Vernacular Alphabets in the Auraicept na nÉces and The Third Grammatical Treatise
Nicolai Egjar Engesland
Masteroppgave i norrøn filologi
Institutt for lingvistiske og nordiske studier
UNIVERSITETET I OSLO
Høsten 2016
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The main supervisor of this thesis has been Jan Erik Rekdal, professor of Irish language and literature, and the co-supervisor has been Jon Gunnar Jørgensen, professor in Old Norse philology, both at the Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies, Faculty of Humanities, University of Oslo.
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Vernacular Alphabets in the Auraicept na nÉces and The Third Grammatical Treatise
Nicolai Egjar Engesland
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Preface
I wish to thank Professor Karl Gunnar Johansson for feedback and constructive criticism during the initial stages of the project and Professor Jon Gunnar Jørgensen for efficient guidance through the final stages of the project.
Heartfelt thanks go to my main supervisor Professor Jan Erik Rekdal. Not only for overseeing this project, but for having introduced me to Irish language and literature in the first place and for being a constant source of motivation and support.
I also wish to thank Dr. Mikael Males for indispensable aid through the different phases of this project from its inception in Reykjavík 2015. Our colloquia have provided a platform in which to try out thoughts and ideas, though the number of participants has for most of the time been fairly limited due to our eclectic bouquet of texts. This eclecticism is to some extent represented in the present treatise.
Finally I would like to thank Ayman Razek, who has had to delve into at least partly unfamiliar subject-matter in order to prevent the present thesis from violating English idiom.
R. XIII Trastevere, November 6th 2016.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface 7
1. INTRODUCTION 11
1.1. Preamble 11
1.2. Historical Backdrop 12
1.3. On the Vernacular Alphabets 15
1.4. Institutiones grammaticae 18
1.5. Auraicept na nÉces 20
1.6. The First Grammatical Treatise 25
1.7. The Third Grammatical Treatise 27
1.8. Considerations on Method 31
1.9. Theoretical Stance and Aim of Thesis 34
2. ANALYSIS 39
2.1. Linguistic Theory: The Letter 40
2.2. Conceptualizing the Minimal Parts of Speech 40
2.3. The Divisions of the Alphabet 45
2.4. The Accidents of the Letter 50
2.5. Graphemic Inventory 55
2.6. Vowels 56
2.7. Consonants 63
2.8. De ordine litterarum 71
2.9. The Opposition between the Native Grammarian and the Latinist 74
2.10. Excursus: Mythography and the Origin of the Vernacular Alphabet 76
3. CONCLUSION 87
3.1. Practical and Theoretical Utility: Grammar as Genre 87
3.2. Texts as Part of a Curriculum 90
3.3. History of Linguistics and the Later Tradition 91
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4. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCES AND ABBREVIATIONS 95
4.1. Manuscripts 95
4.2. Editions and Translations 95
4.3. Monographs and Articles 97
5. APPENDICES 103
5.1. Keys to Alphabets 103
5.2. On Quotations from Editions and Translations 104
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1. INTRODUCTION 1.1. Preamble
This thesis will aim at an assessment of Auraicept na nÉces and The Third Grammatical Treatise from a comparative point of view. These are two vernacular treatises, from medieval Ireland and medieval Iceland respectively, dealing with the fundaments of grammar and poetics. What place these texts occupy in the history of linguistics will to some extent depend on one’s personal take on the turn of events. This might be experienced by browsing the scholarly discourse they have generated. The story to be told here grants them a certain distinction, without, in that particular appraisal, putting too much emphasis on cause and effect.
The texts are rather comprehensive. A qualitative comparison between them could lead in several directions and deal with (from a modern perspective) widely different subject- matter. For this reason and others I have narrowed down the scope so that focus is to be put on those units which, at least in medieval thought, might not be further divided: The letters of the alphabet. Discourse based on such fundaments should be able to sustain a superstructure.
A comparative approach is able, or so it is hoped, to further substantiate claims as to the place of these vernacular grammatical treatises within the history of linguistics and ideas. A juxtaposition of this kind has to the best of my knowledge, excepting the occasional cursory remark, not hitherto been attempted. The treatises are in some important respects deceptively basic productions and have on this account attracted some criticism of doubtful historical relevance. Some of these will still have to be dealt with in due course during the following argument. At any rate their apparent simplicity might account for a certain lack of serious scholarly attention and determination to take them at face-value. Their thematical affinity and their place within cultural history entitle them to a certain unity in treatment.
The Latin grammatical tradition is the obvious tertium comparationis. For several reasons I have found it convenient to let Priscian represent this tradition. First of all he aimed at comprehensiveness, so that his work encompasses the different trends of the art of grammar and discusses different solutions to individual issues, thus allowing ease of reference. Secondly his influence was profound on linguistic thought and discourse after his rediscovery during the Carolingian Renaissance. The third reason is, however, the most important one: He is the chief source for the relevant parts of the texts. This will be further specified when these are properly introduced.
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The present thesis is in its essence an attempt to follow a precept given by the Irish scholar Sedulius Scottus (fl. c. 850) concerning the art of definition: Sed notandum est, quod qui definitionem alicuius rei definit, ita debet definire, ut dicat ipsam partem, quae communis est ei cum altera, et dicat specialem, quam propriam et quam solam habet (Sedulius Scottus;
cited from Law 1994: 105n45).1 This is in many ways a sound approach, but one which has been curiously absent in the modern reception of the relevant texts. Medieval precepts will not otherwise influence the argument, which will proceed in the following manner: A brief historical introduction to medieval grammatica precedes a discussion on vernacular alphabets, which in turn is followed by sections on the sources (including an outlook to the First Grammatical Treatise) and their material state. This raises some issues that will be developed in a separate sub-chapter on the theoretical stance of the present thesis. The main chapter or analysis will be roughly divided into two parts: One will proceed by a close reading of the relevant passages while an excursus is devoted to mythography and the origin of the alphabets.
The conclusion will provide a brief summary of the central matters and direct attention towards issues arising from analysis.
By the end it is to be hoped that adequate answer has been given to the following set of questions: 1) Why does each treatise deal with the vernacular alphabet? 2) How is the vernacular alphabet presented in the one as compared to the other? 3) Could the choices made in one of the treatises shed light on those made in the other? Thus a proper ‘definition’ of the texts in question might be allowed.
1.2. Historical Backdrop
Linguistic thought in the medieval period was a continuation of tendencies which were found in Late Antiquity. As early as the third and second centuries BC, Stoic grammarians based at the school of Pergamum had developed a tripartite division (as in Donatus’ Ars maior) which would later become popular with the Latin grammarians (Law 1982: 12).
