Page 107 - Studia Universitatis Hereditati, vol 12(1) (2024)

French king Charles VIII in Italy (1494-1495). The rap- Slovenian term suggests a borrowing from the German
id spread of the disease across Europe was facilitated by phrase ‘die Franzosen’, a fact that is further supported by
the prevailing structural dynamics of long-term, even the examination of Megiser's and Hippolytus' diction-
multi-year, travel, specifically the migration of soldiers. aries. An examination of the works of Primož Trubar
This resulted in contact between infected individuals allows us to gain a deep understanding of the concepts
and the healthy population. and representations of syphilis in sixteenth-century Slo-
In Occitan culture, syphilis was a disease that, un- venian culture. The reason for this is that the number of
til the mid-twentieth century, carried a significant social instances of the Slovene term for syphilis - francoži/fran­
stigma for the patient, which is difficult to comprehend coži - is highest in these texts, and the occurrences cover
in today's society. In the early modern era, the stigma a wide range of semantic situations.
was prevalent across all social classes and was deeply in- Primož Trubar employed the term ‘French dis-
grained in the ideology and imagination of society. This ease’ not only to denote a sexually transmitted disease,
was particularly true when the disease was perceived as but also as a metaphor for the most severe, challenging, 107
a physical injury, such as mutilation, disfigurement, or and repugnant experiences that a Christian can encoun-
scarring, which deviated visibly from the normal and ter in their earthly existence. Trubar contextualises the
healthy image of a person. Such deviations were consid- concept of French disease alongside poverty, shame,
ered a flagitium Dei, a visible punishment from a high- other misfortunes, disasters, agonising demise, and even
er power for an individual's failure to meet societal ex- death, placing them all on the same semantic level with-
pectations. Consequently, the deviations were seen as a in his texts. Trubar establishes a clear cause-and-effect
personal sin against the eternal order of things and as an connection between the sinful behaviour of Christians,
irrevocable response from heaven to humanity's rebel- specifically their persistence in sin, and the occurrence
lion against God's ultimate authority. In the early mod- of illness as a divine punishment. In this context, venere-
ern age, physical mutilation caused by diseases such as al disease is metaphorically employed to represent God's
Streptococcus pyogenes infection, impetigo, necrotiz- retribution for transgressions, rather than the plague. In
ing fasciitis, syphilis, and smallpox, as well as injuries the second part of the Tiga Noviga testamenta ena dolga »Ta, ki ni od Boga, je od Hudiča, in ima tako svoje francoze ...«
from violent conflicts such as attacks, duels, and war, predguvor (1557, chapter XXX), Trubar methodically ad-
and punishments inflicted by authorities on convicted dressed the theological relationship between personal sin
thieves and adulterers (such as cutting off limbs or the and punishment. He endorsed Philipp Melanchthon's
nose), were seen as a form of divine justice. These acts definition from loci theologici, which states that sinners
were believed to be punishments for the sins of the soul, deserve God's eternal wrath and consequently endure
resulting in harm to the body. eternal suffering. Conversely, the punishments are in-
In sixteenth century Slovene language and litera- tended to discourage humans from committing sins
ture, the term ‘syphilis’, commonly referred to as frančoži and simultaneously serve as evidence of God's existence.
or francoži, appeared as a masculine plural noun. It de- Trubar positioned sin between two pillars, specifically in
noted an infectious venereal disease or, more specifical- connection to the violation of societal regulations, spe-
ly, the secondary stage of the disease (sores), using a met- cifically laws, and primarily, he characterised it as the im-
onymic totum per parte designation. Occurrences can proper conduct of an individual asserting their own di-
be found in six books, specifically the Catechismus z dvei­ vine qualities. According to Trubar, there is only one
ma izlagama (Trubar 1575), Tiga Noviga testamenta pusled­ appropriate reaction to this: punishment. Trubar main-
ni deil (Trubar 1577), the Bible (Dalmatin 1584), the Dic­ tained the belief that illness, including syphilis, is a pun-
tionarium quatuor linguarum (Megiser 1592), House Postil ishment for ignoring one's own divine nature. This posi-
(Trubar 1595), and Thesaurus Polyglottus (Megiser 1603). tion was upheld by him until his death and can be seen
The noun occurs 10 times. The adjective ‘francožen’ consistently in his final work, which was published post-
or ‘frančožen’ is found in two works and appears three humously in 1595.
times. These texts are Cerkovna ordninga (Trubar 1564)
and Ta celi catechismus (Trubar 1574). The origin of the