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Old English literature refers to poetry and prose written in
Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...
in early medieval England, from the 7th century to the decades after the
Norman Conquest The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Norman, Breton, Flemish, and French troops, all led by the Duke of Normandy, later styled William the Conq ...
of 1066, a period often termed
Anglo-Saxon England Anglo-Saxon England or Early Medieval England, existing from the 5th to the 11th centuries from the end of Roman Britain until the Norman conquest in 1066, consisted of various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms until 927, when it was united as the Kingdom of ...
. The 7th-century work '' Cædmon's Hymn'' is often considered as the oldest surviving poem in English, as it appears in an 8th-century copy of
Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom ...
's text, the ''
Ecclesiastical History of the English People The ''Ecclesiastical History of the English People'' ( la, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum), written by Bede in about AD 731, is a history of the Christian Churches in England, and of England generally; its main focus is on the conflict b ...
''. Poetry written in the mid 12th century represents some of the latest post-Norman examples of Old English. Adherence to the grammatical rules of Old English is largely inconsistent in 12th-century work, and by the 13th century the grammar and syntax of Old English had almost completely deteriorated, giving way to the much larger Middle English corpus of literature. In descending order of quantity, Old English literature consists of: sermons and saints' lives; biblical translations; translated Latin works of the early
Church Fathers The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were ancient and influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity. The historical per ...
; chronicles and narrative history works; laws, wills and other legal works; practical works on grammar, medicine, and geography; and poetry. In all, there are over 400 surviving manuscripts from the period, of which about 189 are considered major. In addition, some Old English text survives on stone structures and ornate objects. The poem ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
'', which often begins the traditional canon of English literature, is the most famous work of Old English literature. The ''
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle The ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' is a collection of annals in Old English, chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the ''Chronicle'' was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of A ...
'' has also proven significant for historical study, preserving a chronology of early English history. In addition to Old English literature, Anglo-Latin works comprise the largest volume of literature from the
Early Middle Ages The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th or early 6th century to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Mi ...
in England.


Extant manuscripts

Over 400 manuscripts remain from the Anglo-Saxon period, with most written during the 9th to 11th centuries. There were considerable losses of manuscripts as a result of the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 16th century. Old English manuscripts have been highly prized by collectors since the 16th century, both for their historic value and for their aesthetic beauty with their uniformly spaced letters and decorative elements.


Paleography and codicology

Manuscripts written in both
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...
and the
vernacular A vernacular or vernacular language is in contrast with a "standard language". It refers to the language or dialect that is spoken by people that are inhabiting a particular country or region. The vernacular is typically the native language, n ...
remain. It is believed that Irish missionaries are responsible for the scripts used in early Anglo-Saxon texts, which include the Insular half-uncial (important Latin texts) and Insular minuscule (both Latin and the vernacular). In the 10th century, the Caroline minuscule was adopted for Latin, however the Insular minuscule continued to be used for Old English texts. Thereafter, it was increasingly influenced by Caroline minuscule, while retaining certain distinctively Insular letter-forms. Early English manuscripts often contain later annotations in the margins of the texts; it is a rarity to find a completely unannotated manuscript. These include corrections, alterations and expansions of the main text, as well as commentary upon it, and even unrelated texts. The majority of these annotations appear to date to the 13th century and later.


Scriptoria

Seven major scriptoria produced a good deal of Old English manuscripts:
Winchester Winchester is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs Nation ...
;
Exeter Exeter () is a city in Devon, South West England. It is situated on the River Exe, approximately northeast of Plymouth and southwest of Bristol. In Roman Britain, Exeter was established as the base of Legio II Augusta under the personal comm ...
;
Worcester Worcester may refer to: Places United Kingdom * Worcester, England, a city and the county town of Worcestershire in England ** Worcester (UK Parliament constituency), an area represented by a Member of Parliament * Worcester Park, London, Engla ...
; Abingdon;
Durham Durham most commonly refers to: *Durham, England, a cathedral city and the county town of County Durham *County Durham, an English county * Durham County, North Carolina, a county in North Carolina, United States *Durham, North Carolina, a city in N ...
; and two
Canterbury Canterbury (, ) is a cathedral city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, situated in the heart of the City of Canterbury local government district of Kent, England. It lies on the River Stour. The Archbishop of Canterbury is the primate of t ...
houses, Christ Church and
St. Augustine Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Afr ...
's
Abbey An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns. The c ...
.


Dialects

Regional dialects include Northumbrian; Mercian; Kentish; and
West Saxon West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some R ...
, leading to the speculation that much of the poetry may have been translated into West Saxon at a later date. An example of the dominance of the West Saxon dialect is a pair of
charter A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the re ...
s, from the Stowe and British Museum collections, which outline grants of land in Kent and Mercia, but are nonetheless written in the West Saxon dialect of the period.


Poetic codices

There are four major poetic manuscripts: * The
Junius manuscript The Junius manuscript is one of the four major codices of Old English literature. Written in the 10th century, it contains poetry dealing with Biblical subjects in Old English, the vernacular language of Anglo-Saxon England. Modern editors hav ...
, also known as the
Cædmon Cædmon (; ''fl. c.'' 657 – 684) is the earliest English poet whose name is known. A Northumbrian cowherd who cared for the animals at the double monastery of Streonæshalch (now known as Whitby Abbey) during the abbacy of St. Hilda, he w ...
manuscript, is an illustrated collection of poems on biblical narratives. It is held at the
Bodleian Library The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford, and is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. It derives its name from its founder, Sir Thomas Bodley. With over 13 million printed items, it is the sec ...
, with the shelfmark MS. Junius 11. * The Exeter Book is an anthology which brings together riddles and longer texts. It has been held the
Exeter Cathedral Exeter Cathedral, properly known as the Cathedral Church of Saint Peter in Exeter, is an Anglican cathedral, and the seat of the Bishop of Exeter, in the city of Exeter, Devon, in South West England. The present building was complete by about 14 ...
library since it was donated there in the 11th century by Bishop Leofric, and has the shelfmark Exeter Dean and Chapter Manuscript 3501. * The Vercelli Book contains both poetry and prose; it is not known how it came to be in
Vercelli Vercelli (; pms, Vërsèj ), is a city and ''comune'' of 46,552 inhabitants (January 1, 2017) in the Province of Vercelli, Piedmont, northern Italy. One of the oldest urban sites in northern Italy, it was founded, according to most historians, ...
. * The Beowulf Manuscript (British Library Cotton Vitellius A. xv), sometimes called the Nowell Codex, contains prose and poetry, typically dealing with monstrous themes, including ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
''.


Poetry


Form and style

The most distinguishing feature of Old English poetry is its
alliterative verse In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of ...
style. The Anglo-Latin verse tradition in early medieval England was accompanied by discourses on Latin prosody, which were 'rules' or guidance for writers. The rules of Old English verse are understood only through modern analysis of the extant texts. The first widely accepted theory was constructed by
Eduard Sievers Eduard Sievers (; 25 November 1850, Lippoldsberg – 30 March 1932, Leipzig) was a philologist of the classical and Germanic languages. Sievers was one of the '' Junggrammatiker'' of the so-called "Leipzig School". He was one of the most influe ...
(1893), who distinguished five distinct alliterative patterns. His system of
alliterative verse In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of ...
is based on accent, alliteration, the quantity of vowels, and patterns of syllabic accentuation. It consists of five permutations on a base verse scheme; any one of the five types can be used in any verse. The system was inherited from and exists in one form or another in all of the older Germanic languages. Alternative theories have been proposed, such as the theory of
John C. Pope John Collins Pope (December 4, 1904 – April 18, 1997) was an American scholar of Old English. He taught at Yale University English Department from 1928 to 1971, where he was William Lampson Professor Emeritus of English at the time of his death. ...
(1942), which uses musical notation to track the verse patterns. J. R. R. Tolkien describes and illustrates many of the features of Old English poetry in his 1940 essay " On Translating ''Beowulf''".


