Writers from the Old English period

Writers from the Old English period

Ælfric (955?-1020?) [Dark Ages] A monk of the late Old English period who wrote prolifically, often on linguistic matters. Apart from his Catholic Homilies and Lives of the Saints we have a Latin grammar with glossary which was compiled in English. His Colloquium was intended to improve knowledge of Latin among his pupils. Ælfric worked as a monk in the Benedictine monastery of Winchester and later at Eynsham (near Oxford) where he became abbot around 1006.

Alfred, King (849-899) [Dark Ages] The most famous of Old English kings, called ‘Alfred the Great’. He was a West-Saxon and assumed the leadership of his community in 871 and was immediately confronted by difficult military engagements with the Vikings who were pressing south. Alfred was also concerned with the reform of monastic life and had a number of translations made which are importants monuments of (early West-Saxon) Old English.

Bede, The Venerable (673?-735) [Dark Ages] English monk and historian. Bede was born in Northumbria and became a monk at Jarrow where he remained for the remainder of his life. Bede is known to posterity as the author of Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum ‘Ecclesiastical history of the English people’ which is the main historical source for the Old English period. He was an accurate and reliable observer and compiler of historical information and it is to him that we know of when and how the initial Germanic invasion of Britain took place.

The Origin Of English Video

When we talk about ‘English’, we often think of it as a single language. But what do the dialects spoken in dozens of countries around the world have in common with each other, or with the writings of Chaucer? Claire Bowern traces the language from the present day back to its ancient roots, showing how English has evolved through generations of speakers.

The Origins of the Old English

The Origin Of the Old English

Old English is one of the Germanic group of Indo-European languages. It was spoken, and written, in England before about 1100AD. It is sometimes referred to as Anglo-Saxon.

There were four distinct dialects of Old English: Northumbrian, Mercia, Kentish and West-Saxon. This is known through differences in spelling. After 900AD West-Saxon became widely used as a standard written language, and is sometimes referred to as 'Classic West-Saxon'.

Two stages of the West-Saxon dialect can be distinguished - early West Saxon (eWS), which is the language of the time of King Alfred (c. 900), and late West Saxon (lWS), which is seen in the works of Ælfric (c. 1000). The most important difference is that in eWS ie and īe appear in lWS texts as y and ŷ (for example, eWS fierd becomes fyrd in lWS). Another is that ea may be spelt e in lWS (for example, eWS scēap becomes scēp in lWS).

According to Tacitus the West Germanic people were divided into three major tribal groups: Ingvaeones, Istvaeones, Erminones. It is not clear what these groups corresponded to, but they mark out some important geographical distributions that correspond to later dialect groups.


This whole issue of word origins is very difficult as Latin, the Germanic tongues, Old English (derived from Germanic), and the Celtic tongues are all ultimately derived from a common Indo-European root, and are cognates (related). This can easily be demonstrated by looking (for example) at the words I, me, is, brother, ten.

Old English, New Influences

 

EDSITEment's introduction to Anglo-Saxon literature

June 14, 2011 | By Aia Hussein

From https://www.neh.gov/news/old-english-new-influences

 

Anglo-Saxon (Old English) literature – of which the best-known example is the epic poem Beowulf – flourished from the sixth century CE until the Norman Conquest. But its influence persists today in many contemporary fantasy works of which J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy and J. K. Rowling’s wildly popular Harry Potter series are perhaps the most recognizable. One need only scan the shelves at a local bookstore or note the continued popularity of contemporary medievalist fantasy dramas to know that the old world of the Anglo-Saxon literary tradition, with its fire-breathing dragons and unique poetic form, continues as part of mainstream popular culture.

