The volume is now confused and imperfect, but it is clear that originally there were two compilations: Diogenes with prefatory material (sections (i), (ii), (v), (vi)), and Phalaris with prefatory material (beginning lost, sections (iv), (iii)).

The contents of the volume are as follows:

(i) Elegy dedicating the translation of Diogenes to Pius II, beginning `Ad uaticani praeclara palatia petri` (folio 1).

(ii) Title of the translation of Diogenes (folio 3 verso).

(iii) Preface and translation of four extra letters of Phalaris, beginning `Quatuor Phalaridos epistolas quas nuper in alio libro inuentas` (folio 4).

(iv) Translation of Phalaris, `Letters` 6-135 (folio 7).

(v) Preface to the translation of Diogenes, beginning `Diogenis Philosophi Epistolas nuper a me a Greco` (folio 71).

(vi)Translation of Diogenes, `Letters` (folio 73 verso).

The round humanistic hand is probably that of the calligrapher Giovanmarco Cinico of Parma, who worked at Naples from 1458 to 1498 (cf. ‘La Biblioteca Napoletana dei Re d`Aragona’, i, 42-51). The subscription on folio 100 is erased, but a later hand, apparently trying to copy the erased writing, has written ‘Joannes maurus’: Cinico`s subscriptions regularly begin `Joanes Marcus`. He copied these texts frequently (cf. ‘The Italian Manuscripts in the Library of Major J.R. Abbey’, 73, 75). The later hand on folio 100 also has `Ex libris D[ ]`, and on folio 1 an inscription is erased: `Pertinet ad [ ]`. Other erased notes, some apparently in Italian, occur on folios 1 verso, 6 verso, 15, 38 verso, 59, 63, and 100 verso.

There are six miniatures in gold frames of various sizes, depicting Phalaris and the bull (folio 42 verso), Diogenes being stoned (folio 73 verso), Diogenes in his tub (folio 81), Diogenes in a school (folio 91), Diogenes at table (folio 92), and Diogenes addressing a skull (folio 93). The titles on folios 1 verso, 3 verso are in gold capitals, surrounded by a green laurel wreath with flowers and branches above and below in blue, lake, green, and gold; that on folio 71 is in capitals, the lines alternately gold and blue. On folios 4 and 71 are gold initials with white vine-stem ornament, continued down the left margin, on a blue ground with red, green, and gold filling. On folio 43 is a lake and dull gold initial with blue and green ornamentation and gold rayed discs, on a gold ground, and infilled with a putto in dull gold on a blue ground. Each letter is preceded by the name of the recipient in blue captials; the first word of each is in gold capitals, the initial on a lake and blue ground with white tracery; succeeding initials are alternately blue and gold.