Alliteration and assonance

Old English poetry alliterates, meaning that a sound (usually the initial stressed consonant sound) is repeated throughout a line. For instance, in the first line of ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
'', "Hwaet! We Gar-Dena , in gear-dagum", (meaning "Listen! We of the Spear Danes in days of yore..."), the stressed sound in ''Gar-Dena'' and ''gear-dagum'' alliterate on the consonant "D".


Caesura

Old English poetry, like other Old Germanic alliterative verse, is also commonly marked by the
caesura 300px, An example of a caesura in modern western music notation A caesura (, . caesuras or caesurae; Latin for " cutting"), also written cæsura and cesura, is a metrical pause or break in a verse where one phrase ends and another phrase begin ...
or pause. In addition to setting pace for the line, the caesura also grouped each line into two
hemistich A hemistich (; via Latin from Ancient Greek, Greek , from "half" and "verse") is a half-line of verse, followed and preceded by a caesura, that makes up a single overall prosodic or verse unit. In Latin verse, Latin and Greek poetry, the hemist ...
s.


Metaphor

Kennings are a key feature of Old English poetry. A kenning is an often formulaic metaphorical phrase that describes one thing in terms of another: for instance, in ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
'', the sea is called the ''whale road''. Another example of a kenning in '' The Wanderer'' is a reference to battle as a "storm of spears". Old English poetry is marked by the comparative rarity of
simile A simile () is a figure of speech that directly ''compares'' two things. Similes differ from other metaphors by highlighting the similarities between two things using comparison words such as "like", "as", "so", or "than", while other metaphors c ...
s. ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
'' contains at best five similes, and these are of the short variety.


Variation

The Old English poet was particularly fond of describing the same person or object with varied phrases (often appositives) that indicated different qualities of that person or object. For instance, the ''Beowulf'' poet refers in three and a half lines to a Danish king as "lord of the Danes" (referring to the people in general), "king of the Scyldings" (the name of the specific Danish tribe), "giver of rings" (one of the king's functions is to distribute treasure), and "famous chief". Such variation, which the modern reader (who likes verbal precision) is not used to, is frequently a difficulty in producing a readable translation.


Litotes

Litotes is a form of dramatic understatement employed by the author for ironic effect.


Oral tradition

Even though all extant Old English poetry is written and literate, many scholars propose that Old English poetry was an oral craft that was performed by a '' scop'' and accompanied by a
harp The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has a number of individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orc ...
. The hypotheses of
Milman Parry Milman Parry (June 23, 1902 – December 3, 1935) was an American Classicist whose theories on the origin of Homer's works have revolutionized Homeric studies to such a fundamental degree that he has been described as the " Darwin of Homeric ...
and
Albert Lord Albert Bates Lord (15 September 1912 – 29 July 1991) was a professor of Slavic and comparative literature at Harvard University who, after the death of his mentor Milman Parry, carried on Parry's research on epic poetry. Early life Lord was bor ...
on the
Homeric Question The Homeric Question concerns the doubts and consequent debate over the identity of Homer, the authorship of the '' Iliad'' and '' Odyssey'', and their historicity (especially concerning the ''Iliad''). The subject has its roots in classical ...
came to be applied (by Parry and Lord, but also by
Francis Magoun Francis Peabody Magoun, Jr. MC (6 January 1895 – 5 June 1979) was one of the seminal figures in the study of medieval and English literature in the 20th century, a scholar of subjects as varied as soccer and ancient Germanic naming pract ...
) to verse written in
Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th ...
. That is, the theory proposes that certain features of at least some of the poetry may be explained by positing
oral-formulaic composition Oral-formulaic composition is a theory that originated in the scholarly study of epic poetry and developed in the second quarter of the twentieth century. It seeks to explain two related issues: # the process by which oral poets improvise poetry # ...
. While Old English
epic poetry An epic poem, or simply an epic, is a lengthy narrative poem typically about the extraordinary deeds of extraordinary characters who, in dealings with gods or other superhuman forces, gave shape to the mortal universe for their descendants. ...
may bear some resemblance to
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
epics such as the ''
Iliad The ''Iliad'' (; grc, Ἰλιάς, Iliás, ; "a poem about Ilium") is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Ody ...
'' and ''
Odyssey The ''Odyssey'' (; grc, Ὀδύσσεια, Odýsseia, ) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the '' Iliad'', ...
'', the question of if and how Anglo-Saxon poetry was passed down through an
oral tradition Oral tradition, or oral lore, is a form of human communication wherein knowledge, art, ideas and Culture, cultural material is received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another.Jan Vansina, Vansina, Jan: ''Oral Traditio ...
remains a subject of debate, and the question for any particular poem unlikely to be answered with perfect certainty. Parry and Lord had already demonstrated the density of metrical formulas in
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
, and observed the same feature in the Old English alliterative line: :''Hroþgar maþelode helm Scildinga'' ("Hrothgar spoke, protector of the Scildings") :''Beoƿulf maþelode bearn Ecgþeoƿes'' ("Beowulf spoke, son of Ecgtheow") In addition to verbal formulas, many themes have been shown to appear among the various works of Anglo-Saxon literature. The theory suggests a reason for this: the poetry was composed of formulae and themes from a stock common to the poetic profession, as well as literary passages composed by individual artists in a more modern sense.
Larry Benson Larry Dean Benson (1929–2015) was a professor of medieval literature at Harvard University. After an undergraduate degree at Arizona State University and a Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley, he taught at Harvard for 45 years, retirin ...
introduced the concept of "written-formulaic" to describe the status of some Anglo-Saxon poetry which, while demonstrably written, contains evidence of oral influences, including heavy reliance on formulas and themes. Frequent oral-formulaic themes in Old English poetry include "Beasts of Battle" and the "Cliff of Death". The former, for example, is characterised by the mention of ravens, eagles, and wolves preceding particularly violent depictions of battle. Among the most thoroughly documented themes is "The Hero on the Beach".
D. K. Crowne D. or d. may refer to, usually as an abbreviation: * Don (honorific), a form of address in Spain, Portugal, Italy, and their former overseas empires, usually given to nobles or other individuals of high social rank. * Date of death, as an abbreviati ...
first proposed this theme, defined by four characteristics: * A Hero on the Beach. * Accompanying "Retainers". * A Flashing Light. * The Completion or Initiation of a Journey. One example Crowne cites in his article is that which concludes Beowulf's fight with the monsters during his swimming match with Breca: Crowne drew on examples of the theme's appearance in twelve Old English texts, including one occurrence in
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
. It was also observed in other works of Germanic origin, Middle English poetry, and even an Icelandic prose saga. John Richardson held that the schema was so general as to apply to virtually any character at some point in the narrative, and thought it an instance of the "threshold" feature of
Joseph Campbell Joseph John Campbell (March 26, 1904 – October 30, 1987) was an American writer. He was a professor of literature at Sarah Lawrence College who worked in comparative mythology and comparative religion. His work covers many aspects of the ...
's Hero's Journey monomyth. J.A. Dane, in an article (characterised by Foley as "polemics without rigour") claimed that the appearance of the theme in
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
poetry, a tradition without known connection to the Germanic, invalidated the notion of "an autonomous theme in the baggage of an oral poet." Foley's response was that Dane misunderstood the nature of oral tradition, and that in fact the appearance of the theme in other cultures showed that it was a traditional form.


