Taking as its chronological and geographical limits the period and area of Anglo-Saxon domination, this study provides a guide to the Latin literature that existed alongside the vernacular. It does so through a chronological survey of known works, based on a thorough examination of documents and of modern scholarship. It includes ample illustrative quotations, with accompanying English translations, and the forms associated with individual (although sometimes anonymous) writers, the histories, biographies, letters, poetry, treatises, and some liturgies. An important feature of the book is the very full bibliography, which is keyed to the text discussions. Originally published in 1967. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Organized with the assistance of an international advisory committee of medievalists from several disciplines, Medieval Latin: An Introduction and Bibliographical Guide is a new standard guide to the Latin language and literature of the period from c. A.D. 200 to 1500. It promises to be indispensable as a handbook in university courses in Medieval Latin and as a point of departure for the study of Latin texts and documents in any of the fields of medieval studies. Comprehensive in scope, the guide provides introductions to, and bibliographic orientations in, all the main areas of Medieval Latin language, literature, and scholarship. Part One consists of an introduction and sizable listing of general print and electronic reference and research tools. Part Two focuses on issues of language, with introductions to such topics as Biblical and Christian Latin, and Medieval Latin pronunciation, orthography, morphology and syntax, word formation and lexicography, metrics, prose styles, and so on. There are chapters on the Latin used in administration, law, music, commerce, the liturgy, theology and philosophy, science and technology, and daily life. Part Three offers a systematic overview of Medieval Latin literature, with introductions to a wide range of genres and to translations from and into Latin. Each chapter concludes with a bibliography of fundamental works--texts, lexica, studies, and research aids. This guide satisfies a long-standing need for a reference tool in English that focuses on medieval latinity in all its specialized aspects. It will be welcomed by students, teachers, professional latinists, medievalists, humanists, and general readers interested in the role of Latin as the learned lingua franca of western Europe. It may also prove valuable to reference librarians assembling collections concerned with Latin authors and texts of the postclassical period. ABOUT THE EDITORS F. A. C. Mantello is professor of Medieval Latin at The Catholic University of America. A. G. Rigg is professor of English and medieval studies and chairman of the Medieval Latin Committee at the University of Toronto's Centre for Medieval Studies. PRASIE FOR THE BOOK "This extraordinary volume, joint effort of dozens of scholars in eight countries, will be in constant use for research, for advising students and designing courses, and for answering the queries of nonmedievalist colleagues. . . . Medieval Latin provides a foundation for advances in research and teaching on a wide front. . . . Though Mantello and Rigg's Medieval Latin is a superb reference volume, I recommend that it also be read from beginning to end--in small increments, of course. The rewards will be sheaves of notes and an immensely enriched appreciation of Medieval Latin and its literature."--Janet M. Martin, Princeton University, Speculum "A remarkable achievement, and no one interested in medieval Latin can afford to be without it."--Journal of Ecclesiastical History "Everywhere there is clarity, conclusion, judicious illustration, and careful selection of what is central. This guide is a major achievement and will serve Medieval Latin studies extremely well for the foreseeable future."--The Classical Review

The Latin literature of Anglo-Saxon England remains poorly understood. No bibliography of the subject exists. No comprehensive and authoritative history of Anglo-Latin literature has ever been written. It is only in recent years, largely through the essays collected in the present volumes, that the outline and intrinsic interest of the field have been clarified. Indeed, until a comprehensive history of the period is written, these collected essays offer the only reliable guide to the subject. The essays in the first volume are concerned with the earliest period of literary activity in England. Following a general essay which surveys the field as a whole, the essays range from the arrival of Theodore and Hadrian, through Aldhelm and Bede, to Aediluulf.

The Latin literature of Anglo-Saxon England remains poorly understood. No bibliography of the subject exists. No comprehensive and authoritative history of Anglo-Latin literature has ever been written. It is only in recent years, largely through the essays collected in the present volumes, that the outline and intrinsic interest of the field have been clarified. Indeed, until a comprehensive history of the period is written, these collected essays offer the only reliable guide to the subject. The essays in the first volume are concerned with the earliest period of literary activity in England. Following a general essay which surveys the field as a whole, the essays range from the arrival of Theodore and Hadrian, through Aldhelm and Bede, to Aediluulf.

