# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Gloss, Glossary

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​GLOSS, GLOSSARY, &c. The Greek word γλῶσσα (whence our “gloss”), meaning originally a tongue, then a language or dialect, gradually came to denote any obsolete, foreign, provincial, technical or otherwise peculiar word or use of a word (see Arist. Rhet. iii. 3. 2). The making of collections and explanations of such γλῶσσαι was at a comparatively early date a well-recognized form of literary activity. Even in the 5th century B.C., among the many writings of Abdera was included a treatise entitled Περὶ Ὁμήρου ἤ ὀρθοεπείης καὶ γλωσσέων. It was not, however, until the Alexandrian period that the γλωσσογράφοι, glossographers (writers of glosses), or glossators, became numerous. Of many of these perhaps even the names have perished; but Athenaeus the grammarian alone (c. A.D. 250) alludes to no fewer than thirty-five. Among the earliest was Philetas of Cos (d. c. 290 B.C.), the elegiac poet, to whom Aristarchus dedicated the treatise Πρὸς Φιλπτᾶν; he was the compiler of a lexicographical work, arranged probably according to subjects, and entitled Ἅτακτα or Γλγῶσσαι (sometimes Ἅτακτοι γλῶσσαι). Next came his disciple Zenodotus of Ephesus (c. 280 B.C.), one of the earliest of the Homeric critics and the compiler of Γλῶσσαι Ὁμηρικαί; Zenodotus in turn was succeeded by his greater pupil Aristophanes of Byzantium (c. 200 B.C.), whose great compilation Περὶ λέξεων (still partially preserved in that of Pollux), is known to have included Ἀττικαὶ λέξεις, Λακωνικαὶ γλῶσσαι, and the like. From the school of Aristophanes issued more than one glossographer of name,—Diodorus, Artemidorus (Γλῶσσαι, and a collection of λέξεις ὀψαρτυτικαί), Nicander of Colophon (Γλῶσσαι, of which some twenty-six fragments still survive), and Aristarchus (c. 210 B.C.), the famous critic, whose numerous labours included an arrangement of the Homeric vocabulary (λέξεις) in the order of the books. Contemporary with the last named was Crates of Mallus, who, besides making some new contributions to Greek lexicography and dialectology, was the first to create at Rome a taste for similar investigations in connexion with the Latin idioms. From his school proceeded Zenodotus of Mallus, the compiler of Ἐθνικαὶ λέξεις or γλῶσσαι, a work said to have been designed chiefly to support the views of the school of Pergamum as to the allegorical interpretation of Homer. Of later date were Didymus (Chalcenterus, c. 50 B.C.), who made collections of λέξεις τραγωδουμέναι κωμικαί, &c.; Apollonius Sophista (c. 20 B.C.), whose Homeric Lexicon has come down to modern times; and Neoptolemus, known distinctively as ὁ γλωσσογράφος. In the beginning of the 1st century of the Christian era Apion, a grammarian and rhetorician at Rome during the reigns of Tiberius and Claudius, followed up the labours of Aristarchus and other predecessors with Γλῶσσαι Ὁμηρικαί, and a treatise Περὶ τῆς Ῥωμαΐκῆς διαλέκτου; Heliodorus or Herodorus was another almost contemporary glossographer; Erotian also, during the reign of Nero, prepared a special glossary for the writings of Hippocrates, still preserved. To this period also Pamphilus, the author of the Λειμών, from which Diogenian and Julius Vestinus afterwards drew so largely, most probably belonged. In the following century one of the most prominent workers in this department of literature was Aelius Herodianus, whose treatise Περὶ μονήρους λέξεως has been edited in modern times, and whose Ἐπιμερισμοί we still possess in an abridgment; also Pollux, Diogenian (Λέξις παντοδαπή), Julius Vestinus (Ἐπιτομὴ τῶν Παμφίλου γλωσσῶν) and especially Phrynichus, who flourished towards the close of the 2nd century, and whose Eclogae nominum et verborum Atticorum has frequently been edited. To the 4th century belongs Ammonius of Alexandria (c. 389), who wrote Περὶ ὁμοίων καὶ διαφόρων λέξεων, a dictionary of words used in senses different from those in which they had ​ been employed by older and approved writers. Of somewhat later date is the well-known Hesychius, whose often-edited Λεξικόν superseded all previous works of the kind; Cyril, the celebrated patriarch of Alexandria, also contributed somewhat to the advancement of glossography by his Συναγωγὴ τῶν πρὸς διάφορον σημασίαν διαφόρως τονουμένων λέξεων; while Orus, Orion, Philoxenus and the two Philemons also belong to this period. The works of Photius, Suidas and Zonaras, as also the Etymologicum magnum, to which might be added the Lexica Sangermania and the Lexica Segueriana, are referred to in the article Dictionary.
To a special category of technical glossaries belongs a large and important class of works relating to the law-compilations of Justinian. Although the emperor forbade under severe penalties all commentaries (ὑπομνήματα) on his legislation (Const. Deo Auctore, sec. 12; Const. Tanta, sec. 21), yet indices (ἴνδικες) and references (παράτιτλα), as well as translations (ἑρμηνεῖαι κατὰ πόδα) and paraphrases (ἑρμηνεῖαι εἰς πλάτος), were expressly permitted, and lavishly produced. Among the numerous compilers of alphabetically arranged λέξεις Ῥωμαΐκαί or Λατεινικαί, and γλῶσσαι νομικαί (glossae nomicae), Cyril and Philoxenus are particularly noted; but the authors of παραγραφαί, or σημειώσεις, whether ἔξωθεν or ἔσωθεν κείμεναι, are too numerous to mention. A collection of these παραγραφαί τῶν παλαιῶν, combined with νέαι παραγραφαί on the revised code called τὰ βασιλικά, was made about the middle of the 12th century by a disciple of Michael Hagiotheodorita. This work is known as the Glossa ordinaria τῶν βασιλικῶν.
