Abecedarium (literature)

An abecedarium is a text structured according to an alphabet in order to make the contents technically easier for practical remembering. Abecedariums usually have language-magic or formal playful content. In medieval legal handbooks, such as the Sachsenspiegel and the Schwabenspiegel , the alphabetical register arrangement is an embodiment of a formal abecedarium.

In religious poetic texts, such as in the Old Testament psalms ( Psalm 119  EU ), the lamentations ( Lamentations 1-4  VUL ) or in medieval liturgies, acrostics serve as orientation for the recitation and probably the musical and vocal accompaniment. The first letter of a word in a verse follows the order of the Hebrew alphabet :

• 1st line with Aleph
• 2nd line with Beth
• 3rd line with Gimel
• and so on

School books, whether from the Middle Ages or modern predecessors of the primer , were also referred to as Abecedaries.

Many children's verses and children's poems can also be counted among the Abecedaries. Some of these verses were invented as an alphabet study aid and taught in schools. This is again taken up and parodied in the opera Der Wildschütz by Albert Lortzing . Alphabets are often formed with names or animal names. In modern German poetry, the poet SAID playfully takes up this tradition in his bestiary This animal that doesn't exist .

In The Neverending Story , a novel by Michael Ende , the chapters begin with the letters of the Latin alphabet in alphabetical order. The chapters are preceded by a woodcut-like graphic on the content of the chapter with the letter as the initial .

As a well-known English-language abecedarium, the ABCDE rule has been formed in medicine with indications of potential melanomas :

• A symmetric (asymmetric shape)
• B order (irregular border)
• C olour (color differs)
• D iameter (large diameter)
• E volution (development, rapid changes)

literature

• Gero von Wilpert : Subject dictionary of literature (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 231). 8th, improved and enlarged edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-520-23108-5 .

See also

• Abecedarius (poem form)
• Abecedarium Nordmannicum (runic poem from the 9th century)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Cl. Lanczkowski: Abecedarium. In: Peter Dinzelbacher (Hrsg.): Special dictionary of medieval studies (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 477). Kröner, Stuttgart 1992, ISBN 3-520-47701-7 , p. 1.
2. ^ Gerhard Grümmer : Game forms of poetry . Verlag Werner Dausien, Hanau 1985, ISBN 3-7684-4521-6 , p. 21-22 .
3. ↑ Said (writer) : This animal that does not exist . CH Beck, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-406-45290-6 .
4. ↑ The ABCDEs of Melanoma , Melanoma Research Foundation (MRF), accessed on November 14, 2016