bavarikon4UDescription
The so-called 'Legenda aurea' (Golden Legend) is an extraordinarily popular collection of festival descriptions, life stories and legends of saints, written in Latin by the Dominican monk Jacob of Voragine before 1267. The more than 180 texts are arranged according to the church year, starting with Advent. More than a thousand preserved copies of the Latin version and 97 printed editions up to the year 1500 alone prove that the Legenda aurea was probably the most successful folk book of the Middle Ages. The text was translated into French around 1335 and shortly afterwards, in the first half of the 14th century, the Alsatian Legenda aurea was the first translation into a German dialect. This parchment manuscript is dated at the end (sheet 210 verso) by the scribe on February 23, 1362; it is thus the oldest known copy of the translation and its most important text evidence; as a leading manuscript it was the basis for the modern edition. The language and occasionally also the details in the miniatures suggest that the copy was completed in Strasbourg. The rich illustration with 178 miniatures, which also do not shirk from depicting violence, show that such books not only served as pious edification but also literary entertainment.
Author
Bavarian State Library, Department of Manuscripts and Rare Books, Datum: 2019