christianity and language: st augustine

Christianity and language: St Augustine

354–430; highly learned teacher of rhetoric from North Africa; convert to Christianity, then bishop of Hippo (now Annaba, Algeria)

Highly regarded preacher, prolific writer, most influential thinker of Western Christianity, with strong background in philosophy and liberal arts

Vast amount of exegesis

Works on liberal arts, including dialectic with discussion of signs/semiotics


The Bible on language (Augustine’s exegesis):

• The Tower of Babel (Gen 11:1–9)– variety of languages is God’s punishment

• The Pentecost miracle (Acts 2:1–11)– reversal of punishment, "redemption" of lgs

• Jesus as the Word of God (Greek logos / Latin verbum / Hung ige etc.) → Jn 1:1–23 [see next slide]

Christianity and language: St Aug on Jn1

← The word (logos, verbum) is a meaningful unit of utterance, which exists before it is uttered; the only valuable part of the relation

← The voice (Greek phōnē, Latin vox) is only the carrier, the body of the meaning, accidental (e.g. can be in any language), of no value in itself

"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God...

[John the Baptist] said: I am... a voice of one that cries in the desert: Prepare a way for the Lord..."


The consequence at a general level: what were seen as accidental, external properties of language (forms, sound shapes, variation) were not considered interesting

What matters is meaning and pragmatic force

Also: great efforts to anchor "accidental" properties of language in some aspect of reality (e.g. five vowels → five senses; eight parts of speech → eight beatitudes)

Christianity and the language of the Church

In the East, several languages with time-honoured literary traditions (Greek + Aramaic, Coptic, Syriac)

→ Church had no reservations about translating Bible; liturgy, services in local languages

→ creation of alphabet for languages with no tradition of writing (Armenian, Georgian, Gothic 4th c., Old Church Slavonic 9th c.)

Christianity and the language of the Church

In the West, no such languages (West Germanic, Celtic, later Scandinavian, Slavonic and Hungarian)

→ Roman Church decided to use Latin in liturgy, services, also as the sole language of the Bible (though translations & paraphrases of parts were made occasionally)

→ Literacy meant knowledge of Latin; anyone aspiring for higher status had to be schooled in Latin, the language of all serious business

The Early Middle Ages: 600–800

Elementary instruction in Latin was needed (primarily morphology)

inherited material (Donatus) not really good for this purpose

Lot of experimentation, additions to Donatus, combinations of Donatus and Priscian’s Institutio de nomine...

Insular grammars (mainly by Irish and English monks ― Ireland most cultured part of Europe between cca. 600–800; missions!)

The Early Middle Ages: Carolingian era

Carolingian Renaissance (around 800):

• First back-to-past movement in European history

• Charlemagne (r. 768–814) unified Franconian territories into a strong empire, extended it to large part of Europe; was crowned emperor by Pope Leo III (300+ years after fall of last Roman Emperor)

• Wished to be seen not only as great conqueror but also as patron of arts/science


Chm. invited greatest scholars of his time to his court, e.g. Paul the Deacon (Italy), Theodulf of Orléans (Spain), Alcuin of York; projects:

• All bishops required to open schools

• New editions of Bible and Benedictine Rule

• many classical texts unearthed, manuscripts

• form of writing standardised (Caroline minuscule, clear and harmonious hand → modern lowercase letters)

Caroline minuscule (9th c.)

vs. Merovingian script a hundred years earlier

Merovingian cursive script (8th c.) vs. Caroline minuscule

btw the British Isles had their own script, called Insular Hand(images from http://faculty.nmu.edu/kkendall/HS%20101/07b%20carolingian_book_production.htm and digipal.eu)


Consequence: knowledge of Latin greatly improved, new kind of contact with Antiquity

Very important discoveries:

• Aristotle’s Organon (parts of), in Latin transl. with Porphyry’s introduction (Isagoge)

• Priscian’s Institutiones grammaticae (bw. 600–800 only Institutio de nomine... known), probably Alcuin brought a manuscript from England


Porphyry’ Isagoge: basic notions of philosophy

e.g. definition

species difference category shared feature

Man is a rational animal that is mortal

and able to laughunique feature


Porphyry’ Isagoge: basic notions of philosophy

e.g. definition: Donatus’ verb (Peter of Pisa)

species category shared feature

The verb is a part of speech with tense and person without case, signifying action or passivity or neither

difference unique feature


Two important trends emerge:

• linking grammar with philosophy

• interest in syntax

Both have to do with the discovery of forgotten texts: Aristotle and Priscian, resp.

These trends develop over time into a strong interest in the philosophy of language, also a new direction for pedagogical grammar

The Early Middle Ages: Representing form

Ex: a nominal paradigm (virtus ‘manliness’)

Singular Plural

Nominative virtus virtutes

Vocative virtus virtutes

Accusative virtutem virtutes

Genitive virtutis virtutum

Dative virtuti virtutibus

Ablative virtute virtutibus


A manuscript from Corbie, early 9th c.

virtus tutis ti tem tus te

tes tum bus tes tes bus


A manuscript from Corbie, early 9th c.

• no tables/charts to represent paradigms

• no sense of stem–affix articulation


Ex: a nominal paradigm (virtus ‘manliness’)

Singular Plural

Nominative virtus virtutes

Vocative virtus virtutes

Accusative virtutem virtutes

Genitive virtutis virtutum

Dative virtuti virtutibus

Ablative virtute virtutibus

The High Middle Ages: Universities

Up to 11th c. intellectual life in West takes place in monasteries

City schools set up from 9th c. onwards (cathedral schools, Charlemagne)

Cath. schools grow in size & importance (Reims, Chartres, Notre Dame de Paris, Salisbury, Canterbury...)

