Marius Mercator in the Collectio Palatina

A strange survival

Abstract : The writings of Marius Mercator are only found in the Collectio Palatina, which itself survives in only one MS now in the Vatican Library (Palatinus latinus 234). This limitation of the evidence should be kept in mind whenever we turn to Mercator's works. He wrote a short co...

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Bibliographic Details
Author:Walter Dunphy
Published: S.n., s.l., 2022
Volume:72
Pages:265-288
Language:English
Periodical:Augustiniana
Number:2
ISSN:0004-8003
Format:Article
Topic:- Biography > Relations and Sources > Pelagianism. Semi-Pelagianism > Pelagianism
- Biography > Relations and Sources > Pelagianism. Semi-Pelagianism > Pelagians > Rufinus Syrus
- Biography > Relations and Sources > Latin Christian writers > Marius Mercator
- Works > Manuscripts. Ancient anthologies. > Manuscripta
Status:Active
Description
Summary:Abstract : The writings of Marius Mercator are only found in the Collectio Palatina, which itself survives in only one MS now in the Vatican Library (Palatinus latinus 234). This limitation of the evidence should be kept in mind whenever we turn to Mercator's works. He wrote a short collection of anti-Pelagian writings in Constantinople at the time of the Council of Ephesus. This was incorporated by a Scythian monk in an anti-Nestorian collection in the sixth century. The collection was copied in the ninth century in the environs of Lorsch and was catalogued in the library of that abbey. The Lorsch library was transferred to the university of Heidelberg, and subsequently to Rome when a great part of the Palatinate library was given to the Pope as spoils of war. In the Vatican library the volumes are listed as Codices Palatini latini(Pal. lat.) and the collection of Mercator's writings came to be referred to as the Collectio Palatina. This, the only extant copy of his works, contains a text that is laden with textual and scribal errors, and can only be used with caution. On the basis of a comparison of the content of the MS with the ninth-century catalogue from Lorsch I argue that a quire that contained the 'Sentences of Sextus' is missing from the beginning of the codex.

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