Poets

Most Old English poems are recorded without authors, and very few names are known with any certainty; the primary three are
Cædmon Cædmon (; ''fl. c.'' 657 – 684) is the earliest English poet whose name is known. A Northumbrian cowherd who cared for the animals at the double monastery of Streonæshalch (now known as Whitby Abbey) during the abbacy of St. Hilda, he w ...
,
Aldhelm Aldhelm ( ang, Ealdhelm, la, Aldhelmus Malmesberiensis) (c. 63925 May 709), Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey, Bishop of Sherborne, and a writer and scholar of Latin poetry, was born before the middle of the 7th century. He is said to have been the ...
, and Cynewulf.


Bede

Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom ...
is often thought to be the poet of a five-line poem entitled ''Bede's Death Song'', on account of its appearance in a letter on his death by Cuthbert. This poem exists in a Northumbrian and later version.


Cædmon

Cædmon is considered the first Old English poet whose work still survives. He is a legendary figure, as described in
Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom ...
's Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to Bede, Cædmon was first an illiterate herdsman. Following a vision of a messenger from God, Cædmon received the gift of poetry, and then lived as a monk under Abbess Hild at the abbey of
Whitby Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a maritime, mineral and tourist heritage. Its East Cl ...
in
Northumbria la, Regnum Northanhymbrorum , conventional_long_name = Kingdom of Northumbria , common_name = Northumbria , status = State , status_text = Unified Anglian kingdom (before 876)North: Anglian kingdom (af ...
in the 7th century. Bede's ''History'' claims to reproduce Cædmon's first poem, comprising nine lines. Referred to as '' Cædmon's Hymn'', the poem is extant in Northumbrian, West-Saxon and Latin versions that appear in 19 surviving manuscripts:


Cynewulf

Cynewulf has proven to be a difficult figure to identify, but recent research suggests he was an Anglian poet from the early part of the 9th century. Four poems are attributed to him, signed with a runic acrostic at the end of each poem; these are ''The Fates of the Apostles'' and ''Elene'' (both found in the Vercelli Book), and ''Christ II'' and ''Juliana'' (both found in the Exeter Book). Although
William of Malmesbury William of Malmesbury ( la, Willelmus Malmesbiriensis; ) was the foremost English historian of the 12th century. He has been ranked among the most talented English historians since Bede. Modern historian C. Warren Hollister described him as " ...
claims that
Aldhelm Aldhelm ( ang, Ealdhelm, la, Aldhelmus Malmesberiensis) (c. 63925 May 709), Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey, Bishop of Sherborne, and a writer and scholar of Latin poetry, was born before the middle of the 7th century. He is said to have been the ...
, bishop of Sherborne (d. 709), performed
secular Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin ''saeculum'', "worldly" or "of a generation"), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. Anything that does not have an explicit reference to religion, either negativ ...
songs while accompanied by a harp, none of these Old English poems survives. Paul G. Remely has recently proposed that the Old English ''
Exodus Exodus or the Exodus may refer to: Religion * Book of Exodus, second book of the Hebrew Torah and the Christian Bible * The Exodus, the biblical story of the migration of the ancient Israelites from Egypt into Canaan Historical events * E ...
'' may have been the work of Aldhelm, or someone closely associated with him.


Alfred

Alfred Alfred may refer to: Arts and entertainment *'' Alfred J. Kwak'', Dutch-German-Japanese anime television series * ''Alfred'' (Arne opera), a 1740 masque by Thomas Arne * ''Alfred'' (Dvořák), an 1870 opera by Antonín Dvořák *"Alfred (Interl ...
is said to be the author of some of the metrical prefaces to the Old English translations of Gregory's ''Pastoral Care'' and Boethius's ''Consolation of Philosophy''. Alfred is also thought to be the author of 50 metrical psalms, but whether the poems were written by him, under his direction or patronage, or as a general part in his reform efforts is unknown.


Poetic genres and themes


Heroic poetry

The Old English poetry which has received the most attention deals with what has been termed the Germanic heroic past. Scholars suggest that Old English heroic poetry was handed down orally from generation to generation. As Christianity began to appear, re-tellers often recast the tales of Christianity into the older heroic stories. The longest at 3,182 lines, and the most important, is ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ang, Bēowulf ) is an Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. ...
'', which appears in the damaged Nowell Codex. Beowulf relates the exploits of the hero Beowulf, King of the Weder-Geats or Angles, around the middle of the 5th century. The author is unknown, and no mention of Britain occurs. Scholars are divided over the date of the present text, with hypotheses ranging from the 8th to the 11th centuries. It has achieved much acclaim as well as sustained academic and artistic interest. Other heroic poems besides ''Beowulf'' exist. Two have survived in fragments: '' The Fight at Finnsburh'', controversially interpreted by many to be a retelling of one of the battle scenes in ''Beowulf'', and '' Waldere'', a version of the events of the life of Walter of Aquitaine. Two other poems mention heroic figures: ''
Widsith "Widsith" ( ang, Wīdsīþ, "far-traveller", lit. "wide-journey"), also known as "The Traveller's Song", is an Old English poem of 143 lines. It survives only in the '' Exeter Book'', a manuscript of Old English poetry compiled in the late-10th ...
'' is believed to be very old in parts, dating back to events in the 4th century concerning Eormanric and the
Goths The Goths ( got, 𐌲𐌿𐍄𐌸𐌹𐌿𐌳𐌰, translit=''Gutþiuda''; la, Gothi, grc-gre, Γότθοι, Gótthoi) were a Germanic people who played a major role in the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the emergence of medieval Euro ...
, and contains a catalogue of names and places associated with valiant deeds. '' Deor'' is a lyric, in the style of '' Consolation of Philosophy'', applying examples of famous heroes, including Weland and Eormanric, to the narrator's own case. The ''
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle The ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' is a collection of annals in Old English, chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the ''Chronicle'' was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of A ...
'' contains various heroic poems inserted throughout. The earliest from 937 is called '' The Battle of Brunanburh'', which celebrates the victory of King Athelstan over the Scots and Norse. There are five shorter poems: capture of the
Five Boroughs 5 is a number, numeral, and glyph. 5, five or number 5 may also refer to: * AD 5, the fifth year of the AD era * 5 BC, the fifth year before the AD era Literature * ''5'' (visual novel), a 2008 visual novel by Ram * ''5'' (comics), an awa ...
(942); coronation of King Edgar (973); death of King Edgar (975); death of Alfred the son of King Æthelred (1036); and death of King
Edward the Confessor Edward the Confessor ; la, Eduardus Confessor , ; ( 1003 – 5 January 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066. Edward was the son of Æt ...
(1065). The 325 line poem '' The Battle of Maldon'' celebrates
Earl Earl () is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. The title originates in the Old English word ''eorl'', meaning "a man of noble birth or rank". The word is cognate with the Scandinavian form ''jarl'', and meant " chieftain", particu ...
Byrhtnoth Byrhtnoth ( ang, Byrhtnoð), Ealdorman of Essex ( 931 - 11 August 991), died at the Battle of Maldon. His name is composed of the Old English ''beorht'' (bright) and ''noþ'' (courage). He is the subject of '' The Battle of Maldon'', an Old ...
and his men who fell in battle against the
Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...
s in 991. It is considered one of the finest, but both the beginning and end are missing and the only manuscript was destroyed in a fire in 1731. A well-known speech is near the end of the poem:


