Petrarchan Gleanings in Bohemia

The De sui ipsius et multorum ignorantia was composed by Petrarch between 1367 and 1370 in response to the reservations expressed about his learning by four Venetian Aristotelians. Three of the forty-four manuscripts of those currently known are preserved in Prague. These manuscripts, copied in the Bohemian area, attest to an interest in the work even in regions peripheral to those in which it enjoyed wider circulation. In two of these codices (Prague, Národní knihovna České republiky, I.C.24 and XXIII.F.112), which are not exclusively Petrarchan in content, the De ignorantia is transmitted in excerpted form, indicating the compiler’s intention to select passages deemed of particular interest. The present study examines these anthological sections from the perspectives of content and textual features and offers evidence shedding light on the aims and methods that informed the selection.