Quite a few vernaculars of Western Europe were employed as written languages at different points of time during the Middle Ages. Both Icelandic and Irish were in fact equipped with writing systems which were in all probability derived from alphabetic systems (McManus 1991: 4-5; Pedersen 1909: §4; Spurkland 2001: 16-17). These are themselves the results of linguistic analysis and thus proof of a certain linguistic competence on behalf of their
1 “Note that anyone who gives a definition of anything should define it in such a way that he indicates what it has in common with other things, and singles out for mention its unique characteristics,” (Law 1994: 105). The remark is found in Sedulius’ commentary on Donatus.
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composers (Ahlqvist 1982: 7ff.; McManus 1991: 5). There is no doubt that cultural contact provided the incentive for the framing of these alphabets (McCone 1996: 22ff.); the Irish habit of making epigraphs on sepulchral or other monuments may itself have been occasioned by contact with the late Roman Empire (Ó Cróinín 1995: 35), These and allied matters are further discussed in the next sub-chapter (1.3.).
The adoption of Roman Christianity in Western Europe had far-reaching consequences for the cultural life of the subordinated areas.2 The linguistic situation in Western Europe was no less complex than that in the East, but the languages of the West had no established literary culture prior to the influx of learning brought by the Church. Latin had already been the language of administration in those areas of Western Europe which were part of the Roman Empire. The conversion of previously illiterate people (illiterate in a Latinate sense) necessitated education in literacy and written culture. Christianity followed in the wake of the Roman empire, but reached beyond its former borders. Neither Iceland nor Ireland had first-hand acquaintance with Roman administration.
The new literary culture appears to have been dominated entirely by Latin. However, subsequently also the vernaculars were reduced to writing. Eastern Christianity was early furnished with translations of Scripture from Greek into a multitude of languages such as Coptic, Arameic and Syriac. Armenian, Georgian and Gothic followed suit in the 4th century (Law 2003: 124). Alphabetic scripts were developed in order to reduce these languages to writing. In the West the situation was different. The Latin alphabet was adapted to the vernacular languages, and the native alphabets were not employed as book-scripts. Old Irish was written with the Latin alphabet by 600 AD (Ó Croínín 1995: 189) or at least before the middle of the 7th century (McCone 1996: 31). There is little evidence to suggest that the native systems of writing had any profound role in the adaptation of the Latin alphabet to the vernacular language;3 unlike, for instance, British influence on the pronunciation of Latin (McCone 1996: 31). Old Irish was reduced to writing by the use of the Latin letters and their current pronunciation (Ó Cróinín 1995: 190), or, more eloquently, ‘The written standard of Irish was cast in the mould of written Latin,’ (Rekdal 2012: 169): No additional letters were coined and none were taken over from the Ogam alphabet. The Latin mould ensured a quality
‘similar to the classical written medium’ (ibid.).
2 A comprehensive account of these matters is given by Law (2003: 124ff.).
3 The opposite view is put forth for instance by Mac Neill (1931) and challenged by McManus (1986).
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Given that acquaintance with Latin language in this way preceded the vernacular literary pursuits, it is sensible not to think of a written vernacular as essentially oral language penned down on parchment. Against this background it is interesting to observe that the language of the extant Old Irish corpus is more or less bereft of dialectal features (Thurn.
Gramm.: §16; McManus 1991: 148-50) – which makes it reasonable to regard it as an artificial literary language on a par with Latin. This is unparalleled in early medieval Europe (Ó Cróinín 1995: 189), although a tendency towards a Schriftsprache is seen in early English literature as a result of increased West Saxon influence.
The Irish reception of the late antique and early medieval Latin grammatical works played an important role in the further life of these. This with regard to more or less all aspects: ranging from layout on the manuscript page to commentary and gloss. Speakers of non-Romance languages were in need of language resources with different emphasis and with more thorough description. The movement towards such emphasis is seen in the the Hiberno- Latin grammatical works, which are the subject of Law 1982.
From this tradition emerged the innovatory attempt at grammatical description of the vernacular language. Latin was learnt in the grammarians’ schools. It is only reasonable to assume that Old Irish would be learnt in the same way.
Writing in the 1140s, Petrus Helias acknowledges the possibility of creating a grammar of the French language and clearly states that such a work was not yet in existence (Björn M.
Ólsen 1884: iv; Law 2003: 172).
Est autem gramatica composita in lingua greca, latina, ebrea, et caldea. Et possunt huius artis species crescere, hoc est plures esse, ut si grammatica tractaretur in gallica lingua (quod posset fieri facile, si tantum nomina et figure proprie illius secundum illam linguam inveniretur), sive in alia aliqua in qua nondum tractata est (Thurot 1868: 127).4
This is written at about the time the First Grammatical Treatise (1.6.) was composed (i.e. 1150
± 25 - see discussion in Hreinn Benediktsson 1972: 23ff.). The influence of Petrus Helias and his commentary on Priscian on FGT has been discussed in scholarly reception of the work (Hreinn Benediktsson 1972: 198f.). An opposition between the common idiom and the artificial one (see 2.3.) is also commented on by Henry of Crissey (14th century). For Petrus
4 “For grammar has been composed in the Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Chaldean languages. And the species of this art could grow, that is, become more, for instance if grammar was discussed in the French language (lingua gallica) (which could easily be done, if only its individual nouns and figures could be found according to that language) or in another language in which it has not been treated yet.”
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Helias the vernacular grammar remained a theoretical possibility. When he was active vernacular grammatical literature had been a practical reality in Ireland for several hundred years and was about to establish itself as a genre in Iceland as well.
1.3. On the Vernacular Alphabets
A few remarks on the vernacular alphabets themselves are requisite.5 The dearth of evidence concerning their origins opens up for speculation, but there is no reason to venture beyond the merely synoptic at this point, beginning with the Ogam:
L'alphabet ogamique n'est sans doute que l'une des formes de ces alphabets chiffrés (18). Il est issu d'une sorte de transposition, ou de camouflage, de l'alphabet latin ; les classes de caractères ogamiques semblent inspirées par la classification des lettres proposées par les grammairiens latins (19). La technique employée (traits et points) s'inspire des encoches ou entailles utilisées dans la comptabilité rustique (Lambert 1987: 18).
