Precedent Names and their Functions in Umberto Eco's Novel "The Name of the Rose"

Tsygankova Alisa Andreevna Postgraduate student, Department of Romance Linguistics, Lomonosov Moscow State University 119991, Russia, g. Moskva, g. Moscow, Leninskie gory, 51s1 osip.polskiy@mail.ru Other publications by this author

IntroductionThe phenomenon of precedent refers, simultaneously, to two spheres – linguistics and culture – it is in this way that it appears as the subject of study of modern humanities, for example, in the dissertation of V.Y. Arbuzova ^[1], the study of E. N. Podtelezhnikova and S. S. Pavlova ^[2], E. S. Stepanov ^[3].

Therefore, its study in the context of postmodern literature functioning in a certain cultural context seems more than appropriate. Precedent is the basis of the idiosyncrasy of any postmodernist author, since postmodernism in literature is experiments with the perception of the text, playing with the reader, attempts to mislead him.

According to the concept of J.F. Lyotard, outlined in the work “The State of Postmodernity”, the interaction of the author and the reader occurs at the level of interaction of their individual linguistic and cultural systems ^[4]. Understanding a text is the result of superimposing one system on another. Thus, since each reader has his own individual system of cultural information embodied in the signs of the language, no text can be understood by several people in the same way. The combination of the factors described above results in the so-called “double coding". Double coding is a way of creating a text in which it is written simultaneously for several types of readers, for example, elite and mass, each of whom will enjoy the text, but will read it at a different level ^[5].Studying the idiostyle of Umberto Eco, we must necessarily take into account the fact that Umberto Eco is an outstanding postmodernist theorist who embodied his principles in practice in his works, therefore, when studying his texts, especially their stylistic component, we should always keep in mind their reference and try to discover their pragmatic component – an extralinguistic situation to which they are sending.

It is obvious that the postmodern "locks" and "traps" placed by Umberto Eco everywhere in his textual heritage should be opened with the keys of the same system, therefore, the approach to studying the linguistic component of Eco's heritage should take into account not only the text itself, but also the context. Encryption of text as a kind of code in postmodernism is achieved using certain techniques.

Among them are hidden and direct quoting, homages, parodies, the use of stamps. One of the frequently used techniques is also the "flooding" of the text with precedent names.Subject of research

The subject of this study is the precedent names in Umberto Eco's novel "The Name of the Rose" and their functions.

According to I. V. Zakharenko, a precedent name is "an individual name associated either with a widely known text (for example, Pechorin, Terkin), or with a precedent situation (for example, Ivan Susanin, Stakhanov).

This is a kind of complex sign, when used in communication, an appeal is made not to the actual denotation (in other terminology, the referent), but to a set of differential signs of this precedent name" ^[6]. The structure of the precedent name consists of the core, which contains the differential features, and the periphery, which carries its attributes. The purpose of using the precedent name in the text is to update the connotations contained in it for the reader ^[7]As for the functions of precedent names, scientists present different classifications.

Thus, V. L. Latysheva identifies the emotive function, the function of a marker of cultural identity, the function of activating the collective unconscious, the function of socialization, the function of appealing to culturally significant phenomena, the function of recognition, the function of fixing ^[8]. E. V. Puchkova identifies the function of the response to the addressee, evaluation, password and language game ^[9]In this study, we rely on the classification proposed by E.A. Nakhimova.

In the study “Precedent names in mass communication” it highlights the following repertoire of functions of precedent names:evaluation function (precedent name is used as a means of emotional evaluation);

1. modeling function (the precedent name sets a certain model of perception of the described situation);

2. pragmatic function (the precedent name forms a certain value system valid within this text);

3. password function (a case name is used to detect a common cultural base between the author and the reader);

4. aesthetic function (the precedent name is used for aesthetic evaluation);

5. human function (the precedent name is used for a language game, in this case the precedent name can be given in encrypted form);

6. euphemistic function (a precedent name softens the description, replaces a sharper expression) ^[10]

7. Scientific novelty

The scientific novelty of this study is determined by two parameters.

Firstly, the very concept of a precedent name entered science not so long ago (in the early noughties) and, as a result, needs active development and research on expanded material. Secondly, Umberto Eco's textual heritage has not been fully studied. Among the scientific works devoted to the texts of Umberto Eco, literary studies of his work predominate, but the linguistic aspects of the texts of Umberto Eco have not been the subject of special analysis until now.Research methods

To search for a complete list of precedent names, a program was written using regular expressions in the Python programming language.

A file with the full text of the novel is submitted to the program for input. Using the built-in library for working with regular expressions, the program finds all words and phrases similar to proper names, namely all words starting with a capital letter, not standing after the dot. Duplicates are deleted among the found words, and the resulting list of words is saved in a separate file. Next, we verify the results manually, correct errors, supplement the names with surnames, ordinal numbers, nicknames, titles, and so on. Then we proceed to contextual analysis.

  We find each of the words of the list anew in the text and analyze the context in which it is used in order to unambiguously determine its precedent. Here are the criteria of precedent, which were deduced by E.A. Nakhimova:graphic;

1. morphological;

2. derivational;

3. punctuation;

4. synonymous;

5. attributive;

6. temporal;

7. references to sources of precedent ^[11]. 

