The name of the rose

by Umberto Eco; William Weaver; David Lodge

  “A wondrous harmony of mystical relations,” William agreed.

  “But the square shape also,” the abbot continued, “is rich in spiritual lessons. The cardinal points are four, and the seasons, the elements, and heat, cold, wet, and dry; birth, growth, maturity, and old age; the species of animals, celestial, terrestrial, aerial, and aquatic; the colors forming the rainbow; and the number of years required to make a leap year.”

  “Oh, to be sure,” William said, and three plus four is seven, a superlatively mystical number, whereas three multiplied by four makes twelve, like the apostles, and twelve by twelve makes one hundred forty-four, which is the number of the elect.” And to this last display of mystical knowledge of the ideal world of numbers, the abbot had nothing further to add. Thus William could come to the point.

  “We must talk about the latest events, on which I have reflected at length,” he said.

  The abbot turned his back to the window and looked straight at William with a stern face. “At too-great length, perhaps. I must confess, Brother William, that I expected more of you. Almost six days have passed since you arrived here; four monks have died besides Adelmo, two have been arrested by the Inquisition—it was justice, to be sure, but we could have avoided this shame if the inquisitor had not been obliged to concern himself with the previous crimes—and finally the meeting over which I presided has—precisely because of all these wicked deeds—had a pitiful outcome. ...”

  William remained silent, embarrassed. Without question, the abbot was right.

  “That is true,” he admitted. “I have not lived up to your expectations, but I will explain why, Your Sublimity. These crimes do not stem from a brawl or from some vendetta among the monks, but from deeds that, in their turn, originate in the remote history of the abbey. ...”

  The abbot looked at him uneasily. “What do you mean? I myself realize that the key is not that miserable affair of the cellarer, which has intersected another story. But the other, that other which I may know but cannot discuss ... I hoped it was clear, and that you would speak to me about it. ...”

  “Your Sublimity is thinking of some deed he learned about in confession. ... The abbot looked away, and William continued: “If Your Magnificence wants to know whether I know, without having learned it from Your Magnificence, that there were illicit relations between Berengar and Adelmo, and between Berengar and Malachi, well, yes, everyone in the abbey, knows this. ...”

  The abbot blushed violently. “I do not believe it useful to speak of such things in the presence of this novice. And I do not believe, now that the. meeting is over, that you need him any longer as scribe. Go, boy,” he said to me imperiously. Humiliated, I went. But in my curiosity I crouched outside the door of the hall, which I left ajar, so that I could follow the dialogue.

  William resumed speaking: “So, then, these illicit relations, if they did take place, had scant influence on the painful events. The key is elsewhere, as I thought you imagined. Everything turns on the theft and possession of a book, which was concealed in the finis Africae, and which is now there again thanks to Malachi’s intervention, though, as you have seen, the sequence of crimes was not thereby arrested.”

  A long silence followed; then the abbot resumed speaking, in a broken, hesitant voice, like someone taken aback by unexpected revelations. “This is impossible ... you … How do you know about the finis Africae? Have you violated my ban and entered the library?”

  William ought to have told the truth, but the abbot’s rage would have known no bounds. Yet, obviously my master did not want to lie. He chose to answer the question with another question: “Did Your Magnificence not say to me, at our first meeting, that a man like me, who had described Brunellus so well without ever having seen him, would have no difficulty picturing places to which he did not have access?”

  So that is it,” Abo said. “But why do you think what you think?”

  “How I arrived at my conclusion is too long a story. But a series of crimes was committed to prevent many from discovering something that it was considered undesirable for them to discover. Now all those who knew something of the library’s secrets, whether rightly, or through trickery, are dead. Only one person remains: yourself.”

  “Do you wish to insinuate ... you wish to insinuate ...” the abbot said.

  “Do not misunderstand me,” said William, who probably had indeed wished to insinuate. “I say there is someone who knows and wants no one else to know. As the last to know, you could be the next victim. Unless you tell me what you know about that forbidden book, and, especially, who in the abbey might know what you know, and perhaps more, about the library.”

