De lecturas y variantes lacrimarivm-lacrimatorivm (Plac. Med. 17, Rec. B Howald-Sigerist)

Abstract

In a collection of recipes from late antiquity, we encounter a word (in the accusative) for which our mss. give two variant readings, lacrimarium and lacrimatorium. lexicographers have so far interpreted lacrimarium and lacrimatorium in different ways. however, a study of the transmission of our text allows us to reach the following conclusions: 1) lacrimarium represents the accusative of the noun lacrimarius, and it was this form that the author of the recipe collection himself employed; 2) lacrimatorium is a variant reading present in the exemplar used by the author of a later, modified version of the text, but considered by him as authentic. therefore, in spite of its origin as a variant reading, the noun lacrimatorius must,together with the genuine lacrimarius, figure in our dictionaries of late antique and medieval latin.