PLEASE NOTE THE CHANGE OF DATES: 27-29 April 2022
Living Bodies of Texts: Organising a Literary Corpus in the Middle Ages
The Corpus Nazianzenum and the Corpus Dionysiacum
Göttingen, 27-29 April 2022
Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen
“Haus des Geistes” (Geiststraße 10)
Through the very word ‘corpus’, the metaphor of the ‘body’ is applied to a group of works by the same author that are transmitted together. These works not only share the same ‘skin’ (the binding) but also function organically thanks to a complex system of different paracontents (titles, scholia, glosses, marginal signs, commentaries, author’s biographies, illustrations, tables of contents…). When a corpus is ‘edited’ anew in its original language, or translated into another language, the ‘organs’ (the contents) are transplanted into a new ‘body’, with its own autonomous life.
In the case of only very few medieval authors is it possible to see this system at work such as in the case of the Corpus Nazianzenum and the Corpus Dionysiacum. In many ways both Gregory Nazianzen and Dionysius the Areopagite are ‘super-authors’, who forged their own literary identity as much as they shaped a closed and limited body of writings and prepared it for posterity. This common feature of both corpora sets them apart from other gatherings of patristic works, which were often much larger and not so well defined from the beginning. Neither Gregory nor Dionysius could foresee, however, that a growing apparatus of paracontents would become inseparable from their work. Amongst the early Byzantine writers, Gregory and Dionysius were at the same time the most celebrated and the most difficult to understand, as we see especially in the (early) medieval translations that made their works available to Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, Latin, Slavonic or Syriac audiences. Their multilingual corpora of texts were glossed, annotated and commented upon continuously, giving rise to an ever growing ‘exoskeleton’, which sometimes superseded or even obliterated the actual ‘body’ on which it was built.
Conference supported by the Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen and the Thyssen Stiftung
We hope to hold this conference as an in-person event. For inquiries and registrations, please send an email to cmace@gwdg.de.
PROGRAMME
Wednesday 27 April 2022
14h Welcome
Session I Origins of the Corpora, chair: Chiara Faraggiana
14h15-15h00 Caroline Macé: The Author as a Saint: The Lives of Gregory and Dionysius in the Manuscripts of their Corpus
15h00-15h45 Margherita Matera: Quelques considérations sur la transmission textuelle du Corpus dionysien après le déchiffrement du palimpseste Par. gr. 1330
16h00-16h45 The Editorial Projects on Dionysius Areopagita and Gregory of Nazianzus
Ekkehard Mühlenberg: Das Akademievorhaben „Dionysius Areopagita“ in Göttingen
Bernard Coulie: Le Centre d’études sur Grégoire de Nazianze à Louvain-la-Neuve
17h00-18h00 Public lecture
Stratis Papaioannou: The Body of the Author: Theories and Practices of Authorship in Byzantium
RECEPTION
Thursday 28 April 2022
Session II Medieval and Modern Editions of the Corpora (Greek), chair: Patrick Andrist
9h-9h45 Véronique Somers: Sur les traces d’une édition byzantine des Discours de Grégoire de Nazianze
9h45-10h30 Pierre-Marie Picard: Les divisions mauristes des Poèmes de Grégoire de Nazianze, des corpus évolutifs
PAUSE
Session III Evolution of the Corpora (Latin), chair: Thomas Schmidt
11h-11h45 Reka Forrai: A Foreign Body: the Birth of the Latin Pseudo-Dionysian Corpus
11h45-12h30 Alessandro Capone: Alle origini delle antiche versioni latine delle Orazioni di Gregorio di Nazianzo
LUNCH
Session IV Evolution of the Corpora (Near East and Caucasus), chair: Emiliano Fiori
14h00-14h45 Maia Matchavariani: Books for Bibliophiles: Two Ancient Collections of the Georgian Translations of Gregory Nazianzen’s Works (S-1696 and A-87)
14h45-15h30 Michael Muthreich: Bekanntheit und Verbreitung: Das arabische Corpus Dionysiacum und die dem Dionysius Areopagita zugeschriebenen Texte „außerhalb davon“
PAUSE
Session V Scholia and Commentaries (Armenian and Georgian), chair: Bernard Coulie
16h-16h45 Sergio La Porta: The Armenian scholia on the Corpus Dionysiacum and their Use in the Medieval School Curriculum
16h45-17h30 Tamara Otkhmezouri: Paratexts in Medieval Georgian Manuscripts: Corpus Nazianzenum and Corpus Dionysiacum
Session VIa Scholia and Commentaries (Greek), chair: Caroline Macé
17h30-18h15 Chiara Faraggiana: Anmerkungen hinzufügen: Gehören παρατιθέναι, παραγράφεσθαι, παρακεῖσθαι zum literarischen oder zum kodikologischen Vokabular?
CONFERENCE DINNER (20h)
Friday 29 April 2022
Session VIb Scholia and Commentaries (Greek), chair: Caroline Macé
9h00-9h45 Thomas Schmidt: Les Commentaires de Basile le Minime aux Discours de Grégoire de Nazianze: le cas particulier du Discours 38
9h45-10h30 Gaëlle Rioual: L’ordre de production des Commentaires de Basile le Minime
PAUSE
Session VII Scholia and Commentaries (Syriac), chair: Michael Mutreich
11h-11h45 Jonathan Loopstra: Reading the Corpus Nazianzenum in Syriac by way of the Margins
11h45-12h30 Emiliano Fiori: From Scholium to Commentary: The Syriacization of Dionysius the Areopagite as a Collective Effort
12h30-13h30 Conclusions (round table)