Updates to VULG-T

[Marco V. Fabbri]

As Helen announced, the update to VULG-T module has now been released.

 

I have corrected a few mistakes that I had made. If more come out, it would be very useful for Helen or me to be informed in time to prepare an update in time for the SBL 2009 annual meeting.

 

Most of my work, however, went into lexical forms.

 

Let me recall first that the module is based on the critical edition by Robert Weber (published by Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft). The text by Weber presents Latin forms as they were likely represented in the archetype of the Vulgate. Often these forms are at a variance with dictionary entries. Of course, the critical text has to be respected and was never modified.

 

Even so, there could be two different ways of representing Lexical forms in the Accordance module. The spelling could be as close to the original as possible, or it could be adjusted to fit the entry for that word in a Latin dictionary.

 

For instance, the inflected form 'alietum' could be tagged as accusative of alietus, or as the accusative of haliaaetus. The first is the form that retains the spelling of the text by Weber, with the nominative substituted for the accusative. The second is the word that can be found in a dictionary like the Lewis-Short.

 

When I first tagged the Vulgate, I preferred to retain alietus, as it is closer to the spelling of the critical edition.

 

But then I faced two problems. The first: spelling throughout the printed Vulgate text is not completely uniform. If the same word appeared with two different spellings, should I attach the inflected forms to two different entries? If so, the user who looked for one of the two, would be under the impression that all relevant words had been found, while actually they hadn't. If I wanted to avoid that undesirable effect, I had to join the two spellings under one word. If I did that, I had to choose one form as "normal" and prefer it to the other. The aberrant form should be adjusted to fit the "normal" form.

 

The second problem is apparent in the word haliaaetus. This is a form derived from the Greek ἁλιάετος. It means sea-eagle. A reader skilled in Greek can see that the word includes the stem of the Greek ἅλς = sea plus the Greek ἀετός = eagle. The same reader can recognize at first glance this derivation. The same wouldn't be true if the word were spelled alietus. The rough breathing of ἅλς has been dropped instead of being represented by the Latin h, the vowels άε, which in Greek do not form a diphthong, have been first turned into the Latin diphthong ae, and then the diphthong has been suppressed. As a result, the single Latin vowel e has remained.

 

How could the reader recognize the word after so many changes? And even worse, how could a reader looking for haliaaetus guess that in VULG-T only alietus is represented? He can know, but only after he has searched the module, not before.

 

This persuaded me that it would be better to give haliaaetus as lexical form. In this way, the user can search for hali* and find both the lexical entry and the inflected forms. Or the user could search for 'ali*' and find the same result.

 

I therefore revised VULG-T to accommodate for this need. More work can be done on the module, but I think that user can have an immediate advantage in downloading it.

Edited July 18, 2009 by Marco

[William Varner]

Thanks so much, Marco. This is the first electronic tagged Latin text that I have discovered. The speed with which you completed your work

is commendable. It is a great resource.

 

Will

[Marco V. Fabbri]

Thank you for your kind words. And I am glad that you find the module helpful.

[Researcher]

I am glad that I found your discussion of "alietum".  I am preparing a document for translators on the list of unclean birds in Leviticus 11.  I am including the Hebrew, LXX and Vulgate forms.  In the Vulgate column I am including the lexical word with the Lewis-Short definition.  I do not have the Accordance Lewis and Short module so I am using the Perseus online version.  When I triple clicked on "alietum" the free Latin dictionary that I have with the Vulgate-T did not show anything.  I searched the dictionary by hand.  I assumed that the root was  "alietus" so I looked up this root at the Perseus website.  That also did not show the root.  I copied the root from the Vulgate-T and pasted that into the Latin Dictionary search field but still did not find it.  I looked in an online Clementine Vulgate (http://vulsearch.sourceforge.net/html/index.html) and saw that for Leviticus 11:13 they have " haliæetum".  I then searched the Perseus Lating dictionary by hand and found "hălĭæĕtos" This article helped to explain why I had such a hard time tracking down the root.

 

Harry :-{)