Pioneering work of Prof Colker honoured with exhibition and journal publication
Posted on: 15 February 2018
The pioneering work of Professor M.L. Colker, who created the first comprehensive catalogue of the Library’s medieval Latin manuscript collection, was honoured this month with the publication of a special issue of the journal ‘Hermathena’ and an accompanying exhibition in the Long Room.
The Library of Trinity College Dublin is home to an exceptional collection of medieval Latin manuscripts, especially rich in historical and theological texts. In the 1950s, Marvin ‘Mark’ Colker of the University of Virginia embarked on the Herculean task of cataloguing this collection, comprising around 450 manuscripts.
Over the course of 30 years, Colker made regular visits to Dublin, spending long hours working tirelessly in the manuscripts reading room at the Library. His dedication resulted in the publication of Trinity College Dublin Library: Descriptive Catalogue of the Medieval and Renaissance Latin Manuscripts (Dublin, 1991), fondly referred to as the ‘Colker Catalogue’. His ground-breaking work is the cornerstone for any project or research based on the Latin manuscripts.
By way of tribute, an exhibition entitled Illuminating the Middle Ages is currently on display in the Long Room showcasing the diversity of material made accessible to researchers through Colker’s commitment and expertise.
The exhibition, curated by Assistant Librarian Leanne Harrington, features vividly illuminated psalters, a vibrantly decorated Book of Hours, a handbook for classical learning and a thirteenth-century copy of Peter Lombard’s Sentences. An accompanying online exhibition includes images from the Book of Armagh, the sumptuously decorated Dublin Apocalypse, as well as a unique handbook for confessors.
Colker’s work was also honoured with the publication of a special edition of Hermathena: a Trinity College Dublin Review — the Department of Classics’ journal which has been published without interruption since 1873. The special issue of Hermathena, edited by Anna Chahoud, Professor of Latin, was launched by Professor Brian McGing, Regius Professor of Greek Emeritus.
The collection is entitled Fabellae Dublinenses Revisited and other Essays in Honour of Marvin Colker, and includes essays by scholars from Trinity College (John Scattergood, Edward McParland, Anna Chahoud) and abroad (Thomas Smith, Ernesto Stagni, Giulio Vannini, Ornella Rossi, Silverio Franzoni). The collection of essays gives special attention to the text known, after Colker’s discovery in TCD MS 602, as ‘Petronius Redivivus’. The studies partly engage with Colker’s pioneering research on select Latin manuscripts (MS 602, MS 632) and partly offer a complementary tribute to the extraordinary value of Trinity Library collections for literary, historical and architectural inquiries (MS 115, MS 496, Fagel Collections I.1.95).
Front image caption: TCD MS 106, folio 7r. The small size of this Italian psalter indicates that it was likely created for personal use. The opening Beatus (Blessed) initial B features the image of King David, composer of the psalms, playing on a psaltery (harp).