Cento
A Cento (old Gr. Ὁ κέντρων, dt. The C., Pl. The Centos or the Centones) is a text that is composed exclusively or at least largely of text particles ( quotations ) from another text (patch poem), see also intertextuality . The cited passages regularly lose their previous context and are given a new context through the composition.
The rearrangement can have a parodic effect if the new succession gives the quotes a surprising, travesty-like sense or if parts of sentences from known quotations (“You are approaching again, fluctuating figures”) are put together in varying forms (“You are approaching again? In the Corner, broom! ”From Edwin Bormann's Goethe Quintessence ).
Due to the necessary reference of the cento to other, regularly well-known texts, the cento is discussed not only from the point of view of the parody, but also with regard to its intertextual character.
Concept history
The Greek κέντ (ρ) ov / ként (r) on originally referred to a blanket or harlequin jacket made up of colorful patches . This meaning is first used in Plautus and Cato d. Ä. occupied in Latin. The use of the term as a 'patch poem' is first found by Christian authors. Tertullian calls Homer-Centonen works that take individual parts from Homer's poetry . They put them together "like a cento" to form a new whole. Isidor von Seville's definition also implies that this process is suitable for all possible substances.
Examples
- Hosidius Geta : Medea
- Cento Probae
- Bertram Reinecke: Sleutel voor de hoogduitsche Spraakkunst
literature
- Theodor Verweyen , Gunther Witting: The Cento. A Form of Intertextuality from Montage to Parody . In: Heinrich F. Plett (Ed.): Intertextuality . de Gruyter, Berlin 1991. pp. 165-178, ISBN 3-11-011637-5
Individual evidence
- ↑ C. Top: Cento . In: Historical dictionary of rhetoric . 1992, p. 148-157 .