The Name of the Rose

“Prime, in which William induces first Salvatore and then the cellarer to confess their past, Severinus finds the stolen lenses, Nicholas brings the new ones, and William, now with six eyes, goes to decipher the manuscript of Venantius”

William resolves to take a hard line with both Salvatore and Remigio, since they roam around at night, when strange things seem to happen. First, he gets Salvatore to admit that he procures girls from the village so Remigio can have sex with them. William then compels Salvatore to disclose his past association with the notorious Fra Dolcino, which the other willingly does. Salvatore reveals that he and Remigio had been Dolcino’s followers and then fled together when the heretic was captured. William then questions a reluctant Remigio, prompting the cellarer to reveal his secret trysts and his past as a follower of Fra Dolcino. He begs William not to turn him over to the Inquisition, and William strikes a bargain with him: divulge all his secrets about the abbey in exchange for protection. Remigio reveals that—although he does not know who murdered Venantius—he knows when and where he was killed. On the way to a secret tryst, he found Venatius dead on the kitchen floor, a broken cup beside him. Terrified, he retreated and waited for the body to be discovered. When the corpse was later found in a vat of blood, Remigio was even more terrified. William points out that Malachi is the only one who has total access to the grounds, which terrifies Remigio even more, so William dismisses him. Severinus arrives with the missing glasses, found in Berengar’s habit and confirming it was he who stole both the glasses and the book. Nicholas then arrives with the newly-made glasses. Adso heads to church, still thinking longingly of his sexual encounter with the peasant girl.

“Terce, in which Adso writhes in the torments of love, then William arrives with Venantius’s text, which remains undecipherable even after it has been deciphered”

Adso vividly recalls his encounter with the girl, and struggles to resolve his faith with his desire. As he walks about the grounds, he contemplates the nature of love, passion, and sex, and tries to reconcile the good and the bad actions of humanity in accordance with the good and the bad in nature itself. He contemplates the sheep, the oxen, the villagers working in the fields. As he contemplates God’s creation, he “made an effort to transform the ardor” he felt for the girl into “a sense of inner happiness and devout peace” (339). Having circled the entire abbey, Adso now encounters William, who reports that he has translated Venantius’s secret code on the parchment. To Adso, the words make no sense, and “seemed the ravings of a madman” (340). Are these words, Adso asks, taken from the book itself? The parchment is not ancient, so these must be hand-written notes taken by Venatius while he was reading the now-missing (and probably forbidden) book. Only by reconstructing the nature of the mysterious book, William posits, will they discover the nature of—and thus the identity of—the murderer. William recalls that there is “some strange complicity” (341) that binds Malachi and the cellarer, but the nature of that relationship is still unknown. 

“Sext, in which Adso goes hunting for truffles and sees the Minorites arriving, they confer at length with William and Ubertino, and very sad things are learned about John XXII”

Adso joins Severinus and the swineherds in a truffle hunt, but runs back to the abbey to inform William of the Minorites’ arrival. After formal greetings end, the Franciscans joyfully reunite with Ubertino, and all sit down to eat and talk freely. Adso listens to a conversation between William, Ubertino, and Michael of Cesena, the Minister General of the Franciscans, who has come to negotiate with the Papal legation and discuss the terms of his upcoming meeting with Pope John XXII at Avignon. William describes the Pope as a “thieving magpie” and a “Midas” who possess “diabolical skill in collecting money” (352-353). When Jerome of Kaffa repeats a terrible rumor, William intervenes, though he points out that its very existence “tells us the moral climate of Avignon” where “all, exploited and exploiters, know they are living more in a market than at the court of Christ’s vicar” (355). Michael explains that he will try to find common ground with the Pope’s delegation, but Ubertino insists such accord is impossible, for the Minorites’ insistence on poverty is considered suspect in the papal court. Even more troubling, one of the men reveals that the Pope is planning to unveil a doctrine that denies the dead will see Heaven and God in His fullest glory until after Judgement Day, which enrages the Franciscans even further. The meal concludes with William informing them that Bernard Gui is expected and that Cardinal Bertrand del Poggetto would be leading the Avignon delegation. The men worry that these two will use the argument of heresy against the Minorites, with William and Michael disagreeing about how to counter such charges. William, believing the upcoming meeting to be futile, warns Michael not to expect compromise, and then all depart to greet the Pope’s men, who have just arrived.

