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The Junius Psalter gloss: its historical and cultural context

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Mechthild Gretsch
Mechthild Gretsch
Affiliation:
University of Göttingen
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Extract

Oxford, Bodleian Library, Junius 27 (S.C. 5139), the Junius Psalter, was written, Latin text and Old English gloss, probably at Winchester and presumably during the reign of King Edward the Elder. Junius 27 is one of the twenty-nine complete or almost complete psalters written or owned in Anglo-Saxon England which have survived. (In addition to these twenty-nine complete psalters, eight minor fragments of further psalters are still extant.) This substantial number of surviving manuscripts and fragments is explained by the paramount importance of the psalms in the liturgy of the Christian church, both in mass and especially in Office. Junius 27 is also one of the ten psalters from Anglo-Saxon England bearing an interlinear Old English gloss to the entire psalter. (In addition there are two psalters with a substantial amount of glossing in Old English, though not full interlinear versions.) Since our concern in the first part of this article will be with the nature of the Old English glossing in the Junius Psalter, and its relationship to other glossed psalters, it is appropriate at the outset to provide a list of the psalters in question. At the beginning of each of the following items I give the siglum and the name by which the individual psalters are traditionally referred to by psalter scholars. An asterisk indicates that the Latin text is a Psalterium Romanum (the version in almost universal use in England before the Benedictine reform); unmarked manuscripts contain the Psalterium Gallicanum. For full descriptions of the manuscripts, see N. R. Ker, Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon.

Type
Research Article
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Anglo-Saxon England , Volume 29 , January 2000 , pp. 85 - 121
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2000

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References

1 For the date (presumably in the 920s or shortly before) and provenance of Junius 27, see below, p. 107 and n. 83.

2 For lists of psalters from Anglo-Saxon England, see Gneuss, H., ‘Liturgical Books in Anglo-Saxon England and their Old English Terminology’, Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England. Studies presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. Lapidge, M. and Gneuss, H. (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 91–141, at 114–16Google Scholar; and (with brief descriptions of the manuscripts) Pulsiano, P., ‘Psalters’, The Liturgical Books of Anglo-Saxon England, ed. Pfaff, R. W., OEN Subsidia 23 (Kalamazoo, MI, 1995), 61–85.Google Scholar

3 For the three recensions of the Psalter (Romanum, Callicanum and Hebraicum), see The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, ed. Cross, F. L., 3rd ed. by Livingstone, E. A. (Oxford, 1997), pp. 1344Google Scholar (‘Psalter’), 1410 (‘Roman Psalter’) and 652 (‘Gallican Psalter’), and Gretsch, M., The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform, CSASE 25 (Cambridge, 1999), 21–5 (with further literature).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Ker, N. R., Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford, 1957).Google Scholar For printed editions of glossed psalters, see Gneuss, , ‘Liturgical Books’, pp. 115–16Google Scholar, Pulsiano, , ‘Psalters’, pp. 61–70 and 76Google Scholar, and Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 18–21.Google Scholar

5 From the surviving fragments it is impossible to tell whether Psalter N was glossed entirely or in parts only. For this psalter, see now Gneuss, H., ‘A Newly-Found Fragment of an Anglo-Saxon Psalter’, ASE 27 (1998), 273–87.Google Scholar

6 For the use of the psalter as a textbook for instruction in Latin, see, for example, Riché, P., Les Écoles et l'enseignement dans l'occident de la fin du if siècle an milieu du xi' siècle (Paris, 1979), pp. 227–8Google Scholar; and idem, ‘Le Livre Psautier, livre de lecture élémentaire d'après les vies des saints mérovingiens’, Études Mérovingiennes, Actes des Journées de Poitiers 1952 (Paris, 1953), pp. 253–6.Google Scholar See also Bischoff, B., ‘Elementarunterricht und Probationes Pennae in der ersten Hälfte des Mittclalters’, in his Mittelalterliche Studien, 3 vols. (Stuttgart, 1966–1981) I, 74–8, at 75–6.Google Scholar

7 For a survey of the textual affiliations of the glossed psalters and the literature on the subject, see Sisam, K. in The Salisbury Psalter, ed. C. and Sisam, K., EETS os 242 (London, 1959), 52–75Google Scholar; see also Schabram, H., Superbia. Studien zum altenglischen Wortschatz (Munich, 1965), pp. 21–8Google Scholar, and Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 26–7.Google Scholar For the possible origin of the Royal Psalter gloss in the 940s, in the circle of the future Bishop Æthelwold, see Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations, passim. For the dependence of the Royal gloss on the Vespasian (A-type) gloss (a matter discussed controversially by psalter scholars), see most recently (and with a summary of earlier views) ibid. esp. pp. 33–41.

8 See Lapidge, M., ‘Schools, Learning and Literature in Tenth-Century England’, in his Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066 (London, 1993), pp. 1–48, at 3–4Google Scholar; the quotation at p. 3 (originally published 1991).Google Scholar

9 There is a close link between Ælfric and the glossator of the Lambeth Psalter, inasmuch as both are eminent proponents of the so-called ‘Winchester usage’: see Hofstetter, W., Winchester und der spätaltenglische Sprachgebrauch, Texte und Untersuchungen zur Englischen Philologie 14 (Munich, 1987), 38–66 and 84–8.Google Scholar

10 See, for example, Lindelöf, U., Die Handschrift Junius 27 in der Bibliotheca Bodleiana in Oxford (Helsingfors, 1901), pp. 45–8Google Scholar and passim; Wildhagen, K., ‘Studien zum Psalterium Romanum in England und zu seinen Glossierungen’, Festschrift für Lorenz Morsbach, ed. Holthausen, F. and Spies, H., Studien zur englischen Philologie 50 (Halle, 1913), 418–72, at 446Google Scholar; Der altenglische Junius- Psalter, ed. Brenner, E., Anglistische Forschungen 23 (Heidelberg, 1908), xiii–xxxvGoogle Scholar; Heinzel, O., Kritische Entstehungsgeschichte des ags. Interlinear-Psalters, Palaestra 151 (Leipzig, 1926), 54 and passimGoogle Scholar; Sisam, K., Salisbury Psalter, ed. Sisam, and Sisam, , p. 55Google Scholar; Berghaus, F.-G., Die Verwandtschaftsverhältnisse der altenglischen Interlinearversionen des Psalters und der Cantica, Palaestra 272 (Göttingen, 1979), 36–43 and 133Google Scholar; and Pulsiano, P., ‘The Originality of the Old English Gloss of the Vespasian Psalter and its Relation to the Gloss of the junius Psalter’, ASE 25 (1996), 37–62, at 48–62Google Scholar (for a brief review of the scholarship on the question, see ibid. pp. 37–8 and 48–9).

11 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, p. 61Google Scholar and passim, Wildhagen, , ‘Studien zum Psalterium Romanum’, p. 446Google Scholar, and Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xi and xiii–xv.Google Scholar

12 Cf. Pulsiano, , ‘The Originality’, pp. 48–62; Pulsiano substantiates his view with an extensive collation of Vespasian A. i and Junius 27.Google Scholar

13 Cf. Wildhagen, , ‘Studien zum Psalterium Romanum’, p. 446.Google Scholar

14 See Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. x and xxxiii.Google Scholar A Canterbury origin for Junius 27 has recently been advocated by Dumville, D.Google Scholar; see below, p. 107, n. 83.

15 This has most recently been demonstrated by Pulsiano, , ‘The Originality’, pp. 39–48Google Scholar; cf. ibid. 39–44 for a review of previous scholarship on the question.

16 The surviving witnesses are the Cambridge Psalter (A-type), the Royal Psalter (the D-prototype), the Winchester D-type psalters Tiberius, Vitellius, Arundel and Stowe, as well as the Lambeth Psalter (I-prototype), of possible Winchester origin.

