The Monastic Rules of Visigothic Iberia - eTheses Repository ...

3.6 Visigothic Oral Culture
Although textual culture appears to have played such an important role in Visigothic
society, the monastic rules suggest the presence of a culture, as elsewhere in Europe at this
time (Richter 1994), that also made use of an oral tradition on a wider scale. In the first
instance, it is clear that the communities described in the monastic rules are not silent
communities as might be found in other institutions, such as the later medieval Cluny (Bruce
2007): despite a few references to specified times of silence, Visigothic monastic society
seems to have been based on the idea of group oral activity and interaction (below). Silence,
where recommended, is seemingly pragmatic in nature. For example: “ante somnum […]
cum omni cautela et silentio requiescendum est”; 193 “post deinde adeuntes cubilia summo
cum silentio et habitu tacito gressuque quieto”; 194 “audiant patrem studio summo et
silentio”; 195 “nemo comedens loquatur”. 196
The monastic rules are careful to chastise the oral activity of monks during manual
work, implying that this took place. This often includes berating the fabulae that monks were
wont to tell. For example: “Cum operantur, non inter se fabulas uel cachinnos conserant”; 197
“Similiter aut decanus alius, aut quisquam e fratribus bene probatus assistat in secessu
communi, quousque quieti se tradant cuncti; ne aut fabulas inter se uentilent uanas, aut
ridiculis studeant, aut quodlibet noxiale uitium consuescant”. 198 Isidore, meanwhile, is quick
to belittle the „dirty love songs‟ (amatoria turpia) of secular workers: “Si enim saeculares
193 Rule of Isidore 6.
194 Rule of Fructuosus 2.
195 Rule of Isidore 7.
196 Rule of Fructuosus 5.
197 Rule of Fructuosus 4.
198 Rule of Fructuosus 2.
80