The Bible played a crucial role in shaping Anglo-Saxon national and cultural identity. However, access to Biblical texts was necessarily limited to very few individuals in Medieval England. In this book, Samantha Zacher explores how the very earliest English Biblical poetry creatively adapted, commented on and spread Biblical narratives and traditions to the wider population. Systematically surveying the manuscripts of surviving poems, the book shows how these vernacular poets commemorated the Hebrews as God's 'chosen people' and claimed the inheritance of that status for Anglo-Saxon England. Drawing on contemporary translation theory, the book undertakes close readings of the poems Exodus, Daniel and Judith in order to examine their methods of adaptation for their particular theologico-political circumstances and the way they portray and problematize Judaeo-Christian religious identities.

Essays demonstrating how the careful study of individual words can shed immense light on texts more broadly. Dedicated to honoring the remarkable achievements of Dr Antonette di Paolo Healey, the architect and lexicographer of the Old English Concordance, the Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, and the Dictionary of Old English, the essays in this volume reflect firsthand the research made possible by Dr. Healey's landmark contributions to her field. Each chapter highlights how the careful consideration and study of words can lead to greater insights, from an understanding of early medieval English concepts of time and identity, to reconceptualizations of canonical Old English poems, reappraisals of early medieval English authors and their works, greater understanding of the semantic fields of Old English words and manuscript traditions, and the solving of lexical puzzles. MAREN CLEGG HYER is Professor of English at Valdosta State University; HARUKO MOMMA is Professor of English at NewYork University; SAMANTHA ZACHER is Professor of English and Medieval Studies at Cornell University. Contributors: Brianna Daigneault, Damian Fleming, Roberta Frank, Robert Getz, Joyce Hill, Joan Holland, Maren Clegg Hyer, Christopher A. Jones, R.M. Liuzza, Haruko Momma, Katherine O'Brien O'Keeffe, Andy Orchard, Stephen Pelle, Christine Rauer, Terri Sanderson, Donald Scragg, Paul Szarmach, M. J. Toswell, Audrey Walton, Samantha Zacher.

The Bible played a crucial role in shaping Anglo-Saxon national and cultural identity. However, access to Biblical texts was necessarily limited to very few individuals in Medieval England. In this book, Samantha Zacher explores how the very earliest English Biblical poetry creatively adapted, commented on and spread Biblical narratives and traditions to the wider population. Systematically surveying the manuscripts of surviving poems, the book shows how these vernacular poets commemorated the Hebrews as God's 'chosen people' and claimed the inheritance of that status for Anglo-Saxon England. Drawing on contemporary translation theory, the book undertakes close readings of the poems Exodus, Daniel and Judith in order to examine their methods of adaptation for their particular theologico-political circumstances and the way they portray and problematize Judaeo-Christian religious identities.

Most studies of Jews in medieval England begin with the year 1066, when Jews first arrived on English soil. Yet the absence of Jews in England before the conquest did not prevent early English authors from writing obsessively about them. Using material from the writings of the Church Fathers, contemporary continental sources, widespread cultural stereotypes, and their own imaginations, their depictions of Jews reflected their own politico-theological experiences. The thirteen essays in Imagining the Jew in Anglo-Saxon Literature and Culture examine visual and textual representations of Jews, the translation and interpretation of Scripture, the use of Hebrew words and etymologies, and the treatment of Jewish spaces and landmarks. By studying the "imaginary Jews" of Anglo-Saxon England, they offer new perspectives on the treatment of race, religion, and ethnicity in pre- and post-conquest literature and culture.

The late tenth-century Vercelli Book (Vercelli, Biblioteca Capitolare CXVII) contains one of the earliest surviving collections of homilies and poetry in the English language. The manuscript's combination of poetry and homiletic prose has generated intense scholarly debate, and there is no consensus concerning the original purpose of the compiler.

New Readings in the Vercelli Book addresses central questions concerning the manuscript's intended use, mode of compilation, and purpose, and offers a variety of approaches on such topics as orthography, style, genre, theme, and source-study. The contributors include some of the foremost Vercelli experts, as well as the two most recent editors of the homilies. The remarkable essays in this volume offer the first sustained literary analysis of both the poetry and prose texts of the Vercelli Book, providing important new perspectives on a dynamic and valuable historical document.