17 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 5–41Google Scholar (his edition of parts of the Junius Psalter and collation of the whole text with Vespasian A. i), and 48–61 (his list of phonological and morphological variants in the Junius Psalter); and see Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xv–xxiiiGoogle Scholar for phonological variants, and xxxvi-xliii for lexical variants.

18 For a recent attempt (unique of its kind) to judge the Junius Psalter's vocabulary in terms of the Glossator's scholarly competence, see Wiesenekker, E., ‘The Vespasian and Junius Psalters Compared: Glossing or Translation?’, Amsterdamer Beiträge zur älteren Germanistik 40 (1994), 21–39.Google Scholar Unfortunately, the attempt is seriously flawed: cf. Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 325–6, n. 200.Google Scholar

19 For the dialect of the Vespasian Psalter, see for example Campbell, A., ‘The Glosses’, The Vespasian Psalter (British Museum Cotton Vespasian A. i), ed. Wright, D. H., EEMF 14 (Copenhagen, 1967), 81–92, at 85–90.Google Scholar The earliest and, so far, most comprehensive investigation of the language of Vespasian A. i by Zeuner, R., Zur Sprache des kentischen Psalters (Halle, 1881)Google Scholar, is now of interest only for the history of scholarship, since at the time Zeuner was writing, knowledge of Old English dialects other than West Saxon was insecure. Going by the Canterbury origin of the manuscript, Zeuner attributed many of Vespasian's non-West Saxon features to the Kentish dialect, when, in fact, such features (for example e as i-mutation of ea) are in conformity with the overall Mercian character of the gloss. It was Eduard Sievers, in the first edition of his Angelsächsische Grammatik (Halle, 1882)Google Scholar, who first suggested that the dialect of the Vespasian Psalter was Mercian; in this he was followed by Henry, Sweet, The Oldest English Texts, EETS os 83 (London, 1885), 184.Google Scholar For the difficulty involved in distinguishing Mercian from Kentish dialect features, and of precisely locating the dialect of the Vespasian Glossator, see also Wilson, R. M., ‘The Provenance of the Vespasian Psalter Gloss: the Linguistic Evidence’, The Anglo-Saxons. Studies in some Aspects of their History and Culture presented to Bruce Dickins, ed. Clemoes, P. (London, 1959), pp. 292–310.Google Scholar

20 See Cook, A. S., Biblical Quotations in Old English Prose Writers (London, 1898), p. xxxGoogle Scholar; for Humfrey Wanley's description, see his Librorum veterum septentrionalium catalogus (Oxford, 1705), p. 76.Google Scholar

21 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, p. 50Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , p. xvi (§ 12)Google Scholar; and see Brunner, K., Altenglische Grammatik. Nach der angelsächsischen Grammatik von E. Sievers, 3rd ed. (Tübingen, 1965) [hereafter SB], § 62CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Campbell, A., Old English Grammar (Oxford, 1959) [hereafter Campbell], § 128.Google Scholar

22 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 51 and 53Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xvi (§ 14) and xvii (§ 15); and see SB, §§ 119–20 and Campbell, §§ 222–9.Google Scholar

23 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 50–1Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , p. xvii (§17); and see SB, § 79, and Campbell, § 130.Google Scholar

24 Cf. Cook, , Biblical Quotations, p. xxx.Google Scholar

25 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 53–4Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxi–xxiiGoogle Scholar (§ 32); and see SB, § 101 and Campbell, § 198.

26 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 51–7.Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxiii–xxiv (§ 37)Google Scholar; and see SB, §§ 104 and 105, and Campbell, § 200.

27 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, p. 54Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxiii–xxiv (§ 37); and see SB, §§ 104 and 106, and Campbell, § 200.Google Scholar

28 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 52–3Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xviii–xixGoogle Scholar (§§ 22.2 and 23.2); and see SB, §§ 83–6 and 120, and Campbell, §§ 126,222 and 227.

29 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 51–2Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , p. xix (§ 24)Google Scholar; and see SB, §§ 83 and 85, and Campbell, §§ 139 and 143.

30 Cf. SB, §§ 90 and 91c, and Campbell, §§ 170, 185 and 187.

31 Cf. SB, §§ 108,110 and 111, and Campbell, §§ 205, 210 and 220; and see Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, p. 56Google Scholar, and Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , p. xx (§ 27).Google Scholar

32 Cf. Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, p. 54Google Scholar, Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxiii–xxivGoogle Scholar (§ 37); and see SB, § 96.4 and n. 6 and § 105, and Campbell, §§ 193.a and 200.1.

33 Whereas cwelman (one occurrence) and gemeltan (three occurrences) appear with e only, the distribution for onheldan is: 29 e, 1 ie, 5 æ, for welle. 4 e, 1 ie, 1 æ, see Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxiii–xxiv (§37).Google Scholar

34 See Holthausen, F., Altenglisches etymologisches W¨rterbuch (Heidelberg, 1934), s.v. riec and smiec, and cf. Mod. German Rauch and Schmauch.Google Scholar

35 Of the three West Saxon variants ie, i and y, the Junius Glossator clearly prefers i.

36 Lindelöf's explanation (Die Handschrift Junius 27, p. 71) that rœc is an inverted spelling proving that æ has been unrounded to e in the Glossator's dialect seems too simplistic in view of the intricate web of relationships between the vowels discussed above and in view of the Glossator's undoubted Saxon origin. (In West Saxon œ had been unrounded to e already in the earliest texts; cf. SB, § 101, and Campell, § 198.) Also, we can probably rule out the possibility mat forms of the type cwelman are Kentish, since no other Kenticisms are found in the Junius gloss. (For e as imutation of ea, resulting from breaking, in the Kentish dialect, see SB, § 105, and Campbell, §199.1.)Google Scholar

37 See Wenisch, F., Spezifisch anglisches Wortgut in den nordhumbrischen Interlinearglossierungen des Lukasevangeliums, Anglistische Forschungen 132 (Heidelberg, 1979).Google ScholarWords occurring in the Junius Psalter and discussed in Wenisch's book can be traced via its index, p. 349Google Scholar, s. v. ‘Ps B’. For earlier work on Anglian dialect vocabulary, see below, p. 96, n. 48.

38 Vespasian has thirty-five occurrences of feogan; for one of these the corresponding folio is missing in Junius 27.

39 Vespasian has nine occurrences; for one of these the corresponding folio is missing in Junius 27.

40 For two further occurrences in Vespasian the corresponding folios are missing in Junius 27.

41 In Ps. LXX1V.9 Vespasian has two glosses for the lemma fex: derstan, drosne. According to Kuhn (The Vespasian Psalter, ed. Kuhn, S. M. (Ann Arbor, MI, 1965), p. 172) drosne is by the original glossator or a contemporary, and derstan has been corrected from garbled deastan. This makes one wonder whether the Junius Glossator had before him this double gloss and/or the garbled form of dærste, and whether this (rather than the Anglian colouring of dærste) prompted his lexical substitution.Google Scholar

42 The simplex is invariably retained: see above.

43 For one further occurrence of bileoran in Vespasian the corresponding folio is missing in Junius 27.

44 The frequent substitution of inlihtan by onlihtan must no doubt be judged in the light of the regular replacement (except in the case of the first few psalms) of the Anglian preposition in in Vespasian by WS on in Junius 27; cf. the word-list in Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , p. lx.Google Scholar For literature on the undisputed Anglian word in, cf. Wenisch, , Spezifisch anglisches Wortgut, pp. 174–5.Google Scholar

45 The noun is derived from the Anglian verb feogan, used frequently and consistently to gloss odisse in Vespasian and Junius: see above.

