The Odyssey of the Ravenna Manuscript Urbino Time

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to define the chronology of the Ravenna manuscript (R 429), which is the oldest and qualitatively best witness of Aristophanes’ plays. The manuscript was held at the Court of the Dukes of Urbino between the end of the 15th and 16th centuries. As it is well known, the Ravenna manuscript was in Florence in 1516, but how and when the Ms. came into the Library of Urbino are questions as obscure as how and when it was carried away. Over the centuries, scholars have tried to investigate such issues, but they still disagree to this day. After summarizing the bibliography concerning such chronology, I focus on the ancient indices of the Library of Urbino. Special attention will be given to the so-called “Old Index” and the “Index of Veterani”. By studying these indices and their marginal annotations and also the prefaces of two printed editions of Aristophanes (the 1515 and 1516 Giunta editions), it is possible to suggest that the Ravenna manuscript arrived in Urbino at Federico da Montefeltro’s time (that is to say before 1482) and that it left the library in 1515–1516.