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Some Notices of Books in the East in the Period of the Crusades
James S. Beddie
Speculum
, Vol. 8, No. 2. (Apr., 1933), pp. 240-242.
Stable URL:http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0038-7134%28193304%298%3A2%3C240%3ASNOBIT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-B
Speculum
is currently published by Medieval Academy of America.Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available athttp://www.jstor.org/about/terms.html. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtainedprior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content inthe JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained athttp://www.jstor.org/journals/medacad.html.Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printedpage of such transmission.JSTOR is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to and preserving a digital archive of scholarly journals. Formore information regarding JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.http://www.jstor.orgSun Apr 1 16:38:04 2007
 
240
Books
in
the
East
During
the Crusades
cedure which enabled the citizens of one borough to sue those of another boroughcollectively. Just as the feudand private vengeance lingered on side by side withmore civilized processes
. .
'I
The vitality of this practice can be seen by a casefound in
1438,
eighty-five years after the passage of the statutes that legislatedagainst the practice for all persons2 In this interesting case the Londoners an-swered a royal writ of certiorari to the effect that they had seized the goods inquestion 'by way of
withernant
according to the ancient custom of the city
.
.
'3
Until international relations arrived at
a
state in which the individual mer-chant was assured his just due the ghosts of this practice continued. It was aweapon that a weaker party could always invoke.No better summary statementof the practice can be given than that of Rfiss Bateson.
Just as the right of reprisal and letters of "marque" remain in international law tostrengthen the weakness of the executive, so in mercantile law the
withernam
enabled onetown to force another to render justice, so far as pressure upon individual members ofthat town who happened to be at this distrainor's mercy, could influence the whole groupof which the sufferer of the distraint was a member.4
SOME KOTICES OF BOOKS IN THE EAST
IN
THE PERIOD OF THE CRUSADES
BY JAMES
S.
BEDDIE
EVIDENCEearing on intellectual relations between East and West at the periodof the Crusades is not at hand inlarge quantities. In comparison, documentsdealing with economic, ecclesiastical and feudal relationships are fairly numerous.While the Crusades provided many opportunities for intellectual contact be-tween East and West, from their nature these contacts were somewhat intangi-ble and have left little direct evidence. Several pieces of information about booksin the East may, however, prove of interest.The first is a list of books which appears in manuscript
Q
102
of the Stadt-biicherei (formerly the university library) at Erfurt, under the heading
IZii suntlibri concentus Sazarene ecclesie.
The manuscript, which is described fully in thecatalogue of Sch~m,~ormed a part of the library of Amplonius Ratinck, whichlater passed to the former university library. Its principal contents are also givenin the Amplonian catalogue of
1412,
recently publi~hed.~he manuscript is ofthe end of the twelfth or opening of the thirteenth century and Schum assignedits origin to a 'southern land.' There are no certain indications of either place ordate. The volume includes several short treatises of Augustine, Bede, and
Bateson,
Borough Customs,
I,
lix.Sharpe,
C.L.B.,
K,
217.
a
lbid.
Bateson,
op. cit.,
I,
Ivi.Cf.Hall,
op. cit.,
pp.
xiv,
xx-xxi.Wilhelm
Schum,
Beschreibendes Verzeichniss der Amplonianischen Handschrijten-Sammlmg zuErfurt
(Berlin,
1887),
p.
361.
Afittelalterliche Bibliothekskataloge Deutschlands und der Schweiz,
11,
ed.
Paul Lehmann (Munich,
192s).
 
