Virtutes apostolorum: Editorial Problems and Principles

The school of New Philology urges us as editors of medieval texts to take into account variance as a core characteristic of medieval manuscript transmissions. The scope of variance, however, remains unclear in the programmatic studies presented by this trend, which concentrates mainly on linguistic variants. Therefore, an elaborate methodology to incorporate variance in our editorial work still needs to be developed. It is the aim of this article to present a set of propositions in preparation of an edition of the Latin transmission of Virtutes apostolorum, in order to add to the development of this methodology. The spectrum of variance in the Virtutes apostolorum as a series embraces textual variants; variants concerning the presentation of the text at the level of the individual sections dedicated to one apostle (order of the apostles, choice of text, choice of redaction); variants in (the presence of) paratexts (titles, chapter titles, prologues, epilogues); variants caused by the manual transmission of these texts (corrections, uncorrected errors); and variants inserted in the course of use of the series (semantic glosses, both vernacular and Latin, marginal glosses indicating liturgical use, stress marks on words for the benefit of oral performance). The analyses show the great diversity in the preserved manuscripts. The main question will be how we can create an edition of such a complex and composite medieval text transmission so that its fluidity and variability become visible, as well as its usage in medieval religious practice.