Elegiac poetry

Related to the heroic tales are a number of short poems from the Exeter Book which have come to be described as "elegies" or "wisdom poetry". They are lyrical and Boethian in their description of the up and down fortunes of life. Gloomy in mood is '' The Ruin'', which tells of the decay of a once glorious city of
Roman Britain Roman Britain was the period in classical antiquity when large parts of the island of Great Britain were under occupation by the Roman Empire. The occupation lasted from AD 43 to AD 410. During that time, the territory conquered wa ...
(cities in Britain fell into decline after the Romans departed in the early 5th century, as the early Celtic Britons continued to live their rural life), and '' The Wanderer'', in which an older man talks about an attack that happened in his youth, when his close friends and kin were all killed; memories of the slaughter have remained with him all his life. He questions the wisdom of the impetuous decision to engage a possibly superior fighting force: the wise man engages in warfare to ''preserve'' civil society, and must not rush into battle but should seek out allies when the odds may be against him. This poet finds little glory in bravery for bravery's sake. '' The Seafarer'' is the story of a sombre exile from home on the sea, from which the only hope of redemption is the joy of heaven. Other wisdom poems include ''
Wulf and Eadwacer "Wulf and Eadwacer" (, approximately ) is an Old English poem of famously difficult interpretation. It has been variously characterised, (modernly) as an elegy, (historically) as a riddle, and (in speculation on the poem's pre-history) as a ...
'', '' The Wife's Lament'', and ''
The Husband's Message "The Husband's Message" is an anonymous Old English poem, 53 lines long and found only on folio 123 of the Exeter Book. The poem is cast as the private address of an unknown first-person speaker to a wife, challenging the reader to discover the sp ...
''. Alfred the Great wrote a wisdom poem over the course of his reign based loosely on the neoplatonic philosophy of
Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the t ...
called the ''
Lays of Boethius ''The Old English Boethius'' is an Old English translation/adaptation of the sixth-century '' Consolation of Philosophy'' by Boethius, dating from between c. 880 and 950. Boethius's work is prosimetrical, alternating between prose and verse, and ...
''.


Translations of classical and Latin poetry

Several Old English poems are adaptations of
late classical Late antiquity is the time of transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages, generally spanning the 3rd–7th century in Europe and adjacent areas bordering the Mediterranean Basin. The popularization of this periodization in Englis ...
philosophical texts. The longest is a 10th-century translation of Boethius' '' Consolation of Philosophy'' contained in the
Cotton manuscript The Cotton or Cottonian library is a collection of manuscripts once owned by Sir Robert Bruce Cotton MP (1571–1631), an antiquarian and bibliophile. It later became the basis of what is now the British Library, which still holds the collection. ...
Otho A.vi. Another is '' The Phoenix'' in the Exeter Book, an allegorisation of the '' De ave phoenice'' by
Lactantius Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius (c. 250 – c. 325) was an early Christian author who became an advisor to Roman emperor, Constantine I, guiding his Christian religious policy in its initial stages of emergence, and a tutor to his son Cri ...
. Other short poems derive from the Latin
bestiary A bestiary (from ''bestiarum vocabulum'') is a compendium of beasts. Originating in the ancient world, bestiaries were made popular in the Middle Ages in illustrated volumes that described various animals and even rocks. The natural history ...
tradition. These include ''The Panther'', '' The Whale'' and '' The Partridge''.


Riddles

The most famous Old English riddles are found in the Exeter Book. They are part of a wider Anglo-Saxon literary tradition of riddling, which includes riddles written in Latin. Riddles are both comical and obscene. The riddles of the Exeter Book are unnumbered and without titles in the manuscript. For this reason, scholars propose different interpretations of how many riddles there are, with some agreeing 94 riddles, and others proposing closer to 100 riddles in the book. Most scholars believe that the Exeter Book was compiled by a single scribe; however, the works were almost certainly originally composed by poets. A riddle in Old English, written using
runic Runes are the letters in a set of related alphabets known as runic alphabets native to the Germanic peoples. Runes were used to write various Germanic languages (with some exceptions) before they adopted the Latin alphabet, and for specialised ...
script, features on the
Franks Casket The Franks Casket (or the Auzon Casket) is a small Anglo-Saxon whale's bone (not "whalebone" in the sense of baleen) chest from the early 8th century, now in the British Museum. The casket is densely decorated with knife-cut narrative scenes ...
. The riddle's solution is 'whale', evoking the whale-bone from which the casket made.


Saints' lives in verse

The Vercelli Book and Exeter Book contain four long narrative poems of saints' lives, or
hagiographies A hagiography (; ) is a biography of a saint or an ecclesiastical leader, as well as, by extension, an adulatory and idealized biography of a founder, saint, monk, nun or icon in any of the world's religions. Early Christian hagiographies might ...
. In Vercelli are ''
Andreas Andreas ( el, Ἀνδρέας) is a name usually given to males in Austria, Greece, Cyprus, Denmark, Armenia, Estonia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Finland, Flanders, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Romania, the Netherlands, and Indonesia. The ...
'' and '' Elene'' and in Exeter are '' Guthlac'' and '' Juliana''. ''Andreas'' is 1,722 lines long and is the closest of the surviving Old English poems to ''Beowulf'' in style and tone. It is the story of
Saint Andrew Andrew the Apostle ( grc-koi, Ἀνδρέᾱς, Andréās ; la, Andrēās ; , syc, ܐܰܢܕ݁ܪܶܐܘܳܣ, ʾAnd’reʾwās), also called Saint Andrew, was an apostle of Jesus according to the New Testament. He is the brother of Simon Pete ...
and his journey to rescue Saint Matthew from the Mermedonians. ''Elene'' is the story of
Saint Helena Saint Helena () is a British overseas territory located in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is a remote volcanic tropical island west of the coast of south-western Africa, and east of Rio de Janeiro in South America. It is one of three constit ...
(mother of Constantine) and her discovery of the
True Cross The True Cross is the cross upon which Jesus was said to have been crucified, particularly as an object of religious veneration. There are no early accounts that the apostles or early Christians preserved the physical cross themselves, althoug ...
. The cult of the True Cross was popular in Anglo-Saxon England and this poem was instrumental in promoting it. ''Guthlac'' consists of two poems about the English 7th century
Saint Guthlac Saint Guthlac of Crowland ( ang, Gūðlāc; la, Guthlacus; 674 – 3 April 714 CE) was a Christian hermit and saint from Lincolnshire in England. He is particularly venerated in the Fens of eastern England. Life Guthlac was the son of Penwalh ...
. ''Juliana'' describes the life of Saint Juliana, including a discussion with the devil during her imprisonment.