Lambert singles out precisely those details which are called for in the context of the present argument. The Ogam alphabet is derived from the Latin alphabet. This must be true as far as its relationship to language is concerned, but as a signary in which distinction is made by position-marking, Ogam is unrelated to the Latin alphabet and possibly of pastoral origin, as mentioned above (see also Ahlqvist 1982: 7; Thurneysen 1937: 197). In the words of McManus the Ogam is a result of ‘stimulus diffusion’ (1991: 3); its main theoretical basis, namely the alphabetic principle, was provided by the Latin alphabet, and was given an independent expression. The Ogam alphabet consists of four primary groups (DIL: aicme
‘family’, ‘class’) of five letters. Those letters which denote vowels are distinguished graphically from the consonants. A certain influence from the doctrine of the Roman grammarians, who divided the consonants into three groups, namely semivowels, mutes and ‘Greek letters’, is therefore likely (Ahlqvist 1982: 8), although these groups of consonants do not correspond to those of the Ogam. No distinction is made, for instance, between mutes and semivowels.
5 The expression ‘vernacular alphabet’ is admittedly not quite satisfactory, as both terms might convey the wrong connotations; ‘vernacular’ in the context of this treatise simply means ‘that which is not Latin’ (i.e. used irrespective of high vs. low register and certainly not used in a derogatory fashion), while ‘alphabet’ is used of all systems of writing based on the alphabetic principle, viz. the principle that there is a one-to-one correspondence, though in reality this is a rare achievement, between grapheme and phoneme.
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Several theories have been issued on the niceties of the process of adaptation (e.g.
Carney 1975; Ahlqvist 1982), but they resort to arbitrary reshuffling of the letters and are therefore questionable. McManus has, moreover, amply demonstrated (1986: 39f.) that the manuscript key to the letters and values of the Ogam alphabet is not trustworthy as far as the original values are concerned. The fact that the manuscript key postdates the origin of the alphabet by several centuries, in which drastic language change had taken place, is in itself a serious objection to these proposals.6
During the period between Primitive Irish and Old Irish tremendous changes affected the language. These are to some extent visible in the inscriptions, which are, however, seriously deficient in morphological information (McManus 1991: 83ff.). The visual appearance of the Ogam was not affected by language change and thus gives a misleading impression of uniformity. The values of the letters were not immune to sound-change, as these were closely related to the names of the letters, based as they were on the acrophonic principle.
Names are, needless to say, susceptible to sound-change.
The basic inventory of four times five signs was at some stage augmented with an additional fifth group of letters. These letters were probably a response to manuscript literacy, their creators being ‘out of touch with the objectives of the original framers of Ogam [...]’
(McManus 1991: 2), and will be discussed in more detail at a later stage.
The Ogam alphabet is the first result of linguistic analysis ever made in Ireland. It was accomplished at least by the fifth century. Although this analysis was evidently rather advanced, and presumably dependent on circulation of Latinate grammatical doctrine in the Roman provinces, it furnished the later Old Irish linguists only with their object of study. The stage of the Irish language to which the Ogam was tailored (Primitive Irish) was more or less unknown to scholars in the Old Irish period, and the origin of Ogam clearly a great deal more obscure to them than it is to us. This does not imply that medieval scribes did not spend ink on the matter – obscurity rarely does. They ventured to elucidate the origin of the vernacular alphabet through mythography (2.10.), fitting it into the larger pseudo-historical account of the Irish cultural sphere. Hence they allowed their ignorance of the actual act of invention to
6 The earliest keys to the alphabet are found in the Continental manuscripts Codex Bernensis 207 (fol.
257r) from the eighth/ninth centuries and Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana MS. Reg. Lat. 1308 (fol.
62v) (McManus 1991: 135). The earliest relevant manuscripts of Irish provenance are from the 14th century; in addition to the Auraicept, they contain the texts Dúil feda na forḟid and Dúil feda ind Ogaim.
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become apparent, but they also enabled the re-analysis of their alphabet by the application of that kind of grammatical doctrine, admittedly rather basic, as had enabled its design. The earliest attempt at such analysis is carried out in the grammatical treatise commonly referred to as Auraicept na nÉces (ed. Calder 1917; ed. Ahlqvist 1982).
The runic alphabet or fuþark was in use for a period of about 1300 years. Its origin is no less enigmatic than that of the Ogam, but consensus (Spurkland 2001; Barnes 2012) suggests that the Latin alphabet was the most important antecedent, although some graphical features are easier to account for if other impulses are acknowledged (see discussion in Spurkland 2001:
17). The fuþark is unlike the Ogam in that not only its underlying principle, but also its signs might be traced to the Mediterranean systems. The letters of the runic alphabet were organized into three groups (in later manuscripts these are called ættir (sg. ætt) (Barnes 2012:
17).
The fuþark underwent two main periods of great change: The older fuþark contained 24 graphemes which were reduced to 16 graphemes in its younger variety.7 Probably several mechanisms were at work in the period of change. These are listed and discussed by Spurkland (2001: 92-93): ‘Graphical circumstances’ (i.e. graphical simplification), sound-changes and, as a consequence of these, changes of the names of individual runes. The runic names were likewise based on the acrophonic principle, and a change in their anlaut (e.g. loss of j- and breaking) would consequently have an impact on their value. Sound-changes not affecting the initial sound would naturally be of no consequence in this respect.
Umlaut had led to the development of new allophones which were phonemicized as a result of syncopy. The result was a language with an increased inventory of vowel-phonemes (5 › 9, excluding distinction of quantity and later mergers). The 16-runes’ fuþark did not enable unambigious representation of these phonemes. Towards the High Middle Ages, however, new graphemes were derived from the principal ones by punctuation and distinction of the short-twig varieties from their long-twig counterparts (Spurkland 2001: 163ff.).8 The result was a set of additional characters. This second period of change was concluded by 1200 and was triggered by the presence (at least from the end of the 11th century or beginning of the 12th century) of a manuscript culture which was borne by the Latin alphabet.
7 This should not necessarily be understood as a ‘reform’ (cf. Barnes 2012).
8 E.g. t /t/ is distinguished from d /d/ and k /k/ from g /g/ by punctuation; o /o/ is kept apart from from ø /ø/ and ö/Ö /ɔ/ by establishing a distinction short-twig/long-twig (Spurkland 2001: 164-65).
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Spurkland (2001: 166, 213; see also Barnes 2012: 123ff.) argues for the existence in Norway during the High Middle Ages of a literary culture in which the two alphabets were employed in complementary distribution, as it were. Evidence does not suggest that the runes were taken into use in a manuscript context, with the exception of common abbreviations, together with a few citations, and of course, the Danish compilation AM 28 8vo (Codex Runicus; c. 1300), which contains law texts written entirely in runes, but is otherwise adherent to MS conventions.9 Its only parallel is catalogued as SKB A 120, which is therefore quite possibly a product of the same school or scriptorium, located (on linguistic and thematic grounds) in Scania County (today in Sweden) (Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir 2013: 104). In any case, The Third Grammatical Treatise represents a violation of any complementary distribution,10 though composed in Iceland and not in Norway, by staging the entrance of the runes into the domain of the Latin alphabet.