  “It is cold in here,” the abbot said. “Let us go out.”

  I moved rapidly away from the door and waited for them at the head of the stairs. The abbot saw me and smiled at me.

  “How many upsetting things this young monk must have heard in the past few days! Come, boy, do not allow yourself to be too distressed. It seems to me that more plots have been imagined than really exist. ...”

  He raised one hand and allowed the daylight to illuminate a splendid ring he wore on his fourth finger, the emblem of his power. The ring sparkled with all the brilliance of its stones.

  “You recognize it, do you not?” he said to me. “The symbol of my authority, but also of my burden. It is not an ornament: it is a splendid syllogy of the divine word whose guardian I am.” With his fingers he touched the stone—or, rather, the arrangement of variegated stones composing that admirable masterpiece of human art and nature. “This is amethyst,” he said, “which is the mirror of humility and reminds us of the ingenuousness and sweetness of Saint Matthew; this is chalcedony, mark of charity, symbol of the piety of Joseph and Saint James the Greater; this is jasper, which bespeaks faith and is associated with Saint Peter; and sardonyx, sign of martyrdom, which recalls Saint Bartholomew; this is sapphire, hope and contemplation, the stone of Saint Andrew and Saint Paul; and beryl, sound doctrine, learning, and longanimity, the virtues of Saint Thomas. ... How splendid the language of gems is,” he went on, lost in his mystical vision, “which the lapidaries of tradition have translated from the reasoning of Aaron and the description of the heavenly Jerusalem in the book of the apostle. For that matter, the walls of Zion were decked with the same jewels that decorated the pectoral of Moses’s brother, except for carbuncle, agate, and onyx, which, mentioned in Exodus, are replaced in the Apocalypse by chalcedony, sardonyx, chrysoprase, and jacinth.”

  He moved the ring and dazzled my eyes with its sparkling, as if he wanted to stun me. “Marvelous language, is it not? For other fathers stones signify still other things. For Pope Innocent the Third the ruby announced calm and patience; the garnet, charity. For Saint Bruno aquamarine concentrates theological learning in the virtue of its purest rays. Turquoise signifies joy; sardonyx suggests the seraphim; topaz, the cherubim; jasper, thrones; chrysolite, dominions; sapphire, the virtues; onyx, the powers; beryl, principalities; ruby, archangels; and emerald, angels. The language of gems is multiform; each expresses several truths, according to the sense of the selected interpretation, according to the context in which they appear. And who decides what is the level of interpretation and what is the proper context? You know, my boy, for they have taught you: it is authority, the most reliable commentator of all and the most invested with prestige, and therefore with sanctity. Otherwise how to interpret the multiple signs that the world sets before our sinner’s eyes, how to avoid the misunderstandings into which the Devil lures us? Mind you: it is extraordinary how the Devil hates the language of gems, as Saint Hildegard testifies. The foul beast sees in it a message illuminated by different meanings or levels of knowledge, and he would like to destroy it because he, the Enemy, senses in the splendor of stones the echo of the marvels in his possession before his fall, and he understands that this radiance is produced by fire, which is his torment.” He held out the ring for me to kiss, and I knelt. He stroked my head. “And so, boy, you
must forget the things, no doubt erroneous, that you have heard these days. You have entered the noblest, the greatest order of all; of this order I am an abbot, and you are under my jurisdiction. Hear my command: forget, and may your lips be sealed forever. Swear.”

  Moved, subjugated, I would certainly have sworn. And you, my good reader, would not be able now to read this faithful chronicle of mine. But at this point William intervened, not perhaps to prevent me from swearing, but in an instinctive reaction, out of irritation, to interrupt the abbot, to break that spell he had surely cast.

  “What does the boy have to do with it? I asked you a question, I warned you of a danger, I asked you to tell me a name. ... Do you now wish me, too, to kiss the ring and swear to forget what I have learned or what I suspect?”

