A Present Sense of Things Past : @z%tflmzh fernps?

WESLEY STEVENS

ou will recognize the subtitle of this address as a quotation fmm the Confesswm of St Augustine.' It is an inüigui~~g puzzle for him and fix uc that one may feel and measure periods of time, perhaps even understand Y

time, but also lack the concepts to explain if the right words to clari@ it The better to understand time, Aurelius Augustinus explored mind and memory in his Confessiones: 'Et intravi ad ipsius animi mei sedem, quae iUi est in memoria mea' ('And I entered into the inmost seat of my mind, which is in my memory'). The terms animus, sedes, mem hria were used to express the same.thoughts also in his De bainitafe, in in De civitate Dei, and in still other W& so often that one could be sure that for him 'The seat of mind is in the mem~ry'.~ He explored psychologid

' Confessiones, XL 14.17:

Quid est enim tempus? Quis hoc ad verbum de iilo pmfezendum vel cogitatione conprehendeiit? Quid autem EmiEarius et notiw in loquendo conmernoramus quam tempus: Et intellegimus utique, cum id loquimw, inteilegimus etiam, cum alio l p t e id audirnus.

See Saint Auguriin: Confessiom, ed. by Rem de Labrioile, 2 vols (Paris: Editions Les Beiies Letires, 1950) with Latin text and French translation. The best English transiation is Augusiine: Confesions and Enchiridion, ed. and trans. by Albert C. Outler, Li- of Christian Ciassics, 7 (Philadelphia: Westmkter Press, 1955). FRnch tmnsiations of this work quoted here are by de Labnoile; English trausiatiom are by Wer, or by the present author.

Some of ihese refezences are in the Cetpdoc L i b r q of Chriizian Latin Ta%, 1 (Tumhout: Brepols, 1991), the online Patrologia iurjna Databaie (Cambridge: Chadwyck-Healy, 1994), and Co>pur Augustiniamm GMseme, ed. by Comelio Mayer (Wbburg, 1979- ). For searches in those concordances, I am grateful tq Thema Vann, Hili Monastic Manuscript Library, St John's Abbey and University (CoilegeviIle, MN), Kevin Coyle, St P d University

10 WESLEY STEVENS

analogies by which the mind could apprehend ihe nature of GO^.^ On the other hand, he might also compare memoria witt venter, 'stomach', as a sort of depository of what is known by the rnind:

N m forte non pertinet ad animum? Quis hoc d ient? Nimirum ergo memoria quasi venter est animi, [. . .] Ridiculum est haec illis similia putare, nec tarnen sunt omni modo di~similia.~

(1s it possible that the memory does not belong to the mind? The memory douhtless is, so to say, the belly of the mind: [. . .] It is iidiculous to consider this an analogy; yet they are not untterly4e.)

.,3 $ , , \ 8 ;'!*-.?:., t< ,, , , L',,,. +

If that notion in his p r a y e f i Confessions seemed a little far-fetched, in 272e CiQ of God Augustine could also cianfy that:

Non enim ea sicut illa quae foris sunt uIlo sensu corporis tangimus, quorum sensibilium etiam ima,&es eis simillias nec iam corporeas cogitatione versamus, memoria tenemus?

(Ottawa), and Chrisuf Iaiüller (Wiirzburg), each of whom supplied more citations than I may include here.

De frinifate, X. 19: 'Mentem quippe ipsam in memona [. . .] reperiebamus'; and De m'nitate, XiV. 8: 'Ideoque etiam illis tiibus nominibus insinuandarn mentis putavimus tiinitatem: memoria, intellegentia, voluntate'. Etienne Gilson, Introduction c? I'izude de Saint Augustine, 3rd edn (Paris: Vrin, 1949), considered that for Augustine, memoria was an aspect of 'la vie 6e i ' h e ' (pp. 137-40). He also expressed the opinion in 1928 thai Augustine's concept of memoria was much ncher than that of modern psychologists (p. 135). This judgement would apply equally to the flood of boohs today which offer 'empirical research' to ascertain 'how such phenomena as suffering, violence, danger, boredom, exhilaration, concentrahon, shock, and novelty idiuence our perception of time', such as M. G. Flaherty, A Watched Pot: How Fe Experience Time (New York: New York University Press, [n-d.]).

4 Confessiones, X . 14. 21. Augustine was quite straightfonvard in his comparisons, whereas modern translators like to soften the resonances. For example: 'Without doubt, memory is something iiie a stomach for the mind; [. . .] It is ridiculous to consider these things similar, yet they are not entirely dissimilar', trans. by Vemon J. Bourke in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, Vol. 21 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1953).

De civifate Dei, XI . 26, e d by B. Dombart and A. Kalb, Corpus Scnptomm Ecciesiasticorum Latinorum, 40, 2 vols (Leipzig: Teubner, 1928-29; repr. Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, 47 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1955)). English transIation by Marcus Dods, in A SeIect Libraiy of Nicene und Post-Nicene Fafhers of the Christian Church, e b by Philip Schaff Vol. 2 (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1903). There are many other editions and tmsixtions of this work for example, tbis sentence was expressed by Gerald G. Walsh and Grace Monahan: 'In the case of such sensible things, the best we can do is to form v q close and immaterial images which help us to turn them over in our minds, to hold them

A Present Sense of Things Past I I

Thus, of all sensible objects, 'it is the images resembling them, but not themselves, which we perceive in the mind and hold in the memory'. This is the section in which he argues effectively that 'we both are and h o w that we are, and we love our existente and our knowledge of it'. When the academicians say, 'What if you should be deceived?', he answers, 'X7eU, if I am deceived, I exist', and 'I know that I am'.

I;ite City of God is a large work in twenty-four books begun by St Augustine in AD 413 and continued for at least fourteen years. The first ten books weno stirnulateci by questions about the etemal city, the great and ancient city of Rome that had falien to the Visigoths in 410. This led to the widespread dismay about long-established institutions wbich could be supposed to support a civilized way of life by raising the discussion to a higher level, both politicdy and philosophically. Of course Auggtine responded to the evident crisis, explaining that there is truiy an etemal city, but it is not Rome. The last books were completed ouly in 427, shortly before the bishop died on 8 August 430, as his episcopal seat at Hippo Regis (now Bona, Tunisia) was besieged by invaders-the Vandals whose troops had crossed £rom Spain into North Africa at the Piliars of Hercules and raged along the notbem shore of the Mediterranean Sea, defeating Roman armies whenever they met them.

Considering the current events in which Augustine lived and lost his life, one might wonder what sense it made for the man to be i h i g about 'time', or about 'memory', or about 'mind' and where to locate if. If the mind is seated in memory and functions in memory, does hat not undermine the reliability of ev-g we remember within the unstable flm of time? If so, every one of those shifty and shadowy events of bistory seems to lose its reality. A Roman could well resort to the discouraging remark of street-comer cynics: Tempus e h >-erum, 'T'ime the devourer of things'. While historians are irnmersed in mountains of documents written in almost indecipherable hands, and we find it difficult now to discover and explain what reaily .. happened at some past time, h -, wuld that be because what we iike to call 'facts' are only distant dreams of no signinincance, or because our interpretations of the past are merely in terms of our own guesses. Do our delayed suppositions recur merely in the repetition of a meaningless cycle of shadowy remembrances?'

in our memory', in Fathers of rhe Church: A New Translation, vol. i4 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of Amenca Press, 1952).

kn excelient, bnef swey is by Henri-Irinee Ivlarroq Saini Auewtin et mrgitinisme (?ans: Seuil, 1955), of urhich a part was translated into En&h as Sr kupstine and his InJzience Through the Ages, ed. by Patnck Hepburne-Scott and Edmund HilI (London: Longmans, 1956; New York: Harper, 1957). Marrou provided outlines of events before, during, and afrer Augdshne's lifetime anä a iist of his works with dates of their composition. See further his Saint A u ~ s t i n et Lar% de Ia eulture antique (These de doctorat es Iettres, Paris, 1937; 4th edn, Paxis: De Boccard, 1958), with his Retractaiio.

