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A socio-linguistic approach to the latin middle ages
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
Extract
There are two lights, a greater and a smaller one, that is to say, the wiser men and the less wise; the day signifies the wise men, and the night the uninformed. The greater light illuminates the day, for the wiser men instruct those who are more able. What is Augustine if not a sun in the Church? to whom does he speak if not to the wise? You, however, the priests, knowing less, are the smaller light, you illuminate the night, for you preside over the laity who do not know the Scripture and remain in the darkness of ignorance ... The other section of the clergy who do not preside over the people of God are the stars, because although they cannot shine by doctrine, do nevertheless shine by their work onto the earth, that is, the Church.
These sentences are taken from an anonymous sermon ‘On the Priesthood’, based on Genesis i, 16–20. The author of the sermon showed the priests their place in society: even though they did not belong to the intellectual elite, their profession and knowledge separated them clearly from the darkness of night in which the laity was imprisoned. In the course of the twelfth century, this passage from Genesis underwent an exegetical change and was used, from then onwards, to explain the political relationship between regnum and sacerdotium. What did remain was the notion of a fundamental difference between clergy and laity, and nowhere was this notion better expressed than in our sermon to the priests: quodcunque lumen estis, lumen estis tamen. In true medieval fashion, our author equated knowledge with the knowledge of the Word of God. He also stressed the fundamental difference between light and darkness, between the clergy and the laity. While theology emphasises that ordination makes the clergy by virtue of its office into the mediator between God and man, this was not the main concern of our author. Instead, he voiced the belief, widely shared by the clergy generally, that knowledge as such was the prerogative of the clergy. Such an attitude raises the question of how the clergy was able to achieve monopoly of knowledge, and how it reacted to attempts by the laity to challenge this monopoly. In what follows I propose to enquire into this phenomenon by looking at the linguistic scene in the medieval west.
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- Studies in Church History , Volume 11: The Materials Sources and Methods of Ecclesiastical History , 1975 , pp. 69 - 82
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- Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1975
References
1 PL 147 (1879) col 233.
2 ibid.
3 Compare Congar, Yves M.-J.: ‘The Fathers, and our Western Middle Ages which took this outlook from St Augustine and Cassiodorus, realised with what resources they had, a unity of wisdom between all knowledge and life itself, under the souvereignty of the Bible’, Tradition and Traditions, trans Naseby, Michael and Rainborough, Thomas (London 1966) pp 66–7.Google Scholar
4 Modus ecclesiastkus was contrasted with sermo vulgaris in a legal dispute of c 118o; see Fransen, G., ‘Tribuneaux ecclésiastiques et la langue vulgaire d’ après les questiones des canonistes’, Ephemerides Theologiae Lovanienses, 40 (1964) PP 391-412 at p 394 Google Scholar.
5 For a definition see Halliday, M.A.K., Mclntosh, A., Strevens, P., ‘The users and uses of language’, The Linguistic Sciences and Language Teaching (London 1964, repr 1968) p 80 Google Scholar: ‘One language comes to be adopted as the medium of some activity or activities which the different language communities perform in common. It may be a common language for commerce, learning, adminis tration, religion, or any or all of a variety of purposes: the use determines which members of each language community are the ones to learn it.’
6 Goody, [Jack], in discussing restricted literacy as a policy, speaks of ‘the inhi biting effects of religious literacy that dominated the culture of Western Europe until the advent of the printing press’, [Literacy in Traditional Societies] (Cambridge 1968) p 15.Google Scholar
7 For a review of earlier discussions See Mohrmann, Christine, ‘Le dualisme de la latinité médiévale, Revue des Etudes Latines, 29 (Paris 1951) pp 330-48Google Scholar; see especially p 339: ‘Pour les humanistes médiévaux, le latin étant une partie de leur monde a eux, c’était quelque chose vivant’, again, p 344: ‘ce qui est essentiel, c’est l’instrument vivant, interprète habile de la pensée médiévale . . . ‘ (italics mine). This article is reprinted in Mohrmann, C., Latin Vulgaire, Latin des Chrétiens, Latin Médiéval (Paris 1955) pp 37–54.Google Scholar
8 Bernstein, [Basil], [‘A Public Language: some sociological implications of a linguistic term’, Class, Codes and Control] I (London 1971) pp 42–60, at p 54CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Professor Bernstein there discusses the effects of change from what he calls ‘public’ to ‘formal’ language, thus essentially a change of’code’ of language, but it is assumed here that the adoption of a new language involves similarly fundamental changes. For a recent discussion of the linguistic term ‘code’ see Hasan, R., ‘Code, register and social dialect’, Class, Codes and Control, II, ed Bernstein, B. (London 1973) pp 253-92Google Scholar.
