AZ ORSZÁGOS SZÉCHÉNYI KÖNYVTÁR ÉVKÖNYVE 1959. Budapest (1961)

IV. Könyvtár- és művelődéstörténeti tanulmányok - Summaires

Books in Hungary. 194j

—1960. An exhibition. D. KERRSZTURY The article describes the book-show held in honour of the fifteenth anniversary of Hungary's liberation. Every aspect of the Hungarian book was shown here for the first time: the exhibition embraced book publishing, librarianship and book distribution alike. In all the three domains a great development took place during the last fifteen years. Both the growth in book production, and the development regarding quality were clearly illustrated. As befitting the importance of the event, the exhibition was held in one of the most splendid public halls of Budapest, the ceremonial hall of the National Museum. Although emphasis was laid only upon the most important stages of this vast development, the exhibition showed, in a worthy manner, one of the most remarkable achievements of our cultural revolution; the new Hungarian book. ^he scriptors of the library of King Matthias K. CSAPODI Since more than two and a half centuries historical scholarship has been interested in research on the world-famous Corvina library of King Matthias, but so far only the present author (in an earlier study on the Florentine scriptor Petrus Cenninius) has raised the question exactly what types of handwriting could be discerned in the Corvina-codices, who were the scribes known by name, and what relations did they maintain to the royal court in Buda. The handwriting of a codex, the person of the copyist is of as great an importance, as the printer of a book and the type he used. By comparing the styles of writing of various codices important information affecting not only the history of the Corvina Library, but also of 15th century books and libraries in general may result. By comparing the styles of writing of the Corvina-codices preserved in Hungary and of other codices represented by various reproductions (photostats, microfilms, etc.) this study attempts to establish the personality of at least those scriptors, whose name is known either by their signatures on the codices or by other references. The limitations of the study are accounted for by the fact that no examination could be made of Corvina-codices, the handwriting of which could not be compared to that of scribes whose name or hand was known to the author, nor was it possible to study codices of which there was no reproduction available, finally, the study does not extend to codices touching upon not yet clarified questions on the history of writing in Hungary. The study lists alphabetically, with references, 1) the copyist's name, 2) known biographical data, 3) bibliographical particulars (author, title, year of completion, provenance, callnumber, and consulted literature) of the Corvina-codex copied by the scriptor in question, whether signed or unsigned, or only attributed to him as his work. As the nomenclature for different styles of writing of the 15th century has not yet been entirely cleared up, the listing indicates the style of writing of the single codices and scriptors respectively. This study intends to prove how necessary it is to make research into 15th century history of writing; these investigations may help in examining 15th century codices in the libraries of the world with special regard to the Corvina. The complete solution of the question still requires many years' work and co-ordinated co-operation in the various domains of Corvina research. 401