7 Both Chades N. Cochrane, Christianiw und CIossical CuIfure (Oxford: Oxford

12 WESLEY STEVENS

While the world swirled around hirn Augustine refiected upon memory, min4 and time. Throughout those long works, he was weighimg the arggents of Neoplatonists and rejecting their notions of time 'as a flux of shadowy f o m in which there can be no decisively novel e~en t s ' . ~ Rather, human history is not a dreamlike appearance, it is not what we guessed at or made up &om our private interests, an6 it is not a perpetual cycle of repetition. Time did not exist before the creation of the world. Though mind, memory, and time are not etemal, God is eternal. And God created the world, which we can h o w , so that nature and history are real. Thus, hurnan history can be known by the mind in memory. If we read Boolc XI of the Confessiones again, it wouid almost seem that current events have receded from bis thoughts, as the author concentrated on time as a function of the Creation, taking up and turning over and looking at almost everything which has ever been said and could ever be said about time, logically and epistemologically?

The tempus of which Augustine spoke was the past, the present, and the future of existing thuigs and Iiving beings fiom beghning to end. As created things could be lified and dropped, weighed and measured, split up or moulded together, so their existente in time couid be measured, and events in time could be anticipated, experienced, and remembered Ah! Here we have returned to the human mind grasping for and perhaps not yet quite understanding its own experience. How does the mind go about understanding the series of events in time? It digs into memory. Mind iinds and comprehends the iimited memory of personal experience; the longer memory of family through three generations; the richer, wider, and longer memory of society which sometimes has lefi records or at least monuments, however partial and decrepit. The mind works to make sense of thuigs in the present, but it will

University Press, 1944), and Gerhard Ladner, The Idea of Refonn (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1959), gave very ihorough surveys and critiques of Neoplatonic, Manichaean, aiid other Systems of ideas encountered by thoughtfui people during this penod and Au-mtine's attempts to gain acknowledgement of the logical reality of both past and current events and the epistemological failures of contrary notions.

A useful discussion is by WiUiam A. Christian, 'The Creation of the World', in A Companion to fhe Study of Saint Aupsfine, ed. by Roy.Mr. Battenhoue OJew York: Oxford University Press, 1955).

For analyses of Confessiones, M, see Robert Jordan, 'Time and Contingency in St Augustine', Review of Mefaphysics, 8 (1954-55), 394-417 (repr. in Auewfine: A Coilection of Critical Essays, e d by R A. Markus (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, I972), pp. 255-79); and Hugh M. Lacey, 'Empiricism and Au,mtine's Problems about Time', Review of Meiaphysics, 22 (1968), 219-45 (repr. in Markus, Augusfine, pp. 260-308); Kurt Flasch, PJas ¿F Zeit? Augusiinus von Hippo: Das X. Buch der Conf~siones. Historisch-philosophische Studie. Text-Übersetzung-Kommentar (Fra- 1993); Christof Müller, G e s c h i c h f s b t i bei Augstinus. Onfologische, anihropologische und universalgeschichtlich/heilgeschichdiche Elemente einer augusrinischen ,Geschichtstheorie: Res et Signa. Gießener Augustinus- Studien, Cassiciacum, 39,2 (Wbbwg, 1993).

A Present Sense of Things Past 13

surely not function well if it only starts to think at this moment witbout the memory of a pasr and without the expectation of a füture. For the mind is created and thulks in time.

Augustine a f h e d that he could not defme mind or time. But in order to understand either of them, he um led into memory by piesent experience. n e r e are three times in our souls and our rninds: 'The time present of things pzst is memoria; the time present of rhuigs present is contuifus; the time present of things future is expectatio'.1° Thus, those three-memory, direct expenence, expectation-are all present now in the mind. This present time has extension and can be measured, just as the sound of a sina&ng voice can be measured by time," and the motions of sun and moon can be measured by time, not vice versa." Otherwise, we do not hear or see at all. 'For the mind expects, it attends, and it remembers. [. . .] Our attention hzs continui~.."~

It is in this sense of reflections stimulated by Augustine that I should iike to tell you a story of how stones depend upon the stsucture of calendars and especiaily

lo Confessiones, XI. 20. 26: 'Sunt enim haec in anima tria quaedam et alibi es non video, praesens de praeteritis memona, praesens de praesentibus contuitus, praesens de futuris expectatio'.

11 Confessiones, XI. 26. 33:

Nonne tibi comfeku anima mea confessione veridica metiri me tempora? Itane, domine deus meus, metior [. . .I An tempore breviore metimur longius sicut spatio cubiti spatium transtri? Sic enim videmur spatio brevis syllabae metiri spanum longae syllabae atque id duplum dicere;

Confessiones, XI. 26. 34: 'Ecce puta vox corporis incipit sonare et sonat et adhuc sonat et ecce desi.net, iamque silentium est, [. . .] Cum autem h i t a fuerii, iam non erit'; CoPiJessiones, X. 26.35: 'sed aliquid in memoria mea metior quod infixum manet'.

I2 ConJessiones, XI. 23. 29-30: 'Kemo ergo mihi dicat caelestium motus esse tempora'; Confessiones, XI. 24.3 1: 'Non est ergo kmpus corpons motus'.

l3 Confkssiones, Xi. 27. 36: 'In te, anime meus, tempora metior. [. . .] Affectionem, quam res praetereuntes in te faciunt er, cum iiiae praeterierint, manet [m memona], ipsam metior praesentem, non ea quae praeteriemt, ut fieret; ipsam metior, cum tempora metior'; Confasiones, XI. 28. 37:

Sed quomodo [. . .] nisi in animo, qui iiiud agit, tria sunt? Nam et expectat et adtendit et meminit, ut id quod expectat per id quod adtendit iranseat in quod meminerit [. . .] tamen est adhuc in animo memona praetentorum. [. . .] tamen perdurat attentio, per quarn pergat abesse quod aderit.

See fixther the thorough and thoughtful study of Awstine's Statements as continuity in historical consciousness by Richard Corradini, Zeit und Text. Siudien zum tempus-Beemydes Augustinus, Veröffeniiichungen des Instituts fur Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 33 (Wien: Oldenbourg, 1997): 'Ein Text ist immer eine Relationsbeschreibung' @. 12); 'In Zentrum dieser Arbeit stehen also nicht der Zeit- und Geschichtsbegriff des Au,pstinus, sondern die diskursiven Formationen, die "Menge voii Formulieningsakten'" @. 14).

14 WESLEY STEVENS

about some efforts to bring memories into a new structure: the Western calendar. In order to do so, I shall have to probe your memory and perhaps add data that you should recail in making present sense of things past.

