The stories of early interpreters
Looking for Interpreter Zero in the era before the Norman Conquest or the Crusades can seem unpromising. There is very little material on language use at that time, which is why the record of the Strasbourg Oaths in Nithard’s (795-844) Historiae or De dissensionibus filiorum Ludovici pii (Histories or On the Dissensions of the Sons of Louis the Pious) is so significant. What we get from this …
1066 is a key date in British history, marking the beginning of the Norman Conquest that led to years of upheaval as William the Conqueror consolidated his rule, repressed rebellions, redistributed estates and built castles. This is one of the most studied periods of British history; our interest here is in some details in the landscape, namely languages, communication and …
After Alexios I Komnenos (reigned 1081-1118) seized power in Byzantium in 1081 he became involved in a series of negotiations, understandings and alliances as he sought to protect his land from depredations and conquest from all sides. His agreements with Normans and Turks in the 1080s can be read as a prelude to his most significant rapprochement: the embassy he sent …
The succession of rulers jockeying for position after the 1031 collapse of the Córdoba Caliphate made for a shifting cultural and political landscape on the Iberian peninsula. Christian power was slowly asserted against the Almoravid and then Almohar rulers who swept in from the Maghreb in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. By 1250, Granada was the only Moslem kingdom left …
The Umayyad Caliph of Cordoba, Abd ar-Rahman III (889/91 – 961) needed intermediaries as he sought to consolidate his rule, and they were almost always non-Moslems. There is some suggestion that by the mid-tenth century the Arab elites in al-Andalus had become closed in on themselves and reluctant to deal with non-Moslems Be that as it may, the Caliph’s protracted …
In the 1400s, navigators commissioned by the Portuguese royal family started to sail along the Guinea Coast, the shoreline from the Senegal River to South Angola. They hoped to obtain directly from the source the goods that were traditionally bought from Moorish merchants in North Africa. There was no need to brave the interior as the trading centres that had …
Sir Walter Raleigh’s early attempts at settlement in Virginia informed the approach taken by the next wave of English colonists. Thomas Harriot’s Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia and engravings based on John White’s illustrations were well known, others had written memoirs and Native Americans had travelled to England. Wee our selves have taught them how to be treacherous …
In 1584, Elizabeth I granted Walter Raleigh the right to explore and settle any land on the North American continent that was held by non-Christians. Raleigh’s attempts at settlement came to grief but their story reveals something about the role played by interpreters in early English colonialism. We brought home also two of the Savages being lustie men, whose names …
The Jesuit mission in Japan recognised that the Christian faith had to be less European if they were to make converts. The need to acknowledge the realities of life in Japan gave a worldly edge to the Society’s endeavours there: communication, transactions and negotiations with local governors, powerful barons, and the shogun himself – as well as traders from Macao …
The Ottoman Empire was bound to need interpreters. In the sixteenth century it extended into Central Europe, Crimea, the Middle East and Africa and had a mixed population speaking a variety of languages. It also attracted outsiders: traders, travellers and diplomats. Not everyone needed an intermediary as multilingualism or the use of a lingua franca enabled communication within the Empire …