  “Ah, you ...” the abbot said sadly, “I do not expect a mendicant friar to understand the beauty of our traditions, or respect the reticence, the secrets, the mysteries of charity. .. yes, charity, and the sense of honor, and the vow of silence on which our greatness is based. ... You have spoken to me of a strange story, an incredible story. About a banned book that has caused a chain of murders, about someone who knows what only I should know ... Tales, meaningless accusations. Speak of it, if you wish: no one will believe you. And even if some element of your fanciful reconstruction were true ... well, now everything is once more under my control, my jurisdiction. I will look into this, I have the means, I have the authority. At the very beginning I made a mistake, asking an outsider, however wise, however worthy of trust, to investigate things that are my responsibility alone. But you understood, as you have told me; I believed at the outset that it involved a violation of the vow of chastity, and (imprudent as I was) I wanted someone else to tell me what I had heard in confession. Well, now you have told me. I am very grateful to you for what you have done or have tried to do. The meeting of the legations has taken place, your mission here is over. I imagine you are anxiously awaited at the imperial court; one does not deprive oneself at length of a man like you. I give you permission to leave the abbey. Today it is perhaps late: I do not want you to travel after sunset, for the roads are not safe. You will leave tomorrow morning, early. Oh, do not thank me, it has been a joy to have you here, a brother among brothers, honoring you with our hospitality. You may withdraw now with your novice to prepare your baggage. I will say good-bye to you again tomorrow at dawn. I thank you, with all my heart. Naturally, it is not necessary for you to continue your investigations. Do not disturb the monks further. You may go.”

  It was more than a dismissal, it was an expulsion. William said good-bye and we went down the stairs.

  “What does this mean?” I asked. I no longer understood anything.

  “Try to formulate a hypothesis. You must have learned how it is done.”

  “Actually, I have learned I must formulate at least two, one in opposition to the other, and both incredible. Very well, then …” I gulped: formulating hypotheses made me nervous. “First hypothesis: the abbot knew everything already and imagined you would discover nothing. Second hypothesis: the abbot never suspected anything (about what I don’t know, because I don’t know what’s in your mind). But, anyhow, he went on thinking it was all because of a quarrel between ... between sodomite monks. ... Now, however, you have opened his eyes, he has suddenly understood something terrible, has thought of a name, has a precise idea about who is responsible for the crimes. But at this point he wants to resolve the matter by himself and wants to be rid of you, in order to save the honor of the abbey.”

  “Good work. You are beginning to reason well. But you see already that in both cases our abbot is concerned for the good name of his monastery. Murderer or next victim as he may be, he does not want defamatory news about this holy community to travel beyond these mountains. Kill his monks, but do not touch the honor of his abbey. Ah, by ...” William was now becoming infuriated. “That bastard of a feudal lord, that peacock who gained fame for having been the Aquinas’s gravedigger, that inflated wineskin who exists only because he wears a ring as big as the bottom of a glass! Proud, proud, all of you Cluniacs, worse than princes, more baronial than barons!”

  “Master ...” I ventured, hurt, in a reproachful tone.

  “You be quiet, you are made of the same stuff. Your band are not simple men, or sons of the simple. If a peasant comes along you may receive him, but as I saw yesterday, you do not hesitate to hand him over to the secular arm. But not one of your own, no; he must be shielded. Abo is capable of identifying the wretch, stabbing him in the treasure crypt, and passing out his kidneys among the reliquaries, provided the honor of the abbey is saved. ... Have a Franciscan, a plebeian Minorite, discover the rat’s nest of this holy house? Ah, no, this is something Abo cannot allow at any price. Thank you, Brother William, the Emperor needs you, you see what a beautiful ring I have, good-bye. But now the challenge is not just a matter between me and Abo, it is between me and the whole business: I am not leaving these walls until I have found out. He wants me to leave tomorrow morning, does he? Very well, it’s his house; but by tomorrow morning I must know. I must.”

  “You must? Who obliges you now?”

  “No one ever obliges us to know, Adso. We must, that is all, even if we comprehend imperfectly.”