In Italy also, during the period of the Byzantine ascendancy, various glossae (glosae) and scholia on the Justinian code were produced; particularly the Turin gloss (reprinted by Savigny), to which, apart from later additions, a date prior to 1000 is usually assigned. After the total extinction of the Byzantine authority in the West the study of law became one of the free arts, and numerous schools for its cultivation were instituted. Among the earliest of these was that of Bologna, where Pepo (1075) and Irnerius (1100–1118) began to give their expositions. They had a numerous following, who, besides delivering exegetical lectures (“ordinariae” on the Digest and Code, “extraordinariae” on the rest of the Corpus juris civilis), also wrote Glossae, first interlinear, afterwards marginal. The series of these glossators was closed by Accursius (q.v.) with the compilation known as the Glossa ordinaria or magistralis, the authority of which soon became very great, so that ultimately it came to be a recognized maxim, “Quod non agnoscit glossa, non agnoscit curia.” For some account of the glossators on the canon law, see Canon Law.
In late classical and medieval Latin, glosa was the vulgar and romanic (e.g. in the early 8th century Corpus Glossary, and the late 8th century Leiden Glossary), glossa the learned form (Varro, De ling. Lat. vii. 10; Auson. Epigr. 127. 2 (86. 2), written in Greek, Quint, i. 1. 34). The diminutive glossula occurs in Diom. 426. 26 and elsewhere. The same meaning has glossarium (Gell. xviii. 7. 3 glosaria = γλωσσάριον), which also occurs in the modern sense of “glossary” (Papias, “unde glossarium dictum quod omnium fere partium glossas contineat”), as do the words glossa, glossae, glossulae, glossemata (Steinmeyer, Alth. Gloss. iv. 408, 410), expressed in later times by dictionarium, dictionarius, vocabularium, vocabularius (see Dictionary). Glossa and glossema (Varro vii. 34. 107; Asinius Gallus, ap. Suet. De gramm. 22; Fest. 166$^b$. 8, 181$^a$. 18; Quint. i. 8. 15, &c.) are synonyms, signifying (a) the word which requires explanation; or (b) such a word (called lemma) together with the interpretation (interpretamentum); or (c) the interpretation alone (so first in the Anecd. Helv.).
Latin, like Greek glossography, had its origin chiefly in the practical wants of students and teachers, of whose names we only know a few. No doubt even in classical times collections of glosses (“glossaries”) were compiled, to which allusion seems to be made by Varro (De ling. Lat. vii. 10, “tesca, aiunt sancta esse qui glossas scripserunt”) and Verrius-Festus (166$^b$ .6, “naucum ... glossematorum ... scriptures fabae grani quod haereat in fabulo”), but it is not known to what extent Varro, for instance, used them, or retained their original forms. The scriptores glossematorum were distinguished from the learned glossographers like Aurelius Opilius (cf. his Musae, ap. Suet. De gramm. 6; Gell. i. 25. 17; Varro vii. 50, 65, 67, 70, 79, 106), Servius Clodius (Varro vii. 70. 106), Aelius Stilo, L. Ateius Philol., whose liber glossematorum Festus mentions (181$^a$. 18).
Verrius Flaccus and his epitomists, Festus and Paulus, have preserved many treasures of early glossographers who are now lost to us. He copied Aelius Stilo (Reitzenstein, “Verr. Forsch.,” in vol. i. of Breslauer philol. Abhandl., p. 88; Kriegshammer, Comm. phil. Ien. vii. 1. 74 sqq.), Aurelius Opilius, Ateius Philol., the treatise De obscuris Catonis (Reitzenstein, ib. 56. 92). He often made use of Varro (Willers, De Verrio Flacco, Halle, 1898), though not of his ling. lat. (Kriegshammer, 74 sqq.); and was also acquainted with later glossographers. Perhaps we owe to him the glossae asbestos (Goetz, Corpus, iv.; id., Rhein. Mus. xl. 328). Festus was used by Ps.-Philoxenus (Dammann, “De Festo Ps.-Philoxeni auctore,” Comm. Ien. v. 26 sqq.), as appears from the glossae ab absens (Goetz, “De Astrabae Pl. fragmentis,” Ind. Ien., 1893, iii. sqq.). The distinct connexions with Nonius need not be ascribed to borrowing, as Plinius and Caper may have been used (P. Schmidt, De Non. Marc. auctt. gramm. 145; Nettleship, Lect. and Ess. 229; Fröhde, De Non. Marc. et Verrio Flacco, 2; W. M. Lindsay, “Non. Marc.,” Dict. of Repub. Latin, 100, &c.).
The bilingual (Gr.-Lat., Lat.-Gr.) glossaries also point to an early period, and were used by the grammarians (1) to explain the peculiarities (idiomata) of the Latin language by comparison with the Greek, and (2) for instruction in the two languages (Charis. 254. 9, 291. 7, 292. 16 sqq.; Marschall, De Q. Remmii P. libris gramm. 22; Goetz, Corp. gloss. lat. ii. 6).
