This composite manuscript in thirteen volumes consists of drawings of plants which resulted from the Sessé & Moçiño expedition to the region of Mexico and Central America from 1787 to 1803. Of the 1300 drawings contained in these volumes, about 300 are originals from the expedition, the remaining 1000 were copied in Geneva in 1817 by artists and amateur botanists, most of whom were women from Geneva. The entire collection is usually referred to as Flore des Dames de Genève. (bla)

Online Since: 03/29/2019

This composite manuscript in thirteen volumes consists of drawings of plants which resulted from the Sessé & Moçiño expedition to the region of Mexico and Central America from 1787 to 1803. Of the 1300 drawings contained in these volumes, about 300 are originals from the expedition, the remaining 1000 were copied in Geneva in 1817 by artists and amateur botanists, most of whom were women from Geneva. The entire collection is usually referred to as Flore des Dames de Genève. (bla)

Online Since: 03/29/2019

This manuscript contains a collection of 46 annotated sonnets, organized as a short "canzoniere" (songbook). The work is attributed to the mysterious Neapolitan poet Gironimo Del Riccio, about whom we lack any information. It was probably a gift to the French King Henry III on the occasion of his wedding to Louise de Lorraine-Vaudémont and became part of the royal library, as suggested by the coats of arms on the cover. (rom)

Online Since: 10/08/2020

Composite manuscript with the following content: 1. collection of autographs by the Florentine poet Gabriele Simeoni (Florence, 1509 - Lyon, 1577?), dedicated to Cosimo de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, with poems in Italian and Latin and illustrated by the author;  2. collection of poems, partly autographs, by Giovan Battista Strozzi (1489-1538), containing his madrigals as well as some compositions by Leonardo Giustiniani (1388-1446) and by Anton Francesco Grazzini (1505-1584). (rom)

Online Since: 12/12/2019

This manuscript is a copy of only one of six extant manuscript exemplars and an old print of this work (1743) worldwide. Its author is the famous Bohemian rabbi, astronomer and mathematician R. David ben Salomon Gans (1541-1613). In his 1974 monograph about David Gans, André Neher referred to this copy as the Manuscrit de Genève. A colophon in the manuscript gives the date as 1613, but a current study on the history of the transmission of this work suggests that it is an 18th century copy. (iss)

Online Since: 06/14/2018

This manuscript is from France; certainly from the 14th century onward it has been part of the Libraria secreta of the monastery of St. Francis of Assisi, as attested by an entry in the library inventory. This inventory was written in 1381 by Brother Giovanni Ioli, who saw to its reorganization between 1377 and 1384. The manuscript, which originally contained not only the Liber sapientiae but also the third and fourth parts of Peter Lombard’s Sentences, belongs to an important group of French manuscripts, some richly decorated, that were purchased by the monastery since the founding of the library. When the manuscript was owned by the antiquarian Leo Olschki, it was still complete; but it was already divided in 1960, when the Cantonal and University Library of Lausanne purchased it from the Geneva antiquarian Nicolas Rauch. (ber)

Online Since: 12/14/2018

These fragments, which were discovered in an index volume by the archivist of Moudon in 1931, were named for the place where they were found. According to the manuscript department’s entry register, the fragments were added to the collection of the Bibliothèque cantonale et universitaire - Lausanne in 1950. The document contains 21 entries on plants whose medicinal powers are described. The total number of chapters in the original manuscript is not known. According to Eugène Olivier, who edited the text together with Paul Aebischer, it was not copied by a practicing physician but by a scribe, because there are reading errors such as "sanc" (blood) instead of "sint" (fat). (fri)

Online Since: 10/08/2020

This small-format manuscript with a limp binding falls into the category of "livres de besace": mainly it contains a compilation of medical texts (Guy de Chauliac, Jean Le Lièvre, Jean Jacme, Guillaume de Saliceto, anonymous herbaria), most of which have been translated into Middle French, as well as calendars and songs. The main hand wrote in a script from the second half of the 15th century; there are also notes from the 16th and 17th centuries. The first known owner (mentioned on f. 9r) is Jehan Farcy, who is attested as a barber in Lausanne in 1484 and 1496. Pen trials and coats of arms (Valangin and Aarberg, f. 57v) also indicate a regional context. Likewise the parchment from which the binding was made is a reused notarial document prepared in Vaud on April 25, 1448. With the support of private foundations, the Bibliothèque cantonale et universitaire - Lausanne acquired this manuscript in 2006. (anm)

