The scribe of the Paris Psalter

1999 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 179-183
Author(s):  
Richard Emms
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Latin Text ◽  
English Prose ◽  
The Right ◽  
King Alfred

The Paris Psalter (Bibliothèque Nationale de France, lat. 8824) has attracted much interest because of its long, thin format, its illustrations in the Utrecht Psalter tradition and its Old English prose translation of the first fifty psalms, which has been convincingly attributed to King Alfred himself. It is a bilingual psalter, with Latin (Roman version) on the left and Old English on the right. The first fifty psalms are in the prose translation connected with King Alfred, the remainder in a metrical version made by an author whose work has not been identified elsewhere. The leaves are approximately 526 × 186 mm, with a writing space of about 420 × 95 mm. It has been estimated that there were originally 200 leaves in twenty-five quires, but fourteen leaves, including those carrying all the major decoration, have been removed. There remain thirteen outline drawings integrated into the text on the first six folios. Some drawings may have functioned as ‘fillers’ where the Latin text was shorter than the Old English. Further on in the manuscript, in order to solve this problem, the scribe either left gaps or made the columns of Latin thinner than the corresponding Old English ones. The Old English introductions were set out across both columns, suggesting that the book was made for someone who read English more easily than Latin. The manuscript was written around the middle of the eleventh century, and it is clearly the work of a single skilled scribe who used a neat Anglo-Caroline minuscule for the Latin texts, and matching English vernacular minuscule with many Caroline letter forms for the Old English. Unfortunately, his hand has not been identified in any other books or charters; however, he did record in a colophon (186r; see pl.V) that he was called Wulfwinus cognomento Cada.

scholarly journals Fragments of Boethius: the reconstruction of the Cotton manuscript of the Alfredian text

2005 ◽  
Vol 34 ◽  
pp. 169-181 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan Irvine
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
The Other ◽  
Sixth Century ◽  
The Waste Land ◽  
Waste Land ◽  
English Prose ◽  
King Alfred

‘These fragments I have shored against my ruins’: T. S. Eliot's metaphor in The Waste Land evokes the evanescent frailty of human existence and worldly endeavour with a poignancy that the Anglo-Saxons would surely have appreciated. Such a concept lies at the heart of Boethius's De consolatione Philosophiae, and perhaps prompted King Alfred to include this work amongst those which he considered most necessary for all men to know. Written in the early sixth century, Boethius's work was translated from Latin into Old English at the end of the ninth century, possibly by Alfred himself. It survives in two versions, one in prose (probably composed first) and the other in prose and verse, containing versifications of Boethius's Latin metres which had originally been rendered as Old English prose. It is the latter of these versions which will be the focus of my discussion here. Damaged beyond repair by fire and water, the set of fragments which contains this copy will be seen to epitomize the ideas imparted by the work in ways that Alfred could never have envisaged.

Unfulfilled promise: the rubrics of the Old English prose Genesis

1999 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 111-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin C. Withers
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Formulaic Language ◽  
English Prose ◽  
The People ◽  
Sacred History

The Old English prose Genesis contains a series of innovative rubrics, unparalleled in the Vulgate tradition, which divide the story of Genesis into a series of holy biographies of the patriarchs Noah, Abraham and Joseph. These rubrics, added to the text in the eleventh century, use formulaic language derived from contemporary documents such as Anglo-Saxon wills and thereby regulate how Genesis was to be read and interpreted by an aristocratic layman or novice monk. The rubrics blend ancient Hebrew narratives, stories of the saints and the legal conventions familiar to the reader in order to portray ‘sacred history’ as an unbroken, legally sanctioned inheritance. They emphasize the Covenant of God with Abraham and the people of Israel and assure the contemporary reader that he too will inherit an unfulfilled promise manifested in God's covenant with the patriarchs.

The Taunton Fragment: a new text from Anglo-Saxon England

2004 ◽  
Vol 33 ◽  
pp. 145-193 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mechthild Gretsch
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Somerset County ◽  
English Prose ◽  
Linguistic Evidence ◽  
English Translations ◽  
First Time

The Taunton Fragment (now Taunton, Somerset, Somerset County Record Office, DD/SAS C/1193/77) consists of four leaves containing portions of brief expositions or homilies on the pericopes for four successive Sundays after Pentecost. In the Fragment, brief passages in Latin regularly alternate with the Old English translations of these passages. The manuscript to which the four leaves once belonged was written probably at some point around or after the middle of the eleventh century in an unknown (presumably minor) centre in Anglo-Saxon England. Until recently, the existence of the Taunton leaves had escaped the notice of Anglo-Saxonists; the texts which they contain are printed here for the first time. It will be obvious that eight pages, half of which are in Old English prose, add in no negligible way to the corpus of Old English. Through analysis of the texts in the second part of this article, I hope to show that their contribution to our knowledge of various kinds of literary activity in Anglo-Saxon England is significant indeed, and that the linguistic evidence they present has no parallel elsewhere in the corpus of Old English.

scholarly journals Word order and poetic style: auxiliary and verbal inThe Metres of Boethius

1986 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 167-196 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Donoghue
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Word Order ◽  
English Prose ◽  
English Verse ◽  
Consolation Of Philosophy ◽  
The Many ◽  
King Alfred ◽  
Complex Subject ◽  
Poetic Style ◽  
The Way

