Riddle Ages

Commentary for Bern Riddle 13: De vite

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Thu 21 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 13: De vite

Just like the  previous riddle on the cereal grain, Riddle 13 is a tiny epic. And it continues the theme of depicting the harvesting of crops as an act of extreme violence and revenge, but this time the topic is viticulture and winemaking.
In ancient Rome, wine was ubiquitous, it was drunk by all social classes and it had a unique place in Roman culture. Expensive wines were served at aristocratic banquets, soldiers received a daily ration of posca (a mixture of souring wine and water), and wealthy politicians would often distribute mulsum (“sweetened wine”) to curry favour with the plebeians. Wine was also a popular offering to many deities, and it was considered to have important medicinal properties. There is little evidence that the turmoil of the 5th and 6th centuries involved the destruction of viticulture, although the general decline in long-distance trade and the decline of urban populations in this period certainly gave wine production a more restricted and local character (Unwin, pages 122-4). In fact, when Paul the Deacon described the Goths’ conquest of Italy in his History of the Lombards, he claimed that they came because they liked the wine so much (Paul the Deacon, page 78).

“Aleatico grapes on the vine. Photograph (by Doris Schneider) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 4.0)



The importance of wine in the Christian celebration of the Eucharist reinvigorated Italian viticulture, and early medieval subsistence viticulture began to be bolstered by new, monastically run vineyards. In southern Europe, wine remained the drink of all ranks of society. In the north, on the other hand, wine was largely the drink of the aristocratic and religious elites. Nevertheless, the techniques of winemaking were known in pre-Conquest England, and several vineyards operated in southern England during the 10th and 11th centuries (Unwin, pages 135-6). This is important for our understanding of the Bern Riddles, since it means that we cannot take the riddle as definite evidence that Bern was written in southern Europe.
The riddle begins by alluding to the vine’s hospitality in producing grapes, by imagining it as a custom of offering food and drink to outsiders. Yet this kindness is not returned, since the weeping vine (“the mother”) is pruned to remove the bunches of grapes (“the children”). Even worse, the new-born children are simili damnandos nece (“condemned to a similar death”). Thus, the uncontroversial act of grape harvest is transformed into a horrific tale of mutilation and infanticide.
However, as with the previous riddle, there is a twist in the last two lines. In this case, the parent’s death is avenged by the dead children. Whereas in Riddle 12 the story of the resurrected grain hinted at the Resurrection of Christ, Riddle 13’s vengeful zombie children seems to have echoes of the revenants and ghosts that were so popular in medieval folklore. When they take their revenge in the final line, blood is spilt, but it is theirs—the blood refers either to the process of squeezing and pressing the wine or to the messy drinking of the wine, and the revenge is the inebriating effect of the alcohol on humans. Thus, the children versant (“whirl about” or perhaps “pervert”) the walk of those who are literally stumbling and falling about. If there is a moral to this riddle-story, it is “watch out when you drink wine, or you might suffer the wrath of grapes.”

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Caciola, Nancy Mandeville. “Revenants, Resurrection, and Burnt Sacrifice.” Preternature: Critical and Historical Studies on the Preternatural. Volume 3 (2014). Pages 311–338.

Klein, Thomas. “Pater Occultus: The Latin Bern Riddles and Their Place in Early Medieval Riddling.” Neophilologus 103 (2019), pages 339-417.

Paul the Deacon. History of the Lombards. Edited by Edward Peters, translated by William Dudley Foulke. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1974.

Unwin, Tim. Wine and the Vine: An Historical Geography of Viticulture and the Wine Trade. London: Routledge, 1991. Pages 47-177.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

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Bern Riddle 12: De grano

Bern Riddle 14: De oliva

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 14: De oliva

Original text:

Nullam ante tempus inlustrem genero prolem

Annisque peractis superbos genero natos.

Quos domare quisquis valet industria parvos,

Cum eos marinus iunctos percusserit imber.

Asperi nam lenes sic creant filii nepotes,

Tenebris ut lucem reddant, dolori salutem.

Translation:

I never give birth to noble children before my due date,

and after the years have ended, I give birth to excellent children.

Anyone can tame those little ones if they try,

whenever the sea-storm beats those siblings.

For hard sons create soft grandchildren

So that they give light to darkness and safety to trouble.

Click to show riddle solution?

Olive tree

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 742.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 560.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 14: De oliva

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Thu 21 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 14: De oliva

We have already had riddles about cereal grains and grape vines, and now it is the turn of the top of the crops—the olive tree! Olives were a key crop for many medieval Mediterranean communities, and consequently some scholars have taken this as evidence that the Bern Riddles were composed in southern Europe (see Klein, page 404). I agree that an Italian origin for the riddles is the most likely explanation, but the olive riddle is not definitive evidence—northern European Christians would be very familiar with the numerous biblical references to olives and olive trees. They would also have been familiar with olive oil, which was particularly valued as a fuel for lamps, as well as its liturgical use as holy oil. As a result, olive oil became closely connected with Christian identity and prestige, and churchmen around early medieval Europe went to great lengths to obtain it (Graham, pages 344-66). In England, it does not seem to have been used for cooking, but there is good evidence for its importation throughout the pre-Conquest medieval period (Gautier, pages 393-4).

“Olives. Photograph (by Kos) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)




The first four lines play with the fact that the olives are harvested in the autumn and winter, when they begin to ripen. The parental trope so common to these riddles is used to describe how the children (i.e. the olives) are not born until the end of the year, when the “sea storm” rages, rather than in the summer and autumn like many crops. The idea that the tree’s children are “noble” (inlustris) and “excellent” (superbus) probably alludes to the anointing of kings and priests with olive oil in the Old Testament, and perhaps also its sacramental role as the chrism.  Since olive trees do not need too much attention, at least when compared to grapes and grain, anyone can “tame” or “conquer” (domare) their children by cultivating and picking them.
Line 5 may relate to the process of ripening, but I think it is more likely that it refers to the process of milling, pressing, and decanting the olives (“hard sons”) to produce olive oil (“soft grandchildren”). This leads nicely into line 6, which describes the oil’s use. It can “restore light” because the oil can be used as fuel for lamps—recalling Riddle 2’s oil lamp. And it can restore salutem (“safety” or “health”)—a phrase that may allude either to oil’s use as a preservative for food and leather or its liturgical use.
This riddle is interesting in that, whilst we are very familiar with olives today, we probably attach a different sense of importance to them. In the twenty-first century, we think of olives as primarily a food and a source of cooking oil. They were used in this way in the medieval period too, but this is not mentioned—its role in artificial light was much more important. And this is another reason why olive this riddle so much!

