Titivillus is not dead. We have simply forgotten him, although he is still intensely active among us, wrapped in anonymity that favors his evil acts. Who responds under this name is none other than an imp that since the 13th century, as far as is known, has been executing a very precise order from Satan himself: causing errors in writing.
The copyist monks, those who exhausted long hours of work at the desks of the monasteries, feared it. However, he ended up becoming the patron of scribes. Errare humanum est, but it was much better to indicate that it was the devil's thing.
DC Nabau has recovered this great little figure in the book entitled Titivillus (Hidroavión Editions). On the cover appears this imp and a warning: "Based on real errors." And this is how Nabau remembers, for example, one of the most notorious cases of Titivillus' work success and that he transports us to the 17th century.
Commissioned by King Charles I of England, Robert Barker and Martin Lucas published a thousand copies of the Bible, we know, the great best seller of humanity. Titivillus entered the scene. He sneaked into the workshops and inspired a blunder. When transcribing the sixth commandment, he omitted a word. Just one. But crucial. The “You shall not commit impure acts” became “You shall commit impure acts”.
As a consequence, the Archbishop of Canterbury went into a rage. The thousand copies were burned at the stake, in the purest Savonarola style. The publishers were sentenced to a million-dollar fine and their license to carry out their activity for life was taken away. One of them, drowning in debt, ended up in a prison where he died.
But as things are, the so-called cursed Bible did not completely disappear under the purifying... or infernal fire. Nine copies managed to survive. One of them was purchased at auction eight years ago for more than 30,000 pounds, the price of a historic mistake.
Beyond the anecdotes that Titivillus accumulated over the centuries, Nabau also focuses on his current field of action. Obviously, he continues to whisper in the ear failures that especially affect journalists, writers, editors, translators, philologists... and anyone who knows how to write his name.
But this imp's thirst for errors is insatiable, and it has led him to master programming languages. Who else is behind those nefarious autocorrects or misleading machine translations?
Titivillus has also become the king of WhatsApp, where he puts on his boots and encourages misunderstandings. It can be said that he has more work than ever because he is also chasing various distractions that end up causing the error he so desires, such as misinterpreting the assembly instructions for an Ikea piece of furniture. Titivillus in culpa est. So, if there is any mistake in this column, it is not the responsibility of the person who signs it. Damn it! Or rather, bless him!
