Jonson’s English Grammars

Jonson’s English Grammar was printed posthumously in the 1640 Folio of his complete works. As the sole extant version of a project that was clearly unfinished it is intriguing, raising questions, for example, concerning Jonson’s authorial motivation and the critical response to the work in the seventeenth century. This chapter considers Jonson’s expressed purposes in writing the grammar of his native language and its scholarly reception within the context of the contemporary awareness of an emerging need for a grammar of vernacular English that would standardize use and establish its status alongside other European languages. It shows that despite Jonson’s negative assessment of his achievements and his acknowledging the difficulties of the task, Jonsonian English was regarded predominantly as a model for vernacular standards, Jonson as a prominent grammarian. His taking on this scholarly challenge made a major historical contribution to the production of an English vernacular grammar. It also illuminates our understanding of the early modern cultural preoccupations associated with this important venture.

Homo Curans

This chapter focuses on one of the fables collected and revised by the Roman grammarian Hyginus (d. AD 17) that proved to be particularly relevant among later poets and philosophers. The brief tale relates how Cura—a personification of “care,” “concern,” “anxiety,” or “trouble”—formed the first human being. Although many of the narrative's details may be found in other mythic anthropogonies from a variety of cultures and traditions, Hyginus's account is the only extant version that ascribes the creative role to an allegory of Care. The fable begins with creation ends with the designation of a name, with the determination of a species. The first phase concerns being, the second involves language. With this combination of ontology and semantics or nature and convention, we obtain not only an etiological explanation for one question (Why is the word for “human being” homo in Latin?) but also a philosophical anthropology that folds one question (What is mankind?) into another (What is mankind called?).

Fabliau intertextuality: Some connections between related comic narratives

In addition to borrowing from his own works, Gautier le Leu appears to be indebted to numerous other narratives for elements in his fabliaux. Le fol Vilain probably elaborates on some antecedent of La Sorisete des Estopes, and La Damoisele qui ne pooit oïr parler de foutre furnishes a conceit that reappears in Le sot Chevalier, Connebert, and Les deus Vilains. Although Gautier claims, in the opening lines of Connebert, to have written Le Prestre teint, the extant version of that fabliau is not by him, so his possible indebtness to Le Prestre et le Chevalier of Milles d’Amiens is speculative. Finally, the line of descent from the Alda of Guillaume de Blois through the Trubert of Douin to the anonymous L’Esquiriel connects not at all with Gautier, and only marginally with La Damoisele qui ne pooit oïr parler de foutre.

Pro Milone: Cicero’s Second Thoughts

Asconius believed he had access to two published editions of Cicero’s defence of Milo. The first purported to be a record of the speech as delivered at the trial, in which Cicero was not at his best. The second edition was regarded by Asconius as Cicero’s supreme achievement in oratory. This edition is that which we still have; the first has perished, and it has even been suggested that Asconius — and Quintilian — were duped by a forgery. Even so Asconius’ knowledge of Cicero’s line of defence in the trial cannot have depended on the text of this supposed verbatim record alone, but rather on an ample historiography on which he drew for the long and circumstantial argumentum to his Milonian commentary. (A forger, for that matter, who could impose on Asconius and Quintilian must also have been historically well informed about the case.) Any indication by Asconius, therefore, of a divergence between the original defence and the extant version is likely to rest on specific knowledge.

Dionysus and the Tyrrhenian Pirates

This study examines in detail the handling of an ancient story by three poets of widely differing dates and also considers what is known of lost versions from the surviving prose summaries. It does not speculate on origins or seek to reconstruct the historical connexions between lost and surviving versions, since neither activity can lead to certain results. Origins in religious cult were very much the concern of O. Crusius in an article entitled ‘Der homerische Dionysoshymnus und die Legende von der Verwandlung der Tyrsener’ (Philologus 48 [1889], 193-228), and this should be used as a warning example. His main purpose, however, was to establish the antiquity of the Homeric Hymn to Dionysus and in this he amply succeeded. Although it is impossible to date the hymn within a century or two, no one is likely to dispute that it is the oldest extant version of the story, and no more than that is assumed in this study. In the last part of his article (pp. 218-28) Crusius briefly examines the prose summaries and later poetic versions of the story, and here he makes a number of valuable observations, which I shall acknowledge or dispute wherever relevant. The justification for the present study is that it takes the examination of the material very much further and offers some original interpretations. Care will be taken throughout to be fully intelligible without obliging the reader to turn to the relevant texts, although it will be an advantage to have the texts of the Homeric hymn, Ovid and Nonnus at hand. References to Crusius’ article are made by means of his name and the page-number. The only other unusual abbreviation is ‘A.H.S.’ for the edition of the Homeric hymns edited by T. W. Allen, W. R. Halliday and E. E. Sikes (Oxford, 1936).

Fulfillment of the Christian Golden Age under Pope Julius II: Text of a Discourse of Giles of Viterbo, 1507

The discourse of Giles of Viterbo (1469–1532) on the Golden Age is here published for the first time. It is edited from what seems to be the only extant version, found in manuscript in the Biblioteca Pública e Arquivo Distrital of Évora, Portugal. The discourse was delivered by Giles in a somewhat different form in Saint Peter's basilica in Rome on Dec. 21, 1507, at the request of Pope Julius II and in his presence. The king of Portugal, Manuel I (1495–1521), had written to Julius from Abrantes under date of Sept. 25, 1507, to announce to him some great news. The king, recently informed of three important events regarding his interests in the Far East, now wanted to communicate his information to the pope: the Portuguese, under the leadership of Lourenço de Almeida (?-1508) had landed in Ceylon and obtained from the most powerful ruler there an agreement to pay an annual tribute to the Portuguese crown; on March 18, 1506, de Almeida won an important naval victory over the Zamorin of Calicut; and in the same year another Portuguese fleet discovered the island of Madagascar.