Aesopus Latinus

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Aesopus Latinus or Romulus for short is the title of a collection of Latin fables in prose, which was possibly created in Gaul around the year 400 after an edition of the fables in verses by Phaedrus , which was much more complete at this time than in later centuries. The name of the collection comes from the introductory letter from a Romulus about whom nothing else is known. Romulus claims here that he translated the fables from the Greek. In the Middle Ages, Aesop was known almost exclusively for this edition. Medieval scholars believed they could identify Romulus as the Roman Emperor Romulus Augustulus .

Transmission of the aesopic substances to the Middle Ages

At least twelve text witnesses of Romulus from the 10th to 15th centuries have survived. They are divided into two main editorial offices. The history of the text is extraordinarily complex, but it is now certain that at least 75% of the 81 fables of the core collection, which are handed down in the Recensio gallicana and the Recensio vetus, can be traced back to a prose Phaedrus arrangement from the 4th century. In the research literature, this strand is called Urromulus, Aesopus ad Rufum or Aesopus latinus . Mainly in the fourth book of Romulus, however, other sources also flowed, of which, however, only the Hermeneumata of Pseudo-Dositheus can be identified. In addition to Aesopus latinus, Aesop's fables were also known to the Middle Ages through the mythiamboi of Babrios , which Avianus worked on.

literature

  • Georg Thiele : The Latin Aesop of Romulus and the prose versions of Phaedrus. Critical text with commentary and preliminary investigations . Olms, Hildesheim / Zurich / New York 1985, ISBN 3-487-07663-2 (first edition: Heidelberg 1910).
  • Gerlinde Huber: The motif of the ' widow of Ephesus ' in Latin texts from antiquity and the Middle Ages (=  Mannheim contributions to linguistic and literary studies . Volume 18 ). Narr, Tübingen 1990, ISBN 3-87808-847-7 .
  • Kurt Ranke et al. (Hrsg.): Enzyklopädie des Märchen. Concise dictionary for historical and comparative narrative research . tape 11 . de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2004, ISBN 3-11-017565-7 , Sp. 819 ff .
  • Wolfgang Stammler: The German literature of the Middle Ages . ? Edition. tape ? . de Gruyter, Berlin / New York, p. 144 ff .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.gottwein.de/latine/LLLa.php
  2. ↑ Encyclopedia of Fairy Tales. Volume 11, Col. 819.
  3. ^ Stammler: The German literature of the Middle Ages. 1936, p. 145 f.