Two fragments of an unidentified Commentary on the New Testament, in Latin, manuscript on parchment C14th

Two fragments of an unidentified Commentary on the New Testament, in Latin, manuscript on parchment

[France, 14th century]

A vertical fragment, c. 205 × 115 mm, comprising the lower 57 lines of one column and part of the adjacent column, written in gothic script, each with the quotations from the biblical text of Romans underlined in red (the first is “observo vos fratres per misericordiam dei”, Romans 12:1; the last is “alter alterius membra aliis indigentes et aliis continentes”, the Glossa ordinaria on Romans 12:5), together with:

a wider fragment of a bifolium, c. 205 × 155 mm, comprising most of the lower 55 lines of an inner column, which includes a quotation from Hebrews 11:24, plus the gutter margin and part of the inner column of the conjoined leaf, among whose underlined passages are quotations from Luke 2:33–36; both fragments apparently recovered from use in a bookbinding, with consequent damage, holes, etc., and their reverse sides very darkened and illegible.

Romans 12:1–5 is the text in which St Paul exhorts his readers ‘Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God’; Luke 2:33–36 describes how the priest Simeon says to the Virgin Mary about her infant son, ‘Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel’.