Transcriber’s notes
Notes for the first version
As this work is fairly old, the printing technique and fashion tend to make reading difficult, and even produce some inconsistencies. Thus some changes have been made in order to improve the reading experience :
- Long s (ſ, ß) have been modernized
- The difference between U and V was only contextual (V as uppercase, and u as lowercase). This has been changed to fit more modern standards.
- The difference between i and j was also only contextual (j only in -ij, i.e. at the end of words). J has been replaced by i as in most modern Latin publications.
- Adverbs were distinguished by an accent on the last vowel. Mostly a grave accent, but often a vertical or even acute accent, with no apparent reason. The grave accent has been generalized (unless the word is followed by an enclitic)
- The printer’s typeface was limited, and lacked the appropriate diacritics in uppercase, and used O`, A`, E`, Ae, Oe instead of Ô, À, È, Æ, Œ. This was fixed in order to keep consistency with their lowercase equivalents.
- Sometimes, the acute accent on the word before the enclitic was placed in an isolated position before the enclitic instead of the top of the last vowel, such as est’ne, while éstne was expected. This was fixed.
- Each dialogue was printed in monolithic blocks, impairing readability. Each tirade now has its own line, and the general layout has been modernized.
- The locuters’ names were abbreviated in the text, but with no
consistency, as the length of the abbreviated names was chosen only to
fit in the lines. The full names were restored everywhere. In two dialogues, two names are used but are absent from the introduction. Because the original edition is currently unavailable, it was necessary to search in other editions that may have had access to the original :
- In “Convivium Laudatorium”, the faulty names are “ Bar ” and “ Ant ”. In the Argentorati edition, they are respectively “ Ger ” and “ An ”. Gerardus being one of the named characters, the first name was corrected to Gerardus, because Ger bears some similitude to Bar, and as for the second one, the only possible name left is Kilianus given the context.
- In “Convivium Tabernarium”, the faulty names are Ger[ardus] and Geor[gius]. In the Argentorati edition, they are both Geo[rgius]. As there is no better data, Both have been set to [Georgius].
- Some abbreviations were used in the text, mostly ã, ẽ, ĩ, õ, ũ for am/an, em/en, im/in, om/on, um/un, and & for et (this one is systematic). They were all replaced by the full text, except the & in the titles and presentations of the characters, for styling purposes.
- The order of the dialogs varies somehow from one edition to another, so no strictly fixed order exists
- The edition used for the transcription included works from other authors, such as Erasmus, but as these work are available elsewhere and aren’t part of the original work, they were not included.
Notes for the second version
The second version changes from the first one by :
- the correction of numerous transcription errors
- the correction of printing errors, by using other editions as reference in order not to corrupt the original text
- the adding of a refreshed version for modern audience, with updated spelling and macrons.
- single quotes were added in the refreshed version where relevant (single quotes and not double in order to avoid confusion with already existing quotes)
- Note : a probable anomaly in the text, veniebant, was spotted, and is used instead of venibant/vænibant. This was kept nonetheless.
- aere careo was changed to ære careo
- In colloquium Ante & post cibum hymnum esse dīcendum, Martinus was changed to Mauricius in conformity with older editions.
- A table of contents has been added for easier navigation
Note for Classical Latin students
Please remember the Latin presented in this work is not Classical Latin, although it gets closer to it than Medieval Latin, and so we may find words with an unusual meaning in Classical Latin, most notably :
- pōmum for “ apple“ instead of “ fruit ”
- ipse instead of is
- hallēc for “ herring ” instead of “ fish sauce ”
- bōlus for “ morsel ” (medieval Latin)