ScriptoriaSlavica

Tuesday, September 11th, the OSU Fine Arts Library hosted a “facsimiles open house” so that patrons could familiarize themselves with the variety of manuscript reproductions available in the OSU Libraries. Facsimiles are invaluable resources for researchers, faculty, and students who are unable to access original unique items.

There were over 40 facsimiles in various languages from several different library collections on display. Among them was the Rare Books and Manuscripts’ Codex Nuttall: Facsimile of an ancient Mexican codex belonging  to Lord Zouche of Harynworth, England, with an introduction by Zelia Nuttall (Cambridge, Mass; Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, 1902).

Codex Zouche-Nuttall was presented at some point to Robert Curzon, 14th Baron Zouche.* This is the same Curzon who wrote an illuminating account of his travels and manuscript acquisitions entitled Visits to the Monasteries of the Levant (1848). Curzon describes receiving from the abbot of St. Paul’s Monastery on Mt. Athos a 14th-century Bulgarian manuscript . This manuscript is the focus of Cynthia Vakareliyska’s monumental two-volume annotation of and linguistic/textual introduction to the Curzon Gospel.

*Fewkes, J. Walter. Book Review: “Codex Nuttall. Facsimile of an Ancient Mexican Codex Belonging to Lord Zouche of Harynworth, England.” American Ethnography Quasimonthly. Upon Curzon’s death in 1873, the codex passed to his son, and then to the British Museum.

Addendum: According to the provenance record on the British Library’s webpage for the digital copy of The Gospels of Tsar Ivan Alexander, “Robert Curzon, 15th Baron Zouche (1851-1914): deposited his father’s collection of 218 manuscripts and 69 printed books on permanent loan to the British Museum in 1876. Bequeathed to the British Musuem in 1917 by the 14th Baron’s daughter, Darea, 16th Baroness Zouche (1860-1917)” (Digitised Manuscripts, Add MS 39627, http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Add_MS_39627, accessed Wed., June 9, 2021).