9 A gulf of some kind was bound to occur. It has been well said that ‘ “education” implies that a man’s outlook is transformed by what he knows’, Peters, R.S., Ethics and Education (London 1970) p 31 Google Scholar. See also the important study by Goody, J. and Watt, I., ‘The Consequences of Literacy’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 5 (London 1962-3) pp 304-45,Google Scholar reprinted also in Goody, pp 27-68.
10 ‘Quantum a beluis homines, tantum distant a laicis litterati’, PL 196 (1855) col 1651,Google Scholar which is also quoted by Herbert Grundmann in his excellent article ‘Litteratus—Illitteratus’, Archiv für Kulturgeschichte, 40 (Köln/Graz 1958) pp 1-60, at p 52, n 39, and in Thompson, [J.W.], [The Literacy of the Laity in the Middle Ages] (Berkeley, Cal., 1939) p 143.Google Scholar
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12 See the comments of John of Salisbury on the teaching methods of Bernard of Chartres: ‘Quibus autem indicebantur preexercitamina puerorum in prosis aut poematibus imitandis poetas aut oratores proponebat, et eorum iubebat vestigia imitari, ostendens iuncturas dictionum et elegantes sermonům clausulas’, Metalogicon, I, cap 24, ed Webb, C.C.I. (Oxford 1929) p 56 Google Scholar. Also Peter of Blois on his own education: ‘Profuit mihi, quod epistolas Hildeberti Cenomanensis episcopi styli elegantia et suavi urbanitate praecipuas firmare et corde tenus reddere adolescentulus compellebar’, Ep 101, PL 207 (1855) col 314.Google Scholar
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15 Exceptions to this general rule were pre-Norman England and medieval Ireland, both less under the wing of Rome than the rest of Europe. This question requires detailed examination.
16 This was indicated briefly by Frend, W.H.C., ‘Coptic, Greek and Nubian at Q’asr Ibrim’, Byzantinoslavica, 33 (Prague 1972) pp 224 et seq. Google Scholar
17 For a survey see Delahaye, Philippe, ‘L’organisation scolaire au XIIe siècle’, Traditio, 5 (New York 1947) pp 211-68Google Scholar. The most important stages during the period under consideration would appear to have been the roman council of 1079, held by Gregory VII, which ruled ‘ut omnes episcopi artes litterarum in suis ecclesiis docere faciant’, Mansi 20, col 50, and later the third lateran council held by pope Alexander III, especially C18: ‘per unamquamque ecclesiam cathedralem magistro, qui clericos eiusdem ecclesie et scholares pauperes gratis doceat, competens aliquod beneficium assignetur, quo docentis nécessitas sublevetur et discentis via pateat ad doctrinam’, Mansi, 22, cols 227-8, which is also in Décret. Greg. IX, V, 5,1. See also Riche, Pierre, ‘Recherches sur l’instruc tion des laics du IXe au XIIe siècle’, Cahiers de Civilisation Médiévale, 5 (Poitiers 1962) pp 175-82.Google Scholar
18 This change of concept is clearly formulated in the early fourteenth century: ‘Nee dicas quod debeat exponi “clerici id est literati” more Gallico, sicut quidam exponunt et dicunt quod omnis literatus est clericus’, quoted in Wattenbach, Wilhelm, Das Schriftwesen im Mittelalter (3 ed Leipzig 1896) pp 426-7.Google Scholar
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21 Policraticus, IV, cap 6, i, p 254: ‘Legenda est ergo omnibus diebus vitae suae. Ex quibus liquido constat, quam necessaria sit principibus peritia litterarum, qui legem Domini cotidie revolvere lectione iubentur.’
22 Ibid p 255.
23 PL 203, (1855) cols 151-6.
24 Ibid ed 151: ‘tanto principi adsunt dona charismatum tam preclara, ut in aliis huiusmodi principibus inveniri valeant satis rara’; col 152: ‘dignum fuit ut a vulgarium ignorantia, et brutorum hominum stolida caecitate, scientia litteralis educeret, et clara praeditum redderet libertate . . . Multum ergo debes patri tuo cuius tibi cura et diligentia sic providit, ut . . . te . . . vellet quoque super ceteros comités litterarum scientia sublimari.’
