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Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492: A New Witness to the Old English Bede and its Twelfth-Century Context

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Published/Copyright: June 22, 2017
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From the journal Anglia Volume 135 Issue 2

Abstract

This article draws attention to a series of seven English annotations in a mid-twelfth-century copy of Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica from Bury St Edmunds. It demonstrates that the annotations reflect the comparison of Bede’s Latin with a now-lost manuscript of the Old English Bede shortly after the twelfth-century codex’s production. The annotations are shown to hold a respect for the authority of the Old English Bede that contrasts with the prevailing twelfth-century attitude of gentle suspicion towards earlier vernacular translations.

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Appendix

Figure 1 Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492, fol. 4 r. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, Book I, Chapter 1, with English glosses interlinearly and in the margin (Reproduced by permission of The Board of Trinity College Dublin)
Figure 1

Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492, fol. 4 r. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, Book I, Chapter 1, with English glosses interlinearly and in the margin (Reproduced by permission of The Board of Trinity College Dublin)

Figure 2 Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492, fol. 4 r. Detail of interlinear gloss ‘.seolas.’ to ‘uituli marini’ (Reproduced by permission of The Board of Trinity College Dublin)
Figure 2

Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492, fol. 4 r. Detail of interlinear gloss ‘.seolas.’ to ‘uituli marini’ (Reproduced by permission of The Board of Trinity College Dublin)

Figure 3 Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492, fol. 4 r. Detail of marginal gloss ‘.octo hund mile long. 7 tƿa hund mile brad.’, rotated 90° clockwise (Reproduced by permission of The Board of Trinity College Dublin)
Figure 3

Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492, fol. 4 r. Detail of marginal gloss ‘.octo hund mile long. 7 tƿa hund mile brad.’, rotated 90° clockwise (Reproduced by permission of The Board of Trinity College Dublin)

Published Online: 2017-6-22
Published in Print: 2017-6-2

© 2017 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Articles
  3. Old English Poetic Superlatives
  4. Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492: A New Witness to the Old English Bede and its Twelfth-Century Context
  5. The Influence of Verse Form on the Relative Order of the Name and the Title King within an Appositive Phrase in Laȝamon’s Brut
  6. Norse Loans in Middle English and their Influence on Late Medieval London English
  7. Reviews
  8. Birte Bös and Lucia Kornexl (eds.). Changing Genre Conventions in Historical English News Discourse. Advances in Historical Sociolinguistics 5. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, PA: Benjamins, 2015, xv + 254 pp., € 99.00/$ 149.00.
  9. Haruko Momma. From Philology to English Studies: Language and Culture in the Nineteenth Century. Studies in English Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015, 224 pp., £ 25.99 (pb) [hb 2013].
  10. Rebecca Stephenson. The Politics of Language: Byrhtferth, Ælfric, and the Multilingual Identity of the Benedictine Reform. Toronto Anglo-Saxon Series 18. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015, x + 218 pp., $ 55.00.
  11. A. J. Ford. Marvel and Artefact: The “Wonders of the East” in its Manuscript Contexts. Library of the Written Word – The Manuscript World 45. Leiden/Boston, MA: Brill, 2016, xvi + 178 pp., 38 figures, 1 table, € 109.00/$ 141.00.
  12. Karl Reichl (ed.). Medieval Oral Literature. Berlin/Boston, MA: De Gruyter, 2016, 743 pp., 27 illustr., € 34.95/$ 40.99/£ 28.99 (pb) [hb 2011].
  13. Natasha Moore. Victorian Poetry and Modern Life: The Unpoetical Age. Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, vi + 239 pp., £ 58.00.
  14. Beatrix Hesse. The English Crime Play in the Twentieth Century. Crime Files. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, vi + 290 pp., 1 illustr., $ 69.99.
  15. Jean-Michel Ganteau. The Ethics and Aesthetics of Vulnerability in Contemporary British Fiction. Routledge Studies in Contemporary Literature. New York/London: Routledge, 2015, 179 pp., £ 95.00.
  16. Jean-Michel Rabaté. The Cambridge Introduction to Literature and Psychoanalysis. Cambridge Introductions to Literature. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014, 255 pp., € 24.96.
  17. J. M. Coetzee and Arabella Kurtz. The Good Story: Exchanges on Truth, Fiction and Psychotherapy. New York: Viking, 2015, 198 pp., $ 27.95. David Attwell. J. M. Coetzee and The Life of Writing: Face to Face with Time. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015, 272 pp., numerous illustr., £ 19.99.
  18. Maria Löschnigg. The Contemporary Canadian Short Story in English: Continuity and Change. CAT 7. Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2014, 381 pp., 5 figures, € 42.50.
  19. Alfred Bendixen and Stephen Burt (eds.). The Cambridge History of American Poetry. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014, xx + 1306 pp., $ 170.00.
  20. Reingard M. Nischik (ed.). The Palgrave Handbook of Comparative North American Literature. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014, 417 pp., $ 195.00 (hb)/$ 54.99 (pb [2016]).
  21. Johanna Hartmann. Literary Visuality in Siri Hustvedt’s Works: Phenomenological Perspectives. text & theorie 16. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2016, 320 pp., € 49.80.
  22. Books Received
https://doi.org/10.1515/ang-2017-0026