For the purposes of grammatical instruction (Greek for the Romans, Latin for the Hellenistic world), we have systematic works, a translation of Dositheus and the so-called Hermeneutica, parts of which may be dated as early as the 3rd century A.D., and lexica (cf. Schoenemann, De lexicis ant. 122; Knaack, in Phil. Rundsch., 1884, 372; Traube, in Byzant. Ztschr. iii. 605; David, Comment. Ien. v. 197 sqq.).
The most important remains of bilingual glossaries are two well-known lexica; one (Latin-Greek), formerly attributed (but wrongly, see Rudorff, in Abh.. Akad. Berl., 1865, 220 sq.; Loewe, Prodr. 183, 190; Mommsen, C.I.L. v. 8120; A. Dammann, De Festo Pseudo-philoxeni auctore, 12 sqq.; Goetz, Corp. ii. 1-212) to Philoxenus (consul A.D. 525), clearly consists of two closely allied glossaries (containing glosses to Latin authors, as Horace, Cicero, Juvenal, Virgil, the Jurists, and excerpts from Festus), worked into one by some Greek grammarian, or a person who worked under Greek influence (his alphabet runs A, B, G, D, E, &c.); the other (Greek-Latin) is ascribed to Cyril (Stephanus says it was found at the end of some of his writings), and is considered to be a compilation of not later than the 6th century (Macrobius is used, and the Cod. Harl., which is the source of all the other MSS., belongs to the 7th century); cf. Goetz, Corp. ii. 215–483, 487–506, praef. ibid. p. xx. sqq. Furthermore, the bilingual medico-botanic glossaries had their origin in old lists of plants, as Ps.-Apuleius in the treatise De herbarum virtutibus, and Ps.-Dioscorides (cf. M. Wellmann, Hermes, xxxiii. 360 sqq., who thinks that the latter work is based on Pamphilus, q.v.; Goetz, Corp. iii.); the glossary, entitled Hermeneuma, printed from the Cod. Vatic. reg. Christ. 1260, contains names of diseases.
Just as grammar developed, so we see the original form of the glosses extend. If massucum edacem in Placidus indicates the original form, the allied gloss of Festus (masucium edacem a mandendo scilicet) shows an etymological addition. Another extension consists in adding special references to the original source, as e.g. at the gloss Ocrem (Fest. 181$^a$. 17), which is taken from Ateius Philol. In this way collections arose like the priscorum verborum cum exemplis, a title given by Fest. (218$^b$. 10) to a particular work. Further the glossae veterum (Charis. 242. 10); the glossae antiquitatum (id. 229. 30); the idonei vocum antiquarum enarratores (Gell. xviii. 6. 8); the libri rerum verborumque veterum (id. xiii. 24. 25). L. ​ Cincius, according to Festus (330$^b$. 2), wrote De verbis priscis; Santra, De antiquitate verborum (Festus 277$^a$. 2).
Of Latin glossaries of the first four centuries of the Roman emperors few traces are left, if we except Verrius-Festus. Charis, 229. 30, speaks of glossae antiquitatum and 242. 10 of glossae veterum, but it is not known whether these glosses are identic, or in what relation they stand to the glossemata per litteras Latinas ordine composita, which were incorporated with the works of this grammarian according to the index in Keil, p. 6. Latin glosses occur in Ps.-Philoxenus, and Nonius must have used Latin glossaries; there exists a glossarium Plautinum (Ritschl, Op. ii. 234 sqq.), and the bilingual glossaries have been used by the later grammarian Martyrius; but of this early period we know by name only Fulgentius and Placidus, who is sometimes called Luctatius Placidus, by confusion with the Statius scholiast, with whom the glossae Placidi have no connexion. All that we know of him tends to show that he lived in North Africa (like Fulgentius and Nonius and perhaps Charisius) in the 6th century, from whence his glosses came to Spain, and were used by Isidore and the compiler of the Liber glossarum (see below). These glosses we know from (1) Codices Romani (15th and 16th century); (2) the Liber glossarum; (3) the Cod. Paris. nov. acquis. 1298 (saec. xi.), a collection of glossaries, in which the Placidus-glosses are kept separate from the others, and still retain traces of their original order (cf. the editions published by A. Mai, Class. auct. iii. 427–503, and Deuerling, 1875; Goetz, Corp. v.; P. Karl, “De Placidi glossis,” Comm. Ien. vii. 2. 99, 103 sqq.; Loewe, Gloss. Nom. 86; F. Bücheler, in Thesaur. gloss. emend.). His collection includes glosses from Plautus and Lucilius.
(Fabius Planciades) Fulgentius (c. A.D. 468–533) wrote Expositio sermonum antiquorum (ed. Rud. Helm, Lips. 1898; cf. Wessner, Comment. Ien. vi. 2. 135 sqq.) in sixty-two paragraphs, each containing a lemma (sometimes two or three) with an explanation giving quotations and names of authors. Next to him come the glossae Nonianae, which arose from the contents of the various paragraphs in Nonius Marcellus’ work being written in the margin without the words of the text; these epitomized glosses were alphabetized and afterwards copied for other collections (see Goetz, Corp. v. 637 sqq., id. v. Praef. xxxv.; Onions and Lindsay, Harvard Stud. ix. 67 sqq.; Lindsay, Nonii praef. xxi.). In a similar way arose the glossae Eucherii or glossae spiritales secundum Eucherium episcopum found in many MSS. (cf. K. Wotke, Sitz. Ber. Akad. Wien, cxv. 425 sqq.; = the Corpus Glossary, first part), which are an alphabetical extract from the formulae spiritalis intelligentiae of St Eucherius, bishop of Lyons, c. 434–450.