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Gautier, Alban. “Cooking and Cuisine in Late Anglo-Saxon England.” Anglo-Saxon England, Volume 41 (2012). Pages 373-406.

Graham, Benjamin. “Olives and Lighting in Dark Age Europe.” Early Medieval Europe, Volume 28 (2020). Pages 344-366.

Klein, Thomas. “Pater Occultus: The Latin Bern Riddles and Their Place in Early Medieval Riddling.” Neophilologus 103 (2019), pages 339-417.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

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Bern Riddle 2: De lucerna
Bern Riddle 12: De grano
Bern Riddle 13: De vite

Bern Riddle 15: De palma

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 15: De palma

Original text:

Pulchra semper comis locis consisto desertis,

Ceteris dum mihi cum lignis nulla figura.

Dulcia petenti de corde poma produco

Nullumque de ramis cultori confero fructum.

Nemo, qui me serit, meis de fructibus edit,

Et amata cunctis flore sum socia iustis.

Translation:

I always have beautiful hair and I exist in desert places,

although I do not look like the other trees.

I produce sweet fruits from my heart to those who seek them

and I bear no crop for the farmer from my branches.

No one who sows me feasts upon my fruits,

and when in flower, I am a beloved girlfriend to the just.

Click to show riddle solution?

Date palm

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 742

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 561.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 15: De palma

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Thu 21 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 15: De palma

Medievalists love dates. The date of Charlemagne’s coronation as emperor, the dating of Beowulf’s composition, the computation of a date of Easter—we just cannot get enough of them. Well, this riddle is all about the place where dates come from: the date palm!
I have already discussed whether the olive tree and grape vine riddles (Nos. 13 and 14) are evidence of a southern European origin for the Bern Riddles. As with these others, I agree that the presence of a Mediterranean plant would suggest this (see Klein, page 404), but I do not think it is definitive, since the date palm is a common biblical plant.

“Date palm. Photograph (by Balaram Mahalder) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)



As with the last three riddles, Riddle 15 describes the generosity of plants. Happily, unlike those, the palm tree is not afflicted with beatings, torture, or mutilation. Instead, we get the image of a beautifully haired woman who happily offers dates to those who ask. The mention of cetera ligna (“other trees”) and poma (“fruits”) in line 2 gives the solution away, but it does make me wonder whether the point of these riddles is not so much to name a solution as to unpick the description and admire the riddle’s ingenuity.
The final two lines allude to sexual relations, which it characteristically turns upside down. Line 5 explains that the date is not sown as one would sow many other crops. The verb serere (“to sow”) can also mean to impregnate or beget, and the noun fructus (“fruit”) can have the transferred sense of both produce and pleasure. Thus, the implied meaning seems to be that the date palm cannot become pregnant or gain pleasure from conventional forms of cis heterosexual sexual intercourse. Line 6 develops this conceit further, explaining that the tree is an amata socia (literally “beloved female companion”) when she is in flore (“in flower”), a term that can also be used to describe maidenly virginity. At the same time, this line alludes to a line in Psalms 92:12: “The righteous will flourish like the palm tree.” Like some of its Old English siblings, this riddle is a clever combination of the sacred and the profane.

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Klein, Thomas. “Pater Occultus: The Latin Bern Riddles and Their Place in Early Medieval Riddling.” Neophilologus, Volume 103 (2019), 399-407. Page 404.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Bern Riddle 16: De cedride

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 16: De cedride

Original text:

Me pater ut vivam spinis enutrit iniquis;

Faciat ut dulcem, inter acumina servat.

Tereti nam forma ceram confingo rubentem

Et incisa nullam dono de corpore guttam.

Mellea cum mihi sit sine sanguine caro,

Acetum eructant exta conclusa saporem.

Translation:

Father brings me up to live in painful thorns;

to make me sweet, he keeps me between needles.

I fashion together red wax into a round form,

and I give not a drop when my body is cut.

Although my flesh has no sweet blood,

my enclosed insides give a bitter taste.

Click to show riddle solution?

Juniper/cedar berry

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 743.

Line 1 follows the preferred reading in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 562.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 16: De cedride

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Thu 21 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 16: De cedride

As readers may already know, the Old English riddles of The Exeter Book do not have their solutions included. Because Latin riddles usually include these in their titles, people often think—wrongly, in my opinion—that they are somehow less enigmatic and mysterious. But what about those cases where the titles do not appear to be correct? Well, Bern Riddle 16 is a great example of this. In the past 1500 or so years, people have understood this riddle to be about, variously, the cedar tree, cedar oil, juniper berry, and the lemon. See what you think!

“Lemon tree. Photograph (by Allentchang) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)



The manuscript title is Cedrus (“cedar tree”) and De cedris (“about the cedar”). But when you read the riddle, it does not seem to be about a tree at all, but rather what it produces. Some scholars have assumed that the correct title is “about cedar oil” (cedriis), but this cannot be correct. Firstly, the description does not match this—for example, oil does not have a caro (“body,” “flesh”) that can be cut. Secondly, cedrium is a neuter noun, and the speaker of the riddle is unmistakably feminine singular. (I told you in the commentary to Riddle 1 that the gender of Latin nouns would come in useful!) Other scholars have corrected the title to De citria (“about the citron fruit”), which matches the riddle creature’s grammatical gender and explains the reference to spinae iniquae (“painful thorns”), acetus sapor (“sour or bitter taste”) and teres forma (“round form”) (Meyer, page 420; Salvador Bello, page 260). A third solution, which is preferred by Glorie (page 562) and Klein (page 403-4), is De cedride (“about the juniper/cedar berry”). If this is correct, then it would suggest that, at some point in the manuscript transmission, the ablative cedris (“cedar”) became confused with the nominative cedris (“juniper berry”). This is the solution that I have followed here.