 

As one of the first literary scholars to write seriously on the monsters of Beowulf in his seminal work “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics,” J. R. R. Tolkien understood well the effects of Anglo-Saxon literature on the modern imagination. A number of Anglo-Saxon themes and motifs appear in his Lord of the Rings trilogy and many of the character and place names in the mythological world of his novels are derived from Old English. For example, the root word searu-, which means "treachery” or “cunning,” appears in the name Saruman – whom devoted Tolkien fans will recognize as a major antagonist in the fantasy novels; and the Old English word for earth, middan-geard, becomes Middle-earth, the aptly-named fantasy world of the novels.

Less overt, but no less interesting, is the apparent influence of Anglo-Saxon literature on J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series. Harry’s fierce battle with the Hungarian Horntail during the Triwizard Tournament in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire recalls another mighty confrontation between man and dragon as described in Beowulf.

Undoubtedly functioning as one literary influence among many, Anglo-Saxon literature is most apparent in Rowling’s use of words like “deathday” – an annual celebration of a ghost’s death as opposed to birth – which, according to the Oxford English Dictionary is derived from the Old English word deothdeage. Similarly, “grindylow” – the name of an underwater species that attacks Harry during the Triwizard Tournament – may be derived from the name of one of Beowulf’s antagonists whose home is also underwater, Grendel.

There are countless other literary works that could be analyzed for their Anglo-Saxon inspiration, demonstrating that critical study of the language continues to be both interesting and relevant. This it’s a fragment of the riddle 4 of Beowulf

My gown is silent as I thread the seas,
Haunt old buildings or tread the land.
Sometimes my song-coat and the supple wind
Cradle me high over the homes of men,
And the power of clouds carries me
Windward over cities. Then my bright silks
Start to sing, whistle, roar,
Resound and ring, while I
Sail on untouched by earth and sea,
A spirit, ghost and guest, on wing.

 

 

Periods of English Literature

Periods of English literature

Old English: sixth through eleventh centuries

c. 410: Withdrawal of Roman legions

449 :Jutes arrive in Kent under Hengest

477 :First Saxon invasion (Sussex)

495 :Second Saxon invasion (Wessex)

537 :Death of King Arthur (resistance of Britons at an end)

547: Norwegian (Viking) colony in Northumbria

565 :St. Columba: Irish mission

597 :St. Augustine at Canterbury (Roman mission)

664 :Synod of Whitby eighth century Mercia (Midlands) predominant among seven kingdoms (Northumbria, East Anglia, Essex, Kent, Sussex, Wessex)

802: Egbert of Wessex rules over Essex, Kent, Sussex

866 :Danish "Great Army" (Vikings) lands in East Anglia and occupies Northumbria and Mercia as well

871 :Alfred the Great King of Wessex (d. 899)

878: boundary to Danelaw between London and Chester tenth century English forces re-occupy Danelaw

c. 990: another Danish invasion in the south (Sweyn)

1016: Canute, son of Sweyn, king of England

1042 :Death of Canute´s son; Edward the Confessor

1066: Death of Edward the Confessor; Harold (queen´s brother) defeats the Norwegian invaders at Battle of Stamford Bridge (near York), but is defeated himself in the Battle of Hastings by William the Conqueror (Normandy).

Quiz

1. During the Old English Period, who invaded Britannia (Great Britain)?
A. The Jutes
B. The Angles and the Saxons
C. All of These
D. The Danes / Scandinavians


2. Who was the legendary literary figure said to have resisted the Germanic invaders/mercenaries?

A. Hrothgar
B. Alfred the Great
C. King Arthur
D. Joseph of Arimethea


3. For many years, there was no native literature in England. What changed that?
A. The Romans established schools of literacy
B. The island became largely Christian
C. The Germanic invaders brought a literary tradition
D. The Druids recorded their religious histories


4. Whose "Ecclesiastical History of the English People" recounts the story of the Church in England?
A. St. Jerome's
B. Venerable Bede's
C. St. Augustine's
D. King Ethelbert's


5. What Old English poem tells the story of resistance against a Scandinavian raid?
A. The Battle of Maldon
B. Beowulf
C. Caedmon's Hymn
D. The Dream of the Rood


