The manuscript of the epigram by Philip Melanchton from the collections of the Copernicus Library in Toruń

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12775/FT.2017.013

Keywords

Melanchton, Reformation, the poetry of the 16th century, Academic Gymnasium School in Toruń, Nicolaus Copernicus Public Provincial Library in Toruń, Piotr Osiński

Abstract

The article addresses various issues connected with the manuscript of the epigram De monarchiis by Philip Melanchton and donated in 1607 by Michael Falck (1575–1624) to the gymnasium school library in Torun. The comparative research of the manuscript has proved that it is the original work by Melanchton. The author of the epigram made a substantial number of copies of the poem in the years 1556–1558, which he later gave to his family and friends. They differed in the number of verses: some of them included eight elegiac couplets, while others only seven. The differences between them were not limited only to the number of verses, but they also included varieties of the text in some passages. They were taken into account in the criticism of the edited text, which also included various editions of the epigram. The second part of the article discusses briefly the content of the epigram and its interpretation in the context of the political situation of the epoch when Melanchton lived. The author enclosed the isometric translations of the epigram prepared by Piotr Osiński, the PhD student at the Philological Faculty of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń.

Author Biography

Sławomir Wyszomirski, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń. Department of Classical Philology

 

Dr hab. Sławomir Wyszomirski, associate professor of Nicolaus Copernicus University,  is the head of the Department of Classical Philology of Nicolaus Copernicus University (NCU) in Toruń. He deals with the research on Latin and Greek philosophical terminology (e.g. Der Virtus-Begriff in den philosophischen Schriften von L. Annaeus Seneca. Ein Semantisches Studium, Toruń 1993; Pojęcie arete w etyce Stoi Starszej i Średniej, Toruń 1997), and the philological edition of literary texts (Ieremiae Voinovii Carmina Latina et Graeca, nunc primum in unum volumen collecta edidit praefatione et apparatu critico annotationibusque instruxit Slavomirus Wyszomirski, Thorunii MCMXCIII), and also historical texts (Petrus de Dusburgk, Chronica terrae Prussiae, ediderunt, praefatione notisque instruxerunt Jaroslaus Wenta et Slavomirus Wyszomirski, Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series – Tomus XIII, Academia Scientiarum et Litterarum Polona, Cracoviae 2007).

 Dr hab. Sławomir Wyszomirski, associate professor of Nicolaus Copernicus University,  is the head of the Department of Classical Philology of Nicolaus Copernicus University (UMK) in Toruń. He deals with the research on Latin and Greek philosophical terminology (e.g. Der Virtus-Begriff in den philosophischen Schriften von L. Annaeus Seneca. Ein Semantisches Studium, Toruń 1993; Pojęcie arete w etyce Stoi Starszej i Średniej, Toruń 1997), and the philological edition of literary texts (Ieremiae Voinovii Carmina Latina et Graeca, nunc primum in unum volumen collecta edidit praefatione et apparatu critico annotationibusque instruxit Slavomirus Wyszomirski, Thorunii MCMXCIII), and also historical texts (Petrus de Dusburgk, Chronica terrae Prussiae, ediderunt, praefatione notisque instruxerunt Jaroslaus Wenta et Slavomirus Wyszomirski, Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series – Tomus XIII, Academia Scientiarum et Litterarum Polona, Cracoviae 2007).

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Folia Toruniensia

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Published

2017-11-15

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Wyszomirski, S. (2017). The manuscript of the epigram by Philip Melanchton from the collections of the Copernicus Library in Toruń. Folia Toruniensia, 17, 219–229. https://doi.org/10.12775/FT.2017.013

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Vol. 17 (2017)

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