“Juniper berries. Photograph (by MPF) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)



The riddle begins with a seemingly unpleasant childhood spent within thorns and needles, which refers to the needles of the juniper tree. It may also allude to the biblical Crown of Thorns—another example of how these riddles play with ideas of the sacred and profane. Most manuscripts give mater (“mother”) in line 1, but at least one manuscript gives pater (“father”). My guess is that pater is correct because the Latin for the juniper tree (cedrus) is also masculine—and the juniper tree is the parent of the berry. The cera rubens (“red wax”) in line 3 is the berry itself, which does not ooze its “blood” when cut; it must be crushed with a pestle to extract its juice. Juniper berry juice has been used throughout history as a flavouring and as an ingredient in various kinds of medicine. It is also extremely sour, as lines 5 and 6 explain. Personally, I prefer mine in the form of a gin & tonic, ideally whilst lying in the sun and reading riddles on a hot summer’s day!

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Fr. Glorie (ed.). Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis. Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A. Turnhout: Brepols, 1968. Page 562.

Klein, Thomas. “Pater Occultus: The Latin Bern Riddles and Their Place in Early Medieval Riddling.” Neophilologus, Volume 103 (2019), 399-407. Page 404-5.

Meyer, Willhelm. “Anfang und Ursprung der lateinischen und griechishen rhthmischen Dichtung.” In Abhandlungen der Philosophisch-Philologischen Classe der Koniglich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Volume 17 (1886), 265-450. Page 420.

Salvador-Bello, Mercedes. Isidorean Perceptions of Order: The Exeter Book Riddles and Medieval Latin Enigmata. Morgantown, West Virginia University Press, 2015. Page 260.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Bern Riddle 17: De cribro

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 17: De cribro

Original text:

Patulo sum semper ore nec labia iungo.

Incitor ad cursum frequenti verbere tactus.

Exta mihi nulla; manu si forte ponantur,

Quassa mitto currens, minuto vulnere ruptus,

Meliora cunctis, mihi nam vilia servans;

Vacuumque bonis inanem cuncti relinquunt.

Translation:

My mouth is always open and my lips are never sealed.

I am urged on my course by a well-used whip.

I have no insides. If they are placed by hand,

I, moving and broken by tiny wounds, will send them out, shaken,

keeping the worst for me and the best for all;

everyone abandons the hollow and empty one for the good things.

Click to show riddle solution?

Sieve

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 743.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 563.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 17: De cribro

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 22 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 17: De cribro

Sometimes riddle-reading can be very inten-sieve! Today’s riddle is about a sieve—not a kitchen sieve, but an agricultural one.
The opening two lines of this riddle are a great example of riddling disguise and misdirection, describing the sieve as if it were a loquacious Mr Ed. Line 1 explains that the riddle creature’s mouth that is always open and the lips that are never sealed—a quality of both sieves and talkative people. Line 2 goes on to describe how the creature is urged on its cursus (“course”) by frequenti verbere (“a well-used whip” or “a frequent blow”). It describes the act of shaking the sieve as if it were the whipping of a horse, which recalls the eccentric horse-bench of Riddle 4. The material that is being sieved is probably flour—made with Riddle 12’s grain and Riddle 9’s millstone—which is being separated from any bran or other impurities and made finer for baking.
 
“Talking horses aren’t just in riddles.”


The sieve begins to come into focus in line 3, which tells us that the object has no exta (“insides, bowels”) unless they are placed in there by hand, referring to its concave nature. The riddle then describes sieving as a violent act—the minutum vulnus (“tiny wound[s]”) represents the sieve’s holes, and the moving is the act of sieving.
The last two lines were not the easiest to translate, but the general idea is of separating good (i.e. the flour) from bad (i.e. the bran). This idea has distinctly a biblical feel, and I suspect that the author had Jesus’ remark to Simon Peter that Satan would sift the disciples like wheat (Luke 22.31). Whether he did or not, the central motif in this part of the riddle is that the sieve, who is left with only the detritus, gets the worst of the deal. Even worse, he is then abandoned, having served his purpose. What a sad ending for the poor sieve!

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Bern Riddle 4: De scamno
Bern Riddle 9: De mola
Bern Riddle 12: De grano

Bern Riddle 18: De scopa

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 18: De scopa

Original text:

Florigeras gero comas, dum maneo silvis,

Et honesto vivo modo, dum habito campis.

Turpius me nulla domi vernacula servit

Et redacta vili solo depono capillos;

Cuncti per horrendam me terrae pulverem iactant,

Sed amoena domus sine me nulla videtur.

Translation:

I bear flowering foliage when I live in the woods,

And I live in a respectable way when I dwell in the fields.

At home, no servant has a filthier job than me,

and, led about the vile floor, I shed my hair.

Everyone drags me through the earth’s wretched dust,

but no home looks nice without me.

Click to show riddle solution?

Broom

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 743.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 564.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 18: De scopa

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 22 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 18: De scopa

Those readers who have seen Disney’s Fantasia will know all about the enchanted broom-on-legs whom the sorcerer’s apprentice summons to do his chores, with unintended consequences. Well, this riddle is about another anthropomorphic broom—but this time, the broom does not get the upper hand.
 