46 See Wenisch, , Spezifisch anglisches Wortgut, p. 20Google Scholar, and Schabram, , Superbia, p. 29, and cf. the table at the end of Schabram's book.Google Scholar

47 Cf. Wenisch, , Spezifisch anglisches Wortgut, p. 285.Google Scholar

48 Wenisch's study (Spezifisch anglisches Wortgut), from which the foregoing list was compiled, is based on the lexical material found in the Northumbrian interlinear glosses to the gospel of St Luke in the Lindisfarne and the (dependent) Rushworth Gospels. Words from these glosses for which an Anglian colouring is suspected are then traced through the entire range of Old English literature in order to confirm their Anglian character. Wenisch, therefore, does not normally pronounce on the dialect distribution of words not found in Lindisfarne or Rushworth. Earlier work on Anglian dialect vocabulary includes the important study by Jordan, R., Eigentümlichkeiten des anglischen Wortschatzes, Anglistische Forschungen 17 (Heidelberg, 1906)Google Scholar, and the PhD theses of Scherer, G., Zur Geographie und Chronologic des angelsächsischen Wortschatzes, im Anschluss an Bischof Wærferth's Übersetzung der ‘Dialoge’ Gregors (Berlin, 1928)Google Scholar, and Rauh, H., Der Wortschatz der altenglischen Übersetzung des Matthäus-Evangeliums untersucht auf seine dialektische und zeitliche Gebundenheit (Berlin, 1936).Google Scholar Such studies are usually limited in scope, and do not take into account the whole range of Old English texts. The first publication stressing the importance and, indeed, the indispensable nature of such a comprehensive approach in lexical studies, was Hans, Schabram'sSuperbia (1965).Google Scholar This approach has since then become axiomatic, and for almost twenty years has been greatly facilitated by the Toronto Microfiche Concordance (Healy, A. di Paolo and Venezky, R. L., A Microfiche Concordance to Old English, Publ. of the Dictionary of Old English 1 (Toronto, 1980), and its subsequent development into the electronic Corpus of Old English).Google Scholar

49 For the Anglian dialect character of holinga, see Jordan, , Eigentümlichkeiten, p. 59Google Scholar and Schabram, , Superbia, p. 72 and n. 73.Google Scholar

50 See Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxxvi–xlii.Google Scholar

51 See Schabram, , Superbia, pp. 13 and 29Google Scholar; for oferhygd replacing oferhoga in Junius 27, see above, pp. 95–6.Google Scholar

52 See Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 257–9 (no. 195) and 384–6 (no. 324)Google Scholar, and Dumville, D. N., ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Background and the Earliest Phases’, ASE 16 (1987), 147–79, at 162–3.Google Scholar Both manuscripts are written in pointed Anglo-Saxon minuscule; the date can be established from a (now lost) note, once prefixed to the Tiberius manuscript. The entire text of the Tiberius manuscript has been preserved in a transcript made by Francis Junius, in which, however, we have to reckon with the usual (conscious or subconscious) editorial interventions of sixteenth and seventeenth-century transcribers. On such interventions and inaccuracies in the Junius transcript, see Jost, K., ‘Zu den Handschriften der Cura Pastoralis’ Anglia 37 (1913), 63–8Google Scholar, and The Pastoral Care, ed. Ker, N. R., EEMF 6 (Copenhagen, 1956), appendix.Google Scholar The Regula pastoralis has been edited from Hatton 20, the Tiberius fragments and the Junius transcript by Sweet, H., King Alfred's West Saxon Version of Gregory's Pastoral Care, 2 vols., EETS os 45 and 50 (London, 1871–1872).Google Scholar

53 Cf. Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 57–9 (no. 39)Google Scholar; there are two distinct portions in question: 1r-16v, written in Anglo-Saxon proto-Square minuscule at some point after 891 (the latest annal in this portion): cf. most recently Dumville, , ‘Square Minuscule’, pp. 163–4; and 16v–25vGoogle Scholar, written in Anglo-Saxon Square minuscule Phase I, and hence datable (presumably) to the 920s: cf. Dumville, ibid. pp. 170 and 148, n. 2. For a comprehensive discussion of the script, date, localization and the number of scribes involved, and a critical review of previous scholarship, see Dumville, D. N., ‘The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and the Origin of English Square Minuscule Script’, in his Wessex and England from Alfred to Edgar (Woodbridge, 1992), pp. 55–112, at 55–96Google Scholar; for the scribes, see also the discussion in the latest edition of the Parker Chronicle: The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle MS A, ed. Bately, J. M., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: a Collaborative Edition 3 (Cambridge, 1986), xxi–xxxiv.Google Scholar For a facsimile edition of the manuscript, see The Parker Chronicle and Laws (Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, MS. 173). A Facsimile, ed. Flower, R. and Smith, [A.] H. (London, 1941).Google Scholar

54 For the Lauderdale Orosius, see Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 164–6 (no. 133)Google Scholar and Dumville, , ‘Square Minuscule’, p. 171.Google Scholar The text has been edited by Bately, J. M., The Old English Orosius, EETS ss 6 (London, 1980).Google Scholar For a facsimile, see The Tollemache Orosius (British Museum Additional Manuscript 47967), ed. Campbell, A., EEMF 3 (Copenhagen, 1953).Google Scholar

55 Ker, , Catalogue, p. 409 (no. 335), suggested that the scribes of text and gloss in Junius 27 may be the same person.Google Scholar

56 See ibid. pp. 58, 165–6 and 409 (nos. 39, 133 and 335), Parkes, M. B., ‘The Palaeography of the Parker Manuscript of the Chronicle, Laws and Sedulius, and Historiography at Winchester in the Late Ninth and Tenth Centuries’, in his Scribes, Scripts and Readers (London, 1991), pp. 143–69, at 154, n. 1Google Scholar (originally published 1976), and Dumville, , ‘The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, pp. 72–3.Google Scholar

57 If Junius 27 is mentioned at all in general discussions of Early West Saxon, such mention usually does not go beyond A. Campbell's passing remark that its gloss is ‘valuable for tracing the history of West Saxon’: cf. Campbell, , p. 8 (§ 16).Google Scholar

58 See, for example, the general remarks on the dialect situation in Early West Saxon by Campbell, § 17. Both Campbell and Sievers–Brunner record such Anglian forms in West Saxon texts in the course of their discussions of individual phonemes; cf., for example, SB, § 8, n. 1, and Campbell, § 143: for a (instead of ea) before l + consonant; SB, § 101, n. 1, and Campbell, § 198: for æ¯ (instead of ē) as a result of i-mutation of ō; SB, § 104, and Campbell, § 200: for e (instead of ie, i, y) as a result of i-mutation of ea. For a convenient listing of the most conspicuous Anglian dialect features found in West Saxon texts, see also The Life of St Chad, ed. Vleeskruyer, R. (Amsterdam, 1953), p. 42, n. 4.Google Scholar

59 See Cosijn, P. J., Altwestsächsische Grammatik, 2 vols. (The Hague, 1883–1886)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, for the manuscripts of the Regula pastoralis, the Parker Chronicle and the Orosius. There will be a fresh discussion (with comprehensive documentation) of the non-West Saxon features in the two early manuscripts of the Regula pastoralis in a forthcoming edition of the Cambridge manuscripts of that text by Carolin Schreiber. For the non-West Saxon features in the Parker Chronicle, see also Sprockel, C., The Language of the Parker Chronicle, 2 vols. (The Hague, 1965–1973)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and, most recently, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. Bately, , pp. cxxxiv and cxxxviii–cxxxix.Google Scholar For non-West Saxon features in the Lauderdale Orosius, see The Old English Orosius, ed. Bately, , pp. xl–xliv.Google Scholar Markedly different from these principal witnesses to Early West Saxon is a brief text, the so-called ‘Fonthill Letter’, sent by Ordlaf, ealdorman of Wiltshire to King Edward the Elder. This letter, which, quite possibly, is an autograph, stands out by its uncharacteristically persistent orthography and by the absence of non-West Saxon dialect features. For an edition, translation and full historical discussion of the ‘Fonthill Letter’, see Keynes, S., ‘The “Fonthill Letter”’, in Words, Texts and Manuscripts: Studies in Anglo-Saxon Culture presented to Helmut Gneuss on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. Korhammer, M. (Cambridge, 1992), pp. 53–97Google Scholar; for the language of the letter, see Gretsch, M., ‘The Language of the “Fonthill Letter”’, ASE 23 (1994), 57–102.Google Scholar

