medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
A footnote to this discussion: Luigi Pirandello, perhaps the paradigm
of playwrights dealing with existential notions of the self (cf.
*Henry IV*, to keep within a medieval theme), was a highly skilled
philologist. He went to Bonn to study for a doctorate; his thesis was
on the dialect of his native region of Sicily, and that region was
around the city of Agrigento. Pirandello wrote of his birth in the
village of Caos (or Kaos) during a plague:
"Io son figlio del Caos; e non allegoricamente, ma in giusta realtā,
perché son nato in una nostra campagna, che trovasi presso ad un
intricato bosco denominato, in forma dialettale, Cāvusu dagli
abitanti di Girgenti, corruzione dialettale del genuino e antico
vocabolo greco Kaos". ("I am the child of Chaos; not allegorically,
but in true reality, because I was born in an area of our
countryside, located near a tangled wood named in the local dialect
'Cāvusu' by the inhabitants of Agrigento: a dialectical corruption of
the genuine and ancient Greek term 'Kaos'.")
A bit of a stretch, but perhaps if the forest or wood is millennial,
we have an example of 'chaos' resembling the medieval use of terms
related to 'desert'.
George
--
George FERZOCO
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On 5 Aug 2008, at 02:12, John Dillon wrote:
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
> culture
>
> Dear Jim,
>
> This is an interesting question. But I'm not sure that one can get
> very far with it. If I remember correctly, _Chaos_ as a Greek
> toponym is paralleled in the vicinity of Agrigento, without there
> being any particular association there between it and "The
> Wilderness". It probably just denotes a "topsy-turvy place", e.g.
> one with a lot of obstacles in the form of great boulders and/or
> clefts in the ground. But in South Italian and Sicilian contexts,
> at least, the name seems to be unusual (Diana, is this true
> elsewhere?) and I have also seen it etymologized (on first blush,
> less convincingly) as perhaps indicating the presence of a spring
> (and thus related -- somehow -- to the verb _cheo_).
>
> Best,
> John Dillon
>
>
> On Monday, August 4, 2008, at 5:35 pm, Jim Bugslag wrote:
>
>>> 3) Onuphrius of the Chaos (?). Today's less well known saint of
>>> the
>>> Regno (also O. of Belforte) is a very poorly attested Italo-Greek
>>> hermit of Calabria. He is said, seemingly legendarily, to have been
>>> born at today's Belforte (CZ) and to have lived ascetically to a
>>> great
>>> age in perhaps the tenth century as a recluse at a place called the
>>> Chaos (perhaps because of very rough terrain). This was located by
>>> early modern scholars in the woods of today's Panaia, now a
>>> _frazione_
>>> of Spilinga (VV). Others identify it as today's Sant'Onofrio (VV)
>>
>> Dear John (or anybody else),
>> I'm interested in the idea that "the Chaos" seems to be related to
>> medieval ideas of "the
>> Wilderness" and/or "the Desert" -- essentially places of disorder. I
>> wouldn't be a bit
>> surprised, for example, if he had lived in a cave or grotto, which
>> seems to carry the same
>> sorts of connotations. Do you, or does anyone else, know of written
>> sources for such ideas
>> in the Middle Ages (or earlier)?
>> Cheers,
>> Jim
>
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