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Christian Formulas in Old English Literature: Næs Hyre Wlite Gewemmed and its Implications

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Catherine Brown Tkacz*
Affiliation:
Spokane, Washington

Extract

The heroes of God scorn apostasy. Bound and thrust into an insanely fired furnace, its flames jetting nine and forty cubits above the oven itself, they stand unconcerned in the midst of it, their bonds wondrously burned away. And the flames do not touch them; rather, the fire bursts out the sides to incinerate the torturers who stoke it. Then an angel of the Lord enters the furnace and thrusts the fire from the saints, who feel the pleasant refreshment of a dewy breeze. In the middle of the fire they stand and praise God. Astonished, their persecutor beholds the trio with the fourth who has joined them, who is like unto the Son of God, and calls the three forth from the midst of the fire. He, too, acknowledges and praises God when he and his court see, no longer through the confusing shimmer of heat, but with indisputable clarity, right before their eyes, the converting proof: no power had the fire over the saints' bodies, and not a hair of their heads had been singed, and neither had their garments been affected.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © 1993 by Fordham University 

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References

1 A shorter version of this essay was read at the third session of the Old English Section during the Annual Meeting of the Modern Language Association in San Francisco, 29 December 1991. The short titles for Old English texts used throughout this essay are from “The List of Texts and Index of Editions” in Venezky, Richard L. and Antonette diPaolo Healey's A Microfiche Concordance to Old English, Publications of the Dictionary of Old English 1 (Toronto, 1980), hereafter cited as MCOE. Generally, texts are cited as in MCOE, with the line references being to the start of the sentence containing the headword; references to formulaic expressions, however, are given by precise verse or half-verse. In notes citing several Old English texts, biblical and liturgical texts — if any — are cited first, followed by all others, alphabetized by abbreviation.Google Scholar

2 The phrase in medio ignis epitomizes the miracle and is emphasized by repetition in Daniel 3. It occurs exactly in vv. 23, 25, 88, 92, 93; cf. 21, 24, 50 and the initial threat of being cast in fornacem ignis ardentis in vv. 6, 11, 15, cf. 20, a threat the three scorn, v. 17. All quotations from the Vulgate are from Biblia Sacra iuxta vulgatam versionem, 3d ed, 2 vols. (Stuttgart, 1975).Google Scholar

3 For a review of scholarship on Daniel imagery in early Christian, western medieval, and Byzantine art and liturgy, see Tkacz, “The Topos of the Tormentor Tormented in Selected Works of Old English Hagiography” (Ph.D. diss., University of Notre Dame, 1983), 180–83.Google Scholar

4 For instance, St. Jerome offers this explanation: “in typum praefigurat iste angelus sive filius Dei Dominum nostrum Iesum qui ad fornacem descendit inferni in quo clausae et peccatorum et iustorum animae tenebantur, ut absque exustione et noxa sui eos tenebantur inclusi mortis vinculis liberaret”; Commentariorum in Danielum libri III 〈IV〉 1.3.92b (CCSL 75A:808).Google Scholar

5 St. Cyprian holds this view, clear in his praise of boys who bear witness to God, such as “Ananias Azarias Misael inlustres pueri … quibus inclusis in caminum cesserunt ignes et refrigerium flammae dederunt praesente cum illis Domino et probante …”: Ep. 6, par. 3 (CSEL 3.2:483.5–7); italics mine. See also Hilary of Poitiers, Tractatus mysterium 2.13 (CSEL 65:36–37) and Hippolytus of Rome, who identifies the angel as the Logos: Eis ton Daniel 2.33.4 (Sources Chrétiennes 14: 182). Such interpretations led in the later Middle Ages to the occasional depiction of the fourth figure in the furnace as Christ-Logos; see the early twelfth-century Bible of Stephen Harding, Dijon, Bibliothèque Communale, III, fol. 64r (Princeton Index of Christian Art: 32.D57.LCm.6,C,64a). An illustration in a thirteenth-century Bible depicts Christ in the furnace with the Three Hebrews: Manchester, John Rylands Library, 17, fol. 231r (Princeton Index: 32.M312.LR.9, 231A).Google Scholar

6 For the importance of the Book of Daniel in Anglo-Saxon liturgy and iconography, for instance, see Farrell, R. T., “Some Remarks on the Exeter Book Azarias,” Medium Ævum 61 (1972): 2–4. For reference to Daniel in the early Christian prayer for the dead, the Commendatio animae, see the present author's entries under this heading in The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium (hereafter ODB), 3 vols. (New York, 1991) 1:488 and in Sources of Anglo-Saxon Literary Culture, ed. Paul Szarmach (forthcoming). Several Old English prose accounts of the Three Young Men mention just two of the three areas of miraculous soundness, e.g., feax ‘hair’ and lichaman ‘body’ in ÆCHom I, 37 570.8 and ÆCHom II, 1 9.230–10.266. An additional prose passage of interest because it contains a narrative explicitly comparing the experience of the Three Young Men to that of a holy man, and uses elements of the “Daniel material” in so doing, is GDPref 3(C) 18.219: the Goths, Gregory relates, bescufon the holy Benedict into a burning oven, yet the next day he emerged “swa 3esund, swa he ær wæs [cf. And 1476a], & nallæs Þæt an, Þæt his lichama wæs gesund for fyre, ac eac swylce ne mihton hi forbærnan nanra ÞinƷa his hræƷles.”Google Scholar

7 All the details of the biblical account of the Three Young Men are frequently echoed in hagiography. In the Acta of St. Agnes, when the saint is cast into “ignem copiosum accendi,” at once the flame divides and the saint “in nullo contingebat incendium.” She stands in the orans position, “expandens manus suas in medio ignis,” and praises God (“benedico te…. Benedico te, Pater”). Like the holy trio, she feels not the fire, but heavenly dew (“rore coelesti”), and the fire recoils upon the tormentors (“et ardor incendii hujus ad eos, a quibus ministratur refunditur”); AS Jan., 2: 716–17, par. 11–12. For an example of an elliptical reference to the Three Young Men, see the Acta of St. Agatha, in which she informs her persecutor, “Si ignem adhibeas, Angeli Christi mei rorem subministrabunt”; AS Feb., 1: 625, par. 6. The Latin Acta of St. Juliana refers directly to the Three Young Men and then narrates events which parallel their experiences; see Tkacz, “Tormentor Tormented,” 232–38.Google Scholar

8 The commonplace in Byzantine hagiography parallels the Latin and Old English in employing a formulaic expression derived from the account of the Three Young Men. For instance, Symeon Metaphrastes’ passiones of Sts. Eustratios (PG 116:477B; fire-heated torture, 476A-B), Barbara (PG 116:312A), and Plato (PG 115:408A) all contain this formulaic clause, which contains, and may simply consist of, 1) to [or ho] tuchon — roughly, “it happened”; 2) sparagma ‘shred’ or spilos euretha ‘blemish’ with a verb for “found”; and 3) a prepositional or dative phrase containing somati and meaning “on his/her/the saint's body.” All together, it runs, “But it happened that no wound (or blemish) was found on the saint's body.” The core of this formula derives from the Septuagint account of Dan. 3:94–95 with its repeated reference to tou somatos auton ‘their bodies’ and its use of the conjunctions made and oude. See also Tkacz, C., Lowden, J. H. and Cutler, A., “Three Hebrews,” ODB 3:2081.Google Scholar

