On Lamentations
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Book Series
Corpus Christianorum in Translation, vol. 37
- Pages: 726 p.
- Size:156 x 234 mm
- Illustrations:1 col.
- Language(s):English
- Publication Year:2021
- € 75,00 EXCL. VAT RETAIL PRICE
- ISBN: 978-2-503-59393-7
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- € 75,00 EXCL. VAT RETAIL PRICE
- ISBN: 978-2-503-59394-4
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The Abel Distinctions translates the first edition of Peter the Chanter’s innovative ‘symbol dictionary’ from the late twelfth century.
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Review(s)
"Capping his monumental edition Petri Cantoris: Distinctiones Abel, which made the text of the "Abel Distinctions" by Peter the Chanter (d. 1197) available to Latinate scholars for the first time (in Corpus Christianorum volumes 288 and 288A), Stephen Barney has gifted students, teachers, and scholars alike with an accessible English translation of this ground breaking, influential, and often delightful twelfth-century reference work. The work’s basic statistics suggest its stature and influence: it consists of 1684 articles and survives in 88 manuscripts. But these bare facts only begin to indicate the erudition, devotion, and labor that first editing and then translating the work has entailed." (Martha Rust, in The Medieval Review, 25.01.2023)
"Stephen Barney has not only produced a hefty two-volume critical edition of one of the most popular and influential distinction collections - Peter the Chanter's Distinctiones Abel - for the Corpus Christianorum's Continuatio Mediaevalis series (288, 288A), but has now provided the uninitiated with an excellent one-volume translation of it (with cross-references to the Latin edition)." (Jessalynn Bird, in Sehepunkte, 03/2022)
“(…) Stephen Barney has gifted students, teachers, and scholars alike with an accessible English translation of this ground breaking, influential, and often delightful twelfth-century reference work.” (Martha Rust, in The Medieval Review, 07/01/2023)
BIO
Stephen A. Barney has been Associate Professor of English at Yale University, and is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of California, Irvine. Graduated with Highest Honors from the University of Virginia, he received his Ph.D. in English from Harvard University. Among his many publications are notable studies of Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde and Langland's Piers Plowman. He has received fellowships from Yale and UC, and from the Guggenheim Foundation, APS, ACLS, and NEH.
Summary
Peter the Chanter was a master at Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris in the late 12th century. Among his many works is The Abel Distinctions, an alphabetized collection that treats key words by ‘distinguishing’ their various symbolic meanings in accordance with the traditions of biblical exegesis. The work was innovative in form and deeply conservative in content. Of special use to preachers who would shape a sermon around such sets of distinctions, it also appealed in general to clerics and laity interested in biblical meaning and allegory. The Abel Distinctions may have been the first collection of its kind; it spawned dozens of imitators through the next two centuries and more. Its immense popularity and influence is indicated by its nearly ninety extant manuscripts.
The source text of this volume appeared in Corpus Christianorum, Continuatio Mediaeualis as Petrus Cantor, Distinctiones Abel (CC CM, 288-288A). References to the corresponding pages of the Corpus Christianorum edition are provided in the margins of this translation.
