Glagolitic

This manuscript fragment contains part of an explanation of an unknown gospel. It was at one time bound into a Glagolitic copy of the manuscript book Historia Scholastica by Peter Comestor. The text of the fragment was written in the angular Glagolitic script invented during the ninth century by Saints Cyril and Methodius to translate the Bible and other ecclesiastical works into the language of the Great Moravia region. Around 1633 the folio was used to fill the book binding of the Czech translation of Pastorale Lutheri (The pastoral of Luther) by Conrad Porta. It was discovered by Samuel Zoch (1882–1928) in the Kálmár family library in the town of Veľký Krtíš in southern Slovakia. Samuel Zoch’s brother, Ivan Branislav Zoch, gave the text to Professor Vatroslav Jagič (1838–1923), one of the founders of the field of Croatian linguistic studies. Jagič proved the authenticity of the parchment and hypothesized that it was brought to the historical territory of Slovakia by Czechs living in exile after the Battle of White Mountain (1620). In 1930, Professor František Ryšánek (1877–1969) announced that the manuscript dated back to the turn the 15th century and indicated the Emmaus Monastery in Prague (the monastery of Croatian Benedictines at Slovany) as the place of the origin.

Source: World Digital Library

The Saint-Antonian Glagolitic Fragment is the name of a double-folio parchment, probably of Croatian provenance, i.e., from the territory of the southern Slavs, where the students of Saint Methodius (815‒85) took refuge after the fall of Great Moravia. Produced by an unknown scribe in the 15th century, it contains text written in two columns with black and red ink using square Glagolitic script. It was probably part of a liturgical book, perhaps a Glagolitic breviary. In the 17th century this goat parchment was used as part of a book binding. It was discovered in this form in the mid-20th century by historian of book culture and bibliographer Dr. Vševlad Jozef Gajdoš in the Franciscan monastery in Saint Anton (present day Báč, in southwestern Slovakia). Great Moravia was a Slavic kingdom established in the ninth century in territories comprising the present-day Slovak and Czech republics, part of southern Poland, and the western part of present-day Hungary. Rostislav (also seen as Rastislav), who ruled from 846 to 870, invited the Byzantine missionaries Cyril and Methodius to the kingdom to spread Christianity. The brothers introduced the Slavonic liturgy, based on their own translations from the Greek, and the Glagolitic script for writing Slavic languages. Great Moravia weakened and fell into disunion late in the century, following the death of Rostislav’s successor, his nephew Svatopluk (reigned 870–94), and finally was destroyed by a Magyar attack in around 906.

Source: World Digital Library

These two fragments are among the oldest artifacts in the manuscript collections of the Slovak National Library. They are parchment folios, written on both sides, and are of Croatian provenance. It is believed that they came to the territory of Slovakia through the Franciscan friars or by the exchange of codices and printed books among Franciscan libraries or archives. They were discovered at the library of the former Franciscan monastery in Hlohovec in southwestern Slovakia in 1936. The folios contain parts of the Glagolitic service book from the end of the 13th century or early 14th century, and were preserved in the Italian book binding of a copy of Trattato dell’amore di Dio (Treatise on the love of God, Venice, 1642) by Saint Francis de Sales. Old Church Slavonic text is written in Croatian Glagolitic of the older type. The sheets contain the masses De communi apostolorum (Of the community of apostles) and De communi martyrum (Of the community of martyrs). Although there remain no autographs from the period of the Great Moravian Empire (circa 800−circa 900), it is likely that these texts derive from the ninth century, mediated by Glagolitic and Cyrillic transcripts from 11th century and later. The manuscript is decorated only by the scribal initials. Glagolitic refers to the alphabet invented during the ninth century by Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius to translate the Bible and other religious works into the Slavic language spoken in the region of the Great Moravian Empire.

Source: World Digital Library