Welcome!
This guide provides information about pre-1600 manuscript collections at the University of Dayton and beyond, as well as research resources available to UD students, faculty, and staff.
Getting Started
- Features of a Manuscript PageA single page of a medieval manuscript is full of information. This exercise comes from Harvard's Geoffrey Chaucer Website.
Finding manuscripts at UD and beyond
Two digital consortia, Digital Scriptorium and The Peripheral Manuscripts Project, include manuscripts from University Archives and Special Collections and the Marian Library. While materials are still in the process of being made available online, digitized manuscripts can be found in eCommons' University Libraries / Rare Books collection.
- Digital Scriptorium This link opens in a new window
Access medieval and Renaissance manuscripts held in American libraries, archives, and museums.
Manuscripts at UD
The Marian Library and the University Archives and Special Collections both hold medieval manuscripts and fragments, many of which have been digitized. They're available in eCommons, the University of Dayton's institutional repository, at the links below.
- AntiphonarySpain [?], Approximately 15th century
This large choir book contains music which a religious community would have sung daily from Christmas through the fourth Sunday after Epiphany. - OraisonsFrance, early 15th century
This manuscript has a miniature portrait of St. Ambrose on the first leaf, and illuminated borders with birds and insects appear throughout the manuscript. Prayers are in French and Latin, and the Latin hymn "Ave verum corpus natum" uses a feminine form that suggests the original owner of the book was a woman. - Dāwit (Psalter)Ethiopia, approximately 1790-1800
This manuscript written in the liturgical language Ge'ez contains psalms, canticles, prayers for Mary, and devotional texts in the Ethiopian Orthodox tradition. It dates from about 1790-1800, but the design and materials represent much older manuscript traditions in Ethiopian Orthodox Church. - Book of Hours (Use of Rouen)Rouen, France, approximately 1520-1530
This illuminated book of hours would have been a status symbol as well as a devotional book, with 14 full-page, hand-painted miniatures. Two women in contemporary dress appear in the miniature depicting the Visitation of the Virgin Mary with St. Elizabeth. - Calendar from Book of Hours; use of ParisFrance, approximately 1390
Calendar of saints' feast days from a French book of hours.. The manuscript contains illuminated decorations, with red (rubricated) and gold script for dates used to calcuate Easter. - Annunciation: manuscript leaf from a book of hoursEurope, approximately 1440
Annunciation to the Virgin Mary miniature from a book of hours, with text for Matins, the first hour of the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
