FIRST DAY
PRIME
In which the foot of the abbey is reached, and William demonstrates his great acumen1.
It was a beautiful morning at the end of November. During the night it had snowed, but only a little, and the earth was covered with a cool blanket no more than three fingers high. In the darkness, immediately after lauds2, we heard Mass in a village in the valley. Then we set off toward the mountain, as the sun first appeared.
While we toiled3 up the steep path that wound around the mountain, I saw the abbey. I was amazed, not by the walls that girded it on every side, similar to others to be seen in all the Christian4 world, but by the bulk of what I later learned was the Aedificium. This was an octago?nal construction that from a distance seemed a tetragon (a perfect form, which expresses the sturdiness and impregnability of the City of God), whose southern sides stood on the plateau of the abbey, while the northern ones seemed to grow from the steep side of the mountain, a sheer drop, to which they were bound. I might say that from below, at certain points, the cliff seemed to extend, reaching up toward the heavens, with the rock’s same colors and material, which at a certain point became keep and tower (work of giants who had great familiarity with earth and sky). Three rows of windows proclaimed the triune rhythm of its elevation5, so that what was physically6 squared on the earth was spiritually triangular7 in the sky. As we came closer, we realized that the quadrangular form included, at each of its corners, a heptagonal tower, five sides of which were visible on the outside—four of the eight sides, then, of the greater octagon producing four minor8 heptagons, which from the outside appeared as pentagons. And thus anyone can see the admirable concord9 of so many holy numbers, each revealing a subtle spiritual significance. Eight, the number of per?fection for every tetragon; four, the number of the Gospels; five, the number of the zones of the world; seven, the number of the gifts of the Holy Ghost. In its bulk and in its form, the Aedificium resembled Castel Ursino or Castel del Monte, which I was to see later in the south of the Italian peninsula, but its inaccessible10 position made it more awesome11 than those, and capable of inspiring fear in the traveler who approached it gradually. And it was fortunate that, since it was a very clear winter morning, I did not first see the building as it appears on stormy days.
I will not say, in any case, that it prompted feelings of jollity. I felt fear, and a subtle uneasiness. God knows these were not phantoms12 of my immature13 spirit, and I was rightly interpreting indubitable omens14 inscribed15 in the stone the day that the giants began their work, and before the deluded16 determination of the monks18 dared consecrate19 the building to the preservation20 of the di?vine word.
As our little mules21 strove up the last curve of the mountain, where the main path divided into three, producing two side paths, my master stopped for a while, to look around: at the sides of the road, at the road itself, and above the road, where, for a brief stretch, a series of evergreen22 pines formed a natural roof, white with snow.
“A rich abbey,” he said. “The abbot likes a great display on public occasions.”
Accustomed as I was to hear him make the most unusual declarations, I did not question him. This was also because, after another bit of road, we heard some noises, and at the next turn an agitated23 band of monks and servants appeared. One of them, seeing us, came toward us with great cordiality. “Welcome, sir,” he said, “and do not be surprised if I can guess who you are, because we have been advised of your visit. I am Remigio of Varagine, the cellarer of the monastery24. And if you, as I believe, are Brother William of Baskerville, the abbot must be informed. You”—he commanded one of his party—“go up and tell them that our visitor is about to come inside the walls.”
“I thank you, Brother Cellarer,” my master replied politely, “and I appreciate your courtesy all the more since, in order to greet me, you have interrupted your search. But don’t worry. The horse came this way and took the path to the right. He will not get far, because he will have to stop when he reaches the dungheap. He is too intelligent to plunge25 down that precipitous slope. …”
“When did you see him?” the cellarer asked.
“We haven’t seen him at all, have we, Adso?” William said, turning toward me with an amused look. “But if you are hunting for Brunellus, the horse can only be where I have said.”
The cellarer hesitated. He looked at William, then at the path, and finally asked, “Brunellus? How did you know?”
“Come, come,” William said, “it is obvious you are hunting for Brunellus, the abbot’s favorite horse, fif?teen hands, the fastest in your stables, with a dark coat, a full tail, small round hoofs27, but a very steady gait; small head, sharp ears, big eyes. He went to the right, as I said, but you should hurry, in any case.”
The cellarer hesitated for a moment longer, then gestured to his men and rushed off along the path to the right, while our mules resumed their climb. My curiosity aroused, I was about to question William, but he motioned me to wait: in fact, a few minutes later we heard cries of rejoicing, and at the turn of the path, monks and servants reappeared, leading the horse by its halter. They passed by us, all glancing at us with some amazement28, then preceded us toward the abbey. I believe William also slowed the pace of his mount to give them time to tell what had happened. I had already realized that my master, in every respect a man of the highest virtue29, succumbed30 to the vice31 of vanity when it was a matter of demonstrating his acumen; and having learned to appreciate his gifts as a subtle diplomatist, I understood that he wanted to reach his destination preceded by a firm reputation as a man of knowledge.
