Abstract

The article describes the methods used in the critical edition of the Argumenta of Seneca’s Tragedies composed by Pietro da Moglio, a professor and exegete of the late 14th century in Bologna and Padua. These summaries were transcribed into the manuscripts not only based on an antigraph but, in many cases, under a professor’s dictation or by mnemonics. In the tradition of these texts, there are very few monogenetic errors, a greater number of adiaphore variants, and many polygenetic graphic-phonetic dissimilarities. So, at first, an attempt was made to apply Contini’s trans-Lachmannian diffraction theory; but the stemmata codicum obtained were multiple, and characterized by ‘constellations’ of manuscripts rather than hierarchically structured families. Rejecting, therefore, any Lachmann-inspired logic, the restitutio textus was based on Bédier’s method, particularly suited to the Argumenta tradition, which followed procedures typical of reportationes. So, to edit a text, it’s always useful to evaluate all methods that seem appropriate, considering them with a conciliatory perspective, in order to find or create the most appropriate philological approach.