Poetric Biblical paraphrases

There are a number of partial
Old English Bible translations The Old English Bible translations are the partial translations of the Bible prepared in medieval England into the Old English language. The translations are from Latin texts, not the original languages. Many of these translations were in fact Bi ...
and paraphrases surviving. The
Junius manuscript The Junius manuscript is one of the four major codices of Old English literature. Written in the 10th century, it contains poetry dealing with Biblical subjects in Old English, the vernacular language of Anglo-Saxon England. Modern editors hav ...
contains three paraphrases of Old Testament texts. These were re-wordings of Biblical passages in Old English, not exact translations, but paraphrasing, sometimes into beautiful poetry in its own right. The first and longest is of ''
Genesis Genesis may refer to: Bible * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of mankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Book of ...
'' (originally presented as one work in the Junius manuscript but now thought to consist of two separate poems, A and B), the second is of ''
Exodus Exodus or the Exodus may refer to: Religion * Book of Exodus, second book of the Hebrew Torah and the Christian Bible * The Exodus, the biblical story of the migration of the ancient Israelites from Egypt into Canaan Historical events * E ...
'' and the third is ''
Daniel Daniel is a masculine given name and a surname of Hebrew origin. It means "God is my judge"Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 68. (cf. Gabriel—"God is my strength"), ...
''. Contained in Daniel are two lyrics, ''Song of the Three Children'' and ''Song of Azarias'', the latter also appearing in the Exeter Book after ''Guthlac''. The fourth and last poem, '' Christ and Satan'', which is contained in the second part of the Junius manuscript, does not paraphrase any particular biblical book, but retells a number of episodes from both the Old and New Testament. The Nowell Codex contains a Biblical poetic paraphrase, which appears right after ''Beowulf'', called '' Judith'', a retelling of the story of Judith. This is not to be confused with Ælfric's homily '' Judith'', which retells the same Biblical story in alliterative prose. Old English translations of
Psalms The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived ...
51-150 have been preserved, following a prose version of the first 50 Psalms. There are verse translations of the Gloria in Excelsis, the
Lord's Prayer The Lord's Prayer, also called the Our Father or Pater Noster, is a central Christian prayer which Jesus taught as the way to pray. Two versions of this prayer are recorded in the gospels: a longer form within the Sermon on the Mount in the Gosp ...
, and the
Apostles' Creed The Apostles' Creed ( Latin: ''Symbolum Apostolorum'' or ''Symbolum Apostolicum''), sometimes titled the Apostolic Creed or the Symbol of the Apostles, is a Christian creed or "symbol of faith". The creed most likely originated in 5th-century ...
, as well as some
hymn A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hymn ...
s and
proverb A proverb (from la, proverbium) is a simple and insightful, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and use formulaic language. A proverbial phrase or a proverbia ...
s.


Original Christian poems

In addition to Biblical paraphrases are a number of original religious poems, mostly lyrical (non-narrative). The Exeter Book contains a series of poems entitled ''Christ'', sectioned into ''
Christ I ''Christ I'' (also known as ''Christ A'' or (''The'') ''Advent Lyrics''), is a fragmentary collection of Old English poems on the coming of the Lord, preserved in the Exeter Book. In its present state, the poem comprises 439 lines in twelve dist ...
'', ''
Christ II ''Christ II'', also called ''The Ascension'', is one of Cynewulf's four signed poems that exist in the Old English vernacular. It is a five-section piece that spans lines 440–866 of the Christ triad in the ''Exeter Book'' (folios 14a-20b), and ...
'' and ''
Christ III ''Christ III'' is an anonymous Old English religious poem which forms the last part of ''Christ'', a poetic triad found at the beginning of the Exeter Book. ''Christ III'' is found on fols. 20b–32a and constitutes lines 867–1664 of ''Christ'' ...
''. Considered one of the most beautiful of all Old English poems is ''
Dream of the Rood ''The'' ''Dream of the Rood'' is one of the Christian poems in the corpus of Old English literature and an example of the genre of dream poetry. Like most Old English poetry, it is written in alliterative verse. ''Rood'' is from the Old Englis ...
'', contained in the Vercelli Book. The presence of a portion of the poem (in Northumbrian dialect) carved in runes on an 8th century stone cross found in
Ruthwell Ruthwell is a village and parish on the Solway Firth between Dumfries and Annan in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, gave Ruthwell to his nephew, Sir William Murray, confirmed to Sir John Murray, of Cockpool, in ...
,
Dumfriesshire Dumfriesshire or the County of Dumfries or Shire of Dumfries (''Siorrachd Dhùn Phris'' in Gaelic) is a historic county and registration county in southern Scotland. The Dumfries lieutenancy area covers a similar area to the historic county. I ...
, verifies the age of at least this portion of the poem. The Dream of the Rood is a dream vision in which the
personified Personification occurs when a thing or abstraction is represented as a person, in literature or art, as a type of anthropomorphic metaphor. The type of personification discussed here excludes passing literary effects such as "Shadows hold their b ...
cross tells the story of the crucifixion. Christ appears as a young hero-king, confident of victory, while the cross itself feels all the physical pain of the crucifixion, as well as the pain of being forced to kill the young lord. The dreamer resolves to trust in the cross, and the dream ends with a vision of heaven. There are a number of religious debate poems. The longest is '' Christ and Satan'' in the Junius manuscript, which deals with the conflict between Christ and Satan during the forty days in the desert. Another debate poem is '' Solomon and Saturn'', surviving in a number of textual fragments,
Saturn Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine and a half times that of Earth. It has only one-eighth the average density of Earth; h ...
is portrayed as a magician debating with the wise king
Solomon Solomon (; , ),, ; ar, سُلَيْمَان, ', , ; el, Σολομών, ; la, Salomon also called Jedidiah (Hebrew language, Hebrew: , Modern Hebrew, Modern: , Tiberian Hebrew, Tiberian: ''Yăḏīḏăyāh'', "beloved of Yahweh, Yah"), ...
.


Other poems

Other poetic forms exist in Old English including short verses, gnomes, and
mnemonic A mnemonic ( ) device, or memory device, is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval (remembering) in the human memory for better understanding. Mnemonics make use of elaborative encoding, retrieval cues, and image ...
poems for remembering long lists of names. There are short verses found in the margins of manuscripts which offer practical advice, such as remedies against the loss of cattle or how to deal with a delayed birth, often grouped as charms. The longest is called '' Nine Herbs Charm'' and is probably of
pagan Paganism (from classical Latin ''pāgānus'' "rural", "rustic", later "civilian") is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, or ethnic religions other than Judaism. I ...
origin. Other similar short verses, or charms, include '' For a Swarm of Bees'', ''
Against a Dwarf Three Anglo-Saxon metrical charms "Against a dwarf" ( ang, Ƿið dƿeorh) are contained within in the Lacnunga, which seek to heal an afflicted person by ridding them of a dwarf. Charms Remedies LXXXVIIc and LXXXVIIIc The remedies LXXXVIIc and ...
'', '' Against a Stabbing Pain'', and ''Against a Wen''. There are a group of mnemonic poems designed to help memorise lists and sequences of names and to keep objects in order. These poems are named '' Menologium'', '' The Fates of the Apostles'', '' The Rune Poem'', ''
The Seasons for Fasting The title "(The) Seasons for Fasting" refers to an incomplete Old English homiletic poem, which deals primarily with the observance of fasts on the appropriate dates of the liturgical calendar, but which also attacks the misbehaviour of lax priest ...
'', and the ''Instructions for Christians''.


