Celtic and Latin glossing traditions: uncovering early medieval language contact and knowledge transfer

Introduction

Glosses are fingerprints of the society in which texts were composed, copied, and read. Most importantly, they play a much more significant role than previous research has acknowledged and offer insights about the multilingual and multi-ethnic environment of medieval manuscript and text production that the principal texts cannot: they are first-hand testimonies of the close linguistic and cultural contacts between Insular Celtic (Old Breton, Old Irish, Old Welsh) and Latin speakers.

Research Focus

GLOSSIT researches this largely neglected source for early medieval linguistic and intellectual exchange in Western Europe. This comparative study on the vernacular Insular Celtic and Latin glosses shows that the interlinear and marginal glosses (or paratext) of 9th–10th century manuscripts have a marginal character only at a first glance.

Challenges and Solutions

A striking lack of editions has so far been a strong obstacle for in-depth investigations. GLOSSIT addresses this shortcoming and produces digital editions to research the interrelationships between the languages involved, including:

1. Latin/vernacular contact
2. Intra-vernacular contact

Additionally, it explores the knowledge transfer observable in early medieval glossing traditions.

Methodology

GLOSSIT tackles this issue by combining methods from various fields, including:

• Comparative philology and historical linguistics
• Digital humanities (handwritten text recognition, network analysis, natural language processing)
• (Cultural) history
• Biological computation (applying DNA-sequence alignment methods to glosses)

Core Sources

The core sources are early medieval copies of the computistical works of Bede and Priscian’s Latin grammar, with multiple manuscript witnesses transmitting Insular Celtic and Latin glosses.

Significance

For the first time, GLOSSIT puts their glossing traditions at the center of a large-scale investigation into language contact and knowledge exchange between the Celtic-speaking world and the Carolingian empire in an era that was foundational for Europe’s intellectual history until today.