9 The “Hymnum Trium Puerum” is one of The Oldest English Texts; ed. Henry Sweet, EETS 83 (London, 1885), 414–15. For Daniel in the liturgy, see James Mearns, The Canticles of the Christian Church, Eastern and Western, in Early and Medieval Times (Cambridge, Eng., 1914) 18–24; Heinrich Schneider, “Die biblische Oden, im Mittelalter,” Biblica 30 (1949): 479–500; and Ruth Steiner, “The Canticle of the Three Children as a Chant of the Roman Mass,” Schweizer Jahrbuch fur Musikwissenschaft, N.F., N.S. 2 (1982): 81–90, and “Antiphons for the Benedicite at Lauds,” Journal of the Plainsong and Mediaeval Music Society 7 (1984): 1–17.Google Scholar

For the canticles in the liturgy of the hours in medieval England, see Milton McC. Gatch, “The Office in Late Anglo-Saxon Monasticism,” in Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies Presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. Michael Lapidge and Helmut Gneuss (Cambridge, Eng., 1985), 349–50; for the role of the Book of Daniel in the lectionary, see 353–54.Google Scholar

10 For a more thorough relation of these various terminologies, see Tkacz, “Tormentor Tormented,” chapter two.Google Scholar

11 “The possibility that in … the [Old English] religious [poems] a new body of formulas to express the new ideas of Christian poetry was beginning to be developed on the model of oral traditional poetry” was suggested by Albert Bates Lord in 1974, shortly after the appearance of, for instance, Alvin E. Lee's Guest-Hall of Eden and Michael D. Cherniss's study of Ingeld and Christ, which demonstrated the integration of “Germanic and Christian concepts and motifs”; Lord, “Perspectives on Recent Work on Oral Literature,” Forum for Modern Language Studies 10 (1974): 209; Lee, The Guest-Hall of Eden: Four Essays on the Design of Old English Poetry (New Haven, 1972); Cherniss, Ingeld and Christ: Heroic Concepts and Values in Old English Christian Poetry (The Hague, 1972), 8. Alexandra Hennessey Olsen recently summarized research since 1972 on this “composite tradition of Old English poetry”; Olsen, “Oral-Formulaic Research in Old English Studies: II,” Oral Tradition 3 (1988): 163; Part I appeared in Oral Tradition 1 (1986): 548–606. See also John Miles Foley, Oral-Formulaic Theory and Research: An Introduction and Annotated Bibliography, Garland Folklore Bibliographies 6 (New York, 1985).Google Scholar

To this must be added the research by Riedinger, Anita R., who focuses on Christian adaptation of Germanic materials on both the large scale of the concept, showing the presentation of “a new Christian hero” in Andreas, and the smaller one of the formula, identifying Christian formulas evidently devised by adapting a preexisting formula system; for instance, presenting blissum hremig and the pair sorgum hremig and gehþum hremig as, in effect, new Christian productions from the Germanic system x hremig. Riedinger, “The Poetic Formula in Andreas, Beowulf, and the Tradition” (Ph.D. diss., New York University, 1985), Dissertation Abstracts Index (hereafter DAI) 46 (1985), 710-A; and “The Old English Formula in Context,” Speculum 60 (1985): 310. Jeffrey Burton Russell has also observed the innovative result in Old English literature when “the Teutonic hero and the Christian saint coalesced”; Lucifer: The Devil in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, N.Y., 1984), 134.Google Scholar

12 The earliest study of the verbal formulas in the Bible is William Whallon's article on “Formulaic Poetry in the Old Testament,” Comparative Literature 15 (1963): 1–14. For a survey of this field, see Culley, Robert C., “Oral Tradition and Biblical Studies,” Oral Tradition 1 (1986): 30–65.Google Scholar

13 Ong, Walter J., S.J., Interfaces of the Word: Studies in the Evolution of Consciousness and Culture (Ithaca, N.Y., 1977), 231.Google Scholar

14 Catherine Brown Tkacz, “Literary Studies of the Vulgate: Formula Systems,” Proceedings of the Conference on Patristic, Mediaeval, and Renaissance Studies 15 (1990): 205–19.Google Scholar

15 Howlett, David R. “Biblical Style in Early Insular Latin,” in Sources of Anglo-Saxon Culture, Studies in Medieval Culture 20, ed. Szarmach, Paul E. with the assistance of Virginia Darrow Oggins (Kalamazoo, Mich., 1986), 127–47. Additional relevant discussion may be in the 1981 dissertation of Hugh Magennis, for he states in his abstract that “Old English prose is shown to present a straightforward extension of the structures of Christian Latin thought into the vernacular”: “Imagery of Feasting and Drinking in Old English Literature, with reference to Germanic and to Christian Latin traditions” (Ph.D. diss., Queen's University of Belfast, 1981), DAI 49A (1988): 453.Google Scholar

16 The three are named in the canticle: PsCaL (Lindeloef) 8.17; PsCaC (Wildhagen) 8.30; and PsCaE (Liles), PsCaF (Rosier), PsCaG (Rosier), and PsCaJ (Oess) on 8.32.Google Scholar

17 More frequent are the Persian names — An[n]anias (occasionally with an ash in any or each syllable), Azaria[s], and Mis[s]a[h]el (sometimes with an ash in the middle syllable). The Hebrew names also occur: Sidra[a]c or (once) SiÐrac, Misa[a]c or Misaoc, and Abdenago. The Old Testament heroes are not to be confused with Anglo-Saxon and New Testament figures of the same names. Specifically, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for 871 mentions two different Sidracs, slain in battle: ChronA (Plummer) 871.14, ChronC (Rositzke) 872.2 and 12, ChronD (Classen-Harm) 871.1.1, ChronE (Plummer) 871.1 and 13–14. Also, the dishonest Annanias of Acts 5:1–11 is referred to in a bull of Pope Sergius (Rec 15 [Birch 106] 81), Ælfric's homily for Pentecost (ÆCHom I, 22 316.21), and the Winteney version of the Benedictine Rule (BenRW 57.10). Finally, Ælfric's homily on the nativity of St. Paul recounts the actions of the Annanias who baptized the apostle (Acts 9:10–19); ÆCHom I, 27 386.26 and 390.23.Google Scholar

18 ÆCHom I, 22 316.21, and 27 386.26 et passim, and 37 570.9; ÆCHom II, 1 9.230 et passim, and 4 37.248; ÆHomM 11 (Ass 4) 192; ÆLet 4 (SigeweardZ) 526; ÆLS (Memory of Saints) 71; LawIudDei IV 3.3 and VII 23.2.Google Scholar

19 For instance, in the Rule of Chrodegang; ChrodR 1 18.1.Google Scholar

20 All spellings and inflected forms of the name of Daniel occur in a continuous run of microfiches in the MCOE: fiche D001, pp. 213–22. The only spelling variant is Dani[h]el. Eight works using the name of Daniel refer to the eighth-century bishop of Winchester: the Mercian version of Bede's Ecclesiastical History (BedePref 4.10, BedeHead 5.4.27, Bede 4 18.308.29, and Bede 5 16.446.19 and 448.14, and 22.478.5 and 12 and 17); a charter of Archbishop Dunstan to King Æthelred, Ch 1296 (Nap-Steven 7) 19; a record of manumission, Rec 10.6.3.2 (Thorpe) 1; the records of the bishops of Winchester, KSB 11 (Logeman) 3; the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in four manuscripts mentions him in the entries for the years 709 (C: 708), 721 (C: 720), 731 (D and E only), 744, and 745; ChronA (Plummer), ChronC (Rositzke), ChronD (Classen-Harm), ChronE (Plummer). For comments on the Mercian translation of Bede, see Janet Bately, “The Nature of Old English Prose,” in The Cambridge Companion to Old English Literature, ed. Malcolm Godden and Michael Lapidge (Cambridge, Eng., 1991), 72.Google Scholar