Those who created calendars long ago were measuring time intefligently. Cm anyone make a calendar that will last as it should without measuring lunar and solar cycles? Can anyone make a calendar work now as it should without organized reflection on both past and future events? Quid est enim tempus? Philosophen and theologians like to talk about mind, and about time, but not about memory. Sociologists and psychologists like to taUr aboui subjective expenence of duration as compressed or protracted, as hombIe or boring or exhilarating, but not as the occurrence of events or of periods. Au9stine was more than their master in analysis of such feelings. Quid est enim iempus? It is historians who face this question directly and effectively when they explore personal, familial, and common memory and foiiow Augustine, usually without realizing it; it is paiaeographers tuming the leaves of old documents; it is archaeologists stirring around in piles of dead bones and living stones. But I must warn you that 'Disturbing the dead is a grave proposition, indeed'.14

Annals and chronicles of natural and historid events provide most historians with a structure within which we can work; we then proceed to fiU in the bianks and call it history. Sometimes we change the structure, in order to bring a new perspective on the past. But medieval annals were very bnef, and many appear at first to have been haphazard notations made directIy onto the spaces in twelve-month calendars or onto long lists of years taken Iiom data tables of the 19-year lunar cycles. The earliest medieval cbronicies are usually paramphs written more fully to describe a very few activities which had only been mentioned, and perhaps even overlooked, in the earlier annals. It would seem that those calendars must stand at the head of the senes of sources that provide the structure for our history of the past

It is not only medieval history that came into being that way. Cicero dedicated a Liber annalis to his f?iend and Sponsor, Atticus, though that work has not survived. The Roman histories of Livius and Tacitus show very clearly that they drew information from earlier annals and chronicles before the authors sevched archives, interviewed participants occasionalIy, and then created narratives; the chronicles they used were themselves buiit upon diverse annals. It is the diversity of tl3ose earliest annals which raises the question that I wish to place before you: withi annals and chronicles, can we trust the dates? As usual, we must answer both yes and no.

14 Agatha Christie in her introduction to an adventure of Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie's Eg~pt. The primaq reference of this double entendre is to archaeological excavation.

A Present Sense of Things Pas1 15

We historians raise questions about ali of our sources, as we attempt to ve* the information received But we usualIy do not investigate the calendrical assumptions of those annals or the stnicture of the Western calendar itseif, in which dates are entered or upon which they depend. the Passage of time however, the structures of calendars themselves have changed. What structures support calendars? . Each one required a computus behind it, in it, and aro'md it Without a computm explaining how it is organized and how it functions £rom day to day, from year to year, a calendar may not work at alI; or, it may give dates we cannot comprehend.

When medievai annals, chronicles, charters or tax roUs are dated for exarnple on the Ides of March in the year 45 BC, ure shouid know immediately that something is wrong. The ides of a month was a Roman usage, whereas no reckoning of years BC Qefore Christ) is known until Denis Petau began to count back in those terms alter 1611. Therefore, a document dated to the Ides of March 45 BC cannot be Roman, and a medieval copy of it cannot be trusted: it is certainly false. If however we find the year given as anno ab urbe condifa DCCVIII, at least it is a Roman year such as used by Livius, Tacitus, or Beda venerabilis. But should we believe that 708 years after the founding of Rome corresponds with forty-five years before the Incarnation, in the terms of which aIl of us now work? Yet, a new variable is thereby introduced. The counting of years in terms of aera Incarnation~ was itself a neur structure with reference to the birth of Jesus Christ, invented only in the sixth century of our era by Dionysius Exiguus.

The earliest Cnnstians celebrated the Day of Passion and then calculated the Day of Resurrection thereafter. Of Course tbey used tbe local calendars in the areas of the Meditenanean world in which they iived, and it should not be surprising that they couid not at first agree on the day of the Passion, whether it was on the vemal equinox, nor whether the Resurrection couid be remembered and celebrated on or before or after the equinox. When Victurius, the caimlafov scrupulosus of '. " Aquitaine, was asked to solve the difficulties o f̂ &e Roman bishops in setting the date for Easter Sunday during the fifth century, he accepted the Day of Passion as a date agreed between Rome and Alexandria; and he then adjusted Alexandrian time series to Roman convenience in his year 455. He also identified his annzlr Passionis in terms of anni Mundi but without reference to the birth of Christ. It is uncertain whether the Victurian time series was ever used in Rome, though it was put into practice by some churches in Roman Gaul.15

It was not an Alexandrian or a Roman bishop who took the birth of Christ as a

1s The severai dating Systems created by early Christians bave been studied often. A convenient surnmaxy of lhem is by Wesley M. Stevens, 'Cycles of Time: Calendncal znd Astrooornical Reclconings in Early Scieoce', in Time und Process: the Siu& of Time ViJ ed. by J. T. Fraser and L. Rowell (Madison, CN: InternationaI Universihes Press, 1993; repr. in Cycles of Time and Scient*~ Learning in hedieval Europe (Aldershot: Ashgte, 1995), item I), pp. 27-51. See also Georges Deciercq, Anno Domini: The Urigins of fhe Christian Ern Oumhout: Brepols, 2000).

16 WESLEY STEVENS

beginning point for a sequence of years. It was Dionysius Exiguus, a Scythian scholar working in Rome on the acts of church councils. By the year we call525, he could propose an adaptation of the Alexandrian dating system to local Roman conditions that commenced the year count with the birth of Christ, and thus was created the aera Incarnationis. This system was accepted and explained in Northumbna by the monk Bede urho wrote the clearest explanations in 703 and 725

-"l?i

and who applied it in 731 to his history of the conversion of Angles and Saxons in England to Christianity. Very few people acknowledged the system of Dionysius until it um taken up by Bede. Rather, the whole world learned the aera Incarnationis from Bede, ,gaduaIly and reluctantly giving up other time senes in favour of his innovation. Now that Bede's great work De ternpomrn ratione is available in English,I6 it will be more easily consulted.

It is a wonder that the time series of Victunus of Aquitaine was commissioned about 455 by Kilanis, an officer of the Roman curia, but was not accepied by the mria of Leo the Great (44M1) and probably not by Hilarus when he himself became bishop (46148), or by any bishop of the Roman civitm, so far as we

X know, Similarly, the time series of Dionysius Exiguus was created by a scholar in the - Roman curia and recommended by the primicarius notariontrn of that Court but, so far as the evidence allows, it was not accepted there. The time series of Beda venerabilis however was created and published in 703 and again in 725 at the far end of the world; most bishops and abbots of Latin Europe had accepred it and used it long before it fuially came into use in Rome during the tenth century de facto. Until it was revised slightly and issued by Pope Gregory Xm in 1583, the systems of Dionysius and of Bede had prevailed in Rome for several centaies but had no oEcia1 status. As you know, it was still a long time aftemards before the Gregorian revision was adapted in diverse parts of Europe, a situation which creates endless problems for historians today who want to use documents which survive from the intewening periods. But it seems that dates create diffcuities in every period as to what exactly they meant in their own times and with what days, months, and years they might correspond today.

