Darkness, meagre fare, and relentless toil: Three images of topical modesty by Gallus Anonymus

Abstract

In the dedicatory letter to Book II of his Chronicle, Gallus Anonymus, like many other contemporary writers, demonstrated his exemplary modesty. For this purpose, he made use of three allegorical images justifying the act of writing by an unskilled author. He equated himself with a colour of black – ugly in itself but useful for diversifying paintings; with a poor dish served just for the sake of change; and finally with an ant – much smaller than a camel, but working hard, to the best of its capability. All these motifs have an old literary tradition and reveal the author’s erudition. The “poor dish” motif can be is a borrowing from one of the works of Gregory the Great. The main idea of these allegorical pictures is variety (“varietas”). According to the first two of them it is perceived as a value in itself. The style of Gallus’s Chronicle forces us into deep consid- eration of his inclination to literary “varietas”. It is expressed in emphasizing contrasts and sudden changes, in antithetical oppositions and strong exaggerations. It is possible that similar aesthetic inclinations were based on Gallus’s fundamental beliefs concerning the real order of things and the vicissitudes of human fate.