animals, usually accompanied by colored illustrations, the
Bestiary
tried to explain basic points of Christian doctrine in allegorical terms, by presenting them in the guise of a book about animals. By the late twelfth century, it had become the most popular nonbiblical manuscript of its time—indeed, the first such work to reach a wide lay audience. By the early fourteenth century, almost every monastery and church parish owned a copy; schoolchildren learned it by rote in their classrooms. Ever since the first folk taxonomies emerged, human beings have been naming and categorizing animals. So perhaps it should come as no surprise that the
Bestiary
should prove such a runaway best-seller in pre-Gutenberg Europe.
The work had originated in the early Greek Christian community, persisting through the ages as successive generations of monks copied the manuscript and passed it around from monastery to monastery throughout early Christendom. Its origins stretch far back into classical antiquity. The textual material evolved from a seminal Greek work known as the
Physiologus
(meaning, “The Naturalist”), whose bibliographical lineage stretches through a number of other books dating back to the reign of King Solomon. Parts of the book can be traced back to Pliny and Aristotle, some even further back to stories of Indian, Egyptian, and Jewish origin. In other words, the
Bestiary
contained a healthy dose of folk wisdom from ancient oral tradition. By echoing the themes of popular folk taxonomies and portraying animals as symbols of other divine truths, the
Bestiary
may havestruck a deep unconscious chord with its illiterate audience, who may have felt the stirrings of an ancient wisdom tradition at work.
Adam naming the animals, from the
Aberdeen Bestiary
, Folio 5r. Copyright by University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, England.
The book was full of allegorical stories, using the figures of animals to tell a larger story about Christian theology to people who lived, for the most part, in an oral culture. We have seen how folk taxonomies give rise to synaesthetic knowledge systems that persist with remarkable fidelity in oral cultures. In the oral culture of the late Dark Ages and early medieval era, the
Bestiary
tapped into this vein of folk wisdom while at the same time serving as a kind of boundary object between oral and literate cultures, introducing illiterate audiences to tales that were undoubtedly meant to be heard aloud yet were nonetheless obviously encased between the covers of a codex book.
The
Bestiary
almost always begins with the image of Adam naming the animals, making a biblical claim for humanity’s divine right to name—and, by extension, categorize—the beasts of the earth. “To name is to control,” as Whit Andrews puts it, “and to establish primacy and the right of exploitation.” 1 In this image, Adam not only names the beasts but also appears to assign a rudimentary taxonomy, allotting each beast to a particular box in his scheme. Each animal’s name includes a divine etymology, with families of animals arranged by both family and relative proximity to humankind, with animals “not in man’s charge” (the great cats and other wild quadripeds), followed by animals “for use by men” (like horses, cows, and sheep), and finally “beasts” (like dogs, cats, and boar). This image also echoes the folk classifications of preliterate societies in which affiliate classes provide a category for grouping animals by their relationship to human beings as well as by their relationships to each other.
The author (sometimes also known as “Physiologus”) attempts to draw instructive moral lessons from the behaviors and qualities attributed to various real and mythical animals. Each chapter conforms to a simple pattern: First, an animal is described in physiological detail; then its properties are shown to illustrate a particular theological point, often buttressed with biblical passages.
Bestiary
tried to explain basic points of Christian doctrine in allegorical terms, by presenting them in the guise of a book about animals. By the late twelfth century, it had become the most popular nonbiblical manuscript of its time—indeed, the first such work to reach a wide lay audience. By the early fourteenth century, almost every monastery and church parish owned a copy; schoolchildren learned it by rote in their classrooms. Ever since the first folk taxonomies emerged, human beings have been naming and categorizing animals. So perhaps it should come as no surprise that the
Bestiary
should prove such a runaway best-seller in pre-Gutenberg Europe.
The work had originated in the early Greek Christian community, persisting through the ages as successive generations of monks copied the manuscript and passed it around from monastery to monastery throughout early Christendom. Its origins stretch far back into classical antiquity. The textual material evolved from a seminal Greek work known as the
Physiologus
(meaning, “The Naturalist”), whose bibliographical lineage stretches through a number of other books dating back to the reign of King Solomon. Parts of the book can be traced back to Pliny and Aristotle, some even further back to stories of Indian, Egyptian, and Jewish origin. In other words, the
Bestiary
contained a healthy dose of folk wisdom from ancient oral tradition. By echoing the themes of popular folk taxonomies and portraying animals as symbols of other divine truths, the
Bestiary
may havestruck a deep unconscious chord with its illiterate audience, who may have felt the stirrings of an ancient wisdom tradition at work.
Adam naming the animals, from the
Aberdeen Bestiary
, Folio 5r. Copyright by University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, England.
The book was full of allegorical stories, using the figures of animals to tell a larger story about Christian theology to people who lived, for the most part, in an oral culture. We have seen how folk taxonomies give rise to synaesthetic knowledge systems that persist with remarkable fidelity in oral cultures. In the oral culture of the late Dark Ages and early medieval era, the
Bestiary
tapped into this vein of folk wisdom while at the same time serving as a kind of boundary object between oral and literate cultures, introducing illiterate audiences to tales that were undoubtedly meant to be heard aloud yet were nonetheless obviously encased between the covers of a codex book.
The
Bestiary
almost always begins with the image of Adam naming the animals, making a biblical claim for humanity’s divine right to name—and, by extension, categorize—the beasts of the earth. “To name is to control,” as Whit Andrews puts it, “and to establish primacy and the right of exploitation.” 1 In this image, Adam not only names the beasts but also appears to assign a rudimentary taxonomy, allotting each beast to a particular box in his scheme. Each animal’s name includes a divine etymology, with families of animals arranged by both family and relative proximity to humankind, with animals “not in man’s charge” (the great cats and other wild quadripeds), followed by animals “for use by men” (like horses, cows, and sheep), and finally “beasts” (like dogs, cats, and boar). This image also echoes the folk classifications of preliterate societies in which affiliate classes provide a category for grouping animals by their relationship to human beings as well as by their relationships to each other.
The author (sometimes also known as “Physiologus”) attempts to draw instructive moral lessons from the behaviors and qualities attributed to various real and mythical animals. Each chapter conforms to a simple pattern: First, an animal is described in physiological detail; then its properties are shown to illustrate a particular theological point, often buttressed with biblical passages.
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