Pseudo-Bonaventure

Collective name for the authors of a number of medieval devotional works

Meditationes vitae Christi (Giovanni de Cauli?), c. 1478

Pseudo-Bonaventure (Latin: Pseudo-Bonaventura) is the name given to the authors of a number of medieval devotional works which were believed at the time to be the work of Bonaventure: "It would almost seem as if 'Bonaventura' came to be regarded as a convenient label for a certain type of text, rather than an assertion of authorship".^[1] Since it is clear a number of actual authors are involved, the term "Pseudo-Bonaventuran" is often used. Many works now have other attributions of authorship which are generally accepted, but the most famous, the Meditations on the Life of Christ, remains usually described only as a work of Pseudo-Bonaventure.

Other works

• "Biblia pauperum" ("Poor Man's Bible" – a title only given in the 20th century), a short typological version of the Bible, also extremely popular, and often illustrated. There were different versions of this, the original perhaps by the Dominican Nicholas of Hanapis.
• Speculum Beatæ Mariæ Virginis by Conrad of Saxony
• Speculum Disciplinæ, Epistola ad Quendam Novitium and Centiloquium, all probably by Bonanventura's secretary, Bernard of Besse
• Legend of Saint Clare
• Theologia Mystica, probably by Hugh of Balma.
• Philomena, a poem now attributed to John Peckham, Archbishop of Canterbury from 1279 to 1292.

References

1. Medieval texts and their first appearance in print, E. P. Goldschmidt, p. 128

• Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "St. Bonaventure" . Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. (Penultimate paragraph.)

Further reading

Meditationes de vita Christi

• Lawrence F. Hundersmarck: The Use of Imagination, Emotion, and the Will in a Medieval Classic: The Meditaciones Vite Christi. In: Logos 6,2 (2003), S. 46–62
• Sarah McNamer: Further evidence for the date of the Pseudo-Bonaventuran Meditationes vitæ Christi. In: Franciscan Studies, Bd. 10, Jg. 28 (1990), S. 235–261
• Livario Oliger: Le meditationes vitae Christi del pseudo-Bonaventura. In: Studi Franciscani 18 (1921), S. 143–183; 19 (1922), S. 18–47
• Giorgio Petrocchi: Sulla composizione e data delle Meditationes Vitae Christi. In: Convivium, N.S. 5 (1952), S. 757–778

Bonaventura

• Balduin Distelbrink: Bonaventurae scripta: authentica, dubia vel spuria critice recensita. Istituto storico Cappuccini, Rom 1975 (= Subsidia scientifica Franciscalia, 5)
• Klaus-Bernward Springer (1992). "Johannes (de) Cauligus". In Bautz, Friedrich Wilhelm (ed.). Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL) (in German). Vol. 3. Herzberg: Bautz. cols. 303–304. ISBN 3-88309-035-2.