Space and Pat are scheduled to arrive at Vienna’s Schwecat airport in just under 24 hours. Just in time, floodwaters are beginning to recede in this part of Austria and the first trees – plum and apricot – are starting to blossom. Hopefully we’ll be able to make an excursion to the library at the monastery in Melk, which is where Umberto Eco’s “The Name of the Rose” begins. Pat’s been looking forward to that, and so have I. Although I’ve lived here steadily for more than 10 years now, and have been in Austria off and on since 1976, I’ve never seen that library either, which is said to be grand.
You know, in “Name of the Rose,” when William discovers the secret to entering the finis Africae, he exclaims, “suppositio materialis, the discourse is presumed de dicto and not de re . . . .” Translated his comment means “material supposition,” the discourse is presumed to be about the word not the thing. In Summa of Logic, William of Occam demonstrates the important difference between material supposition and signification. “Material supposition occurs when a term does not supposit significantly, but supposits for an utterance or an inscription. This is clear in ‘Man is a name’. ‘Man’ supposits for itself [the word man], and yet it does not signify itself [the concept man]. Likewise in the proposition ‘Man is written’ the supposition can be material, because the term supposits for what is written.” (Summa of Logic, Part I, Chpt 64; emphasis added). William experienced difficulty deciphering the clue “the first and seventh of the four” because he was attempting to interpret “four” significantly–as a sign representing a concept related to the number four. “[W]hat can this ‘four’ be that has a ‘first’ and a seventh’?” (p.209). Only when he interprets Venantius’ clue materially as relating to the word “four” is he able to understand how to gain entrance into the finis Africae.
So there’s that, right? On the other hand, wrong library. Melk figures at the very beginning, when the narrator (? the person who finds the old manuscript relating the actual story) visits Melk in the first chapter.
Well, you remembered Finis Africae, which is more than I remembered. I just lifted that stuff from some website.