PREFACE

...the compendium of Palladius is read in an excerpted form. I excerpted the variety of readings from book VI of the Speculum doctrinale Mirror of Doctrine, using the Nuremberg edition, and I applied the same method in excerpting the reading of the Speculum naturale Mirror of Nature up to book XVIII. However, from the following book until the end, I was forced to use the Douai edition published under the title Bibliothecae Mundi Library of the World, since the remaining part of the Nuremberg edition was missing from the public University of Viadrina library and the Royal Berlin Library. Sometimes, however, in that same part of the work, I examined the Douai edition at the same time and placed its variants alongside the Nuremberg edition. Io. Mich. Heusinger, in his Emendationes Emendations II, Chapter 4, p. 200 ff., described the Venetian edition of the Speculum historiale Mirror of History and Speculum naturale Mirror of Nature printed in folio format in 1494, and clearly demonstrated the rich use of both for correcting the books of classical Latin writers. Io. Frider. Eckhard did the same in Frid. Eberhard Boysen’s Allgemeinem historischen Magazin General Historical Magazine, Part VI, p. 257 ff. That Fr. Gronovius had long ago thought about comparing Vincent of Beauvais with Palladius is attested by a brief annotation inscribed in Abr. Gronovius’s copy of the Commelinian edition. Albertus Albertus Magnus, who was older than both Vincent and Crescentius and was excerpted by both, rightly called "Great" in his own century, diligently excerpted the books of Palladius and illustrated them here and there with his own inserted judgments. Often, however, he did not enumerate the exact words but rendered the sentiment of Palladius for the reader; therefore, much caution was needed whenever Albertus had to be summoned to aid in criticism.