Laudator Temporis Acti

Jerome, Letters 7.2.1 (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, vol. 54, p. 27; to Chromatins, Jovinus, and Eusebius; tr. Charles Christopher Mierow, with his note):

I am now having a chat with your letter, I embrace it, it speaks to me. It is the only thing here that understands Latin. Here in your aging days you must either learn to talk a barbarous language or else remain silent.⁶ As often as the familiar handwriting brings back to me your dear faces, so often am I no longer here, or else you are here. Do believe my love, that it is speaking the truth: in this case too, as I write this letter, you are here with me.

⁶ hic enim aut barbarus seni sermo discendus est aut tacendum est. Jerome gives a small sample of this “barbarous language” in his Vita Pauli 6.—Note the use here of the word seni, “for an old man” (“in your aging days”). If Jerome was born around the middle of the century, say between 345 and 350, and this letter was written in 375 or 376, then Jerome at this time was at the most thirty or thirty-one years old. References by Jerome to his age, evidently at times exaggerated, have complicated determination of a chronology. On the date of Jerome’s birth, cf. Cavallera 2.1—12. Cf. also n. 1 to Letter 14 below.

nunc cum vestris litteris fabulor, illas amplexor, illae mecum loquuntur, illae hic tantum Latine sciunt. hic enim aut barbarus seni sermo discendus est aut tacendum est. quotiensque carissimos mihi vultus notae manus referunt inpressa vestigia, totiens aut ego hic non sum aut vos hic estis. credite amori vera dicenti: et cum has scriberem, vos videbam.

Jerome, Life of Paul the Hermit 6.2 (Sources Chrétiennes, vol. 508, pp. 154, 156; tr. W.H. Fremantle):

Another [monk] in an old cistern (called in the country dialect of Syria Gubba) kept himself alive on five dried figs a day.

alter in cisterna veteri — quam gentili sermone Syri "gubbam" vocant — quinque caricis per singulos dies sustentatur.

See also Jerome, Commentary on Jeremiah 2.12 (Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina, vol. 74, p. 65):

hoc autem Latinus lector intelligat, ut semel dixisse sufficiat, "lacum" non "stagnum" sonare iuxta Graecos, sed "cisternam", quae sermone Syro et Hebraico "gubba" appellatur.