Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index


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1. Record Number: 11196
Author(s): Ahern, John.
Contributor(s):
Title : Nudi Grammantes: The Grammar and Rhetoric of Deviation in Inferno XV [Male genitalia have a complex range of metaphorical meanings. Certain writers in the medieval rhetorical tradition align sexuality and rhetoric, comparing forms unorthodox sexuality (like sodomy) with perversions of language. Most notably, Brunetto Latini, a grammarian and sodomite who appears in the Inferno, uses a series of puns involving the word “fico” (fig or tree), confusing the word’s natural (biological) and grammatical gender. In Latin and Italian, this word (meaning both tree and fruit) could metaphorically stand for either the male or the female sexual organs. Brunetto’s learned yet ambiguous use of language thus suggests his own sexual deviancy. Title note supplied by Feminae.].
Source: Romanic Review , 81., 4 ( 1990):  Pages 466 - 486.
Year of Publication: 1990.