The ''Hermeneumata'' (; also known as the ''Hermeneumata Pseudodositheana'' or ''Hermeneumata pseudo-Dositheana'') are anonymous instructional manuals written in the third century CE to teach the

Greek language Greek (, ; , ) is an Indo-European languages, Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic languages, Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece, Cyprus, Italy (in Calabria and Salento), south ...

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

-speaking people in the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...

, and to teach Latin to Greek-speakers. The word ''Hermeneumata'' means "translations" or "interpretations".

History

The ''Hermeneumata'' were composed as a Greek-Latin schoolbook in late antiquity, probably around the third century CE. The work was originally composed to help Greeks learn Latin, but in the medieval West, it came to be widely used as a source for Latin-literate authors to learn about Greek. In the twentieth century, the name of the ''Hermeneumata'' inspired scholars to give the name '' Hermeneutic style'' to a style of Latin writing found in late Antiquity and the early Medieval West which was characterised by extensive use of Greek loan-words. The ''Hermeneumata'' survive in nine manuscripts, mostly from the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, hristine Franzen 'Introduction', in ''Ashgate Critical Essays on Early English Lexicographers Volume 1: Old English'', ed. by Christine Franzen (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), xv-lxxiii (p. xx). one of which attributes the work to

Dositheus Magister Dositheus Magister () was a Greece, Greek grammarian who flourished in Rome in the 4th century AD. Life He was the author of a Greek language, Greek translation of a Latin grammar, intended to assist the Greek-speaking inhabitants of the empire in ...

. For this reason, they are often known as the ''Hermeneumata Pseudodositheana'', although there is not sufficient evidence to attribute them to Dositheus. One of the manuscripts is the Anglo-Saxon Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale MS 1828-30.

Contents vary dramatically from one manuscript to another, but at its fullest extent the text comprises: # An alphabetic glossary including, at its fullest, over 3000 entries. # A subject glossary. This thematic glossary contains about 30,000 words, including the names of gods,

constellations A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The first constellations were likely defin ...

, temples, holidays, clothing, colors, birds, and trees, as well as military, judicial and financial terms. It does not include vocabulary relating to death or illness. Words are sometimes presented alongside two or three different translated equivalents. # Conversation guides. These dialogues (known as the "colloquia") follow the dictionary, and use juvenile language to tell the story of a day in the life of a pupil and his master. There are eight sections: Waking up, school, work, social life, lunch, homework, bathing, dinner, and going to bed. # Texts for reading The ''Hermeneumata'' was later adapted, and further Greek vocabulary being added from the ''

Liber glossarum The ''Liber glossarum'' (also called the ''Glossarium Ansileubi'') is an enormous compendium of knowledge used for later compilations during the Middle Ages, and a general reference work used by contemporary scholars. It is the first Latin encyclo ...

''. The

pedagogy Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political, and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken ...

of the dialogues is based on the immediate comprehension of extremely simple phrases, most often limited to a subject,

verb A verb is a word that generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual description of English, the basic f ...

and

complement Complement may refer to: The arts * Complement (music), an interval that, when added to another, spans an octave ** Aggregate complementation, the separation of pitch-class collections into complementary sets * Complementary color, in the visu ...

. There are no grammatical explanations: Conjugations are simply enumerated by way of disconnected sentences which present a variation on a grammatical theme (e.g. pronoun substitution, verb tense).

References

Bibliography

* * * {{cite journal , last = Cammisuli , first = Salvatore , url = https://www.academia.edu/49860123/La_sezione_sui_colori_nel_glossario_degli_Hermeneumata_Celtis_Edizione_critica_e_commento_Wiener_Studien_134_2021_199_221 , title = La sezione sui colori nel glossario degli Hermeneumata Celtis. Edizione critica e commento , journal = Wiener Studien , volume = 134 , pages = 199-221 , year = 2021 , doi = 10.1553/wst134s199 Mordeglia Caterina, Le favole dello pseudo-Dositeo (ms. Paris, BnF, lat. 6503), in Animali sui banchi di scuola (ed. critica), Firenze, SISMEL, Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2017.

External links

The text of the Hermeneumata
vi

Latin textbooks Ancient Greek-language education Language textbooks Latin words and phrases Glossaries Bilingual books 3rd-century books in Latin Greek literature (post-classical) Education in classical antiquity