S (Scala Coeli)
The version of the Seven Sages narrative known as 'Version S' in scholarship was penned by Jean or Johannes Gobi the Younger, as part of the collection of exempla titled Scala Coeli composed circa 1323–30. Gobi was a Dominican friar from the south of France, who compiled and composed the Scala Coeli while living at the monastery in Saint-Maximin (a site overseen by Jean Gobi the Elder, presumably his uncle) (see Aranda García (2021a), Polo de Beaulieu (1996)). The exempla in the compilation - somewhere between 400 and 1,100 in number, depending on the individual manuscript/incunabula witness - are mostly, but not universally, Dominican, drawn from and found in many other popular contemporary exempla collections, including those attributed to Jacques de Vitry, Arnold of Liège, Étienne of Bourbon, and Caesarius of Heisterbach.
The collection is ordered alphabetically, with exempla grouped under thematic headings beginning with Abstinentia and ending with Usura. Each exemplum opens with a moral message and attribution, and is usually followed by a moralisation; however, this is not the case for the version of the Seven Sages found in the Scala, which is also longer and more detailed than most of the other exempla (Aranda Garcia 2021a). That additional length may explain why only some surviving Scala Coeli texts include the Seven Sages - it does not meet the usual formal expectations of exempla, whose brevity allowed for their use in sermons, and may therefore have been deemed a poor fit for the collection by redactors. According to Cañizares Ferriz (2011), the three distinct redactions of the Latin Scala Coeli differ in their treatment and inclusion of the Seven Sages:
- Group I (most complete manuscripts, 1002–1068 exempla): most include the Seven Sages, and mostly include the sages' names.
- Group II (876–974 exempla): more than half contain The Seven Sages, rarely contain the sages' names.
- Group III (most abbreviated, 487–617 exempla): less than half contain the Seven Sages, and almost always omit the sages' names.
Cañizares Ferriz was primarily working with Marie-Anne Polo de Beaulieu's 1991 edition when analysing these groups; as such, the texts not included in Polo de Beaulieu's edition - nine manuscripts in total - are not described by Cañizares Ferriz, and whether or not they contain the Seven Sages text is unknown. Those manuscripts are not included in this database (but they are listed on the page for the Latin Scala Coeli Manscripts). (For the presence/absence of the Seven Sages in the Spanish translation of the Scala Coeli, see Cañizares Ferriz, and Hilka (1913)).
Despite the fact that the Seven Sages is longer than most other exempla in the Scala Coeli, it is still notably brief when compared with other texts in the the broader Seven Sages tradition; Campbell (1907) observes that it is 'much compressed', though the narrative pattern is 'not substantially altered'. Gobi attributes the tale to the lost Liber de septem sapientibus, the text that Paris hypothesized might be the source for much of the Western transmission of the Seven Sages (see Paris (1876)). Regardless of its relationship to the broader tradition, Scala Coeli is clearly closely related to the French Version L. The order of the stories in the two versions is nearly identical; the placement of Tentamina and Puteus is reversed, and Version S includes Vaticinium and Vidua which Version L omits, but in all other respects, they are very similar. Critically, this includes the stories Filia and Noverca, which substitute for Roma and Inclusa in Version A. These two stories - only found in these two versions and the anomalous Overlap A/L texts - are of particular note because of their rarity, and because of their meta-reflective function. Also like (some of) the Version L texts, this narrative includes the motif of the judicial duel/trial by combat, staged prior to the prince's final story. The empress's champion is defeated, and she is condemned; as she is led to her pyre, she says,
"Nunc veritatem experiar de somnii mei. Videbatur enim mihi quod serpens egrediebatur de ore meo et septem aves insequerentur serpentem. Cumque cum adjutorio aquile cepissent serpentem et reduxissent eum ad me, una cum eo ardebam in igne. Hic serpens est falsitas mea. Septem autem aves sunt septem sapientes, aquila filius tuus qui denudaverat falsitatem meam." (Polo de Beaulieu, 1991, p. 389)
[Now I see the truth of my dream. I dreamed that a serpent came out of my mouth, and seven birds pursued the serpent. When they captured it with the help of an eagle and brought it back to me, I burned in the fire with it. This serpent is my falsehood. The seven birds are the seven wise men, and the eagle is your son, who exposed my lie.]
Her death is then immediately followed by the prince's story Vaticinium, in which interpreting of symbols and the meaning of birds becomes further - though posthumous - proof of the empress's guilt and the son's innocence.
| Identification and general Information | |
|---|---|
| Reference Number | |
| Siglum of the version of the Seven Sages | S (Scala Coeli) |
| Version Number | |
| Title | Liber de Septem Sapientibus (Scala Coeli) |
| Author | |
| Tradition and Lineage | |
|---|---|
| Branch of the tradition | West |
| Adapted from (version) | (Lost) Liber de Septem Sapientibus |
| Adapted into (version) | |
| Source for composition and adaptation information | |
| Recorded secondary versions |
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| Connected manuscripts |
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| Language and Composition | |
|---|---|
| Original language of version | Latin |
| Language of text | Latin |
| Regional or specific language of version | |
| Translated into (languages) | Latin, Spanish |
| Place of composition | Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume, France |
| Date of composition | 1322 - 1330 |
| Islamic date of composition | |
| Hebrew date of composition | |
| Source for date of composition | Cañizares Ferriz (2011), Polo de Beaulieu (1991) |
| Notes and Commentary | |
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| Note | |
| Notes on motifs | |
| Notes on the frame | |
| Pattern of embedded stories in this version |
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| Connected prints |
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No connected prints |