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Articles
  3. Old English Poetic Superlatives
  4. Dublin, Trinity College, MS 492: A New Witness to the Old English Bede and its Twelfth-Century Context
  5. The Influence of Verse Form on the Relative Order of the Name and the Title King within an Appositive Phrase in Laȝamon’s Brut
  6. Norse Loans in Middle English and their Influence on Late Medieval London English
  7. Reviews
  8. Birte Bös and Lucia Kornexl (eds.). Changing Genre Conventions in Historical English News Discourse. Advances in Historical Sociolinguistics 5. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, PA: Benjamins, 2015, xv + 254 pp., € 99.00/$ 149.00.
  9. Haruko Momma. From Philology to English Studies: Language and Culture in the Nineteenth Century. Studies in English Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015, 224 pp., £ 25.99 (pb) [hb 2013].
  10. Rebecca Stephenson. The Politics of Language: Byrhtferth, Ælfric, and the Multilingual Identity of the Benedictine Reform. Toronto Anglo-Saxon Series 18. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015, x + 218 pp., $ 55.00.
  11. A. J. Ford. Marvel and Artefact: The “Wonders of the East” in its Manuscript Contexts. Library of the Written Word – The Manuscript World 45. Leiden/Boston, MA: Brill, 2016, xvi + 178 pp., 38 figures, 1 table, € 109.00/$ 141.00.
  12. Karl Reichl (ed.). Medieval Oral Literature. Berlin/Boston, MA: De Gruyter, 2016, 743 pp., 27 illustr., € 34.95/$ 40.99/£ 28.99 (pb) [hb 2011].
  13. Natasha Moore. Victorian Poetry and Modern Life: The Unpoetical Age. Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, vi + 239 pp., £ 58.00.
  14. Beatrix Hesse. The English Crime Play in the Twentieth Century. Crime Files. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, vi + 290 pp., 1 illustr., $ 69.99.
  15. Jean-Michel Ganteau. The Ethics and Aesthetics of Vulnerability in Contemporary British Fiction. Routledge Studies in Contemporary Literature. New York/London: Routledge, 2015, 179 pp., £ 95.00.
  16. Jean-Michel Rabaté. The Cambridge Introduction to Literature and Psychoanalysis. Cambridge Introductions to Literature. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014, 255 pp., € 24.96.
  17. J. M. Coetzee and Arabella Kurtz. The Good Story: Exchanges on Truth, Fiction and Psychotherapy. New York: Viking, 2015, 198 pp., $ 27.95. David Attwell. J. M. Coetzee and The Life of Writing: Face to Face with Time. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015, 272 pp., numerous illustr., £ 19.99.
  18. Maria Löschnigg. The Contemporary Canadian Short Story in English: Continuity and Change. CAT 7. Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2014, 381 pp., 5 figures, € 42.50.
  19. Alfred Bendixen and Stephen Burt (eds.). The Cambridge History of American Poetry. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014, xx + 1306 pp., $ 170.00.
  20. Reingard M. Nischik (ed.). The Palgrave Handbook of Comparative North American Literature. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014, 417 pp., $ 195.00 (hb)/$ 54.99 (pb [2016]).
  21. Johanna Hartmann. Literary Visuality in Siri Hustvedt’s Works: Phenomenological Perspectives. text & theorie 16. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2016, 320 pp., € 49.80.
  22. Books Received
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