The Hand that Touched Troy: Using Maniculae in Latin and French Manuscripts (Benoît de Sainte-Maure’s Roman de Troie, Guido delle Colonne’s Historia and their Respective Prose Versions)

Abstract

Abstract In Auch, BM, 10, more than 120 maniculae, or manicules, touch the text of the Historia destructionis Troiae by Guido delle Colonne with their short or disproportionately long fingers. These maniculae are accompanied by brackets, notae, various remarks. They testify to an active reading of the work, which brushes against the writing as closely as possible, signalling and selecting passages, sometimes simply pointing out, sometimes recopying, summarizing, or commenting. This practice, which was by no means specific to the Trojan material, is far more apparent in manuscripts of the Latin work compared to those of its French source (Benoît de Sainte-Maure) and in the French prose versions that stem directly from it. By examining manuscripts of both the Latin and French traditions, and while also taking into account the methodological biases that this approach implies, this article interprets the presence of reading marks (maniculae, underlining, notes) in Trojan texts. I retrace various types of reading, which include character-focused, historical, moral or rhetorical modes of reading. I demonstrate that specific readerly profiles emerge, and more specifically, that such marks of reading turn out to be topical teaching tools or otherwise present a more subjective interaction with the textual matter. In short, I examine how these hands touching the words might inform our understanding of the reception of Troy during the Middle Ages and the early modern period.