25 Ibid col 152: ‘tantis, ut aiunt, litteris es imbutus, ut quamplures clericos trans cendas in eorum nequaquam numero constitutus.’
26 See ibid cols 155B, 155D, 156B; see also col 816.
27 Ibid 154B-C.
28 Ibid col 153: ‘invenis quid populum, quid militem, quid principem deceat vel prelatum.’
29 PL 157 (1899) col 180. ‘Ducendus est populus, non sequendus’, is perhaps a pun on a passage in a letter from Pope Celestine I of AD 429(PL 50, col 437): ‘docendus est populus, non sequendus’, which was found in all important canon law col lections and was finally taken into Gratian’s collection; see Dist. LXII, cap 2. A similar view of the priests’ exemption from popular criticism is expressed by pope Innocent III, PL 214 (1855) cols 697-8.
30 ‘Compendium Studii’ cap 3, Fr Rogeri Bacon Opera Inedita, ed Brewer, J.S., RS 15 (1859) p 416.Google Scholar
31 PL 203 (1855) col 152: ‘Unde et litterarum scientiam recte vocant ethnici liberalem, quia eum qui labore et studio sortitur gratiam litteralem, a confuso vulgi consortio et a multitudine liberat publicana, ne pressus et oppressus teneatur compede et hebetudine rusticana.’
32 Bernstein, pp 202-30, at p 202.
33 Durkheim, Emile, Education and Sociology (Chicago 1956) p 123 Google Scholar (italics mine). See also further: ‘Not only is it society which has raised the human type to the dignity of a model that the educator must attempt to reproduce, but it is society, too, that builds this model, and it builds it according to its needs.’ p 122. Thorndyke, Lynn claimed that ‘in the developed medieval culture elementary and even secondary education was fairly widespread and general’, ‘Elementary and Secondary Education in the Middle Ages’, Speculum, 15 (1940) pp 400–8 Google Scholar, at p 401, but his paper hardly bears out this claim.
34 Peter of Blois, Sermo LXX, ‘Ad populum’, PL 207 (1855) cols 750-1.Google Scholar
35 See, for example, Petrus Cantor, Verbum Abbreviatum, cap 65, where he says on the subject of preaching: ‘non enim omnibus indifferenter proponere debemus, sed quasi ad quamdam praegustationem maiora maioribus, et minora minoribus offene’, PL 205 (1855) col 198.
36 Southern, R.W., The Life of St Anselm by Eadmer (London 1962) p xxvi.Google Scholar
37 Reg. Greg. VII, vii, II, pp 473-5, ed Caspar, Erich, MGH Epp sei, II (1920)Google Scholar; see also Deanesly, Margaret, The Lollard Bible (Cambridge 1920), pp 23–4 Google Scholar; Miccoli, Giovanni, ‘Ecclesiae primitivae forma’, Studi Medievali, 3 series, I (Rome 1960) pp 470-98, especially at pp 79-81Google Scholar. On the vernacular in worship more generally see Korolewsky, Cyril, Living Languages in Catholic Worship, trans Attwater, D. (London 1957)Google Scholar also Michaud, Maurice, ‘Langue d’Eglise et droit liturgique’, L’Année Canonique, 3 (Paris 1954-5) pp 99–128, esp pp 120 et seq; Google Scholar for the early period see Bardy, G., La question des langues dans l’église ancienne (Paris 1948)Google Scholar and Martimort, A.G., ‘La discipline de l’Eglise en matière de langue liturgique. Essai historique’, La Maison-Dieu, 11 (Paris 1947) pp 39–541.Google Scholar
38 PL 126 (1852) col 906 (Jarfé no 3319); see also Vlasto, A.P., The Entry of the Slavs into Christendom (Cambridge 1970) pp 20–79 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, especially at pp 50-66. Even in the thirteenth century, we find the church occasionally not opposing the use of the vernacular, so in the legislation of the fourth lateran council, c9: ‘Quoniam in plerisque partibus intraeandem civitatem atque dioecesim permixti sunt populi diversarum linguarum, habentes sub una fide varios ritus et mores, districte precipimus ut pontífices huiusmodi civitatum sive dioecesum provideant viros idoneos, qui secundum diversitates rituum et linguarum divina officia illis celebrent et ecclesiastica sacramenta ministrent, instruendo eos verbo pariter et exemplo’, Mansi, 22, 998; Décret. Greg. IX, I, 31, 14.