8. After carrying out all the above procedures, we received a list of 544 names.

Analysis of research results

For ease of orientation in the array of data obtained, we classified the material into several categories. Below we present the resulting classification with the quantities of ohms and examples.Precedent names of people

1. Real

1. Saints (42): San Bartolomeo, San Silvestro, San Mauro

1. Religious figures (90): Cardinale Orsini, Francesco di Assisi, Benedetto XI

2. Historical figures (31): Caifa, Carlo il Calvo, Ludovico di Savoia

3. Figures of science and culture (59): Dante, Prudenzio, Ugo Novocastro

4. Fictional

2. Biblical Heroes (55): Caino, Lia, Lucifero

1. Characters of European culture (64): Guido Putagio

2. Heroes, Fictional Eco 

3. Characters of ancient Greek myths (10): Achille, Agamennone, Priamo

4. Use cases names of geographical objects

2. Real

1. Cities and regions (135): Bagdad, Castiglia, Firenze

1. Abbeys and Castles (10): Melk, Cluny, Conques

2. Natural objects (11): Alpi, Mercurio, Golgota

3. Fictional (10): Isole Fortune, Sodoma, Epigmaride

2. The conducted contextual analysis shows that in the vast majority of cases, at the intra-textual level, precedent names are used in the text in pragmatic and modeling functions.

On the one hand, they are designed to set a certain frame of what is happening, on the other, to show the reader a system of values relevant to the characters of the text. This can be seen already at the level of numbers: the vast majority of precedent names are somehow connected with the sphere of religion, which immediately shows the value systems and the picture of the world in which the characters of the novel are located.There are also cases when a precedent name occurs in the evaluation function, for example: "Ma tra la folla fuori del palazzo ne udii molti che dicevano che egli era come Cristo tra i farisei" ^[12], however, such cases are less frequent.

At the supra-textual level, we find several examples of the use of a precedent name in a logical function.

Of special interest in our classification are the names of the characters that the author invented, since many of them are made up of components that themselves have precedent, Here are some examples:Jorge da Burgos.

• This name beats two precedent names: Jorge Borges and the Spanish city of Burgos, which should evoke in the reader the memory of the homeland of the main character of the main Spanish epic — Sid, on the one hand, and the idea of a stronghold of supporters of the Spanish Reconquista, on the other;Adelmo da Otranto — brings to mind the precedent name "Otranto martyrs", i.e. residents of the city of Otranto who refused to convert to Islam and accepted martyrdom;

• Malachia de Hildesheim.

• The name consists of two precedent components: on the one hand, it refers to the prophet Malachi, who denounced the people and priests, on the other, the famous German monastery Hildesheim;Nicola da Morimondo — updates the name of the Cistercian monastery of Morim in Lombardy, promoting medieval cuisine;

• Remigio da Varagine — refers to the name of Yakov Voraginsky, author of the collection "Golden Legend";

• Rabano da Toledo — at the first level of decryption, we recall the German theologian Rabanus the Moor, and we get the "Moor" component and, comparing it with Toledo, we return to the Reconquista again.

• In the course of the study, we also managed to find several "pseudonymous names".

These names are set in context, which implies that these heroes are well-known and extremely popular in the Middle Ages, but in fact modern Eco researchers are encrypted in them. We found at least two such names:Under the name Algirdas da Cluny, Doctor Quadratus hides A. J. Greimas, a Lithuanian scientist of Russian origin, who created the semiotic square.

• There is no doubt that the semiotic Eco was well aware of this concept ^[13].Under the name Paolo da Rimini, Abbas Agraphicus hides Paolo Fabbri, a teaching colleague and a well-known specialist in semiotics, one of the founders of the Semiotics Center in Urbino, as well as the head of the magazine Mezzavoce ^[14],[15].

• Thus, we see that in the above cases, precedent names are used in the human function.

They appear to us as a kind of cipher that we, as qualified readers, must unravel.In addition, there are errors (or intentional distortions) in the text of the correlation of the name and the fact attributed to it, for example, there is the following statement in the text: "Per san Brunone l'acquamarina concentra la scienza teologica nella virtu dei suoi purissimi bagliori" ^[12].

We have not been able to find any evidence of a connection between Bruno of Cologne and aquamarine.It is also important to note that despite the correlation of each of the names with a certain situation or cultural phenomenon, the text contains both massively identifiable heroes (Herod, Tristan and Isolde, Saint Benedict), so, for example, the names of Arab scientists known only to narrow specialists.

Thus, Umberto Eco works with precedent names in all parts of the recognition spectrum.Conclusions

It is obvious that the use of precedent names in the text to such an extent is used by the author precisely as an artistic device.

A certain term has not yet taken root in science to denote this technique, but we would like to follow the Danish specialist Jon Kust, who transferred the concept of name-dropping from popular culture to scientific usage, and use this term ^[16].We have considered the main functions in which precedent names are used in the text of the novel, however, taking into account the general postmodern context of the creation of the novel, it seems necessary to say that the password is accompanying all these functions.

We believe that the precedents of the names mentioned in the text are a kind of filter by which the author filters out his reader. 

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