Noise before Decibel. Towards Semantics of Illegitimate Sound in the Late Middle Ages

噪音令人不安，分心，甚至可能导致疾病。因此，我们今天试图通过技术手段来减少噪音，自19世纪世纪中期以来，我们已经能够测量噪音。在中世纪，人们还不能这样做。然而，他们也受到噪音的影响。本项目题为“分贝之前的噪音”，通过分析感官印象的措辞，探讨中世纪晚期对声音的接收和评估。噪声之所以被选为研究的对象，是因为它的命名来自于感官印象，也来自于对它令人不安因而不合理的评价。这有助于将声音的洪流缩小到可行的程度。这些研究的目的是为不合法音的历史语义学奠定基础。对于一个没有录音的社会来说，解读历史声学环境及其感知的唯一方法是调查声音的语言实现。因此，对于中世纪来说，历史学家最近宣布的声音转向似乎首先是语言转向。因此，以媒介为中心的现代声音研究和声景观研究成果，并不能作为前现代研究的模板。他们需要一个系统的扩展。作为达到这一目的的一种手段，人类学对听觉和声音的考虑似乎很有希望。它们甚至可能被扩展成一个真正的古代音景考古学。因此，对不合法声音的解释学方法的框架将被设置在三个层面上：（1）感觉印象通常是如何被语言编码的，（2）分散或干扰的声音是如何命名的，（3）声音表达如何在社会和政治语境中被用作隐喻？这三个步骤可以让我们深入了解当代人对声音的感知和表达。一方面，为了处理个人的感知和命名的噪音，我们将重点放在文本与一个主要的内省和叙事维度，如人文主义者的信件和旅行帐户。另一方面，我们选择了修道院的规则和城市的法规。他们展示了对声音的集体观点，以及正式区分合法和非法声音的必要性。通过阅读，将声学短语及其语义结合语境进行分析。本研究的主要目标之一是“Thesaurus sonorum molestorum”，这是一本关于噪音的在线词典。此外，根据来源的选择，结果将在两本专著中介绍。此外，还将开发一些方法模块，以促进对前现代时期声音的进一步研究。

Noise is disturbing, distracting, and may even cause illnesses. Thus, we try to reduce noise by technical means today, and since the middle of the 19th century we have been able to measure it. In the Middle Ages people were not yet able to do so. Nevertheless, they suffered from the impact of noise as well. The present project entitled “Noise before Decibel” approaches reception and evaluation of sounds in the Late Middle Ages by analysing the wording of sensory impressions. Noise has been chosen as subject of investigation, because its denomination results from sense impressions as well as from the assessment that it is disturbing and thus illegitimate. This helps to narrow the flood of sounds down to a feasible degree. The studies aim to lay the foundations for historical semantics of illegitimate sounds. With regard to a society, which did not have sound recording at its disposal, the only way to decipher the historical acoustic environment and its perception is to survey the linguistic realisation of sounds. Thus, for the Middle Ages the sonic turn recently announced by historians seems to be above all a linguistic turn. Therefore, the achievements of modern sound studies and soundscape research which mostly concentrate on media cannot serve as an exact template for studies concerned with pre-modern times. They need a methodical extension. As a means to this end, anthropological considerations on hearing and sounds appear to be quite promising. They may even be extended into a veritable archaeology of ancient soundscapes. Thus, the frame for a hermeneutic approach to illegitimate sound would be set on three levels: (1) how is sense impression linguistically encoded in general, (2) how are distracting or disturbing sounds denominated, and (3) how are sound expressions used as metaphors in social and political contexts? Those three steps may allow insight into the contemporary perception and expression of sounds.There are two kinds of sources to be examined. On the one hand, in order to deal with individual perception and denomination of noise we will focus on texts with a predominant introspective and narrative dimension such as humanists’ letters and accounts of journeys. On the other hand, we chose monastic rules and city statutes. They display the collective view on sounds as well as the need to distinguish formally between a legitimate and an illegitimate kind. By means of close reading, acoustic phrases and their semantics will be analysed in context. One of the principal goals of the present study is the “Thesaurus sonorum molestorum”, an online dictionary of phrases referring to noise. Furthermore, results will be presented in two monographs according to the selection of sources. In addition, some methodological modules will be developed to facilitate further research on sounds in pre-modern times.