Other sources were the Differentiae, already known to Placidus and much used in the medieval glossaries; and the Synonyma Ciceronis; cf. Goetz, “Der Liber glossarum,” in Abhandl. der philol.-hist. Cl. der sächs. Gesellsch. d. Wiss., 1893, p. 215; id. in Berl. philol. Wochenschr., 1890, p. 195 sqq.; Beck, in Wochenschr., p. 297 sqq., and Sittls, ibid. p. 267; Archiv f. lat. Lex. vi. 594; W. L. Mahne, (Leid. 1850, 1851); also various collections of scholia. By the side of the scholiasts come the grammarians, as Charisius, or an ars similar to that ascribed to him; further, treatises de dubiis generibus, the scriptores orthographici (especially Caper and Beda), and Priscianus, the chief grammarian of the middle ages (cf. Goetz in Mélanges Boissier, 224).
During the 6th, 7th and 8th centuries glossography developed in various ways; old glossaries were worked up into new forms, or amalgamated with more recent ones. It ceased, moreover, to be exclusively Latin-Latin, and interpretations in Germanic (Old High German, Anglo-Saxon) and Romanic dialects took the place of or were used side by side with earlier Latin ones. The origin and development of the late classic and medieval glossaries preserved to us can be traced with certainty. While reading the manuscript texts of classical authors, the Bible or early Christian and profane writers, students and teachers, on meeting with any obscure or out-of-the-way words which they considered difficult to remember or to require elucidation, wrote above them, or in the margins, interpretations or explanations in more easy or better-known words. The interpretations written above the line are called “interlinear,” those written in the margins of the MSS. “marginal glosses.” Again, MSS. of the Bible or portions of the Bible were often provided with literal translations in the vernacular written above the lines of the Latin version (interlinear versions).
Of such glossed MSS. or translated texts, photographs may be seen in the various palaeographical works published in recent years; cf. The Palaeogr. Society, 1st ser. vol. ii. pls. 9 (Terentius MS. of 4th or 5th century, interlinear glosses) and 24 (Augustine’s epistles, 6th or 7th century, marginal glosses); see further, plates 10, 12, 33, 40, 50-54, 57, 58, 63, 73, 75, 80; vol. iii. plates 10, 24, 31, 39, 44, 54, 80.
From these glossed or annotated MSS. and interlinear versions glossaries were compiled; that is, the obscure and difficult Latin words, together with the interpretations, were excerpted and collected in separate lists, in the order in which they appeared, one after the other, in the MSS., without any alphabetical arrangement, but with the names of the authors or the titles of the books whence they were taken, placed at the head of each separate collection or chapter. In this arrangement each article by itself is called a gloss; when reference is made only to the word explained it is called the lemma, while the explanation is termed the interpretamentum. In most cases the form of the lemma was retained just as it stood in its source, and explained by a single word (tesca: sancta, Varro vii. 10; clucidatus: suavis, id. vii. 107; cf. Isid. Etym. i. 30. 1, “quid enim illud sit in uno verbo positum declarat [scil. glossa] ut conticescere est tacere”), so that we meet with lemmata in the accusative, dative and genitive, likewise explained by words in the same cases; the forms of verbs being treated in the same way. Of this first stage in the making of glossaries, many traces are preserved, for instance, in the late 8th century Leiden Glossary (Voss. 69, ed. J. H. Hessels), where chapter iii. contains words or glosses excerpted from the Life of St Martin by Sulpicius Severus; chs. iv., v. and xxxv. glosses from Rufinus; chs. vi. and xl. from Gildas; chs. vii. to xxv. from books of the Bible (Paralipomenon; Proverbs, &c., &c.); chs. xxvi. to xlviii, from Isidore, the Vita S. Anthonii, Cassiodorus, St Jerome, Cassianus, Orosius, St Augustine, St Clement, Eucherius, St Gregory, the grammarians Donatus, Phocas, &c. (See also Goetz, Corp. v. 546. 23–547. 6. and i. 5-40 from Ovid’s Metam.; v. 657 from Apuleius, De deo Socratis; cf. Landgraf, in Arch. ix. 174).
By a second operation the glosses came to be arranged in alphabetical order according to the first letter of the lemma, but still retained in separate chapters under the names of authors or the titles of books. Of this second stage the Leiden Glossary contains traces also: ch. i. (Verba de Canonibus) and ii. (Sermones de Regulis); see Goetz, Corp. v. 529 sqq. (from Terentius), iv. 427 sqq. (Virgil).
The third operation collected all the accessible glosses in alphabetical order, in the first instance according to the first letters of the lemmata. In this arrangement the names of the authors or the titles of the books could no longer be preserved, and consequently the sources whence the glosses were excerpted became uncertain, especially if the grammatical forms of the lemmata had been normalized.
A fourth arrangement collected the glosses according to the first two letters of the lemmata, as in the Corpus Glossary and in the still earlier Cod. Vat. 3321 (Goetz, Corp. iv. 1 sqq.), where even many attempts were made to arrange them according to the first three letters of the alphabet. A peculiar arrangement is seen in the Glossae affatim (Goetz, Corp. iv. 471 sqq.), where all words are alphabetized, first according to the initial letter of the word (a, b, c, &c.), and then further according to the first vowel in the word (a, e, i, o, u).
No date or period can be assigned to any of the above stages or arrangements. For instance, the first and second are both found in the Leiden Glossary, which dates from the end of the 8th century, whereas the Corpus Glossary, written in the beginning of the same century, represents already the fourth stage.
