OLD LITERARY TREASURE

Evening Star, Issue 21885, 23 November 1934, Page 13

OLD LITERARY TREASURE

FOUND IN HUNGARIAN CASTLE

Bibliophiles agree that one of the rarest literary treasures to be discovered in any illuminated manuscript once forming part of the superb library of 50.000 treasures belonging to King Matthias Augustus Corvinus of Hungary, in the fifteenth century. Spoliation after the King’s death in 1490 and the sacking of Buda by the Turks in 1527 account for this rarity. Indeed, only 164 relics of the famous library can now be traced (writes A. C. R. Carter, in the London ‘ Daily Telegraph ’). The well-known collector, Mr Gabriel Wells, of New York, left London with a magnificent vellum transcription of the works of Tacitus, formery in this king’s historic library, which had been in a Hungarian castle for more than 200 years. The acquisition by Mr Wells of , this Corvinus relic is regarded as of unusual importance. It takes the form of the ‘ Annales * of Tacitus. beautifully transcribed; illuminated with historiated initials; and gorgeously bound in one of those gold-stamped leather binding which the Hungarian king was among the first to use. Just before Mr Wells sailed for New York I had the privilege of inspecting this great prize, which had been brought to London by air from the library of a Hungarian noble family, where it had been reposing for over two centuries. On the first page of the manuscript is a Latin inscription, of which the translation is: “I belong to Beatus. Rhenanus. Nor do 1 change my master. The gift of Jacobus Spirgellius, Jurist, in the Year of Our Lord, 1517.” It declares further that the work was written by the command and at the expense of Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary and Bohemia, and was taken from the library at Buda. The date shows that it “ escaped ” from its old home ten years before the Turks reached Buda. In the centre of the rich binding will be discerned the figure of the raven, from which Matthias derived his cognomen, and, at the top, there is the blur made by the clasp of the chain which used to fasten the treasure to its place. Aloreover, the manuscript bears its original number in the library of Corvinus—s4. To-day America bristles with universities and their libraries. Before Columbus discovered the new Continent, Matthias Corvinus had refounded and endowed the old Hungarian University of Ofen. A KING’S AMBITION. Every Hungarian worships the memory of that Maecenas of the arts and letters, King Matthias Corvinus, who, before be died in 1490, had amassed a collection of 50,000 manuscripts in bis library of red marble at Buda. His ambition was to outshine the literary glories of the Vatican, and historians testify that be succeeded. The scribes and illuminators of every seat of learning in Italy were employed by him in transcribing the ancient classics and codices. He also bad the most inventive Florentine binders in his pay

to prepare sumptuous coverings for his treasures. Of this splendid array learned librarians tell us that only 160 manuscripts can now be traced. The despoiling of Matthias’s red marble library began shortly after his death. When the Turks sacked Buda in 1527 they completed the destruction. Some thousands, however, they took to Constantinople, but only to rot and perish. To-day collectors are still on the quest for some survivor of this wonderful library. Our British Museum proudly possesses just a few._ There are some in the Vatican, at Paris, Munich, and Vienna. The Pierpont Morgan collection in New York can boast of three. One went from the Duke of Devonshire’s celebrated library. A million lire was paid in 1912 for a Didymus of Alexandria manuscript to- the Jesuit Cloister in Rome.

Not long ago Signor Mussolini made one of his great gestures by restoring to the museum at Buda the Attavantes Codex, which had wandered from the treasures of Corvinus to Italy.