How to Cite

Esch, Arnold and Schmugge, Ludwig: Spätmittelalterliches Umgangslatein. Direkte Rede und empfundene Sprache in den Pönitentiarie-Suppliken, in Menschen in ihrer Gegenwart: Die Fülle spätmittelalterlichen Lebens im Spiegel der Apostolischen Pönitentiarie, Heidelberg: Heidelberg University Publishing, 2024 (Online-Schriften des DHI Rom. Neue Reihe: Pubblicazioni online del DHI Roma. Nuova serie, Volume 10), p. 337–376. https://doi.org/10.17885/heiup.1345.c18687

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ISBN 978-3-96822-261-5 (Hardcover)
ISBN 978-3-96822-262-2 (PDF)

Published

04/04/2024

Authors

Arnold Esch

Spätmittelalterliches Umgangslatein. Direkte Rede und empfundene Sprache in den Pönitentiarie-Suppliken

Abstract The requests for absolution or dispensation, addressed to the pope and registered by the Penitentiary, always had to contain a detailed account of the case involved at the beginning. To lend this narratio more credibility at the tribunal, the petitioners or their procurators sometimes added spoken Latin in direct speech, particularly affective language like insults, phrases, snatches of conversation, threats, curses, blasphemies etc. in deliberately crude, non­Ciceronian expressions („It’s easy for you to talk!“, „I’ll wind your guts out of your belly!“, „If I knew that I had to get out of bed for such a lousy mass, I certainly wouldn’t do it!“, „He can get stuffed!“). Of course, the phrases presented here (with translations in German) are in almost all cases uttered in the native tongue and translated into Latin by the procurator and are thus not protocolled speech, but reconstructed speech. But they are still colloquial Latin of the Late Middle Ages.