4P Li gç(' TRANSACTIONS

VOL 47, PT. 5, 19,571 INTRODUCTION 801
some of them several times. A number of them, original
with Oresme, have remained permanently in the
French language; georgique, expedient, procreation,
communiquer, participer, cohabiter, unanimité, 1riode,
débilité. The word so perostateur (337a) appears to
be Oresine's own creation of a learned equivalent for
the Latin praeposilos, which has since assumed the
form pre pose, meaning superintendent; it appears to
be constructed from su/7erstare, to stand over. In general,
the vocabulary of the Yconomique contains few
neologisms and is of less linguistic interest than
Oresme's other French writings.
5. THE MANUSCRIPT COPIES AND THE PRINTED EDITION
OF 1489
In a gloss at the beginning of the Ycononlique (fol.
329bc) Oresme divides moral science into three parts—
ethics, economics, and politics, according to Aristotle's
own classification as stated at the beginning of the
Nico,nacheasr Ethics. Oresme explains the relation of
these three parts to the whole in the following logical
manner: ethics deals with the individual's mastery of
himself alone; economics treats of man as manager of
a family group; politics seeks to establish the science
of managing communities of family groups or the art
of governing cities. "Thus," says Oresme in substance,
"according to logical order, ethics is the first,
economics the secoll(l and politics the third division of
moral science, and therefore Aristotle dealt first with
ethics; he then proceeded, in the first Book of the
Politics to treat of economics, "But," he goes on to explain,
"in order to treat economics more fully and to
supplement the discussion in the Politics, this Boob of
Econoics m is placed after the latter work to clarify and
perfect it."
It is clear, then, that Oresnie regarded his Yconomiquc
as a sequel to his Politiqucs and assumed
that in so doing be was following the intention of
Aristotle. However little this logically deduced supposition
may accord with the historical facts as we
know them today, it certainly does explain why we find
each of the ten extant manuscript copies of the Yeanomique,
as well as the unique printed edition of 1489,
preserved together with the Polifiques and placed immediately
after the latter work. Since there are eight
additional manuscript copies of the Politiques unaccompanied
by the Yco,toinique, it is apparent that
Oresme's sense of the logical interdependence of the
two treatises was not uniformly shared by others after
him, even though the absence of the latter treatise may
be due to wholly accidental circumstances.
In the following paragraphs we describe the ten
extant manuscript copies of the Livre de Ycononziquc
and the \Térard edition of 1489, indicating the sigla
" For convenience in comparing the several copies of the
Yconomique with the corresponding companion copies of the
Ethiques we have used here the same sigla as those employed
in the description of the copies of the latter work in Maistre
we shall use to identify these several copies in further
references to them.
A
Avranches, Bihl. Municipale, Ms, 223. Parchment,
360 if., 310 x 220 mm. Le Lirre de Folitiques if. 2c-
328d, unique final redaction; Le Livre de Yconornique
if. 329a-348c; seven glosses selected from Le Livre de
Ethiques if. 350a-360a. The Yconomique is written
in two columns of thirty-six lines—text in lettre de cour,
glosses in small hdtarde; pages unnumbered; chapter
headings in rubric, chapter initials in red and blue, no
running titles. Both Politiqucs and Yconolnique in
same hand; selections from Ethiques in different hand.
Several sheets are badly stained and often difficult to
read. This manuscript has been described in detail by
Leopold Delisle, "Observations sur plusieurs mss. de
la Politique et l'Economique de Nicole Oresme." BIN.
de l'Ecoie de Chartes, fime serie, t. 5: 601-623, 1869. A
presents the original text of the first redaction of the
Yconomique plus the additions incorporated in the
second redaction inserted as marginal notes. Two
such marginal notes are found only in A (fol. 345d)
Delisle assumed these unique additions to he in
Oresme's own hand. Across the bottom of fol. 348cd:
"Liber iste Politicorum est Henrici Oresme, junioris
canonici Baiocensis." Delisle suggests (ibid., p. 614)
that A is a personal copy of the Politiques and Yconomique
belonging to Oresme and given by him to his
nephew Henri Oresme, who was canon of Bayeux in
1385. A came to Avranches from Mont Saint-Michel,
where it may well have been obtained from nearby
Bayeux. It was certainly written before Orcsme's
death in 1382 and is one of the four oldest copies extant.
It is of the same date approximately as B, M and V.
Since A presents the original draft of the Ycono;nique
and marginally all the modifications included in the
second redaction plus two unique additions, it has
been chosen for reproduction in the present edition.
The language of A is strongly Norman in character.
Latin U is retained uniformly in stint; -atus, -ala participles
preceded by a palatal > -ic, in both genders:
traiclie (329c), tronchie (3301)), lessie (332c) ; peior >
piere (332d) ; iwt'eneni > Jenne (333d), les jennes
homsnes (334b). The orthography of A is generally
consistent; the dropping of final a in cc, de, ne, qua
occurs but rarely, in le usually, before initial vowels;
Ia. = le before initial vowels in polysyllabic feminines,
ic ulilité (333a), but l'Escri/'ture regularly.
Y
BibI. Nationale. Ms. franc. 204. Parchment 584 if.,
428 x 320 mm. Politiques, if. 1-326b, third redaction;
Yconomiques, 45 if. 326c-346c, second redaction;
Nicole Oresme: Le Livre de E!hiqucs, 46-53, New York,
Stcchcrt, 1940.
45 The plural spelling is uniform in all copies with the exception
of A.