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Exeter Book
The largest extant collection of Old
English poetry. Copied c. 975, the manuscript
was given to Exeter Cathedral by Bishop Leofric
(died 1072). It begins with some long religious
poems: the Christ, in three parts; two poems on
St. Guthlac; the fragmentary “Azarius”; and the
allegorical Phoenix. Following these are a
number of shorter religious verses intermingled
with poems of types that have survived only in
this codex. All the extant Anglo-Saxon lyrics,
or elegies, as they are usually called—“The
Wanderer,” “The Seafarer,” “The Wife’s Lament,”
“The Husband’s Message,” and “The Ruin”—are
found here. These are secular poems evoking a
poignant sense of desolation and loneliness in
their descriptions of the separation of lovers,
the sorrows of exile, or the terrors and
attractions of the sea, although some of
them—e.g., “The Wanderer” and “The
Seafarer”—also carry the weight of religious
allegory. In addition, the Exeter Book preserves
95 riddles, a genre that would otherwise have
been represented by a solitary example.
The remaining part of the Exeter Book includes
“The Rhyming Poem,” which is the only example of
its kind; the gnomic verses; “Widsith,” the
heroic narrative of a fictitious bard; and the
two refrain poems, “Deor” and “Wulf and
Eadwacer.” The arrangement of the poems appears
to be haphazard, and the book is believed to be
copied from an earlier collection.
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Vercelli Book
Old English manuscript written in the late 10th
century. It contains texts of the poem Andreas,
two poems by Cynewulf, The Dream of the Rood, an
“Address of the Saved Soul to the Body,” and a
fragment of a homiletic poem, as well as 23
prose homilies and a prose life of St. Guthlac,
the Vercelli Guthlac. The book is so named
because it was found in the cathedral library at
Vercelli, northwestern Italy, in 1822.
Marginalia in the manuscript indicate that the
manuscript was in English use in the 11th
century. It was probably taken to Italy by one
of the numerous Anglo-Saxon pilgrims on the way
to Rome.
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