Volume 140, Issue 3

The aim of the article is to investigate the non-coreferential uses of the Latin reflexive pronoun se / sibi in the Romance languages. In prepositional phrases, the stressed form of this pronoun replaces the outcomes of illu(m) in Ibero-Romance, Gallo-Romance and Gallo-Italic, whereas its unstressed form is used in place of illu(m) as the Indirect Object in Castilian and Sardinian (as part of a clitic cluster) and in southernmost Calabrese (as isolated pronoun). Furthermore, the outcomes of se / sibi also convey Direct and/or Indirect Objects of 1st and 2nd person plural in several areas of the Romance domain. We argue that this multifunctionality is related to the morphological gender and number neutrality characterising this pronoun, whose syntactic role is clarified by either prepositions or verbal valency. Moreover, as a 3rd person marker, it also develops the so-called «non-person» feature (as claimed by Benveniste), designating a generic reference, of which plurality represents only one of its possible realisations.

This article is devoted to the Trésor des simples , a treatise written around the middle of the fifteenth century by the Burgundian bishop Jean Germain and dedicated to his patron Philip the Good. Halfway between anti-Islamic polemic and crusading propaganda, the Trésor des simples offers a refutation of the Qur’ān that is, on the one hand, a reworking of the classic topics of medieval anti-Islamic polemic, and on the other, a refunctionalisation of these topics in a new context, with the production of original remarks. Among these, there is the issue of the “poetic nature” of the Qur’ān, where poetic stands for the presence of a musical/rhythmic component, associated with a fictional content. Far from representing a mere element of aesthetic inadequacy, the alleged “poetic nature” of the Qur’ān is exploited by Germain as a proof to refute the theological validity of Islam’s holy book. This article aims to trace the different paths that this issue follows in the Trésor des simples , attempting to justify them in the light of medieval anti-islamic polemical literature and, above all, of its historical, cultural and literary context.

This paper examines some Biblical quotations found in the preface to Archprest of Hita’s Libro de buen amor (fourteenth century). This short prose text is transmitted in an early fifteenth-century codex unicus : Salamanca, Univ. Library, 2663. As for critical issues, I argue that redis (Ps 61, 13) and equs (Ps 31, 9) should not be corrected to read reddes and equus , as has been customary among almost all editors. Besides, in Ecclo 15, 1 the manuscript does not read Dominum , but Deum , which should be kept as well. On the contrary, illi (Ps 21, 31), viam (Ps 118, 30), probably also juxta (Ps 61, 13), as well as the restoration of Job 14, 1 are right conjectures. After or within quotations in Latin, the Tironian et should be transcribed as et, not e[t] . As for literary matters, certain Biblical quotations allow us to identify new Latin sources which were used by the Archprest, including Hildebert of Lavardin († 1133) and Bernard of Clairvaux († 1153). They also suggest that at least certain Biblical verses were not directly quoted by the Archprest from the Vulgate: he rather borrowed them from Patristic and Medieval Latin authors. This indirect procedure clarifies the striking confusion between the books of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus: the error was probably inherited from an intermediate source.

The combination of hagiography and romance of the manuscript Escorial h-I-13 is an interesting testimony to the Iberian propagation of French literature in translation, especially from the point of view of historical and interpretative investigation. The paper, however, will delve into those elements, generically defined as formulae, that the preparer of the miscellaneous codex had to recognise, if not actually introduce, in order to define the points of tangency of two discursive universes potentially coexisting in the same framework. Fixed word sequences and recurring syntactic structures will therefore be explored, as these help to define the implicit competence of speakers and writers even across different Romance languages.

The aim of this research is to explain the diachronic evolution of the form seguro and the adverbial constructions de seguro and a buen seguro as epistemic operators that perform different discursive functions. The starting hypothesis is that the semantic change experienced by these units is explained by a subjectification process motivated by their appearance in specific contexts which facilitate the conventionalization of values of the epistemic modality and originate the grammaticalization of these constructions. The diachronic and variational analysis allows us to determine the mechanisms behind the evolutionary process, the historical stages in which it has developed, the functions performed in the sentence and extrasentence framework, the diatopic extension, the link to specific discursive traditions and specific registers, and the frequency of use in the different evolutionary periods.

