The Book of Memory

by Mary Carruthers

respect to the images, moreover, two things are helpful for the person

  remembering. First he should not make up his images for himself too

  speedily, but taking sufficient time he should impress every part of it by

  concentrating profoundly and steadily. The second thing is that he should

  with equal diligence commit to his memory not just the image itself, but also

  its order in relation to what immediately precedes and follows it, so that as he

  may wish he may recollect everything easily, going forwards or backwards.

  But one achieves recollection in two ways: in an easy way, that is only by

  the subject matter [i.e., memoria rerum]; in another difficult way, that is by

  the very words [i.e., memoria verborum]. You need to have this two-fold art

  of remembering. First, I will treat memory for the subject matter. Things to

  be remembered are of two sorts, some sensory and some abstract. Of the

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  sensory things, some are visual and some not. Of those visible some are

  overly large, some overly small, and others are average. I will speak in the

  first place about those that are average.

  Suppose that someone must memorize the twelve signs of the Zodiac,

  that is the Ram, the Bull, etc. So he might, if he wished to, make for himself

  in the front of the first location a very white ram standing up and rearing on

  his hind feet, with golden horns. And he might put a very red bull to the

  right of the ram, kicking the ram with his rear feet; standing erect, the ram

  with his right foot might kick the bull in his large and super-swollen

  testicles, causing a copious effusion of blood. And by means of the testicles

  one will recall that it is a bull, not a castrated ox or a cow.

  In a similar manner, a woman may be placed before the bull as though

  laboring in birth, and in her uterus as if ripped open from her breast may be

  figured coming forth two most beautiful twins, playing with a horrible,

  intensely red crab, which holds captive the hand of one of the little ones

  and thus compells him to weeping and to such signs, the remaining child

  wondering yet nonetheless touching the crab in a childish way. Or the two

  twins might be placed there being born not of a woman but from the bull

  in a miraculous manner, so that the principle of economy of material may

  be observed. To the left of the ram a dreadful lion might be placed, who

  with open mouth and rearing on its legs attacks a virgin, beautifully

  adorned, tearing her garments. With its left foot the ram might inflict a

  wound to the lion’s head. The virgin might hold in her right hand the

  scales, for which might be fashioned a balance-beam of silver with a cord of

  red silk, and weights of gold; on her left may be placed a scorpion horribly

  stinging her so that her whole arm is swollen; and also she could strive to

  balance the scorpion in the aforementioned scales.

  Then in the front of the second location might be placed an archer with

  suitable equipment, holding an astounding bow fully extended, in which

  might be an even more astounding arrow, and he could strive to shoot

  arrows at a goat standing erect slightly farther back in the same location,

  remarkably hairy and shaggy, having a weird-looking horn and a golden,

  luxuriant beard. And he might hold in his right foot a most remarkable jug

  full of water, in his left foot unusual fishes, onto which he pours crystal-

  clear water from the water-vessel. And if it should be necessary to remem-

  ber more things, one may place their images in the following locations in a

  similar manner. Having done so, the person remembering is able to recite

  these things in whatever order he may want, forwards or backwards.

  If however you wish to recall things of extreme size, whether large or

  small, of the sort such as the world, an army, a city, a millet seed, an iota, or

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  365

  the smallest of worms, one makes average-sized images of them, perhaps of

  the sort that are depicted by manuscript decorators, or one can acquire the

  memory of such things through another thing that is opposite, similar, or

  in some other way analogous to them. If you want to recall sensory

  phenomena that are not visible, as for instance sweetness, place someone

  feeding himself with something sweet, like sugar, honey, milk, or happily

  tasting something else of this sort. But for bitterness, place someone

  feeding himself on something bitter and immediately vomiting it up in a

  disgusting manner. For foulness, place something smelling bad in the

  presence of someone else, who pinches his nostrils with one hand as though

  against the bad odor and with the other gestures contemptuously towards

  this thing. For things entirely abstract, such as are God, an angel, infinite

  space, and such matters, place an image as the painters make it, or you can

  secure its recollection by means of something that is contrary to it, similar,

  or analogous in another manner.

  So much for memory-of-things, now memory-of-words demands its

  time; concerning which I propose this particular algorithm for remember-

  ing syllables presented to you, in order to commit a syllable artificially to

  memory. The person remembering should have for himself a ready-made

  image for any syllable always stored away by rote, which whenever he wants

  he is able freely to use, and he may do this in the following manner. He

  should consider and write down for himself the whole possible number of

  syllables, and should also consider the same number of easily visualizable

  things known to him, whose names in Latin or in his own language or in

  another language known readily to him may start with those syllables or

  coincide completely with them, which is even more useful. And because

  among diverse languages, and even among different speakers of the same

  language, frequently several different names for various things are used,

  and occur more readily to memory, it is not really possible to give specific

  advice that applies to all people. But each should take pains to adapt this

  advice for himself to his own way of remembering, and most prudently

  conserve his version without variation.

