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

praecepta potius seruetis”; 308 “nos tamen haec non dicimus monasteria, sed animarum
perditionem et ecclesiae subuersionem”; 309 “mihi credite, non potest toto corde habitare cum
Domino qui mulierum saepe accessibus copulatur”. 310 In addition to these, the Common
Rule in particular makes frequent use of shorter personalised phrases of the type: ut (supra)
diximus and quae supra perstrinximus.
It is often the more subtle reflections of the spoken language that give the monastic
rules an overall sense of colloquialism. Features such as redundancy of pronouns, referred to
by Palmer (1954: 75) as “ the product of a speaker‟s anxiety to hammer his point home”: “illi
perierunt manna manducando […] illi manna manducando mortui sunt et isti scripturas
legendo et audiendo spirituali fame quotidie moriuntur”; 311 “neque enim aliquid imperasse
cuique licebit quod ipse non fecerit”; 312 “si quid deest in mensa, is qui praeest signo dato uel
nutibus silenter petat et indicet ministranti quid inferri uel quid auferri sit a mensa
necesse”; 313 impersonal phrases of the type: “in utrisque temporibus refectio mensae tribus
erit pulmentis, olerum scilicet et leguminum et, si quid tertium fuerit, id est, pomorum”; 314
“quod si in malo perseverans perdurauit et propria uoluntate poenitentiam agree noluit et
saepe ac saepe contumax et murmurator patule contra seniorem uel fratres in facie perstiterit
[…] in collationem deductus exuatur monasterii uestibus”; 315 “nec quisquam e monachis
308 Rule of Isidore 24.3.
309 Common Rule 1.
310 Common Rule 15.
311 Common Rule 5.
312 Rule of Isidore 2.2.
313 Rule of Fructuosus 5.
314 Rule of Isidore 9.9.
315 Common Rule 14.
129