Glossa Ordinaria. Biblical text (large
text) and gloss (small text) for Daniel
1.1–4. BN lat. 155, fol. 138. Courtesy
of the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.
Epistles and perhaps the Gospel of John to Anselm of Laon, and the Pentateuch,
Jeremiah, and perhaps Joshua to 2 Kings and the Minor Prophets to Gilbert of Auxerre,
“the Universal.” Anselm’s brother, Ralph, may have made the gloss on Matthew. The
compilers of the other glosses remain a mystery.
The Glossa was taken up by two famous Parisian masters, Gilbert of Poitiers and Peter
Lombard. Peter wrote commentaries on the Psalter and the Pauline epistles, which were
incorporated into the glossed text as standard (the Magna glossatura). Perfecting the
characteristic layout, apparently in Paris late in the 12th century, made it the reference
tool par excellence.
The Glossa was printed in many early versions, the first by Adolph Rusch of
Strasbourg (1480–81). From the 1495 edition, the Glossa was printed together with the
postillae of Nicholas of Lyra, and after ca. 1500 an increasing number of interpolations in
the printed texts make them unreliable witnesses to the 12th-century versions. The
adjective Ordinaria was not added to the general term Glossa until the 14th century.
Lesley J.Smith
[See also: ANSELM OF LAON; BIBLE, CHRISTIAN INTERPRETATION OF;
GILBERT OF POITIERS; PETER LOMBARD; RABANUS MAURUS; WALAFRID
STRABO]
Medieval france: an encyclopedia 758