Saturday, February 20, 2016

Eco's Echo

Umberto Eco Huffington Post Obituary

I've been reading The Name of Rose for a couple weeks now.  Very good book, it's a murder mystery set in an abbey in 1327.  Very complex and intricate story telling, Eco was a master of language.  I read Foucault's Pendulum a few years ago, it is one of the most difficult books that I've read to date, but very rewarding.  It's necessary to do a little research.  I'm only on page 76, but here's already some notes of mine:

Ecclesiestics – Christian clergy
Usus facti – “make use of”
Cum inter nonnullos – “among the few”
unico homine regent – “Rule of one (man)”
Cuirass – armor breastplate
apta coadunation – “suitable gathering”
corymbs – flat flower cluster where all flowers originate from single stalk-axis



Glycyrrhiza – licorice
Chrysoprase
Cistus 

Hoopoe 

Hypnale

Myrrh


Narcissus 

Privet 
Taro

Acanthus

Mallow – family of plants (Malvaceae) contains okra, cotton, and cacao.
Mecca Balsam (Opopanax – “vegetable juice panacea”) – medicinal gum resin from genus Commiphora called “bdellium”
Ramify – cause to branch or spread out
Pard – Cheetahs that mate with lions to produce leopards (lol)
Cynophale (?) Thyreophora (“shield-bearer”) cynophila “bone skipper” – species of fly that reproduces in animal bone marrow, thought to be extinct until rediscovery in 2009 in Spain
Polycaudate – “Many tailed”
Hydrophora – “Water carrier”?
                Hypophora – a figure of speech where speaker poses a question and then answers said question
Cynocephaly - “dog-head”
Leucrota – result of mating between a hyena and lioness that results in a beast the size of an ass with the torso of a lion, the haunches of a stag, a badgers head, a mouth that opens ear to ear, very fast, and with a voice that imitates human speech.
Manticore – sphinx like creature with body of a lion, human head, 3 rows of sharp shark like teeth, bat like wings, and a trumpet like voice.
Parander – Mix between a bear and an ibex that can change skin color like a chameleon
Prester – a venomous serpent
Spectafici – “fig looking”?
Saurian – ancient sub-order of lizards
Scytale (“baton”) – ancient transposition cypher
Amphisbaena – ant-eating serpent with a head at each end
Iaculo – “snake javelin”
Dipsase – One who experiences uncontrollable craving for alcoholic liquors (a dipsomaniac)
Jasper – “spotted or speckled stone”
Sardonyx – sard – “shades of red” onyx “claw” or “fingernail” stone
Interlocutor – a person who takes part in a dialogue or conversation
Viscid – glutinous; sticky
Glabrous – free from hair (bald); smooth
Curia – group of officials who assist in governance of a particular Catholic Church
Mundum discurrit vagabundus – a world travelling vagabond
Prebendary – senior member of clergy
Prebend – form of reward for services of the prebendary
Cicatrize – heal by scar formation
Olieribos, Aglaophotis – occult herbs
Patens – small plate used to hold Eucharistic bread to be consecrated

Monstrance (ostensorium) – vessel used for more convenient exhibition of some object of piety.

From Google Translate, online dictionaries, Wikipedia, my Webster's dictionary from 1965, and online 'medieval bestiaries'.

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