Online Since: 12/10/2020

The “Recueil Grenet” is a collection of poems written by the Geneva merchant Gilbert Grenet (1510?-1568) containing French poems written during the decades 1530-1560. The composite manuscript begins with about forty epistles and «dizains» (ten-line poems) by Clément Marot, which were probably copied during and after the poet’s stay in Geneva (1542-1543). This is followed by anonymous poems on the virtues of education and the art of writing. At the end there are about forty epigrams and poems praising the Reformation and polemicizing against Catholicism. Some are personal revisions of texts by Théodore de Bèze and Ronsard. The manuscript is partially illuminated and illustrates the role of militant poetry in the commercial milieu that supported the Reformation in the city of Geneva during Calvin's time. It was acquired by the Cantonal and University Library of Lausanne in 1844. (dou)

Online Since: 12/12/2019

This manuscript, written in early Gothic script and dated to the end of the 12th century, contains an incomplete copy of Ovid’s Metamorphoses (2,52 – 3,466; 3,651 – 14,43; 14,414 – 15,668). There are marginal and interlinear glosses as well as variants by various hands. (del)

Online Since: 06/22/2017

This manuscript is a cartulary that was created for the Cluniac priory of Romainmôtier (canton of Vaud) and that was probably copied at the monastery. It consists of two chronologically distinct parts that were united at an unknown time. The first part is from the 12th century and consists of 77 documents, introduced by a preface that recounts the most important events from the history of the institution. The second part was copied around the end of the 13th century and contains 80 documents, most of which date back to the years 1270-1286. (anm)

Online Since: 03/29/2019

This prayer book is either from the Cologne area, as indicated by the selection of prayer texts and calendars, or from the “Stift Münstereifel”, as the saints Daria and Chrysanthus, who are venerated there, are explicitly mentioned on 218r and 219r. Via Catharina von Wrede (front paste-down), the prayer book reached the Bibliothèque des Cèdres, which became part of the holdings of the Bibliothèque cantonale et universitaire - Lausanne in 1966. This small-format volume, illustrated with 18 miniatures, contains a cycle of prayers on the life and passion of Christ, prayers on the truths of the faith, and on various saints. The miniatures and the beginnings of the texts are surrounded by borders with leaf scroll and interlace ornamentation; additional decoration consists of 35 initials in gold, as well as pen flourishes and blue, red and gold Lombard initials in the margins. (brd)

Online Since: 10/08/2020

This book of hours, donated to the library of the Academy of Lausanne in 1779, is a typical example of such devotional books from the late Middle Ages. The calendar is for use in Paris: each day has its saint assigned to it, without any of them being highlighted. The masculine form of address of the Obsecro te could have been for a book of hours made for the book market as much as it could designate the actual recipient of the manuscript. Some prayers in French, such as the XV joies de Notre Dame, Les sept requêtes à Notre Seigneur, and a prayer to the Holy Cross, conclude the work. All illuminations marking the beginning of each of the Offices, probably full-page decorations, have disappeared. The only remaining traces of book decoration can be found in the margins and in the decorated initials in the secondary divisions of the same Offices. (rou)

Online Since: 10/08/2020

De vita solitaria is one of the Latin works by the famous Italian poet Petrarch (1304-1374), who wrote it in 1346 and revised it several times in the course of the following years. Two books praise the secluded, solitary life dedicated to study and meditation. This paper manuscript shows a certain elegance, in the page layout as well as in the two gold initials (p. 7, 103). Its origin is unknown, but before 1892, when it was acquired by the library, it was owned by the canons of Lausanne and a family of notaries from Muraz (Valais). The binding originally consisted of a series of 14th century paper fragments, which were joined together in numerous layers and were later detached and restored. Some of these fragments are papal privileges addressed to members of various French dioceses, others are in Italian from the area of Tuscany, and one contains Hebrew text. (ber)