“Nones, in which Cardinal del Poggetto arrives, with Bernard Gui and the other men of Avignon, and then each one does something different”

As the men exchange cordial greetings, Adso’s attention goes to Bernard Gui, also known as Bernardo Guidoni or Bernardo Guido. Adso watches with interest as Gui and William exchange barbs under the guise of compliments. Then, Bernard, who has already been informed of the murders, begins roaming the abbey, interrogating everyone he meets, and spreading fear wherever he goes. William goes back to Venantius’s desk to read the books there, and the inquisitor continues his interrogations, avoiding the monks and focusing mainly on the peasants and laypersons. Adso notes that this method is “the opposite of William’s strategy thus far” (363). 

“Vespers, in which Alinardo seems to give valuable information, and William reveals his method of arriving at a probable truth through a series of unquestionable errors”

William and Adso visit with Alinardo, and the elderly monkasserts that the murders are being conducted in a manner that mirrors a “sequence in the book of Revelation”(364). Adso asks why this is so, and Alinardo rants about a previous abbot, who had promised to make him librarian, but then will say no more about the persons to whom he is referring. He will only say “Many acts of pride were committed in the library” (365). After he departs, William insists that these angry ravings contain a great deal of truth, and they discuss how to construct a hypothesis around this information. Adso finally understands William’s method of reasoning: it is the opposite of the philosopher’s method, which begins with “first principles”(367) and reasons outwardly from there. Adso is left wondering if the inquisitor’s ways are not a better method of reaching the truth. 

“Compline, in which Salvatore tells of a prodigious spell”

After an extremely opulent meal in honor of the papal delegation, Adso catches Salvatore sneaking a bundle out of the kitchen, claiming it is a snake. When pressed he reveals it is a black cat, and that he knows a love spell that will compel village girls to have sex with him too, despite being old and ugly. He will need the aid of a young girl in order to perform the spell, and Adso wonders aloud, embarrassed, if it will be the same girl from the other night, thus prompting Salvatore to tease the young novice mercilessly. Wretched and angry, Adso leaves to join William for their next journey into the labyrinth. 

“After Compline, in which they visit the labyrinth again, reach the threshold of the finis Africae, but cannot enter because they do not know what the first and seventh of the four are, and, finally, Adso has a recurrence, though a very erudite one, of his love malady”

William and Adso work through the long, cold night: they mark doorways, decipher the scroll carvings, and take note of passageways in order to map the labyrinth. William gets waylaid by the wondrous volumes in the bookcases, and the two men stop often to read, peruse, and share what they find. By doing so, they are also systematically unravelling the principles by which the books are organized, and which rooms contain which categories of texts. It seems that “the plan of the library reproduces the map of the world,” and that “the books are arranged according to the country of their origin, or the place where their authors were born” (377-8). They pass through the room where Adso had visions, dousing the burning herb which causes hallucinations. They discover that the library has one of the largest extant collections of—and textual commentaries on—the Apocalypse. They discover a cache of books about “monsters and falsehoods,” including the Koran, which William insists contains “a wisdom different from ours” (379). They reach the spot where Berengar said “the explanation of a certain secret” would be (155), when he used the expression “finis Africae” (literally, “the end of Africa”), which had so enraged Malachi. Reviewing their map, they realize the Africa room is walled up, hidden by the monks who designed the library many years before. There must be a way to access the secret room, William notes, because Venantius found it, or was given its description by Adelmo, who had it from Berengar. Reading the parchment’s secret messages, they try but fail to find entry to the finis Africae. They complete their map and depart, but not before Adso finds a treatise on love that re-enflames his desires for the village girl.

“Night, in which Salvatore allows himself to be discovered wretchedly by Bernard Gui, the girl loved by Adso is arrested as a witch, and all go to bed more unhappy and worried than before”

As the two men exit the library, they hear loud noises coming from the kitchen, and blow out their lamps to investigate. Archers belonging to the papal delegation were patrolling the abbey when they captured Salvatore with the village girl beloved by Adso, in the company of a black cat, a knife, and two broken eggs. Only Adso knows of Salvatore’s intention to cast a love spell. Bernard Gui, on the other hand, is convinced a satanic ritual was about to take place, and terrifies all those who have gathered with gruesome descriptions. Bernard brands the girl a witch, which means she will be tortured and burned at the stake; he imprisons Salvatore in the basement, to await interrogation. Adso is wretched, and William, though sympathetic, commands him to restrain himself. He speaks with Michael and the other Minorites about the fact that Bernard now has a pseudo-explanation for the murders, i.e., that “necromancers” are circulating in the abbey (399). William does not think the next day’s negotiations will be affected, but rather that Bernard will save this information to use later, in order to disrupt the progress of the talks,should they do not go his way.