<h2>AP1</h2><h2>Re-using parchement in binding</h2> As often in large patrimonial collections, the binding of the manuscript is modern. However it is not in a good state and the back spine is missing. This reveals how the binding is made: another page, often from a parchment is used to cover the different quire forming the manuscript and bound together.

<h2>AP2.1</h2><h2>Catch the reader attention!</h2> A splendid ornate letter (D, for "Dispositio corporum celestium"), in the Parisian style of the mid-fourteenth century, with vegetal and geometric motifs in blue, gold, orange and dusty pink, opens a text of which this manuscript is the only witness.﻿

AP2.1<h2>First occurence of Parisian Alfonsine parameters</h2> This text, a table set by the Parisian astronomer Jean Vimond, is the first attestation of the Alfonsine tables at the University of Paris around 1319-1320. However the new astronomical parameters and theories are somehow hidden in the layout of the tables and numerical values they contains. Only specialist could detect the novelty.

AP3<h2>Texts and tables together</h2> On this page, as on many others in this manuscript, we see a very rare layout, bringing together numerical tables and texts explaining their uses (canons). In the Latin tradition, astronomical tables and their canons mostly circulated separately and even in different manuscripts.

AP4<h2>Texts, tables and missing diagrams</h2> Manuscript production usually involved several artisans with specialist skills (scribe, draftsman, illuminator, binder…) and the process went through stages. Diagrams, in many cases, were considered often as a type of decoration and produced only in the final stages.

AP4.1<h2>Texts, tables and missing diagrams</h2> On this page, we see a space is left blanck to include a diagram (likely related to eclipses) that was not produced. Note also how the most tiny space is used to include text around the blank left out for the diagram!

AP5<h2>Stages of manuscripts production</h2> This page includes a table of Mercury equations which is very neatly copied (to compute the planet true position). Next to it a wide margin is unfilled. This margin was probably&nbsp;intended to be a space for the copy of a text, possibly accompanied by diagrams. However for some reason the text, and its diagrams, were not copied.&nbsp;This page gives a precious indication about the ways different categories of content were copied at different stages of production of the manuscript.

AP6<h2>Double motions for the fixed stars</h2> This table, from John Vimond,&nbsp;lists the value of four astronomical parameters for 1, 2, 3, and 4 years then for multiple of 4 years until 76 years. The heading “aux”, on the third line of each set of values refers to the apogee of the Sun (i.e. the position on the ecliptic where the distance between the sun and the earth is maximal).&nbsp;The values listed in this table for this parameter are exceptional because they are the first known tabular values to include a double motions for the sphere of fixed stars which is a characteristic feature of Alfonsine astronomy as expressed in Latin sources.

AP7<h2>Table for the Sun</h2> This table from John Vimond provides different quantities that can be used to compute the exact position of the sun on the ecliptic at any given date and time for the meridian of Paris. Among them, the most striking one is the first. Under the heading “motus completus” (point 1)&nbsp;is the first known attestation in a tabular format of a theory of the sun motion with a maximum equation of 2;10° which is characteristic of alfonsine astronomy as expressed in Latin sources.

AP8.1<h2>Among the earliest copies</h2> The text beginning here with the words Cuiuslibet arcus is a very important work by the Parisian master John of Lignères written in Paris about 1321. This text introduces, following previous handbooks like that of the arabic astronomer Albatani, the theory and computations an astronomer needs to know in order to understand and predict how the sky can be seen depending on your place on earth and the time of the day or night. It is a text on the rising and setting of celestial objects on the horizon, about the equator, the ecliptic, the meridians etc.&nbsp;John of Lignères Cuiuslibet arcus had an important success among astronomers throughout Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries and many manuscript copies of it are extant. This one, produced in Paris, is among the earliest copies.

AP8.2<h2>Precesion of the equinoxes</h2> Here we have three different tables. They describe a very slow celestial motion named the precesion of the equinoxes. This motion produces a slow shift of the equinoxe with respect to stars so that after a few centuries the zodiac seems to move forward or the equinoxe to move backward.This very slow motion, first noticed by Hyparchus in antiquity, was very important for religious and calendrical reasons and for christian in particular with respect to the date of easter. It was one of the major concerns of astronomers well into the modern period. Alfonsine astronomers had a specific theory for that phenomenon, expressed by their tables: a composition of two motions. There was first a regular motion (point 1) making a full revolution in 49 000 years. Then there is an irregular motion expressed by two tables (point 2 and 3) with a periodicity of 7000 years

AP9<h2>Alfonsine Mean Motions</h2> This table, from John of Lignères tables of 1322, gives the mean motion of all the relevant parameters useful for the computation of the sun, moon and planetary positions.These quantities give the luminaries and planetary positions as if they were moving at a constant pace around the ecliptic. In a second phase of the computation, equations tables will account for the different ways the luminaries and planets change their pace or even in some cases become retrograde.This organisation of mean motion tables is specific to John of Lignères. Usually mean motion of the different celestial objects are given in separated tables.&nbsp;Here on the contrary they are given together.The values tabulated here are characteristic of alfonsine astronomy as expressed in Latin sources.