The riddle tells the story of an apparently respectable woman from the woods, who is transformed into a wretched and much-abused servant in the home. It also tells the story of a tree branch that is made into a broom. The riddle is all about power and status. It plays upon the social standing of the maidservant in the home, which it compares to the broom’s “servitude” to humans. As Samuel Röösli explains, the broom and the servant are the same “in that they both suffer a loss of agency and dignity in the interior space to which they are confined and which they must keep lovely” (Röösli, page 99). Often in classical and medieval texts, it is the wild woods and countryside that are associated with dishevelment and a humble station, but here they are linked to the domestic world. The movement from the countryside to the home also has a sexual element to it—the flowering of the branch in nature is juxtaposed against the filthiness of its work as a broom, probably with ideas of virginity and promiscuity in mind.
If we were not aware that the subject is a broom, then lines 4 and 5 of this riddle would be extremely disturbing. The servant-broom’s turpis (‘filthy’ or ‘sordid’) work would be a horrific act of domestic abuse—she is dragged about the floor so that she loses her hair (i.e. the straw or twigs of the broom’s head). Even more concerning is the fact that “everyone” (cuncti) participates in this abuse. The Bern Riddles often give you the sense that all humans are guilty of violent acts against the non-human world–and this is a prime example. They also frequently depict this violence as necessary for human life, as we see in the final line—despite her tribulations, the servant-broom nevertheless makes the home look beautiful. Just as the servant is considered equally lowly and indispensable, so is the humble broom.

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Röösli, Samuel. “The Pot, the Broom, and Other Humans: Concealing Material Objects in the Bern Riddles.” In Secrecy and Surveillance in Medieval and Early Modern England. Edited by Annette Kern-Stähler & Nicole Nyffenegger. Swiss Papers in English Language and Literature (SPELL) 37. Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag, 2020. Pages 87-104.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

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Bern Riddle 18: De scopa

Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice

Original text:

Dissimilem sibi me mater concipit infra

Et nullo virili creta de semine fundor.

Dum nascor sponte, gladio divellor a ventre.

Caesa vivit mater, ego nam flammis aduror.

Nullum clara manens possum concedere quaestum;

Plurem fero lucrum, nigro si corpore mutor.

Translation:

My mother—I am unlike her—conceives me within,

and I am born and made from no manly seed.

While I am born willingly, I am ripped from the womb with a sword.

Cut, my mother lives on, for I am burnt by flames.

Retaining my shine, I can give no profit;

I carry more value if my body is turned dark.

Click to show riddle solution?

Wax or pitch

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 744.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 565.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Wed 27 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice

Sometimes, the Bern Riddles like to make us work hard for their solutions. You might remember Bern Riddle 16, which can be solved as either citrus fruit or cedar/juniper berry. Well, this is another riddle where we get to choose the solution. Many manuscripts give it the title of De pice (“About Pitch”), but one gives De nimpha (“About the fountain/siphon”) and another gives De cera (“About [bees]wax”). My preference is definitely “wax,” which fits with the next two riddles (“honey” and “bee”). Having said all this, it is a tricky riddle to read, and it took me quite a while to work out how the solution fits—see if you agree with my reading.
 
“Beeswax. Photograph (by Frank Mikley) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)



The first two lines are all about likeness between a mother and her child—as with so many other riddles, we are expected to guess who the parent is. Originally, I thought that she was a mould for wax candles, but recently I have changed my mind: the mother is the beehive, who is utterly unlike her child, and who gives birth to the wax without any “manly seed” (virili… de semine). The wax caps are then cut out of the honeycomb “womb” (venter) by humans. As line 3 explains, although the hive has had the wax cut from it, it “lives on.” In this way, the riddle uses the virgin birth and caesarean birth motifs that we have already come across with  Bern Riddle 8’s egg.

“6th/early 7th century beeswax candles, found in the Frankish-Alemannic graveyard of Oberflach, near Tuttlingen, Germany. Photograph (by Andreas Franzkowiak) from Wikipedia Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)



The wax is then burnt as a candle. Most early medieval candles would have been made of tallow, but expensive beeswax candles burnt brighter and with a more pleasant odour. Because of this, beeswax candles were frequently reserved for their use in liturgy, and particularly the Easter Vigil, where a candle would be lit on the night of Holy Saturday in the image of the Resurrection.
The final two lines are quite tricky to account for. Why is wax only valuable when it is darkened? My best guess is that these lines refer either to the process of rendering beeswax (i.e. melting and then straining it) to remove any impurities, or to the process of hand-dipping candles. If heated excessively, both processes can lead to the wax being discoloured. But I would welcome any other suggestions. Like I said, the Bern Riddles like to make us work!

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Bern Riddle 8: De ovo
Bern Riddle 16: De cedride
Bern Riddle 20: De melle
Bern Riddle 21: De apibus

Bern Riddle 20: De melle

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 27 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 20: De melle

Original text:

Lucida de domo lapsus diffundor ubique,

Et quali dimissus modo, non invenit ullus.

Bisque natus inde semel in utero cretus,

Qualis in conceptu, talis in partu renascor.

Milia me quaerunt, ales sed invenit una

Aureamque mihi domum depingit ab ore.

Translation:

Falling from a bright home, I am scattered everywhere

and, banished, no one finds out how.

Born twice, then grown once in the womb,

I am born again, in conception as in birth.

Thousands seek me, but only the flyer finds me

and paints a golden home for me with its mouth.

Click to show riddle solution?

Honey

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 744.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 566.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 20: De melle

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Thu 28 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 20: De melle

This riddle is, to quote everyone’s favourite 90s Scottish noise-pop band, The Jesus and Mary Chain, “just like honey”—mainly because it is all about honey! It is the second of three bee-themed riddles (see Riddle 19 and Riddle 21).




Beekeeping was an important and very profitable economic activity throughout the European Middle Ages. Honey was a sweetener for food, it was a medicine, and it was fermented to produce mead; beeswax was used to make candles, adhesives, waterproof clothing, and paints, among other things.
In Italy, the ancient Roman culture of beekeeping continued into the early medieval period, albeit affected by the general decline in trade of the fifth and sixth centuries. Beekeeping was enthusiastically adopted by many monastic houses. The image below, taken from a late eleventh century Easter scroll (known as an “exultet roll”) from Monte Cassino gives us an idea of what these monastic beehives might have looked like—here, a beekeeper is harvesting wax from the hive.