~ 1200 some of these develop into universities: Paris, Oxford, later Cambridge, Naples, Lisbon, Toulouse...


What made these universities?

• structured course spread over several years

• well-defined stages

• core of prescribed texts, on which lectures were given a set number of times

• the granting of degrees

• public recognition (charter from Pope)


What were the stages?

• Arts: Priscian’s Institutiones, Aristotle’s logic, ethics, physics

• After graduation: Master of Arts

• Higher faculties: theology, law or medicine

• At a few universities (e.g. Oxford, Cambridge), faculty of grammar dedicated to training teachers


Gregorius Reisch: Margarita philoso-phica nova (1515)

Peter of Lombardy (theology)

Plato (Physics), Seneca (moral philos.)

Pythagoras (music), Euclides (geom.) Ptolemy (astronomy)

Aristotle (logic), Cicero (rhetoric, poetics), Boethius (arithmetic)

Priscian (advanced grammar)

Donatus (elementary grammar)


What were the influences?

• primarily newly discovered texts by Aristotle

• including rest of his Organon, Physics, Metaphysics and others

• often translated from Arabic, with Muslims, Jews and Christians collaborating in South

(Greek to Arabic to Old Spanish to Latin ?)


What happened in the study of language?

• Speculative grammar (~ Modistic grammar)– (meaning of term: theoretical!)– (practically only at Paris university, but spreads)– great interest in syntax, based on Priscian– philosophical interest in linking language to

universals of reality and workings of the mind

• Practical grammar– pedagogical grammar, verse grammars

Speculative Grammar

Syntax: government and agreement (regimen & congruitas)

• word-based, dependency-relations– adjectives depend on nouns– verbs also depend on nouns (both S and O)

• mainly for ontological reasons

• notion of subject and predicate appear but grammar remains word-based (as opposed to logic)

Speculative Grammar

Linking language, mind and reality; universal properties of language

• nothing essential about language can be found in sounds & sound shapes because those are arbitrary and language-specific

• really important (=universal, non-arbitrary) properties can be found in meaning

• basic problem: why eight parts of speech and why those specifically?

Speculative Grammar

Answer to be found in meaning, but not meaning as such (e.g. laugh and laughter have the same meaning) →

• Modes of meaning (modi significandi)– substance with quality: noun– substance without quality: pronoun– action or passivity: verb– ...

Speculative Grammar

Later extended to level of mind and reality:

Thing (in reality) props. of thing

(modi essendi)

Concept (in mind) props. of concept

(modi intelligendi)

Meaning (in word) props. of meaning

(modi significandi)

Speculative Grammar

Also extended to lower level of grammar (categories like gender, tense etc. are all refashioned as modi, practically unchanged)

Problems: ‘stone’ – lapis masc., petra fem.

why two genders for same meaning?

Martinus Dacus’ answer:

lapis = laedens pedem ‘hurting the foot’

petra = pede trita ‘rubbed away by the foot’

active (masc.) vs. passive (fem.) meaning

Practical Grammar: Verse grammars

Donatus taught to beginners, Priscian at advanced level; at lower levels experimen-tation continues (form-based grammars not copied any more!)

Verse grammars become very popular, incorporate bits and pieces of morphological and sytanctic information in unsystematic manner; verse form makes them easy to memorise


Most famous: Alexander de Villa Dei’s Doctrinale (~1199, survives in 500+ manuscripts!)

"Est adjectivum substantivo sociandum

in simili genere casu simili numeroque."

‘The adjective is to be joined to the noun

in the same gender, number and case.’


Most famous: Alexander de Villa Dei’s Doctrinale (~1199, survives in 500+ manuscripts!)

"Est adjectivum substantivo sociandum

in simili genere casu simili numeroque."

Jelzőt főnévhez helyesen kapcsolni csak így tudsz:

nemben, esetben, számban is egyezzék ez a két szó.

Vernacular grammars in the Middle Ages

Vernacular = spoken languages, not Latin

• grammars of/in vernaculars of various types:– concerned with general issues, word classes etc.

(e.g. Icelandic grammatical treatises)– grammar of Latin in vernacular (e.g. Aelfric)– grammar of vernacular in vernacular (e.g.

Occitan Leys d’Amors)

• all very rare!

Vernacular grammars in the Middle Ages

Why would anyone write such grammars?

• no prestige in vernaculars; not taught

• description not seen a value in itself

• language of all serious business is Latin

→ only in response to some particular pressing need

Example: Aelfric’s grammar in Old English as introduction to study of Latin

Aelfric’s grammar (written cca. 1000)

Image taken from British Library Digitised Manuscripts

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=harley_ms_3271_f007r

Aelfric’s grammar (written cca. 1000)

Littera is stæf on englisc. and is se læsta dæl

littera is letter in English and is the smallest part

on bócum. and untodæledlic;

in books and indivisible

we todælað ða bóc to cwydum. and syððan

we divide the book into sentences and then

ða cwydas to dælum. eft ða dælas to stæfgefegum.

the sentences into words. the words into syllables.

and syððan ða stæfgefegu to stafum...

and then the syllables into letters...

christianity and language: st augustine

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