Between “Catena” Commentary and Marginal Glosses: Towards the Edition of Hilarius of Orléans’ Commentary on the «Aeneid» (12th c.)

In the 12th century arose a new commentary to Virgil, now attributed to Hilarius of Orléans, who taught in Angers during the early 12th century and was the beginner of the huge tradition of the classical commentaries in Orléans (among his pupils we find brilliant writers such as Arnulf of Orléans or Guillaume de Tyr). His ‘glosule’ (exposition of both littera and sententia), first case of wide application of biblical quotations in order to explain a classical author, took the place of Servius and became, with more than 20 MSS. dated between 12th and 15th century, the most popular medieval commentary to Virgil. Despite the relevance of this lectura, no edition of the text is available, causing a remarkable lack of information in the history of scholarship. The paper – connected with the census for the larger ‘Catalogus translationum et commentariorum’ corpus - will give a quick introduction (5 min.) to the MS. tradition, marked by a varied dissemination: a longer ‘version’ (as in the MS. London, BL, Add. 16380, 12-13th c.); a shorter ‘version’ (best witness: MS. Berlin, SB, lat. fol. 34, 12th c.); at last 7 other MSS. in which glosses appear in the margins of the Virgil text (among them 2 newly discovered MSS., which will be shortly highlighted). The paper will then especially focus (15 min.) on the problems encountered by the work for the critical edition, with methodological considerations: census of the tradition, with special consideration for marginal glosses; comparison of the different ‘versions’; editorial strategies.