Abstract

The bilingual Philoxenus Glossary drew some of its materials from Festus de Signif. Verb. and occasionally mentions his name. Its Festus glosses have been collected in a Jena dissertation by Dammann. The Abolita Glossary seems to have begun with Festus excerpts. Before we can glean from these two glossaries every available scrap of evidence about Festus, we must try to complete and correct them. For of the Philoxenus Glossary we have practically only one MS., and that of the ninth century. It must have omitted many items and perverted the words of many others. The Abolita Glossary was associated with another, the Abstrusa Glossary, in Spain, and this composite collection passed into Italy. The MSS. are, we may say, only two, and of each a certain number of leaves are missing. The older and better MS., an uncial codex of the eighth century, was written apparently in Central Italy; the other was written two centuries later at Monte Cassino. They show us Abol. not in its original form, but rearranged in a not too strict alphabetical order. The St. Gall Glossary was compiled from Philox., the composite Abstr.-Abol., and supplies some of those Festus glosses of Philox. and Abol. which are omitted in our MSS. It seems to have been a Bobbio compilation. Our best MS. was written in rude uncials at St. Gall in the eighth century.