Augustine and the Primeval Language in Early Modern Exegesis and Philology

Abstract

In his influential work City of God — De civitate Dei — Augustine identifies Hebrew as the original, or primeval, language of mankind, and more accurately as the language that survived the confusion of languages at Babel in the house or family of Heber, a descendant of Noah in the fifth generation. This article surveys (1) how this claim is related to ideas about this topic in ancient Jewish and Christian sources before and after Augustine, (2) demonstrates how Augustine’s interpretation of biblical primeval history and his concept of history is interconnected with his view on the primordial language, and (3) explores how early modern exegesis and philology adopted this specific Augustinian model with regard to the topic in question. This study is both descriptive and analytical. It is based on primary sources which modern scholarship of the history of linguistic thought hitherto to a great extent has either failed to pay attention to or misrepresented.