Medieval Latin - Online Dictionaries
halcombe
historical rather than literary interest.
But, when dabbling, naturally found the need of a dictionary.
Having searched high and low, no doubt in the wrong places, the only
reasonably comprehensive looking volume I found was 'Lexicon manuale
ad scriptores mediae et infimae latinitatis' by W.-H. Maigne d'Arnis,
on the Gallica site at
http://gallica.bnf.fr/scripts/ConsultationTout.exe?E=0&O=N027078 (PDF
link is http://gallica.bnf.fr/Ftpdsk/002/N0027078_PDF_1_1172.PDF ).
At 88MB, it's a question of broadband or patience. Searching isn't
helped by the fact that the Acrobat Find gizmo doesn't work
(presumably because the text was never digitised); DIY indices are de
rigueur. And the definitions are in Latin (though many come with a
Modern French crib at the end).
But it seemed to answer most of my (admittedly sparse) queries; and
seems to benefit from a complete online monopoly when it comes to
reasonably modern, reasonably complete medieval Latin online
dictionaries.
Is there anything else comparable available online? (Something a tad
less comprehensive and more manageable would be great, but....)
ekim
http://www.histopia.nl/onldict/lat.html
and you can download a free dictionary from this site
http://www.ifrance.com/freelang2/dictionary/index.html
"halcombe" <halc...@subdimension.com> wrote in message
news:d7fa3848.02030...@posting.google.com...
Edward Casey
http://www.orbilat.com/Latin/Medieval_Latin/Dag_Norberg/index.html
Also at:
http://digilander.iol.it/Marziale/Grex/nexus/cone.html
you will find the ten volumes of DuCange (also from Gallica) as well as:
Vademecum in opus Saxonis...
"Hoc est tomus II (auctore Franz Blatt) operis Gesta Danorum ut appellantur;
tomus II labori meo fuit fundamentum, sed necessitate coactus omnia errata
atque delicta in huius temporis scriptorio facta emendavi ut spero.
Notionibus modo et constructionibus servatis omnes pæne notas ad textum
nonnisi exempli gratia omisi ad unumquemque locum celeriter perspiciendum;
id quod in animo habebam. Angulatis uncis [ ] propria adde liberandum digna
annotavi et omni tempore cum RH signavi. Facultates mechanicae omnes
magistros linguae latinae ex amatoribus in exploratores huius artis
fecerunt; ob eam causam supplementa huius opusculi sequentur et nos
complures et varios auctores cognoscere et legere sperabimus." (R.
Hemmingsen)
Eduardus
Chris Phillips
> But it seemed to answer most of my (admittedly sparse) queries; and
> seems to benefit from a complete online monopoly when it comes to
> reasonably modern, reasonably complete medieval Latin online
> dictionaries.
>
> Is there anything else comparable available online? (Something a tad
> less comprehensive and more manageable would be great, but....)
There are certainly quite a few Latin dictionaries online, but I agree
comparatively little geared towards the medieval period rather than the
classical.
I have found this useful in the past:
http://kufacts.cc.ukans.edu/ftp/pub/history/latin_language/latwords.html
"Latin Word List", compiled by Lynn H. Nelson of the University of Kansas
Chris Phillips
Jonathan Jarrett
halcombe <halc...@subdimension.com> wrote:
>I can't pretend to have done more than dabbled in medieval texts, for
>historical rather than literary interest.
>
>But, when dabbling, naturally found the need of a dictionary.
<snip>
>Is there anything else comparable available online? (Something a tad
>less comprehensive and more manageable would be great, but....)
There's a rather nice one located at
<http://lysy2.archives.nd.edu/cgi-bin/words>. The beauty of this one is
that it does declensions and conjugations for you, so you can feed it
anything and it will, if the word's in there, come back with the root,
tense and person, or case. It's also free to download as a small program
(the DOS version I have comes to just over 7Mb though I imagine Windows
versions will be chunkier) so you don't even need to be dialled up more
than once. It has a certain degree of intelligence and will try some
modifications of word forms (for medieval spellings and so on) if it can't
find the word you put in (and you have this option switched on). This
does, as the author warns, mean that it's possible it will come up with
words that never actually existed but even those are often useful for
hints as to what the person who thought of the word you're looking at may
have had in mind.
It's not huge, and hasn't a huge wealth of medieval vocabulary in
it (though it has a lot more than your stock school dictionary) but if you
use it with a certain amount of lateral thinking for spelling variation
and so on it's much better than anything I've used that wasn't
multi-volume except Niermeyer (which I fear you just have to buy). On the
other hand, thanks to the kind person who posted a link to an online Du
Cange in an earlier reply, you may no longer need this information. Yours,
Jon Jarrett
--
Jonathan Jarrett Cambridge/London
jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk early medieval history
01223 514989 tea & spacerock
----------------------------------------------------------
Laura Lee Bayne-Slimp
I have a quick question. Has anyone come accross a reliable list or
shareware program of Medieval Latin abbreviations? I'm reading some
renaissance reprints of M-L commentaries on Ovid and am having trouble
deciphering the shorthand at times. I can't seem to get my mitts on a
good copy of the only comprehensive list of M-L paleography and
abbreviations (long story, but the academic library where I live won't
let guest borrowers recall books). Anything you can throw my way
would be very helpful as most of the sites I've seen are mostly
concerned with inscriptions. Thanks.