“And now tell me”—in the end I could not restrain myself—“how did you manage to know?”
“My good Adso,” my master said, “during our whole journey I have been teaching you to recognize the evidence through which the world speaks to us like a great book. Alanus de Insulis said that
omnis mundi creatura
quasi liber et pictura
nobis est in speculum
and he was thinking of the endless array of symbols with which God, through His creatures, speaks to us of the eternal life. But the universe is even more talkative than Alanus thought, and it speaks not only of the ultimate things (which it does always in an obscure fashion) but also of closer things, and then it speaks quite clearly. I am almost embarrassed to repeat to you what you should know. At the crossroads, on the still-?fresh snow, a horse’s hoofprints stood out very neatly32, heading for the path to our left. Neatly spaced, those marks said that the hoof26 was small and round, and the gallop33 quite regular—and so I deduced the nature of the horse, and the fact that it was not running wildly like a crazed animal. At the point where the pines formed a natural roof, some twigs35 had been freshly broken off at a height of five feet. One of the blackber?ry bushes where the animal must have turned to take the path to his right, proudly switching his handsome tail, still held some long black horsehairs in its brambles. ... You will not say, finally, that you do not know that path leads to the dungheap, because as we passed the lower curve we saw the spill of waste down the sheer cliff below the great east tower, staining the snow; and from the situation of the crossroads, the path could only lead in that direction.”
“Yes,” I said, “but what about the small head, the sharp ears, the big eyes ...?”
“I am not sure he has those features, but no doubt the monks firmly believe he does. As Isidore of Seville said, the beauty of a horse requires ‘that the head be small, siccum prope pelle ossibus adhaerente, short and pointed36 ears, big eyes, flaring37 nostrils38, erect39 neck, thick mane and tail, round and solid hoofs.’ If the horse whose passing I inferred had not really been the finest of the stables, stableboys would have been out chasing him, but instead, the cellarer in person had undertaken the search. And a monk17 who considers a horse excellent, whatever his natural forms, can only see him as the auctoritates have described him, especially if”—and here he smiled slyly in my direction—“the describer is a learned Benedictine.”
“All right,” I said, “but why Brunellus?”
“May the Holy Ghost sharpen your mind, son!” my master exclaimed. “What other name could he possibly have? Why, even the great Buridan, who is about to become rector in Paris, when he wants to use a horse in one of his logical examples, always calls it Brunellus.”
This was my master’s way. He not only knew how to read the great book of nature, but also knew the way monks read the books of Scripture40, and how they thought through them. A gift that, as we shall see, was to prove useful to him in the days to follow. His explanation, moreover, seemed to me at that point so obvious that my humiliation41 at not having discovered it by myself was surpassed only by my pride at now being a sharer in it, and I was almost congratulating myself on my insight. Such is the power of the truth that, like good, it is its own propagator. And praised be the holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ for this splendid revela?tion I was granted.
But resume your course, O my story, for this aging monk is lingering too long over marginalia. Tell, rather, how we arrived at the great gate of the abbey, and on the threshold stood the abbot, beside whom two novices42 held a golden basin filled with water. When we had dismounted, he washed William’s hands, then embraced him, kissing him on the mouth and giving him a holy welcome.
“Thank you, Abo,” William said. “It is a great joy for me to set foot in Your Magnificence’s monastery, whose fame has traveled beyond these mountains. I come as a pilgrim in the name of our Lord, and as such you have honored me. But I come also in the name of our lord on this earth, as the letter I now give you will tell you, and in his name also I thank you for your welcome.”
The abbot accepted the letter with the imperial seals and replied that William’s arrival had in any event been preceded by other missives from his brothers (it is difficult, I said to myself with a certain pride, to take a Benedictine abbot by surprise); then he asked the cellar?er to take us to our lodgings43, as the grooms44 led our mules away. The abbot was looking forward to visiting us later, when we were refreshed, and we entered the great courtyard where the abbey buildings extended all about the gentle plain that blunted in a soft bowl—or alp—the peak of the mountain.