Prose

The amount of surviving Old English prose is much greater than the amount of poetry. Of the surviving prose, the majority consists of the homilies, saints' lives and biblical translations from Latin. The division of early medieval written prose works into categories of "Christian" and "secular", as below, is for convenience's sake only, for literacy in Anglo-Saxon England was largely the province of monks, nuns, and ecclesiastics (or of those laypeople to whom they had taught the skills of reading and writing Latin and/or Old English). Old English prose first appears in the 9th century, and continues to be recorded through the 12th century as the last generation of scribes, trained as boys in the standardised West Saxon before the Conquest, died as old men.


Christian prose

The most widely known secular author of Old English was King
Alfred the Great Alfred the Great (alt. Ælfred 848/849 – 26 October 899) was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death in 899. He was the youngest son of King Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who bo ...
(849–899), who translated several books, many of them religious, from Latin into Old English. Alfred, wanting to restore
English culture The culture of England is defined by the cultural norms of England and the English people. Owing to England's influential position within the United Kingdom it can sometimes be difficult to differentiate English culture from the culture of the ...
, lamented the poor state of Latin education: Alfred proposed that students be educated in Old English, and those who excelled should go on to learn Latin. Alfred's cultural program aimed to translate "certain books ..necessary for all men to know" from Latin to Old English. These included: Gregory the Great's ''
Cura Pastoralis Pastoral care is an ancient model of emotional, social and spiritual support that can be found in all cultures and traditions. The term is considered inclusive of distinctly non-religious forms of support, as well as support for people from ...
'', a manual for priests on how to conduct their duties, which became the ''Hierdeboc'' ('Shepherd-book') in Old English;
Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the t ...
' ''
De Consolatione philosophiae ''On the Consolation of Philosophy'' ('' la, De consolatione philosophiae'')'','' often titled as ''The Consolation of Philosophy'' or simply the ''Consolation,'' is a philosophical work by the Roman statesman Boethius. Written in 523 while he ...
'' (the '' Froforboc'' or 'book of consolation'); and the '' Soliloquia'' of Saint
Augustine Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Afr ...
(known in Old English as the ''Blostman'' or 'blooms'). In the process, some original content was interweaved through the translations. Other important Old English translations include:
Orosius Paulus Orosius (; born 375/385 – 420 AD), less often Paul Orosius in English, was a Roman priest, historian and theologian, and a student of Augustine of Hippo. It is possible that he was born in ''Bracara Augusta'' (now Braga, Portugal), t ...
' '' Historiae Adversus Paganos'', a companion piece for St. Augustine's '' The City of God''; the ''Dialogues'' of Gregory the Great; and
Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom ...
's ''
Ecclesiastical History of the English People The ''Ecclesiastical History of the English People'' ( la, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum), written by Bede in about AD 731, is a history of the Christian Churches in England, and of England generally; its main focus is on the conflict b ...
''.
Ælfric of Eynsham Ælfric of Eynsham ( ang, Ælfrīc; la, Alfricus, Elphricus; ) was an English abbot and a student of Æthelwold of Winchester, and a consummate, prolific writer in Old English of hagiography, homilies, biblical commentaries, and other genres ...
, who wrote in the late 10th and early 11th centuries, is believed to have been a pupil of Æthelwold. He was the greatest and most prolific writer of sermons, which were copied and adapted for use well into the 13th century. In the translation of the first six books of the Bible ('' Old English Hexateuch''), portions have been assigned to Ælfric on stylistic grounds. He included some lives of the saints in the ''Catholic Homilies'', as well as a cycle of saints' lives to be used in sermons. Ælfric also wrote an Old English work on time-reckoning, and pastoral letters. In the same category as Ælfric, and a contemporary, was
Wulfstan II Wulfstan (sometimes Wulfstan II or Lupus;Wormald "Wulfstan" ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' died 28 May 1023) was an English Bishop of London, Bishop of Worcester, and Archbishop of York. He is thought to have begun his ecclesiast ...
, archbishop of York. His
sermons A sermon is a religious discourse or oration by a preacher, usually a member of clergy. Sermons address a scriptural, theological, or moral topic, usually expounding on a type of belief, law, or behavior within both past and present contexts ...
were highly stylistic. His best known work is ''
Sermo Lupi ad Anglos The ' ('The Sermon of the Wolf to the English') is the title given to a homily composed in England between 1010-1016 by Wulfstan II, Archbishop of York (died 1023), who commonly styled himself ', or 'wolf' after the first element in his name = ...
'' in which he blames the sins of the English for the Viking invasions. He wrote a number of clerical legal texts: ''Institutes of Polity'' and ''
Canons of Edgar The Canons of Edgar are a set of early eleventh-century ecclesiastical regulations produced in Anglo-Saxon England by Wulfstan, Archbishop of York. According to Fowler, the ''Canons of Edgar'' "was central in Wulfstan's programme of reform; it als ...
''. One of the earliest Old English texts in prose is the '' Martyrology'', information about saints and martyrs according to their anniversaries and feasts in the church calendar. It has survived in six fragments. It is believed to have been written in the 9th century by an anonymous
Mercia la, Merciorum regnum , conventional_long_name=Kingdom of Mercia , common_name=Mercia , status=Kingdom , status_text=Independent kingdom (527–879)Client state of Wessex () , life_span=527–918 , era=Heptarchy , event_start= , date_start= , y ...
n author. The oldest collections of church sermons is the ''
Blickling homilies The Blickling Homilies is the name given to a collection of anonymous homilies from Anglo-Saxon England. They are written in Old English, and were written down at some point before the end of the tenth century, making them one of the oldest colle ...
'', found in a 10th-century manuscript. There are a number of saint's lives prose works: beyond those written by Ælfric are the prose life of Saint Guthlac (Vercelli Book), the life of Saint Margaret and the life of Saint Chad. There are four additional lives in the earliest manuscript of the ''Lives of Saints'', the Julius manuscript: Seven Sleepers of Ephesus, Saint Mary of Egypt, Saint Eustace and Saint Euphrosyne. There are six major manuscripts of the
Wessex Gospels __NOTOC__ The ''Wessex Gospels'' (also known as the ''West-Saxon Gospels'') refer to a translation of the four gospels of the Christian Bible into a West Saxon dialect of Old English. Produced from approximately AD 990 to 1175 in present-day En ...
, dating from the 11th and 12th centuries. The most popular, ''
Old English Gospel of Nicodemus The ''Old English Gospel of Nicodemus'' is an Old English prose translation of the Latin ''Gospel of Nicodemus''. The ''Old English Gospel of Nicodemus'' is preserved in two manuscripts (the Cambridge University manuscript and the Cotton Vitelli ...
'', is treated in one manuscript as though it were a 5th gospel; other apocryphal gospels in translation include the ''
Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew The Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew (or The Infancy Gospel of Matthew) is a part of the New Testament apocrypha. In antiquity the text was called The Book About the Origin of the Blessed Mary and the Childhood of the Savior. Pseudo-Matthew is one of a ...
'', ''Vindicta salvatoris'', ''
Vision of Saint Paul The Apocalypse of Paul (''Apocalypsis Pauli'', more commonly known in the Latin tradition as the or ) is a fourth-century non-canonical apocalypse and part of the New Testament apocrypha. The full original Greek version of the ''Apocalypse'' is ...
'' and the '' Apocalypse of Thomas''.