Every set of annals, and each chronicle, depends upon a twelve-month calendar and a long year count. Unfortunately a twelve-month calendar might begin with September or with January or with March; and a long year count could be enumerated diversely, as Camlingian scholars discovered. We must know their systems, which time series they assume and which beginniig of the year, in order to understand the dates in a calendar that was used for annais or for a chronicle. Without that, we cannot know where we are, or when they were.

l6 Bede: 17ie Reckoning of Time, trans. with introduction, notes and commentaty by Fa& Wallis, Translated Texts for Historians, 29 (Liverpool: Liverpool Universiv Press, 1999).

A Present Sense of Things Past

It is the nature of a calendar to require expertise for its effective me. The long development of the Western calendar demonstrates a scholarly tradition i?om the second to the sixteenth century in which lunar cycles and solar cycles were descnbed and coordinated. Cycles of 8, 11, 16, or 19 years were conceived in order to provide the stability of a calendar based in narural phenomena of the Creation. For these purposes, there were also well-conceived cycIes of 28, 56, 59, 76, 84, 95, one 112, and even 532 years.

In every case for such cycles to be used, tables must be created by which the data senes could be kept in phase during the full Course of the cycle. With the R7estem calendar users were satisfied only if farmers CO-dd keep up with the seasons, Jews codd keep up with lunar months and seven weekdays, Romans could have their solar years with alternating thirty and thirty-one day months, Egyptians could have their leap years: and Christians scattered amongst aii those peoples couid celebrate the Passion of Christ and his Resurrection &er the vemal equinox.

Scholars who conceived of a calendar cycle had to provide tables for days of the week and for days of the month each year in succession for fulfilment of those user needs. Therefore, they formulated tables with data for their time senes and weni further to write bnef paragmphs of explanation; that is, formlrlae or arpmenta puschalis, so that a reader codd apply the colurnns of data to make the cycles wo& The fiftt-century Victurian 19-year table is accompanied by such explanations. The sixth-century Dionysian 19-year table has with it nine argumenta explaining how to apply each of the nine colunuis of data. The eighth-century table of Bede was adapted from the Dionysian one, but Bede's application was different; in order io use the Bedan tables of data, you must have his own explanations or else you wiii soon get into difficulties.

Those scholars must hzve spent much time with instruction for sIow learners. But for the use of experis, they also had to address those occasional variants within every System, such as short months, embolismic years, and salius Zunae which were too technical and would only confuse most users of data tables. Thus, they provided codes and fixther explanations by which their data could be adjusted to variants in time senes. In consequence, there were many teachers of computus in Carolingian schools, and a geat literature was generated for computisfica. It is an area of study

L . %

that rnisleadingIy seems close to common sense &d thus easy to gmsp, but which actually is highly complex and requires systematic training, expenence, and understanding.

LS'ESLEY STEVENS

One of the most important teachers in the history of Europe is Ealhwine of York (C. 735-804), commonly called Alcuin by the Fr&, or Horatius in table talk at Charlemagne's court, or Albinus as he himself sometimes preferred. He personally gave a geat stimuius to the new cumcula of Carolingian schools, including study of

/-L-/ L, computus. Coqputistica includes everything having to do with reckoning, but especially c2enda.r reckoning. Ealhwine understood the compufus in the terms of ~ e d e , and he brought many paschal tabIes and tracts with him to Charlemagne's seat at Heristal. From these computistical materials, he formed a LibelZus annalis which was then used in the court schools of Heristal and Aachen, the momstic schools of

- Tours, St Denis, Köln, St Amand, Salzburg, Reichenau, St Gallen, FuIda, and those / of many other monasteries and cathedrals which were able to respond to the royal

mandata. Today, we speak of the arfes liberales, of trivium and quadrivium. But it is actually quite difficult to describe the studies in monastic schools under those terms. It wouid be closer to the evidence to speak of physica, logica, and ethica, or of - gammatica, cantica, and compgtlstica, as many did at that time. Such terms are nearer to the language of the Admonitio generalis (786-800) and the Episfola de litferis colendis (794-800) issued by command of Chariemagne." They did insist on the study of computus.

Ealhwine had the reputation of being a n effective teacher. But evidence for bis teaching in disciplines requiring reckoning has seemed to be rather scarce, though not superficial. In addition to his contributions to the two mandafa issued by Charlemagne, we may cite:

1. Propositiones ad accuendos iuvenes; 2. Calculatio Albini Magistri; 3. Three works on computus:

a. Liber de bissexfo, b. Liber de cursu lunae, C. Liber de saltu lunae;

4. Five letters to Chariernagne about eciipses, comets, and calendars.

Anthmetic and algebraic problems in the Propositiones were intended for be,&ers, and the s'mdents were expected to advance step by step to the nore di%cult level~.'~

17 These Patterns have been reviewed by Stevens most recentIy in 'KaroIingsche renovatio in Wissenschaften und Literatur', in Kunsi und Kultur der Karolingerzeit, Ergämmssband des Katalogs zur Austellung, 799: Kar1 der Grosse und Papst Leo 111. in Paderbom (Mainz: von Zabem, 1999), pp. 662-80.

18 Mensa Falkerts, 'Die Alcuin zugeschriebenen Propositiones ad acuendos iuvenes', in

A Presenf Sense ofTh»lgs Past 19

The computistical tracts appear to contain simple instruction on how to apply the Bedan teaching about the bisse& or Ieap year, the 19-year cycle, and the lunar day which musi be skipped at the end of such a cycle: salrus Iunae. Such evidence does not show that Ealwhine had anythmg new io contribute to any of these subjects, but it does show his intelligent abiIity to formulate questions clearly, and io answer rhem in a manner that would stimulate students and readers. For several years, Charlemagne himself was one of those students.

From surviving Ietters there is more to be learned, as has been explained recently by Amo Borst and Dietrich Lorhmann.lg Having introduced the study of c o m p u u or time-reckoning inio Charles's directions for schools, Ealwhine had also promised to provide a compendium of t~acts, W e s , and formulae for support of its study. He then moved to Tours and presumably into retirement without having done so. Nevertheless, CharIes put pressure on him to produce Libellus annalis for this purpose. Later in Aachen, about 830, Walahfrid Strabo found and used such a book which he named Liber de Albino Magisrro. That book has not yet been i

identified with certainty, but tbere are severai good candidates: a Phillipps '

manuscript in BerlinZo and two manuscripts of the Palatinus latinus collection in the Vatican Iibrary." Among the numerous computistical tracts in these compendia, each con tak the Calculatio Albini ldagismm that gives computistical instruction in the manner of Bede. That is a text writien by Eaixx~hiue but one ignored by virtually all historians. FutLher compuristica1 mcts and fonnulae in folios 49-59" of the

Science in Western und Easfern Civilimtion in Carolingiim Times, ed. by P. L. Butzer and D. hhrmann (Basel: Birl<hauser, 1993), pp. 273-81; 'Die AIcuin zugeschriebenen Propositiones nd ncuendos iuvenes (Aufgaben zur Scharfung des Geistes der Jugend): lateinischer Text und deutsche Übersetzung', ed. by Heimut Gericke arid M. Folkerts, in B~tzer and Lohrmann, Science in Wesfern undErnfern Civifizafion, pp. 283-362.

l9 A. Borsi, 'kicuin und die Enzykiopädie von 809', in Butzer änd Lohrmann, Science in Western und E- Civilization, pp. 53-78; and D. Lohrmann, 'Alcuins Korrespondenz mit Karl dem Großen über Kalender und Astronomie', in Butzer and Lohrmam, Science in Western and Eastern Civiiization, pp. 79-1 14.

