Was St Patrick a non-native speaker of Latin?
Date:
Abstract:
The two texts written by St Patrick, namely the Confessio and the Epistola ad milites Corotici, are unique examples of Latin written in late antiquity outside the Latin-speaking area. They present numerous difficulties. The Latin of Saint Patrick is recognised as one of the most difficult to read, the reason not being complex syntax or especially learned vocabulary – of which the exact opposite might be said – but rather the author’s apparent lack of confidence as a second language user of Latin. Patrick himself, in the first few lines of the Confessio, seems to be extremely self-conscious about the abrupt interruption of his education in his early years, and constantly refers to his rusticitas. In this respect, it is not clear whether Patrick was sincere or whether his humbleness is a means to better connect with its Christian readers. What can be said with certainty is that Patrick’s Latin is a curious mixture of biblical expressions and of uses typical of Late Latin, not to mention some non-standard grammatical constructions. It has even been suggested that Patrick’s Latin might suffer influences from Old Irish, which if not his native language, was at least one he knew very well, having himself lived in Ireland for several years. The evidence for this, however, is not convincing, and perhaps not easy to find, given the intricacies of Patrick’s Latin. The approach used so far to answer this question has consisted of attempts to either make some supposedly unidiomatic expressions go back to Old Irish, and sometimes Welsh, constructions, or to simply highlight these unidiomatic expressions. Instead, better results may be obtained if we looked at what sort of mistakes or unconventional uses would be present in the language of a language learner, and verified if these are present in Patrick’s Latin.