Secular prose

The ''
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle The ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' is a collection of annals in Old English, chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the ''Chronicle'' was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of A ...
'' was probably started in the time of King Alfred the Great and continued for over 300 years as a historical record of Anglo-Saxon history. A single example of a Classical romance has survived: a fragment of the story of ''
Apollonius of Tyre Apollonius of Tyre is the subject of an ancient short novella, popular in the Middle Ages. Existing in numerous forms in many languages, the text is thought to be translated from an ancient Greek manuscript, now lost. Plot summary In most versi ...
'' was translated in the 11th century from the '' Gesta Romanorum''. A monk who was writing in Old English at the same time as Ælfric and Wulfstan was Byrhtferth of Ramsey, whose book '' Handboc'' was a study of mathematics and rhetoric. He also produced a work entitled ''
Computus As a moveable feast, the date of Easter is determined in each year through a calculation known as (). Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon, which is the first full moon on or after 21 March (a fixed approx ...
'', which outlined the practical application of arithmetic to the calculation of calendar days and
movable feasts A moveable feast is an observance in a Christian liturgical calendar which occurs on different dates in different years.John Ayto ''Oxford Dictionary of English Idioms'' 2010 p123 019954378X "a movable feast an event which takes place at no reg ...
, as well as tide tables. Ælfric wrote two proto-scientific works, '' Hexameron'' and ''
Interrogationes Sigewulfi ''Quaestiones in Genesim'' is a commentary on the biblical Book of Genesis by the Anglo-Saxon scholar Alcuin, addressed to his protege Sigewulf, comprising 281 questions and corresponding answers about Genesis. It has been dated by Michael Fox to a ...
'', dealing with the stories of Creation. He also wrote a grammar and glossary of Latin in Old English, later used by students interested in learning
Old French Old French (, , ; Modern French: ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France from approximately the 8th to the 14th centuries. Rather than a unified language, Old French was a linkage of Romance dialects, mutually intel ...
, as inferred from glosses in that language. In the Nowell Codex is the text of '' The Wonders of the East'' which includes a remarkable map of the world, and other illustrations. Also contained in Nowell is '' Alexander's Letter to Aristotle''. Because this is the same manuscript that contains ''Beowulf'', some scholars speculate it may have been a collection of materials on exotic places and creatures. There are a number of interesting medical works. There is a translation of ''
Apuleius's Herbarium 210px, Manuscript Kassel; 9th century, Mandragora Pseudo-Apuleius is the name given in modern scholarship to the author of a 4th-century herbal known as ''Pseudo-Apuleius Herbarius'' or ''Herbarium Apuleii Platonici''. The author of the text appare ...
'' with striking illustrations, found together with ''Medicina de Quadrupedibus''. A second collection of texts is '' Bald's Leechbook'', a 10th-century book containing herbal and even some surgical cures. A third collection, known as the '' Lacnunga'', includes many charms and incantations. Legal texts are a large and important part of the overall Old English corpus. The Laws of Aethelberht I of Kent, written at the turn of the 7th century, are the earliest surviving English prose work. Other laws wills and charters were written over the following centuries. Towards the end of the 9th, Alfred had compiled the law codes of Aethelberht, Ine, and
Offa Offa (died 29 July 796 AD) was King of Mercia, a kingdom of Anglo-Saxon England, from 757 until his death. The son of Thingfrith and a descendant of Eowa, Offa came to the throne after a period of civil war following the assassination of Æth ...
in a text setting out his own laws, the '' Domboc''. By the 12th century they had been arranged into two large collections (see '' Textus Roffensis''). They include laws of the kings, beginning with those of Aethelbert of Kent and ending with those of
Cnut Cnut (; ang, Cnut cyning; non, Knútr inn ríki ; or , no, Knut den mektige, sv, Knut den Store. died 12 November 1035), also known as Cnut the Great and Canute, was King of England from 1016, King of Denmark from 1018, and King of Norway ...
, and texts dealing with specific cases and places in the country. An interesting example is '' Gerefa'', which outlines the duties of a reeve on a large manor estate. There is also a large volume of legal documents related to religious houses. These include many kinds of texts: records of donations by nobles; wills; documents of emancipation; lists of books and relics; court cases; guild rules. All of these texts provide valuable insights into the social history of Anglo-Saxon times, but are also of literary value. For example, some of the court case narratives are interesting for their use of rhetoric.


Writing on objects

James Paz proposes reading objects which feature Old English poems or phrases as part of the literary output of the time, and as "speaking objects". These objects include the
Ruthwell Ruthwell is a village and parish on the Solway Firth between Dumfries and Annan in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, gave Ruthwell to his nephew, Sir William Murray, confirmed to Sir John Murray, of Cockpool, in ...
monument (which includes a poem similar to the
Dream of the Rood ''The'' ''Dream of the Rood'' is one of the Christian poems in the corpus of Old English literature and an example of the genre of dream poetry. Like most Old English poetry, it is written in alliterative verse. ''Rood'' is from the Old Englis ...
preserved in the Vercelli Book), the Frank's Casket, the
Alfred Jewel The Alfred Jewel is a piece of Anglo-Saxon goldsmithing work made of enamel and quartz enclosed in gold. It was discovered in 1693, in North Petherton, Somerset, England and is now one of the most popular exhibits at the Ashmolean Museum in Ox ...
.


Semi-Saxon and post-conquest Old English

''The Soul's Address to the Body'' (c. 1150–1175) found in Worcester Cathedral Library MS F. 174 contains only one word of possible Latinate origin, while also maintaining a corrupt alliterative meter and Old English grammar and syntax, albeit in a degenerative state (hence, early scholars of Old English termed this late form as "Semi-Saxon"). The '' Peterborough Chronicle'' can also be considered a late-period text, continuing into the 12th century.


Reception and scholarship


Later medieval glossing and translation

Old English literature did not disappear in 1066 with the Norman Conquest. Many sermons and works continued to be read and used in part or whole up through the 14th century, and were further catalogued and organised. What might be termed the earliest scholarship on Old English literature was done by a 12th or early 13th-century scribe from Worcester known only as The Tremulous Hand – a
sobriquet A sobriquet ( ), or soubriquet, is a nickname, sometimes assumed, but often given by another, that is descriptive. A sobriquet is distinct from a pseudonym, as it is typically a familiar name used in place of a real name, without the need of expla ...
earned for a hand tremor causing characteristically messy handwriting. The Tremulous Hand is known for many Latin glosses of Old English texts, which represent the earliest attempt to translate the language in the post-Norman period. Perhaps his most well known scribal work is that of the Worcester Cathedral Library MS F. 174, which contains part of Ælfric's ''Grammar'' and ''Glossary'' and a short fragmentary poem often called ''St. Bede's Lament'', in addition to the Body and Soul poem.