6. What king of the West Saxons supported literature, even translating Boethius's "Consolation of Philosophy"?
A. King Henry
B. King Alfred
C. King Ethelbert
D. King Arthur


7. Bede tells the story of an unlearned cowherd who instituted a school of Christian poetry. Who was he?
A. Hrothgar
B. Caedmon
C. Beowulf
D. Heglac


8. The author who wrote down "Beowulf" was probably a:
A. Christian
B. Roman Pagan
C. Celtic Pagan
D. Danish Pagan


9. Who is "the young hero" of the poem "The Dream of the Rood"?
A. Hrothgar
B. Beowulf
C. Jesus Christ
D. King Arthur


10. Which of the following is an example of a kenning?
A. Swift sword
B. Triumph-tree
C. Keel
D. Wyrd

11. Where does this quote come from? "Then middle-earth, mankind's Guardian, eternal Lord, afterwards made."
A. The Lord of the Rings
B. The Battle of Maldon
C. Beowulf
D. Caedmon's Hymn


12. From what work does this quote come? "Wonderful was the triumph-tree, and I stained with sins, wounded with wrongdoings."
A. Beowulf
B. The Wanderer
C. The Battle of Maldon
D. The Dream of the Rood


13. What work begins, "Yes, we have heard of the glory of the Spear-Danes' kings in the old days--how the princes of that people did brave deeds."
A. The Dream of the Rood
B. Beowulf
C. The Battle of Maldon
D. The Wanderer


14. What work contains the characters Birhtnoth and Ethelred?
A. Beowulf
B. The Wanderer
C. The Dream of the Rood
D. The Battle of Maldon


15. In "Beowulf," what is wergild?
A. Fate
B. Whale-road
C. Monster
D. Blood-price

Poetry

Old English poetry falls broadly into two styles or fields of reference, the heroic Germanic and the Christian. Almost all Old English poets are anonymous.

Although there are Anglo-Saxon discourses on Latin prosody, the rules of Old English verse are understood only through modern analysis of the extant texts. The first widely accepted theory was constructed by Eduard Sievers (1893), who distinguished five distinct alliterative patterns. His system of alliterative verseis based on accent, alliteration, the quantity of vowels, and patterns of syllabic accentuation. It consists of five permutations on a base verse scheme; any one of the five types can be used in any verse. The system was inherited from and exists in one form or another in all of the older Germanic languages. Two poetic figures commonly found in Old English poetry are the kenning, an often formulaic phrase that describes one thing in terms of another (e.g. in Beowulf, the sea is called the whale road) and litotes, a dramatic understatement employed by the author for ironic effect. Alternative theories have been proposed, such as the theory of John C. 

Lexilogo

Old English Dicctionary

Introduction to the Anglo Saxon Literary Time Period: Old English

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Beowulf

The Vikings

By the late 8th Century, the Vikings (or Norsemen) began to make sporadic raids on the east cost of Britain. They came from Denmark, Norway and Sweden, although it was the Danes who came with the greatest force. Notorious for their ferocity, ruthlessness and callousness, the Vikings pillaged and plundered the towns and monasteries of northern England - in 793, they sacked and looted the wealthy monastery at Lindisfarne in Northumbria - before turning their attentions further south. By about 850, the raiders had started to over-winter in southern England and, in 865, there followed a full-scale invasion and on-going battles for the possession of the country.

The Vikings spoke Old Norse, an early North Germanic language not that dissimilar to Anglo-Saxon and roughly similar to modern Icelandic (the word viking actually means “a pirate raid” in Old Norse). Accents and pronunciations in northern England even today are heavily influenced by Old Norse, to the extent that they are largely intelligible in Iceland.

