If you read a work by Cicero or Seneca and then open The Pilgrimage of Egeria, Augustine, or Gregory of Tours, you will soon notice that Late Latin authors quote authorities differently. They provide a perfect example of synthesising two potentially conflicting traditions – “classical” and “biblical”. You can see an innovative mix of marking words including the very classical inquit, an increased use of dico, and the newly recruited ait and dicens, influenced by biblical translations. The authors try to make reading easier by putting quotative words before quotations and they like redundant combinations (e.g. “he answered saying”).