21 In addition to the texts cited in the next two notes, these twenty-eight texts include the following: ÆCHom I, 24 348.2, 34 518.15–16; ÆCHom II, 1 7.146 and 147, and 33 253.142 et passim; ÆEtat 171 et passim; ÆGram 38.13; ÆHom 19 222 and 273; ÆLet 2 (Wulfstanl) 32; ÆLet 3 (Wulfstan2) 83; ÆLet 4 (SigeweardB) 631, 645; ÆLet 4 (SigeweardZ) 471, 526, 631, 645; ÆLS (Maccabees) 254; BenR 63.11 (also BenRW 63.11 and BenRWells 63.11); ChrodR 1 18.1; GDPref 3(C) 24.227.21 and GDPref 4(C) 35.311.26; HomU 34 (Nap 42) 248; LS 11 (James) 33; Mt (WSCp) 24.15 (and MtGl [Ru] 24.15); ProgG1 1 (Forst) 1; and ThCap 1 and 2 (Sauer) 36.381.31.Google Scholar

22 On Þæra leona seaþe: ÆCHom I, 37 570.34 and 572.10; ÆHom 22 311, cf. 489; ÆLS (Memory of Saints) 78; GD 2(C) 22.150.1 and GD 2(H) 22.150.7; HomS 11.1 (Belf 5) 133; and HomS 11.2 (VercHom 3) 150. A new edition of the latter is now available: The Vercelli Homilies and Related Texts, ed. Scragg, D. G., EETS 300 (Oxford, 1992).Google Scholar

23 Betwux Þam leonum: ÆCHom I, 32 488.3; ÆCHom I, 37 572.13; ÆCHom II, 11 101.326; cf. ÆHom 22 486 (betwux Þam deorum). Daniel, who remains unwemme amidst the lions, seems to provide the pattern for Ælfric's statement, “Se hælend betwux synfullum unwemme fram ælcere synne Þurhwunode”; ÆCHom I, 25 356.11.Google Scholar

24 Interestingly, this formula and its context are quite similar to the Byzantine Greek formula for the same material; see n. 8 above.Google Scholar

25 Howlett, “Biblical Style” (as in n.15), 147.Google Scholar

26 This summary treats simply the three passages using the full complement of Daniel material; it can readily be seen how the subsets of material in the Old English Martyrology and in Azarias tie into this schema. In addition, at least fifteen other passages using bits of the material survive: In six passages, fex ‘hair’ is described as unhurt, e.g., ÆLS (Memory of Saints) I, 342.75–6; cf. 182.122, 231. The Old English translation of Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica recounts the wonder that Cuthbert's hrœgl ‘garments’ are ungewemmed when he is exhumed eleven years after burial (Bede 4 31.376.2). Also, nehrœglum occurs twice in the Old English translation of Gregory the Great (GD 3[C] 18.219.24; 19.221.1); Baudouin de Gaiffier discusses this passage in Études critiques d'hagiographie et d'iconologie, Subsidia hagiographica 43 (Brussels, 1967), 52, cf. 59–60. Other Old English passages treating the Three Young Men themselves or using imagery or vocabulary from Daniel 3 include ÆCHom I, 37 570.17; ÆCHom II, 1.10.251–58; ÆHom 22 296; ÆLet 4 (Sigeweard2) 529 and 1029; ÆLS (Memory of Saints) 71; LS 8 (Eust) 462; and GD 4(C) 37.317.12.Google Scholar

27 Donald Klein Fry, Jr., “Old English Formulaic Themes and Type-Scenes,” Neophilologus 52 (1968): 53. He first offered his definitions of system, formula, type-scene, and theme in his dissertation in 1966; cf. “Old English Formulas and Systems,” English Studies 48 (1967): 194–204.Google Scholar

28 This research is greatly indebted to the MCOE (as in n. 1). Scholars have studied other terms common to two or more of the poems which contain the Daniel material, but the present study is the first discussion of the specific words wlite and gewemman, either in these particular poems or as a global word study. Weise, Judith A. comments on dædhwaten ‘bold in deeds’, used of the Three Young Men (Az 67) and, in the opening lines of Juliana, of persecuted Christians; “Ambiguity in Old English Poetry,” Neophilologus 63 (1979): 588–91. Calder, Daniel G. comments on hwearfan ‘to turn’ or ‘to convert’, repeated in Dan 22; Az 161, 166; and Jul 275, 381, 390, 703; Calder, “The Art of Cynewulf's Juliana,” Modern Language Quarterly 34 (1973): 367. Cf. Albert Keiser, The Influence of Christianity on the Vocabulary of Old English Poetry, University of Illinois Studies in Language and Literature 5 (Urbana, Ill., 1919; rpt. New York, 1967).Google Scholar

The word wloh ‘fringe’, also used exclusively in Christian contexts, need not be discussed here, for it lacks the richness of meaning of wlite and gewemman. Outside the Daniel material, wloh is found in a solitary gloss on the gospel account of the woman with the flow of blood; MtGl (Li) 9.20, 14.36. Other glosses and homilies treating this miracle use the word hrœgl instead.Google Scholar

29 Douglas Moffat, “The Occurrences of Ac ‘Oak’ in Old English: A List,” Mediaeval Studies 49 (1987): 534–40. Venezky, Richard L. and Sharon Butler, A Microfiche Concordance to Old English: The High-Frequency Words, Publications of the Dictionary of Old English 2 (Toronto, 1985).Google Scholar

30 Here the asterisk () represents all possible endings. In the following examples, square brackets [] enclose optional letters.Google Scholar

31 The Dictionary of Old English (Toronto, in progress: hereafter DOE) will treat about a dozen additional occurrences in the entry on ascufan: the collocations fram ascufan, niþer ascufan, onweg ascufan, and ut ascufan, which have alternatively been taken as compounds; private communication from Antonette diPaolo Healey.Google Scholar

32 The following word study treats the 594 occurrences of [ge]wl[i/y]t derived from wlite, the 16 occurrences of un[ge]wlit , and the unique occurrence of hiofonwlitige. Google Scholar

33 Decus and its inflected forms and cognates in the Psalms (esp. 20.6, 25.8, 29.8, 49.2, 92.1, and 103.1) and Latin hymns are translated scores of times by a form of wlite, as is readily seen from glancing at MCOE, fiche W017, pp. 80–88. Glosses in other texts include ÆGram 46.16; A1dV 1 (Goossens) 1071, 1246, 4859; A1dV 13.1 (Nap) 1020, 1197, 4976; RegCG1 1.49, 2.112; and LibSc 17.22; the latter also renders decorus as wliteful, 4.34. Correspondingly, dedecus and indecores are glossed most often as unwlite; dedecus: ClGl 1 (Stryker) 1884, 1885, and ClGl 3 (Quinn) 1164, indecor: ÆGram 47.12, BoG1 (Hale) M.4.5. The other two glosses on unwlitig render it deformes; ClGl 1 (Stryker) 1985, 1991. The Old English translation of Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica consistently renders deformis and deformitas as unwlitig and unwlitegnes; Bede 4 33.382.3 and 33.384.1, Bede 5 2.390.14, compared to Hist. Eccl. 4.32 (twice) and 5.2 in Baedae operae historicae, ed. and trans. King, J. E., 2 vols. (Cambridge, Mass., 1962–63) 2:192.7 and 194.29 and 2:206.15. Samples of the other equivalents are species: most glosses (A,B,C,D,E,G,H,I,J) on Ps. 44:3; PsG1E (Harsley) 44.5,12; similarly, the Old English translation of Bede's Hist. Eccl. uses wlite (Bede 4 11.288.14) to render his species in the context of a heavenly vision (Hist. Eccl. 4.9 in Baedae opera 2:288.14–15); pulcher: ÆGram 235.2, cf. PsGlI (Lindeloef) 44.5; formosus: ÆG1 2.40; AldV 13.1 (Nap) 4978; MonCa 1 and 3 (Korhammer) 13.1; comat: Abbo 1 (Zupitza) 291; Abbo 2 (Stevenson-Lindsay) 59; HlGl (Oliphant) 5312. Once insigni is glossed as wlitescenan, PsGlI (Lindeloef) 80.4. The Greek-derived plasmaverunt evidently confused one Anglo-Saxon translator of the Psalms, who rendered it gewlitegodon; PsG1E (Harsley) 118.73; cf. ClG1 1 (Stryker) 4077: metaplasmus: wlite. Another Latin-Old English glossary renders stemmate as wlite. Also odd is Aldhelm's glossing machina as wlite; A1dAE 1 (Nap) 58.Google Scholar

