Isidore’s Etymologies, omitting the first four books, half of the fifth and the tenth (the seven liberal arts, law, medicine and the
alphabet of words), and copying the rest, beginning with the
seventh book, verbally, though with great omissions, and adding
(according to Ritter, Geschichte der Philosophie, vii. 193, from
Alcuin, Augustine or some other accessible source) the meanings
given in the Bible to the subject matter of the chapter; while
things not mentioned in Scripture, especially such as belong to
classical antiquity, are omitted, so that his work seems to be
formed of two alternating parts. His arrangement of beginning
with God and the angels long prevailed in methodical encyclopaedias.
His last six books follow very closely the order of the
last five of Isidore, from which they are taken. His omissions
are characteristic of the diminished literary activity and more
contracted knowledge of his time. His work was presented to
Louis the German, king of Bavaria, at Hersfeld in October 847,
and was printed in 1473, fol., probably at Venice, and again at
Strassburg by Mentelin about 1472–1475, fol., 334 pages.
Michael Constantine Psellus, the younger, wrote Διδασκαλία παντοδαπή, dedicated to the emperor Michael Ducas, who reigned 1071–1078. It was printed by Fabricius in his Bibliotheca Graeca (1712), vol. v., in 186 pages 4to and 193 chapters, each containing a question and answer. Beginning with divinity, it goes on through natural history and astronomy, and ends with chapters on excessive hunger, and why flesh hung from a fig-tree becomes tender. As collation with a Turin MS. showed that 35 chapters were wanting, Harles has omitted the text in his edition of Fabricius, and gives only the titles of the chapters (x. 84–88).
The author of the most famous encyclopaedia of the middle ages was Vincent of Beauvais (q.v.) (c. 1190–c. 1264), whose work Bibliotheca mundi or Speculum majus—divided, as we have it, into four parts, Speculum naturale, Speculum doctrinale, Speculum morale (this part should be ascribed to a later hand), and Speculum historiale—was the great compendium of mid-13th century knowledge. Vincent of Beauvais preserved several works of the middle ages and gives extracts from many lost classics and valuable readings of others, and did more than any other medieval writer to awaken a taste for classical literature. Fabricius (Bibl. Graeca, 1728, xiv. pp. 107-125) has given a list of 328 authors, Hebrew, Arabic, Greek and Latin, quoted in the Speculum naturale. To these should be added about 100 more for the doctrinale and historiale. As Vincent did not know Greek or Arabic, he used Latin translations. This work is dealt with separately in the article on Vincent of Beauvais.
Brunetto Latini of Florence (born 1230, died 1294), the master of Dante and Guido Cavalcanti, while an exile in France between 1260 and 1267, wrote in French Li Livres dou Tresor, in 3 books and 413 chapters. Book i. contains the origin of the world, the history of the Bible and of the foundation of governments, astronomy, geography, and lastly natural history, taken from Aristotle, Pliny, and the old French Bestiaries. The first part of Book ii., on morality, is from the Ethics of Aristotle, which Brunetto had translated into Italian. The second part is little more than a copy of the well-known collection of extracts from ancient and modern moralists, called the Moralities of the Philosophers, of which there are many MSS. in prose and verse. Book iii., on politics, begins with a treatise on rhetoric, chiefly from Cicero De inventione, with many extracts from other writers and Brunetto’s remarks. The last part, the most original and interesting of all, treats of the government of the Italian republics of the time. Like many of his contemporaries, Brunetto revised his work, so that there are two editions, the second made after his return from exile. MSS. are singularly numerous, and exist in all the dialects then used in France. Others were written in Italy. It was translated into Italian in the latter part of the 13th century by Bono Giamboni, and was printed at Trevigi, 1474, fol., Venice, 1528 and 1533. The Tesoro of Brunetto must not be confounded with his Tesoretto, an Italian poem of 2937 short lines. Napoleon I. had intended to have the French text of the Tesoro printed with commentaries, and appointed a commission for the purpose. It was at last published in the Collection des documents inédits (Paris, 1863, 4to, 772 pages), edited by Chabaille from 42 MSS.
Bartholomew de Glanville, an English Franciscan friar, wrote about 1360 a most popular work, De proprietatibus rerum, in 19 books and 1230 chapters.