The Metres of Boethiusoffer a unique opportunity to study the complex subject of Old English verse syntax. They enjoy this distinction because of the unusual way in which they were composed. The versifier did not work directly from the original Latinmetraof Boethius'sConsolation of Philosophybut from an Old English prose intermediary, freely translated from the Latin originals. King Alfred was the author of the prose translation and was probably also responsible for turning the parts of the prose corresponding to the Latinmetrainto Old English verse. Since a copy of the prose model survives, it affords us an opportunity to compare the two versions in order to judge the versifier's debt to the prose. He apparently followed it quite faithfully and without referring back to the Latin originals. In many verse passages one can find words and half-lines which are direct transcriptions from the prose. Consequently the Old EnglishMetresare generally considered nothing more than prose expanded into verse, adding only ‘poetic’ embellishments (like repetition and variation) and obvious morals drawn from the passage. The fruit of the versifier's labours may be uninspired poetry, but the way that he rearranged the words of the prose offers a rare glimpse into the more elusive conventions of verse-making. Since the many similarities make the differences quite pronounced, the poetical shortcomings of theMetresmay be a blessing. A mediocre versifier is more likely to compose mechanically and to imitate established patterns than a good poet, whose virtuosity often conceals the rudiments of his craft.

The Old English Life of St Neot and the legends of King Alfred

2010 ◽  
Vol 39 ◽  
pp. 193-225
Author(s):  
Malcolm Godden
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Derivative Work ◽  
King Alfred

AbstractThe Old English Life of St Neot has been generally dated to the twelfth century and dismissed as a late and derivative work. The article argues that it was written much earlier, in the first few decades of the eleventh century, and is both a significant example of late Old English hagiographic literature and an important witness to early legends about King Alfred and his posthumous reputation.

The Latin and the Old English Versions of St Augustine’s Prayer in his Soliloquia: A Study and a Rhetorical Synopsis

2019 ◽  
Vol 137 (4) ◽  
pp. 561-611
Author(s):  
Hans Sauer
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Old English ◽  
English Translation ◽  
Textual Criticism ◽  
Special Kind ◽  
British Library ◽  
Latin Text ◽  
Short Text ◽  
Entire Text ◽  
King Alfred

Abstract A special kind of a short text that is embedded in a larger text is the prayer near the beginning of St Augustine’s Soliloquia, which serves as a kind of introduction to the ensuing dialogue. The relatively independent nature of this prayer was recognized early on, and in addition to its transmission in the manuscripts of the Soliloquia it has also been transmitted as an independent prayer. Something similar happened to the Old English translation. There is a full translation of the entire text, traditionally ascribed to King Alfred (and his learned helpers), but preserved only in a much later manuscript (London, British Library, Cotton Vitellius A.xv); however, a shortened version of the prayer was included in a collection of brief penitential texts in an earlier manuscript (London, British Library, Cotton Tiberius A.iii). In the present article I look at the structure of the Latin prayer and at its Old English translation, especially the relation of the two manuscript versions and their value for textual criticism and the reconstruction of the original version, their relation to the Latin source, and the rhetoric of the Latin prayer and its Old English translation, including a brief discussion of the binomials used. The Appendix provides a synoptic version of the Latin text and the two manuscript versions of the Old English translation, highlighting their rhetorical structure, something that to my knowledge has never been done for the Old English translation.

scholarly journals The northern world of the Anglo-Saxon mappa mundi

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
pp. 275-305
Author(s):  
Helen Appleton
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Tenth Century ◽  
Urban Spaces ◽  
British Library ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
The Mediterranean

AbstractThe Anglo-Saxon mappa mundi, sometimes known as the Cotton map or Cottoniana, is found on folio 56v of London, British Library, Cotton Tiberius B. v, which dates from the first half of the eleventh century. This unique survivor from the period presents a detailed image of the inhabited world, centred on the Mediterranean. The map’s distinctive cartography, with its emphasis on islands, seas and urban spaces, reflects an Insular, West Saxon geographic imagination. As Evelyn Edson has observed, the mappa mundi appears to be copy of an earlier, larger map. This article argues that the mappa mundi’s focus on urban space, translatio imperii and Scandinavia is reminiscent of the Old English Orosius, and that it originates from a similar milieu. The mappa mundi’s northern perspective, together with its obvious dependence on and emulation of Carolingian cartography, suggest that its lost exemplar originated in the assertive England of the earlier tenth century.

Women Saints' Lives in Old English Prose (review)

Parergon ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 177-179
Author(s):  
Antonina Harbus
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Women Saints ◽  
English Prose

Tamar, Widowhood, and the Old English Prose Translation of Genesis

2020 ◽  
Vol 138 (4) ◽  
pp. 586-617
Author(s):  
A. Joseph McMullen ◽  
Chelsea Shields-Más
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Turn Of The Millennium ◽  
Biblical Narrative ◽  
English Prose ◽  
Early English

AbstractRecently, more attention has been paid to the conscious translation efforts that produced the Old English Hexateuch/Heptateuch, examining how a number of revisions must be analyzed as an effort to control readerly interpretation. This study contributes to that discussion by considering the translation of Genesis 38, which greatly changes the biblical narrative by removing Tamar’s second marriage and any rationale for the death of her first husband. Previously, this omission has been read as a way to streamline the story or avoid unsavory (sexual) topics. We argue, instead, for another, concurrent possibility: to revise the text in light of pre-Conquest views on widowhood. The turn of the millennium saw early English widows gain much more attention in various legal and ecclesiastical sources. These sources, we believe, speak to the concerns of the translator in some of the alterations found in the chapter (including forced remarriage, multiple marriages, the amount of time in between marriages, and the Levirate custom as an institution).

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