For the purpose of identification titles have of late years been given to the various nameless collections of glosses, derived partly from their first lemma, partly from other characteristics, as glossae abstrusae; glossae abavus major and minor; g. affatim; g. ab absens; g. abactor; g. Abba Pater; g. a, a; g. Vergilianae; g. nominum (Goetz, Corp. ii. 563, iv.); g. Sangallenses (Warren, Transact. Amer. Philol. Assoc. xv., 1885, p. 141 sqq.).
A chief landmark in glossography is represented by the Origines (Etymologiae) of Isidore (d. 636), an encyclopedia in which he, like Cassiodorus, mixed human and divine subjects together. In many places we can trace his sources, but he also used glossaries. His work became a great mine for later glossographers. In the tenth book he deals with the etymology of many substantives and adjectives arranged alphabetically according to the first letter of the words, perhaps by himself from various sources. His principal source is Servius, then the fathers of the Church (Augustine, Jerome, ​ Lactantius) and Donatus the grammarian. This tenth book was also copied and used separately, and mixed up with other works (cf. Loewe, Prodr. 167. 21). Isidore’s Differentiae have also had a great reputation.
Next comes the Liber glossarum, chiefly compiled from Isidore, but all articles arranged alphabetically; its author lived in Spain c. A.D. 690–750; he has been called Ansileubus, but not in any of the MSS., some of which belong to the 8th century; hence this name is suspected to be merely that of some owner of a copy of the book (cf. Goetz, “Der Liber Glossarum,” in Abhandl. der philol.-hist. Class, der kön. sächs. Ges. xiii., 1893; id., Corp. v., praef. xx. 161).
Here come, in regard to time, some Latin glossaries already largely mixed with Germanic, more especially Anglo-Saxon interpretations: (1) the Corpus Glossary (ed. J. H. Hessels), written in the beginning of the 8th century, preserved in the library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge; (2) the Leiden Glossary (end of 8th century, ed. Hessels; another edition by Plac. Glogger), preserved in the Leiden MS. Voss. Q$^o$. 69; (3) the Épinal Glossary, written in the beginning of the 9th century and published in facsimile by the London Philol. Society from a MS. in the town library at Épinal; (4) the Glossae Amplonianae, i.e. three glossaries preserved in the Amplonian library at Erfurt, known as Erfurt$^1$, Erfurt$^2$ and Erfurt$^3$. The first, published by Goetz (Corp. v. 337–401; cf. also Loewe, Prodr. 114 sqq.) with the various readings of the kindred Épinal, consists, like the latter, of different collections of glosses (also some from Aldhelm), some arranged alphabetically according to the first letter of the lemma, others according to the first two letters. The title of Erfurt$^2$ (incipit II. conscriptio glosarum in unam) shows that it is also a combination of various glossaries; it is arranged alphabetically according to the first two letters of the lemmata, and contains the affatim and abavus maior glosses, also a collection from Aldhelm; Erfurt$^3$ are the Glossae nominum, mixed also with Anglo-Saxon interpretations (Goetz, Corp. ii. 563). The form in which the three Erfurt glossaries have come down to us points back to the 8th century.
The first great glossary or collection of various glosses and glossaries is that of Salomon, bishop of Constance, formerly abbot of St Gall, who died A.D. 919. An edition of it in two parts was printed c. 1475 at Augsburg, with the headline Salemonis ecclesie Constantiensis episcopi glosse ex illustrissimis collecte auctoribus. The oldest MSS. of this work date from the 11th century. Its sources are the Liber glossarum (Loewe, Prodr. 234 sqq.), the glossary preserved in the 9th-century MS. Lat. Monac. 14429 (Goetz, “Lib. Gloss.” 35 sqq.), and the great Abavus Gloss (id., ibid. p. 37; id., Corp. iv. praef. xxxvii.).
The Lib. glossarum has also been the chief source for the important (but not original) glossary of Papias, of A.D. 1053 (cf. Goetz in Sitz. Ber. Akad. Münch., 1903, p. 267 sqq., who enumerates eighty-seven MSS. of the 12th to the 15th centuries), of whom we only know that he lived among clerics and dedicated his work to his two sons. An edition of it was published at Milan “per Dominicum de Vespolate” on the 12th of December 1476; other editions followed in 1485, 1491, 1496 (at Venice). He also wrote a grammar, chiefly compiled from Priscianus (Hagen, Anecd. Helv. clxxix. sqq.).
The same Lib. gloss. is the source (1) for the Abba Pater Glossary (cf. Goetz, ibid. p. 39), published by G. M. Thomas (Sitz. Ber. Akad. Münch., 1868, ii. 369 sqq.); (2) the Greek glossary Absida lucida (Goetz, ib. p. 41); and (3) the Lat.-Arab. glossary in the Cod. Leid. Scal. Orient. No. 231 (published by Seybold in Semit. Studien, Heft xv.-xvii., Berlin, 1900).
The Paulus-Glossary (cf. Goetz, “Der Liber Glossarum,” p. 215) is compiled from the second Salomon-Glossary (abacti magistratus), the Abavus major and the Liber glossarum, with a mixture of Hebraica. Many of his glosses appear again in other compilations, as in the Cod. Vatic. 1469 (cf. Goetz, Corp. v. 520 sqq.), mixed up with glosses from Beda, Placidus, &c. (cf. a glossary published by Ellis in Amer. Journ. of Philol. vi. 4, vii. 3, containing besides Paulus glosses, also excerpts from Isidore; Cambridge Journ. of Philol. viii. 71 sqq., xiv. 81 sqq.).
