Etymology and Grammatical Discourse in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages

296 Pages·1989·32.88 MB·English

by  Mark E. Amsler

ETYMOLOGY AND GRAMMATICAL DISCOURSE
AMSTERDAM STUDIES IN THE THEORY AND
HISTORY OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE
General Editor
E. F. KONRAD KOERNER
(University of Ottawa)
Series III - STUDIES IN THE HISTORY OF THE LANGUAGE SCIENCES
Advisory Editorial Board
Ranko Bugarski (Belgrade); Jean-Claude Chevalier (Paris)
H.H. Christmann (Tübingen); Boyd H. Davis (Charlotte, N.C.)
Rudolf Engler (Bern); Hans-Josef Niederehe (Trier)
R.H. Robins (London); Rosane Rocher (Philadelphia)
Vivian Salmon (Oxford); Aldo Scaglione (New York)
Volume 44
Mark Amsler
Etymology and Grammatical Discourse
in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages
ETYMOLOGY AND GRAMMATICAL
DISCOURSE IN LATE ANTIQUITY
AND THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES
MARK AMSLER
University of Delaware
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY
AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA
1989
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
8
National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1984.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Etymology and grammatical discourse in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages / Mark Amsler.
p. cm. -- (Amsterdam studies in the theory and history of linguistic science. Series III, Studies in
the history of the language sciences, ISSN 0304-0720; v. 44)
Includes index.
Bibliography: p.
1. Classical languages --Etymology. 2. Classical languages --Grammar. 3. Classical philology --History --To
1500. 4. Linguistics --History --To 1500.
PA191 .A47 1989
480/.09/02--19 88007616
ISBN 978 90 272 4527 4 (hB; alk. paper)
© 1989 – John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means,
without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Company • P.O. Box 36224 • 1020 me Amsterdam • The Netherlands
John Benjamins North America • P.O. Box 27519 • Philadelphia, PA 19118-0519 • USA
For Ben Amsler and Florence Small Amsler

Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Abbreviations xi
Prelude 1
1. Etymology and Discourse in Late Antiquity 15
1.1 Etymological Strategies of Intervention 19
1.2 Varro's Etymological Model 24
1.3 The Critique of 'Etymologia' from Plato to Augustine 31
2. Technical and Exegetical Grammar Before Isidore 57
2.1 Etymology and Technical Grammar from Donatus to Priscian 59
2.2 Sacred Onomastics and Christian Grammar 82
2.3 Augustine, Jerome, and Glossography 100
2.4 Grammatical Criticism: the Aeneid and the Bible 118
3. Isidore of Seville and the Etymological Encyclopedia 133
3.1 Definitions and Concepts of 'Etymologia' 136
3.2 The Grammatical Model 147
3.3 Origines verborum 158
3.4 Origines rerum 165
4. The Text of Early Medieval Grammar 173
4.1 Vocation and Grammar 177
4.2 An Interlude of Virgilius Maro Grammaticus 197
4.3 Technical Grammar, Encyclopedias, and Dialectic 207
Postlude 251
References 255
Index 277

Acknowledgments
There are people who make writing a book take longer than one thinks
it should and those who help get a book written faster than one fears it will
take. Bill Frawley, Daniel Callahan, Phil Goldstein, Jim Dean, Bruce Fin-
nie, Leo Lemay, students in the History of Linguistics graduate seminar,
Konrad Koerner, Jan Ziolkowski, and the anonymous reader for the series
in which this volume is appearing as its Vol. 44 are responsible for making
me see there was more to say when I thought I had said enough. In particu­
lar, the anonymous reader provided me with the sort of detailed review and
critique a writer dreams about and fears. Thanks to that person's scrupul­
ous review, the details, citations, and quotations in this book are more
accurate than I alone could make them. Professors Alan Brown, Walter
Scheps, and Christian Zacher read a much earlier draft of what are now
Chapters Two and Three and allowed me to bite off more than I could
chew. Errors and omissions are my own problems.
The diligent staff of the University of Delaware's Morris Library Inter-
library Loan Office (especially Nancy Froysland-Hoerl) made my work
easier and the library holdings substantially larger. Professors Bernhard
Bischoff, Bengt Löfstedt, Louis Holtz, and Martin Irvine provided me with
important materials at the eleventh hour. Erin Mackie and Brad Howard
did yeoman's and woman's service checking references and quotations.
Deborah Lyall and Suzanne Potts processed the words of several drafts.
The University of Delaware General Research Fund twice provided me
with leave time to read and write. The School of Criticism and Theory gave
me a fellowship during which time I read and argued about critical dis­
course, semiotics, and the historiography of language study in a wonderful
intellectual pressure cooker.
I thank those who have heard me out regarding the history of linguis­
tics, especially the participants in: the International Conference on
Medieval Grammar (Davis, Calif., 1976), the Colloquium on Classical and
X ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Medieval Semiotics (Toronto, 1982), the Lilly-Pennsylvania Medieval
Studies Colloquium (Philadelphia, 1982), and the Fourth International
Conference on the History of the Language Sciences (Trier, W. Germany,
1987). Part of Chapter One first appeared in Recherche SémiotiquelSemio-
tic Inquiry and is reprinted here by permission.
Finally, Ann Amsler, present at the beginning, the ending, and the
middling, thank you.
Newark, Delaware Mark Amsler
December 1987