20 Berlin, Staatsbiblioihek, Preußischen Kulturbesitz, MS Phiilipps -_,--.."I 183L [Cat. '1281 (Verom C. 800) fols 122-25', pari of a Liber anmiis (fols 116-25").

21 Ci& del Vaticano, Biblioteca hpstofica Vaticanz @ d e r BAV), Palatinus 1atinu.s MS 1448 -. ---.X...-

(Tner, Mainz s.lX %), fols 62-82; and BAV, Pd. lat. MS 1447 (St A l b a Mainz s.M1), fols 8-19, 22-30. The codex BAV, Pal. Iat MS I448 contains a large collection of 26 computisricd ttacts which were used quite early m the nintb century at Tner and at Lorsch, one patl with 51 folios is named Libellus Anmzlis and is imoduced by Verses written by Ealwhine. She second codex now in tbe same library but copied far use at Mainz, BAV, Pd. lat. MS 1447 (s.IX1), is another collection of 21 computistical tracts in four parts, also headed LibeZlus Annalis. The CaInrlatio Afbini iMuO$stri is in bolb these manuscnpts, and fkom them we may be able to describe more accurately Ealwhine's interests and his teaching of compufus.

20 WESLEY STEVENS

Phillipps manuscript give dates for 758, 764, 777, and 793. In order to illustrate the application of JormuZae to tables of data, they use repeatedly the annus praesens 793 the last year of Ealwhine's activity in York and the year of his Settlement in the - tourt of Charles in HeristaL well before Aachen had been developed as a royal seat Some of the same matenals and dates are zisc found in the Vatican manuscnpts, and they could show some of Ealwhine's teaching and applications in Heristal, Aachen, and Tonrs; in these manuscripts the Users have often introduced Iater dates into the formulae. Similar compendia were copied and expanded for teachuig computus in Corbie and later in Corvey, St Riquier, Würzbnrg, Mainz, and many other schools in the niqth century. These books display the normal Pattern of development in an important scholarly discipline.

For example, in the Phillipps manusaipt is a bnef tract De bissexto libellw which was probabIy of Irish an,&, but it had been used in the school of Bede and was h o w n also at York; Ealwhine then brought it to the continent and used it in correspondence with Charles. His own adaptation of it is caUed Liber de bissexio in the Vatican manuscnpts. On the other hand, the tract De salht Iunae may have been brought with him fiom York, but it does not correspond either with the work of Bede or with Ealwhine's discussion of the salhts with Charles. Its presence in these collections has a different purpose, and it may help us to understand the situation Ealwhine faced in Francia. Some advisers to Charlemagne wanted to observe the saltus lunae in March - rather than in ,._..... November _as_,Bede advised and Ealwhine insisted; '-.~ .. .~. . , and this probably means that they begaieach year in March, but well aftk the lunar day had been skipped. Ealwhine argued that placing the saZrus in I\/Iarch for a 19-year table would shiff Easter Sunday to a new date, and not rnerely by a single day. Because of the consequent change in coordination of lunar and solar cycles, aii dates of Easter would be changed in the following years, as well as the coordination of weekdays with numbered days of the months throughout every year thereafter. The number of each year would be changed in the calendar sequence. Any one of those factors would cause difficulty in a calendar, but together there wouId be total confusion, not to be wished upon any court or people.

But his warning was not heeded and the Bedan computus was opposed. The opposition was strong and influential. Amongst Charlemagne's advisers, there were quite senous controversies about time series, about formuloe for application of dating Systems. and thus about our sources for narrative history in calendars, annals, and chronicles." The codex Vatican, Palatinus latinus, ?vfSsL48 contains a lwge collection of twenty-six computistical tracts which were used quite early at Trier and at Lorsch; one part with Efty-one folios is named Libellus annalis and is introduced by the verses written by Ealwhine: 'Me legat, annales vult qui cognoscere ciclos,

22 lvlany of those controversies havs been explained recentiy by Amo Borst, Die karolingische Knlendemefonn, Monuments Gennaniae Historica, Schiften, 46 (Hannover: Hahn'sche Buchhandlung, 1998), as well as by Charles W. Jones, by Stevens, 'Cycles of Time', and Declercq, Anno Domini.

A Presenf Sense of Things Pasf 21

Tempora qui varia, qui simul astra pol? ('Let him read me who wishes to know the mual cycies of years, the chan,&g seasons, together wicith the pole stars'). The second codex is another collection of twenty-one computistical tracts in fow p- which is also headed, LibelZus annalis; it was copied for use at Mainz, though it was also biought eventually io the Vatican Libraxy, Palatinus latinus MS 1447. in both of these manusaipts is the Cdculatio AIbini Magisstpi, and fkom those MO collections we may be able to describe more accurately Ealwhine's interests and his teaching of c o m p u ~ .

The Lectiones -. .................. sive Reoulae ..o ..................... Compufand? ................... will illusirate the pupose and organization of various Sets of these caiendar fomrslae. The Lectiones were probabiy conceived in 760 but revised in ,:~~ 800, . and applied again in 801 by anonymous polemicist. They have four dishct parts: Part k is a tabülä ppaschalis that provides twelve data sets with twenty-eight lines each for the concurrenfes, which cooidinate with re-dars and epacts. These are some of the technicai t e m used for this table:"

Regulares secundum feriam, Regulares adsolares, Regulares adfiriam dividendm, Regulares adpascha conpüfanda, Regulares ad Imam, Epactar, lunae.

Part B is especially interesting because the author was using the Dionysian table, but he has also compared it with the Victurian data and with data f?om the Greelcs at Alexandria whom he called 'Egyptians'. klthough he accepted Bede's aera Incarnationis, in Part C he rejected Bede's annur Mundi 3952 which that venerabie monk had used as equivalent to the year of Christ's birth. Rather, this writer affirmed that the annus Mündi 5199 as used by Eusebius, Jerome, and Orosius was the proper historical refeience to the beginning of the aera Incarnationis. Part D of the Lecfiones is headed Calculatio and provided not the nine formlrlae for a Dionysian

23 Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, MS Weißenbnrg 91 (s.M in), fols 96"-97 K ö h DombibIothek, LXXZP (I(öInc. 805), fok 59-61'; ~%,~ib$oth~nationale d e ~ m c e (BNF), MS -.- Lat. 2796 . (%3<-fÖigz?-49; Bem, Burgerbibliothek, MS 417 ................ (s.iX1), fols 2Iv-22; Karlsruhe, Badische tandesbibliothek, MS Aug. CLXVII .......-..... Perg. ~ - & ~ ~ - - (s.iX1),fols 612; Geneva, Bibliotheque universitake, MS Lat. 50 ( s .h second quarter), fols 168-70; Paris, Bibliotheque nationale, MS Lai,,l,z4'_lc. 543), fol. 1": selections; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Digby 63 (862-92); fols 24-26; München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek MS c h I0270 ---'--- ( s . a , tol. 11; London, British Library, MS Harley 3017 (s.iX2), .... fols 143-49; EI Esconal, Real Mnasterio de San Lorenzo, MS 1.iII.8 (s.M ex), fols 165'46".

- ..

A detailed study of the Lectiones has been prepared by Richard Corraaini (Wien) and is forthcoming.