Boolcs
in
the East
During
the
Crusades
24
1
Gregory. The list of books in question appears on the last page, fol.
162b.
It
is noted as no.
433
in Gottlieb's register of library catalogues,' and there assignedto Prance. Xeither the reference to
Nazarene ecclesie
nor to the books in thepossession of the bishop of Sidon justify connecting the list certainly with Syria,but inasmuch as we apparently have no lists of books from the crusading states,the possibility is interesting. The content of the collection, with its large represen-tation of classical authors, is typical of the close of the twelfth century.
It
isgiven here from the Erfurt manuscript.
Hii sunt libri conventus Nazarene ecclesie. Ieronimus super psalterium; Anbrosius(!)super Lucam; Matheus; Iohannes; apocalysis Iohannis; Gregorius super ii libros Ezechi-elis; textus lllarci evangeliste; gesta pontificum; Isidorus ethimologiarum; Isidorus desummo bono; dialogus Ieronimi presbiteri et vita patrum in eodem volumine; liber quidamqui dicitur Paradisus; cur Deus homo; textus iiii evangeliorum; epistole Ieronimi ethugustini in uno volumine; duo libri canonum; xvcirn libri beati Augustini, etiam Gregoriussuper cantica canticorum in eodem volumine; Augustinus de Trinitate; Augustinus superIohannem et glosule super Iohannem; epistole magistri Ivonis; elucidarium; Gregoriussuper moralia Iob; epistole Pauli glosate, Augustinus de agone Christiano; Eps. SidoniensisAugustinum de retractacione, Augustinurn(!) encheridion habet; Ieronimus de interpre-tacionibus nominum; liber Ieronimi questionum Hebraicarum et de xmm empt[at]ionibuset de paralipomenon; et canticum de befre [Efrem]; et lamentacion [es] Iheremie; etepistola ad Dardanum de distanciis locorum; epistola de vesti sacerdotali; registrumLeonis pape; alius Isidorus de sumo(!) bono; de Egissipo iiii quaterniones et dimidius;vii libri de sentenciis; x libri de phisica; scintilarius, pastoralis Gregorii; et duo libridialogorum Gregorii; [Here in margin: Hi supradicta de divinitate
-
Hi audem degramaticn] duo libri de luna; arimethica; magnus Pricianus; alius de construcione; iiiesBoetii cum glosulis; iio Oracii cum glosulis; iio Stacii cum glosulis; Persius; iiO Salustii;Eneis Virgilii; Lucanus cum glosulis; Iuvenalis duplex; duo Stacii Achilleidos; Tullis deamicicia; iii.7 Prudencii; comrnenta Boetii; ii Sedullii; duo Ovidii epistolarum; Ovidius dePonto; Ovidius de amatoria arte; ii Ovidii stristium; ii
0.
de remedio amoris; duo Catones;v Sprosperi; duo Maximiani; duo
D.
.
.
.
[The remainder has been erased.
The crusading impulse was not always favorable to the preservation of booksand learning. The diversion of the Fourth Crusade is the notable example, butan earlier instance of the same sort caused the loss of his extensive library tothe R!toslem emir Usamah. Usamah has left us an extremely interesting auto-bi~graphy,~any passages of which read as thrillingly as the
Arabian Nights
and include a number of observations upon his opponents, the Franks. In
1145,
while his library, along with other treasure, was being transported by ship alongthe Syrian coast and under a safe conduct from Icing Baldwin
111
of Jerusalem,the vessel was driven ashore near Acre and its contents plundered by Baldwinin person in spite of his previous pledge, the pretext being that such was theb1oslem custom of dealing with wrecked vessels. Usamah estimated the numberof his books at no less than
4000
volumes and said that their loss grieved himas no other experience in the course of a long life.
Theodor Gottlieb,
Ueber mittelalterliche Bibliotheken
(Leipzig, 1890).Translated by Hartwig Derenbourg in
Ret'ue de 1'0rient Latin,
11
(1891),
337-565,
summarizedby N. Jorga, 'Le llonde Oriental et les CroisBs,' in the
Melanges $Histoire du Moyen
Age
offerts
2
M.
Ferdinand Lot
(Paris, 1925),
p.
263,
and recently translated into English by
P.
K.
Hitti under thetitle
An Arab-Syrian Gentleman and Warrior
in
the Period of the Crusades, Memoirs of Usaimah ibn-Munqidh
(New York, 1929).
of 00

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