Monday, November 29, 2021

More on Scotus' Birthplace

 So back on the theme of where Scotus was born, namely, was he Irish (Scotus, Hibernicus), or Scottish (Scotus). While it is commonly held today that the Scottish position has triumphed, there was some criticism on a post from earlier in the year to the effect that the word "scotus" originally meant someone from Ireland and only later, possibly during Scotus' own time did it come to mean someone from Scotland. 


While transcribing the Additiones magnae, a text compiled by William of Alnwick from Scotus' Oxford and Parisian teaching, I came across the following sentence, that is obviously sketching a map of Europe and also distinguishes between Scotland (scotia) and Ireland (hibernia). 

"...inter Norwegiam et Scotiam et inter Hyspaniam et Hyberniam..."


This is from the end of Add. II d. 14 q. 4. Even if William of Alnwick may be expanding on Scotus' text (studies on the Additiones II are in their infancy, so I don't know if there is a parallel elsewhere in Scotus yet), it shows that ireland was already being called 'hibernia' by about 1315, close to Scotus' lifetime.

Monday, November 8, 2021

Festum Scoti

 Happy Feast everyone!