1.4. Institutiones grammaticae
The Institutiones grammaticae (‘The Institutes of Grammar’; henceforth Instt. gramm.) was among the grammatical works rediscovered during the Carolingian Renaissance. The popularity of the work during and following the Carolingian Renaissance is confirmed by the great number of manuscript witnesses which have survived (Law 2003: 143-47; Irvine 1994:
306). Among these we find the famous Codex Sangallensis 904, which has been crucial in the description of Old Irish grammar, as represented by Rudolf Thurneysen’s Handbuch des Alt- Irischen (Heidelberg 1909; translated to English in 1946), due to its rich collection of glosses, and which testifies to the solemnity with which the text was received in Irish circles in the middle of the 9th century. It is significant that the Irish interest in Priscian (and Donatus) might have predated the Carolingian Renaissance by as much as two hundred years (Ahlqvist 1982). For the present investigation, however, it is of equal importance that this manuscript is
9 A facsimile edition of this ms. might be found at https://handrit.is/en/manuscript/view/da/AM08- 028. Consult also Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir 2013 (104-105) for a discussion on the manuscript – “one of the most remarkable products of medieval literary culture” (ibid.). It is most probably a revivalist production with no genetical link to epigraphic script culture: “hafa menn giskað á að í rúnanotkuninni felist ákveðinn vilji til að endurlífga gamla norræna letrið eða hefja það upp á stall til hins latneska“
(ibid.). “Men have guessed that behind the use of the runes there is to be found a decided wish to revive the Old Norse alphabet or to elevate it to the standing of Latin”.
10 It is a possibility that traditional runic literacy had all but disappeared in Iceland at the time of composition, judging from abscence of evidence (see further Wills 2016: 127).
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a contemporary document which testifies to the work done by Irish scribes in the reception of late antique grammatical writing, but also to current influence on Irish literate culture and grammatical meta-language (see Ahlqvist 1982: 14-15). St. Gallen, the monastery to which this manuscript, possibly of Irish provenance, was eventually brought, was evidently a centre of grammatical learning on a high level. This is evidenced by the presence of such persona as Notker (c. 840-912) (Irvine 1994: 310), who had a high command of both Latin and his vernacular tongue, and who created the first systematic orthography for the latter.
Priscian Caesariensis (fl. early sixth-century AD), the author of Instt. gramm., received his education in Constantinople and was active in the early sixth century. The context in which he worked, together with the character of the text, clearly shows that it was intended to serve native speakers of Greek, with its abundance of Greek examples and reference to dialectal characteristics. Among the features of the Institutes which made it expressly suitable for speakers of other languages was its inclusion of a discussion of pronunciation.
Priscian’s influence extended well beyond the Carolingian Renaissance. The Instt.
gramm. had a profound effect on the nature of linguistic inquiry because of its inclusion of more advanced discussions on linguistics, and this effect made an impact also on grammatical thought during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century. Between these two renaissances the work was in steady use and served to fuel grammatical discussion. Due to its monumental size, it was commonly disseminated by means of extracts. An important example of this is the Excerptiones de Prisciano, which was adapted and translated by Ælfric (ca. 992- 1002)(ed. Zupitza 1880; see further Law 2003: 145). His work in turn became influential in Iceland (Gade 2007). Ælfric takes a markedly apologetic position when he introduces his Old English translation (Law 2003: 194). This is articulated in both languages.
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1.5. Auraicept na nÉces
The oldest extant attempt at adapting Latinate grammatical description on a vernacular language in Western Europe is the Irish treatise Auraicept na nÉces (ʻThe Scholars’ Primer’;
henceforth Auraicept), which treats topics of linguistic interest. The oldest stratum of this text is traditionally dated to the early Old Irish period (Ahlqvist 1982).
When the title of the treatise, which has medieval authority, was taken into use we do not know (cf. Burnyeat 2007: 191f.). Caution should therefore be issued in using this title as confirmation of the intention and aspirations of the author(/s). On its own, the term auraicept was compounded from the Latin borrowing aiccept/aiccecht and the preposition air,11 and used to denote such concepts as ‘primer’ or ‘primary lesson’. Hence the Auraicept na nÉces is commonly perceived as a « manuel de formation des (futurs) savants » (Lambert 1987: 17). 12 The genitival attribute na nÉces (g.pl. of éces ‘scholar’, ‘poet’) is generally taken to refer to the
‘scholars in spe’, but is ambiguous as it might also refer to the scholars who issued the
‘primer’.13 This ambiguity is not present in the reference to the Auraicept in the Mittelirische Verslehren II (henceforth MVII) (ed. Thurneysen 1891: 1-182), which has the reading na nÉicsine (‘of the students’, construed with the diminutive suffix) rather than na nÉces.
11 The latter part of the compound (aiccept), is derived from the supine stem (accept-) of the Latin verb accipiō. More general use of the term (i.e. with the meaning ʻlesson’) is documented for instance in the following passage, taken from the commentary to Félire Óengusso Céli Dé (Stokes 1905: 202): Is ann bói Ciarán ic frital a aicepta soisceli, 7 is e ní airithe ro labair .i. Omnia quaecunque uultis ut faciunt uobis homines sic facite iliss. This is rendered as: “Ciarán was then preparing his Gospel lesson, and this especially is what he said: ‘Whatsoever ye wish men to do unto you, that do ye unto them’.” (ibid.:
203).
12 Marstrander translates Auraicept na nÉicsíne asʻstudenternes elementærbok’ (notes to Thurneysen 1891: 32; consult bibliography). Thurneysen: ʻVor-Aufgabe der Studenten’ (Thurneysen 1891: 115).
Note that both translate ... na nÉicsine ʻof the students’ (DIL: éicsíne) and not ... na nÉces. (See further Burnyeat 2007: 189ff.).
13 Such a construction is paralleled in the text usually referred to as Audacht Morainn:IncipitAuraicept Morainn nó Tecosca Morainn for Feradach Findḟechtnach (slightly normalized from Thurneysen 1917: 80). Here the preposition for precedes the receiver of the teachings, while authorship is expressed by a genitive attribute. It should be noted, though, that the usage in MVII does seem to contradict this explanation, with its distinction between airacept and foacepta (Thurneysen 1891: 32, 34; see also Burnyeat 2007: 191).