24 These terms are explained by Jones, Stevens, Borst, Wallis, Declercq, arid Corradini.

22 WESLEY STEVENS

table but ten paragraphs explaining how to use a Bedan table. This is a si,dcant differente which has rarely been taken into account. Those modern masters who read medieval chronicles should hope that they were written by early masters who accepted and used the fomülae of Bede, or at least thoseJ'imu2ae in the Lecfiones sive Replae Computandi in its version of 801.

As I mentioned, a twelve-month calendar may have a beginning of the year in September, January, or March. September was favoured by 'Egyptians', that is to say, Greek-speaking Christians in Alexandria whose practices also inciuded the use of imperial indictioris and imperial years, followed by Dionysius and cited at the Frankish CO- January was favoured by the 'Romans', those Christians within the Roman civitas, whose practices also included other aspects of the Julian calendar; March was favoured by some Frankish scholars in Mea, Aachen, Corbie and other infiuential centres. Egyptian, Roman, and Frankish years as well as Victurian, Dionysian, and Bedan time senes can be found in documents of the Lectiones which reflect conb-ovenies amongst scholars in the Carolingian schools. In particular they reveal questions about reckoning the times that Ealwhine and Charles f rs t agreed upon during the years 794 and 796, but about which they Iaier disagreed during the years 797-800. After Ealwhine went &om Heristal to Tours, Charles was listening more to other advisers who favoured 'Egyptian' and Greek time senes and rejected those k o n that outlandish region we call Northumbria. Nine manuscripts of the

' Leciiones have been identified, of which one of the earliest was transcribed about 805 in thr cathedral scnptonum of Hildebald, Chancellor for Charlemagne and krcbbishop of Köln, along with twenty-five earlier computistical tracts and thuty- five f ~ m u l a e ; ~ ~ another copy is £rom MittelZell on the Reichenau in the eariy ninth century, also with much earlier Iiterature and forty f ~ r n l a e . ~ ~ We should not be far wrong to estimate that well over fifty copies of each were circulating among Carolingian schools. Those questions were not settied easily, if ever.

After Ealwhiie's death in 804, it seemed unlikely that the Bedan calendar would be accepted in the Caroligian empire or, if it were, that it would be used as intended. Fuaher evidence of such activity is found in the great compendia that bear the dates of 807,808,809, and 810. These are materials from Aachen and from St Amand, as

25 Köln, Dombibliothek, MS LXXXn12 (Köln, c. 805). fols 59-6iv, with additional computistical argumenta on foIs 62-69; see Borst, 'Alcuin und die Enzyklopädie', pp. 186 passim.

26 Karisruhe, Badische Landesbibliothek MS .4ug. CLXTiII Perg. weichem& 834-48), fok 6-9. In recent years, this manuscript has been dated vaiousIy s.M1, s.M med, and 848 with reference to specific texrs. For example, F. F. Heinzer 'Zur Datierung des Karlsruher Beda (Aug. CLXVn)', Scriptoriurn, 37 (1983), 239-41 and plate 23.

A Presenf Sense of Things Past 23

weil as &om Corbie, Metz, Salzburg, and St Denis. You may recall Ad.alhard .. .....*.. L. :,>.. (752-826), the nephew and counsellor of

Charlemagne, who was banned to Noimnoutier by Ludwig der Fromme but was later released and served as Abbot of Corbie during the last two decades of his life. Adalhard was responsible for an assembly of .............. instnic.0~~ in compuhrs; it was a workshop for those trained or who needed training in this discipline. Partial resultc s w i v e in ,.-,,>%=>. five manuscnpts as questions and answers, and some of the answers are stated as unsatisfactory by the scribe." They give examples for applying data f?om paschai tables in years 808, 809, and 810, and there are very many computistical aPgumenta that used those years for their examples of reckoning. Both in preparation for and in consequence of those public discussions, several large compendia were produced which I call Compilafio &-.- ........ . . . . comp.$istica.~et astronomica AD DCCCWII.

The first of these compendia with 162 folios in threebooks .. .-i..- must have had its ori=.in in Aachen and now survives in two manuscripts: one f?om the region of northwest Aus t ia perhaps having been transcribed at Salzburg; and a copy of it ;,

made in the sniptoniun of St E m m e m at Regen~burg.~~ Tbis Compilatio includes a ..)

senes of coordinated datings: the forty-second year of Charles's r e i s and his ninth year as emperor, the second imperial indiction, and annm Mundi 4761, all of which fit annus Domini 808, or 809 if you accept the Bedan annus Mundi 3952 as equivalent with the &st year of t5e aera Incamationis. Nevertheless, some dates in that compendium had ah-eady been changed to annus Mundi 4762 or annzs Domini 810 before it came to SaJzburg (Wien, Österreichische Nationaibibliothek, MS Lat 387, fols 4-165). Further cha&ges were made to annus Domini 818 and the eleventh indiction by the time a copy was made for the library of St Emineram in Regensburg (F&nchen, Bayerische Staaisbibliothek, MS CLM 210). Ninety-nine chapters of Book One include excemts fkom fomi-seven of the &st skb--five chapters of Bedae

&

De tempomm ratione, the ones which give workhg explanations for basic problems in understanding and applying the data series &om Bedan Easter tables, including his more sophisticated chapters." The copy now at Wien aIso shows dates that were

27 Paris, BhT, MS N.a.lat. 1613 (s.M1), fols 20-20'; Paris, BNF, MS N.a.lat. 1615 (C.

830), fols 143"-MV; Paris, BNF, MS Lat.2796, Part I1 (s.l[X), fols 98-99; Oxford, Bod. Lib., MS Bodley 309 (sXP), fols 141-41"; Bruxelles, Bibliotheque Royale, MS 9590 (s.X ex), fok 5536"; ed. by E. Dummler, Monrunenta Germania Histonca, Epistolae, 4 (1895), pp. 24-26; English translation by C. W. Jones, 'An Early Medieval Licensing Examination',

i Hisioqi of Educ&.on Quarter@, 3 (1963), 24-26; but its dialogue form does not indice ,F_ ,:, ......... ......... exarnination. "$,.

'8 Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek (Öh%), MS Lat 387 (8!&16), fols 4-163', mitten in northwestem Austia and perhaps at Salzburg; München, Bay. ~taatsbikd, MS clm 210 (812-18), iols 4-165. The laiter was probabiy copied diiectly from Wien, Öh%, MS Lat. 387, rather than from a common exemplar.

29 Wien, ÖNB, MS Lat 387, especially fol. 16: Bedae, De temporum ratione, XIX; ~ O I S 5gV-61: XX; ~ O I S 68'=71~: XXIV, XXITI, XVII, xvm; ~ O I S 7s"-74-: XXXVLII,

24 WESLEY STEVENS

erased and altered for annw Mundi 4783, and annus Domini 830 when it was beiig studied. Book Two contains wen-illustrated astronomy, including materials fiom the Historia naturalis of Plinius Sec~ndus.3~ Book Three is Bede's early work De natura rerurn, to which are added two more tables and further arpmenta prwchalis. h d there are numerous selections fiom other computistical tracts, tables, and fomulae of diverse origgs and divergent contents. This was a source for studies in the schools.

An even larger Compilatio in seven books was made between 812 and 820; : it has some of the Same material but is reorganized according to subje& matter.

