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Old English composite homilies from Winchester

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

M. R. Godden
M. R. Godden
Affiliation:
The University of Liverpool
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Extract

Many of the homilies preserved in manuscripts of Old English are composite; that is, they are made up largely of passages drawn with little change from other Old English writings (usually homilies) and not freshly composed or translated from Latin. Most of them exist in only one copy, compared with the several surviving copies of most original homilies, and they were probably not given wide circulation. But such homilies can tell us a great deal about the homiletic tradition in England: about attitudes towards homiletic form and content; about the interests of those who read and plundered the homilies of Æfric and Wulfstan; and about the availability of particular texts in particular areas, and the form in which they were known.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anglo-Saxon England , Volume 4 , December 1975 , pp. 57 - 65
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975

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References

page 57 note 1 Ker, N. R., Calalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford, 1975)Google Scholar, passim and Jost, K., Wulfstansludien (Bern, 1950).Google Scholar

page 57 note 2 ‘“Wulfstaa” Homilies XXIX, XXX and some Related Texts’, Anglia 81, (1963), 347–64.

page 57 note 3 ‘Three Versions of the Jonah Story: an Investigation of Narrative Technique in Old English Homilies’, ASE 1 (1972), 183–92.

page 58 note 1 Catalogue, pp. 31–5.

page 58 note 2 English Caroline Minuscule (Oxford, 1971), p. xv, n. 2.Google Scholar

page 58 note 3 The character of the collection is well described by Pope, John C. (Homilies of Ælfric: a Supplementary Collection, Early Eng. Text Soc. 259 and 260 (London, 1967–1968), 39–42).Google Scholar

page 58 note 4 They have not so far been published in their entirety, but the second of them is included in the forthcoming collection of hitherto unpublished Rogationtide homilies by my colleagues J. E. Cross and Joyce Bazire. I am grateful to both of them for their comments on this article, and to Professor Clemoes for his generous help.

page 58 note 5 The extract corresponds to lines 139–454 of Pope's text. This use of the Ælfric homily in Ii. 4. 6 was noted of course by Professor Pope, who collates this manuscript, and also by Raynes, Enid M. in her unpublished Oxford University D.Phil. thesis (1954).Google Scholar

page 58 note 6 The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church: the First Part Containing the Sermones Catholici or Homilies of Ælfric, ed. Benjamin, Thorpe, 2 vols. (London, 1844–1846) 11, 314, lines 1–8Google Scholar. The correspondence was pointed out by Ker (Catalogue, p. 32).

page 59 note 1 An Old English Martyrology, ed. Herzfeld, G., EETS os. 116 (London, 1900), 72, lines 21–4.Google Scholar

page 59 note 2 Migne, Patrologia Latina 101, col. 621.

page 59 note 3 Wulfstan: Sammlung der ihm zugeschriebenen Homilien, ed. Napier, A. S. (Berlin, 1883), pp. 143–52Google Scholar. (I refer to items in this collection as, e.g., Napier XXX.) The extract in Ii. 4. 6 corresponds to Napier XXX, pp. 149, line 14 – 152, line 6 (with omissions).

page 59 note 4 For the sources of Napier xxx, see Jost, , Wulfstanstudien, pp. 208–10.Google Scholar

page 60 note 1 Homilies of Wulstan, ed. Bethurum, D. (Oxford, 1957), no. XIII, lines 53–5.Google Scholar

page 60 note 2 See Napier XXX, p. 150, lines 24–5; Napier XXIV, p. 121, line 6; and Ii. 4. 6, 229VII.

page 60 note 3 Wulfstanstudien, p. 263.

page 61 note 1 Ælfric's Lives of Saints, ed. Skeat, W. W., EETS o.s. 76, 82, 94 and 114 (London, 1888–1901; repr. in 2 vols., 1966)Google Scholar. Ii. 4. 6, 233r8–19 = Skeat XII, lines 122–7 and 133–7.

page 61 note 2 Ii. 4. 6, 233vi–236ri6 = Catholic Homilies, ed. Thorpe, 1, 52, line 27–56, line 22Google Scholar. This parallel was noted by Ker.

page 61 note 3 Catholic Homilies 1, 528, lines 28–31.

page 61 note 4 Ii. 4. 6, 236r16–236VI2 = Skeat XII, lines 145–8, 152–3 and 268–72. Partly identified by Ker.

page 61 note 5 Ii. 4. 6, 236vi2–17 = Skeat XIII, lines 116–19.

page 61 note 6 Ii. 4. 6, 236v20–237r16 = Catholic Homilies, ed. Thorpe, 11, 324Google Scholar, lines 27–9, and 326, lines 9–16.

page 62 note 1 Ii. 4. 6, 237v15–238r13 = Catholic Homilies, ed. Thorpe, 11, 574, lines 6–27.Google Scholar

page 62 note 2 At 215v19, 227v11–12, 227v19 and 228r16.

page 62 note 3 See above, p. 59.

page 63 note 1 Alternatively, of course, the scribe himself may have been the compiler, perhaps changing his mind after he started copying, perhaps simply missing his own earlier directions while he copied.

page 63 note 2 See Bishop, , English Caroline Minascule, p. xv, n. 2.Google Scholar

page 63 note 3 See Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 391–9.Google Scholar

page 63 note 4 Whitbread, ‘“Wulfstan” Homilies’, p. 362.

page 63 note 5 See now Scragg, D. G., ‘The Compilation of the Vercelli Book’, ASE 2 (1973), 189–208.Google Scholar

page 64 note 1 See Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 224–9.Google Scholar

page 64 note 2 See above, pp. 61 and 62.

page 64 note 3 See Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 344–5.Google Scholar

page 65 note 1 See above, p. 57 and n. 3.

page 65 note 2 For the place of origin of the manuscripts, see Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 184 and 344–5.Google Scholar