HISTORY AND PRINCIPLES OF TEXTUAL CRITICISM

The module takes the form of an introduction to the study of manuscript traditions and the discussion of the main ecdotal approaches to textual production in the Germanic Middle Ages.

1. Knowledge and understanding
To know and understand the problems related to the transmission of both manuscript and printed literary texts in the medieval and modern Germanic field; to know and understand the philological practices and the theorisations developed in connection with the preparation of the critical edition of the text.
2. Ability to apply knowledge and understanding
To be able to recognise the problems inherent in the transmission of texts and the philological procedures necessary for the restitution of the text in the form presumably closest to the original; to acquire awareness of the linguistic, stylistic, historical-cultural, palaeographical and codicological knowledge indispensable to the practice of text edition.
3. Autonomy of judgement
Being able to recognise, by comparing manuscript or printed witnesses with modern editions of a text, the practice followed by individual editors and to assess, through analysis of the critical debate, the greater or lesser goodness of their choices.
4. Communication skills
To be able to communicate in a clear and technically adequate manner the contents of the course
course content in a clear and technically appropriate manner, using the register relevant to the communicative situation.
5. Learning ability
To be able to present the course content in an organic manner and to consult reference texts critically.

There are no prerequisites.

- The conversion to Christianity and the beginning of the written tradition
- The transmission of the text in the Germanic Middle Ages
- The critical edition of a text: principles and processes
- Diplomatic edition
- The New Philology and the valorisation of the individual manuscript as a historical witness of a work
- Examples from the English (Anglo-Saxon and Middle English), German (Old High German and Middle High German) and Nordic (Icelandic, Swedish) areas

- Paolo Chiesa, Elementi di critica testuale, Bologna: Patron, 2012.
- Giorgio Pasquali, Storia della tradizione e critica del testo, Firenze, Le Lettere 1988

The examination consists of an oral test of the course content based on the training objectives set out in the appropriate section

More specifically:
- knowledge and understanding: assessment through questions concerning the course content;
- ability to apply knowledge and understanding: assessment through a practical exercise (e.g. description and evaluation of the characteristics of an edition)
- autonomy of judgement: assessment through methodological questions;
- communication skills: assessment of the ability to express oneself in a technically correct (with the appropriate use of terms from the philological lexicon) and clear manner;
- learning ability: assessment of the student's degree of autonomy in formulating a judgement.

The module consists of lectures and exercises on facsimile manuscripts

Italian

oral