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Hisperic Style in the Old English “Rhyming Poem”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2020

James W. Earl
James W. Earl*
Affiliation:
Fordham University, Bronx, New York
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Abstract

The “Rhyming Poem” is a bizarre verse experiment combining a rhyme scheme common in Latin hymnody with a stringent use of Old English alliterative meter. It has been thought that the poet, in his unsuccessful effort to carry out his self-appointed metrical task, strained his language to the breaking point, producing a poem crackpot, incompetent, and quickly corrupted. It is more likely, however, that the poet was being linguistically inventive in the manner of many such experiments in Carolingian and Hiberno-Latin poetry. Such obscurantism only exaggerates a quality already present in much Old English verse, notably in the latter part of The Exeter Book, where the “Rhyming Poem” is found, and also in much Norse and Irish verse. Considering the several poetic traditions coexisting in Anglo-Saxon England, it is surprising that the “Rhyming Poem” is the only example of the genre in Old English.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 102 , Issue 2 , March 1987 , pp. 187 - 196
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1987

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