medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
For what it's worth, thus spoke the OED:
"Mediæval Latin texts have commonly ihc or ihs, ihm, ihu (with or without a stroke over or across the h, or other mark of abbreviation) for Iesus, Iesum, Iesu. In ME., the usual form was ihu = Jesu; less frequently ihs, ihc, or ihus. These abbreviations were in later times often erroneously expanded as Ihesus, Ihesum, Ihesu.
"The Romanized form of the abbreviation [Jesus] would be IES, but from the entire or partial retention of the Greek form [IHC] in Latin MSS. as IHC or IHS, and subsequent forgetfulness of its origin, it has often been looked upon as a Latin abbreviation or contraction, and explained by some as standing for 'Iesus Hominum Salvator,' Jesus Saviour of men, by others as 'In Hoc Signo (vinces),' in this sign (thou shalt conquer), or 'In Hac Salus, in this (cross) is salvation.'"
Given how much late medieval devotion seemed to enjoy collecting synonyms for the divine name (I think of all those charms with bloated lists of names for God), I could see how the first two panels could be taken for "IHS" and "IHC" respectively. I'm still stumped by what panel 3 could be spelling.
Best,
John
----- Original Message -----
From: Scott Carson <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Friday, July 28, 2006 5:15 pm
Subject: Re: [M-R] St. Levan roodscreen
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
> culture
> On 28 Jul 2006, at 16:42, Diana Wright wrote:
>
> > medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion
> and
> > culture
> >
> > John Briggs wrote:
> >
> >> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion
> and
> >> culture
> >>
> >> [log in to unmask] wrote:
> >>
> >>>
> >>> Looking at Diana's link to Susan's Levan rood-screen panels, I can
> >>> almost convince myself that in both the first and second
> panels I
> >>> see
> >>> the stylized letters "i h s" with an expansion dash above--
> viz., the
> >>> standard abbreviation for "Jesus" (though I'm not happy with my
> >>> purported "s" in either panel). But the 3rd panel stumps me
> unless>>> the picture somehow got reversed, in which case you
> could argue that
> >>> it spells "sitis," though that makes no sense in context.
> >>
> >>
> >> "I h s" is quite often "i h c" for reasons which elude me.
> >>
> >> John Briggs
> >
> >
> > C is the Greek S in medieval documents, but why it would be used
>
> > for an otherwise Latin phrase eludes me.
> >
> > DW
>
> I think that when it's written "IHS" it is the ligature for the
> Latin
> word "Iesus", and when it is written "IHC" it is the ligature for
> the
> Greek word "IHCOUC".
>
> Scott Carson
>
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