Everything Totally Explained


Ask & we'll explain, totally!
Lacuna (manuscripts)
Totally Explained


  NEW! All the latest news in the worlds of computer gaming, entertainment, the environment,  
finance, health, politics, science, stocks & shares, technology and much, much, more.  


View this entry using RSS

Everything about Lacuna Manuscripts totally explained

A lacuna is a gap in a manuscript, inscription, text, painting, or a musical work.
   The state of old manuscripts or inscriptions which have weathered or been damaged sometimes gives rise to lacunae — passages consisting of a word or words that are missing or illegible. In order to reconstruct the original text, the context is to be considered. In archaeology and literary criticism this may sometimes lead to competing reconstructions and consequent interpretations. Published texts containing lacunae often mark the section where the missing text is with a […]. For example, "This sentence contains 20 words, and […] nouns." Another example is "one kilogram equals one […] grams" where the word 'thousand' is lost in a lacuna in the manuscript.

Famous examples

  • A famous Old English example of a lacuna is in the manuscript British Library MS Cotton Vitellius A. xv, the poem Beowulf: » :hyrde ich thaet [......On]elan cwen. (Fitt 1, line 62)


       This particular lacuna is always reproduced in editions of the text, but many people have attempted to fill it, notably editors Wyatt-Chambers and Dobbie, among others, who accept the verb "waes" (was). Malone (1929) proposed the name Yrse for the unnamed queen, as it would then alliterate with Onela. This is still hotly debated amongst editors though.
  • Another notable lacuna is the eight-leaves-long Great Lacuna in the Codex Regius, the most prominent source for Norse mythology and early Germanic heroic legends. Luckily parts of it survived in independent manuscripts and in prose form in the Völsunga saga.
  • Tacitus, a Senator and historian of Ancient Rome published two works with significant lacunae.Further Information

    Get more info on 'Lacuna Manuscripts'.


    External Link Exchanges

    Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

      <a href="http://lacuna__manuscripts.totallyexplained.com">Lacuna (manuscripts) Totally Explained</a>

    Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
       As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.



  • Copyright © 2007-8 totallyexplained.com | Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License | Site Map
    This article contains text from the Wikipedia article Lacuna (manuscripts) (History) and is released under the GFDL | RSS Version