  When, therefore, one wants to remember a certain syllable, one should

  place something whose name begins with that syllable, or may be totally

  coincident with it, in a particular location, as I demonstrated earlier, by

  means of which one may immediately recall the name of that thing whose

  first syllable it epitomizes, and one should work in a similar way with

  regard to any syllable. But whoever might wish to shorten this labor should

  do this using only the one language known to him whose instant recol-

  lection seems the most useful to him; though in any single language there

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  are fewer syllables than all those which might be needed. But certainly, the

  principle behind this task of remembering syllables is extremely econom-

  ical and very useful.

  Every syllable is a vowel or is composed of a vowel and a consonant. For

  the five vowels make for yourself five images in this way: for ‘A’ make for

  yourself gold [aurum], a com
munion wafer [azimus], or Adam covering his

  naked genitals with leaves, or something else of this sort whose name begins

  with ‘ A,’ or nouns of the same sort you might know in a language other than

  Latin that occurs to you more readily. For ‘ E’’ place Eve, naked, hiding her

  prominent breasts with her long hair and her genitals with green leaves, or

  something else of the sort I indicated earlier. And for the remaining vowels

  you should make for yourself other images in a similar fashion.

  For the shortest composite syllables, that is, ones constituted only from

  one vowel and a consonant, you should work in exactly the same way. So,

  for the ‘‘ab’’ syllable, imagine to yourself an abbot you know, dressed

  appropriately; for ‘‘ba’’ a crossbowman [balisterius] with a belt and the

  rest of the things that encumber him, and do the same thing for other

  syllables of this kind. If however you should wish to work more econom-

  ically, let an upright abbot indicate ‘‘ab’’ to you, an upsidedown one ‘‘ba’’;

  an upright crossbowman ‘‘ba,’’ an upsidedown one ‘‘ab.’’ And thus you can

  use only one image for pairs of syllables, according to its various positions.

  For syllables of three letters, with two consonants at the extremes and a

  vowel in the middle, the technique is the same in every respect. So, for the

  syllable ‘‘bar’’ you might fashion Bartholomew, flayed; for ‘‘rab,’’ Rahab

  the infamous harlot, or for this pair of syllables you might place only just

  the one or the other according to one or the other likeness (upsidedown or

  rightside-up), as I told you.

  If however you wish to make the technique still easier, fashion for

  yourself images for all the consonants, or at least for those which occur

  often before or after syllables of two letters; of this sort are ‘‘r’’ and ‘‘l’’ and

  those like them – there are a few exceptions. For the ‘‘l’’ consonant, there-

  fore, if you are English, you can imagine for yourself an elbow, which

  accords with that consonant both in name and shape. So, if you want to

  recall ‘ bal,’ you might locate your image of the ‘ ba’ syllable, an upside-down

  abbot (or an upright crossbowman, if you’d rather use that) and he might

  hold the elbow by its middle sideways in his mouth (or in the other image it

  might be attached to the uppermost part of the crossbowman) in order to

  signify that the ‘‘ba’’ syllable must be followed by an ‘‘l.’’ And the ‘‘lab’’

  syllable may be signified by the same image in the contrary situation. But

  for remembering the syllable ‘‘bla,’’ position a crossbowman holding his

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  367

  elbow in his hand at his waist, if you like, or under his belt, which should

  signify to you that ‘‘l’’ ought to be in the middle of the ‘‘ba’’ syllable, and in

  this way it will figure for you the syllable ‘‘bla.’’ There are other syllables of

  more letters, and for them a skillful person can readily enough extend this

  technique. Let these examples, however, suffice for the technique of

  remembering syllables.

  Now let us consider how to remember words, concerning which a

  technique of the same sort may be proposed for the remembering of a

  word that has been put to you to be artificially recalled. This technique

  follows from the previous one. All words have syllables in serial order, and

  so when a memory of the syllables has been secured, a memory of the words

  is also achieved. Another method however is shorter and handier, although

  more prone to cause error. This involves mixing memory for the things

  themselves with memory of their names. If you should need to recall a

  certain word which signifies to you a thing for which you can make an

  image, place for yourself the image of that thing itself instead of using the

  special memory technique for a word. And if an image of a thing known to

  you should present itself which would also serve for a word you propose to

  remember, if possible take the name of something which, in two or more of

  its syllables, sounds like that word. If however you cannot find one, at least

  find something whose name in its first syllable sounds like your word,

  which you can do according to the previous technique; and I should add

  further that, just as it is a fact that one can recollect a whole from its parts

  and the reverse, and sometimes the whole of a word from just its beginning,

  and one of two things that are alike by means of the other, or one of two

  contraries from the other, so also one can recall anything from something

  added onto it or in any way pertaining to it.

