Page:The library a magazine of bibliography and library literature, Volume 6.djvu/386

 374 The Library. bearing the arms of Innocent III. and Boniface, and one con- tained nothing but Innocent III.'s sermons. Other chests con- tained the archives. M. Faucon declares that all the archives of the Holy See were there. But the degree of precision exer- cised at this time may be again gauged by the fact that one chest is spoken of as containing letters of princes of the I2th and i3th century; letters patent of the German emperors and kings of Hungary, &c.; a copy, on silk paper, of all letters addressed by Frederick II. to Louis IX. on the excommunication pro- nounced by Innocent IV.; these archives remaining at Assisi till 1362, when they were carried to Avignon, and where they are found entered in the catalogue of 1366.' Towards the end of the sojourn at Avignon the mention of books becomes more and more rare, 2 which is possibly attri- butable to the fact that the library by that time had become fairly well furnished. 3 Imbued with Latin as the Papal Court then was, it is interesting to find that the library of Urban V. con- tained no more than five or six small volumes in French or Romance, and in Italian, which already contained chefs-cTceuvrts in poetry, eloquence, and history, absolutely none. 4 The popes of Avignon had none of the leisure of the popes of the Renais- sance. 5 Petrarch writing to Nelli, the Prior of the Church of the Santi Apostoli at Florence, in a letter dated January 8, 1352, on the subject of his Pliny, says : " There is no Pliny here that I ever knew of except the popes'." The library was apparently a private one for the exclusive use of the popes. For all that it was not difficult of access. 6 On January 28, 1353, a new inventory was commenced. Carini states that in 1354 the offices of sacrist, librarian and confessor to the pope were reunited. He gives no authority (p. 29). By the year 1364 Urban V. had only one idea that of re- turning to Rome, and while he gave orders for the repair of the Vatican and of the churches, he also ordered, in 1369, a complete inventory of the possessions of the popes. 7 This inventory is the most complete of all those of the popes of the i4th century. 8 But neither under Urban V., who returned to Avignon to die he died September 24, i37o 9 and under whom the library was 1 Faucon, op. cit., pp. 10-11. - Ibid., pp. 51-2. 3 Epp. famil.^ ed. Fracassetti, lib. xii., 5. * Tom. ii. 182. 5 Carini, 31-2. Ibid., pp. 54-5. 7 Ibid., p. 30.
 * Ibid. * Ibid., p. 30.