Osbern of Gloucester (c. 1123–1200) compiled the glossary entitled Panormia (published by Angelo Mai as Thesaurus novus Latinitatis, from Cod. Vatic. reg. Christ. 1392; cf. W. Meyer, Rhein. Mus. xxix., 1874; Goetz in Sitzungsber. sächs. Ges. d. Wiss., 1903, p. 133 sqq.; Berichte üb. die Verhandl. der kön. sächs. Gesellsch. der Wiss., Leipzig, 1902); giving derivations, etymologies, testimonia collected from Paulus, Priscianus, Plautus, Horace, Virgil, Ovid, Mart. Capella, Macrobius, Ambrose, Sidonius, Prudentius, Josephus, Jerome, &c., &c. Osbern’s material was also used by Hugucio, whose compendium was still more extensively used (cf. Goetz, l.c., p. 121 sqq., who enumerates one hundred and three MSS. of his treatise), and contains many biblical glosses, especially Hebraica, some treatises on Latin numerals, &c. (cf. Hamann, Weitere Mitteil. aus dem Breviloquus Benthemianus, Hamburg, 1882; A. Thomas, “Glosses provençales inéd.” in Romania, xxxiv. p. 177 sqq; P. Toynbee, ibid. xxv. p. 537 sqq.).
The great work of Johannes de Janua, entitled Summa quae vocatur catholicon, dates from the year 1286, and treats of (1) accent, (2) etymology, (3) syntax, and (4) so-called prosody, i.e. a lexicon, which also deals with quantity. It mostly uses Hugucio and Papias; its classical quotations are limited, except from Horace; it quotes the Vulgate by preference, frequently independently from Hugucio; it excerpts Priscianus, Donatus, Isidore, the fathers of the Church, especially Jerome, Gregory, Augustine, Ambrose; it borrows many Hebrew glosses, mostly from Jerome and the other collections then in use; it mentions the Graecismus of Eberhardus Bethuniensis, the works of Hrabanus Maurus, the Doctrinale of Alexander de Villa Dei, and the Aurora of Petrus de Riga. Many quotations from the Catholicon in Du Cange are really from Hugucio, and may be traced to Osbern. There exist many MSS. of this work, and the Mainz edition of 1460 is well known (cf. Goetz in Berichte üb. die Verhandl. der kön. sächs. Gesellsch. der Wiss., Leipzig, 1902).
The gloss MSS. of the 9th and 10th centuries are numerous, but a diminution becomes visible towards the 11th. We then find grammatical treatises arise, for which also glossaries were used. The chief material was (1) the Liber glossarum; (2) the Paulus glosses; (3) the Abavus major; (4) excerpts from Priscian and glosses to Priscian; (5) Hebrew-biblical collections of proper names (chiefly from Jerome). After these comes medieval material, as the derivationes which are found in many MSS. (cf. Goetz in Sitzungsber. sächs. Ges. d. Wiss., 1903, p. 136 sqq.; Traube in Archiv f. lat. Lex. vi. 264), containing quotations from Plautus, Ovid, Juvenal, Persius, Terence, occasionally from Priscian, Eutyches, and other grammarians, with etymological explanations. These derivationes were the basis for the grammatical works of Osbern, Hugucio and Joannes of Janua.
A peculiar feature of the late middle ages are the medico-botanic glossaries based on the earlier ones (see Goetz, Corp. iii.). The additions consisted in Arabic words with Latin explanations, while Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Arabic, interchange with English, French, Italian and German forms. Of glossaries of this kind we have (1) the Glossae alphita (published by S. de Renzi in the 3rd vol. of the Collect. Salernitana, Naples, 1854, from two Paris MSS. of the 14th and 15th centuries, but some of the glosses occur already in earlier MSS.); (2) Sinonoma Bartholomei, collected by John Mirfeld, towards the end of the 14th century, ed. J. L. G. Mowat (Anecd. Oxon. i. 1, 1882, cf. Loewe, Gloss. Nom. 116 sqq.); it seems to have used the same or some similar source as No. 1; (3) the compilations of Simon de Janua (Clavis sanationis, end of 13th century), and of Matthaeus Silvaticus (Pandectae medicinae, 14th century; cf. H. Stadler, “Dioscor. Longob.” in Roman. Forsch. x. 3. 371; Steinmeyer, Althochd. Gloss. iii.).
Of biblical glossaries we have a large number, mostly mixed with glosses on other, even profane, subjects, as Hebrew and other biblical proper names, and explanations of the text of the Vulgate in general, and the prologues of Hieronymus. So we have the Glossae veteris ac novi testamenti (beginning “Prologus graece latine praelocutio sive praefatio”) in numerous MSS. of the 9th to 14th centuries, mostly retaining the various books under separate headings (cf. Arevalo, Isid. vii. 407 sqq.; Loewe, Prodr. 141; Steinmeyer iv. 459; S. Berger, De compendiis exegeticis quibusdam medii aevi, Paris, 1879). Special mention should be made of Guil. Brito, who lived about 1250, and compiled a Summa (beginning “difficiles studeo partes quas Biblia gestat Pandere”), contained in many MSS. especially in French libraries. This Summa gave rise to the Mammotrectus of Joh. Marchesinus, about 1300, of which we have editions printed in 1470, 1476, 1479, &c.
