[gothic-l] The Letter H (was Re: Gothic word for King)

[keth at ONLINE.NO]

Hails Matþaius,

You wrote:
>I suppose this argument will lead back to the original spelling of (h)Eruls,
>as well as lend support for *Ala- over against *Hala-
>
>Keth, the only problem I see here with your theory concerning the h in
>manuscript tradition is that because Latin no longer pronounced the 'h' in
>the period, following a trend that had been ongoing since the 2nd c. AD, its
>scribes could no longer recognize its proper place or proper usage. It is
>thought that the h was kept in spelling out of tradition rather than as a
>reflection of colloquial pronunciation, which was thus like Spanish or
>Italian or French (or any other Romance language) in respect to the 'h'.
>Since the h was not pronounced in spoken Latin, scribes often had to do
>their best to remember when it should be written, and, in lieu of the many
>errors, probably seldom resorted to ancient texts for correction. H had
>become a vestige, a sort of symbol of antiquity, and therefore perhaps also
>of learnedness. Whether the h was etymological, eventually, through
>ignorance or apathy, came to have diminished importance. The evidence of
>such treatment is apparent in much of the vulgar latin texts of the early
>medieval period.

What I thought was that a man like Jordanes would have known the Gothic 
language, since he lived not long after Theodoric. And in his time the
Langobards were coming to power in Italy and that included the Langobardic
language; and so we can assume that Jordanes lived among people who spoke
a Germanic language; either Gothic or Langobardic. Besides, the Heruls
had been defeated by the Langobards not many generations earlier. We
can therefore assume that the Heruls were not just a distant memory
in Jordane's time. That H in personal names was important in the Germanic
languages of Italy is shown for example in the Langobardic genealogies,
where the H, as far as I can see, has been correctly preserved.
Examples are:

Hildeoc
Hildichis
Chlodio
Childeric
Chlothar
Childebert
Haroden
Hildeprant 
Hermelinda

I can see, though, from the Latin Getica, that there are many scribal errors
that concern the letter h. Sometimes it has been added where it doesn't 
belong, and other times left out. However, the manuscripts that we have
are not the original one that Jordanes wrote, but hand copies that belong to
later centuries. If you then take a survey of all the existing manuscripts
you will see that the H in a name like Herul is never lacking in a systematic
fashion, i.e. like being absent in all occurrences of the name in a single
manuscript. But it always seems to be the case that it lacks only sporadically,
but then pops up again later in the same manuscript when the name occurs again.
Thus the variation in spelling has the character of a random error -- and 
furthermore, it does not dominate. The majority of occurrences in the single
manuscript includes it correctly.

I would therefore say that the best explanation for this is that the original
manuscript that Jordanes wrote used H throughout, and that the fluctuations
we see in Mss. that were copied in the following centuries, are due to random
scribal error.
 
It was earlier discussed how long the Langobard language was used in Italy.
And it was said that it may have disappeared soon after the Franks subdued
Desiderius in 774. Perhaps also a name like Desiderius is a sign that the
national language had seen its best days. But Aistulf (749-754) evidently still
preserved the original Langobard tradition in his name. Although this is 
only a guess, it seems reasonable to me to assume that the Langobard language
was spoken until the middle of the 8th century. This would then mean that
a man like Paul the Deacon learned the Langobard language as his mother's
language, which would again mean that he knew where the H-es belonged and
where they did not belong. I am saying this because the Latin of his
"Historia" seems to be fairly consistent in writing Germanic personal
names with the H-es in the correct places.


TABLE from the "Pauli Historia Langobardorum",
----------------------------------------------
showing all occurrences of the word "Herul"
including all Ms. variants:

    51         53      65'     65''
A2  Herulorum  Heroli  Herolis Herolorum
A3  Herulorum  Heroli  Herolis Herolorum
A4  Herulorum  Eroli   Herolis Herolorum
B1  Herulorum  Heroli  Herolis Herolorum
D1  Herulorum  Heroli  Herolis Herolorum
E1  Herulorum  Hieroli Herolis Herolorum
F1  Herulorum  Heruli  Herolis Herolorum
G2  Herulorum  Heroli  Herolis Herolorum
G5  Herulorum  Heruli  Herolis Herolorum
I2  Herulorum  Heruli  Herolis Herolorum
D1  Herulorum  Heruli  Herolis Herolorum
L2  Herulorum  Herculi Herolis Herolorum

    67'       67''      67'''  67''''  66'5   67'6      67'7
A2  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
A3  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
A4  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
B1  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
D1  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
E1  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
F1  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
G2  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
G5  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
I2  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
D1  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum
L2  Herolorum Herolorum Heroli Herolia Heroli Herolorum Herolorum

    69        82        85        
A2  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
A3  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
A4  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
B1  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
D1  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
E1  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
F1  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
G2  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
G5  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
I2  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
D1  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 
L2  Herolorum Herulorum Herulorum 

As you will see from the table, there are 12 different Mss. (A2, A3,
A4, B1, D1, E1, F1, G2, I2, D1 and L2). The word in its variants
occurs 14 times in each Ms. And you will see that the spelling is
remarkably consistent(!) Only once on page 53 do the Mss. deviate 
to some extent, and of all the deviations, it is only one (1) that 
shows a spelling without an initial H. So out of one-hundred-and-
sixty-eight occurences of the word, only one(!) lacks the initial H.
So much for the argument that Herul is without H.

Best regards
Keth

 



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