34 Creation as wlite: e.g., ChristC 1580; Dan 360; GenA 205, 2191; GuthB 1110; HomS 1 (VercHom 5) 74; Rec 5.4 (Rob 104) 17. See also And 1435 and Solil 2 63.4; cf. Rid 31 1, 32 1, 84 36. Creation is wlitebeorhte in GenA 129 and Beo 90. The parts of creation are individually beautiful, e.g., the sun (GuthB 1309; Bo 14.29.13; cf. wlitetorht, Met 28.59), light (HyGl 2 [Stevenson] 2.1 and 22.1), plants (ÆCHom 1 215), the tree of life (GenB 467) and the forbidden fruit in Paradise (Gen 3.6; ÆCHom II, 36.1 270.776), gold (LS 25 [MichaelMor] 6), gems (Bo 13.28.28). A recurring phrase is “middeneardes wlite”; e.g., in the homily for Tuesday in Rogationtide — HomS 7 143; HomS 40.1 (Nap 49) 279; HomS 40.3 (McCabe-VercHom 10) 305 — and HomU 27 (Nap 30) 175; cf. Bo 12.27.4.Google Scholar

35 Angels: e.g., Glor I 41; ÆCHom I, 1 10.14, 1 12.12, and 15 220.8, and II, 9 74.69; ÆLS (Maccabees) 773; LS 18.1 and 2 (NatMaryAss 10N) 160; and Sat 222. Lucifer: WHom 6 25. Leohtberend: ÆCHom I, 1 10.20; HomU 47 (Nap 58) 214; WHom 6 25.Google Scholar

36 Eve: GenB 522; 626, 694, 821. See also Sarah: GenA 1822, 1847, 1851; Gen 12.11, 14, 15 and 20.2; and ÆIntSig 61.1. Other biblical figures are less frequently so described; Esther: ÆHomM 14 (Ass 8) 79 and 97; Joseph: Gen 39.6 and Gen (Ker) 39.6; Judith: ÆHomM 15 (Ass 9) 205; Job's daughters: ÆCHom II, 35 267.220; and the daughters of men: Gen 6.2.Google Scholar

37 Christ: HomU 2 (Belf 11) 11, 91, 101, 105, 107, 116, 173, 190, 215. The cross: e.g., El 88 and 157; HyGl 3 (Gneuss) 67.5.Google Scholar

38 LS 7 (Euphr) 76, 164; LS 14 (MargaretAss 15) 53 and 56 and 182; Jul 588, cf. 162. For Mary, see, e.g., Ælfric's homilies on the Annunciation (ÆCHom I, 13 198.4) and Assumption (ÆCHom I 30 442.32, 444.1,18,33). Other saints described as wlitig include Cecilia (ÆLS [Cecilia] 290), Daria (ÆLS [Chrysanthus] 80), Eugenia (ÆLS [Eugenia] 144), and Petronella (ÆLS [Peter's Chair] 25 and 252). St. Peter's daughter is also “swiÐe wlitegu”; Mart 5 (Herzfeld-Binz) 1053 [My31/A/2]. Cf. the portent connected with Guthlac, GuthB 1309. The presence of a saint can cause a town to be gewlitegod; ÆLS (Lucy) 30.Google Scholar

39 ChristC 1460. A similar first-person speech is in HomS 32 178.Google Scholar

40 For instance, HomU 15 (Robinson) 48, Jul 311a, Part 16a, PPs 56.13, and Sat 231a. The words are reversed, wlite wuldres, in PPs 95.6. Other expressions also occur, as “hiofena rices wlite,” HomS (FörstVercHom 9) 190. By evident analogy with heaven, church buildings have wlite, in their ornament; see ChrodR 1 73.2, CP 18.135.4, for instance.Google Scholar

41 For instances of wlite butan awendednesse, see HomM 13 (PetersonVercHom 21) 288; HomS 38 (SzarmachVercHom 20) 139.V; HomS 49 (Brot2) 244. Heaven is also where wlite shines (Sat 210b).Google Scholar

42 Pertinent texts include Hom 17.1 (Kluge E) 16 and 92; HomU 17.2 (Kluge G) 15 and 81; cf. HomU 20 (BIHom 10) 19. For “wlitig and wynsumlic” in the Blickling and Vercelli homilies, see Ryan, William R. “Word-Play in Some Old English Homilies and a Late Middle English Poem,” in Studies in Language, Literature, and Culture of the Middle Ages and Later, ed. Elmer Bagby Atwood and Hill, Archibald A. (Austin, Tex., 1969), 271; cf. Tkacz, “Tormentor Tormented” (as in n. 3), 241–42. Similar are such expressions as “on wlite and on wynne,” HomU 37 (Nap 46) 272.Google Scholar

43 “Wlitig ond wynsum”: DEdg 3a; OrW 63a; Pan 65a; Phoen 203a and 318a (with “wuldre” in 318b); Rid 84 20a; and Sat 213a.Google Scholar

44 ÆLS (Agnes) 51: “His wlites wuldriaÐ Þa wynsumum tunglan, sunne and mona Þe middaneard onlihtaÐ.”Google Scholar

45 Sat 608. Lee (1972) 79, has noted that wlitige in this passage refers to the blessed souls. The martyrs, tested by fire, have “beorhtne wlite,” as do all the blessed; ChristC 1056, 1076; cf. 847.Google Scholar

46 HomS 32 232; this work has been newly edited by Joyce Bazire and Cross, James E., Eleven Old English Rogationtide Homilies, Toronto Old English Series 7 (Toronto, 1982). See also ÆLS (Christmas) 211 and CP 14.87.3.Google Scholar

47 Similar pairings are frequent, e.g., “wlite and wuldre” (GenA 36a), “wuldorfæstne wlite” (GenA 2193a), “wuldorlicne wlite” (MSol 56). For “wuldres wlite,” see n. 40 above. See also the recurring phrase “to wlite and to wuldre” — ÆCHom II 33 252.106, CP 4.39.13, HomU 2 (Belf 11) 72; cf. “fram wlite and fram wuldre heofena rices” and “on wlite and on wuldre”; HomU 32 (Nap 40) 56 and 136. See also HomU 37 (Nap 46) 171 on the saints at Judgment seeing “heora wuldor and heora wlite.” The alliterating pair are also found in the Psalms, e.g. PsGIF (Kimmens) 20.6. Cf. “wlite Þæs wuldorlecan lichoman,” the Old English translation of Bede's “species corporis gloriosi” in his account of a heavenly vision (Bede 4 11.288.14 and Baedae opera 2:288). See also ChristC 1587; Phoen 609; Rid 84 24; and Sat 222b-23b. Bushtueva, V. V. discusses wuldor and its adjectival suffixes: “Odnoosnovnye edinitsy nominatsii i usloviia ikh realizatsii v iazyke (na materiale drevneanglĭskikh prilagate-l'nykh),” Vestnik Leningradskogo Universiteta 23 (1985): 70–74.Google Scholar

