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

Chapter Five: Issues of Language in the Monastic Rules
“θαὶ ἐθεῖ δεμηνῦηαη παξὰ ηῆο καθαξίαο Μειάλεο ηῆο Ῥσκαίαο. Πάιηλ ηνῦ δηαβόινπ
ζθιεξύλαληνο αὐηνῦ ηήλ θαξδίαλ, θαζάπεξ ηνῦ θαξαῶ, ὡο λές θαὶ ζσξηγῶληη ηὴλ ἡιηθίαλ,
γέγνλε πάιηλ ἐλδπαζκνο, θαὶ ἐδπζςύρεζε κεδελὶ κεδὲλ εἰξεθώο. θὰθεῖζη πάιηλ ἐμαιιάζζσλ
5.1 Introduction
ηνῖο ἱκαηίνηο, θαὶ ἐλ ηῳ δηαιέθηῳ θαξνύκελνο ὑπὸ ηῆο θελνδνμίαο” 428
The principle aim of these final two chapters is to investigate aspects of the language
of the monastic rules, both meta-linguistic and linguistic, and place them in the wider context
of arguments concerning language use and language change in early medieval Europe at the
time. The reason why the monastic rules are important for these issues is because the period
in which they were written was a time of important linguistic change, considered often to be a
transitional stage between the divergence of spoken Latin from written Latin and the
emergence of Romance. It is certainly true that within a couple of centuries from the
composition of the monastic rules, the first evidence for a written language recognised today
as no longer being Latin would appear: the late eighth-century Indovinello Veronese from
Italy, the Strasbourg Oaths of 842 and the glosses of San Millán de la Cogolla from 977
(Dionisotti & Grayson 1949: 1-3; Olarte Ruiz 1977; Ayres-Bennett 1995: 16-30).
5.2 Language Consciousness in the Ancient World
Palladius, in the quotation that starts this chapter, reveals that upon meeting the
noblewoman Melania in Jerusalem, the young Evagrius Ponticus was so enflamed by his
sexual desires, the very reason for which he fled Constantinople originally, that he changed
428 Palladius Lausiac History 38.8.
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