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Medieval usage seems to favour more specific reference to the core-text, but in a manuscript culture this core would invariably be surrounded by gloss and commentary. The make-up of this immanent kernel is not, however, immediately discernible. This is partly caused by the fact that the Auraicept na nÉces is traditionally divided into four different books which are all ascribed to pseudo-historical authors (see 2.10.). Due to its brevity, the text reconstructed by Ahlqvist could hardly be subdivided into four feasible books or chapters 14 - as stressed by the editor (1982: 19). Thus the division into four books must have been carried out only after a substantial amount of commentary was composed (see Bauer 2013: 11). MVII suggests that Auraicept na nÉcsíne was thought to consist of three parts: Prologue (brol(l)ach), main part and paradigms or inflections (réimenna) (Thurneysen 1891: 32, 115; Ahlqvist 1982:
17), and does not mention the fourfold division which is highlighted in the commentary to the Auraicept itself. It would seem that the commentators sought to augment the importance of their object by various means. This argumentation will be developed further.
The Auraicept na nÉces was first edited by George Calder (1917). His edition is based on the recensions in RIA MS 23P12/536 (Book of Ballymote; henceforth BB), NLS MS Advocates’ 72.1.1 (E), TCD MS H 2.16 (Yellow Book of Lecan; YBL) and British Library MS Egerton 88 (Eg.). Together with the Old Irish text he has edited accompanying Middle Irish commentary and glosses. Calder recognized two families of text and commentary which go back to a common source, from which they presumably deviated during the eleventh century (Thurneysen 1928: 285; Ahlqvist 1982: 32). The text that is shared by both recensions is, as would be expected, often better transmitted in one of the families (Thurneysen 1928: 280).
The first redaction is furnished with a somewhat problematic translation, which at times surrenders to Irish idiom to the degree that the reader unfamiliar with ‘standard Old Irish textbook prose’ (Charles-Edwards 1980: 147) in its Middle-Irish guise may be charmed into thinking that it is an acutely faithful rendition of the original. Arguably more serviceable to the researcher is Calder’s endeavour to portray the actual manuscript state of the text with its occasional imperfections – but his text is not a diplomatic transcript of any single witness.
Information on his editing procedure is not included in the introduction to the edition. Calder did not always identify the correct source for the quotations in the Auraicept na nÉces, but a valuable contribution in this regard is Poppe’s paper “Latin Quotations in Auraicept na nÉces:
Microtexts and their Transmission” (2002).
14 Note, for instance, that no statement of Amairgen’s is treated as canonical in BB. In YBL several of them are given this privilege.
22
The make-up of the source material is rather complex. The nature of the manuscript transmission of the Auraicept na nÉces and its commentary is to a very limited extent treated in the foreword by Calder (1917: xiii, xxiii). Calder’s edition is far from satisfactory on several points. Firstly, it may be noted that his edition “being the texts of the Ogham tracts from the Book of Ballymote and the Yellow Book of Lecan, and the text of the Trefhocul from the Book of Leinster, edited from eight manuscripts, with introduction, translation of the Ballymote text, notes and indices” (Calder 1917, title blade) does in fact contain two editions of the core text and its commentary (i.e. one of each family of manuscripts). Calder divided the manuscripts with which he worked into two families according to whether they contained a shorter version of the commentary (as do his B, L, M) or a longer one (as in Y, Eg.). Calder’s two editions of the text with commentary are edited from eight manuscripts altogether. In addition to this he includes treḟocal from LL (1917: ll. 5057-5414). Calder failed to provide accurate information on his editing procedures and principles of translation.15 The consequence of this and of his at times rather disorderly presentation of the material is that the use of his edition (not to mention the facing translation) as the basis of research requires a good deal of caution.16 The advantage of this is that a study of the text is almost forced to deal with, or at least take into account, the heterogeneity of the actual manuscript witnesses.
Although her article is limited to two such witnesses, Deborah Hayden (2011) shows how taking into consideration the different organisation of the manuscripts’ content may assist our understanding of the text(s). The organisation and extent of the accreted commentary varies significantly in the manuscript witnesses (Hayden 2014: 24). With the facsimiles which are made available by the ISOS-project17 it is of course more convenient than before to do comparative examinations of the different witnesses to the text. Notwithstanding this ease of access, and the fact that the project provides updated catalogues of the items contained in the published manuscripts, thorough and reliable codicological reexamination would demand access to the manuscript themselves.
15 The somewhat forthright air is and is ben-si intan fognaithir dia sliasait (Calder 1917: l. 609) is translated with “for it is then she is a woman, quum femori ejus serviatur”. The use of Latin here for euphemistic purposes is rather confusing, as Calder does not in general translate Latin quotations (but compare for instance l. 214). He tidies them up and occasionally expands them (ll. 457-59).
16 For instance a sentence following i clar na croiche in BB is lacking from Calder’s text (1917: l. 165).
This reads: Cid siu natised atuaid asin sgitia (BB: 368 a). Calder does not mark this omission.
17 http://www.isos.dias.ie
23
The so-called canonical text was later edited afresh by Anders Ahlqvist (1982). His edition is based on several manuscripts which were unknown to Calder. His catalogue-based research into the Auraicept-corpus yielded eleven fragments of the text in addition to eleven full copies, which were all divided into three families according to their content and their treatment of the canonical part of the text (Ahlqvist 1982: 22-27). All manuscripts are of Irish provenance (Poppe 2002: 312),18 with the earliest dating to the 14th century and the later paper copies to the 17th/18th centuries.19 As is the case with other works from the Old Irish period, many of the details surrounding its transmission will therefore remain unknown due to loss of evidence. The number of manuscript witnesses, the amount of gloss and commentary in them and the length of the period in which the Auraicept was read and was able to exert influence on other texts, is clear evidence that it was considered important.
In scholarly discourse, Auraicept na nÉces is used to denote the text in its fully commented form, as it is represented by each of the two recensions in Calder’s edition (1917).20 This is complemented by more specific reference to the canonical text which became the locus for commentatory and glossatory activity, rather as it is delimited and edited by Anders Ahlqvist (1982). It is important to note that the perception of the text (including features as for instance layout) in the Middle Irish and Early Modern Irish periods has been of great importance also when reconstructing the Old Irish text of the archetype. Medieval
“editorial technique” has, in a way, aided the modern researcher in moving past a point beyond which textual criticism may not reach.21 The accuracy of any reconstruction which aims to represent a text which is older than this point is dependent on the fallibility of medieval textual preservation and presentation. That differentiation of script is in itself no certain criterion when establishing a text is proven by Meroney (1945: 18-19; see also McLaughlin 2009: 2).
The fact that only Ahlqvist’s group b preserves more or less systematic distinction between canonical text and commentary is worthy of note - how was the canonical text delimited in the common source? No stemmatic relationship of the different witnesses has yet been presented.
18 Against the notion that Auraicept na nÉces is an odd representative for Irish medieval literature, it might be noted that the rather more well-known heroic epos Táin Bó Cúailnge survives in eight mss.