Online Since: 12/10/2020

This codex contains two different texts, both incomplete, in a single 19th century binding. One of these is Henry Suso’s Horologium Sapientiae (1-66), a text that was written in Constance and that was in wide use during the late Middle Ages. The other is Petrarch's De Vita Solitaria (67-116). The first is a parchment manuscript of Italian origin that can be dated to the late 14th or early 15th century; it is written by a single hand in a semi-cursive Gothic script in two columns. What makes this manuscript special is that it was written on a parchment palimpsest that originally contained legal texts written in the 13th century. The second part, by another hand and of French or Swiss origin, contains a text by Petrarch written in a bastarda script in two columns, dated to the 15th century. Both texts contain pen-flourish initials and are interspersed with manicules. (fav)

Online Since: 10/10/2019

The Sworn Letter (“Geschworener Brief”), drawn up for the first time in 1252, consists mainly of provisions of criminal law for the sake of maintaining internal peace. It soon attained the status of a social contract that was periodically revised, and the town assembly was sworn into office each year with an oath on this document. COD 1075 presents the last version in a special form: The text was elaborately arranged in calligraphy by chancery clerk Josef Corneli Mahler; the articles are introduced by artistic initials and are accompanied by figures (which bear no reference to the themes of the text). For the binding, the wooden boards are covered in blue and white velvet and have protective book corners, clasps and bosses made of silver. (jag)

Online Since: 03/22/2017

In 1433 town clerk Egloff Etterlin compiled a cartulary with copies of documents relevant to the laws of Lucerne, including translations of Latin texts. The volume permitted the council quick access to these texts; thus it served as a finding aid for the originals stored in the water tower (« Wasserturm »). These copies of 150 documents (with 21 translations) do not render the originals in chronological order, but are instead ordered by topic. They were written by various scribes of the Lucerne chancery and go up to the year 1492. This volume receives its name from the magnificent 1505 cover of velvet and taffeta over wooden boards, decorated with silver bosses and clasps with the coat of arms of Lucerne. (jag)

Online Since: 03/22/2017

Strictly speaking, this manuscript (COD 3655) is a “Stadtbuch” (city register). In addition to the lists of new citizens up to 1441 (actually the oldest register of citizens written by town clerk Werner Hofmeier fol. 1r-53v), it contains statutes, copies of documents, notes regarding the administration (including a catalog of the treasure of St. Peter's Chapel, fol. 19r, and an instruction manual for the new clock in the “Graggenturm”, fol. 24r), as well as chronicled notes. Worth mentioning among the latter are notes about the battles of Sempach (fol. 22r), Näfels (fol. 22r) and Arbedo (fol. 49r). The binding of wooden boards covered in pigskin, on which is painted the coat of arms of Lucerne, dates from the second half of the 16th century. (jag)

Online Since: 03/22/2017

This second Register of Citizens contains the list of new citizens for Lucerne from 1479 until 1572. The volume ist valuable as a source regarding immigration to Lucerne, since the individual entries give not only the names of the new citizens, but also their exact origins. At the same time it shows the gradual isolation of the citizenry of Lucerne over the course of the 16th century, as fewer and fewer newcomers were able to enjoy the rights of citizenship. In addition to the original register, which is ordered by first names, the imposing leather-bound volume also contains an index by the municipal archivist Joseph Schneller († 1879). (jag)

Online Since: 03/22/2017

As part of a great lawsuit against necromancers and treasure seekers, the Lucerne authorities in 1718 confiscated this meticulous copy of the Schlüssel Salomos, a book of spells that had evidently been widely read in certain quarters and of which various versions had been in circulation. Through the rituals for conjuring spirits described in the book, people around the priest Hans Kaspar Giger hoped to become wealthy. The volume was labeled “superstitious” by the authorities, was sealed and placed in the archives. (jag)

Online Since: 03/22/2017