The purpose of this notice is to inform readers about commentaries on the Book of Revelation from the Middle Ages that have been published recently.
Two Apocalypse commentaries attributed to Alcuin of York (d. 804) were recently translated by Sarah Van Der Pas and published in the Consolamini Commentary Series at Consolamini Publications in West Monroe, Louisiana.
A new critical edition and English translation of Scholia in Apocalypsin, once attributed to Origen, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2013. Its title is An Ancient Commentary on the Book of Revelation by P. Tzamalikos.
A new translation by Faith Wallis of Bede’s eighth-century Commentary on Revelation was published by Liverpool University Press in 2013 in the Translated Texts for Historians series, Volume 58. It contains a great introduction and extensive notes.
The first portion of Beatus of Liebana’s eighth-century Commentary on the Apocalypse is available in English translation by Maureen O’Brien. It is for sale in electronic form on amazon.
A Gloss on the Apocalypse found in a tenth-century manuscript at Cambridge was edited recently by Roger Gryson in Corpus Christianorum. The commentary may be from an earlier century. Dr. Colin McAllister of the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs is preparing an English translation of it.
The Glossa Ordinaria on the Apocalypse was recently translated into English by Sarah Van Der Pas. Its title is Consolamini Commentary Series: The Glossa Ordinaria on Revelation. An English Translation. It was published in 2015 by Consolamini Publications in West Monroe, Louisianna.
Catherine A. Scine wrote a very informative doctoral dissertation that discusses in much detail commentaries on the Apocalypse from the thirteenth century, including those of Peter of Tarentaise and Hugh of Saint Cher. Hugh wrote two commentaries, with the incipits Aser pinguis and Vidid Jacob respectively. The dissertation is entitled “Early Dominicans on the Apocalypse: A Reading of the 1260s Apocalypse Commentary of Peter of Tarentaise,” and is available from Proquest.
Finally, a Latin edition of Peter John Olivi’s Lectura super Apocalypsim from the year 1298 is now available from Franciscan Institute Publications. This edition by Warren Lewis was previously only available in a hard-to-locate typewritten European doctoral dissertation from the 1970s, and is a great edition to scholarship on the subject.
I hope in these volumes you find refreshment, delight, and insight.
Frank