48 In four other texts wuldor and gewlitegad are in close proximity: Glor I 2a and 5a, El 1319b and 1321a, and esp. LPr III 12b–13a and Phoen 117. See also “wuldorbeagas … gewlitegod”; HyG13 (Gneuss) 42.3.Google Scholar

49 See also “Þæsne wlite, & Þis wuldor”; HomU 2(Belf 11)107.Google Scholar

50 Dan 239a, 436a; Jul 163a, 590a; Az 179a; and And 1471. Robert Farrell, Daniel and Azarias, Methuen's Old English Library (London, 1974), 138. Wlitigian: Dan 326a; Az 43a, 187a. Cf. the man superficially gewlitegod with stolen vestments; GD 2(C) and 2(H) 14.131.19.Google Scholar

51 The same connotations apply to related terms: like wlitescyne is wliteful and hiofonwlite; like wliteleas is unwlite. Google Scholar

52 Eve as wlitesciene wif: GenB 527a. Angel as wlitescyne wer: Az 51a, Dan 335a, cf. wlitescyne on weres hade in El 72ab. Heavenly host as weorud wlitescyne: ChristB 493a, 554a, and the blessed in heaven as weoruda wlitescynast, 1664a. Juliana as wlitescyne wuldres condel: Jul 454ab.Google Scholar

53 SedGl 2.1 (Meritt) 484; deformatio as unwlitegung, C1Gl1 (Stryker) 1991; deformis = unwlitig, ClGl 1 (Stryker) 1985. Cf. dedecus: ClGl 1 (Stryker) 1884, 1885, and ClGl 3 (Quinn) 1164.Google Scholar

54 ÆLS (Christmas) 155, 227, cf. 211. Cf. Gifts 97.Google Scholar

55 See also WHom 8b 45 and 8c 79. Not only are the devils now without their own original wlite; at Judgment, when all humankind, good and evil, shall look upon God, none of the devils may see even a trace “Þæs wuldraes & Þæs wlites”; HomU 2 (Belf 11) 110.Google Scholar

56 The laws sometimes mention the beauty of a person or thing as enhancing its value; e.g., LawVlAs 6.1 and 6.3.Google Scholar

57 ÆAdmonl 7.34, cf. 1 8.1,5,17,22,30 and ÆHomM (Bel 9) 213. See also Ælfric's reference to the uselessness of bodily wlite to the damned, ÆHom 11 326. See also HomU 15 (Robinson) 58. On the frail wlite of the body, see also Bo 32.72.6 and 28.Google Scholar

58 Bo 28.64.23; Met 15.1.Google Scholar

59 Mt (WSCp) 23.27; MtGl (Ru) 23.27; and MtGl (Li) 23.27.Google Scholar

60 HomS 17 (BIHom 5) 57; HomS 4 (FörstVercHom 9) 190.Google Scholar

61 The following discussion is based on the analysis of 439 occurrences of [un][ge]wemman, 70 of which are spelled with a single -m-. In 5 instances, forms of the verb weman ‘to sound, to persuade, to lead astray’ are spelled with -mm-; they are not considered here. In 61 instances, the root vowel is ash. Forms with the negative prefix un- are more frequent (55 percent) than positive forms.Google Scholar

62 For an example of wemme as a physical ailment, see LchII (1 Head) 2.1; cf. the Old English translation of Bede's account of a monk with a disfigured (wemde) eyelid, healed by a relic of St. Cuthbert (Bede 4 33.382.3); intriguingly, when the monk is healed it is as if he never had any unwlitegnes (33.384.1; cf. 5 2.390.14). Ælfric's grammatical uses of the cognates are in ÆGram 294.4; ÆColl 1. For the charter, see Ch 391 (Rob 23) 27; cf. Ch 1289 (Rob 21) 11 and Ch 1394 (Rob 94) 12. Examples of gewemman with corpses — ÆCHom II, 22 198.264; Bede 4 21.316.29, 320.14; BedeHead 4.20.13 (on Æthelthryth's uncorrupted corpse); cf. the ungewemmed graveclothes of the exhumed Cuthbert, Bede 4 31.376.2. For gewemman as a gloss on corruptio mortis, see AldV 1(Goossens) 3886 and AldV 13.1 (Nap) 3999.Google Scholar

63 Sin in general: ÆCHom I, 23 332.12 and II, 37 277.175; ÆLet 4 (Sigeweard) 1070; BenRW 7.55; GenA 1287. Sexual sins (adultery, rape): ÆCHom II, 37 277.160; AldV 1 (Goossens) 2813, 3232, 4197, 4847; AldV 10 (Nap) 318; AldV 13.1 (Nap) 3339, 4317; ClGl 1 (Stryker) 3304; ClGl 3 (Quinn) 1572; Conf 1.1 (Spindler) 20 and 423; Conf 5 (Mone) 188, 190; Gen 20.14; HeptNotes 19; HomS 32 183; HomS 43 (Wülcker) 32; HomU 7 (FörstVercHom 22) 185; Law VI Atr 39; LibSc 21.35; LS 8 (Eust) 218, 357. Drunkenness: ChrodR 1 60.21. Gluttony: HomU 11 (VercHom 7) 125. Body as temple of God: ÆCHom I, 14.1 212.2; HomS 49 (Brot 2) 34 and 41; LibSc 21.32. Polluting the sanctuary: PPs 73:6 and PPs 78:1.Google Scholar

Middle English retains several of these meanings for the word: in Chaucer's Second Nun's Prologue and Tale, for instance, the “Virgine wemmeless” is invoked (47); Cecilia prays, “O Lord, my soule and eek my body gye / Unwemmed” (136–37); and an angel adjures her and Valerian, “With body clene and with unwemmed thought / Kepeth ay wel this corones” (225–26).Google Scholar

64 GenA 1287. See also Gen. 6:11–12. When Andrew calls forth a flood upon the sinful Mermedonians, he says it is that they may be gewemmede; LS 1.1 (AndrewBright) 265.Google Scholar

65 Maculare: AldV 1 (Goossens) 2813, 3700; AldV 13.1 (Nap) 2912, 4964; ArPrGl 1 (Holt-Campb) 17.37; HyGl 2 (Stevenson) 86.2; LibSc 21.18, 21.35, 51.4. Other examples are in nn. 68–69 below on the specific translations of immaculatum and sine macula. Google Scholar

