In the early 20th century, Zacarías García Villada discovered the ''Nodicia de kesos'' on the backside of a tenth-century parchment recording a gift to the monastery of San Justo y Pastor, which was located in either
Chozas de Abajo or
Ardón del Esla in the
Kingdom of León.
[Roger Wright]
"Latín tardío y romance temprano: la ‘lista de quesos’ de Ardón del Esla"
''Argutorio'', 1 (1999), 24–26. Originally published in ''Latín tardío y romance temprano en España y la Francia carolingia'' (Madrid: Gredos, 1989), 9–13 and 261–64, translated from ''Late Latin and Early Romance in Spain and Carolingian France'' (Liverpool: 1982). It is a list of the
cheeses used up by the monastery in various activities, either as food or as payment. Its orthography is reflective of early
Iberian Romance pronunciation and diverges sharply from
classical Latin
Classical Latin is the form of Literary Latin recognized as a literary standard by writers of the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. It was used from 75 BC to the 3rd century AD, when it developed into Late Latin. In some later period ...
. It predates any distinction between the
Leonese language
Leonese ( ast-leo, Llionés, ast, Lleonés) is a set of vernacular Romance language varieties currently spoken in northern and western portions of the historical region of León in Spain (the modern provinces of León, Zamora, and Sala ...
and
Castilian.
The conventional title of the list comes from its first three words (
incipit) and means "list of cheeses", similar to
modern Spanish ''noticia / lista / relación de (los) quesos''.
The document is one of the texts that Ramón Menéndez Pidal used in his work ''Origins of Spanish'' (1926) to give an account of the state of peninsular romances in the 10th century.
The original is currently kept in the archives of the
Cathedral of León, under the name ''Manuscript 852v''.
An "extraordinary parallel" to the ''Nodicia'' is found on a
Visigothic slate from the late 6th or early 7th century, found in
Galinduste. The graffito identifies itself as a ''Notitia de casios''.
[Isabel Velásquez Soriano, ''Las pizarras visigodas: edicion critica y estudio'' (Real Academia de la Historia, 1989), pp. 165–168, no. 11 (with drawing).]
Text
;1st column
:List of /cheeses that spent brother /Semeno: in the work/ of the brothers in the vi /neyard /near Saint Just,/ 5 cheeses; in the /other of the abbot, /2 cheeses; in
he one that they put this year, / 4 cheeses; in the one /of
Castrillo, 1; /in the main vineyard, 2''
;2nd column
:/that they took as war tribute, /2, to the tower; that they took to
Cea, /2, when they car- /ved the table; 2 that /they took to
León; 2/''..s...en'' /''u...re...'' /''...que...'' /''...c...'' /''...e...u'' /''...''other (?) /''...'' /''g... Uane Ece'' /another that to- /ok Gomi's nephew /de do...a...; 4 that they spe- /nt when
the king /came to Rozuela; /1 when Salvador /came there.
References
{{reflist
Leonese language
10th century in the Kingdom of León
10th-century Christian texts
10th-century manuscripts
Spanish manuscripts
Earliest known manuscripts by language
History of accounting
Spanish cheeses