First published in 1998, this valuable reference work offers concise, expert answers to questions on all aspects of life and culture in Medieval England, including art, architecture, law, literature, kings, women, music, commerce, technology, warfare and religion. This wide-ranging text encompasses English social, cultural, and political life from the Anglo-Saxon invasions in the fifth century to the turn of the sixteenth century, as well as its ties to the Celtic world of Wales, Scotland and Ireland, the French and Anglo-Norman world of the Continent and the Viking and Scandinavian world of the North Sea. A range of topics are discussed from Sedulius to Skelton, from Wulfstan of York to Reginald Pecock, from Pictish art to Gothic sculpture and from the Vikings to the Black Death. A subject and name index makes it easy to locate information and bibliographies direct users to essential primary and secondary sources as well as key scholarship. With more than 700 entries by over 300 international scholars, this work provides a detailed portrait of the English Middle Ages and will be of great value to students and scholars studying Medieval history in England and Europe, as well as non-specialist readers.

Originally published in 1977, Old English and Middle English Poetry provides a historical approach to English poetry. The book examines the conditions out of which poetry grew and argues that the functions that it was assigned are historically integral to an informed understanding of the nature of poetry. The book aims to relate poems to the intellectual and formal traditions by which they are shaped and given their being. This book will be of interest to students and academics studying or working in the fields of literature and history alike.

The popular notion that sees the Anglo-Saxon era as “The Dark Ages” perhaps has tended to obscure for many people the creations and strengths of that time. This collection, in examining many aspects of pre-Norman Britain, helps to illuminate how Anglo-Saxon society contributed to the continuity of knowledge between the ancient world and the modern world. But as well, it posits a view of that society in its own distinctive terms to show how it developed as a synthesis of radically different cultures. The Bayeux Tapestry is examined for its underlying political motivations; the study of Old English literature is extended to such works as laws, charters, apocryphal literature, saints’ lives and mythologies, and many of these are studied for the insight they provide into the social structures of the Anglo-Saxons. Other essays examine both the institution of slavery and the use of Germanic warrior terminology in Old Saxon as a contribution towards the descriptive analysis of that society’s social groupings. The book also presents a perspective on the Christian church that is usually overlooked by historians: that its existence was continuous and influential from Roman times, and that it was greatly affected by the Celtic Christian church long after the latter was thought to have disintegrated.

Alexander’s A History of Old English Literature is an outstanding introduction to a difficult period of literary history. It provides a simple historical and cultural context for the study of the Anglo-Saxons, and offers a history, illustrated by many passages in translation, of the whole of the literature that survives. While it contains solid, insightful and sensible criticism of individual literary works, its overall historical organization suggests that Old English literature was created in a cultural context that changed from one century to another. Although its intentions are scholarly, this history of Old English literature is also an introduction, assuming little knowledge of this period or its surviving products, and none of its language. This edition has been revised and rewritten throughout, and offers a new preface as well as an updated bibliography.

A HISTORY OF OLD ENGLISH LITERATURE A History of Old English Literature has been significantly revised to provide an unequivocal response to the renewed historicism in medieval studies. Focusing on the production and reception of Old English texts and on their relation to Anglo-Saxon history and culture, this new edition covers an exceptionally broad array of genres. These range from riddles and cryptograms to allegory, liturgical texts, and romance, as well as lyric poetry and heroic legend. The authors also integrate discussions of Anglo-Latin texts, crucial to understanding the development of Old English literature. This second edition incorporates extensive reference to scholarship that has evolved over the past decade, with new chapters on both Anglo-Saxon manuscripts and on incidental and marginal texts. There is expanded treatment throughout, including increased coverage of legal texts and scientific and scholastic texts. The book concludes with a retrospective outline of the reception of Anglo-Saxon literature and culture in subsequent periods.