  I was still confused and humiliated by William’s words against my order and its abbots. And I tried to justify Abo in part, formulating a third hypothesis, exercising a skill at which, it seemed to me, I was becoming very dextrous. “You have not considered a third possibility, master,” I said. “We had noticed these past days, and this morning it seemed quite clear to us after Nicholas’s confidences and the rumors we heard in church, that there is a group of Italian monks reluctant to tolerate the succession of foreign librarians; they accuse the abbot of not respecting tradition, and, as I understand it, they hide behind old Alinardo, thrusting him forward like a standard, to ask for a different government of the abbey. So perhaps the abbot fears our revelations could give his enemies a weapon, and he wants to settle the question with great prudence. ...”

  “That is possible. But he is still an inflated wineskin, and he will get himself killed.”

  We were in the cloister. The wind was growing angrier all the time, the light dimmer, even if it was just past nones. The day was approaching its sunset, and we had very little time left.

  “It is late,” William said, “and when a man has little time, he must take care to maintain his calm. We must act as if we had eternity before us. I have a problem to solve: how to penetrate the finis Africae, because the final answer must be there. Then we must save some person, I have not yet determined which. Finally, we should expect something from the direction of the stables, which you will keep an eye on. ... Look at all the bustle. ...”

  In fact, the space between the Aedificium and the cloister was unusually animated. A moment before, a novice, coming from the abbot’s house, had run toward the Aedificium. Now Nicholas was coming out of it, heading for the dormitories. In one corner, that mornings group, Pacificus, Aymaro, and Peter, were deep in discussion with Alinardo, as if trying to convince him of something.

  Then they seemed to reach a decision. Aymaro supported the still-reluctant Alinardo, and went with him toward the abbatial residence. They were just entering as Nicholas came out of the dormitory, leading Jorge in the same direction. Seeing the two Italians enter, he whispered something into Jorge’s ear, and the old man shook his head. They continued, however, toward the chapter house.

  “The abbot is taking the situation in hand ...” William murmured skeptically. From the Aedificium were emerging more monks, who belonged in the scriptorium, and they were immediately followed by Benno, who came toward us, more worried than ever.

  “There is unrest in the scriptorium,” he told us. “Nobody is working, they are all talking among themselves. ... What is happening?”

  “What’s happening is that the people who until this morning seemed the most suspect are all dead. Until yester
day everyone was on guard against Berengar, foolish and treacherous and lascivious, then the cellarer, a suspect heretic, and finally Malachi, so generally disliked. ... Now they don’t know whom to be on guard against, and they urgently need to find an enemy, or a scapegoat. And each suspects the others; some are afraid, like you; others have decided to frighten someone else. You are all too agitated. Adso, take a look at the stables every now and then. I am going to get some rest.”

  I should have been amazed: to go and rest when he had only a few hours left did not seem the wisest decision. But by now I knew my master. The more relaxed his body, the more ebullient his mind.

  BETWEEN VESPERS AND COMPLINE

  In which long hours of bewilderment are briefly narrated.

  It is difficult for me to narrate what happened in the hours that followed, between vespers and compline.

  William was absent. I roamed around the stables but noticed nothing abnormal. The grooms were bringing in the animals, made nervous by the wind; otherwise all was calm.

  I entered the church. Everyone was already in his place among the stalls, but the abbot noticed Jorge was absent. With a gesture he delayed the beginning of the office. He called for Benno, to dispatch him to look for the old man, but Benno was not there. Someone pointed out that he was probably making the scriptorium ready for its evening closing. The abbot, annoyed, said it had been decided that Benno would close nothing because he did not know the rules. Aymaro of Alessandria rose from his stall: “If Your Paternity agrees, I will go and summon him. ...”

  “No one asked anything of you,” the abbot said curtly, and Aymaro sat back down in his place, not without casting an inscrutable glance at Pacificus of Tivoli. The abbot called for Nicholas, who was not present. Someone reminded him that Nicholas was preparing supper, and the abbot made a gesture of annoyance, as if he were displeased to reveal to all that he was upset.