AP10<h2>A fundamental trigonometrical quantity</h2> This table is John of Lignères' tables of sines. The sine values are at the mathematical basis of most astronomical computations. Here, in John of Lignères' Tables of 1322, the sine table opens a series of astronomical tables dedicated to trigonometry and computation related to the daily motion of the celestial sphere (raising and setting of stars, length of the day at different latitudes …). In a wording contemporary to John of Lignères, we would say,&nbsp;“Primum mobile” (first mobile) astronomy.

AP11<h2>Solar equation</h2> The table for the equation of the sun which begins on this folio allows one to take into account the varying velocity of the Sun along its revolution on the ecliptic. It is a necessary complement to mean motion tables which are computed under the assumption that planets and the luminaries move at constant pace. This table opens a full series of similar ones for the moon and the five planets, the values of which are characteristic of alfonsine astronomy as expressed in Latin sources. This particular subset of tables is at the core of what we call today the Parisian Alfonsine Tables. In this manuscript, as in many others,&nbsp;they are integrated in John of Lignères Tables of 1322. Medieval astronomers often make this sort of compilation between different works.

AP12<h2>Ornate 'P' for Priores</h2> The very nice ornate “P” for Priores astrologi…, marks the beginning of a very important text by the astronomer John of Lignères where one can learn how to compute planetary positions and eclipses. This text is among the first to provide in Latin a set of procedures to work with the Parisian Alfonsine Tables and certainly one of the most successful in terms of number and diffusion of extant manuscript copies. Maybe one reason for its success is that John of Lignères is composing a balanced blend of new elements from the Parisian Alfonsine Tables and more established ones on the computations of latitudes or eclipses for instance.

AP13<h2>Rissing star in Paris</h2> The table presented here provides, under the title “elevationes signorum” a quantity that we name today ascenional difference (usefull for the computation of rising and seting times of the stars). It is computed for the latitude of Paris (48°) and with a value of 23;33,30° for the obliquity of the ecliptic on the equator. This value is useful to establish horoscopes or predict the aspect of eclipses for instance.&nbsp;It is one of the rare tables included by John of Lignères in his Tables for 1322 that he is very likely to have computed himself. Most of the other material that we find in sources transmitting this table set either comes from the Parisian Alfonsine Tables or from the earlier Toledan tables.

AP14<h2>The time of sundials</h2> This table provides, under the title “Tabula equationum dierum cum noctibus suis”, a quantity that we name today the equation of time. This quantity allows us to convert computed “equal hours”, the time of our watches, to true local time, the time of sundials. It is a very important quantity as “sundials time” is the only time reference accessible to observation. The equation of time is central to the computation of eclipses or accurate horoscopes. John of Lignères included this table, computed for the latitude of Paris, as a part of his Table set of 1322 and took it from Peter of Saint Omer, a Parisian astronomer of the previous generation.

AP15<h2>Wandering planets</h2> This table provides, under the title “Tabula diversorum motuum planetarum in una die”, the daily motion of the different planets according to their position on the ecliptic and on their epicycle. Note the several occurrences of the word “retrogradus” (1) in different columns marking the point when a given planet changes its direction on the ecliptic.&nbsp;The table is useful for the computation of planetary conjunctions which are considered very important celestial events following the doctrine of the Arabic astronomer Abu Ma'shar. This table was included by John of Lignères in his Tables of 1322. It is not coming from the Toledan tables as is often the case but it is of Andalusian origin. Notably,&nbsp;it is described in the Castilian canons to the Alfonsine tables produced some 50 years before in Toledo at the court of Alfonso X.

AP16<h2>Eclipse prediction</h2> Under the title “Tabula semidiametrorum solis et lune et umbre et pertinet ad eclipses” we find here a set of quantities (radia of the sun, moon and earth shadow) that are useful to compute the magnitude of solar and lunar eclipses. The particular version of the table attested here, with a small instruction text copied in the margin of the table, can be attributed to John of Genoa. He was a Parisian astronomer probably among the pupils of John of Lignères who dedicated his works to eclipse computations: one of the most complex phenomena accessible to naked eye observation. This table of John of Genoa is very often found copied in manuscript with John of Lignères Tables of 1322. The compilations produced by medieval astronomers often tell a story of tradition and transmission.

AP17<h2>The moon and the zodiac</h2> The title of this table attributes it to the Parisian astronomer Petrus de Dacia who belonged to a generation just before that of John of Lignères and John Vimond, the main authors attested in this manuscript. Again, the compilations produced by medieval astronomers in their manuscripts often tells a story of tradition and transmission.&nbsp;The table presented here describes, in a given year, the path of the moon in the zodiacal signs. If you follow one column vertically you will see that the different zodiacal signs are listed in order and that the moon takes between two or three days to go through each of them. The numbers in the left column list the successive day of the lunar month while the numbers in the far right column list the degree of zodiacal signs in which the moon is at the beginning of each of these days.

This is a manuscript from the middle of the 14th century probably produced around Paris.The manuscript is interesting because of its visual organisation with instructions texts surounding the numerical tables. It is also important because it is one of the early witnesses of astronomical texts from John Vimond and John of Lignère which are essential authors in the Parisian Alfonsine astronomy.