The Canary Islands show a peculiar linguistic behavior that differs from that of the Iberian Peninsula and that can be observed in the phenomenon of the elision of intervocalic /d/. In this paper we analyze data from the Corpus Oral y Sonoro del Español Rural to address the situation of /d/ in the islands. The aim is to detect possible geographical patterns of expansion of the phenomenon, as well as factors of change that may have influenced its evolution. The data distribution shows great heterogeneity, which does not allow to propose a clear geographical pattern. As for the factors of change, they appear to be similar to those acting in other areas, but they show a weaker explanatory power.

The following is a brief overview of the Fiorita by Armannino from the point of view of both textual tradition and historical-literary contextualisation. The article’s main objective is to highlight the points of contact between Dante’s Commedia and Armannino’s work, demonstrating how the Fiorita constitutes a crucial witness to Dante’s early fortunes. The analysis shows how the dialogue that Armannino weaves with the Commedia is realised on several fronts: the structure of the work, which is divided into 33 conti preceded by a proem; the macro-themes, such as that of the catabasis; and punctual and explicit references that create an image of Dante as an auctor . In some cases, the intertextuality is limited to specific branches of the tradition, demonstrating how the Commedia fascinated not only Armannino but also his copyists, confirming the power of Dante’s masterpiece.

This contribution analyses a number of trade terms of Northern Italo-Romance origin attested in German and Dutch documentation between the 14th and 17th centuries. In both cases, the borrowings are first presented with brief historical contextualizations. Next, the sources attesting the borrowings are examined and the dynamics of their dissemination are discussed, starting with the analysis of two conversation manuals composed between the 15th and 16th centuries. Finally, some concluding considerations are proposed, highlighting points of convergence and divergence between the German and Dutch cases.

The “Bericht über Portugiesisch-Afrika und Ostindien”, which was probably written between 1512 and 1519, is one of the few German-language documents from the early period of European and especially Portuguese trading activities in India and Southeast Asia. With regard to the lexicon, the text is far richer than all other German-language reports from the early years of the Portuguese expansion. As a consequence of the complex historical interrelations between the various nations involved in the oriental trade, the “Orient-Bericht” contains numerous borrowings from Italian and Portuguese as well as – through Indo-Portuguese mediation – from Arabic, various Indian languages and Malay. As many of these words have not yet been examined in the light of modern research, the text is highly interesting for both German and Romance historical lexicology and lexicography.

In 2019, a previously unknown Vegliote manuscript written by Marcantonio Impastari was discovered by chance in the Biblioteca Civica in Trieste. The manuscript was composed between 1892 and 1897 and mainly consists of already known linguistic material, primarily that published by Antonio Ive in the article L’antico dialetto di Veglia (1886). In addition, it also contains new material and/or variations of already known materials, as well as a list edited by Impastari of presumed Vegliotisms in the Venetian dialect of the island of Veglia (modern Krk in Croatia). Since Impastari not only copied Ive’s article but also included unknown material in his manuscript, the present contribution provides, in addition to a critical publication of the manuscript, also an analysis of his method of processing his sources. At the same time, using the etymological method, the presumed Vegliotisms in the Venetian dialect of Veglia are examined. The manuscript is undoubtedly of utmost interest to Vegliote language studies.

The authors of the article cicātrīx in the Lessico Etimologico Italiano (LEI) state that the formation of the term cicotrico (ib. 14,90) is not entirely clear. Based on the original textual source, our brief note demonstrates that the word resulted from an incorrect segmentation of the noun cicotriconizatoria .

The name of the brigidini , a type of aniseed wafer which is typical of the town of Lamporecchio (Italy), is linked traditionally and anecdotally to the nuns of a convent of Saint Brigida. However, there is no historical evidence to support the existence of such an institution. In our paper, we review potential alternative hypotheses and advocate for a more solid one based on the Northern It. brazadel(lo) ‘dessert, in particular donut with anise’. The aforementioned etymon was subsequently modified by a reference to the name of the Saint because of the frequent association of such sweets with manufacturers established in female convents. This development was further facilitated by the semantic opacity of the term.