Abstract

Paul of Venice’s tract on reference, a brief excerpt from his lengthy Logica Magna, deals with material, simple, and personal supposition. His treatment of these standard subjects of late medieval logic is significant because it defends the use of material signs to indicate that a term is being used in material supposition and because of its critique of Peter of Mantua’s reduction of all reference to personal reference. Paul also defends against several challenges to the common notions that terms do not refer outside the context of propositions and that only the subject and predicate terms, not the copula, refer. His encyclopedic treatise was widely used in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Professor Perreiah has established a critical edition of the Latin text and it is printed opposite his readable and reliable English translation. The translation is excellent in rendering the technical terms of medieval logic into the terms of contemporary logic. The introduction could be more developed, but it is very helpful as are the notes explaining references in the text. This book is a scholarly and significant contribution to the study of medieval logic.—K. M.