I shall have occasion to discuss the layout of the abbey more than once, and in greater detail. After the gate (which was the only opening in the outer walls) a tree-lined avenue led to the abbatial church. To the left of the avenue there stretched a vast area of vegetable gardens and, as I later learned, the botanical garden, around the two buildings of the balneary and the in?firmary and herbarium, following the curve of the walls. Behind, to the left of the church, rose the Aedi?ficium, separated from the church by a yard scattered45 with graves. The north door of the church faced the south tower of the Aedificium, which offered, frontally, its west tower to the arriving visitor’s eyes; then, to the left, the building joined the walls and seemed to plunge, from its towers, toward the abyss, over which the north tower, seen obliquely46, projected. To the right of the church there were some buildings, sheltering in its lee, and others around the cloister47: the dormitory, no doubt, the abbot’s house, and the pilgrims’ hospice, where we were heading. We reached it after crossing a handsome flower garden. On the right side, beyond a broad lawn, along the south walls and continuing eastward48 behind the church, a series of peasants’ quarters, stables, mills, oil presses, granaries, and cellars, and what seemed to me to be the novices’ house. The regular terrain49, only slightly rolling, had allowed the ancient builders of that holy place to respect the rules of orientation50, better than Honorius Augustoduniensis or Guillaume Durant could have demanded. From the position of the sun at that hour of the day, I noticed that the main church door opened perfectly51 westward52, so choir53 and altar were facing east; and the good morning sun, in rising, could directly wake the monks in the dormitory and the animals in the stables. I never saw an abbey more beautiful or better oriented, even though subsequently I saw St. Gall34, and Cluny, and Fontenay, and others still, perhaps larger but less well proportioned. Unlike the others, this one was remarkable54 for the exceptional size of the Aedificium. I did not possess the experience of a master builder, but I immediately realized it was much older than the buildings surrounding it. Perhaps it had originated for some other purposes, and the abbey’s compound had been laid out around it at a later time, but in such a way that the orientation of the huge building should conform with that of the church, and the church’s with its. For architecture, among all the arts, is the one that most boldly tries to reproduce in its rhythm the order of the universe, which the ancients called “kosmos,” that is to say ornate, since it is like a great animal on whom there shine the perfection and the proportion of all its members. And praised be our Creator, who has decreed all things, in their number, weight, and measure.
收听单词发音 |
1
acumen
|
|
| n.敏锐，聪明 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
lauds
|
|
| v.称赞，赞美( laud的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
toiled
|
|
| 长时间或辛苦地工作( toil的过去式和过去分词 )； 艰难缓慢地移动，跋涉 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
Christian
|
|
| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
elevation
|
|
| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
physically
|
|
| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
triangular
|
|
| adj.三角（形）的，三者间的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
minor
|
|
| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
concord
|
|
| n.和谐；协调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
inaccessible
|
|
| adj.达不到的，难接近的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
awesome
|
|
| adj.令人惊叹的，难得吓人的，很好的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
phantoms
|
|
| n.鬼怪，幽灵( phantom的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
immature
|
|
| adj.未成熟的，发育未全的，未充分发展的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
omens
|
|
| n.前兆，预兆( omen的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
inscribed
|
|
| v.写，刻( inscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；内接 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
deluded
|
|
| v.欺骗，哄骗( delude的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
monk
|
|
| n.和尚，僧侣，修道士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
monks
|
|
| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
consecrate
|
|
| v.使圣化，奉…为神圣；尊崇；奉献 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
preservation
|
|
| n.保护，维护，保存，保留，保持 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
mules
|
|
| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
evergreen
|
|
| n.常青树；adj.四季常青的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
agitated
|
|
| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
monastery
|
|
| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
plunge
|
|
| v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
hoof
|
|
| n.(马，牛等的)蹄 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
hoofs
|
|
| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
amazement
|
|
| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
virtue
|
|
| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
succumbed
|
|
| 不再抵抗（诱惑、疾病、攻击等）( succumb的过去式和过去分词 )； 屈从； 被压垮； 死 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
vice
|
|
| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
neatly
|
|
| adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
gallop
|
|
| v./n.(马或骑马等)飞奔；飞速发展 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
gall
|
|
| v.使烦恼，使焦躁，难堪；n.磨难 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
twigs
|
|
| 细枝，嫩枝( twig的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
pointed
|
|
| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
flaring
|
|
| a.火焰摇曳的，过份艳丽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
nostrils
|
|
| 鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
erect
|
|
| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
scripture
|
|
| n.经文，圣书，手稿；Scripture:(常用复数)《圣经》，《圣经》中的一段 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
humiliation
|
|
| n.羞辱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
novices
|
|
| n.新手( novice的名词复数 )；初学修士（或修女）；（修会等的）初学生；尚未赢过大赛的赛马 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
lodgings
|
|
| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
grooms
|
|
| n.新郎( groom的名词复数 )；马夫v.照料或梳洗（马等）( groom的第三人称单数 )；使做好准备；训练；（给动物）擦洗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
scattered
|
|
| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
obliquely
|
|
| adv.斜； 倾斜； 间接； 不光明正大 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
cloister
|
|
| n.修道院；v.隐退，使与世隔绝 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
eastward
|
|
| adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
terrain
|
|
| n.地面，地形，地图 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
orientation
|
|
| n.方向，目标；熟悉，适应，情况介绍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
westward
|
|
| n.西方，西部；adj.西方的，向西的；adv.向西 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
choir
|
|
| n.唱诗班，唱诗班的席位，合唱团，舞蹈团；v.合唱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
remarkable
|
|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |