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Did Cynewulf use a martyrology? Reconsidering the sources of The Fates of the Apostles

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

John M. McCulloh
John M. McCulloh
Affiliation:
Kansas State University
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Extract

In The Fates of the Apostles Cynewulf shows only limited interest in the details of his heroes' lives and passions. He devotes more of his poem to meditation on the meaning of those events than to the actions themselves. Even so, for the last hundred years, scholars have sought to identify the source or sources of the hagiographical information the author incorporated into his text. Cynewulf speaks of having gathered his information from far and wide (lines 1–2), but most investigators have dismissed this statement as a conventional tag, and they have tried to identify the minimum number of sources needed to provide the details that Cynewulf relates. Efforts to locate a single source have always been in vain, but early investigators generally agreed that the most important source was probably the martyrology of the Venerable Bede or a related document. Not only did this text include nearly all of the information that Cynewulf chose to convey, but its attribution to Bede seemed to assure that it would have been available to an early-ninth-century poet. In 1908, however, this consensus was shaken by the publication of Henri Quentin's path-breaking investigation of the medieval martyrological tradition. Surprisingly, although nine decades have passed since this work appeared, its full implications have yet to be integrated into Cynewulf scholarship. Now a revival of the view that Cynewulf employed a martyrology makes the assimilation of Quentin's conclusions along with the results of more recent martyrological studies imperative.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anglo-Saxon England , Volume 29 , January 2000 , pp. 67 - 83
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2000

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References

1 The most recent edition of Cynewulf's text is Brooks, K. R., Andreas and The Fates of the Apostles (Oxford, 1961), pp. 56–60.Google Scholar On the topic of the poet's sources, see Sarrazin, G., ‘Die Fata Apostolorum und der Dichter Kynewulf’, Anglia 12 (1899), 375–87Google Scholar; Krapp, G. P., Andreas and The Fates of the Apostles: Tivo Anglo-Saxon Narrative Poems (Boston, 1906), pp. xxix–xxxiiGoogle Scholar; Perkins, R., ‘On the Sources of the Fata Apostolorum’, Mod. Lang. Notes 32 (1917), 159–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hamilton, G. L., ‘The Sources of the Fates of the Apostles and Andreas’, Mod. Lang. Notes 35 (1920), 385–95CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Sisam, K., ‘Cynewulf and His Poetry’, PBA 18 (1932), 302–31Google Scholar, repr. in his Studies in the Histoiy of Old English Literature (Oxford, 1953), pp. 1–28Google Scholar; Brooks, , Andreas and The Fates of the Apostles, pp. xxx–xxxiGoogle Scholar; Calder, D. G., ‘The Fates of the Apostles, the Latin Martyrologies, and the Litany of the Saints’, MÆ 44 (1975), 219–24Google Scholar; idem, Cynewulf, Twayne's English Authors Series 327 (Boston, 1981), 27–9; Allen, M. J. B. and Calder, D. G., Sources and Analogues of OldEnglish Poetry: the Major Latin Textsin Translation (Cambridge, 1976), pp. 35–9Google Scholar; Cross, J. E., ‘Cynewulf's Traditions About the Apostles in Fates of the Apostle’, ASE 8 (1979), 163–75Google Scholar, repr. Cynewulf: Basic Readings, ed. Bjork, R. E. (New York, 1996), pp. 79–94; and P. W. Conner, ‘On Dating Cynewulf, Ibid. pp. 23–55.Google Scholar

2 Quentin, H., Les Martyrologes historiques du moyen áge: étude sur la formation du Martyrologe romain (Paris, 1908) [hereafter Mart. hist.].Google Scholar

3 Sollerius, J. B., Martyrologium Usuardi monachi… (Antwerp, 1714)Google Scholar and in Acta sanctorum quotquot toto orbe coluntur, Iun. 6–7 [the second half of each volume] (Antwerp, 1715–1717)Google Scholar; in the more widely available 3rd ed. of AASS, this text appears in one volume, Iun. 6 (Paris, 1866)Google Scholar; it is also reproduced in PL 123–4. The standard edition is now Dubois, J., Le Martyrologe d’Usuard: Texte et commentaire, Subsidia hagiographica 40 (Brussels, 1965).Google Scholar

