Abstract

It is the purpose of these notes to make a contribution towards solving a problem the difficulty of which has inhibited all modern editors of the Silvae: the apparent impossibility of establishing a satisfactory relation between the Madrid manuscript and the readings noted by Politian in his copy of the first edition now in the Corsinian library in Rome. It is the task of the editor to draw up a stemma that would reconcile the evidence of our text with the testimony of the great humanist