19 The oldest extant fragment of material relating to the Auraicept proper is the so-called Ó Cianáin Miscellany (NLI G2; ca. 1345).
20 These recensions share several common mistakes which must by necessity have occurred before the textual transmission was split (Thurneysen 1928: 281; Meroney 1945: 18).
21 It should be mentioned that the tradition is contaminated (Ahlqvist 1982: 29), showing interplay of elements from different recensions.
24
The Auraicept in its commented form will be the main object of study for the present investigation. The conclusion must therefore be that Calder’s edition is the natural point of departure. The original Auraicept, if such a text existed, is irretrievably lost. Although Ahlqvist’s edition provides us with a probable archetype, it is not an authentic document.22 In spite of its many shortcomings, the first edition will have to serve. Ahlqvist’s edition, being a considerably more conscientious production, will be consulted when reference is made to the core-text.
Below is an overview which might help the reader to find the relevant parts of the edition (given in lines). It is based on a summary which Thurneysen made in ZCP 17 (1928:
281ff.) of the contents of Calder’s edition. See also Calder’s harmony between the two families (1917: liv-lv).23
1. (I. 63-734; II. 2260 resp. 2616-3492) Book of Cenn Fáelad mac Ailella 2. (I. 735-1027; II. 3492-3984) Book of Ferchertne.
3. (I. 1028-1101; II. 3984-4101) Book of Amairgen Glúngel 4. (I. 1102-1636; II. 4136-4725) Book of Fénius, Íar and Goídel 5. (I. 1637-1758; II. 4726-4960) Coic fillte fichet i reim
6. (I. 1759-1879; II. 4961-5055) Do bhunadhaibh na remend
7. (I. 1880-1892) No title.
8. (I. 1893-1926) Do ernailibh in imchomairc
9. (I. 1927-2255) Treḟocul (1)
10. (II. 5056-5415) Treḟocul (LL)
11. (5417-5463) De duilib feda na forḟid (BB, LL)
12. (5465-6165) Ogam (BB)
22 For a discussion on the mechanisms involved in the preservation of canonical text surrounded by commentary, the reader is referred to Fergus Kelly’s article on the transmission of law-texts (2002) as well as his A Guide to Early Irish Law (1988: 225ff.).
23 I: first family of mss. II: second family of mss.
25
1.6. The First Grammatical Treatise
The First Grammatical Treatise (henceforth FGT; ed. Hreinn Benediktsson 1972) provides us with a discourse on the adaptation of the Latin alphabet to Icelandic. The FGT is securely dated to the period 1125-75 (Hreinn Benediktsson 1972: 31), but is only preserved in the mid- 14th century Codex Wormianus. It is a unique document not only in an Icelandic context, but in the Medieval West. The FGT, being the second preserved attempt at the study of a non- sacred language in Western Europe, is occasionally mentioned in the same breath as the Auraicept. Apart from superficially dealing with cognate subject-matter, the texts have very little in common. The task the FG set himself was to present an improved alphabet for the Icelandic language. This necessitated reflection on the sounds of the language and of the ability of the letters to represent that which in his words might ʻalter the discourse’ (skipta máli). All his propositions are assessed and, in principle, supported by the use of a commutation test.
The degree to which his propositions are backed up by the use of minimal pairs is quite remarkable for his time, as these were granted no central role in traditional grammatical literature (Hreinn Benediktsson 1972: 76-78).
The FGT stems from a debate which must have taken place among men of letters, but which has not been elsewhere recorded. In other words, the FGT represents a kind of discourse which has left no trace in Irish sources: How should the vernacular be reduced to letters? Moreover, it shows that such discourse must have taken place over some time and offers a view of the kind of arguments that might have been used in the evaluation of different proposals.
The FG did not venture to apply Latinate grammatical precepts on the vernacular or its alphabet - on the contrary his evaluation of the vernacular alphabet is less than enthusiastic:
Eigi er þat rúnanna kostr þó at þú lesir vel eða ráðir vel at líkindum þar sem rúnar vísa óskýrt (normalized from Hreinn Benediktsson 1972: 214). 24
The most recent editor of the text, Hreinn Benediktsson, was of the opinion that rún was used as a ‘mere stylistic variant’ of stafr (1972: 42) and dismissed the reading of Björn M.
Ólsen (1883: 103-104), who took rún to simply denote ‘runic letter’. This reading is preferable
24 “It is not the virtue of the runes if you are able to read well or give a likely interpretation where the runes are unclear.” Hreinn Benediktsson: “It is not the virtue of the letters if you can read well or make a good guess (in cases) where the letters are unclear,” (1972: 215).
26
– not least if style is invoked as a parameter.25 The polemic against the vernacular alphabet is lost in translation and replaced with polemic against unclear usage. At any rate, the perception of the vernacular alphabet at the time of the FGT, when Icelandic literacy was still in its infancy26 differed vastly from the one which comes to the fore in the ThGT about a century later.
25 The term rún does in fact only occur four times in the FGT; twice outside the quoted passage, both times as part of the ʻminimal pairʼ ru̇nar:rúnar (Ru̇nar heita gelltir enn rúnar málstafir“Male pigs are called r nar (‘boars’), but letters (are called) rúnar (‘runes’),” (Hreinn Benediksson 1972: 222/223).
Hreinn offers no further support for his choice of translation, which might therefore be dismissed (see Males 2016: 266n13). Snorri uses the word occasionally, but rather to denote ‘secret’ or ‘enigma’ than
‘letter’ or ‘rune’ (ONP: rún) (Males 2015: 177n10.).
26 On the authority of the FGT it already encompassed laws, genealogy, exegesis and historiography (Hreinn Benediktsson 1972: 208/209).
27
1.7. The Third Grammatical Treatise
The Third Grammatical Treatise (henceforth ThGT) is contained in four manuscripts: AM 748 Ia-b 4° (henceforth A; early 14th century), AM 242 fol. (W; mid-14th century), a fragment (w) now part of AM 757b 4°, and AM 757a 4° (B; c. 1390-1410) (B. M. Ólsen 1884: xlviii ff.).27 Sharing all the errors of W, the text in w appears to be a transcript of the former and is accordingly without text-critical value, but does nevertheless testify to the popularity of the text. The same is true for a number of later paper copies of the treatise. Although its manuscript record might seem modest compared to that of the Auraicept, with its eleven full and eleven fragmented copies (Ahlqvist 1982: 22ff.), the ThGT is the best represented of the medieval Icelandic grammatical treatises, with the important exception of Snorri’s Edda and especially the influential Skáldskaparmál (ed. Faulkes 1998), which, following Guðrún Nordal (2001), are counted as part of the grammatical corpus.
