The hand and glossing activity of Hucbald of Saint-Amand (c.840-930) at home and abroad
Abstract. Hucbald of Saint-Amand’s hand has never been identified. But Valenciennes, Bibliothèque Municipale, Ms.174, is the key to finding it. This is a collaboration of several Reims scribes with a single Saint-Amand hand and can be situated during Hucbald’s residency in Reims. It bears personal notes in the calendar which directly refer to events in Hucbald’s life. The hand can also be found in other manuscripts Hucbald possessed.
The late Carolingian intellectual and composer, Hucbald of Saint-Amand (c.840-930) was, in addition to his home monastery, also active for extended periods at both Saint-Bertin and Reims, as teacher and scholar. Unlike other contemporaries, his hand has actually never been identified. According to Smith, ‘Hucbald…has left no trace in the surviving manuscripts’. But a key to identifying him is his activity at Reims. He was invited to teach in Reims by Archbishop Fulk and brought back several manuscripts afterwards, many of which show collaborations between Reims and Saint-Amand hands. Some of these manuscripts show distinct traits that allow us to identify Hucbald’s hand in them.
There is one particularly special example among this collection of material created by the fertile collaboration of Reims and Saint-Amand. Valenciennes, Bibliothèque Municipale, Ms. 174 is a miscellany with an extensive calendar, all written in the last quarter of the ninth century. Portions are written by a number of Reims hands, among which a single Saint-Amand hand undertakes several distinct stints. Unlike in other cases, this was a Saint-Amand hand working with and at the same time as several Reims scribes, actively collaborating in the construction of the manuscript. This hand is clearly distinct, and has some recognisable characteristics that allow us to differentiate it not only from the surrounding Reims hands, but also among Saint-Amand’s scribes.
For this single Saint-Amand hand, a connection to Hucbald himself can be strongly supported by the internal evidence in the calendar. Some key additions in this hand note events of Hucbald’s own life, including his own ordination to the priesthood in 870, and the death of his uncle and teacher, Milo of Saint-Amand in 872. The personal character of the calendrical notes adds strong support to the idea that this collaboration between a single Saint-Amand hand and several Reims hands would be best explained by a production during Hucbald’s tenancy at Reims, and that he himself took part in the making of this manuscript, directing and collaborating with his students in Reims. It suggests that we can identify the single Saint-Amand hand active in Valenciennes BM, 174, including in the calendar, with Hucbald of Saint-Amand, finally uncovering his own script.
Thus, the characteristics of the hand in Valenciennes, Bibliothèque Municipale, Ms. 174 can be noted, and these traces identified elsewhere. For Hucbald, we also have a resource and guide in the list of manuscripts he possessed and donated to Saint-Amand, many of which survive. Some bear a similar hand. More unexpectedly, some liturgical manuscripts from Saint-Amand have it too. Together, these attest Hucbald’s wide interests and broad activity, over his long and productive life.