66 Corrumpere: ÆGram 177.3; ClGl 1 (Stryker) 911; LibSc 1.20, 13.4 and 26, 21.27, 32.59, 38.41, 49.2; OccGl 49 (Zupitza) 25.23; SedGl 2.1 (Meritt) 452; most glosses on Ps. 13:1 (and Ps 13.1 itself) and on Ps. 52:2, as well as PsGlG (Rosier) 37.6; PsGlE (Harsley) 12.6; PsGlI (Lindeloef) 37.6. Corruptio: AldV 1 (Goossens) 3601, 3886; AldV 13.1 (Nap) 3712, 3999. Prophanare: PsGlD (Roeder), PsGIF (Kimmens), PsGLG (Rosier), PsGIH (Campbell), PsGlJ (Oess) and PsGlK (Sisam) on 88:32 and/or 88:40. Prevaricavi: PsGlD (Roeder) and PsGlK (Sisam) on 118.119; PsGlD (Roeder), PsGlF (Kimmens), PsGlG (Rosier), PsGIH (Campbell), PsGlI (Lindeloef) and PsGlJ (Oess) on 100.3; PsGlI (Lindeloef) on 180.3; AldV 2.3.1 (Nap) 84. Lenocinans: AldV 1 (Goossens) 2813, 4197, 4847; AldV 10 (Nap) 318; AldV 13.1 (Nap) 2912, 4317, 4964; AntGl 6 (Kindschi) 107.Google Scholar

67 Violare: LibSc 21.32 and 30.23 and PrudGl 1 (Meritt) 583; with the specific sense of violating the Sabbath in, e.g., Mt. (WSCp) 12.5; MtGl (Ru) 12.5; ÆHomM 2 (Bel7) 203; and Nic(A) 169, 766; cf. AldV 1 (Goossens) 3910. Interfecta: PsGlD (Roeder), PsGlG (Rosier), PsGlJ (Oess) and PsGlK (Sisam) on 105.38. Mechus: MtGl (Ru) 5.28; ClGl 1 (Stryker) 4096. Scortator, adulter, fornicator: AldV 1 (Goossens) 3232, AldV 13.1 (Nap) 3339. Incestans: ClGl 1 (Stryker) 3304, ClGl 3 (Quinn) 1572. Corripere: PsGlG (Rosier) 6.2. Infecta: ClGl 1 (Stryker) 3343. Infractus: ClGl 1 (Stryker) 3434. Probrosus: AldV 10 (Nap) 119. Obstaculis impedimentsi [!] contrariis: AldV 1 (Goossens) 3449.Google Scholar

68 Immaculatum glossed as ungewemmed: nine or more glosses do so on 63:5, 100:6 and 118:80; the other verses are 7:5, 17:24, 17:31, 18:8, 18:14, 36:18, 100:2 and 118:1. The same Psalms are translated with ungewemmed: Ps 17.24, 17.31, 18.14; PPs 100.2 and 118.1. Ps. 118:80, “Fiat cor immaculatum,” is included and translated in a prayer in ÆLS (Cecilia) 23. See also LibSc 78.17. Note: the Vulgate numbering of the verses is used here; several Old English texts number the verses somewhat differently.Google Scholar

Ungewemmed is a gloss on other negated terms, but far less frequently: especially inviolata, e.g., Canticle 19.2 in C,D,E,G,I,J versions; also, e.g., incorruptionem, LibSc 9.3; inmunis, intactus, inlibatus, AldV 1 (Goossens) 1529; intacta, HyGl 2 (Stevenson) 44.4; and intemerata, ProgGl 2.1 (Forst) 1.4.Google Scholar

69 E.g., PsGlD (Roeder), PsGlE (Harsley), PsGIF (Kimmens), PsGIH (Campbell), and PsGlJ (Oess) on 14.2.Google Scholar

70 For instance, ÆCHom I, 2 42.4; ÆCHom lI, 1 5.70 and 2 42.4; ÆHomM 8(Ass 3) 93 and 325; AldV 1 (Goossens) 392; ArPrGll (Holt-Campb) 10.2; ChristA 294 and 416; HomS 40.1 (Nap49) 12; HomS 40.2 (BlHom 9) 10; HomU 10 (VercHom 6)3; HomU 18 (BlHom 1) 87; HyG12 (Stevenson) 36.3, 44.4, 47.2; HyG13 (Gneuss), same verses; Lit 4.4.1 (Hughes) 12; LS 18.2 (NatMaryAss 10J) 599; and LS 22 (InFestisSMarie) 15, 19, and 71.Google Scholar

71 Ungewœmmed word: JnArgGl (Li) 2. Lichaman: GDPref and 4(C) 26.295.22; HomS 22 (CenDom 1) 171; HomS 26 (BIHom 7) 131. “On him næs nare synne wem“; HomU 1 (Belf 10) 53. Lamb: ÆCHomI, 38 590.13, cf. Exod 12.5. Old Testament laws concerning unwemme offering: Lev 1.1,10; 3.1,6; 4.3; 9.1,3; cf. LibSc 51.4.Google Scholar

72 John the Baptist: HomS 2 (PetersonVercHom 16) 32. Red Sea passage: LitBen 7.1 (Ure) 25. Here miraculously nature is made to act in two ways at once, as when the fire of the furnace burned the bonds of the Three Young Men but not their flesh; cf. Jul 584–89, where the fire leaves the saint unscathed but kills seventy-five of the heathen army. Note that Cynewulf clarifies that it is the men who built the fire to harm Juliana who are killed by it — in this he differs from the writer of the Acta. Note also Gregory the Great's discussion of such double action of natural elements as a patterning after the biblical narrative of the Three Young Men: GD 3(C) 18.219.24. For such double action in Andreas, see Marie Michelle Walsh, “The Baptismal Flood in the Old English ‘Andreas’: Liturgical and Typological Depths,” Traditio 33 (1977): 137–58. For such double action more generally, see Charles Grant Loomis, White Magic: An Introduction to the Folklore of Christian Legend (Cambridge, Mass., 1948).Google Scholar

73 Bede 1 4.32.8; Bede 4 20.314.30 and 24.332.5; LS 4 (Christoph) 63; cf. ChrodR 1 80.59.Google Scholar

74 ÆCHomI, 33 492.4 and 35 520.27; ÆHomM 8 (Ass 3) 93; WHom 10c 39.Google Scholar

75 ÆLS (Æthelthryth) 13, 24, 107; (Agnes) 59, 69, 168; (Cecilia) 13, 31; (Julian and Basilissa) 75, 91; (Lucy) 36, 84, 90; LS 14 (MargaretAss 15) 40, 165; and LS 16 (MargaretHerbst) 116, 165. See also Mart 2.1 (Herzfeld-Kotzor) 31 [JU25/A/5] and Mart 5 (Herzfeld-Binz) 330 [MA04/A/19].Google Scholar

76 For instance, ÆCHom I, 2 36.4; see also ChrodR 1 79.95; HomM 5 (Willard) 424; HomS 22 (CenDoml) 265; HomU 2 (Belf 11) 133, and cf. 29 416.16. Butan œlcere gewemmednysse: ÆCHom I, 5 88.32 and II, 43 321.92.Google Scholar

77 “Se welwillende scyppend læt hi habben agenes cyres geweald, Þa wearÐ heo by agenum wyllan gewæmmed Þurh Þæs deofles lare”; ÆLS (Christmas) 174.Google Scholar

78 The following analysis is based on the 63 occurrences of [ge]scf which are derived from scufan. Prefixed forms of the verb, ascufan through wiÐscufan, are drawn upon only as they confirm meanings demonstrable for scufan itself. See also the DOE entry on bescufan. Google Scholar

79 Beo 211; ChronE (Plummer) 1048.78; cf. LS 35 (VitPatr) 346. Ascufan: ÆHom 15 10 and 15 76; ChronC (Rositzke) 897.38 and ChronD (Classen-Harm) 897.1.46.Google Scholar