60 Asser gives us the names of the four Mercians in ch. 77 (cf. Asser's Life of King Alfred, ed. Stevenson, W. H., (Oxford, 1904), p. 62Google Scholar; trans. Keynes, S. and Lapidge, M., Alfred the Great. Asser's ‘Life of King Alfred’ and Other Contemporary Sources (Harmondsworth, 1983), pp. 92–3): Wærferth, bishop of Worcester (c. 872–915)Google Scholar, on whom see conveniently, Keynes, and Lapidge, , Alfred the Great, p. 259, n. 163Google Scholar; Plegmund, archbishop of Canterbury (890–923), on whom see ibid., p. 259, n. 165, and Keynes, S., ‘Plegmund’, The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England, ed. Lapidge, M., Blair, J., Keynes, S. and Scragg, D. (Oxford, 1999), pp. 371–2Google Scholar; and the priests and chaplains Æthelstan and Werwulf, on whom see Keynes, and Lapidge, , Alfred the Great, p. 259, n. 166.Google Scholar For the probability of a stronger Mercian presence at the courts of Alfred and Edward than may be gleaned from Asser's remarks, see below, p. 103 and n. 73; such probability, however, is not normally considered in philological discussions: cf., for example, SB, § 2, n. 3.

61 For example, non-West Saxon features are found in the second manuscript of the Old English Orosius (London, BL, Cotton Tiberius B. i(s. xi1)), otherwise written in standard Late West Saxon: see The Old English Orosius, ed. Bately, , pp. xlix–li.Google Scholar Such forms are also found in the later annals of the Parker Chronicle: see The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. Bately, , pp. cxliv–cxlv.Google Scholar

62 See, for example, Campbell, , p. 9 (§ 17) and p. 69 (§ 185)Google Scholar; Vleeskruyer, , Life of St Chad, p. 50Google Scholar, and The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. Bately, , pp. cxxxv and cxl.Google Scholar

63 Cf., for example, Campbell, , pp. 14 (§ 31) and 19 (§ 48)Google Scholar, and Hogg, R. M., A Grammar of Old English, I: Phonology (Oxford, 1992), pp. 11–12.Google Scholar

64 See, for example, Luick, K., Historische Grammatik der englischen Sprache (Leipzig, 1914–1940; repr. with an index by R. F. S. Hamer, Oxford, 1964), p. 146 (§ 146, n. 2) (with respect to the appearance of a + l + consonant), or p. 179 (§ 194) (for e as a result of i-mutation of ea)Google Scholar; and cf. especially for the Junius Psalter, Lindelöf, , Die Handschrift Junius 27, pp. 66–73Google Scholar and Junius-Psalter, ed. Brenner, , pp. xxii–xxiii.Google Scholar The idea of the ‘West Saxon patois’ was first mooted by Bülbring, K., Altenglisches Elementarbuch (Heidelberg, 1902), p. 10.Google Scholar

65 See below, p. 105 and n. 80.

66 See, for example, Wenisch, , Spezifisch anglisches Wortgut, pp. 325–6 and passim.Google Scholar

67 Cf. Berghaus, , Verwandtschaftsverhältnisse, p. 39.Google Scholar

68 See Keynes, S., ‘King Alfred and the Mercians’, Kings, Currency and Alliances. History and Coinage of Southern England in the Ninth Century, ed. Blackburn, M. A. S. and Dumville, D. N. (Woodbridge, 1998), pp. 1–45, esp. at 34–9Google Scholar; idem, ‘England, 700–900’, The New Cambridge Medieval History, II: c. 700–c. 900, ed. McKitterick, R. (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 18–42, at 41CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, ‘England, 900–1016’, The New Cambridge Medieval History, III: c. 900–c. 1024, ed. Reuter, T. (Cambridge, 1999), pp. 456–84, at 460–6Google Scholar; idem, ‘The West Saxon Charters of King Æthelwulf and his Sons’, EHR 109 (1994), 1109–49, at 1148–9; and idem, ‘Edward, King of the Anglo-Saxons’ (forthcoming).Google Scholar

69 Cf. Keynes, ‘King Alfred and the Mercians’, fig. 1.

70 Cf. Keynes, , ‘England, 900–1016’, p. 465.Google Scholar Depending on how one reads the surviving evidence, there is some uncertainty with regard to Edward's recognition in the Mercian regions of the kingdom during the first part of his reign, especially in terms of his relationship with his brother-in-law Æthelred and his sister Æthelflæd (‘Lord and Lady of the Mercians’). However, much can be said for assuming that Edward, in 899, succeeded his father as king of the Anglo-Saxons: see Keynes, , ‘England, 900–1016’, pp. 461–3.Google Scholar

71 Even though the concept of the ‘Kingdom of the Anglo-Saxons’ in its precise outline has been defined only recently, the fact that the unification of England in the course of the tenth century proceeded on the basis of a military and political alliance between Wessex and Mercia dating from the reign of Alfred the Great should have been common knowledge among philologisyyts.

72 Cf. Keynes, S., ‘The Control of Kent in the Ninth Century’, Early Medieval Europe 2 (1993), 111–31, at 120–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, ‘The Mercian Supremacy’, The Making of England. Anglo-Saxon Art and Culture AD 600–900, ed. Webster, L. and Backhouse, J. (London, 1991), pp. 193–4, at 194Google Scholar; and (for the dealings of the ninth-century West Saxon kings with the metropolitan see) Brooks, N., The Early History of the Church of Canterbury. Christ Church from 597–1066 (Leicester, 1984), pp. 145–9 and 197–203.Google Scholar

73 For Mercians at King Alfred's court, see Keynes, , ‘King Alfred and the Mercians’, pp. 39–40Google Scholar; for Mercian scholars, see also above, p. 100 and n. 60. The presence of Mercian scholars at King Edward's court may be inferred, inter alia, from a distinctive ‘Mercian’ style in some of the Latin charters issued in his reign: see Keynes, , ‘West Saxon Charters’, pp. 1141–3 and 1145.Google Scholar It should also be recalled that Edward's eldest son, the future King Æthelstan, was apparently educated at the Mercian court of his aunt Æthelflæd and her husband Æthelred: see William, of Malmesbury, , Gesta Regum Anglorum. The History of the English Kings, ed. and trans. Mynors, R. A. B., Thomson, R. M. and Winterbottom, M., Oxford Med. Texts, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1998–1999) 1, 210 (bk ii, ch. 133) and II, 119.Google Scholar

74 See Keynes, , ‘King Alfred and the Mercians’, pp. 40–1.Google Scholar

75 Cf. Pastoral Care, ed. Sweet, , p. 3Google Scholar

76 See Asser's Life, ch. 77, ed. Stevenson, , p. 62Google Scholar; trans. Keynes, and Lapidge, , Alfred the Great, p. 92.Google Scholar The Old English text is edited by Hecht, H., Bischof Wærferths von Worcester Übersetzung der Dialoge Gregors des Grossen, Bibliothek der angelsächsischen Prosa 5 (Leipzig and Hamburg, 1905–1907).Google Scholar What is relevant to our purposes is Asser's verdict on Wærferth's English prose style as possibly representing a reflex of late-ninth- and early-tenth-century opinions on the bishop's scholarly and literary performance. We are not concerned here with the question of whether this verdict stands up to scrutiny; for sceptical views of Wærferth's performance as a translator, see Hecht, , Bischof Wærferths Übersetzung, part 2, esp. at 99–121Google Scholar; Hartung, P. N. U., ‘The Text of the Old English Translation of Gregory's Dialogues’, Neophilologus 22 (1937), 281–302CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and most recently Godden, M., ‘Wærferth and King Alfred: the Fate of the Old English Dialogues’, in Alfred the Wise. Studies in Honour of Janet Bately on the Occasion of her Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. Roberts, J. and, Nelson, J. L. with Godden, M. (Cambridge, 1997), pp. 35–51, esp. 43–9.Google Scholar

77 The Old English text is edited by Miller, T., The Old English Version of Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, 4 vols., EETS os 95, 96, 110, 111 (London, 1890–1898)Google Scholar; and see Whitelock, D., ‘The Old English Bede’, PBA 48 (1962), 57–90.Google Scholar That the Old English Bede is the work of a Mercian translator has never been seriously questioned by modern scholarship. It is interesting, therefore, that Ælfric refers to the Old English Bede as one of King Alfred's translations: see Ælfric's Catholic Homilies: the Second Series, Text, ed. Godden, M., EETS SS 5 (London, 1979), 72 (Ælfric's homily on St Gregory). Apparently Ælfric, a scholar whose awareness of linguistic detail can scarcely be paralleled anywhere in Old English literature, saw no problems in attributing a text crawling with Anglian dialect features (which no doubt he will have recognized) to the king himself.Google Scholar

78 Ker, , Catalogue, p. 267 (no. 203)Google Scholar, gives the date as probably s. ixmed for the Old English gloss in Vespasian A. i; a date s. ix1 is assumed by Brown, M., ‘The Mercian Supremacy’, The Making of England, ed. Webster, and Backhouse, , pp. 197–9, at 199.Google Scholar For the origin of the gloss not before c. 800, see Campbell, , ‘The Glosses’, p. 82 and n. 4.Google Scholar The historical and intellectual milieu in which the Vespasian gloss originated still awaits scholarly attention. It is possible that the gloss was composed in the circle of the great Archbishop Wulfred (805–32), but the matter requires further investigation; see ibid., ‘The Glosses’, p. 83. In this context it is interesting to note that the handful of glosses in the Mercian dialect which were entered in the Blickling Psalter (M: see above, p. 86), probably by the mid-ninth century, are written in a type of script which has been called ‘West Saxon minuscule’, and which occurs, for example, in three charters connected with the West Saxon king Æthelwulf, Alfred's father: see S. Keynes, ‘The Power of the Written Word: Alfredian England 871–899’ (forthcoming), and, for the type of script, Crick, J., ‘The Case for a West Saxon Minuscule’, ASE 26 (1997), 63–75, at 68–70 and 74.Google Scholar

79 In explanation of the West Saxon appreciation of Mercian learning and the Mercian dialect it is not necessary to invoke that venerable ghost of philology, the merzisch-kentische Kirchensprache. This ‘Mercian-Kentish ecclesiastical language’, the postulation of which goes back to the brilliant psalter scholar Karl Wildhagen, is the shadowy product of a time when Old English dialects were even less sufficiently understood than in our days and has never been fleshed out by tangible evidence; cf. Wildhagen, , ‘Studien zum Psalterium Romanum’, p. 437.Google Scholar By the same token, the passionate plea, made by Vleeskruyer, for a Mercian literary language comparable to the Late West Saxon standard cannot be verified because of the scarcity of surviving texts; see Life of St Chad, ed. Vleeskruyer, , pp. 38–62.Google Scholar

80 Cf. Wrenn, C. L., ‘Standard Old English’, TPS (1933), 65–88Google Scholar, Quirk, R. and Wrenn, C. L.. An Old English Grammar, 2nd ed. (London, 1957), pp. 5–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and the seminal article by Gneuss, H., ‘The Origin of Standard Old English and Æthelwold's School at Winchester’, in his Language and History in Early England (Aldershot, 1996) I, 63–83 (originally published 1972).Google Scholar

81 For this rather more pragmatic view, see Keynes, , ‘King Alfred and the Mercians’, pp. 25–6.Google Scholar For the assumption of a far-reaching impact of the vision of a gens Anglorum, which found its most influential, though not exclusive, proponent in Bede, see especially Wormald, P., ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origin of the Gens Anglorum’, Ideal and Reality in Frankish and Anglo-Saxon Society: Studies presented to J. M. Wallace-Hadrill, ed. Wormald, P. with Bullough, D. and Collins, R. (Oxford, 1983), pp. 99–129, esp. 122–6Google Scholar; and idem, ‘Anglo-Saxon Society and its Literature’, The Cambridge Companion to Old English Literature, ed. Godden, M. and Lapidge, M. (Cambridge, 1991), pp. 1–22, at 7–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also Foot, S., ‘The Making of Angelcynn. English Identity before the Norman Conquest’, TRHS 6th ser. 6 (1996), 25–49.Google Scholar No doubt the term Angelcynn was much in vogue at King Alfred's court, but it is questionable whether it will bear the burden which some historians wish to place on it. Before speculating on the possible connotations of Bede's concept, and of the dominant role of Anglian culture which might be carried by the compound, we should bear in mind the caveat of word-formation and semantics: the alternative, Seaxcynn or Seaxnacynn, would not only have been less elegant in terms of phonotactics (that is the combination of sounds), it would also have been likely to produce confusion with the continental Saxons, the Ealdseaxe. A possible compounded first element such as Angel-Seaxnacynn would not have had much to recommend it even to Anglo-Saxons of less refined tastes in matters of language. What may be ruled out, simply by looking at the language of the manuscripts, is that King Alfred wished to promote the West Saxon dialect and culture in other parts of England, as has been suggested by Nelson, J. L., ‘Wealth and Wisdom: the Politics of Alfred the Great’, Kings and Kingship, ed. Rosenthal, J., Acta 11 (1984), 31–52, at 44–5Google Scholar, and idem, ‘The Political Ideas of Alfred of Wessex’, Kings and Kingship in Medieval Europe, ed. Duggan, A. J. (London, 1993), pp. 125–58, at 135–7.Google Scholar

82 For the scribe, see Ker, , Catalogue, p. 409 (no. 335).Google Scholar The calendar has been printed by Hennig, J., ‘Studies in the Literary Tradition of the Martyrologium Poeticum’, in his Medieval Ireland, Saints and Martyrologies, ed. Richter, M. (Northampton, 1989) VI, 197–226, at 220–5Google Scholar (originally published 1954); and in a useful diplomatic edition by Dumville, D. N., ‘The Kalendar of thejunius Psalter’, in his Liturgy and the Ecclesiastical History of Late Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 1992), pp. 1–38, at 3–14.Google Scholar It has been collated by McGurk, P., ‘The Metrical Calendar of Hampson. A New Edition’, AB 104 (1986), 79–125.Google Scholar

83 See Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 408–9 (no. 335)Google Scholar; Sisam, K., Salisbury Psalter, ed. Sisam, and Sisam, , p. 48Google Scholar; Bishop, T. A. M., ‘An Early Example of the Square Minuscule’, TCBS 4 (1964–1968), 246–52, at 247Google Scholar; Parkes, , ‘The Palaeography of the Parker Manuscript’, pp. 150–60Google Scholar; Temple, E., Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts 900–1066 (London, 1976), pp. 38–9Google Scholar; and Lapidge, M., ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar from Ramsey’, in his Anglo-Latin Literature 900–1066, pp. 343–86, at 361–2Google Scholar (originally published 1984). For the date and the script of Junius 27 as a specimen of Square minuscule Phase I, see Dumville, , ‘The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, pp. 92–3 and 104–6Google Scholar, and idem, ‘Square Minuscule’, pp. 169–73. The ascription to Winchester has recently been challenged by Dumville, who posits a Canterbury (Christ Church) origin for Junius 27, principally for two reasons: because of the presupposition that the gloss in Junius 27 is a direct copy of the (Canterbury) Vespasian Psalter (which we have seen it is not), and because the calendar is assumed to point to Canterbury (for which, see below): cf. Dumville, , ‘The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, pp. 73–5, 77–8, 87–8, 92–3 and 104Google Scholar; and idem, ‘The Kalendar’, esp. pp. 1 and 37–8.Google Scholar

84 Cf. English Calendars before A. D. 1100, ed. Wormald, F., HBS 72 (London, 1934), 5 and n. 2.Google Scholar

85 Cf. Hennig, , ‘Studies in the Literary Tradition’, p. 224Google Scholar, and Dumville, , ‘The Kalendar’, p. 21Google Scholar; for a convenient listing of the entries in question, see also ibid. pp. 18–19.

