Working with liturgical manuscripts, part 11 - A sequence for the dispersion of the Apostles

Although I am no longer employed to work with liturgical manuscripts at the university library of University of Southern Denmark, I am nonetheless excited whenever I am alerted to a new find in the library's collection of old books. A few weeks back, my colleague Jakob Povl Holck sent me some pictures he had taken of a fragment he had just discovered, and I will share my research on these fragments with you. The pictures are all taken by Jakob, and I have his permission to reproduce these images here.

Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek, RARA K 246

Photo by Jakob Povl Holck

Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek, RARA K 246

Photo by Jakob Povl Holck

Syddansk Universitetsbibliotek, RARA K 246

Photo by Jakob Povl Holck

The fragment contains an incomplete sequence - performed during mass - for the feast of the dispersion of the apostles, Divisio Apostolorum, celebrated July 15 in commemoration of the apostles leaving Jerusalem to take up their missionary work. The earliest evidence for a celebration of this feast is a sequence composed by Godescalc (d.1098), a monk at Limburg. I do not know whether this sequence is the one found in the fragment of RARA K 246, however. The book containing this fragment was printed in Strasbourg in 1522, and so it is likely that the manuscript from which the fragment comes was kept at some ecclesiastical institution in Alsace.

The sequence found in this fragment is a long panegyric of the glory of God and a list of the apostles. In the fragment of RARA K 246, only a small part of this sequence has survived (the full text can be found here), and this contains the list of the apostles. I have transcribed the surviving text of the fragment, and this can be read here:

[uerbum] dei creature omni coram regibus [et] princibus. Sicut missit me pater et ego mitto uos in mundum estor[e] ergo prudentes sicut serpents est[ore ut columbe simplices]. H[inc petrus romam apostolorum princeps adiit Paulus greciam ubique docens gratiam ter quatuor hi proceres in plagis terre quatuor euangelisantes trinum et unum]. A[ndre]as iacobus uterque philippus ba[r]tholomeus. Symon tha[de]us io[ha]nnes thomas et matheus. Duodecim iudices non ab u[no sed in un]um diuisi per o[rbem] di[uisos in unum colligunt]


I have not yet had the time to translate this text or to write more carefully about it, but I hope to return to it in the near future.