Artificiosa memoria

This paper proposes a new interpretation of the famous fourth century A.D. mosaic of the “Seven Sages” and the “Anger of Achilles”. Discovered in Merida in 1982, this mosaic was previously analyzed and interpreted by J.M. Aharez Martinez and M.-H. Quet. The occurrence of these two iconographic themes in one mosaic tends the author to compare the description of the “Anger of Achilles” in the first book of the Iliad with the maxims of the Seven Sages of Greece. The study of both written and iconographic sources shows that he image of the “Anger of Achilles” evokes allusively the moral precepts of the Seven Sages. The mosaic constitutes therefore an example of the practical use of “artificiosa memoria “.

Three stages can be distinguished in the history of the printed text of Iacobus Publicius's Ars memorativa. The first one comprises two volumes pu blished in Toulouse and Paris, around 1477. The same stage in the composition of the text is also to be found in a later edition (around 1489). Two versions have been preserved of the second stage of the text: the version that is possibly earlier in time (around 1481) lacks tituli and even omits the author's name. It also contains several engravings, all of them with moving parts, representing the combination of imagines and literae reales. The second version of this second stage was published in Venice in 1482 at the Ratdolt printing press. The Ars memorativa was associated with two rhetorical treatises (Institutiones oratoriae and Ars epistolandi), and the resulting volume was published under the generic title Oratoriae artis epitomata. This version includes a mnemonic alphabet that largely coincides with the one presented in the 1481 version, although now almost all images are fixed. Regarding the text, the main novelty is a profound rearrangement of the contents throughout all the books. The last stage (1485, by Ratdolt) wants to achieve two aims: put the three books on the same level despite having been clearly in favour of the first one before, and homogenize the content of each of the three books. The result is a well-balanced work from a doctrinal point of view and an interesting one from the editorial, which both surely explain much of its success.

Phoenix siue artificiosa memoria by Pedro de Rávena was widely circulated around 16th century Europe. There are two keys to his success: his reputation for being an illustrious mnemonist that he managed to incorporate into his exhibitions on memory and the use of emotions when formulating mnemonic rules based on humour and eroticism. In addition, shortly before his death, in 1508, he published the brief additiones quaedam ad artificiosam memoriam in which he adds several new rules and, above all, disregards that which suggests using the image of beautiful youths to elaborate mnemonic scenes. This kind of retractatio is explained within the context of the controversy maintained by some theologians from Cologne.

El arte de memoria descrito por Trebisonda en el capítulo que dedica a este tema en el libro cuarto de sus Rhetoricorum libri quinque debe mucho a la Rhetorica ad Herennium en lo relativo a la disposición de loci o lugares mentales que sirvan de depósito a las imagines que elabora el usuario de esta técnica. Sin embargo, en la teoría sobre la composición de imágenes mentales para alimentar la memoria, Trebisonda dota de un nuevo sentido a la distinción antigua entre memoria rerum y memoria uerborum, pues los tipos de asociaciones o similitudines que se establecen en uno y otro caso son una adaptación de los tropos y de las figuras de dicción que el autor explica en otros capítulos de su obra. Todo ello se explica por concebir el arte de la memoria como un sistema de escritura mental, cuyas unidades expresivas se enfrentan a los mismos problemas de significación con los que topa la palabra escrita. En este sentido llama la atención que el autor admita incluso la elaboración de signos ad placitum, de acuerdo con sus convicciones neoaristotélicas.

Aunque Jiménez Patón sólo menciona al Brocense para criticar su actitud ante la retórica, lo cierto es que el Mercurius debe mucho al humanista extremeño, tanto a las diferentes versiones de su Rhetorica como a la Artifrciosae memoriae ars. Vives y palmireno, a quienes cita como fuentes, apenas prestan materiales. En cualquier caso, como otros humanistas del siglo anterior, Jiménez Patón acaba adoptando una posición ecléctica, pues, aunque condena la filiación retórica de la memoria, no duda en dedicarle
tres capñitulos en el cuerpo de su obra. En dos de ellos, la define en términos retóricos, más concretamente dispositivos; y en el tercero la pone a las puertas de la misma memoria artificial que practicaban los oradores antiguos y enseñan los rétores del Renacimiento y del Barroco.

In this paper we aim to explain the reasons for which, during the Renaissance,
the reading notas similitudines is preferred (as opposed to the commonly accepted
present-day notatas similitudines) in the passage Rhetorica ad Herennium (3,
37) that describes the function of the memoria artificialis and, more specifically, the
composition of imagines firmae.
En este trabajo intentamos explicar las razones por las que durante el Renacimiento se prefiere la lectura notas similitudines (frente a la comúnmente admitida hoy notatas similitudines) en el pasaje de la Rhetorica ad Herennium (3, 37) que describe el funcionamiento de la memoria artificialis y, más concretamente, la composición de imagines firmae.