In W, the so-called Codex Wormianus (on which see Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir 2013:
39ff.), the ThGT is found together with three other grammatical treatises and a prologue which introduces them as a thematic group. Unsurprisingly, none of these texts have survived as autographs (Johansson 1997: 57; Males 2013: 41n2), with the exception of the prologue, which is tailored to fit the particular ‘grammatical digest’ (Raschellà 2005: 359) contained within W (on its redactor, see Males 2013). W significantly includes a copy of the aforementioned Edda of Snorri Sturluson, and its wide range of works pertaining to the vernacular language and literature makes W the foremost representative of the Icelandic grammatical tradition of the Middle Ages. Apart from the texts contained within W, only minor texts are extant, as the fragment AM 921 III 4° (c. 1400) (ONPRegistre 1989: 464), which contains examples of Latin verbal conjugation with Icelandic translation, and AM 748 Ib 4to (c. 1300-25) (loc. cit.), which contains a diminutive portion of another grammatical treatise. Two of the grammatical texts containted in W are not extant elsewhere. The treatises are all anonymous and carry no name - hence their order of appearance in this manuscript provides a convenient way of reference to them.28 The other main witness to the ThGT, and
27 Consult also ONP Registre on http://onp.ku.dk/adgang_til_ordliste_etc/registre/ (last visited November 6th 2016) for updated catalogue information. The dates provided there correspond to those given by B. M. Ólsen (1884).
28 In this treatise they are referred to as First Grammatical Treatise (FGT), Second Grammatical Treatise (SGT), Third Grammatical Treatise (ThGT) and Fourth Grammatical Treatise (FoGT). Their
28
the one which is generally preferred by its editors, is A. B. M. Ólsen posits a single manuscript witness between the archetype and A and three witnesses between the archetype and W (B.
M. Ólsen 1884: lxii). B derives from the same redaction of the text as that which is found in AW (op.cit.: lviii). Tarrin Wills (2001: 52ff.) has challenged B. M. Ólsen’s assessment of the stemmatic relationship between the manuscripts, and has made a fresh contribution in which he harmonizes the stemma of the ThGT and that which Finnur Jónsson made of those witnesses to Skáldskaparmál which are contained in the same manuscripts.
The first part of the Third Grammatical Treatise (ThGT, c. 1250) is commonly referred to as Málfræðinnar grundvöllr (‘Foundation of Grammar’; henceforth Mg). As noted above, there is no medieval authority for this title, which first appeared in the editio princeps by Rasmus Rask (1818: 297) and has been used by later editors (Sveinbjörn Egilsson 1849; B. M.
Ólsen 1884; Wills 2001).29 Mg is, though the bulk of its content is derivative of Priscian (or directly translated from him), the most original contribution of the ThGT (Finnur Jónsson 1927: 14f.; Raschellà 1994: 679). The very first passage is a deviation from traditional structure (represented by e.g. Donatus’ Ars maior) and have more in common with tracts on logic and dialectics; such as the 12th century Summulae logicales by Petrus Hispanus.30 This passage begins with the very general statement: Allt er hljóð, þat er um kvikvendis eyru má skilja (B.
M. Ólsen 1884: 33). “Sound is everything which the ears of living creatures may comprehend.”
The discussion of different sounds is gradually narrowed down, until it reaches the more humble level of abstraction where Priscian begins his discourse: Philosophi definiunt vocem esse aerem tenuissimum ictum vel suum sensibile aurum, id est quod proprie auribus accidit (GL vol. II: 5). This is rendered in the ThGT as: En Priscianus kallar rǫdd vera hit grannligsta loptsins hǫgg ok eiginliga eyrum skiljanligt (B. M. Ólsen 1884: 35). “But Priscian states that voice is the most subtle strike of air and intelligible to one’s own ears.” From this on Mg follows the lay-out of Priscian quite closely.
The second part of the ThGT was named Fígúrur í ræðunni (ʻFigures in speech’) by Rasmus Rask (1818: 308). Later Sveinbjörn Egilsson called it Málskrúðsfræði (1849;
authors are referred to by abbreviations on a par with ‘FG’ (leg. First Grammarian), as done by Hreinn Benediktsson (1972).
29 Finnur Jónsson (1927) and Thomas Krömmelbein (1998) both used Björn M. Ólsenʼs edition as their point of departure. The latter edition contains a convenient, though not quite satisfactory, German translation (see Jón Axel Harðarson 2003).
30 For a demonstration of the influence of this text on the ThGT the reader is referred to the commentary in Wills’ edition (2001).
29
henceforth M). It deals with rhetorical figures in skaldic poetry and includes a wealth of verses of anonymous and identified origin.31 M is, in terms of traditional Latin grammar as represented by e.g. Donatus’ Ars maior, the logical extension of Mg, as it follows the progression, beginning in Mg with the sound of speech and the syllable, to the larger units of textual composition.
It is reasonable to believe that Óláfr’s treatise has been transmitted without significant losses or additions (Finnur Jónsson 1927: 16), although it should be said that certain systematic abridgements of the text are witnessed in B (Wills 2016: 119), some of which may have been made out of editorial expediency (ibid.). Although the editor of W has generally not refrained from editorial interference, the text of the ThGT is relatively untampered with (op.cit.: 43
§[4.2]).
The ThGT has been edited and published several times. The first edition by Rasmus Rask (1818; 297ff.), solely based on W, has already been mentioned.32 Sveinbjörn Egilsson published an edition of the text from the manuscripts A, W and B, as part of his edition of SnE (1848-49; 173-200). Sveinbjörn chose A as the basis for his edition. This has been the standard since. The ThGT was published as part of the Arnamagnean edition of SnE (1848- 87). The standard edition of both the ThGT and of the FoGT was published by Björn M.
Ólsen in 1884.33 Finnur Jónsson edited the ThGT in 1927. Tarrin Wills has edited Mg afresh as part of his doctoral thesis (2001).34 His edition contains transcripts from all four manuscript witnesses, together with an edited text accompanied by a text-critical apparatus and a translation. Wills has identified relevant passages in other texts that might have influenced the author of Mg.
The authorship of Óláfr Þórðarson has medieval authority, as it is established in a passage in A (fol. 14v, ll. 6ff.): Hér er lykt þeim hlut bókarinnar er Óláfr Þórðarson hefir
31 A list of these verses are to be found at The Skaldic Project (ed. Clunies Ross et. al.):
http://skaldic.abdn.ac.uk/db.php?id=32&if=default&table=text (last visited October 17th 2016).
32 A new diplomatic edition of W is available at the MENOTA project; http://www.menota.org
33 This edition of the FoGT has recently been replaced by Clunies Ross and Wellendorf (2014). Wills’
edition is a very valuable complement to B. M. Ólsen 1884.
