Latin rubbish/Greek to me

[Vicki Marsh]

Greetings from Zara Zina,

>Lord Jovian possibly muttered...

>Another question: I just got another book on Byzantine history and 
>they state that Medieval Greek and Modern Greek are very similar. Does 
>this mean that I can pick up modern Greek textbooks and phrase books 
>and speak closely to how my persona would have?

Jovian, in "Everyday Life in Byzantium" by Tamara Talbot Rice, Barnes &
Noble Books, 1994, ISBN 0-88029-145-1, p. 193, Rice states that "As in
present-day Greece, three forms of Greek were in simultaneous use from about
the eight century: the vernacular Romaic was used by the uneducated, Attic
Greek was used by educated people when writing, and a more elaborated
version for conversation.  The last was closer to classical Greek that to
Romaic and was used for orations, thus widening the gap between the written
and spoken forms."

As you are from a noble family, you would probably know and be able to speak
all three - like High, Middle, and low German.  Time to learn how to read
Homer - Can you memorize your 50 lines a day?? That's what was required of
the school children.

BTW, I finally got it in gear and found some information about the
Calligraphic style.  Caroline or Carolingian miniscule was in use fro the
8th - 12th century and would have been used when writing Latin.  The
Emperors commonly employed Greek and Latin scribes.  In writing Greek, a
script called Greek miniscule was used from the 10th - 12th century.  I have
also seen reference but no examples of a Beneventan script dating from
1087-13th c. from Benevento in Southern Italy.  It was also in use at Cava
Capula, Bari, and in Dalmatia.

Italy came to using Gothic towards the end of the 13th century.

Sources: ibid. above
        "ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS, The Book before Gutenberg", Giulia
Bologna, Random House, 1995, ISBN 0-517-12083-6

        This is an excellent book, with good histories of Latin scripts.
Mark Harris/Stefan asked me about Carolingian Scripts and how they would
have travelled to Byzantium.  This book outlines its journey from
Charlemagne's reign (768-814) where it developed in the scriptoria of the
area between the Rhine and the Loire, spreading in use throughout Spain,
Italy, England, France,& Germany.  

Gotta go do some real reseach now.  I've got a paper on Team Management due
tomorrow.

:-)

Zara Zina