Ambr. L 116 sup.
Material Description
The manuscript Ambr. L 116 sup. is a paper codex currently consisting of 320 folios, measuring approximately 280 x 200 mm. Its present composition is as follows: A, B (modern paper restoration), I, 320, C (modern paper restoration). The paper is unwatermarked and of poor quality—porous, dark in color, and marked by numerous frayed edges and irregular margins. Most of the folios were reinforced with modern paper during the latest restoration, which took place in Grottaferrata on April 24, 1957, as recorded in a handwritten note in pen on a sheet affixed to the front pastedown. Three modern foliation systems can be distinguished: one at the bottom center of each folio recto (serving as the main reference foliation); one at the upper right margin of each recto; and a handwritten pagination at the top of the outer margin of each folio. The binding is a modern restoration, featuring wooden boards and a leather spine.
The manuscript transmits the text of the Iliad, accompanied by scholia and other exegetical material. Specifically, the Homeric text is presented in two columns per page, each flanked by the pseudo-Psellian paraphrasis. Each book is preceded by its corresponding hypothesis and followed by scholia, arranged as full-page text. Marginal annotations or intercolumnar notes—more rarely, exegetical material in a first hand — are also present. The scholia belong to class D according to Erbse’s classification, more precisely to family h (Erbse 1960, 184–209; Erbse 1969, LVI-LVIII). The manuscript is, in fact, a witness of the h2 subgroup, which — based on current knowledge — appears to consist almost entirely of manuscripts produced in the Terra d’Otranto region.
Brief History of the Manuscript
The codex was copied by a single scribe. Paleographic evidence suggests a date in the second half of the 13th century and a place of origin in Terra d’Otranto. However, only a few decades after its production, the manuscript was read in one of the major centers of the Eastern Roman Empire—either Constantinople or Thessalonica. This is indicated by numerous marginal interventions scattered throughout the codex, executed in a distinctly Eastern graphic style. Among these later readers, one can identify a prolific anonymous copyist known as Scribe F, who was active in Thessalonica around the mid-14th century within the scholarly circle of Demetrios Triklinios. He is definitively responsible for the current restoration leaf, fol. 318 (Pascale 2025). Furthermore, the manuscript appears to have served as a direct exemplar for the scholia of Florence, Ricc. gr. 30, a manuscript produced in Constantinople—or at least in an Eastern setting—during the first half of the 14th century (Sciarra 2005, 157–159).
By at least the mid-15th century, the codex had returned to Italy. It was first owned by Lianoro Lianori (1425–1477) of Bologna, and later by Luca Bonfio (1470–1540) of Padua. The manuscript was acquired by the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in 1603.
Martini – Bassi 1906, pp. 603–604 (reference catalogue of Greek manuscripts preserved in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana); Erbse 1960 (on the text of the scholia); Erbse 1969 (on the text of the scholia); Jacob 1977 (on the graphic stylization characteristic of the Otranto region); Hoffmann 1984 (on the ornamental features of Salentine manuscripts); Vassis 1991 (on the pseudo-Psellian paraphrasis); Arnesano 2005, pp. 143–145 (on the scribe); Sciarra 2005, pp. 14–20 and passim (detailed description of the codex and philological analysis of the scholia); Pasini 2007, p. 179 (comprehensive bibliography of the manuscript up to 2006); Arnesano 2008, pp. 56, 103, 124 (on the scribe); Durante 2008 (on the ornamentation of Salentine manuscripts);Durante 2020 (on the ornamentation of Salentine manuscripts); Pascale 2025, forthcoming (study of the manuscript and further analysis of the scholia)