Finally we may mention such compilations as the Summa Heinrici; the work of Johannes de Garlandia, which he himself calls dictionarius (cf. Scheler in Jahrb. f. rom. u. engl. Philol. vi., 1865, p. 142 sqq.); and that of Alexander Neckam (ib. vii. p. 60 sqq., cf. R. Ellis, in Amer. Journ. of Phil. x. 2); which are, strictly speaking, not glossographic. The Breviloquus drew its chief material from Papias, Hugucio, Brito, &c. (K. Hamann, Mitteil. aus dem Breviloquus Benthemianus, Hamburg, 1879; id., Weitere Mitteil., &c., Hamburg, 1882); so also the Vocabularium Ex quo; the various Gemmae; Vocabularia rerum (cf. Diefenbach, Glossar. Latino-Germanicum).
After the revival of learning, J. Scaliger (1540–1609) was the first to impart to glossaries that importance which they deserve (cf. Goetz, in Sitzungsber. sächs. Ger. d. Wiss., 1888, p. 219 sqq.), and in his edition of Festus made great use of Ps.-Philoxenus, which enabled O. Müller, the later editor of Festus, to follow in his footsteps. Scaliger also planned the publication of a Corpus glossarum, and left behind a collection of glosses known as glossae Isidori (Goetz, Corp. v. p. 589 sqq.; id. in Sitzungsber. sächs. Ges., 1888, p. 224 sqq.; Loewe, Prodr. 23 sqq.), which occurs also in old glossaries, clearly in reference to the tenth book of the Etymologiae.
The study of glosses spread through the publication, in 1573, of the bilingual glossaries by H. Stephanus (Estienne), containing, besides the two great glossaries, also the Hermeneumata Stephani, which is a recension of the Ps.-Dositheana (republished Goetz, Corp. iii. 438–474), and the glossae Stephani, excerpted from a collection of the Hermeneumata (ib. iii. 438–474).
In 1600 Bonav. Vulcanius republished the same glossaries, adding (1) the glossae Isidori, which now appeared for the first time; (2) the Onomasticon; (3) notae and castigationes, derived from Scaliger (Loewe, Prodr. 183).
In 1606 Carolus and Petrus Labbaeus published, with the effective help of Scaliger, another collection of glossaries, republished, in 1679, by Du Cange, after which the 17th and 18th centuries produced no ​further glossaries (Erasm. Nyerup published extracts from the Leiden Glossary, Voss. 69, in 1787, Symbolae ad Literat. Teut.), though glosses were constantly used or referred to by Salmasius, Meursius, Heraldus, Barth, Fabricius and Burman at Leiden, where a rich collection of glossaries had been obtained by the acquisition of the Vossius library (cf. Loewe, Prodr. 168). In the 19th century came Osann’s Glossarii Latini specimen (1826); the glossographic publications of Angelo Mai (Classici auctores, vols. iii., vi., vii., viii., Rome, 1831–1836, containing Osbern’s Panormia, Placidus and various glosses from Vatican MSS.); Fr. Oehler’s treatise (1847) on the Cod. Amplonianus of Osbern, and his edition of the three Erfurt glossaries, so important for Anglo-Saxon philology; in 1854 G. F. Hildebrand’s Glossarium Latinum (an extract from Abavus minor), preserved in a Cod. Paris. lat. 7690; 1857, Thomas Wright’s vol. of Anglo-Saxon glosses, which were republished with others in 1884 by R. Paul Wülcker under the title Anglo-Saxon and Old English Vocabularies (London, 2 vols., 1857); L. Diefenbach’s supplement to Du Cange, entitled Glossarium Latino-Germanicum mediae et infimae aetatis, containing mostly glosses collected from glossaries, vocabularies, &c., enumerated in the preface; Ritschl’s treatise (1870) on Placidus, which called forth an edition (1875) of Placidus by Deuerling; G. Loewe’s Prodromus (1876), and other treatises by him, published after his death by G. Goetz (Leipzig, 1884); 1888, the second volume of Goetz’s own great Corpus glossariorum Latinorum, of which seven volumes (except the first) had seen the light by 1907, the last two being separately entitled Thesaurus glossarum emendatarum, containing many emendations and corrections of earlier glossaries by the author and other scholars; 1900, Arthur S. Napier, Old English Glosses (Oxford), collected chiefly from Aldhelm MSS., but also from Augustine, Avianus, Beda, Boethius, Gregory, Isidore, Juvencus, Phocas, Prudentius, &c.
There are a very great number of glossaries still in MS. scattered in various libraries of Europe, especially in the Vatican, at Monte Cassino, Paris, Munich, Bern, the British Museum, Leiden, Oxford, Cambridge, &c. Much has already been done to make the material contained in these MSS. accessible in print, and much may yet be done with what is still unpublished, though we may find that the differences between the glossaries which often present themselves at first sight are mere differences in form introduced by successive more or less qualified copyists.
Some Celtic (Breton, Cornish, Welsh, Irish) glossaries have been preserved to us, the particulars of which may be learnt from the publications of Whitley Stokes, Sir John Rhys, Kuno Meyer, L. C. Stern, G. I. Ascoli, Heinr. Zimmer, Ernst Windisch, Nigra, and many others; these are published separately as books or in Zeuss’s Grammatica Celtica, A. Kühn’s Beiträge zur vergleich. Sprachforschung, Zeitschr. für celtische Philologie, Archiv für Celtische Lexicographie, the Revue celtique, Transactions of the London Philological Society, &c.
The first Hebrew author known to have used glosses was R. Gershom of Metz (1000) in his commentaries on the Talmud. But he and other Hebrew writers after him mostly used the Old French language (though sometimes also Italian, Slavonic, German) of which an example has been published by Lambert and Brandin, in their Glossaire hébreu-français du XIII $^e$ siècle: recueil de mots hébreux bibliques avec traduction française (Paris, 1905). See further The Jewish Encyclopedia (New York and London, 1903), article “Gloss.”
