Hospitium

As a hospitium ( Latin hospitium , "hospitality", "guest house", "hostel", to hospes , guest), the legally stipulated free accommodation of certain people was referred to in the Middle Ages .

Origin of the term

In ancient times, a hospitium was a general term for a building that temporarily provides hospitality and shelter to the traveler or stranger, be it a friend's house, an inn or a rental apartment. The word occurs in Cicero's Orationes Philippicae (XII, 9) and in De Senectute (23), and also in Livius (V, 28). Hospices were set up at regular intervals on the major Roman roads (for example on the Via Appia ) , and these were also found in the fortified settlements along the Roman roads .

In antiquity, the apartment of a soldier who was quartered with a private person could also be referred to as a hospitium (Sueton Tiberius 37).

Importance in the Middle Ages

In the Middle Ages, the term changed to an expression for the Herberg law , so the law of the ruler and his officials on room and board by its subjects while traveling in his sphere of influence.

In addition, in the Middle Ages the duty of the monasteries to accommodate the bishop on his visitation trips was called the hospitium or procuratio canonica . A first small, still dependent settlement of the Franciscan order in a city could also be called a hospice ; when the monastery became more permanent and enlarged, it became an independent convent .

Finally, in the Middle Ages, the sick department of the monasteries, some of which was also available to the residents of the area, was called hospitium, from this meaning the term hospital is derived from hospitalis (“hospitable”) . In addition, the term xenodochium (from the Greek ξενοδοχε , ον , "hostel") is in use.  

Usage today

In the word hospice , the term has found its way into contemporary culture with a changed meaning.

See also

• Fodrum
• Obligation to host
• Journeyman's Hospice
• Hospice (disambiguation)
• Pilgrim hostel

literature

• Carlrichard Brühl : Fodrum, gistum, servitium regis. Studies on the economic foundations of kingship in the Frankish Empire and in the Frankish successor states of Germany, France and Italy from the 6th to the middle of the 14th century . Cologne 1968
• Kurt Baldinger : The meaning of Middle Latin for the origin and development of the French document language (Mlat. Hospes, fr. Hôte in the field of the free peasant) . In: Medium Aevum Vivum. Festschrift for Walther Bulst . Heidelberg 1960, pp. 125-146.
• Cay-Rüdiger Prüll, Ulrich Tröhler: Hospital. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte . De Gruyter, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 620 f.