4 Manuscript attributions of martyrologies to Bede are common; see Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 136, 237 and 406n.Google Scholar

5 In the Middle Ages, Bede was also regarded as the author of a poetic martyrology; Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 120–30.Google Scholar On this text, which is now commonly known as the metrical calendar of York, and its derivatives, see Lapidge, M., ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar from Ramsey’, RB 94 (1984), 326–69Google Scholar, repr. in his Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066 (London, 1993), pp. 343–86.Google Scholar

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7 Acta Sanctorum, 03 2 (Antwerp, 1688). The martyrology is printed with separate pagination at the beginning of the volume. It appears in the same location in the third edition of the AASS (Paris, 1865). Migne, PL 94, cols. 799–1148, reprinted this text beneath Herwagen's edition, designating it the ‘Editio Bollandiana’.Google Scholar

8 The Bollandists' text differed from Quentin's reconstruction primarily in the inclusion of a substantially larger number of short notices; Quentin, , Mart. hist., p. 119.Google Scholar

9 Ibid. p. 468, n. 1.

10 On this text, see now McCulloh, J. M., ‘The “Pseudo-Bede of Cologne”: a Martyrology of the “Gorzean” Reform’, Forschungen zur Reichs-, Papst- und Landesgeschichte: Peter Herde zum 65. Geburtstag von Freunden, Schülern und Kollegen dargebracht, ed. Borchardt, K. and Bünz, E., 2 vols. (Stuttgart, 1998) I, 81–99.Google Scholar

11 On the history of the Roman Martyrology, see Aigrain, , L'hogiographie, pp. 91–9Google Scholar; Dubois, J. and Lemaitre, J.-L., Sources et méthodes de l'hagiographie médiévale (Paris, 1993), pp. 121–3.Google Scholar Baronius's use of Herwagen's edition is clear from the references to Bede in his notes to the Roman Martyrology. (I examined the edition published at Antwerp in 1589). In McCulloh, , ‘Pseudo-Bede’, pp. 95–6, I identified thirty-four notices characteristic of the pseudo-Bedan text that the compiler did not draw from earlier standard martyrologies. Twenty-one of those saints appear in the Roman Martyrology on the same day, and in seventeen cases, Baronius mentions Bede as one of the sources for his notice: 1 Mar. Swithbertus, 26 Mar. Liutgerus; 23 Apr. Adalbertus; 21 May Valens et pueri iii; 1 Jun. Simeon, 20 Jun. Florentia, 22 Jun. Consortia; 4 Jul. Oudalricus; 28 Aug. Pelagius; 1 Sept. Verena, 8 Sept. Corbinianus, 22 Sept. Emmeramus, 28 Sept. Wenceslaus; 16 Oct. Eliphius, 19 Oct. Aquilinus, 21 Oct. virgines 11,000; 16 Dec. Ado. Moreover, the Roman Martyrology agrees with the earliest manuscripts of pseudo-Bede in commemorating Biship Eucharius of Metz on 8 Dec. In Herwagen's edition the notice for Eucharius appears on 9 Dec., and on 8 Dec. Baronius notes, ‘Agit de eodem Beda die sequenti.’Google Scholar

12 In his edition of the Fates, published in 1961, Brooks frequendy cites ‘Bede's martyrology’ in his commentary on the text, but the work in question is clearly pseudo-Bede. As a resuit, two of the references to Bede are accurate (lines 43 and 54), but the others are not (lines 17, 45, 51, 68, 70, 76 and 77).

13 See especially Perkins, ‘On the Sources’; Hamilton, ‘The Sources of the Fates and Sisam, ‘Cynewulf and His Poetry’.

14 Cross, ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’.

15 Conner, ‘On Dating Cynewulf.

16 Ibid. pp. 24–35. This thesis was challenged in another essay in the same volume: Fulk, R. D., ‘Cynewulf: Canon, Dialect, and Date’, Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , pp. 3–21, at 16–17.Google Scholar