Over time, Old Norse was gradually merged into the English language, and many Scandinavian terms were introduced. In actual fact, only around 150 Norse words appear in Old English manuscripts of the period, but many more became assimilated into the language and gradually began to appear in texts over the next few centuries. In all, up to 1,000 Norse words were permanently added to the English lexicon, among them, some of the most common and fundamental in the language, including skull, skin, leg, neck, freckle, sister, husband, fellow, wing, bull, score, seat, root, bloom, bag, gap, knife, dirt, kid, link, gate, sky, egg, cake, skirt, band, bank, birth, scrap, skill, thrift, window, gasp, gap, law, anger, trust, silver, clasp, call, crawl, dazzle, scream, screech, race, lift, get, give, are, take, mistake, rid, seem, want, thrust, hit, guess, kick, kill, rake, raise, smile, hug, call, cast, clip, die, flat, meek, rotten, tight, odd, rugged, ugly, ill, sly, wrong, loose, happy, awkward, weak, worse, low, both, same, together, again, until, etc.

Anglo-Saxon Literature: Beowulf

ALPHABET

Anglo-Saxon runes are runes used by the early Anglo-Saxons as an alphabet in their writing.

A list of the most popular Old English books

List of books: Click here

It may be the oldest surviving long poem in Old English and is commonly cited as one of the most important works produced between 975 and 1025. The author was an anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet, referred to by scholars as the "Beowulf poet".

The poem is set in Scandinavia. Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall in Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel. After Beowulf slays him, Grendel's mother attacks the hall and is then also defeated. Victorious, Beowulf goes home to Geatland (Götaland in modern Sweden) and later becomes king of the Geats. After a period of fifty years has passed, Beowulf defeats a dragon, but is fatally wounded in the battle. After his death, his attendants cremate his body and erect a tower on a headland in his memory.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf

OLD ENGLISH

Old English was a very complex language, at least in comparison with modern English. Nouns had three genders (male, female and neuter) and could be inflected for up to five cases. There were seven classes of “strong” verbs and three of “weak” verbs, and their endings changed for number, tense, mood and person. Adjectives could have up to eleven forms. Even definite articles had three genders and five case forms as a singular and four as a plural. Word order was much freer than today, the sense being carried by the inflections (and only later by the use of propositions). Although it looked quite different from modern English on paper, once the pronunciation and spelling rules are understood, many of its words become quite familiar to modern ears.

Many of the most basic and common words in use in English today have their roots in Old English, including words like water, earth, house, food, drink, sleep, sing, night, strong, the, a, be, of, he, she, you, no, not, etc. Interestingly, many of our common swear words are also of Anglo-Saxon origin (including tits, fart, shit, turd, arse and, probably, piss), and most of the others were of early medieval provenance. Care should be taken, though, with what are sometimes called "false friends", words that appear to be similar in Old English and modern English, but whose meanings have changed, words such as wif (wife, which originally meant any woman, married or not), fugol (fowl, which meant any bird, not just a farmyard one), sona (soon, which meant immediately, not just in a while), won (wan, which meant dark, not pale) and fæst (fast, which meant fixed or firm, not rapidly).

During the 6th Century, for reasons which are still unclear, the Anglo-Saxon consonant cluster "sk" changed to "sh", so that skield became shield. This change affected all "sk" words in the language at that time, whether recent borrowings from Latin (e.g. disk became dish) or ancient aboriginal borrowings (e.g. skip became ship). Any modern English words which make use of the "sk" cluster came into the language after the 6th Century (i.e. after the sound change had ceased to operate), mainly, as we will see below, from Scandinavia.http://www.thehistoryofenglish.com/history_old.html

Video about The Old English Literature Period

ANGLOSAXON LITERATURE

In the middle of S. V a series of migratory waves produced by the Germanic tribes (Angles, Jutes and Saxons) that were populating England. After the invasion of the Barbarians, England was divided into seven kingdoms. When they England had already been Christianized or after the invasion of the barbarians were very weak pockets of resistance so from S. VI penetrates Christianity in England with force.

Since the late eighth century small raids of conquest in the eastern part of the island are produced by Vikings, Norse settlers, so a domain called Viking zone Danelaw is established. In 1000 all of England was under the dominion and orders Viking King Canute. At this time a kinship between Viking and German states.