The writings of Augustine pose an interesting problem for the philosopher. Very soon after one begins reading them, there appears the old and apparently non-philosophical admonition: ‘Unless you believe, you will not understand.’ Is the autonomy of philosophy being threatened by this demand? Is reason being told that it must accept certain statements as true on authority other than its own? And if so, why?

The editor of the Translatio Vetus, Joanna Judycka, remarks of the anonymous translator that he knew his métier. Indeed, the translation, apart from some minor omissions, is extremely competent. Some of its various features mentioned by Dr. Judycka are, in fact, common to many medieval translations from the Greek into Latin; for example, the confusion of the present and future, the rendering of ἄν with the optative by utique with the future indicative, and the handling of the all-pervasive articular infinitive (so common and important in scientific prose). Nor are the discrepancies in number and degree characteristic of any one author or school. Only a detailed analysis of the translator's Sprachgebrauch, such as L. Minio-Paluello contemplated before his death, can reveal the identity of the translator.

The French royal genealogy compiled by Giles of Paris (1160? – before 1224) has received little scholarly attention, but it is an important source for the historical views of Capetian circles at the beginning of the thirteenth century. The work is an elaborate family tree which traces the royal succession from the legendary origins of the Franks to the contemporary heir to the throne, the future Louis VIII, who is identified on the chart as Ludouicus puer. Giles begins with a narrative of the history of Sicambria and of the entry of the Franks into Gaul which he illustrates with a table of the first Merovingians. The family tree then continues, indicating the length of each king's reign and giving historical notes on some rulers. The genealogy is traced in detail from Clovis through the sons of Louis the Pious, but afterward there appear only kings, and rarely their queens, except for the family of Louis VI, whose sons and eldest grandsons are shown. In addition, Giles traces the supposed Merovingian descent of the Carolingians, the descent of the Capetians from Robert the Brave, and the lines of many of the descendants of William the Conqueror. Giles's selection, presentation, and reworking of materials from his sources reveal a view which in some respects is original and in others, while derivative, is an unusually clear sketch of the dynastic schematization of the national history. The genealogy is an outline history of France which, although written at the beginning of a period of great historiographical activity and itself unlike other works of the time, has remained unedited and has never been seriously studied.

From the beginning of the Divine Comedy — ‘where the sun is silent’ — to the final vision of light, the poem is a carefully ordered hierarchy of light and shadows. We are not only asked to see clearly but we are asked to see qualitatively, to distinguish degrees of light and kinds of vision. It is in the last canto of the Paradiso that the degree of light is most intense and that our attention is called to a unique kind of seeing. With extraordinary insistence, Dante repeats some form of the verb vedere (to see) or a derivative there-of every few lines. The transition from time to eternity and from the finite to the infinite makes all the more sophisticated resources of language inadequate, and one must revert to a childlike form of emphasis, mere repetitions. This simplest of rhetorical devices is, by some miracle of art, adequate for the expression of the most unimaginable of possible experiences. In every line we feel something of Dante's joy in the possession of a ‘novella vista’ and his rapture in the divine vision, an effect conveyed by the very struggle to express the inexpressible. The struggles of course are those of Dante the pilgrim; Dante the poet is in perfect control of his artistic resources, and it is through the masterly rendering of inadequacy that the whole presentation becomes — paradoxically — adequate.

In the Old English poem Guthlac A, after Guthlac has taken possession of the beorg, the poet catalogues the temptations the saint has overcome:

Oft ϸurh reorde abead
ϸam ϸe ϸrowera ϸeawas lufedon
Godes ærendu ϸa him gæst onwrah
lifes snyttru, ϸæt he his lichoman
wynna forwyrnde 7 woruldblissa,
seftra setla 7 symbeldaga,
swylce eac idelra eagena wynna,
gierelan gielplices: him waes Godes egsa
mara in gemyndum ϸonne he menniscum
ϸrymme æfter ϸonce ϸegan wolde. (160b-169)

This paper presents the results of my research into the scriptural text which St. John Chrysostom used as the basis of his Homilies on Acts. These results give a good indication of the text-type of Acts known to Chrysostom and, as a corollary, provide evidence bearing on the textual tradition of the Homilies themselves.

Among the persistent problems of Piers Plowman criticism, that of defining the meaning of the poem's title figure still holds a prominent place. The problem is largely one of finding or forging a unity out of the bewildering multiplicity of Piers's roles in the poem. Skeat, the poem's first modern editor, proposed three discrete meanings for Piers in three parts of the poem: in his first appearance (B 5–7) he is ‘the type of the ideal honest man’; in the second (B 15–18), Christ; in the third (B 19–20), Peter and his worthy successors in the papal office. Later critics, searching for a means of unifying these three, have fallen roughly into three traditions, each with its own approach to the ‘problem of Piers.’

