Precarious knowledge in the Carolingian period: The case of prognostic texts

Abstract

Learning and education were considered to be of the utmost importance throughout the Carolingian world. The Carolingian revival of learning, which is usually considered to be part of the so-called “Carolingian reforms”, had impressive effects. A wave of rediscovered and new knowledge thus washed over Carolingian Europe, and was eagerly studied, copied, discussed, and disseminated. Studying doubt or precariousness may therefore shed new light on the development of early medieval ideas about reliability and authority. The best attested way in which early medieval copyists or compilers added to the potential trustworthiness of prognostic texts is through adding titles or emending them. The “storage house” of precarious knowledge was no quarantine area that one could only enter with the necessary precautions in place. As for students and scholars in the Carolingian period itself, the store-room seems to have inspired curiosity rather than fear about prognostic texts.