86 This much had already been implied by Bishop, E., Liturgica Historica (Oxford, 1918), p. 254.Google Scholar

87 These entries are listed by Dumville, , ‘The Kalendar’, pp. 22–3.Google Scholar

88 Note that St Eufemia, a widely culted saint, is commemorated in Junius on 16 September, her usual feast day in the Sanctorale; MCH has two entries for her, on 17 August (erroneously) and on 16 September. Also note that the Junius Calendar does not normally commemorate a saint on the days which are marked for vigils or octaves with reference to a high-status feast.

89 See, for example, the Leofric Missal, Oxford, Bodleian Library 579 (S.C. 2675) (s. ix, from northern Francia but in England in the later tenth century), printed by Warren, F. E., The Leofric Missal (Oxford, 1883), p. 136Google Scholar; the Winchcombe Sacramentary, Orléans, Bibliothèque Municipale 127 (105), s. xiin, from Winchcombe or Ramsey (?), printed by Davril, A., The Winchcombe Sacramentary, HBS 109 (London, 1995), 144Google Scholar; the sacramentary of Archbishop Robert of Jumièges, Rouen, Bibliothèque Municipale, 274 (Y 6), 1014 × 1023, from Peterborough or Ely (?), printed by Wilson, H. A., The Missal of Robert of Jumièges, HBS 11 (London, 1896), 155Google Scholar; and the New Minster Missal, Le Havre, Bibliothèque Municipale 330, s. xi2, from the New Minster, Winchester, printed by Turner, D. H., The Missal of the New Minster, HBS 93 (London, 1962), 64.Google Scholar

90 The calendars in question are English Calendars, ed. Wormald, nos. 9, 10, 11 and 12.

91 For Anastasius, his cult, and the presumed introduction of this cult by Archbishop Theodore, see Lapidge, M. in Biblical Commentaries from the Canterbury School of Theodore and Hadrian, ed. Bischoff, B. and Lapidge, M., CSASE 10 (Cambridge, 1994), 52, 64, 68–9 and 182–4.Google Scholar

92 Cf., for example, 10 May: Gordianus and Epimachus (MCH: Gordianus) or 16 June: Cyriacus and Julitta (MCH: Cyriacus); and cf. above, p. 108: SS Primas and Felicianus for MCH's St Columba on 9 June.Google Scholar

93 It may be worth mentioning that, while Vincentius is invoked in most of the Anglo-Saxon litanies of the saints, Anastasius occurs in only two of these litanies; one of these (preserved in London, BL, Royal 2. A. XX) is clearly associated with Archbishop Theodore: cf. Lapidge, M., Anglo-Saxon Litanies of the Saints, HBS 106 (London, 1991), 75, 304 and 320.Google Scholar

94 Cf. ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, ed. McGurk, , p. 101.Google Scholar Such confusion between the two feasts of a saint is not unusual in liturgical texts: in the New Minster Missal, for example, the mass sets for St Benedict on 21 March and 11 July both bear the rubric ‘Natale Sancti Benedicti abbatis’; cf. New Minster Missal, ed. Turner, , pp. 82 and 123.Google Scholar

95 The first (unsatisfactory) edition by Hampson, R. T., Medii Aevi Kalendarium, 2 vols. (London, 1841) I, 397–420Google Scholar has now been superseded by the edition by McGurk, ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’. For a discussion of the text, cf. ibid. 79–89; see further Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar’, pp. 359–65Google Scholar, and idem, ‘Schools, Learning and Literature’, pp. 15–16.Google Scholar See also the earlier discussion by Hennig, , ‘Studies in the literary Tradition’, pp. 216–19Google Scholar, and cf. McGurk, P., ‘The Metrical Calendar’, An Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Illustrated Miscellany. British Library Cotton Tiberius B. V Part 1, ed. McGurk, P., Dumville, D. N., Godden, M. R. and Knock, A., EEMF 21 (Copenhagen, 1983), 44–8.Google Scholar

96 For a brief discussion of the possible functions of metrical calendars, see Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar’, p. 343Google Scholar, and idem, ‘The Saintly Life in Anglo-Saxon England’, Cambridge Companion, ed. Godden, and Lapidge, , pp. 243–63, at 248–50.Google Scholar

97 For bibliographical references for the dating and localization of Tiberius B. v and Julius A. vi, see Dumville, , ‘The Kalendar’, p. 20, n. 30.Google Scholar

98 See the textual discussion by McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, pp. 86–8.Google Scholar

99 For the date of the quires of Galba A. xviii in which MCH is contained, see Dumville, , ‘The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, p. 74.Google Scholar

100 See McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, pp. 84–5 and his stemma on p. 88Google Scholar; but note the somewhat sceptical view concerning the assumption that Junius 27 is a direct copy of Galba A. xviii by Dumville, , ‘The Kalendar’, pp. 28–9 and 38.Google Scholar

101 For the date and the continental origin of Galba A. xviii, see Gneuss, Handlist, no. 34, which, in turn, is based on B. Bischoff's forthcoming catalogue (vol. 2) of ninth-century continental manuscripts. For a recent description (with bibliography) of the manuscript, and for the suggestion that Galba A. xviii may already have travelled to England at some point in the later ninth century, see Keynes, S., ‘Anglo-Saxon Entries in the Liber Vttae of Brescia’, Alfred the Wise, ed. Roberts, et al. , pp. 99–119, at 117–19.Google Scholar Note that the ascription to Winchester has recently been challenged by Dumville, : ‘Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, pp. 73–7 and 87–8Google Scholar, and ‘The Kalendar’, p. 38.Google Scholar

102 On the art historical aspects of Galba A. xviii, see Temple, , Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, pp. 36–7 (no. 5)Google Scholar; Wormald, F., ‘The Winchester School before St Ethelwold’, in his Collected Writings, I: Studies in Medieval Art from the Sixth to the Twelfth Centuries, ed. Alexander, J. J. G., Brown, T. J. and Gibbs, J. (Oxford, 1984), pp. 76–84, at 79Google Scholar; Deshman, R., ‘Anglo-Saxon Art after Alfred’, Art Bull. 56 (1974), 176–200, esp. 178–90, 193 and 197–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and, particularly, Deshman, R., ‘The Galba Psalter: Pictures, Texts and Context in an Early Medieval Prayerbook’, ASE 26 (1997), 109–37.Google Scholar For the influence of Galba A. xviii on the Benedictional, see, for example, Alexander, J. J. G., ‘The Benedictional of St Æthelwold and Anglo-Saxon Illumination of the Reform Period’, Tenth-Century Studies. Essays in Commemoration of the Millennium of the Council of Winchester and ‘Regularis Concordia’, ed. Parsons, D. (London, 1975), pp. 169–83, at 176, 178–9 and passimGoogle Scholar, Temple, , Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, p. 49 (no. 23)Google Scholar; and Deshman, R., The Benedictional of Æthelwold (Princeton, NJ, 1995), pp. 20–4, 84–6, 146–58, 166–7, 259–60 and passim.Google Scholar

103 See Deshman, , ‘The Galba Psalter’, pp. 128–35Google Scholar; for the Winchester origin of the early-tenthcentury additions to the Psalter, cf. also ibid. pp. 137–8.

