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Translatio Studiorum Through Philosophical Terminology Giacinta TRANSLATIO STUDIORUM THROUGH PHILOSOPHICAL TERMINOLOGY Giacinta Spinosa This paper is divided into two parts. In the first I want to clarify some points regarding the idea of translatio studiorum.1 In the second I want to develop the theme indicated in the title, claiming that translatio studio- rum can also be seen in the changes in the philosophical terminology of medieval Greek-Latin translations. 1. The Idea of Translatio Studiorum The idea of translatio studiorum, or the idea of cultural translation and transmission, originated in the medieval period in the context of the translatio imperii that took form in the ninth century, with Charlemagne’s translation of the Roman Empire from the Byzantine East to the Latin West (and the previous translation from West to East in 476 ce). Charle- magne and his historians, particularly Alcuin2 and later Notker Balbulus 1 During the last decade there has been renewed interest in the subject of a histo- riographical kind, as a means of studying long-term changes: see Joël Biard and Roshdi Rashed (eds.), Descartes et le moyen âge (Paris: Vrin, 1997); Stephen F. Brown (ed.), Meet- ing of the Minds: The Relation between Medieval and Classical Modern European Philosophy (Turnhout: Brepols, 1998); Costantino Esposito and Pasquale Porro (eds.), Heidegger e i medievali (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001); Frank La Brasca-Alfredo Perifano (eds.), La transmis- sion des savoirs au Moyen Age et à la Renaissance (Besançon: Presses Universitaires de Franche-Comté, 2005), 2 vols.; Charles Burnett, José Meirinhos, and Jacqueline Hamesse (eds.), Continuities and Disruptions between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (Louvain- la-Neuve: FIDEM, 2008); Laura H. Hollengreen (ed.), Translatio or the Transmission of Culture in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance: Modes and Messages (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008); see also Édouard Jeauneau, Translatio studii=Transmission of Learning (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1995). 2 See Alcuin’s letter to Charlemagne in 799: “As many have responded to the famous appeal you made to devote themselves to study, perhaps a new, or even better, Athens could be created in France” (“Si, plurimis inclitum vestrae intentionis studium sequenti- bus, forsan Athenae novae perficeretur in Francia, immo multo excellentior”), Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Epistolarum Tomus IV (Berlin: Weidmann, 1895), 279. On this, see also Aurelio Roncaglia, Le origini, in Emilio Cecchi and Natalino Sapegno (eds.), Storia della letteratura italiana (Milano: Garzanti, 1965), 87–98. 74 giacinta spinosa and Otto of Freising,3 saw the Carolingian reform as the opportunity to retrieve texts of ancient Greek and Latin culture (mainly, however, in a grammatical sense), a retrieval that was essentially carried out through a Christian and ecclesiastic filter. The historical concept of translatio imperii, or the translation of power, involved a series of tensions between the Carolingian Empire and the Empire of the East, between the power of the Empire and that of the papacy.4 But we should note that already the idea of translatio imperii, or translation of power, was understood in the larger sense of translatio studiorum, of a cultural translation and trans- mission that involves grafting a patrimony of knowledge onto a different cultural context. This happened before the ninth century. I refer to the early sixth century, between the late antique and early medieval periods in Italy, and I refer particularly to the great philosopher, theologian and Latin politician Severinus Boethius.5 His words indicate that the expres- sion imperium transtulere, transferring power, takes on the fuller mean- ing of cultural transmission, effected in a series of transitions. It is highly significant that this intellectual of Latin culture regarded transmitting the values (prisca . virtus) of ancient Greek civilization (Graecae sapientiae) as an essential part of his political activity, a vital part in the transmis- sion of which was his program of translating Aristotle, starting from the work on logic.6 He had the foresight to underline that Roman culture had 3 See Notkerus Balbulus, Gesta Karoli Magni Imperatori, in Monumenta Germaniae His- torica, Scriptores rerum germanicarum, nova series, tomus XII (Berlin: Weidmann, 1959) 3: “whose doctrine [Alcuin’s] produced so many fruits that the Gauls or French equalled the ancient Romans and Athenians” (“Cuius [Albini scilicet Alcuini] in tantum doctrina fruc- tificavit, ut moderni Galli sive Franci antiquis Romanis et Ateniensibus aequaretur”). See also Gregorio Piaia, Vestigia philosophorum: Il medioevo e la storiografia filosofica (Rimini: Maggioli, 1983), 135–42. 4 See Jacques Le Goff, La civilisation de l’occident médiéval (Paris: Arthaud, 1965), 218–21. 5 See Massimiliano Vitiello, Il principe, il filosofo, il guerriero (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2006), 105–12. 6 See Boethius, In Categorias Aristotelis, liber II, prol., PL 64, 201B: “Even though the cares of our consular office prevent us from devoting all our otium and all our activities to these studies, it nevertheless seems that instructing the citizenry in the doctrine of a subject that has been fully pondered is relevant to care for public affairs. Nor will I be worthless in the eyes of my citizens if I have arranged the customs of our civilization in accordance with the arts of Greek wisdom, once the ancient virtue of the men of other cities has transferred its imperium and its rule to this republic” (“Et si nos curae officii consularis impediunt quo minus in his studiis omne otium plenamque operam consumimus, pertinere tamen vid- etur hoc ad aliquam reipublicae curam, elecubratae rei doctrina cives instruere. Nec male de civibus meis merear, si cum prisca hominum virtus urbium caeterarum ad hanc unam rempublicam, dominationem, imperiumque transtulerit, ego id saltem quod reliquum est, Graecae sapientiae artibus mores nostrae civitatis instruxero”)..
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