Medieval France
(Adam of Bosham or Adam Balsham; fl. early 12th c.). A shadowy figure, Adam was a dialectician and moral theologian of the speculative school at a time when the most famous names, such as Peter the Chanter and Stephen Langton, were “biblical moral” theologians.
Two of his works are preserved for us, an Ars disserendi or dialectica and De utensilibus or Phaletolum. Although Adam is praised by a later member of the Petit-Pont school, Alexander Neckham, the adjective parvipontani was used as a term of abuse for sophistical hairsplitters.
Lesley J.Smith
[See also: THEOLOGY]
Minio-Paluello, Lorenzo, ed. Twelfth Century Logic, Texts and Studies I: Adam Balsamiensis Parvipontani Ars disserendi (Dialectica Alexandri). Rome, 1956.
——. “The Ars disserendi of Adam of Balsham ‘Parvipontanus.’” Mediaeval and Renaissance Studies 3(1954):116–69.
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