39 PL 126 (1852)906: ‘neque enim tribus tantum, sed omnibus linguis Dominum laudare auctoritate sacra monemur’.
40 See Chaytor, H.J., From Script to Print (London 1966) p 79 Google Scholar, commenting on Dante, Il Convivio, I, x, io.
41 Travers, J., ‘Le mystère des langues dans l’Eglise’, La Maison-Dieu, 11 (1947) pp 15–38 Google Scholar. ‘La vrai conclusion, c’est que dans l’Eglise seule les langues sont vraiment réhabilitées, dans l’Eglise seule elles perdent pour les hommes et pour les nations leur charactère nocif’, p 25. We must also mention the important study by Borst, Arno, Der Turmbau von Babel. Geschichte der Meinungen über Ursprung und Vielfalt der Sprachen und Völker, 4 vols in 6 pts (Stuttgart 1957-63)Google Scholar.
42 See Nelson, Janet L., ‘Society, theodicy and the origins of heresy: towards a reassessment of the medieval evidence’, SCH, 9 (1972) pp 65–77;Google Scholar Brenda Bolton, ‘Tradition and temerity: papal attitude to deviants, 1159-1216’, ibid, 79-91.
43 Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, I, cap 31, ed Wright, T., CS, 50 (1850) p 64;Google Scholar English translation from James, M.R., Cymmrodorion Record Series, 9 (London 1923) pp 65 Google Scholar et seq.
44 Roger Howden reports remarks of a cardinal-priest working against the Albigensians in Toulouse: ‘quaesivimus ut latinis verbis respondentes suam fidem defenderent, turn quia lingua eorum non erat nobis satis nota, tum quia evangelia et epistolae, quibus tantummodo fidem suam confirmare volebant, latino eloquio noscuntur esse scripta. Cumque id facere non auderent, utpote qui linguam latinam penitus ignorabant, sicut in verbis unius illorum apparuit, qui cum latine vellet loqui vix duo verba iungere potuit, et oinnino defecit; necesse fuit nos illis condescenderé, et de ecclesiasticis sacramentis propter impertitiam illorum, quamvis satis erat absurdum, vulgärem habere sermonem. ‘ Houedene, ii, p 157.
45 For Lull see his Liber define, ed Gottron, Adam, Ramon Lulls Kreuzzugsideen, Abhandlungen zur mittleren und neueren Geschichte, 39 (Berlin 1912), esppp 66-9, and p 88;Google Scholar for Dubois see De recuperatane terre sánete, ed Ch. — Laiiglois, V., Collection de textes pour servir d l’étude et d l’enseignement de l’histoire (Paris 1891) pp 47–51, 59-60, 68, 108Google Scholar et seq.
46 Morris, Colin, The Discoveryof the Individual, 1050-1200 (London 1972) pp 122 Google Scholar et seq.
47 Wireker, Nigel: ‘Si scribat dominus papa, etiam sine omni conjunctione et adverbio plane et aperte, ita ut nihil sit ambiguum (text: ambiguus), nihil con-trarium, mandatum tarnen eius nihilominus eluditur.’ ‘Tractatus contra curiales et officiales clericos’, The Anglo-Latin Satirical Poets and Epigrammatists, 2 vols, ed Wright, T., RS 59 (1872) i, p 205 Google Scholar.
48 Ibid p 224: ‘Si ducitur episcopus ad librum sicut bos ad aquam, . . . apud te titulus iste tibi non potest opponi’.
49 Giraldus Cambrensis, ‘Gemma Ecclesiastica’, ii, 34, Op ii, ed Brewer, J.S., RS 21 (1862) p 332.Google Scholar
50 Ibid p 346.
61 Bischoff, Bernhard, ‘The Teaching of Foreign Languages in the Middle Ages’, Speculum, 36 (1961) pp 209-24, at p 210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
52 [Ottonis et] Rahewini [Gesta Friderici I. Imperatorie], ed Waitz, G., 3 ed, MGH in usuiti scholarum (Hannover/Leipzig 1912) p 175 Google Scholar: ‘imperialis insigne coronae libentissime conferens . . . neque tamen penitet nos ... si maiora beneficia excellentia tua de manu nostra suscepisset’.
53 The whole incident has been subjected to a very thorough scrutiny by Heinemeyer, Walter, ‘ beneficium—non feudum sed bonum factum. Der Streit auf dem Reichstag zu Besançon 1157’, Archiv für Diplomatik, 15 (Köln/Wien 1969) pp 155-236.Google Scholar
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