Secondary sourceBookc. 1350-1400
Virgil, Opera Omnia (Georgics)
Virgil · c. 1350-1400
A late-medieval Italian manuscript copy of Virgil's complete works, including his poem the Georgics, made for a humanist library.
A medieval manuscript copy of Virgil's complete works, showing how his poetry was preserved and transmitted after antiquity.
About this source
What it is
This is a page from a manuscript copy of Virgil's complete works, made in Italy around 1350-1400 and now held in the Biblioteca Malatestiana. It is handwritten in Latin on vellum, with decorated initial letters in red, blue, gold and white marking the start of sections, along with marginal notes.
Why it matters
Manuscripts like this show how Virgil's poetry, written over a thousand years earlier, was still carefully copied and studied by scribes and scholars in the later Middle Ages. The careful decoration and notes show that Virgil's works were treated as treasured texts worth preserving for humanist libraries.
Look closer
- Why might scribes have decorated certain letters so elaborately?
- What do the marginal notes suggest about how readers used this book?
- What does the survival of this manuscript tell us about how ancient texts reached later centuries?
This book is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Virgil on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.
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