Antiquarianism and early scholarship

During the
Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
, when monastic libraries were dispersed, the manuscripts began to be collected by
antiquarian An antiquarian or antiquary () is an fan (person), aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artifact (archaeology), artifac ...
s and scholars. Some of the earliest collectors and scholars included Laurence Nowell,
Matthew Parker Matthew Parker (6 August 1504 – 17 May 1575) was an English bishop. He was the Archbishop of Canterbury in the Church of England from 1559 until his death in 1575. He was also an influential theologian and arguably the co-founder (with a ...
, Robert Bruce Cotton and Humfrey Wanley. Old English dictionaries and references were created from the 17th century. The first was William Somner's ''Dictionarium Saxonico-Latino-Anglicum'' (1659). Lexicographer
Joseph Bosworth Joseph Bosworth (1788 – 27 May 1876) was an English scholar of the Anglo-Saxon language and compiler of the first major Anglo-Saxon dictionary. Biography Born in Derbyshire in 1788, Bosworth was educated at Repton School as a 'Poor Scholar ...
began a dictionary in the 19th century called ''
An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary ''An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary'' is a dictionary of Old English, a language that is also known as Anglo-Saxon. Four editions of the dictionary were published. It has often (especially in earlier times) been considered the definitive lexicon for ...
'', which was completed by Thomas Northcote Toller in 1898 and updated by Alistair Campbell in 1972.


19th, 20th, and 21st century scholarship

In the 19th and early 20th centuries the focus was on the Germanic and pagan roots that scholars thought they could detect in Old English literature. Because Old English was one of the first vernacular languages to be written down, 19th-century scholars searching for the roots of European "national culture" (see
Romantic Nationalism Romantic nationalism (also national romanticism, organic nationalism, identity nationalism) is the form of nationalism in which the state claims its political legitimacy as an organic consequence of the unity of those it governs. This includes ...
) took special interest in studying what was then commonly referred to as 'Anglo-Saxon literature', and Old English became a regular part of university curriculum. After World War II there was increasing interest in the manuscripts themselves, developing new palaeographic approaches from antiquarian approaches.
Neil Ker Neil Ripley Ker (; 1908–1982) was a scholar of Anglo-Saxon literature. He was Reader in Palaeography at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford until he retired in 1968. He is known especially for his ''Catalogue of Ma ...
, a paleographer, published the groundbreaking ''Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon'' in 1957, and by 1980 nearly all Anglo-Saxon manuscript texts were available as facsimiles or editions. On account of the work of Bernard F. Huppé, attention to the influence of Augustinian
exegesis Exegesis ( ; from the Greek , from , "to lead out") is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text. The term is traditionally applied to the interpretation of Biblical works. In modern usage, exegesis can involve critical interpretation ...
increased in scholarship. J.R.R. Tolkien is often credited with creating a movement to look at Old English as a subject of
literary theory Literary theory is the systematic study of the nature of literature and of the methods for literary analysis. Culler 1997, p.1 Since the 19th century, literary scholarship includes literary theory and considerations of intellectual history, mor ...
in his seminal lecture " Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics" (1936). Since the 1970s, along with a focus upon
paleography Palaeography ( UK) or paleography ( US; ultimately from grc-gre, , ''palaiós'', "old", and , ''gráphein'', "to write") is the study of historic writing systems and the deciphering and dating of historical manuscripts, including the analysi ...
and the physical manuscripts themselves more generally, scholars continue to debate such issues as dating, place of origin, authorship, connections between Old English literary culture and global medieval literatures, and the valences of Old English poetry that may be revealed by contemporary theory: for instance, feminist, queer, critical race, and eco-critical theories.


Influence on modern English literature


Prose

Tolkien adapted the subject matter and terminology of heroic poetry for works like '' The Hobbit'' and ''
The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's bo ...
'', and John Gardner wrote ''
Grendel Grendel is a character in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem '' Beowulf'' (700–1000). He is one of the poem's three antagonists (along with his mother and the dragon), all aligned in opposition against the protagonist Beowulf. Grendel is feared by ...
'', which tells the story of Beowulf's opponent from his own perspective.


Poetry

Old English literature has had some influence on modern literature, and notable poets have translated and incorporated Old English poetry. Well-known early translations include
Alfred, Lord Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his ...
's translation of ''The Battle of Brunanburh'',
William Morris William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He w ...
's translation of ''Beowulf'', and
Ezra Pound Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an expatriate American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a Fascism, fascist collaborator in Italy during World War II. His works ...
's translation of ''The Seafarer''. The influence of the poetry can be seen in modern poets T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound and W. H. Auden. More recently other notable poets such as
Paul Muldoon Paul Muldoon (born 20 June 1951) is an Irish poet. He has published more than thirty collections and won a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the T. S. Eliot Prize. At Princeton University he is currently both the Howard G. B. Clark '21 University P ...
,
Seamus Heaney Seamus Justin Heaney (; 13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature.
, Denise Levertov and
U. A. Fanthorpe Ursula Askham Fanthorpe, CBE, FRSL (22 July 1929 – 28 April 2009) was an English poet, who published as U. A. Fanthorpe. Her poetry comments mainly on social issues. Life and work Born in south-east London, Fanthorpe was the daughter of a jud ...
have all shown an interest in Old English poetry. In 1987 Denise Levertov published a translation of Cædmon's Hymn under her title "Caedmon" in the collection ''Breathing the Water''. This was followed by Seamus Heaney's version of the poem "Whitby-sur-Moyola" in his ''The Spirit Level'' (1996), Paul Muldoon's "Caedmona's Hymn" in his ''Moy Sand and Gravel'' (2002) and U. A. Fanthorpe's "Caedmon's Song" in her ''Queuing for the Sun'' (2003). In 2000, Seamus Heaney published his translation of ''Beowulf''. Heaney uses Irish diction across ''Beowulf'' to bring what he calls a "special body and force" to the poem, putting forward his own Ulster heritage, "in order to render
he poem He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...
ever more 'willable forward/again and again and again.'"


Editions

The entire corpus of Old English poetry is being edited and annotated to available digital images of manuscript pages and objects, with Modern English translations, in the
Old English Poetry in Facsimile Project
'.


See also

*
Anglo-Saxon architecture Anglo-Saxon architecture was a period in the history of architecture in England from the mid-5th century until the Norman Conquest of 1066. Anglo-Saxon secular buildings in Britain were generally simple, constructed mainly using timber with tha ...
*
Anglo-Saxon art Anglo-Saxon art covers art produced within the Anglo-Saxon period of English history, beginning with the Migration period style that the Anglo-Saxons brought with them from the continent in the 5th century, and ending in 1066 with the Norman ...
* Hebban olla vogala * History of the Anglo-Saxons *
List of illuminated Anglo-Saxon manuscripts This is a listing of illuminated manuscripts produced between 900 and 1066 in Anglo-Saxon monasteries, or by Anglo-Saxon scribes or illuminators working in continental scriptoria. This list includes manuscripts in Latin and Anglo-Saxon. For manus ...
* List of national poetries *
List of poems This is a list of poems – individual notable poems (not poetry collections or anthologies), of any length, often published in book form if long enough, or, if a short poem, as a tract or broadside. 0–9 * "1914" – Wilfred Owen A * ...


Notes


References

* . * * . * * . * . * . * . * . * * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * .


Further reading

* . * . * . * . * . * . * . * . * .


External links


''An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary''



Contemporary Poets read new translations of Anglo-Saxon poems

The Anglo-Saxon Bible
Files in HTML and PDF formats of translations of the Bible (Old and New Testaments) into Anglo-Saxon

An online supplement to the Norton Anthology of English Literature with recordings of Old English Poetry
Old English Poetry in Facsimile Project
The entire corpus of Old English poetry is being edited and annotated to available digital images of manuscript pages and objects, with Modern English translations {{Authority control History of literature in the United Kingdom
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...