Authorities.—For a great part of what has been said above, the writer is indebted to G. Goetz’s article on “Latein. Glossographie” in Pauly’s Realencyklopädie. By the side of Goetz’s Corpus stands the great collection of Steinmeyer and Sievers, Die althochdeutschen Glossen (in 4 vols., 1879–1898), containing a vast number of (also Anglo-Saxon) glosses culled from Bible MSS. and MSS. of classical Christian authors, enumerated and described in the 4th vol. Besides the works of the editors of, or writers on, glosses, already mentioned, we refer here to a few others, whose writings may be consulted: Hugo Blümner; Catholicon Anglicum (ed. Hertage); De-Vit (at end of Forcellini’s Lexicon); F. Deycks; Du Cange; Funck; J. H. Gallée (Altsächs. Sprachdenkm., 1894); Gröber; K. Gruber (Hauptquellen des Corpus, Épin. u. Erfurt Gloss., Erlangen, 1904); Hattemer; W. Heraeus (Die Sprache des Petronius und die Glossen, Leipzig, 1899); Kettner; Kluge; Krumbacher; Lagarde; Landgraf; Marx; W. Meyer-Lubke (“Zu den latein. Glossen” in Wiener Stud. xxv. 90 sqq.); Henry Nettleship; Niedermann, Notes d’étymol. lat. (Macon, 1902), Contribut. à la critique des glosses latines (Neuchâtel, 1905); Pokrowskij; Quicherat; Otto B. Schlutter (many important articles in Anglia, Englische Studien, Archiv f. latein. Lexicographie, &c.); Schöll; Schuchardt; Leo Sommer; Stadler; Stowasser; Strachan; H. Sweet; Usener (Rhein. Mus. xxiii. 496, xxiv. 382); A. Way, Promptorium parvulorum sive clericorum (3 vols., London, 1843–1865); Weyman; Wilmanns (in Rhein. Mus. xxiv. 363); Wölfflin in Arch. für lat. Lexicogr.; Zupitza. Cf. further, the various volumes of the following periodicals: Romania; Zeitschr. für deutsches Alterthum; Anglia; Englische Studien; Journal of English and German Philology (ed. Cook and Karsten); Archiv für latein. Lexicogr., and others treating of philology, lexicography, grammar, &c.  (J. H. H.)
* ↑ The history of the literary gloss in its proper sense has given rise to the common English use of the word to mean an interpretation, especially in a disingenuous, sinister or false way; the form “gloze,” more particularly associated with explaining away, palliating or talking speciously, is simply an alternative spelling. The word has thus to some extent influenced, or been influenced by, the meaning of the etymologically different “gloss” = lustrous surface (from the same root as “glass”; cf. “glow”), in its extended sense of “outward fair seeming.”
* ↑ See Matthaei, Glossaria Graeca (Moscow, 1774/5).
* ↑ See Labbé, Veteres glossae verborum juris quae passim in Basilicis reperiuntur (1606); Otto, Thesaurus juris Romani, iii. (1697); Stephens, Thesaurus linguae Graecae, viii. (1825).
* ↑ See Biener, Geschichte der Novellen, p. 229 sqq.
* ↑ Irnerius himself is with some probability believed to have been the author of the Brachylogus (q.v.).
* ↑ Thus Fil. Villani (De origine civitatis Florentiae, ed. 1847, p. 23), speaking of the Glossator Accursius, says of the Glossae that “tantae auctoritatis gratiaeque fuere, ut omnium consensu publice approbarentur, et reiectis aliis, quibuscumque penitus abolitis, solae juxta textum legum adpositae sunt et ubique terrarum sine controversia pro legibus celebrantur, ita ut nefas sit, non secus quam textui, Glossis Accursii contraire.” For similar testimonies see Bayle’s Dictionnaire, s.v. “Accursius,” and Rudorff, Röm. Rechtsgeschichte, i. 338 (1857).
* ↑ The so-called Malberg glosses, found in various texts of the Lex Salica, are not glosses in the ordinary sense of the word, but precious remains of the parent of the present literary Dutch, namely, the Low German dialect spoken by the Salian Franks who conquered Gaul from the Romans at the end of the 5th century. It is supposed that the conquerors brought their Frankish law with them, either written down, or by oral tradition; that they translated it into Latin for the sake of the Romans settled in the country, and that the translators, not always knowing a proper Latin equivalent for certain things or actions, retained in their translations the Frankish technical names or phrases which they had attempted to translate into Latin. E.g. in chapter ii., by the side of “porcellus lactans” (a sucking-pig), we find the Frankish “chramnechaltio,” lit. a stye-porker. The person who stole such a pig (still kept in an enclosed place, in a stye) was fined three times as much as one who stole a “porcellus de campo qui sine matre vivere possit,” as the Latin text has it, for which the Malberg technical expression appears to have been ingymus, that is, a one year (winter) old animal, i.e. a yearling. Nearly all these glosses are preceded by “mal” or “malb,” which is thought to be a contraction for “malberg,” the Frankish for “forum.” The antiquity and importance of these glosses for philology may be realized from the fact that the Latin translation of the Lex Salica probably dates from the latter end of the 5th century. For further information cf. Jac. Grimm’s preface to Joh. Merkel’s ed. (1850), and H. Kern’s notes to J. H. Hessels’s ed. (London, 1880) of the Lex Salica.
* ↑ Anglo-Saxon scholars ascribe an earlier date to the text of the MS. on account of certain archaisms in its Anglo-Saxon words.