“Beekeeper removing wax from a hive, BL Additional 30337, fol. 10. Photograph from The British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts (licence: CC0 1.1)



Bees were also kept in pre-Conquest England. The Rectitudines Singularum Personarum, an English manual of estate management from c. 1100, mentions that a freeman who keeps bees (a beoceorl) should pay a tax to the landowner of 4 sestels (about 10 pints) of honey per year (Rectitudines, 6). Other English texts mention fines for theft from beehives (Attenborough, pages 68-71), and what to do if bees kill someone by stinging them—kill them and eat their honey (OE Scrifboc, CCC MS 190, fol. 382)! Bees and honey also feature in Old English poetry: Exeter Book Riddle 27 and the brilliant Old English metrical charm, For a Swarm of Bees.

“Bees and beehives from a 14th century French bestiary, Bodleian Library, MS. Douce 151, f. 69v. Photograph from Digital Bodleian (licence: CC BY-NC 4.0)



Bern Riddle 20 begins by describing honey that is dripping “from the bright home” (lucida de domo) and scattered in a mysterious way. Reading this for the first time, you might think that the “bright home” is the beehive. But the riddle seems to be alluding to something much more interesting—the idea that honey is a form of dew created in the heavens, which falls upon plants and is collected by bees. If this is the case, then the “bright home” would be the sky. Several classical and medieval sources mention this belief, including Virgil and Isidore of Seville. Perhaps the most memorable description is found in Pliny the Elder’s encyclopaedic Natural History:
Venit hoc ex aere et maxime siderum exortu… sublucanis temporibus. Itaque tum prima aurora folia arborum melle roscida inveniuntur, ac si qui matutino sub divo fuere, unctas liquore vestis capillumque concretum sentiunt, sive ille est caeli sudor sive quaedam siderum saliva sive purgantis se aeris sucus.


[Honey] comes from the air, and largely from the rising of the stars… shortly before dawn. Thus, at first light, the leaves of the trees are found moist with honey, and if someone who has been under the morning sky, they feel their clothes are damp and their hair is matted, whether this is the sky’s moisture, or some kind of saliva of the stars, or the juice of the vomiting air.]

—Pliny the Elder, Natural History, Book XI, page 450. (translation mine)


 Pliny was writing this in the 1st century AD, but his work continued to be influential throughout the early medieval period—Isidore of Seville used it when writing his own encyclopaedia, as did Bede. Interestingly, the riddle’s reference to the uncertain nature of celestial honey (line 2) also agrees with what Pliny says here. Perhaps the riddler was familiar with Pliny’s work? After all, the use of encyclopaedia-knowledge is very common in medieval riddles (see Mercedes Salvador-Bell, Isidorean Perceptions of Order).
The rebirth in lines 3 and 4 returns to the religious motif of rebirth and resurrection that appears in Riddles 6, 12, 13. But it also describes how the bees collect the nectar from the plants and then regurgitate it into the honeycomb. We saw in Riddle 19 that the honeycomb was a “womb” (venter). Likewise, here it is a “womb” (uterus), within which the honey “grows.”

“Bees and beehives from an early 13th century bestiary from Peterborough, Bodleian Library, MS. Ashmole 1511, Folio 75v. Photograph from Digital Bodleian (licence: CC BY-NC 4.0)



In the final two lines, the thousands who seek honey are the humans who crave its sweet taste. The “flyer” (ales is, of course, the bee. Since bees create their honeycomb cells using regurgitated wax, it can be said that they “paint” their “golden home” (aureum domum) using their mouths.
Like many works of medieval literature on the natural world, Riddle 20 is a mix of curious myths and detailed observational truths. On the one hand, it mistakes pollen-collecting with celestial honey-collecting. At the same time, it recognises how bees build their honeycombs. It is a mixture of nature documentary and an un-bee—lievable story!

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

“Charm for a Swarm of Bees.” In Robert E. Bjork (ed. and trans.), Old English Shorter Poems, Volume II.Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2014. 216-7

“Laws of Alfred.” In Frederick Attenborough (ed. and trans.), The Laws of the Earliest English Kings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922. Pages 62-93. (The text is also available in the original and with a German translation, in Felix Liebermann (ed.), Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, Vol. 1. Halle: Max Niemeyer, 1903. Pages 46-87. Available at Archive.org)

The Old English Scrifboc (or The Confessional of pseudo-Egbert) in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 190, folios 387-413. Available at Parker Library on the Web.

Rectitudines Singularum Personarum. Early English Laws, IHR/King’s College London. Website. https://earlyenglishlaws.ac.uk/laws/texts/rect/

Banham, Debbie. Anglo-Saxon Farms and Farming. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Pages 104-5, 135-6.

Kritsky, Gene. “Beekeeping from Antiquity Through the Middle Ages.” Annual Review of Entomology, Volume 62 (2017). Pages 249-264.

Pliny the Elder, Natural History, Volume IX: Books 33-35. Loeb Classical Library 394. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge, Mass.: harvard University Press, 1952.

Price, Helen. “A Hive of Activity: Realigning the Figure of the Bee in the Mead-Making Network of Exeter Book Riddle 27.” Postmedieval, Volume 8 (2017). 444-462.

Salvador-Bello, Mercedes. Isidorean Perceptions of Order: The Exeter Book Riddles and Medieval Latin Enigmata. Morgantown, West Virginia University Press, 2015.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Exeter Riddle 27
Bern Riddle 6: De calice
Bern Riddle 12: De grano
Bern Riddle 13: De vite
Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice
Bern Riddle 21: De apibus

Bern Riddle 21: De apibus

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Sat 28 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 21: De apibus

Original text:

Masculus qui non sum sed neque femina, coniux.

Filios ignoto patri parturio multos.

Uberibus prolem nullis enutrio tantum;

Quos ab ore cretos nullo de ventre sumpsi.

Nomen quibus unum natisque conpar imago,

Meos inter cibos dulci conplector amore.

Translation:

I am a spouse who is neither man nor woman.

I am pregnant with many sons to an unknown father.