Laura Bayne-Slimp
Doctoral Candidate
Program in Comparative Literature
UT Austin
Brian M. Scott
Bayne-Slimp) wrote:
>Hi All,
>I have a quick question. Has anyone come accross a reliable list or
>shareware program of Medieval Latin abbreviations? I'm reading some
>renaissance reprints of M-L commentaries on Ovid and am having trouble
>deciphering the shorthand at times. I can't seem to get my mitts on a
>good copy of the only comprehensive list of M-L paleography and
>abbreviations (long story, but the academic library where I live won't
>let guest borrowers recall books). Anything you can throw my way
>would be very helpful as most of the sites I've seen are mostly
>concerned with inscriptions. Thanks.
Can you get your hands on C.T. Martin, _The Record Interpreter_? It
has a fairly extensive list of abbreviations.
Brian
Daniel Farnworth
Cappelli, A., ed., _Dizionario di Abbreviature Latine ed Italiane_, 2nd ed.,
editore Ulrico Hoepli, Milan, ca. 1973,
which has literally hundreds of abbreviations, contractions, ligatures and
so forth. Italian and Latin but one can manage. Not online but beautifully
bound!
Available at fine stores -- well -- practically nowhere. Mine came from
eBay.
DLF
Brian M. Scott <b.s...@csuohio.edu> wrote in message
news:3ca69471....@enews.newsguy.com...
Brian M. Scott
<kay...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>I present the following, in the faint hope it might be useful:
>Cappelli, A., ed., _Dizionario di Abbreviature Latine ed Italiane_, 2nd ed.,
>editore Ulrico Hoepli, Milan, ca. 1973,
>which has literally hundreds of abbreviations, contractions, ligatures and
>so forth. Italian and Latin but one can manage. Not online but beautifully
>bound!
That's the one I was trying to remember. Martin's selection, though
running to over 150 pages, is significantly less comprehensive, I'm
told.
[...]
Brian
Laura Lee Bayne-Slimp
I've managed to borrow an antique (1920s) edition of Capelli from SMU,
but had to return it when it was recalled. I've looked at the _Record
Interpreter_ (and photocopied quite a bit of it), but am concerned
about its reliability as what I'm looking at is French (Bersuire's
allegorical commentary), so I'm worried that the English shorthand
would be idiosyncratic. I know that, like monastic scripts,
abbreviations would vary depending on the conventions of the various
local scriptoria. I can puzzle through most of them with the
references I've managed to find, but have trouble when squiggles are
involved. Capelli is ideal because of its historical presentation of
the scripts and abbreviations. Any other copies being sold
(resonably)? Thanks to all for the advice (those who posted on list
and replied off list). Cheers. Laura
Warren B. Hapke
: Hi Brian and Daniel,
: but had to return it when it was recalled. I've looked at the _Record
: Interpreter_ (and photocopied quite a bit of it), but am concerned
If I'm reading a somewhat cryptic bibliographic note correctly, Cappelli's
work was last revised by him in 1929, and later editions are basically
reprints, not revisions. If that's the case, your "antique" edition
is probably fine.
: about its reliability as what I'm looking at is French (Bersuire's
: allegorical commentary), so I'm worried that the English shorthand
: would be idiosyncratic. I know that, like monastic scripts,
: abbreviations would vary depending on the conventions of the various
: local scriptoria. I can puzzle through most of them with the
: references I've managed to find, but have trouble when squiggles are
: involved. Capelli is ideal because of its historical presentation of
: the scripts and abbreviations. Any other copies being sold
: (resonably)? Thanks to all for the advice (those who posted on list
: and replied off list). Cheers. Laura
The Latin abbreviation system, from what I know, tended to be the
most elaborate, and the conventions for works in vernacular languages
tended to be less elaborate (and less difficult for us). I found
Cappelli reasonably useful for manuscripts created outside Italy
(which was the focus of much of his research).
If you go to http://www.abebooks.com/ and type in "Adriano Cappelli"
for the author search, you will find four listings. The only one
for sale in the US (which would minimize shipping costs) is listed
for $45.00; you can decide if that's reasonably or not.
Stephen Reimer of the University of Alberta has an excellent
set of pages on manuscript studies at
http://www.ualberta.ca/~sreimer/ms-course.htm
However, he doesn't have any abbreviations cataloged. He mentions that
someone created Macintosh software that reproduces the catalog of
abbreviations found in Cappelli, but the link didn't work for me.
Warren B. Hapke
wbh...@prairienet.org
Warren B. Hapke
: I have a quick question. Has anyone come accross a reliable list or
: shareware program of Medieval Latin abbreviations? I'm reading some
There is a Macintosh program called "Abbreviationes" that provides
searchable information on medieval Latin abbreviations. According
to its description, it has the full catalog of abbreviations from
Cappelli, as well as those from other sources. The description on
the web site also indicates that the program will run on Windows
computers with a Macintosh emulator.
The web page describing the software is at
http://www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/philosophy/projects/abbrev.htm
Cost is 99 Euros.
Warren B. Hapke
wbh...@prairienet.org