A Companion To Aelfric

This collection provides a new, authoritative and challenging study of the life and works of Ællfric of Eynsham, the most important vernacular religious writer in the history of Anglo-Saxon England.

The Displacement of the Body in Ælfric's Virgin Martyr Lives addresses 10th-century Old English hagiographical translations, from Latin source material, by the abbot and grammarian Ælfric. The vitae of Agnes, Agatha, Lucy, and Eugenia, and the married saints Daria, Basilissa, and Cecilia, included in Ælfric's s Old English Lives of Saints, recount the lives, persecution, and martyrdom of young women who renounce sex and, in the first four stories, marriage, to devote their lives to Christian service. They purport to be about the primacy of virginity and the role of the body in attaining sanctity. However, a comparison of the Latin sources with Ælfric's versions suggests that his translation style, characterized by simplifying the most important meanings of the text, omits certain words or entire episodes that foreground suppressed female sexuality as key to sainthood. The Old English Lives de-emphasize the physical nature of faith and highlight the importance of spiritual purity. In this volume, Alison Gulley explores how the context of the Benedictine Reform in late Anglo-Saxon England and Ælfric's commitment to writing for a lay audience resulted in a set of stories depicting a spirituality distinct from physical intactness.

This Companion has been thoroughly revised to take account of recent scholarship and to provide a clear and accessible introduction for those encountering Old English literature for the first time. Including seventeen essays by distinguished scholars, this new edition provides a discussion of the literature of the period 600 to 1066 in the context of how Anglo-Saxon society functioned. New chapters cover topics including preaching and teaching, Beowulf and literacy, and a further five chapters have been revised and updated, including those on the Old English language, perceptions of eternity and Anglo-Saxon learning. An additional concluding chapter on Old English after 1066 offers an overview of the study and cultural influences of Old English literature to the present day. Finally, the further reading list has been overhauled to incorporate the most up-to-date scholarship in the field and the latest electronic resources for students.

Translating Europe in ?lfric's 'Lives of Saints' is the first study of the representation of European peoples, places, and geographies in the Lives of Saints, one of early medieval England's most famed works. It examines the Lives of Saints as a unified collection whose various items work cumulatively and concurrently to provide audiences with teachings far beyond the scope of an individual homily or saints' life. In doing so, it demonstrates that ?lfric's European characters and settings served not merely as a convenient skeleton on which to frame his hagiographical narratives, but rather lay at the heart of his didactic praxis and pedagogic aims. Luisa Ostacchini systematically compares each of the 30 plus items that comprise ?lfric's Lives of Saints to their Latin sources and to one another to highlight previously unnoticed patterns and formulae within collection. In so doing, she demonstrates that ?lfric's interest in community was both inward and outward looking: he sought on the one hand to situate England within the wider Christian world, and on the other hand to promote the internal unity of the English kingdom and the reformed monastic establishment. This book sheds new light on the ways that ?lfric wrote about the Christian world and England's place within it, and further illuminates of the didactic praxis and ideology of one of the most influential and significant authors of the early medieval period. Luisa Ostacchini is a college lecturer at St John's College, Oxford, where she teaches Old and Middle English literature.

Volume 37— Literary Appropriations—examines medieval literature in a different light. This volume features six original articles, focusing on the art of appropriation, as well as fourteen reviews of recent scholarly publications. The first article “The Oldest Manuscript Witness of the First Life of Blessed Francis of Assisi” by Jacques Dalarun reveals the oldest known source of the writings of Francis of Assisi, until of late only found in an Italian church publication. Lisa Bansen-Harp’s essay “Ironic Patterning and Numerical Composition in the Vie de saint Alexis: Form and Effect/Affect” takes an ironic look at the oppositions used throughout the work to offer a rich analysis of patterns. Reexamining genealogy as spiritual rather than biological is Nicole Leapley’s essay “Rewriting Paternity: The Meaning of Renovating Westminster in La Esoire de seint Aedward le rei.” David Lummus’s essay “Boccaccio’s Three Venuses: On the Convergence of Celestial and Transgressive Love in the Genealogie Deorum Gentilium Libri” provides a comparative look of how love—celestial and transgressive—can be seen in the Decameron. “Dante’s Justinian, Cino’s Corpus: The Hermeneutics of Poetry and Law” by Lorenzo Valterza compares and contrasts Dante’s own view of law versus that of his friend Cino da Pistoia. Lastly, editor Paul Clogan contributes his own article “Dante’s Appropriation of Lucan’s Cato and Erichtho” to demonstrate the importance of Lucan’s characters in Dante’s own work Along with these articles, fourteen reviews, from the United States and all over the world, are included, truly making Medievalia et Humanistica an international publication. To reflect the submissions and audience for Medievalia et Humanistica, the editorial and review boards include ten members from the United States and ten international members, making thisa truly international publication. For submission guidelines, please contact Jin Yu at [email protected]. Please submit books for review consideration to: Attention: Reinhold F. Glei Medievalia et Humanistica Ruhr-University Bochum Seminar fuer Klassische Philologie D-44780 Bochum, Germany

Since its founding in 1943, Medievalia et Humanistica has won worldwide recognition as the first scholarly publication in America to devote itself entirely to medieval and Renaissance studies. Since 1970, a new series, sponsored by the Modern Language Association of America and edited by an international board of distinguished scholars and critics, has published interdisciplinary articles. In yearly hardcover volumes, the new series publishes significant scholarship, criticism, and reviews treating all facets of medieval and Renaissance culture: history, art, literature, music, science, law, economics, and philosophy.

In Compelling God, Stephanie Clark examines the relationship between prayer, gift giving, the self, and community in Anglo-Saxon England.

The articles in this volume focus upon Boethius's extant works: his De arithmetica and a fragmentary De musica, his translations and commentaries on logic, his five theological texts, and, of course, his Consolation of Philosophy. They examine the effects that Boethian thought has exercised upon the learning of later generations of scholars.

Old English literature thrived in late tenth-century England. Its success was the result of a concerted effort by the leaders of the Benedictine Reform movement to encourage both widespread literacy and a simple literary style. The manuscripts written in this era are the source for the majority of the Old English literature that survives today, including literary classics such as Beowulf. Yet the same monks who copied and compiled these important Old English texts themselves wrote in a rarified Latin, full of esoteric vocabulary and convoluted syntax and almost incomprehensible even to the well-educated. Comparing works by the two most prolific authors of the era, Byrhtferth of Ramsey and Ælfric of Eynsham, Rebecca Stephenson explains the politics that encouraged the simultaneous development of a simple English style and an esoteric Latin style. By examining developments in Old English and Anglo-Latin side by side, The Politics of Language opens up a valuable new perspective on the Benedictine Reform and literacy in the late Anglo-Saxon period.

A Companion to British Literature, Medieval Literature, 700 - 1450