Besides the copies noted by Wickersheimer (1913) in French manuscripts from the ninth to the eleventh centuries, such as Laon 407, Orléans 276, and BN nouv. acq. 1616, where in fact it occurs twice: at fol. 7v, “Ratio spere phytagor philosophi quem epulegus descripsit,” and at fol. 14r, “Ratio pitagere de infirmis,”—the following may be listed.
BN 5239, 10th century, # 12.
Harleian 3017, 10th century, fol. 58r, “Ratio spherae Pythagorae philosophi quam Apuleius descripsit.”
Cotton Tiberius C, VI, 11th century, fol. 6v, Imagines vitae et mortis quarum utraque rotulum tenet longum literis et numeris quae ad sphaeram Apuleii ad latera adscriptis, cum versibus pagina circumscriptis. The figures are of Vita with halo, robes, and angelic face, and of Mors, who wears only a pair of drawers, whose ribs show through his flesh, and who has wings like a demon. One has to turn the page upside down in order to read some of it.
CU Trinity 1369, 11th century, fol. 1r, just before the Calendar of Marianus Scotus, “Racio spere pytagorice quam apuleius descripsit.”
Chartres 113, 9th century, fol. 99, following works by Alcuin, “Spera Apuleii Platonis.”
Ivrea 19, 10th century, # 5, De spera Putagorae.
CLM 22307, 10-11th century, fol. 194, Ratio sphaerae Phitagoreae philosophi quam Apulegius descripsit, “Petosiris philosophus Micipso regi salutem ...”, where it would seem to be confused with the letter of Petosiris to Nechepso.
Vatican Palat. Lat. 176, 10th century, fol. 162v, “Eulogii ratio sperae Pitagorae philosophi,” in a MS containing works of Jerome, Augustine, and Ambrose.
Vatican Urb. Lat. 290, 11-13th century, fol. 2v, Ratio spere Pitagoras quam Apuleius descripsit; fol. 3, Petosiris Micipso regi salutem.
I suspect that the following would also prove upon examination to be one of these Spheres of life and death.
CLM 18629, 10th century, fol. 95, Characteres literarum secretarum, item incantationes. Alphabetum Graecorum et numeri per tabulam dispositi; fol. 106, Tractatus de literis alphabeti (mysticus).
Vatican Palat. Lat. 485, 9th century, fol. 14, Litterae graecae cum interpretatione alphabetica et numerica.
Vatican 644, 10-11th century, fol. 16v.
Of the numerous occurrences of the Sphere of Pythagoras or of Apuleius in MSS later than the eleventh century I have noted only a few examples.
Vienna 2532, 12th century, fols. 1-2, Tractatus astrologicus de divinando exitu morborum e positionibus lune et de sphere Pythagore.
Vatican 642, 12th century, fol. 82, a somewhat different mode of divination, by which one tells what another is thinking or is holding in his hand, is attributed to Bede.
Madrid 10016, early 13th century, fol. 3, “spera de morte vel vita”; fol. 85v, the letter of Petosiris to Nechepso. It is interesting to note that this MS originally belonged to an English Cluniac monastery: Haskins, EHR (1915), p. 65.
BN 7486, 14th century, fol. 66v, “Canon supra rotam Pictagore,” opens, “Pictagoras is said to have written thus to Nasurius, king of the Chaldees;” then at fol. 67r comes “The Sphere of Pictagoras the philosopher which Epuleus Platonicus briefly described;” which is followed at fol. 68r by a long treatise ascribed to Ptolemy, Exortatio ad artem prescientie ptholomei regis egypti, in which various questions are answered by numerical and alphabetical calculations and one is also by the same method referred to nativities arranged under the 28 mansions of the moon.
CU Trinity 1109, 14th century, fol. 15, Spera apulei et platonici; fol. 20, “Ratio spere pictagis philosophe quod apollonius scripsit;” fol. 392, S(p)era Fortune.
Digby, 58, 14th century, fol. 1v, “Spera philosophorum.”
Bodleian 26 (Bernard 1871), 13-14th century, fols. 207 and 216v.
Bodleian 177 (Bernard 2072), late 14th century, # 1, Pythagorae sphaera quam Apuleius exaravit ut scias an aeger convalescat; # 14, fol. 22r, Apuleii Platonici Sphaera de vita et morte et de omnibus negotiis quae inquirere volueris.
Amplon. Quarto 380, 14th century, at the close of a Geomancy by Abdallah, “Spera Apuley de vita et morte vel de omnibus negociis de quibus scire volueris; sic facias....”
Additional 15236, 13-14th century, fol. 108, “Spera (Pictagore) de vita et morte sive de re alia quacunque secundum Apuleium.”
Harleian 5311, 15th century, folder i, “Spera Apullei.”
S. Marco XI, 111, 16th century, ascribes a wheel of life and death to “Bede the presbyter,” and another to Apollonius and Pythagoras.