De dignitate conditionis humanae: Translation, Commentary, and Reception History of the Dicta Albini (Ps.-Alcuin) and the Dicta Candidi

In two MSS of the ninth century the Dicta Albini and the Dicta Candidi Presbyteri de imagine Dei are to be found fused together into a treatise named De dignitate conditionis humanae. Although the Dicta Albini, once attributed to Alcuin of York, may go back to an unknown late antique author from southern Gaul and the Dicta Candidi may have had a pupil of Alcuin for its author, their common theme unites them and testifies to the history of the conceptualization of human dignity. Both dicta have been critically edited by John Marenbon (1981) and are translated here for the first time. A hitherto-unnoticed source of the Dicta Albini in the Roman liturgy is also identified. Against the background of the study of the content of the treatise(s) it is argued that dignitas conditionis humanae is so close in meaning, systematically and linguistically, to the contemporary idea of human dignity that the treatise(s) should be read as part of the history of this idea. In fact our treatise(s) significantly influenced the thought of later ages. The considerable popularity which the material enjoyed is traced from Carolingian times down to the early Renaissance. Around 1450 an extensive excerpt from the Dicta Albini was translated into Middle English; in an appendix this version is edited from all four manuscript witnesses. All of these ramifications of the treatise(s) alert us to an often-overlooked strand in the history of the idea of human dignity.