17 Conner, , ‘On Dating Cynewulf’, pp. 35–45.Google Scholar

18 Ibid. pp. 36–7; Hamilton, , ‘The Sources of the Fates’, p. 387.Google Scholar Hamilton presents no evidence for his identification, but Conner is not the only scholar he has misled; see Allen, and Calder, , Sources and Analogues, p. 36. In fact, the pseudo-Bedan martyrology owes nothing to Usuard, but the confusion is understandable since the two texts represent independent abridgements of the martyrology of Ado of Vienne.Google Scholar

19 Conner, , ‘On Dating Cynewulf’, pp. 46–7.Google Scholar In dating Usuard's martyrology to c. 875, Conner follows Hamilton, , The Sources of the Fates, p. 387.Google Scholar This date was once commonly accepted, but is now considered too late. For more regarding the date of Usuard's compilation, see below, p. 73 and n. 28.

20 For favourable assessments of Conner's analysis, see in the same volume the comments by the editor, Bjork, R. E., Cynewulf, pp. xvi–xviiGoogle Scholar, and Fulk, , ‘Cynewulf: Canon, Dialect, and Date’, pp. 16–17.Google ScholarSee also the review by Howe, N., Speculum 73 (1998), 152–3.Google Scholar

21 Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 17–119.Google Scholar Quentin reconstructs Bede's text, but he presents it as apart of an analysis of the author's sources. Dubois, J. and Renaud, G., Édition pratique des martyrologes de Bède, de l'anonyme lyonnaise et de Florus (Paris, 1976)Google Scholar, offer Quentin's reconstructed text in normal calendarial order. They identify entries proper to the two recensions of Bede's martyrology with the symbols ‘B’ and ‘B2’. A translation of Bede's narrative notices by Lifshitz, F. is now available in Medieval Hagiography: an Anthology, ed. Head, T. (New York, 2000), pp. 169–97.Google Scholar

22 Quentin, , Mart. hist., p. 115.Google Scholar

23 Ibid. pp. 220–1.

24 Ibid. pp. 131–221. For the text, see Dubois and Renaud, Édition pratique, where the notices proper to this compilation are designated ‘L’.

25 Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 222–407. For the text, see Dubois and Renaud, Édition pratique, where the eulogies proper to Florus's two recensions are identified with ‘F’ and ‘F2’. Dubois and Renaud, p. vi, place Florus's two recensions shortly before and shortly after 837. Quentin, pp. 384–5, preferred a broader framework, assigning one to the first third of the ninth century and the other to the second third.Google Scholar

26 Florus expanded the notices for James, brother of Jesus (1 May); Peter and Paul (29 Jun.); James, brother of John (25 Jul.); Matthew (21 Sept.); Simon and Thaddeus (28 Oct.); Andrew (30 Nov.); Thomas (21 Dec.); and John (27 Dec.). In the case of Peter and Paul, Dubois, and Renaud, , Édition pratique, pp. 116–17Google Scholar, attribute to Bede's second recension a long addition that is, in fact, the work of Florus; see Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 359–60.Google Scholar

27 Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 465–608.Google Scholar For the text, see Dubois, J. and Renaud, G., Le Martyrologe d'adon; ses deux familles, ses trois recensions: texte et commentaire, Sources d'histoire médiévale 14 (Paris, 1984) [hereafter Mart. d’Adon]. The editors (pp. xx and xxvi) place the first recension of Ado's work around 855, the second around 865, and the third probably before his death in 875. Quentin, pp. 673–5, dates the first recension between 850 and 859–60. He sets the second between 865 and 875, and he expresses uncertainty whether the third recension is the work of Ado at all.Google Scholar

28 Dubois, Martyrologe d'usuard, originally identified two recensions, but he later discovered a text earlier than Usuard's ‘first recension’, which he described in ‘A la recherche de l'état primitif du martyrologe d'usuard: le manuscrit de Fécamp’, AB 95 (1977), 43–71Google Scholar; repr. with original pagination in his Martyrologes d'usuard au Martyrologe romain: articles réédités pour son soixant-dixiéme anniversaire (Abbéville, 1990).Google Scholar For a summary of the present state of research on the recensions and their dates, see Overgaauw, E. A., Martryrologes manuscrits des anciens diocèses d'utrecht et de Liège: étude sur le développement et la diffusion du Martryrologe d'usuard, 2 vols. (Hilversum, 1993) I, 30–4.Google Scholar

