Alcuin's heirs : the early reception of Alcuin's De rhetorica and De dialectica

• Main Author: Bohn, Eva Magdalena Elisabeth
• Published: University of Cambridge 2003
• Subjects: 940
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.596747

This dissertation is a study of the early reception of two treatises by Alcuin of York(�. 740-814), LV namely, De rhetorica and De dialectica. Alcuin was one of the most influential (court) scholars under Charlemagne (771-814). My investigation depends on the close analysis of a single manuscript: Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 6407 CV). First, because it is the oldest manuscript containing De rhetorica and De dialectica. Secondly, because in my view, recent analyses of the contents of this manuscript have been mistaken in associating its recension of De rhetorica and De dialectica with Alcuin and with the circle of his students at Tours. Moreover, I believe that, as such, past scholarship on V exemplifies the problems and pitfalls in describing intellectual activity in the Carolingian period. My argument consists of two parts. I begin by showing that the codicological structure of the manuscript would argue against a common origin for all of its texts. I then examine the possible original contexts both for Alcuin's De rhetorica and De dialectica and for the specific recension of these works in V. In this process, I reconsider the traditional views on the dating of these two treatises, and their place in the wider context of Alcuin's work.