The Name of the Rose

“Terce, in which Severinus speaks to William of a strange book, and William speaks to the envoys of a strange concept of temporal government”

William is called out of the meeting by an anxious Severinus, who whispers even as other monks hover around him. He has found a strange book in the infirmary that he must immediately show William: he believes it was the book Berengar was carrying right before he was murdered. They surmise that he stashed it before heading to the balenary. They see Jorge feeling his way toward them, but he appears not to have heard their whispered discussion, despite having excellent hearing. William is summoned back to the meeting, so he tells Severinus to lock himself in the infirmary until he can return to look at the book. William tells Adso to follow Jorge, just in case. But here William makes a mistake: he loudly calls to Severinus, and Remigio, overhearing, follows the herbalist out. Adso, fearing for Severinus, chooses to follow Remigio instead of Jorge. But the cellarer sees Adso following him, and the two play a cat and mouse game, until Adso is certain Severinus has locked himself safely inside the infirmary. Remigio turns away, towards the kitchen, and Adso returns to the chapterhouse, where peace has been restored. William is invited to speak on behalf of the imperial theologians. Anxious to get to the infirmary but mindful of his duty to this mission, he lays out his arguments for Christ’s poverty as unprovable, but an idea worth believing in, and not something that threatens the Pope’s power. No one is convinced by his humble disquisition, but no one argues either. At this moment, an archer enters and whispers something to his master. Bernard interrupts the negotiations, and all run from the room, with William fearing that harm has come to Severinus.

“Sext, in which Severinus is found murdered but the book that he had found is to be found no longer”

Severinus is found dead, his head bashed in, lying in a pool of blood. A very fine armillary surmounted by a gold cross that previously sat on the infirmary shelf is beside the body. It is clearly the murder weapon. Two archers hold the struggling Remigio, who proclaims his innocence, claiming the man was already dead when he entered the infirmary. The archers had found him rummaging in the dead man’s shelves, the infirmary floor strewn with papers, books, and broken glass. Bernard reveals that he had intended to arrest Remigio for other crimes, relating to his past with Salvatore, and regrets that he did not do so sooner, so as to have saved Severinus. Remigio, spotting Malachi, screams as he is being dragged away, “You swear, and I swear!” The librarian replies, “I will do nothing to harm you” (434). A public trial will take place that afternoon. Benno pulls William and Adso aside, revealing in a whisper that Malachi was already in the room before Remigio entered, and that he saw the librarian come out from behind the infirmary curtain. Either Malachi is a witness to the murder or he is the killer. William asks Abo to make everyone leave so he can investigate, and when Malachi tries to remain, William is adamant. They ask Benno to stand guard at the door while they work quickly to find the missing book. Instead, they discover that the murder weapon corresponds to the description of the ‘fourth trumpet’ in the book of the Apocalypse. It appears that the murderer is not striking at random but is instead following a plan. William sends Benno to spy on Malachi, while he and Adso replay Severinus’s words over and over: he had called his discovery “a strange book” (421). Suddenly, they realize it is a book comprised of different manuscripts, in different languages, all bound together. They have been gravely mistaken in searching only for a Greek book. They race back to the infirmary, but it is too late: the book they had seen and discarded earlier is now gone. The narrator—Adso in his later years—reveals that Benno has stolen the book, but at that time, neither he nor William can know this. They only know that they have failed once again.

“Nones, in which justice is meted out, and there is the embarrassing impression that everyone is wrong”

The terrified cellarer is now before the tribunal. Remigio holds his own under questioning until Bernard marches Salvatore in. It is clear the man has been tortured, and he has revealed all, including the fact that Remigio is in possession of secret letters given to him by the heretic Fra Dolcino, which he probably gave to Malachi to hide. The librarian is now summoned before the tribunal. He repeats what he has already told Bernard that very morning: namely, that he became friendly with Remigio, that the latter had asked him to hide some papers entrusted to him during confession, and that he had complied, never suspecting their heretical nature. He is then dismissed, and is clearly held in great favor by the inquisitor, who continues his persecution of the cellarer. It becomes clear that Gui—in condemning Remigio’s past life with the Dolcinians—is also condemning the ideas of the Emperor’s theologians, the Franciscans. As they realize Gui’s trap, both William and Abo look grim. At this point, Remigio snaps: he “seemed at once possessed and illuminated” (463), and he confesses all of his terrible misdeeds with the Dolcinians. Despite having denied being the murderer, when threatened with torture, he confesses to the killings in the abbey as well. Bernard concludes the proceedings by declaring that a proper trial will be held at the Pope’s court at Avignon, and in his stern condemnations and insinuations, it is clear that the meeting of the two sides—the Franciscan and the papal delegation—has failed. Bernard has implicated the Franciscans beyond repair, and Adso muses that, “if Bernard had been sent by the Pope to prevent a reconciliation between the two groups, he had succeeded” (471).

“Vespers, in which Ubertino takes flight, Benno begins to observe the laws, and William makes some reflections on the various types of lust encountered that day”

William, Ubertino, and Michael ofCesena confer after the trial of Remigio. William tells Michael not to go to Avignon to meet directly with the Pope or he will be risking his life. Adso the narrator digresses here to relate what happens to Michael in the future, but then wrests himself back to the present, and to William’s caution: Ubertino is no longer safe. The men plot his escape, and embrace farewell. After dinner, they corner Benno, demanding the book. Benno tells them he has asked to be made the new assistant librarian, Malachi has assented, and he has turned the book over to the librarian. William declares, “Benno has joined the other side,” first longing to know the library’s secrets and “now…the guardian” of them (477). Alone with Adso, William explains that Benno has “a lust for knowledge…for its own sake,” but only because it had been denied him (478). Unlike William’s revered Roger Bacon, who loved knowledge as a way to illuminate truth, Benno’s lust is “sterile, and has nothing to do with truth” (478). Exhausted and demoralized, they head to compline and then to bed. On the way, they encounter Aymaro, who sneers at Benno’s promotion and Malachi’s machinations.

“Compline, in which a sermon is heard about the coming of the Antichrist, and Adso discovers the power of proper names”

After Vespers, everyone expects a homily from Abo, but instead he asks Jorge to speak. The blind monk exhorts the audience—including the visitors—to reject pride. He thunders balefully about the pride that has afflicted the abbey: the desire to read and to study books which should not be seen. Here, William whispers to Adso that “the old man knows more than he is saying,” (484). It is the Antichrist at work in the abbey, Jorge says, assailing everyone in the audience, high and low. Adso wonders what the Cardinal and Bernard Gui are thinking at this moment, while William jokes that the description of the Antichrist sounds a lot like Jorge himself. After the sermon, on the way to bed, Adso asks what will become of the prisoners, but it is really the peasant girl whom he is mourning. William tells him again that she will be burned as a witch, and Adso cries, “So the cellarer was right: the simple folk always pay for all”;he goes to his cell and cries through the night for “the only earthly love of [his] life,” whose name he will never know (493).