A Companion to Hildegard of Bingen

278 michael embach
for the canonization attempt.10 Therefore, in the early phase of textual
transmission, one can discuss a monastic community of influence, which
collectively sought to popularize Hildegard’s works through the use of
corporate structures. However, Hildegard herself never claimed to be an
exclusively monastic author, or even a monastic theologian. For whom did
Hildegard write? This question demands a more comprehensive answer:
she wrote for believers, for the Church, and even for humanity itself.
The transmission of Hildegard’s texts in the form of an opera omnia
never really became popular. This is represented by the famous Riesenkodex
(Wiesbaden, Hessische Landesbibliothek [Hessian State Library],
Ms. 2), which as a manuscript possesses the nimbus of a reliquary and
stands as an icon for Hildegard. The claim that Hildegard wrote the codex
with her own hand, a statement maintained as fact well into the 17th
century, remains signifijicant, even if it is also completely incorrect. It has
as little basis in history as the cliché that Hildegard herself painted the
miniatures in the illuminated Scivias manuscript. Very few manuscripts
can even be considered as approximate copies of the Riesenkodex: only
Ms. Add. 15102, held by the British Library in London and commissioned
by Johannes Trithemius (1462–1516); Ms. lat. Qu. 674, currently in the
Staatsbibliothek in Berlin as part of the Preußischer Kulturbesitz; and
Cod. 721, previously owned by the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek in
Vienna and currently lost, can be included in this number. Despite this,
the Riesenkodex continues to be used as a source for copies of individual
works by Hildegard. Even the version of Scivias edited by Jacobus Faber
Stapulensis (Jacque LeFèvre d’Étaples, c.1450–1536) and published in 1513
was based on the text included in the Riesenkodex and not on the Scivias
manuscript itself.
The case that Hildegard’s works on natural history were not included in
the Riesenkodex serves to underscore the fact that Hildegard was initially
considered primarily as a visionary, prophet, and remonstrator of the
errant; her roles as physician or composer were considerably less important.
The foundation for the former estimation obviously remains the trilogy
of visionary texts, the Scivias, the Liber vite meritorum, and the Liber
diuinorum operum. These three works, composed over a period of approximately
30 years, represent the nucleus of Hildegard’s writings. Other texts,
10 Angela Carlevaris, Das Werk Hildegards von Bingen im Spiegel des Skriptoriums von
Trier St. Eucharius, Mitteilungen und Verzeichnisse aus der Bibliothek des Bischöflichen
Priesterseminars zu Trier 12 (Trier, 1999); Michael Embach, “Die Beziehungen Hildegards
von Bingen zu Trier,” Jahrbuch Kreis Trier-Saarburg 31 (2000): 229–235.