29 Rabani Mauri Martryrologium, ed. McCulloh, J., CCCM 44 (Turnhout, 1979)Google Scholar; McCulloh, J., ‘Hrabanus Maurus' Martyrology: the Method of Composition’, Sacris erudiri 23 (1978–1979), 417–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

30 McCulloh, ,‘Pseudo-Bede’, pp. 91–2.Google Scholar

31 Ibid. p. 83.

32 See Sarrazin, , ‘Die Fata Apostolorum’, pp. 380–1Google Scholar; Krapp, , Andreas and The Fates, pp. xxx–xxxiiGoogle Scholar; Perkins, , ‘On the Sources’, pp. 159–60Google Scholar; Allen, and Calder, , Sources and Analogues, pp. 35–9; and Cross, ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, passim.Google Scholar

33 The Breviarium is ed. Quentin, H. and Delehaye, H. in Acta Sanctorum, Nov. II. ii (Brussels, 1931), 3–6Google Scholar; a translation appears in Allen, and Calder, , Sources and Analogues, pp. 37–9.Google Scholar On the work in general, see Gaiffier, B. de, ‘Le Breviarium apostolorum (BHL, 652): tradition manuscrite et œuvres apparentées’, AB 81 (1963), 89–116.Google Scholar For a list of manuscripts, see Lambert, B., Bibliotheca Hieronymiana manuscripta: la tradition manuscrite des æuvres de saint Jérôme, 4 vols, in 7, Instrumenta patristica 4 (Steenbrugge, 1970) III B, 403–5Google Scholar, supplemented by Gaiffier, B. de, ‘Les Manuscrits du Breviarium apostolorum: nouveaux témoins’, Corona gratiarum: miscellanea patristica, historica et liturgca Eligio Dekkers O.S.B. XII lustra complenti oblata, 2 vols. (Bruges, 1975) I, 237–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Additional copies appear in Admont, Stiftsbibliothek, 184, 1v–2v, and 430, 2v–4r; and Graz, Universitätsbibliothek, 309, 8v–10r. It seems also to be in Erlangen, Universitätsbibliothek, Cod. 147; see Fischer, H., Die lateinischen Pergamenthanchchriften, Katalog der Handschriften der Universitätsbibliothek Erlangen I (Erlangen, 1928), 153.Google Scholar Of special interest for the Insular connection of this text is an eleventh-century Welsh manuscript, Dublin, Trinity College 50 (A. 4. 20), on which see Colker, M. L., Trinity College Library Dublin. Descriptive Catalogue of the Medieval and Renaissance Latin Manuscripts, 2 vols. (Dublin, 1991) I, 86–90.Google Scholar In addition to the Breviarium, this codex contains an Insular abbreviation of the Hieronymian martyrology, and Hrabanus Maurus, an heir of the Anglo-Saxon tradition in Germany, drew upon both of those texts for his own martyrology; McCulloh, J. M., ‘Martyrologium Hieronymianum Cambrense: a New Textual Witness’, AB 96 (1978), 121–4.Google Scholar

34 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, pp. 3–4.Google Scholar Florus, Ado and Usuard also include information about the burial places of these apostles. All of them note that Peter's tomb lay next to the Via Triumphalis, and then they say of him, ‘totius orbis veneratione celebratur’. Conner, , ‘On Dating Cynewulf’, p. 38, suggests that Cynewulf's statement, ‘is se apostolhad/wide geweorðod ofer werþeoda!’ (‘The discipleship was widely esteemed throughout the world’), represents a translation of that phrase.Google Scholar

35 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, pp. 4–5.Google Scholar

36 On the contents of the Passiones, see Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, pp. 170–1Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 86).Google Scholar

37 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, pp. 5–6.Google Scholar

38 Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, p. 171Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , pp. 86–7).Google Scholar

39 The phrase ‘quem diligebat lesus’ appears at John XIII. 23, XXI.7 and 20, but the disciple is never identified by name.