34 Page numbers refer to the printed, but unpublished edition of the thesis, while the paragraph numbers might also aid in locating the relevant section in the digital edition.
30
samansett [...] (B. M. Ólsen 1884: 119).35 This statement, written in red ink (compare note in B. M. Ólsen 1884: 119 n.), is generally accepted (Clunies Ross 2005: 109, 186, etc.) and is furthermore confirmed by the FoGT, which contains one quotation which is attributed to Óláfr, though without the patronymic, together with explicit references to the terminology of the ThGT (Clunies and Wellendorf 2014: 12, 18-22).
Óláfr hvítaskáld Þórðarson (d. 1259) was the son of Þórðr Sturluson, brother of the politician and author Snorri Sturluson. He was a member of the influential family of the Sturlungs, and ran a school at Stafaholt in Borgarfjörður. This school is the likely context for the production of the ThGT (B. M. Ólsen 1884: xxxvi; Finnur Jónsson 1927: 7). Óláfr was clearly well versed in Latin (‘en velstuderet klærk’) (Finnur Jónsson 1927: 3), judging by his output, which is limited to the ThGT and skaldic poetry (cf. Males 2015). Óláfr’s death, before the age of fifty, poses a certain terminus ante quem for the composition of the ThGT, which is therefore likely a production of the 1240s or 1250s (see a summary of biographical information based on the sagas in B. M. Ólsen 1884: xxxii-xxxvii; Finnur Jónsson 1927).
Before the composition of the ThGT, Óláfr had been attending the court of King Valdemar the Conqueror (Valdemar Sejr). There is text-internal and external evidence (saga literature, e.g. Knytlinga saga) of this event. The Codex Runicus (see 1.3.), though postdating Óláfr’s death, might have been the result of similar influence, though this is neither confirmed nor precluded by the available evidence (Wills 2016: 125).
The ThGT does not only offer the most relevant comparison with the Auraicept, but it is the only Old Norse/Icelandic (indeed the only Germanic) production which fully deserves to be referred to as ‘grammatical’ (as stated in Raschellà 1982: 4) – the only one to treat the full specter from the letter to rhetorics.
35 “Here that part of the book which Óláfr Þórðarson put together is ended.” As an aside it might be mentioned that the attribution of the Auraicept of Cenn Fáelad is not generally accepted, although this too might boast of medieval authority.
31
1.8. Considerations on Method
The following discussion will direct attention to some of the issues that are germane to the methodological approach as laid out in the preamble.
First of all, this study does not presuppose any direct connection between the Icelandic and the Irish grammatical traditions. A certain influence might be envisaged (see Bauer 2013), although this is inherently difficult to prove when the relevant confounders are ruled out.
Insular influence on the Icelandic grammatical treatises would rather have been provided by the Hiberno-Latin grammatical commentaries (see Micillo 1999: 215). As a consequence, boundary between languages is avoided as an issue. The only relevant boundary is that between the vernacular language and Latin, and this, I think, might better be described as an interface in the context of bilingual textual communities. The Latin grammatical tradition, as a tertium comparationis, is the vantage point from which the vernacular traditions might be contrasted. The zenith of grammatical learning was the Instt. gramm. which provided many centuries with a huge collection of data and the means necessary to analyse them (Law 2003:
86).
Chronology presents an issue in two ways. The first of these is the fact that the texts themselves date from different periods, a hitch, while the second issue pertains to the timespan of the Auraicept-tradition itself, and, though not unique to the present argument, is indeed a serious impediment, although it is frequently bypassed by scholars of Irish literature.
Vivien Law proposes a fourfold division of the stages in the history of linguistic thought in Europe during the Middle Ages (2003: 112-15):
1) The early Middle Ages (500-800); defined by the endeavour to make descriptive grammars of Latin available and understandable to non-native speakers in Western Europe.
2) The central Middle Ages (800-1100); the period from the Carolingian Renaissance to the twelfth-century Renaissance; the rediscovery of Priscian’s Instt. gramm. together with Aristotle’s Categories and De interpretatione.
3) The later Middle Ages (1100-1350); development of Scholasticism and influence from Aristotelian writing on linguistic thought.
4) The end of the Middle Ages (1350-1500); heightened awareness of the vernaculars and attempts to present Latin grammar through the medium of the vernaculars. Some experiments with vernacular grammars.
32
It is difficult (and probably futile) to attempt to fit the relevant texts into the stages proposed by Law. The kernel of the Auraicept na nÉces would belong to the first stage and The Third Grammatical Treatise to the third.36 Instead of undermining her system this emphasises the singular character of these texts within the long term development of Western European linguistic thought until the end of the Middle Ages.
It should be said here that the Instt. gramm. may have been unknown at the time of the initial composition of the Auraicept na nÉces. This is not quite the stumbling block it might seem at first glance, for two main reasons: The date of composition of the Auraicept is uncertain (see discussion in the following paragraph). Therefore its role in relation to the Carolingian Renaissance is not clear. 37 In this period Priscian was rediscovered, as rehearsed above. In addition to this the doctrines of Priscian provided posterity with an imposing collection of grammatical information which comprised the works of his predecessors. The definitions of Donatus’ Ars maior, for instance, do not explain the argument laid out by the author of the Auraicept, but Priscian provided definitions which do. Both the Auraicept and the ThGT mention Priscian in several instances and they make conscious use of him, if not always conscientious.
The principal issue posed by chronology has at this point been anticipated. It is caused by the complexity of the Irish material, concerning its textual history (see 1.5.), and the difficulties that arise in the attempt at delimiting it. Choosing a particular chronological layer as the basis of study (as in Acken 2013)38 is at this stage a questionable approach, due to the uncertainty regarding the make-up of the text at any given time. There are two solutions to this problem: One is to let chronology prevail and accept doubt as to the actual contents of the
36 The actual manuscript witnesses would, for both texts, belong to the third and fourth stage. It is interesting to note that these manuscripts confirm the interest in vernacular languages towards the end of the Middle Ages.
37 It has traditionally been dated to the 7th century (1.5.) and thus to the period preceding the Carolingian Renaissance. In this connection it should be said that the latter would have been a probable period as far as cultural history is concerned.
38 The validity of a statement as the following, intriguing though it is, must therefore be questioned:
“What the Auraicept received from Latin tradition it absorbed and returned with an enormous profit;
its systems of interpretation finding their way into the Latin commentaries of the Carolingian Renaissance.” (Acken 2008: 159-60). Poppe’s view, namely that the Auraicept reflects a tradition of Hiberno-Latin learning (2002: 299), is more considerate of the limited evidence at our disposal and of the chronological difficulties pertaining to it.