Anselm referred to De Grammatico as a ‘not useless introduction to dialectic’. This is a view, it has to be said, that has not been shared by everyone who has read it. (Just how does one translate the title?‘On the paronym, grammatical’?!) Consequently, until the groundbreaking work of the late Desmond Henry, it was little addressed, since it appeared very difficult to make sense of what it was about. So two obvious questions raise themselves: (1) why would Anselm consider it an introduction, and presumably, therefore, understandable by neophytes, when it is clearly difficult to understand, and (2) if this is an introduction to dialectic, then what did Anselm think dialectic was?
In his welcome addition to the discussions of Anselm's intentions in De Grammatico, Peter Boschung does not address the first question directly. However, his book can be seen as an attempt to answer the second and in so doing to provide a useful counterbalance to Henry's use of Lesniewski's ‘ontology’ as a heuristic device. (To regard it as more than that would be to accuse Henry of anachronism.) His conclusion is that Anselm regards dialectic as ‘primarily the theory of proper dispute’ (p. 315) and that De Grammatico is a complex introduction to dialectic (p. 314).
The title of this book is instructive since it makes clear that one of Boschung's goals is to establish the origins of Anselmian dialectic in Boethius' treatment of the topics. This is an important insight, which others such as Steiger have noted. If it is true, then one would think that Anselmian dialectic is related to the discovery of arguments concerning matters in doubt, for that is what the topics are concerned with. But, of course, one cannot throw a copy of In Ciceronis Topica or De Topicis Differentiis at a student and tell them to start discovering arguments. They have to be taught. They have to know how to identify middle terms and to assess them. They have to know how to ‘construct syllogisms’, as Anselm instructs and guides his student in doing in De Grammatico. In fact, a central thesis of Boschung's work is that Anselm's particular concern is to pass on to his student a clearly worked out methodology for handling fallacies. This is perhaps to overstate the case, since whilst dialectic must concern itself with the identification and avoidance of fallacies, its primary purpose is surely to provide convincing arguments.
Boschung claims to identify a clear distinction in De Grammatico between ‘argument’ and ‘argumentation’ (pp. 60–64). He states that this distinction is based on that of Boethius (p. 63), but he has already shown that it is not a clear distinction in Boethius (p. 52). He makes use of what Steiger calls the Verstehensregel: the statement in De Grammatico 4 that it is the meaning rather than the words that binds the syllogism, i.e. gives it its demonstrative power. Middle terms may be concealed or not present at all in the expression of an argument, but this does not necessarily destroy the validity or the effectiveness of the argument, since it is what is to be understood that is important. If one identifies the argument with the meaning and the argumentation with the expression, this would appear to support a distinction between argument and argumentation of the kind Boschung claims to find. However, Boschung does not look at the use of the term in Anselm's other writings. If he had, he would have seen that the lack of clarity in Boethius appears to have passed into Anselm, and that the terms appear to be used interchangeably. (Compare Responsio 10, ‘necessaria argumentatione’, with De Grammatico 2, ‘argumenta…necessaria sunt’.) It is surprising that there is no mention, let alone discussion, of Anselm's use of the term ‘argument’ in the Proslogion. One might expect to be able to throw light back onto De Grammatico by seeing how Anselm uses dialectical terms in his other works.
In identifying the sources of Anselm's dialectic, Boschung turns his attention to a 12th century catalogue of the library at Bec. The catalogue he is referring to is not complete (e.g. most of Lanfranc's works are missing), so one should not conclude as the author implies one should (p. 24) that the Categoriae Decem is not a source for Anselm on the grounds that it is missing from this catalogue. Lanfranc was certainly acquainted with it. (See R. Hunt, ‘Studies on Priscian in the eleventh and twelfth centuries’ in Mediaeval and Renaissance Studies 1 (1943) 194–231, p. 208.)
Boschung is unwilling to accept that Anselm is a lone genius. He is rather ‘an outstanding testimony to a broader strand of 11th century’ logic. Anselm ‘operates in a purely Boethian framework’ (p. 315) without knowledge of Aristotle's Sophistici Elenchi and yet manages to develop a theory of fallacious reasoning. Boschung offers a helpful discussion of the relationship of signification per se, signification per aliud, and appellation. He argues convincingly that signification per aliud and appellation are not to be identified (pp. 249–253).
The book contains rather too many typographical errors, particularly in Boschung's own translations, some of which verge on the incomprehensible. (See, for example, the quotation from the Glose in Aristotilis Sophisticos Elencos on p. 74.) For some reason, the extracts from Priscian on pp. 206–213 go untranslated. It is also surprising given the title and the suggestion of the importance of Boethius' In Ciceronis Topica, that the index does not contain entries for ‘middle terms’ or ‘maximal propositions’. The work is not a history of reception, and certainly did not require an entire chapter (originally intended as an appendix?) given over to Henry's use of Lesniewski.
That said, there is much of importance in this book (for example the discussion of usus loquendi) and it should be essential reading for anyone who wants to get to grips with Anselmian dialectic in the De Grammatico, which is, I suspect, a necessary condition for the understanding of his other writings.