40 On this point, see Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, pp. 171–2Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 87).Google Scholar

41 Conner, , ‘On Dating Cynewulf’, p. 41Google Scholar; see also Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, p. 172Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 87).Google Scholar

42 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, p. 5.Google Scholar

43 Acts XII.2: ‘Occidit [Herodes] autem lacobum fratrem lohannis gladio.’

44 Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, p. 172Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 88).Google Scholar

45 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, p. 6.Google Scholar

46 Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, pp. 166–7Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 82).Google Scholar

47 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, p. 7.Google Scholar

48 Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, p. 173Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 88).Google Scholar

49 Ibid.

50 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mari. d'adon, p. 7.Google Scholar

51 Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, pp. 167–9Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , pp. 83–4).Google Scholar

52 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, p. 8.Google Scholar

53 Rabani Mauri Martyrologium, ed. McCulloh, , p. 96.Google Scholar

54 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, pp. 6–7.Google Scholar

55 Edited in ‘Catalogus codicum hagiographicorum bibliothecae civitaus Catnotensis’, AB 8 (1889), 136–7.Google Scholar

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57 Dubois, and Renaud, , Mart. d'adon, p. 8.Google Scholar

58 On the sources of Florus's notices for the apostles, see Quentin, , Mart. hist., pp. 358–62Google Scholar. That Cynewulf also used such sources is the thesis of Cross, ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’.

59 Both are edited by Quentin, and Delehaye, in Acta Sanctorum, 11 II. ii, 2–3.Google Scholar

60 The column on the left represents the BC recension of the Festa. The right-hand column represents the LV recension.

61 The Breviarium identifies Thaddeus as Jude.

62 In the Notitia, the final entry lists Simon the Canaanite and Simon the Zealot as sepatate individuals, omitting Thaddeus/Jude.

63 The BC recension lists the last of the aposdes as Jude.

64 The LV recension identifies this apostle as Jude and adds Matthias as the thirteenth.

65 Hamilton, , ‘The Sources of the Fates’, p. 387Google Scholar; and Sisam, , ‘Cynewulf and His Poetry’, p. 327, n. 13 (repr. Studies, p. 9 n.).Google Scholar

66 Matt. X.2–4, Mark III.16–19 and Luke VI.14–16.

67 Lapidge, M., Anglo-Saxon Litanies of the Saints, HBS 106 (London, 1991).Google Scholar The six texts that reverse the order of Thomas and Matthew are nos. VI (p. 115), XIII (p. 148), XIX (p. 178), XXVII (p. 214), XXXIX (p. 265) and XLIII (p. 283). All of these appear in manuscripts of the tenth or eleventh century and mostly from the south of England. No. XXVI (p. 212) reverses the order of John and James. This manuscript (London, British Library, Royal 2. A. XX), of Mercian provenance, dates from the eighth century. Hamilton, , ‘The Sources of the Fates’, p. 387Google Scholar, and Sisam, , ‘Cynewulf and His Poetry’, p. 327, n. 13Google Scholar (repr. Studies, p. 9 n.) have noted that this same order is reflected in the Irish Stowe Missal: The Stoive Missal, ed. Warner, G. F., 2 vols., HBS 31–2 (London, 1906–1915) II, 15.Google Scholar

68 Cross, , ‘Cynewulf's Traditions’, p. 175Google Scholar (repr. Cynewulf, ed. Bjork, , p. 90), touches on this point at the end of his study, but he does not pursue it.Google Scholar

69 Philippart, G., Les Légendiers latins et autres manuscrits hagiographiques, Typologie des sources du moyen âge occidental 24–5 (Turnhout, 1977), 16–18Google Scholar, and mise à jour (1985), p. 5, lists nearly one hundred manuscripts containing passionaries of the apostles. None of the codices is of identifiably English provenance, but Philippart disclaims any attempt at exhaustiveness. He discusses these collections, pp. 87–93, concluding with comments on the frequently varied order of their contents. Similarly, Lipsius, R. A., Die apokryphen Apostelgeschichten und Apostellegenden: ein Beitrag zur altchristlichen Literaturgeschichte, 3 vols, in 4 (Braunschweig, 1883–1890) I, 153–6Google Scholar, investigates the order of a smaller sample of manuscripts and comments on its arbitrariness.

70 Mombritius, B., Sanctuarium seu vitae sanctorum, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (Paris, 1910) II, 357, lines 30–3.Google Scholar On the wide distribution of this prologue, see Philippart, , Les Légendiers latins, p. 90.Google Scholar