I feed an infant without using breasts;

I collected with my mouth those born out of no womb. 

The children have a single name and a similar look.

With sweet love, I surround my children with food.

Click to show riddle solution?

Bees

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 744.

Line 4 follows the preferred reading in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 567.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 21: De apibus

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 29 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 21: De apibus

We have already had riddles about beeswax and honey. Now we turn to the bees themselves. RELEASE THE BEES!

via GIPHY

via GIPHY
This riddle begins with a variation on the virgin birth trope that also appears in Riddles 8 and 19. In this case, the speaker is a “spouse” (coniux) who is masculus non… sed neque femina (“neither man nor woman”). Moreover, the father is ignotus (“unknown”). These lines play with two ideas about bees that sometimes crop up in late antique and medieval texts: their apparent sexlessness and their spontaneous generation. For example, Ambrose of Milan, writing in the 4th century, says:
Communis omnibus generatio, integritas quoque corporis virginalis omnibus communis et partus, quoniam neque inter se ullo concubitu miscentur, nec libidine resolvuntur, nec partus quatiuntur doloribus, et subito maximum filliorum examen emittunt, e foliis et herbis ore suo prolem legentes.


Procreation is common to all, as is childbirth and the chastity of the virgin body, since neither do they mix between themselves in any sexual intercourse, nor is their libido unleashed, nor are their childbirths affected with pains, and they suddenly send forth a huge swarm of offspring, gathering the child from leaves and blades of grass.

–Ambrose, Hexameron, Book V, 21, 68 (PL14:234B).

As a result of ideas like this, bees became associated in the visual arts and literature with ideas of virginity, chastity, and the Virgin Mary. The spontaneous generation of bees is repeated in line 4 of the riddle—whereas the previous two riddles described the hive as a “womb,” the bee has none.

“Bees travelling between flowers and the hive. From a 13th century English bestiary, Bodleian Library, MS. Bodley 764, folio 89r. Photograph from Digital Bodleian (licence: CC BY-NC 4.0)



Line 4 also has an interesting crux: ab ore cretos… sumpsi. If you did not know the context, you might be tempted to read it as “I consumed… by mouth.” Thus, it would be referring to a gruesome act of cannibalistic fratricide! However, the correct translation is probably “I gather… by mouth.” This alludes to another medieval bee “fact” mentioned in Ambrose’s passage that I quoted earlier—the idea that bees gather their larvae from plants. When I think about it, sumpsi (“I gathered”) might even have the sense of “adopted” which would fit nicely with the unknown father of line 2.
The final line describes how the larvae are surrounded with food in the honeycomb, which involves a nice little pun on dulci amore (“with sweet love”). Oh, how nice it is to have a riddle with an unambiguously sweet ending!

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Ambrose, Hexameron. In Jacques Paul Migne (ed.), Sancti Ambrosii Opera Omnia, Vol. 1.1. Patrologia Latina 14. Paris: Migne, 1845. Columns 123-475. Available at Google Books.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Bern Riddle 8: De ovo
Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice
Bern Riddle 20: De melle

Bern Riddle 22: De ove

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Sat 28 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 22: De ove

Original text:

Exigua mihi virtus, sed magna facultas:

Opes ego nulli quaero, sed confero cunctis.

Modicos oberrans cibos egena requiro

Et ieiuna saepe cogor exsolvere censum.

Nullus sine meo mortalis corpore constat

Pauperaque multum ipsos nam munero reges.

Translation:

I have little courage but great resources:

I seek wealth from no one, but I give it to everyone.

Wandering and poor, I seek humble foods,

And, hungry, I am often forced to give up my wealth.

No mortal endures without my body,

And I am poor, yet I give generously even to kings.

Click to show riddle solution?

Sheep

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 745.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 568.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 22: De ove

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 29 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 22: De ove

Some riddles are very good, and some are just baaaa… Immediately after the three bee riddles (Riddles 19, 20 and 21), we come to another creature who produces a valuable commodity: the sheep.
The opening line tells us that the riddle-subject has little virtus, a word derived from the Latin word vir (“man”), and which can mean “manliness” or “virility” as well as “courage” and “excellence.” This description is easy to grasp. Even though some sheep can be remarkably feisty, sheep are not well-known for their courage—and this was true in the Middle Ages too. For example, Isidore of Seville, writing in the early 7th century, tells us in his Etymologies that the sheep is molle pecus lanis, corpore inerme, animo placidum (“a placid livestock animal with an unarmed body and a peaceful disposition”) (Isidore, Etymologies, page 247). The first line of the riddle also says that the sheep has facultas, which plays on two meanings of the word: “capacity” and “abundance.” The primary meaning seems to be “I have little courage but great resources” but you could also read it as “I have little courage, but I am really capable.”

“A flock of lovely sheep. From a mid-13th century English bestiary, Bodleian Library, MS. Bodley 764, Folio 35v. Photograph from Digital Bodleian (licence: CC BY-NC 4.0)



The middle section of the riddle depicts the sheep as an itinerant wanderer or pilgrim. The metaphor is a very apt one for an animal who wanders about the field or hillside, always hungry for grass and having given up her “wealth” (i.e. her fleece). Wandering riddle-creatures feature in several other Bern riddles, including Nos. 37 (pepper), 40 (mice), 41 (wind) and 59 (moon). I will be going into more depth on the topic of “wanderers” in my forthcoming commentary on Riddle 37, so watch this space!
In the final two lines, the image of the poor, wandering sheep is juxtaposed against the idea that the sheep has a great wealth, fit for everyone, even kings. Perhaps this image of the humble and placid creature, upon whom we nevertheless all depend, is intended as an allegory for Christ. After all, Jesus is frequently depicted in medieval liturgy and art as the Lamb of God, based the title that John the Baptist is said to have bestowed upon him. However, the fact that the sheep is female might give us second thoughts. This seems to be another example of the riddler playing with the boundaries of the sacred and the profane. What do ewe think?

