Plinio il Vecchio e Vincenzo di Beauvais: Quale modello di «Naturalis historia» per lo «Speculum maius»?

This article studies, in a strictly philogical way, the relationship between the.Speculum Naturale of the Dominican Vincent of Beauvais (1180/1190-1264) and one of its most important sources, Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia. The enquiry reveals that the Speculum is related to the two main families of the Naturalis Historia diffused at that time, to a very different extent as a consequence of a complex contamination process. Meanwhile, it shows that all the ancient editions of the Speculum are marked by another contamination phenomenon, already attested in the editio princeps (1476) on the basis of the revised second edition of Pliny’s text (1472). The investigation is supported by extensive collations on the manuscripts of both works, which need further examinations because of the unreliability of the editions. It offers as a result some new materials useful to the study of the manuscript tradition of both texts, especially for the Naturalis Historia.