About half of the argumenta pmchallr were omitted and the number of selections kom Bede increased. A new Book Six. c o n b excerpts kom Macrobius and

h ,. ,.,

paraphrases kom Martianus Capella, pethaps ihe eariiest use of those two authors yet identified in Carolingian schools. The astronomical diagrams have been improved. For example, Book Five, secnon 10 provides a list of eclipses reported for years 760, 764, 787, 807, two for 810, one for 81 1, and another for 812, all of which could have been seen in the region of Aachen, St Amand, and Stavelot. That grezt campendium is known now ins& manuscripts,3' of which the earliest may be dated 820* Ivfany additional manuscnpts contain large excerpts of both compendia.

. .. Ealwhine's work in this field gave an emphasis to omputistica ,... .. and thus supported the study of arhonomia in Carohgian schools which cont&ed during the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries. The h i t s of ori,oinality are evident especially in their rilusbztions of planetary orbits eccentric to the Earth?2 Emphasis

XXXM, XLI incomplete; fols 77-78": XLII; fols 79"-82: X=, fols 85-91: V-XiV incomplete; foIs 92-94: XVI, XXV, XJCW incomplete; fols 95-1 12: XXVm-XXX, XLIU- XLVIII, L, LEI, LV-LVI, LXI-LXVI.

30 Arno Borst, Das Buch der N ~ e s c h i c h i e . Plinim undseine Leser im Zeadier des Pergamenis, Abhancihmgen da Heidekrp Algdeanie de Ur-- phil-hist fClasse 194Q (Heide- Wmtez, 1994); rev. edn 1995, ch. V/]: 'Arithmetische Zuspitnmg: SaJzburger Kompiiation', esp. pp. 166-76.

" Monza, Biblioteca Cornrnunaie, MS F.91176 (bubach A.D. 869), fols 7-92"; Paris, BNF, MS La~12117 (1031-60), fok 168-83; Paris, BNF, MS K . ~ l a t 456 (s.ZLX), fols 1G137, 173-89; Vatican, BAV, MS Lat.645 (St Quentin s.IXZ), fols 12-92"; Vatican, BAV, MS Regin. lat 309 (St Denis s.TX), fols 4"-120. Alihough Madrid, BibIioteca National, MS 3307

! F.953 (82040), fols 5-76' has often been cited from secondary sources, I have not been - i / able to confimi its contents, date, or provenance wetz?), either in sitrt or on microfilm. -. . .. -.. . .~ .. ...~....

32 The essays by Bmce S. Eastwood are important in recovery of astronomical studies d d g this period; for example: 'CosmoIogy, astronomy, arithrnetic, and geometry', in Cambridge Hisfory of Science, eds. David Lindberg and IIvrchael Shank, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 11: The Middk &es, ch.14; and Bnice S. Eastwood, 'Planetary Diagams-Descriptions, Models, Theories: from Carolingian Deployments to Copemican Debates', Max-Plank-Institut fk Wissenschaftsgeschichte~ Preprint 132 (2000), 47pp.; both Papers are well illustrated

hogress in this m e n t research has been summarized and uiterpreted by Wesiey Stevens,

A Presenf Sense of372ings Past 25

on computus and astronornia Iater continued to control cunicula for bachelors at the universities of Paris and Oxford during the tWeLfth to fourteenth centuries, as attested by manuscript collections of schoofbooks f?om those ~niversit ies.~~ If you ask why the compufus of Bede came eventually to dominate calenders for several centuries when it seems to have been unEnown to the curia of Rome and was vigorously opposed by the Court of Charlemagne, I believe that the only answer must be found in the curiosity and sheer inteliigence of Beda venerabilis, of Edurhine of York and Tours, and their many students whose careers took them throughout Europa.

This review of computus in the eighth and ninth centuries has opened questions of its development, its content, and its use. Serious disagreements by Caroiingian expert5 were cited. Large compendia contain lunar and solar cycles based upon scientific kmwledge. The tables of data are accurate but difficult: they are not reader fiiendly. Thus, calendar cycles couid be used by a sound master and by clever students only if the tables had been learned and thefomzulae clearly understood, and if they were followed with care. Otherwise, the cycles go wrong; the calendar does not work; dates will be &staken; and history would be in ä muddle.

Manuscripts are rich with evidence that the explanations were studied and were often applied to the current year. Ealwhine explained very well that no data could be understood outside of their oun sequences, tables, and fomulae for application, exactly as it is today. Did Charlemagne h e x him? A final example will make clear why this question is 'a grave proposition, indeed', and may well disturb the dead.

Historians often describe the coronätion of Charlemagne in Rome 800 as imperator e f mgushcs, citing the words of Egmhard (also cailed Einhart) who shouid have been well informed: 'It was at this time that he accepted the title of emperor and a lcgus t~s ' .~~ Unfortunately, E,@ard probably wote his Statement between

'Astronomy in Carolingiaii schools', in Kar1 der Grosse und sein Nachwirken: I200 Jahre Kultur und Wissenschaft in Europa; Val. I: Fissen und Felfbild, eds. P. L. Buizer and oihers (Leiden: BriII, 1997), pp. 417-87; Wesley Stevens, 'Alternatives to Ptolemy: Astronomy in Carolingian Schoois', in Dimensions of Time, ed. by M. Muldoon (Windsor, Out.: Humanities Research Group, 1999): pp. 1-22; and Srevens, 'Karolingische renovatio in Wissenschaften und Literature'. Al1 three essays are.il1ustrated

33 Olaf Pedersen, 'The Corpus Asfi-onomicum and the traditions of mediaeval Latin askonomy', in Colloquia Copernicana 111: Astronomy o j Copernicus and its Background (Wrociaw: Zakiad Narodouy im. Ossolinskich, 1973, pp. 57-96.

34 Eginhard: Vie de Charlemagne, ed. and trans. by Louis Halphen, 3rd edn rev. and corrected, in Les clmsiques de France au moyen 2ge (Paris: Editions Les Belies Leaes, I947), ch. 28, p. 80. See the works by Heinrich Fichtenau, 'Kar1 der Große und das Kaisertum', Mitfeilungen d a Instituts fUr Osterreichische Gachichtiforschung, 61 (1953), 257-334; Fran~is L. Ganshof, lSie ImperiaI Coronahn ojcharlemagne (Glasgow: Jackson, 1949);

26 WESLEY STEVENS

815 and 830, a long time after the event; he was vague about the year, and he referred to festal days 'at this time' which could have been Advenf Christmas, or Epiphany. Our usual dating is implied fiom other sources, reinforced by the Liber pontificalis which has a chom singing the same praises to imperator et augus- on Christmas Day, though no year was indicated: 'To Charles, the most pious Augustus, crowned by G o 4 the great and peace-giving Empeior, life and v i ~ t o r y ' . ~ ~ But its evidentiary vaiue is not much better than Eginhard's, as Leo iived until816. Nearer to the probable day of coionation is a charter issued by Charlemagne in Rome on 4 March 801, in urhich he used the title rex, not imperator 'Carolus p t i a dei rex Francorum et Langobardonun ac patricius R~manonun'?~ In fact, the adjective augusstus and the title imperator are attested for the first time only about twelve weeks later in a diploma issued on the bank of River Reno near Bologna, 29 May 801: 'Karolus serenissimus augustus a deo coronatus magnus paciIicus imperator Romanum gubemans imperium, qui et per misericordiam dei rex Francorum atque Lang~bardonun'.~' And the nomen imperatoris was used by two Sets of amals for anno DCCCI, mitten perhaps dining 801-03. The annals in question are two: a manuscript of Wien contains the earliest known annals for the years DCCXCV to DCCCITI, and the coronation of Charlemagne was also entered on the calendar line for anno DCCCI (801). Though they and are more likely £rom Gone or M e e 8 and reveai no reference to Lorsch, they became lmown as the Annales Larre~hnmensis?~

Peter Munz, The Origin of the Carolingim Empire (Leicester: Dnnedin, 1960); Roberi Folz, Le couronnement imperial de Charlemagne (F'aris: Gallimard, 1964); znd many similar essays.