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

Isidore of Seville. The Etymologies of Isidore of Seville. Edited by Stephen A. Barney, W. J. Lewis, J. A. Beach and Oliver Berghof. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice
Bern Riddle 20: De melle
Bern Riddle 21: De apibus
Bern Riddle 37: De pipere
Bern Riddle 40: De muscipula
Bern Riddle 41: De vento
Bern Riddle 59: De luna

Bern Riddle 23: De igne

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Sat 28 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 23: De igne

Original text:

Durus mihi pater, dura me generat mater,

Verbere nam multo huius de viscere fundor.

Modica prolatus feror a ventre figura,

Sed adulto mihi datur inmensa potestas.

Durum ego patrem duramque mollio matrem,

Et quae vitam cunctis, haec mihi funera praestat.

Translation:

My father is hard, my hard mother makes me,

for, after a great bashing, I am born from her insides.

At birth, I am taken from the womb in a tiny form

but I am given great power as an adult.

I soften my hard father and hard mother,

and that which is life to all is my funeral.

Click to show riddle solution?

Fire

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 745.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 569.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 23: De igne

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Fri 29 Jan 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 23: De igne

This riddle is all about starting fires and then putting them out. Regular readers will know that I take every opportunity to quote songs that I like. So, “let me light your fire” with this great riddle.




The riddle opens with the kind of polysemic play that typifies many riddles of the Bern collection. If you were unaware that this was a riddle about fire, you would probably read lines 1-2 as a disturbingly violent story of two “severe” (durus) parents who conceive the child after a “great beating” (verbere… multo). However, since we already know the solution, we recognise that the “hard” (durus) parents that are probably an iron firestriker, i.e. the iron or steel and flint device that was used as a firelighter in many pre-modern societies. The fire is born from the union of steel and flint only after “a great bashing” or “striking” (verbere… multo). Note that the term for “to birth” is fundere (literally “to pour out”), a word that will crop up again and again in these riddles—it appears, sometimes with prefix of pro- or dis-, in seven other riddles (Nos. 8, 19, 20, 27, 28, 29 and 49).

“Reproduction Roman and medieval firetools. Photograph (by Gaius Cornelius) from Wiki Commons (licence: CC BY-SA 3.0)”



In the immortal words of Bruce Springsteen, “You can't start a fire without a spark.” And similarly, our fire begins its life “in tiny form” (a ventre figura) as a spark. From line 4 onwards, the child’s relationship with his parents is reversed, as he grows up to become a mighty fire who will eventually “soften” its parents. Presumably, this refers to the blistering fire of a smith’s forge —iron melts once it reaches 1538°C. The final line explains that water—which is “life to all” (vitam cunctis)—nevertheless brings about the fire’s death.
I have mentioned the term “tiny epics” in some of my commentaries before. Well, this riddle is certainly worthy of that name. It manages to tell the story of life-cycle of fire in six short, clever lines—from the birth of young spark to the death of an old flame.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Bern Riddle 8: De ovo
Bern Riddle 19: De cera/De pice
Bern Riddle 20: De melle
Bern Riddle 27: De papiro
Bern Riddle 28: De serico/bombyce
Bern Riddle 29: De speculo
Bern Riddle 49: De pluvia

Bern Riddle 24: De membrana

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Sat 28 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 24: De membrana

Original text:

Luctum viva manens toto nam confero mundo

Et defuncta mirum praesto de corpore quaestum.

Vestibus exuta multoque vinculo tensa,

Gladio sic mihi desecta viscera pendent.

Manibus me postquam reges et visu mirantur,

Miliaque porto nullo sub pondere multa.

Translation:

When alive, I give wealth to the whole world

and dead, I provide a wonderful profit from my body.

Stripped of clothes and stretched out by many a bond,

my insides hang out, mown by a sword.

Afterwards, kings marvel at my sight and touch,

and I carry many thousands without any burden.

Click to show riddle solution?

Parchment

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 745.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 570.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 24: De membrana

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Mon 08 Feb 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 24: De membrana

This riddle is about a very special material that preserves the thoughts, memories, and imaginations of people who lived hundreds and hundreds of years ago. Yes, you guessed it—this riddle is all about parchment!
One of the fascinating things about the Bern Riddles are their interrelatedness—they love to talk about each other! They love using similar phrases and themes to express the properties of very different objects, and this generates unexpected and surprising connections. Today’s riddle continues the theme of life and death from the previous riddle about fire). Its first and fifth lines also the theme of livestock bringing wealth to all, including kings, from the sheep riddle (No. 22). And it contains the same phrase, “stripped of clothes” (vestibus exuta) as we saw with Riddle 5’s table. Fires, sheep, tables—all have something in common with parchment.

“Goatskin parchment stretched on a wooden frame. Photograph (by Michal Maňas) from Wiki Commons (licence: CC BY 2.5)”



Preparing parchment was a complicated and specialist activity in early medieval Europe. The skin of goats, sheep, and calves was usually treated with a lime solution, before having as much hair removed as possible. It was then stretched on a frame and washed, scraped with a special curved knife, and stretched over several days, before the parchment was thin enough and smooth enough for use.
There are other medieval riddles about parchment, and they all describe the process of its manufacture. The parchment of Tatwine’s Riddle 5 complains that its killer “stripped me of clothing” (exuviis me… spoliavit), before scraping, ruling, and then writing upon it. Exeter Riddle 26 describes the process in a similar way, but it goes into more detail, explaining that feond sum (“a certain enemy”) soaked it and removed its hairs, before scraping it and cutting it to size. Bern Riddle 24, on the other hand, manages to compress this process into two lines (3-4). The hairs are removed from the skin (“stripped of clothes”), which is “stretched our by many a bond” as it hangs on the frame (“my insides hang out”). It has been gladio desecta, literally “cut away by a sword.” However, I have translated this phrase idiomatically as “mown,” under the assumption that it describes the process of scraping as if the parchment were a field being harvested.