104 It should also be noted that there are art historical links between Galba A. xviii and Junius 27: see, for example, Temple, , Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, p. 39 (no. 7).Google Scholar

105 For the possible association of Galba A. xviii with the court of Alfred's grandson, King Æthelstan, see Keynes, S., ‘King Æthelstan's Books’, Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England, ed. Lapidge, and Gneuss, , pp. 143–201, at 193–8Google Scholar, and Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 310–15 and 330–1.Google Scholar

106 For a brief survey of what texts may be dated to Edward's reign, see Lapidge, , ‘Schools, Learning and Literature’, pp. 12–16.Google Scholar

107 See McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, p. 84 and n. 22Google Scholar; idem, in An Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Illustrated Miscellany, p. 48; and Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar’, p. 363.Google Scholar The obit for Ealhswith in Tiberius B. v is: ‘Quinta tenet ueram dominam Anglorum Ealhswythe caram.’ This was probably also the original reading of Galba A. xviii, where caram is now missing, presumably through mutilation of the manuscript: see McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, p. 110, apparatus criticus for line 339. The Tiberius and (presumed) Galba line is hypermetrical and hence probably not original. Arguably, caram was intended (by the original poet?) as an alternative for ueram, written, perhaps, above the line and subsequently copied as part of the line. I am grateful to Michael Lapidge for this suggestion (personal communication). In any case, the vacillation between the two adjectives gives us a glimpse of the author's emotional involvement in the Ealhswith obit.Google Scholar

108 See McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, pp. 108 and 110, apparatus criticus to lines 299 and 339.Google Scholar

109 The fourteen Irish feasts in MCH such as The Finding of the Head of St Paul (25 February) or The Finding of the Head of St John the Baptist (27 February) are listed by Bishop, , Liturgica Historica, p. 255, n. 1 (b).Google Scholar

110 Ibid. p. 256; the reference is to Asset's Life, ch. 76, ed. Stevenson, , p. 60.Google Scholar

111 Cf., for example, McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, p. 89Google Scholar, and Bullough, D. A., ‘The Educational Tradition from Alfred to Ælfric: Teaching utriusque linguae’, in his Carotingian Renewal: Sources and Heritage (Manchester, 1991), pp. 297–334, at 301 (originally published 1972).Google Scholar

112 See Bishop, , Liturgica Historica, p. 256.Google Scholar

113 For Grimbald and his career, see Lapidge, M., ‘Grimbald of Saint-Bertin’, Blackwell Encyclopaedia, pp. 221–2Google Scholar; Keynes, and Lapidge, , Alfred the Great, pp. 26–8, 182–6 and 331–3Google Scholar; The Liber Vitae of the New Minster and Hyde Abbey Winchester: British Library Stowe 944, ed. Keynes, S., EEMF 26 (Copenhagen, 1996), 16–18Google Scholar; see also Grierson, P., ‘Grimbald of St Bertin's’, EHR 55 (1940), 529–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Bately, J., ‘Grimbald of St Bertin's’, MÆ, 35 (1966), 1–10.Google Scholar

114 For the Metrical Calendar of York, see Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar’, pp. 343–59.Google Scholar This metrical calendar consisted, in its original form, of eighty-two hexameters and was composed, probably at York, in the later eighth century. It enjoyed a wide circulation on the Continent, and, interestingly, the earliest witness to its continental diffusion is a manuscript from Rheims which can be dated to the episcopacy of Archbishop Ebbo (816–46). The manuscript was destroyed by fire, but a transcript made by Jean Mabillon has survived: see Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar’, pp. 350–1.Google Scholar That the Metrical Calendar of York was laid under contribution by the author of MCH is clear from a number of lines lifted either verbatim or in a slightly recast form from the York calendar: see ibid. pp. 363–4, and McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, p. 82. That a continental redaction (rather than an English one) of the Metrical Calendar of York was used by the author of MCH is suggested not only by the state of English libraries after the Viking incursions, but also by the fact that only a very few English saints appear in its 365 verses.Google Scholar

115 For the books possibly imported to England by Grimbald, see Keynes, and Lapidge, , Alfred the Great, p. 214, n. 26Google Scholar; Gneuss, H., ‘Anglo-Saxon Libraries from the Conversion to the Benedictine Reform’, in his Books and Libraries in Early England (Aldershot, 1996) II, 643–89, at 678–9 (originally published 1986)Google Scholar; and Lapidge, M., ‘Prolegomena to an Edition of Bede's Metrical Vita Sancti Cuthberti’, Filologia mediolatina 2 (1995), 127–63, at 155–7.Google Scholar

116 It may be worth mentioning that the author of MCH has a certain penchant for grecisms: see Lapidge, , ‘Schools, Learning and Literature’, p. 16 and n. 46.Google Scholar As I have tried to show elsewhere, the tenth-century fascination with the hermeneutic style, which first becomes manifest at the court of King Æthelstan (924–39), had some Alfredian roots: see Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 341–4. The use of grecisms in MCH would attest to the rising trajectory of this style in the decades preceding Æthelstan's reign.Google Scholar

117 This is the suggestion made by Dumville, who holds Christ Church, Canterbury to be the church in question: see ‘The Kalendar’, pp. 37–8 and passim.Google Scholar

118 For the foundation of the New Minster, see Keynes, , Liber Vttae, pp. 16–18.Google Scholar

119 Cf. the description of manuscripts preserving the continental redaction of the Metrical Calendar of York by Lapidge, , ‘A Tenth-Century Metrical Calendar’, pp. 349–62.Google Scholar

120 Cf., for example, St Felix and SS Primus and Felicianus replacing SS Fursey and Columba; see above, p. 108.Google Scholar

121 Cf. 7 October: the feast of St Matthew having been replaced by Pope Marcus; for the Irish feasts in MCH, see above, p. 112, n. 109.Google Scholar

122 In view of the Junius compiler's orthodoxy, Austraberta is clearly an eccentric choice, and thus may be of special significance too. Note that Austraberta, a seventh-century abbess of Pavilly (in Normandy), received the veil from St Audomarus (St Omer), that during the Viking raids in the mid-ninth century the nuns of the Pavilly community took temporary refuge in the church of Sainte-Marie, which was situated in close proximity to the community of Saint-Bertin, and that, as a token of their gratitude, they donated a relic of St Austraberta to the church of Sainte-Marie. In other words, Grimbald of Saint-Bertin may well have been familiar with, and perhaps attached to, the cult of St Austraberta. The liturgical veneration of St Austraberta in Anglo-Saxon England has recently been studied by Corréa, A., ‘St Austraberta of Pavilly in the Anglo-Saxon Liturgy’, AB 115 (1997), 77–112.Google Scholar For her links with Saint-Omer and Saint-Bertin, see ibid. pp. 81, 83 and 87–8. The cult of St Austraberta was not widespread in Anglo-Saxon England. The scribe of MCH in Julius A. vi did not even recognize her name in his exemplar: cf. McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, p. 93Google Scholar, apparatus criticus to line 42. Austraberta only occurs in two further Anglo-Saxon calendars and in only four litanies of the saints (cf. Wormald, English Kalendars, nos. 2 and 13 (in no. 8 Austraberta has been added by a later hand), and see Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Litanies, nos. II.i. 66; XIII.l 19; XVIII.86; and XLIII.141). In addition, a blessing for Austraberta is preserved in two eleventh-century benedictionals (London, BL, Harley 2892 and Paris, BN, lat. 987, part 2): see Corréa, , ‘St Austraberta’, pp. 92–7Google Scholar (for the calendars and litanies) and 97–107 (for the benedictionals). From these liturgical commemorations it emerges that in the later eleventh century she was culted to some extent at Christ Church, Canterbury, which had acquired relics of the saint: see Corréa, , ‘St Austraberta’, pp. 94–7 and 107–9Google Scholar; see also Gneuss, H., ‘Origin and Provenance of Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: the Case of Cotton Tiberius A. Ill’, Of the Making of Books. Medieval Manuscripts, their Scribes and Readers. Essays presented to M. B. Parkes, ed. Robinson, P. R. and Zim, R. (Aldershot, 1997), pp. 13–43, at 32Google Scholar, and Dumville, , ‘The Kalendar’, p. 27. In the light of this later Canterbury cult it seems odd that the Canterbury scribe of Julius A. vi should have failed to identify Austraberta in his exemplar.Google Scholar