80 Beo 917: “Da wæs morgenleoht scofen and scynded.” GenA 135; Met 13.56 (seyfÐ).Google Scholar

81 ChronD (Classen-Harm) 1052.1.15: “… and hi gegaderedan ealle on Gleawcesterscire æt Langatreo mycel fyrd and unarimedlic, ealle gearwe to wige ongean Þone cyng, buton man ageafe Eustatius and his men heom to hand sceofe, and eac Þa Frencyscan Þe on Þam castelle wæron.” See also ÆCHom I, 37 570.26 (“to handum asceaf”) and 19 268.34 (“to deofles handa ascofen”). For another military use, see Mald 134. A unique use of scufan concerns an account, attributed to St. Augustine, of the locomotion of a sea serpent, Prov 1 (Cox) 2.8.Google Scholar

82 These are the parable in Matthew of the seats at the banquet (sit presumptuously high and someone may scufe you lower), the account in Luke of the people of Nazareth who scufon Jesus out of town [see also LS 30 (Pantaleon) 416], and, in the synoptic Gospels, the episode in which the unclean spirits besceofen the Gadarene swine into the sea: Mt (WSCp) 20.28; Mk (WSCp) 5.13; Lk (WSCp) 4.29; referred to in ÆCHom II, 27 219.166 and ÆHom 18 238. Cf. the rather Machiavellian “shoving” of Prov 1 (Cox) 1.81 and 2.8. The only other creature shoved into the sea in an Old English text is the dragon; Beo 3131. See also Ælfric's reference to the account in Luke of an attempt to shove (ascufan) Christ over a cliff; ÆCHom II, 13 134.231. For use in the Old Testament, see GenA 1562 (sceaf). In the Cura Pastoralis, the term gescofene is used for rejection from training for the priesthood; CP 49.375.18.Google Scholar

83 Glossses: I cogens: AldV 12 (Nap) 6. Deputans: HyGl 2 (Stevenson) 121.2. Precipitate: AldV 1 (Goossens) 2591; ClGl 1 (Stryker) 4900. Trudens: AldV 1 (Goossens) 131, 3658 and 3769; AldV 4 (Nap) 27 (scifþ); AldV 13.1 (Nap) 38 and 5477; HyGl 2 (Stevenson) 70.6; HyGl 3 (Gneuss) 70.6; Ælfric also translates trudo as ic sceofe; ÆGram 170.11. Cf. deponentes = ofscyfende, DurRitGl 1 (Thomp-Lind) 17.1 and 127.1.Google Scholar

84 Three Young Men: Dan 230. Daniel: ÆHom 22 311; ÆCHom II, 11 101.326, and I, 37 572.13. The similarities to the Daniel accounts found in the plot and diction of episodes of the Old English Letter of Alexander the Great to Aristotle seem to be merely coincidental; Alex 308 (bescufan) and 712 (bescufan, gesunde).Google Scholar

85 The verb describes both the torturers’ pushing of the saints into the fire (Dan 230b) and also the angel's scattering of the flames — “se Þone lig tosceaf“; Az 55b, Dan 339b. Juliana is also scufan (584) into a fire-heated wylm of lead, and during a previous fiery torture an angel of God had come “ond Þæt fyr tosceaf … ond Þone lig towearp”; Jul 563. Cf. Alms 5: toscufeþ. See also a similar construction, with a different verb, in Ælfric's account of the Three Young Men in ÆCHom I, 37 570.14–15: “tosceoc Þone lig.”Google Scholar

86 ÆLS (Agnes) 216; ÆLS (Eugenia) 396; GDPref 3(C) 18.218–19, esp. 219.12 and 219.24; HyGl 2 (Stevenson) 117.4.Google Scholar

87 Jul 582; ÆCHom I, 4 58.24.Google Scholar

88 Tormentors bescufan St. Eugenia, a hewn stone hung from her neck, into a river; similarly, Aufidianus had his servants tie an anchor to the neck of bishop Clement and asceofaþ him into the sea; a persecutor had someone bescufe St. Pantaleon in the midst of wild beasts (deorum); St. George's adversary had the saint bound to a wheel, two swords set against him, and “swa up ateon and underbæc sceofan”; and heathens scufon the Forty Soldiers into an icy mere and kept them there. ÆLS (Eugenia) 389; ÆCHom I, 37 564.1; LS 30 (Pantaleon) 306; ÆLS (George) 85; ÆLS (Forty Soldiers) 145. The similarities between the Forty Soldiers and the Three Young Men have been noted by Nancy Porter Stork, ”Is ‘Ice’ in Old English,” Mediaeval Studies 51 (1989): 292–93. When Elene has servants scufan Judas into the dry seaÐ, it is to gain information from him, and the experience facilitates his conversion; El 691. Another description of persecution involving scufan is related by Ælfric: persecutors “underbæc scufon” the apostle James and stoned him; ÆCHom II, 18 172.91 and 95, and I, 28 402.15. See the devils’ threat to scafanne Guthlac “on Ðas witu Þysse neowolnesse”; LS 10 (Guth) 308.Google Scholar

89 “on Þeostrum cwearterne”: ÆLS (Thomas) 116; “sweartum cwearterne”: ÆCHom I, 38 590.33; LS 29 (Nicholas) 393; Or 5 4.224.11; “on helstor besceaf”: And 1190. Old Testament uses: ÆLS (Book of Kings) 437; cf. the baker in Gen 41.9.Google Scholar

90 “Hwa dorste Þæs gewilnian Þæt se almihtiga cyning scedde besceofan to cwale his ancennedan æÐeling and swa ahreddan Þone Ðeowan? Næs se sunu na genyd Þæt he mann gewurde. and siÐÐan for us Ðrowian sceolde. ac he wæs gehyrsum his fæder æfre oÐ deaД; ÆCHom II, 1 4.24.Google Scholar

91 HomM 14.2 (Healey) 19: “Forþon, ic nu for Ðinum gewyrhtum eom cwylmed, and for Þinum yfelum dædum, ic eom on hellewite bescofen.”Google Scholar

92 A dozen texts use scufan to describe the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise, always contrasting their original and fallen states; for instance, GuthB 852: scofene; WHom 6 46: “of Þære myrhÐe aworpene … & on Þis wræclice lif bescofene … on geswince”; WHom 14 44: “of myclum myrhÐum … bescofen to hefigum geswincum.” Also HomS 9 52. Examples with ascufan are ÆCHom 1, 10 154.10, HomM 9 18; HomM 11 (PetersonVercHom 14) 23; HomS 2 (PetersonVercHom 16) 218; HomS 3 (VercHom 8) 56; HomS 8 (BIHom 2) 46; HomS 9 46; HomU 57 (Warn 44) 15.Google Scholar

93 HomS 6 (Ass 14) 133; ÆCHom II, 21 189.288. See also next note. Cf. ÆCHom II, 37 277.160 and ChrodR 1 60.25. Related are HomU 12.2 (Willard) 36 and Ch 1208 (Rob 22) 11. See also WCan 1.2 (Torkar) 35 (scyfÐ).Google Scholar

94 Sat 598–635; Eluc 1 (Warn 45) 23; ÆCHom II, 42 313.101. Cf. ÆCHom II, 38 283.128 and ÆCHom I, 7 112.5.Google Scholar

95 Scyfe ‘shove’ can be the inclination or impulse — inpulsu, PrudGl 4.2 (Page) 37 — to sin, either at the devil's instigation or from inner stirrings. Deofles scyfe: Conf 4 (Fowler) 283 (scife) and 308; HomU 48 (Nap 59) 28; LawICn 23; WHom 14 33; WPol 2.2.2 (Jost) 10. Inner stirrings: CP 33.215.11 and 15; CP (Cotton) 33.214.12 and 17.Google Scholar

