The tradition of rhetoric vitia as a source of poetic devices in the Hisperica Famina (116–132)

The present article is a treatment of the ancient grammar concept vitium (vitia, grammatical mistakes) in the language of the Hisperic poetic circle. The second part of the "Hisperica famina" (lines 116–132 which are considered a separate poem and called “The twelve mistakes”) forms the research material, presumably created in Ireland in the 7th century. The poem "Twelve Errors" stands out against the backdrop of other poems in the corpus, as it represents a reflection on the correctness of poetic speech. In it, the author of the poem (the faminator) lays out his professional poetic terminology based on the tradition of Latin grammar. The author of the article explores the specific of the faminator's poetic language regarding his literary sources. To achieve this goal, the author of the article briefly summarizes the specific of grammatical terminology in the faminator's sources – Isidore of Seville's "Etymologies" and Aelius Donatus's "Ars Maior" – and then moves on to describe the influence of these concepts on the analyzed text. Methodologically, the study represents a poetic analysis aimed at describing the specific of Hisperic poetics in the mentioned poem. As the study shows, the faminator deliberately allows numerous violations of rhetoric and grammar rules (vitia), which gives the poetics of the text a satirical hue of overt polemics with the whole Latin grammatical tradition. The deliberate use of these errors (which were undesirable within the framework of classical rhetoric) such as barbarism, solecism, pleonasm, tautology, etc., allows the author to form his own poetic language, which also reveals the influence of the grammatical literature read by the faminator. The poetics of wordplay, based on triggering of the listener's (reader's) background knowledge, is an integral part of the aesthetics of "Hisperica Famina" and, likely, of the entire Hisperic circle. This study contributes to a deeper analysis of the continuity between ancient rhetoric and Latin literature in Ireland, especially within the framework of the Irish tradition of Latin rhetoric.

Hisperica Famina, hisperic language, Insular Latin, poetic devices, literary devices, poetics, Hiberno-Latin, Hiberno-Latin literature, ancient grammar, ancient rhetoric