random history for the day

[ivyfic]

I just finished listening to a lecture series on the Early Middle Ages. One of the most interesting factoids came in a lecture on the Carolingian Renaissance. Charlemagne started a massive initiative to reconstruct the Bible and other religious texts from the earliest sources possible to get rid of the rampant errors in the copies that had at that time--as each book was copied by hand, you can imagine that over hundreds of years, the versions had gotten less and less accurate. It was these scholars that introduced upper and lower case letters, spaces between words, and rudimentary punctuation, in an effort to make it easier to read the Bible. This also meant trying to reteach the clergy proper Latin, since by the eighth century, what people were speaking in the Frankish kingdoms was less Latin and more a precursor to modern French.

But the reason for all of this? Charlemagne believed that his priests' Latin was so bad that God could no longer understand them when they prayed. I love this idea of God going "What? What? Your Latin is terrible! Learn your declensions for goodness sake!"

Comments

[amara-1783.livejournal.com]

Heee! Thanks for sharing; this is making me grin!

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

...When I read your last line, I hear it in Eddie Izzard's voice.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

That's what I said last night! "Jesus Christ, what is that awful racket?" "Don't use my name in vain, Dad!"