The unknown language and letters of Hildegard von Bingen (2015)

Although inventing a language might seem like a purely modern phenomenon, nearly a thousand years ago, the Benedictine Abbess, lecturer, composer, and visionary, Hildegard von Bingen created her own language, the Lingua Ignota. Hildegard begins with the words for God and the angels, then proceeds to human beings, other animals, plants, and so on. Along with her own language, Hildegard created an alphabet. Why did Hildegard create this language? Although she never explicitly said why, it should not be understood outside of her theology, based in part on the limits of language. As Wittgenstein once said, "The limits of my language define the limits of my world". If our language is limited, it will hinder our experience and appreciation of the divine. Hildegard's Lingua Ignota thus may be an attempt to redeem our fallen language so that in the world it shapes, the natural holiness of all things will be manifest.