2022-01-09

Errata et Corrigenda (2)

On further examination, it appears that the cancelled passage on fol. 37r of Sloane 3824 (i.e. the one piece of text in that division, barring the contents list by Sloane's librarian at the start, that isn't in Ashmole's hand) isn't--as I had previously suggested--a cancelled draft of part of the "Celestial Keys" of the Janua Magica Reserata, but is a direct continuation of the fragment of "A Select Treatise as it was first revealed to the Egyptian Magi" that follows the Janua in Sloane 3825: that copy looks never to have been finished, and it seems that Ashmole, while copying the passages from a variant Janua, detached that sheet (and possibly some more blank sheets with it) and added them to the "Longobardus" notebook.

This also resolves the difficulty I'd created for myself, as to why two draft passages from the same work--since the loose leaf that is now fol. 109 of Sloane 3824 manifestly does contain drafts of Janua passages--would be in different handwriting.

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