Hadrian I's synodica of 785 (JE 2448), addressed to the Byzantine Emperors Irene and her son Constantine VI, which encouraged the rulers in their planned restoration of image-worship, is one of the most important official Latin documents of the eighth century. In the East it became in 787 the basis of the discussions at the Seventh Ecumenical Council (II Nicaea), which restored the worship of images in Byzantium. In the West, the Franks and Charlemagne based their rejection of image worship and of II Nicaea on certain sections of the synodica which were critically discussed in the Frankish Capitulare adversus synodum of c. 788/9, as well as in Hadrian I's refutation of this lost capitulary, whose text is extensively cited in the chapter headings of the so-called Hadrianum (JE 2483) of c. 791. Greek and Latin testimonia invoked in JE 2448 in favor of image worship are rebuked in Charlemagne's Libri Carolini, the official Frankish protest against II Nicaea. Finally, numerous merous fragments of the synodica's text, especially from its catena of patristic testimonia, were inserted into the Libellus synodalis of the Paris Synod of 825.

If a definitive history of the controversy during the final decades of the thirteenth century regarding the real distinction between essence and existence still remains to be written, an exposition of the views expressed by Godfrey of Fontaines on this point may provide one more step in this direction. It seems probable that Godfrey had studied in Paris during Thomas' final years there (1269-1272) and that he may have studied under Henry of Ghent as well as under Siger of Brabant. He lectured as Master of theology at Paris for some thirteen years (1285-1297), and again around 1303-1304, when he composed his fifteenth Quodlibetal Question. Giles of Rome had also studied at Paris under Thomas (1269-1272) and served there as Bachelor in theology (1276-1277), and later as Master in theology (1285-1291). Henry of Ghent had taught at Paris around 1271 (apparently on the faculty of Arts) and later, beginning in 1276, on the faculty of Theology. Between 1276 and 1292 he delivered the courses which resulted in his Summa and in his Quaestiones Quodlibetales. Because Godfrey was familiar with the work of Thomas Aquinas (in Q[uodlibet] 2 q.3 one finds an almost verbatim reproduction of a section of Thomas' De aeternitate mundi), because he witnessed the famed debate on the real distinction between Henry of Ghent and Giles of Rome, and because his work was well known to Duns Scotus, clarification of his own position should be of historical interest. In addition, it is to be hoped that such a study will show that his views are distinctive enough to merit investigation for their own sake.

In 1256 Guy de l'Aumône became the first Cistercian master of theology at the University of Paris. Very little is thought to survive of his magisterial activities. Only his Summa … de diversis questionibus theologie has been seen as a series of ordinary disputed questions. This, however, has been enough to lead some historians to attribute certain original views to Guy. Above all, Guy is supposed to have had a distinctive belief in the precepts of the Old and New Testaments as absolute, which resulted in a desire to produce work based purely on Scripture. Unfortunately this interpretation rests on mistaken assumptions about the nature of the Summa, in particular a willingness to accept its structure at face value. In fact this structure was imposed on several distinct blocks of material which reflect different types of magisterial activity. A greater range of Guy's work is thus available to the historian than hitherto imagined. This makes possible a more balanced assessment of what Guy thought and the kind of work he was engaged in. It also reveals more about the milieu in which he worked, especially the use to which the Halesian Summa was put and attitudes towards different kinds of university exercise.

The Rare Book Room of the University of Pennsylvania Libraries has recently acquired an early fourteenth-century manuscript (Lat. 95) of a hitherto unknown Apparatus on the Clementines. The author is Stephanus Hugoneti (from southern France, possibly Narbonne), whose work as a canonist has gone unknown, and whose ultimate though brief emergence from historical obscurity as bishop of Bologna has hardly been noticed.

It is a commonplace that Aristophanes' heroes stage successful revolts against whatever they perceive prevents them from attaining their goals or from fulfilling their potential. Nothing so restrictive as political obstacles, or bodily restraints, or even divine directives remains immune, so it seems, from a triumphant revolt launched so humorously and so uniquely by such splendid comic creations as Dikaiopolis, Pisthetairos, and Lysistrata, to name three of the most famous Aristophanic heroes. In the process, political and military heroes who revere their presumed control and power are mastered; there fall those natural functions which seem to exercise periodic dominion over varied phases of our lives; and even the Olympian gods are compelled to succumb to the imposing demands of comic vision, fantasy, and ultimate heroic triumph.

Nowadays we define Giants as persons suffering from scientifically defined physiological disorders. Since Western culture has a short memory for obsolete scientific discourse, however, the simplicity of our contemporary understanding of gigantism makes it difficult for us to understand previous attitudes toward Giants, especially as expressed in literature. As Donald Frame has remarked, ‘When most Western readers think of giants in literature, they think of Rabelais and Swift; when they think of Rabelais and Swift, they think of giants.’ However, the actual importance of Rabelais and Swift would be seriously misrepresented were we to imagine them as exponents of the traditional Western attitude toward Giants and gigantism. What is more, Rabelais, who is the source of most early modern speculation about Giants, is a particularly problematic case. His combination of agile parodic wit and extreme philosophical and theological literacy is only beginning to be satisfactorily understood. Thus his treatment of gigantological themes has until now been almost completely misrepresented because of an insufficient understanding of the cultural significance of gigantism before his time. In fact, he is at least two removes from a coherent tradition of gigantological discourse running from the Old Testament through Judaic and patristic commentary and historiography, straight into the era of humanism. While the scope of this article will not permit an intensive analysis of Rabelais' own gigantology, an analysis of the two traditions upon which he depended will implicitly demonstrate the inadequacy of the conventional wisdom which sees Pantagruel and Gargantua as a direct outgrowth of medieval French folklore, the Grandes chronicques, and the literary romances of Pulci and Folengo.

Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41 contains the B-text of the Old English Bede, and a sizeable body of marginalia that includes a substantial amount of liturgy. The main text is in a large format but remains incomplete in some of its artwork; it was copied in two parts by two different scribes in the early eleventh century and supplied with various decorated initials, not all of them finished. The book was given by Bishop Leofric to Exeter between 1050 and 1072. It is not immediately apparent whether the liturgical addenda were copied there or done earlier at some other center, but the nature of the marginalia suggests that the additions were made, as was perhaps the book itself, in a provincial scriptorium of no great size. The use of the margins of the text indicates a shortage of available vellum, thus suggesting that the original text of the Old English Bede may have been made for a smaller center with a minimal library, or possibly for an individual.

Though the Green Knight describes his challenge before Arthur's court as ‘a Crystemas gomen’ (283), and though some scholars have responded to this and other references in the poem and treated it as an entertainment or as essentially about games, most modern studies of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight concentrate on the difficult questions of moral behaviour which the poem raises. Though it is certainly full of violent movement and physical action, though it sets forth a world of arresting concrete specificity and colourful variety, the poem's most crucial moment (if it can be said to have one) occurs in the early morning quiet of the hero's bed-chamber when Gawain accepts the green girdle and agrees to ‘lelly layne’ (1863) it from Bertilak. It is a point at which the hero makes a clear moral decision to drop his skilful verbal defence against the Lady's propositions and to allow himself to be acted upon: ‘he Jmlged with hir ‘repe …] ooled hir to speke … he granted … hym gafe with a goud wylle …] oe leude hym acordez’ (1859-63). Most scholars agree with Gawain's own subsequent judgment that his moral behaviour was, to a greater or lesser degree, ‘fawty and falce’ (2382); but how his moral faultiness is to be measured and assessed, and how in conceptual terms it is to be analysed and described, are more difficult questions.

A common view of medieval thought focuses on the separation of speculative thought from biblical exegesis which occurs with the rise of the universities. Whereas in the patristic era and the early Middle Ages theology and exegesis formed a unity, the introduction of Aristotle and the techniques of quaestio and disputatio detached theology from the study of scriptural texts. The results were twofold: theology attained a new autonomy and a distinctive form in the summa, and exegesis — free of the demands of theological speculation — could pursue a more literal and historical style of interpretation. Whatever the historical accuracy of this view, it has certainly shaped modern scholarship on medieval thought. Theologians and philosophers have focused on summae and disputed questions to such an extent that the Leonine edition of Thomas Aquinas has yet to publish his major Commentary on the Gospel of John. Since Thomas is considered first of all a theologian, not an exegete, his biblical commentaries have been accorded less interest and attention than his systematic works. In contrast, students of medieval exegesis may so emphasize literal and historical interpretation that they exclude or dismiss commentaries that are speculative or mystical. Beryl Smalley's The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages represents this trend, as it devotes little attention to Bernard of Clairvaux but concentrates on commentators like Guerric of St. Quentin, who gave ‘his attention to the literal sense first and foremost.’

In the quest for the source of Chaucer's Parson's Tale investigators have discovered a number of texts that contain elements identical or similar to parts of Chaucer's treatise, though it is now generally conceded that none of the works thus far examined is in any sense a direct source of Chaucer's ‘Tale.' Among the larger units of the treatise Chaucer translated, none have so successfully eluded attempts to discover derivation as the remedia against the vices, contained in the tractate on the seven deadly sins (X[I]387-957). Earlier researchers have found in the postulated sources almost nothing that bears a close resemblance to the materials and their ordering in these sections. But these remedia contain, for the most part, doctrine that was established in the ethical tradition during the twelfth century and that proliferated widely during succeeding centuries: the ultimate source of this doctrine is the well-known Moralium dogma philosophorum, a treatise whose influence on ethical thinking during the late Middle Ages, particularly in the matter of the virtues and their ramifications, is enormous.

This paper concerns three small collections of decretals of Innocent III, two of which have been named and briefly described in print by Professor Stephan Kuttner, who has kindly brought the third to my notice.

Two ideas, the Divine and the Other-World, seem to have dominated much of the life of the ancient Greeks and Romans and to have claimed their best energies. To a great extent the culture of classical antiquity is the natural expression of these two predominant religious convictions. When Christianity entered the Graeco-Roman world and gathered its adherents from among both the cultured class and the unlettered masses, it made no violent break with ancient culture but preserved whatever was best in it. On the one hand, the Church sought to suppress whatever militated against its own teaching in these matters; on the other, it readily embraced a number of purely folk customs and practices of virtually spontaneous growth and gave them a new orientation in conformity with Christian principles. In a word, some of the pagan usages and rites were purified and, whenever possible, adapted to Christian worship.