  These matters having thus been disposed of, it remains to speak about

  how to remember sentences; the following algorithm may be proposed in

  order to recite any sentence presented to you. This one follows from the

  second one [concerning remembering words]. ‘‘Benedictus Dominus qui

  per regem Anglie Berwicum fortissimum et totam Scotiam subiugavit.’’

  [‘‘Blessed be the Lord who by means of the English king subjugated most

  mighty Berwick and all Scotland.’’] For the first phrase, if you know

  someone named Benedict, or even Saint Benedict the Abbot, place him

  at the front of the first location; and if you have a lord you know, whom

  you just call ‘‘dominus,’’ not using his actual name, place him injured in the

  face, pulled by the hair, mangled, or, in some way touched by the right

  hand of Benedict; or you might place there Saint Dominic or Emperor

  Domitian or someone known to you called by a similar name. For the third

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  word and the fourth, which are monosyllables, proceed according to the

  technique for syllables; or for ‘‘qui’’ place a very white cow with very large

  very red teats, erect upon her hind legs, whose right front foot Benedict

  might hold with his left hand as though dancing with her. For indeed, a

  cow is called ‘‘qui’’ [ky] in northern English. In addition the cow, in a

  strange manner, holds in her left front foot a partridge [perdix], which will

  give the word ‘‘per’’ to your memory.

  Then in the foreground of the second location you should bring together

  a king, resplendent in a crown and the other tokens of royal majesty, or if

  you should know well any king, or someone called or surnamed King, or

  one who in some game was a king, place him there, and let him hold in his

  right hand an eel [anguilla] wriggling about greatly, which will give you

  ‘‘England’’ [Anglia].2 And in his left hand he might hold a bear by the tail or

  foot, which in English would signify the two first syllables of the word

  ‘‘Berwicum,’’ and consequently the whole. From the other side of the bear

  might come mighty Samson or a lion, and strike that bear; and so this will

  figure to you ‘‘most mighty’’ [fortissimum]. Finally, the rest of this example

  could be fashioned in a third location in a similar manner, by placing there

  someone named Thomas, with his right hand subduing like a beast either a

  Scot or someone so named or surnamed, or someone whom you know to

  ha
ve campaigned vigorously in Scotland; and placing in his left hand an

  impressive yoke. This technique is for remembering material presented

  audibly, but certainly for remembering visual matter, such as recalling

  written things, one may make use of a similar method.

  Now my pen must turn to remembering numbers. So, for ‘‘one’’ you

  might form a unicorn; for ‘‘two,’’ Moses with his two horns, perhaps, or the

  two tablets; for ‘‘three,’’ a tripod, or the Trinity as it is usually painted in

  churches; for ‘‘four,’’ one of Ezekiel’s creatures having four faces; for ‘‘five,’’

  Christ crucified with his five wounds; for ‘‘six,’’ an angel with six wings; for

  ‘‘seven,’’ the Lamb which has seven horns or eyes; for ‘‘eight’’ [octo], the

  emperor Octovian; for ‘‘nine,’’ an angel clothed in a very white garment

  having nine very red transverse stripes, three above, three below, and three

  in the middle, which may signify to you the nine orders of angels, or this: a

  man with his thumb cut off, binding his wound with the other hand – for

  then indeed only nine digits will remain; for ‘‘ten,’’ may be placed a zero or

  the Greek letter ‘‘chi’’; and calculate the rest according to your skill in

  algorism. But one who has learned the notary art will attain the highest

  perfection of this craft.

  Here ends the treatise of Master Thomas Bradwardine on acquiring a

  trained memory. Thanks be to God, says R[obert] Emylton.

  Notes

  P R E F A C E T O T H E S E C O N D E D I T I O N

  1. Conf., X . 8; translated by M. Boulding. Subsequent quotations are from this

  translation; any alterations are indicated by square brackets.

  2. Ricoeur, Memory, History, Forgetting, 67.

  3. Weinrich, Lethe, 10.

  4. Bolzoni, The Gallery of Memory, 139–145.

  5. See the description of this episode in Spence, The Memory Palace of Matteo

  Ricci.

  6. On the dating of Hugh of St. Victor’s works, see the entry by Roger Baron in

  the Dictionnaire de Spiritualite´, s. v. Hugues de Saint-Victor. Didascalicon is

  one of Hugh’s first works composed after he arrived in Paris in 1127; the

  Chronicle and its preface is somewhat later (around 1130, from internal

  evidence).

  I N T R O D U C T I O N

  1. Quoted from Miller, ‘‘Information and Memory,’’ 44–45.