milan, translaton of Aristotle, De anima, in Latin North(?) Italy, Siena(?); 15th century, second quarter MS. Bywater 10, fols. i verso - 1r
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Walter Burley, De vita et moribus philosophorum; Ps.-Seneca, De remediis fortuitorum, in Latin Italy; 15th century MS. Bywater 12, fol. 1r
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Collection of Moral Sayings, in Latin France / Italy; 15th - 16th century MS. Bywater 17, fol. 38r
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Nicolaus Sagundinus, six manuscripts bound together, in Latin and Italian Italy, Venice, Verona, Padua; 15th century, 1460, 1536-40, 1551-64, etc. MS. Bywater 37, fols. 31v-32r
© Source: Special-order slide Small \| Medium \| Large	Miscellaneous humanist translations and texts, in Latin Italy, Florence(?); 15th century, partly 1414 MS. Bywater 38, fols. 1v-2r

Catalogue information

Information about catalogues of Bodleian medieval manuscripts can be reached from the Western manuscripts to c. 1500 web page.

Bodleian filmstrips

The 35 mm. filmstrips or slides from which these images are scanned derive mostly from a stock of more than 30,000 images, as published by the Bodleian Library over the last forty years or so.

The Library recommends the filmstrips for private study or teaching purposes, but cannot guarantee that they are of a quality suitable for further reproduction. Details, including a price-list, can be found at the Western manuscripts Photographic Services page.

Image captions

The captions accompanying the images on this page are taken from handlists prepared over the decades by a number of staff and volunteers to accompany the published filmstrips. They are intended to serve here as a guide to content of the images, but have not been systematically rechecked.

Image quality

Since most of the images presented here have been scanned from the Library's stock of existing slides and filmstrips; their quality is not always up to the highest standards of new photography. Nonetheless, it is hoped that even the scans from the oldest filmstrips will provide users with a great deal of further material for visual reference, in a convenient form. Users who require higher quality images may order photographs in the normal way: see the Photographic Services page.

Sometimes two or more thumbnails may show the same subject. Such apparent duplicates are included for archival purposes: they will derive from shots of the same item, taken at different times, and may therefore show differences of lighting, colour contrast and general quality.

Image editing software has been used to 'sharpen' the thumbnail images, and to reduce the number of colours each thumbnail contains to a maximum of 256; but no manipulation of the larger images has been performed. Users may use their own imaging software to alter features such as the the brightness, contrast, or colour-balance of the images, for purposes of private study.

The images were scanned from existing 35 mm. transparencies using a Nikon LS-2000 slide scanner, at a resolution of 2,700 dpi, in 24-bit colour, which produces an uncompressed TIFF image file a little under 30MB in size. The shelfmark, folio reference, and copyright notice were then added to each file manually using Adobe Photoshop, and saved as an uncompressed TIFF. A batch process using Photoshop creates the JPEG compressed files.

Note that the apparent quality of the images as viewed on-screen is in part dependant upon the quality of the monitor used to view them, and the apparent colour-values are likewise dependant on whether the monitor has been correctly calibrated, and the ambient lighting conditions of the room.

Image sizes

The JPEG thumbnail images on this page are 200 pixels in length along their longest side, use no more than 256 colours, and the files are each about 15-20KB in size. Clicking on each of these images will load a larger version, 500 pixels in length.

The larger versions of each image, respectively 500, 1000, and 1500 pixels along the long side, can be viewed by clicking on the 'Small', 'Medium', and 'Large' links beneath each caption. The images of 500 pixel-length are each about 50-100 KB in size; the 1000 pixel ones about 200-350 KB, and the 1500 pixel ones are about 500-750 KB. We recommend that users start by selecting the smaller sizes before attempting to download the larger ones, since the latter may seem slow to load: this depends on the speed of each user's internet connection and computer system.

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Western manuscripts to c. 1500
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