Book 1 relates to God; 2, angels; 3, the soul; 4, the substance of the body; 5, anatomy; 6, ages; 7, diseases; 8, the heavens (astronomy and astrology); 9, time; 10, matter and form; 11, air; 12, birds (including insects, 38 names, Aquila to Vespertilio); 13, water (with fishes); 14, the earth (42 mountains, Ararath to Ziph); 15, provinces (171 countries, Asia to Zeugia); 16, precious stones (including coral, pearl, salt, 104 names, Arena to Zinguttes); 17, trees and herbs (197, Arbor to Zucarum); 18, animals (114, Aries to Vipera); 19, colours, scents, flavours and liquors, with a list of 36 eggs (Aspis to Vultur). Some editions add book 20, accidents of things, that is, numbers, measures, weights and sounds. The Paris edition of 1574 has a book on bees.
There were 15 editions before 1500. An English translation was completed 11th February 1398 by John Trevisa, and printed by Wynkyn de Worde, Westminster, 1495? fol.; London, 1533, fol.; and with considerable additions by Stephen Batman, a physician, London, 1582, fol. It was translated into French by Jehan Corbichon at the command of Charles V. of France, and printed 14 times from 1482 to 1556. A Dutch translation was printed in 1479, and again at Haarlem, 1485, fol.; and a Spanish translation by Padre Vincente de Burgos, Tholosa, 1494, fol.
Pierre Bersuire (Berchorius), a Benedictine, prior of the abbey of St Eloi in Paris, where he died in 1362, wrote a kind of encyclopaedia, chiefly relating to divinity, in three parts:—Reductorium morale super totam Bibliam, 428 moralitates in 34 books on the Bible from Genesis to Apocalypse; Reductorium morale de proprietatibus rerum, in 14 books and 958 chapters, a methodical encyclopaedia or system of nature on the plan of Bartholomew de Glanville, and chiefly taken from him (Berchorius places animals next after fishes in books 9 and 10, and adopts as natural classes volatilia, natatilia and gressibilia); Dictionarius, an alphabetical dictionary of 3514 words used in the Bible with moral expositions, occupying in the last edition 1558 folio pages. The first part was printed 11 times from 1474 to 1515, and the third 4 times. The three parts were printed together as Petri Berchorii opera omnia (an incorrect title, for he wrote much besides), Moguntiae, 1609, fol., 3 vols., 2719 pages; Coloniae Agrippinae, 1631, fol., 3 vols.; ib. 1730–1731, fol., 6 vols., 2570 pages.
A very popular small encyclopaedia, Margarita philosophica, in 12 books, divided into 26 tractates and 573 chapters, was written by Georg Reisch, a German, prior of the Carthusians of Freiburg, and confessor of the emperor Maximilian I. Books 1-7 treat of the seven liberal arts; 8, 9, principles and origin of natural things; 10, 11, the soul, vegetative, sensitive and intellectual; 12, moral philosophy. The first edition, Heidelberg, 1496, 4to, was followed by 8 others to 1535. An Italian translation by the astronomer Giovanno Paolo Gallucci was published at Venice in 1594, 1138 small quarto pages, of which 343 consist of additional tracts appended by the translator.
Raphael Maffei, called Volaterranus, being a native of Volterra, where he was born in 1451 and died 5th January 1522, wrote Commentarii Urbani (Rome, 1506, fol., in 38 books), so called because written at Rome. This encyclopaedia, printed eight times up to 1603, is remarkable for the great importance given to geography, and also to biography, a subject not included in previous encyclopaedias. Indeed, the book is formed of three nearly equal parts,—geographia, 11 books; anthropologia (biography), 11 books; and philologia, 15 books. The books are not divided into short chapters in the ancient manner, like those of its predecessors. The edition of 1603 contains 814 folio pages. The first book consists of the table of contents and a classed index; books 2-12, geography; 13-23, lives of illustrious men, the popes occupying book 22, and the emperors book 23; 24-27, animals and plants; 28, metals, gems, stones, houses and other inanimate things; 34, de scientiis cyclicis (grammar and rhetoric); 35, de scientiis mathematicis,