“A riddle about parchment, on parchment. Bern, Burgerbibliothek, Cod. 611, f. 76v. Photograph from E-codices (licence: CC BY 3.0)”



All three riddles end with the parchment being used for writing and reading. In Tatwine 5, the words become nourishing victum… et medelam (‘food and medicine’). And Exeter 26 closes with a long series of gifts that the book gives to its reader. Unlike the others, Bern does not glorify the spiritual benefits that a book can bring. Instead, its final line describes the paradox of a book carrying many thousands of letters and words that are all effectively weightless. It recalls Riddle 7’s bladder, which carries the apparently weightless air when it is inflated. What an apt ending for a riddle that likes talking to other riddles so much!

Notes:

References and Suggested Reading:

De Hamel, Christopher.Making Medieval Manuscripts. Oxford: Bodleian Library, 2018.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Related Posts:
Exeter Riddle 26
Bern Riddle 5: De mensa
Bern Riddle 7: De vesica
Bern Riddle 22: De ove
Bern Riddle 23: De igne

Bern Riddle 25: De litteris

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Sat 28 Nov 2020

Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 25: De litteris

Original text:

Nascimur albenti loco sed nigrae sorores;

Tres unito simul nos creant ictu parentes.

Multimoda nobis facies et nomina multa,

Meritumque dispar vox et diversa sonandi.

Numquam sine nostra nos domo detenet ullus,

Nec una responsum dat sine pari roganti.

Translation:

We are born in a white place but we are black sisters;

Three parents create us together with one stroke.

We have various faces and many names,

different values and diverse voices.

Nobody ever detains us outside our home,

nor do any of us reply without a suitable questioner.

Click to show riddle solution?

Letters (of the alphabet)

Notes:

This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 746.

A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 571.

Tags: latin Bern Riddles

Commentary for Bern Riddle 25: De litteris

NEVILLEMOGFORD

Date: Mon 08 Feb 2021

Matching Riddle: Bern Riddle 25: De litteris

This is the second of two riddles about writing technologies. The previous riddle told us about parchment—now it is the turn of the letters that are written on it. Writing was a popular medieval riddle topic, and this riddle employs several common tropes. So, without further ado, letters proceed to the riddle!
It begins by looking back to the parchment of the previous riddle, which here is described as the albentum locum (“white place”) upon which the letters are born as sisters. Groups of sisters are used in two other Bern riddles where the subject is plural and grammatically feminine: flowers (No. 33) and stars (No. 61). Aldhelm also uses the sister motif in his riddle on the alphabet, in which the seventeen sisters are the consonants, and the six “bastard-sisters” (nothas) are the vowels.

“A copy of Augustine’s On the Trinity, probably written in the nunnery scriptorium of either Chelles Abbey or Jouarre Abbey in Northern France, around 750. Bodleian MS. Laud Misc. 126 f. 2r. Photograph from Digital Bodleian (licence: CC BY NC 4.0)”



In the second line, we are told that three parents create the letters. This is part of a long medieval tradition of describing writing as an activity carried out using three fingers—although writers never tell us exactly which digits they have in mind (Rosenfeld, pages 24-5). Riddlers often play with this idea, sometimes combining it with ideas about parentage. In Aldhelm’s riddle on the alphabet (No. 30), the three fingers are “brothers” who create their “sisters” “with an unknown mother” (incerta matre). Similarly, Tatwine’s riddle on the pen (No. 6) mentions three creatures that “bind” (vincere) the pen; another of his riddles, on letters (No. 4) mentions an unnamed mother, which may refer to the pen, hand, or page. And Exeter Book Riddle 51, which is usually solved as pen and fingers, describes “four creatures” (wuhte feower) that “travel together” (samed siþian). We should also mention two riddles in which weapons are operated by three fingers —Aldhelm’s riddle on the slingshot (No. 74) and Eusebius’ riddle on the sword (No. 36). Erika von Erhardt-Siebold (page 74) suggested that the three finger-motif in riddles may have something to do with a line from the Book of Isaiah: “quis appendit tribus digitis molem terrae?” (“who measures the earth’s dust by three fingers?”). However, this connection might seem a bit of a stretch, especially since the motif was so popular outside of riddles (Williams, page 112).

“The four Evangelists writing the Gospels, carved on an ivory plaque from Cologne in the mid-11th century. Photograph from the V&A collections (licence: here)”



Aside from the three fingers motif, there are several very interesting parts of this riddle. In line 2, the idea that the finger-parents conceive the child with one “stroke” or “thrust” (ictus) is a great example of the sexualised double entendre that we more often associate with the Exeter Book Riddles. The idea in line 4 that no one can “detain” (detenere) the letters outside their home (sine… domo) seems to be that speech, unlike the written word, is fleeting, and that letters cannot be “held” or “stopped” outside of the page. And the final line explains that the sisters do not reply without a suitable “questioner” (or, in some manuscripts, the “father” (patre))—the idea is that the letters do not “speak” without a reader. Of course, this does not apply to us today, because we have all kinds of text-to-speech readers and audiobooks!

Notes:

Aldhelm of Malmesbury, “Riddle 30” and “Riddle 74.” In Rudolph Ehwald (ed.), Aldhelmi Opera, MGH Auctrorum antiquissimorum 15. Berlin: Weidmann, 1919. Pages 110 and 131. Available here.

von Erhardt-Siebold, Erika. Die lateinischen Rätsel der Angelsachsen: Ein Beitrag zur Kulturgeschichte Altenglands. Anglistische Forschungen 61. Heidelberg: Winter, 1925. Pages 73-4, 80-1. Available here.

Klein, Thomas. “Pater Occultus: The Latin Bern Riddles and Their Place in Early Medieval Riddling.” Neophilologus 103 (2019). Pages 339-417.

Rosenfeld, Randall. “Tres digiti scribunt: A Typology of Late-Antique and Medieval Pen Grips.” In John Haines and Randall Rosenfeld (eds.), Music and Medieval Manuscripts. Farnham: Ashgate, 2004. Pages 20-58.

Williams, Mary. The Riddles of Tatwine and Eusebius. PhD Thesis, University of Michigan (1974). Pages 80-2, 112, and 206-7.

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