35 Liberpontfialiq IU, ed by L. Duchesne (F'aris: E. Thorin, 1892), E, 7. No year is @ven for 'the day of the birih of our Lord Jesus Christ' on which the event occurred. Without supporting evidente, it cannot be assurned that this entry was writien until after the death of Leo, Bishop of Rome (795-816).

36 No. 196, ed. by Engelbert MühIbacher and others, Monuments Germaniae Historica, Diplornata Karolinonnn (Hannover: Hahn, 1906), pp. 26364. It is dated 'EI1 Nones Marcias XXXIU: et XXVIlI': that is, his 33rd year in Francia and 28th in Italia; for a date prior to the equinox, that would probably conespond with our 801, no matter when the year began. A later ninth century copy in the Capitelarchiv at Arezzo has the dternase reading: 'EX Fmncorum et Romanorum et Langobardm', as do several pnnted editions.

j7 No. 197: Mühlbacher znd others, MGH, Diplomata Karolinonim, pp. 265-66. It is dated 'IIII Kal. Iunias anno prirno nostri et X X X m E& nostri in Francia et XXVIll in ItaIia', that is anno DCCCI (801).

38 Bedard Bischoff, Lorsch im Spiegel seiner Handschriften (ivlünchen: Arbeo- Geseilschaif 1974), p. 53.

39 Annales Laureshamenses: Wien, ÖNB, MS Lat. 515, fols 1-5; Annales Laureshamenses, ed. by G. Pertz, Monument2 Gemaniae Histonca, Scriptores, 1 CHannover: Hahn, 1836), pp. 19-33, esp. p. 38. See also E. A. Lowe, Codices Latinomm Antiquiomm, 10 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), p. 1482: two scripts 'writteu presumäbly in the Alemannic area [. . .J certainly not written at Lorsch'. Other than the assisiance he gave

A Present Sense of Things Past 27

Another maauscnpt preserved at Sankt Paul-im-Lavanthal (Kikiten, Austna): manuscript codex 25 a. 8 copied those annals aiid has more annals for earlier and later years, some of which mention persons or events that may be explained by reference to Lor~ch;~' but none were transcribed before 835. Similar information about Chademagne is found in a work called knnales Laurissenses minores, of which the manuscript Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, 430* is the ea~liest;~' unlortunately it includes only the years DCCCVi to DCCCXIV (806-14), stemming perhaps from St Vaa~t .~* Again, that is a later transcnption and expansion which said that his coronation occmed anno DCCCI (801). Due to this later copy, it is supposed that some of those annals couId have been written in Aschen, so tiat they have been hopefidly designated Annales regni F r a n ~ o n r m . ~ ~ Other early and valuable annais place the same event firmly and simply in the years 802, 803, 804, and perhaps also year 805.

How may these contradictory data foi the coronation of Chariemape be explained? It was a public event with many witnesses. No other sources can eliminate any of those dates as inaccurate." Shall we pick one set of annals and be

Lowe, so far as I know, Bernhard Bischozdid not evaiuate fols 1-5 of this manuscript

Das Wiener Fra0menf der Lorscher Annalen, [. . .J Codex Vindobonensk 515 der Ösferreichischen Nationalbiblioiheic. Facsimileausgabe, intro. and trans. by Franz finterkircher (Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt, 1967); Unte~kircher is ceriainly correct to distinguish four hands, none of u'hich were fom Lorsch. Hands B, C, and D ieveaI usages fiom the same scriptorium, and Hand C wrote ihe annais for years DCCXCViiII, DCCC, DCCCI which are also indicated in the margjns as years XXXD[, XXXIII, XXXiIU of Charlemagne's reign as rex Francom. They da not give years of his reign as rex Langobardorum or of his reign as imperator. Unterkircher wodd change ihe year fiom DCCCI to DCCC, simply by asserhng: 'am U~eihnacbtstag des Jahres 800 (nach damaliger Jahreszählung 801, da das Jahr mit dem Weihnachtstag begann)' @. 20), but ~Xthout evidence to support that adjustment.

Richard Conadini, Die Wiener Han&chny CVP 430% Ein Betrag zur Historiogrqhie in Fulda im frühen 9. Jahrhundert @ranidüri aM.: Knecht, 2000) agrees with some of these details but also refers to Chronicon Larriss. breve which dates the coronation to 800 and cites chapter XXXII, not XXXB.

40 See also Annalium Larreshamensium editio emendata secundum codicum SI Pauiensern XXV ci32 de, ed. by Emmanuel Kak (Separatabdruck vom Jahresbericht des &entlichen Stifts-Untergymnasimx d a Benediktiner ni S t Paui (Kärnten), 4 (1889)). My thanks to Dr R. Corradini for this citation.

41 Comdini, Die Wiener Hnndschr@ CVP 430%

42 Unteilürchner, Das Wiener Fragment der Lorscher Annalen. 43 Annales reogni Francom, ed with Geman trans. by R Rau, in Quellen zur

karolingischen Reichsgeschicizfe, 1 (Berlin: Riitten 6- Loening, [nd]): p. 74. 44 SurviWig primary sources are assembled with English translation by Richard Suliivan as

introduction to the useful pamphlet B e Coronafion of Charlemagne-Whaf Did It SigniJy?,

Volume 9 . .

Editorial Board

Axel E. W. Müller, Alan V. Murray, Peter Meredith, & Icui N. Wood with the assistance of the IhlC progxamming Committee

Bntisb Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Time and eiemity: the medieval dkmurse. - ( i n W o n z I rnrdievai m.czmiI; 9) 1.Chronology 2.Tme -History -T0 1500 1.Jarits Ge- 1949- E.Moreno-Riatio, Gerson, 1971-529

AI1 nghts reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrievai System, or transmitted, in any form or by any mewis,

eleceonic, mechanicai, photocopying, recording, or othenvise, without the prior permission of the publisber.

D/2003/0095/26 ISBN: 2-503-513 12-3

Printed in the E.U. on acid-fkee Paper.

Gerhard Jaritz &

Gerson Moreno-Rialio

-E3 BREPOLS

Time and Eternity: Where Doubt Continues to Exist GERHARD J m Z AW GERSON IVIORENO-m0

What Is Time?

A Present Sense of Things Past: Quidesf enim tempus? WESLEY STEVENS

Time, Its Computation arid the glse of @&endan

The Emergence ofAnno Domini DANIEL P. Mc CARTHY

'Sexta aetas coniinet anrios praeteritos DCCVIJU' @ede, De ternporibus, 22): A Scribzl Error?

MASAKO OHASHi

Abbo of Fleury and the Computational Accuracy of tbe Christian Era

PETER VERBIST

The Iduence of Bede's De temponrm rafione on Eifiic's Understanding of Time

AARON J. KLEIST