Following Ian's masterful explanation, I'll simply add that one of Charlemagne's many problems was finding enough people who could write to copy his many orders, which is why some were misunderstood or uncomprehensible !
Selon Ian <ilikemonkeys.geo_at_ELT2DLDNFX4GoVELZvfcHPFP0He8vdVSmLHiqXf_292gkvo5Ii64A2RL5Xl4-cJPwoVPbL2rPJv85NOe9N1Kh15j.yahoo.invalid>:
> It's tacky replying to myself, but I had to wrap that email up in a hurry to
> get to work. Now that I'm ensconced at my nice, quiet
> unbothered-by-students-thanks-to-the-snow desk, I can elaborate.
>
> So, for those who want to fact check me, an example of the corrupted Roman
> texts would be the Vigil of Venus, or Pervigilium Veneri. In both surviving
> manuscripts, Pervigilium was converted into "Per Virgilium" or "By Virgil",
> leading to a nonsensical title if you can read. Throughout both manuscripts
> are similar errors that would have been caught had the person writing the
> manuscript had been able to read what he was writing.
>
> Even had they been able to read the text, medieval copying of sacred texts
> was as much a form of devotion and worship as a way of transmitting
> information. Interacting with the text by /reading/ it would have been as
> much a distraction as chatting about the weather while praying. Many monastic
> copyists were *drawing* the page, not actually writing, as we mean the word,
> what they were seeing.
>
> The Patriarch Nikon is the 17th century Russian patriarch I mention (my
> source is "Chamber's encyclopaedia), who wanted to have as much temporal
> power as The Pope, in addition to his significant spiritual power - and I see
> a lot of parallels between his behavior and situation and the situation in
> Rokari Tanisor at several points in history. He was one of the richest
> serf-owners in the nation, he surrounded himself with a kind of
> ecclesiastical court that was associated with the Pope, said court plundering
> the parish clergy of treasures, and in processions used a 'Latin' cross
> rather than the Eastern Cross. The correction process was already started by
> the Church before Nikon had become Patriarch, and was explicitly because of
> errors introduced by illiterate copyists, but under Nikon it became perceived
> as a case of real world 'God-Learnerism' - he was changing the holy texts to
> fit his agenda!
>
> It is not universally agreed upon by historians that there was a significant
> population of illiterate copyists in 7th century Europe, but it is not fringe
> theory, either. Equally, it is not outside the realm of possibility that
> there are Talari scribes, who take dictation, and then illiterate Dronari
> copyists who simply draw the pages handed to them.
>
> -- Ian
>
> >
> > Perhaps "semi-literate" would be more accurate, but a number of what are
> now corrupted Roman texts come to us from copyists in the 7th-9th centuries
> who couldn't proofread what they were copying.
> >
> > In 17th century Russia, the Church Patriarch made a campaign of trying to
> correct the Russian translations of the Scriptures that had been muddled by
> illiterate Russian copyists. He was vilified for trying to be 'Latin' - the
> peasants preferred a "wrong" bible in Russian to a "correct" one based on
> some other language.
> >
> > That's just two.
> >
> > --Ian
> >
> >
> > --- In WorldofGlorantha_at_yahoogroups.com, "Mark" <markmohrfield@> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --- In WorldofGlorantha_at_yahoogroups.com, "Ian" <ilikemonkeys.geo@> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Copyists that cannot read were surprisingly common in OUR world's
> history.
> > > >
> > >
> > > Really? Could you give some examples?
> > >
> > > Mark
> > >
> >
>
>
>
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