123 Such initials mark, for example, the beginnings of Pss. XXVI, XXXVIII, LII, LXVIII, LXXX, XCVII and CIX (two of these initials have been cut out). The initials indicate the first psalms sung at Nocturns from Monday to Saturday (the first psalm sung at Nocturns on Sunday was Ps. I, which would have had an especially decorated initial in any case); they also indicate the first of the psalms (CIX) for Vespers on Sunday, all according to the secular Office. For tables comparing the medieval secular and monastic (Benedictine) Office, see, for example, Hughes, A., Medieval Manuscripts for Mass and Office: a Guide to their Organisation and Terminology (Toronto, 1982), pp. 52 and 230Google Scholar, and cf. the brief remarks, ibid. pp. 50–1; and Harper, J., The Forms and Orders of Western Liturgy from the Tenth to the Eighteenth Century (Oxford, 1991), pp. 258–9 and 243–50.Google Scholar

124 The source for this information is lectio vi on St Grimbald's feast day (8 July) in the early-fourteenth-century Monastic Breviary of Hyde Abbey, which in turn appears to be based on a lost late-tenth-century uita, see Grierson, , ‘Grimbald of St Berlin's’, pp. 530–40.Google Scholar

125 See Keynes, , Liber Vitae, p. 17.Google Scholar

126 See ibid.; the New Minster tradition is preserved in an account of the early history of the New Minster, composed 988 X 990, and subsequently incorporated, as an introduction, into the Liber Vitae of the New Minster, written in 1031 (now, London, BL, Stowe 944): see Keynes, , Liber Vitae, pp. 31–2 and 81–2Google Scholar; for the date of the Liber Vitae, see ibid. pp. 66–7.

127 See ibid. p. 17; for a discussion of the charters concerning the foundation of the New Minster, see Keynes, , ‘The West Saxon Charters’, pp. 1141–7.Google Scholar

128 On Gildas, see, briefly, The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, ed. Cross, , pp. 675–6Google Scholar; Lapidge, M., ‘Gildas’, Blackwell Encyclopaedia, p. 204Google Scholar; and Gildas: New Approaches, ed. Lapidge, M. and Dumville, D. N. (Woodbridge, 1984).Google Scholar For Gildas's training and the problems involved in dating his literary activity, see esp. M. Lapidge, ‘Gildas's Education and the Latin Culture of SubRoman Britain’, ibid. pp. 27–50, and D. N. Dumville, ‘Gildas and Maelgwn: Problems of Dating’, ibid. pp. 51–9.

129 See English Kalendars, nos. 2,3,4, 5, 6,1,14 and 19.

130 MCH in its original form does not commemorate Gildas: on 29 January it has Valerius, a thirdcentury bishop of Trier, and a saint not widely culted in Anglo-Saxon England. Note that Valerius on the 29th is substituted by Gildas in Tiberius B. v: cf. McGurk, , ‘Metrical Calendar of Hampson’, p. 92, apparatus criticus to line 29.Google Scholar

131 See Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Litanies, nos. XXIII, XXXVIII and XLIV; the last two are of Breton origin.

132 A representative of this tradition would be Hincmar (d. 882), archbishop of Rheims and Fulco's predecessor, who was centrally involved in the composition of the annals of SaintBertin: cf. Les Annales de Saint-Bertin, ed. Grat, F., Vielliard, J. and Clemencent, S. (Paris, 1964)Google Scholar; trans. Nelson, J. L., The Annals of St-Bertin (Manchester, 1991)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; for Hincmar's authorship of the latter parts of the Annals, see ibid. pp. 9–13.

133 See, for example, Parkes, , ‘The Palaeography of the Parker Chronicle’, pp. 160–3Google Scholar, and Keynes, and Lapidge, , Alfred the Great, pp. 40 and 217, n. 60.Google Scholar

134 For the MCH entries, see above, p. 112.Google Scholar

135 See Keynes, , Liber Vitae, p. 17.Google Scholar The burials of members of the royal family are recorded in the late-tenth-century account incorporated in the Liber Vitae of the New Minster; see ibid. p. 81. For the connection with the royal family and the New Minster as a church for a replanned town with an increasing population, see ibid. pp. 17–18 (with further references).

136 See Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (F). The annal there is misdated to 903; for this and for further manifestations of the cult of St judoc at the New Minster, see Keynes, , Liber Vitae, pp. 17–18.Google Scholar

137 The fact that none of the saints (such as St Judoc or St Grimbald himself) whose cult had demonstrably developed at the New Minster during the intervening years found their way into the Junius Calendar may appear less striking when we reflect that, as late as c. 1005, Ælfric in his Letter to the Monks of Eynsham (an epitome of the Regularis concordia which he composed for use in the monastery where he had recently been installed as abbot) occasionally adopts blank liturgical formulas from his source and thus fails to record for posterity important liturgical details such as the dedication of the monastery church at Eynsham, or which saints were especially venerated there: see Jones, C. A., Ælfric's Letter to the Monks of Eynsham, CSASE 24 (Cambridge, 1998), 68, 159, n. 53,170, n. 98 and 215, n. 313.Google Scholar For eleventh-century evidence for the cult of St Grimbald at the New Minster, see The Durham Collector, ed. Correa, A., HBS 107 (London, 1992), 121–2.Google Scholar

138 For Frithestan, the Winchester minsters and the royal court, see Keynes, , Liber Vitae, pp. 18–19Google Scholar; for the New Minster tradition concerning Frithestan, see ibid. p. 101 (no. XV). For the stole and maniple, see The Relics of St Cuthbert, ed. Battiscombe, C. F. (Oxford, 1956), pp. 375–432.Google Scholar For Frithestan's involvement in the production of manuscripts, see Parkes, , ‘The Palaeography of the Parker Chronicle’, pp. 159–60 and 165–6Google Scholar; for the connections between the manuscripts, see above, p. 99. For Junius 27 and Frithestan, see also Wormald, , ‘The Winchester School before St Ethelwold’, in his Collected Writings I, 77–8.Google Scholar

139 See Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 325–31.Google Scholar

140 For a description of the initials, see Wormald, F., ‘Decorated Initials in English Manuscripts from A. D. 900 to 1100’, in his Collected Writings I, 47–75, at 55–6.Google Scholar For lists of later manuscripts with initials deriving from the Junius types, see ibid. pp. 72–5. See also Temple, , Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, pp. 38–9 (no. 7).Google Scholar For the apparently deliberate exclusion of the Junius-type initials from the Benedictional, see Temple, , Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, p. 52 (no. 23)Google Scholar; Alexander, , ‘The Benedictional of St Æthelwold’, pp. 174 and 181–2Google Scholar, and Deshman, , Benedictional, pp. 248–9 and 252.Google Scholar

141 See Gretsch, , The Intellectual Foundations, pp. 326–8.Google Scholar

142 For this presumed political tension, see Keynes, , ‘England, 900–1016’, pp. 467–8Google Scholar; idem, Liber Vitae, pp. 19–21; and Yorke, B., ‘Æthelwold and the Politics of the Tenth Century’, Bishop Ætbelwold: his Career and Influence, ed. Yorke, B. (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 65–88, at 71–3.Google Scholar

143 See Wulfstan of Winchester: the Life of Æthelwold, ed. Lapidge, M. and Winterbottom, M., Oxford Med. Texts (Oxford, 1991), pp. 10–11 (ch. 7).Google Scholar

144 I am deeply grateful to Helmut Gneuss, Simon Keynes, Michael Lapidge and Carolin Schreiber for commenting on this article and for their help in various respects.