96 GenA 65–66. Later in the poem AbiDmelech acknowledges God's power and Abraham's closeness to God, saying: “Waldend scufeÐ, frea on forÐwegas folmum sinum willan Þinne”; GenA 2813.Google Scholar

97 El 933–34, 941–43.Google Scholar

98 GuthA 632 and 661.Google Scholar

99 HomM 13 (Peterson VercHom 21) 167, and HomS 34 (Peterson VercHom 19) 23.Google Scholar

100 ÆCHom I, 7 112.5 (bescufe); ÆCHom I, 24 342.17 and 36 538.30 (ascofene); perhaps cf. ChrodR 1 79.77.Google Scholar

101 HomU 27 (Nap 30) 76: “Þurh Ða ofermodignesse mære englas on heofonum wurdon geo forsceapene to atelicum deoflum and besceofene on helle grund, Þær hi sceolon ecelice witu Þolian forÐan Þe hi forhogedon Þone ecan drihten and him sylfum Þær rice mynton.”Google Scholar

102 The immediate source is not known, according to George Herzfeld, who compares the entry to that in Boninus Mombritius's fifteenth-century Sanctuarium; see An Old English Martyrology, ed. Herzfeld, G., EETS 116 (London, 1890; rpt. 1973), xxxviii, xxiv. See also Das altenglische Martyrologium, ed. Gunter Kotzor, Abhandlungen, Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, n.F., Heft 88 (Munich, 1981).Google Scholar

103 “Passio sanctorum Chrysogoni, Anastasiae, Agapes, Chrysoniae, Irenes, et Theodotae” in Sanctuarium seu Vitae Sanctorum, 2 vols. (Milan, ca. 1477; new ed. Paris, 1910; rpt. New York, 1978) 1:357–59. The parallelism of the quoted phrases is an instance of biblical style; see Howlett's discussion in “Biblical Style” (as in n.15), 128–31.Google Scholar

104 Like the Latin martyrologies of Bede, the anonymous Lyonnaise compiler, and Florus, the Old English Martyrology lacks the third saint, Irene, in the pertinent entry, commemorating her on a different day. Nonetheless, all four versions model the narrative on Daniel 3, although writing about two young saints, not three.Google Scholar

105 Martyrology, 52–54.Google Scholar

106 On the martyrologist's knowledge and use of Scripture, see Cross, J. E. “On the Library of the Old English Martyrologist,” in Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies Presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday, ed. Michael Lapidge and Helmut Gneuss (Cambridge, Eng., 1985), 233–34. This section of Cross's discussion begins with the commonsense reminder that “analysis of sources should not overlook the obvious.” For the case that the martyrologist was “a competent Latinist,” see Cross, “The Latinity of the Ninth-Century Old English Martyrologist,” in Studies in Earlier Old English Prose: Sixteen Original Contributions, ed. Szarmach, Paul E. (Albany, N.Y., 1986), 275–99.Google Scholar

107 Angel: Dan 156, 237, etc. Dewy: Dan 273–77, 345–54. Beauty, unhurt: Dan 240–41, 342–44, 436–39, 463–66.Google Scholar

108 Angel: Az 52, 61, etc. Dewy: Az 59–64. Beauty, unhurt: Az 176–79, 186–88a.Google Scholar

109 The passage is alluded to but not discussed by Roberta Bux Bosse and Jennifer Lee Wyatt, “Hrothgar and Nebuchadnezzar in Old English Verse,” Papers on Language and Literature 23 (1987): 265.Google Scholar

110 Cf. Ælfric's nefex forswœlan in his account of the Ðry cnihtas; ÆLS (Memory of Saints) I, 342.75–76; cf. 182.122, 231.Google Scholar

111 Leonore MacGaffey Abraham notes that lines 230–44 of Daniel — shown in the present study to include the Daniel material — are “generally reckoned to have other close resemblances to the description of the ordeals in Juliana,” but little else has been said on the subject; “Cynewulf's Juliana: A Case at Law,” Allegorica 3 (1978): 182.Google Scholar

112 Dan 339, Az 55. For a discussion of these lines, see Alison Jones, “Daniel and Azarias as Evidence for the Oral-Formulaic Character of Old English Poetry,” Medium Ævum 35 (1966): 99–100.Google Scholar

113 Tkacz, “Tormentor Tormented” (as in n. 3), 235–39 et passim. The use of Daniel material in the legend of Juliana is traditional, evident in the seventh-century Latin Acta and in Symeon Metaphrastes’ tenth-century Greek version as well. For a full discussion of Daniel material in the Greek version, see “Tormentor Tormented,” 243–46. The only prior study comparing the Greek, Latin, and Old English versions is that of Garrett, James M., “The Latin and the Anglo-Saxon Juliana,” Publications of the Modern Language Association 14 (1899): 279–98.Google Scholar

114 Bzdyl is right that Juliana's thanksgiving here emphasizes the contrast between Eleusius and herself in the next few lines: Donald Gregory Bzdyl, “Prayer in Old English Narratives” (Ph.D. diss. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne, 1977), 163–70; a more powerful motive for including her thanks at this point, however, was probably the poet's desire to evoke Daniel 3. Even the emphasis by repetition of the verb stod seems to strengthen the parallel with the Daniel passage, for all visual depictions of the Three Young Men show them standing, typically in the orans position; Henri Leclercq, “Hébreux (Les Trois Jeunes),” DACL 6.2:2107–26; Klaus Wessel, “Jünglinge im Feuerofen,” Reallexikon zur byzantinischen Kunst, ed. Marcell Restle (Stuttgart, 1966–) 3:668–76; Catherine Brown Tkacz, Lowden, John H., Anthony Cutler, “Three Hebrews,” ODB 3:2081.Google Scholar

115 Wardale, When E. E. translated wlite ungewemmed as “unblemished beauty,” he aptly used alliteration, but missed the important connotations of the phrase; Chapters on Old English Literature (London, 1935; rpt. New York, 1965), 157.Google Scholar

116 For Andrew as a type of Christ, see, e.g., Hill, Thomas D. “Figural Narrative in Andreas: The Conversion of the Mermedonians,” Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 70 (1969): 271, and especially Biggs, Frederick M., “The Passion of Andreas: Andreas 1398–1491,” Studies in Philology 85 (1988): 413–27.Google Scholar

117 This finding complements that of Anita Riedinger, who finds in Andreas evidence of a poet well-versed in the Old English formulaic tradition but using it “very selectively” and in a manner that “changes” and “critiques the formulaic tradition — a very literary act”; “Andreas and the Formula in Transition,” in Hermeneutics and Medieval Culture, ed. Gallacher, Patrick J. and Helen Damico (Albany, N.Y., 1989), 184, 187.Google Scholar

118 Blickling Homily XIX, “S. Andreas,” likewise introduces the loc of … heafde in Andrew's prayer and repeats the phrase in God's reply; pp. 243, 245. This brief homily does not stress the role of the apostle as type of Christ, and perhaps therefore lacks the material from the description of Andrew's healing, simply stating “hraþe he Þa aras gesund”; p. 245.Google Scholar

119 Thomas Hill, “Hebrews, Israelites, and Wicked Jews: An Onomastic Crux in ‘Andreas’ 161–67,” Traditio 32 (1976): 358–61. For additional evidence of the poet's use of typology see Hill, “Figural Narrative,” 261–73, and Walsh, “Baptismal Flood” (as in n. 72).Google Scholar

120 Several hagiographic texts concerning saints who were not martyrs use the Daniel material partially. For instance, St. Catherine of Siena is unharmed by a cooking fire, and St. Martin experiences an accidental fire in a monastery as if he were on wynsummum deawe; ÆLS (Martin) II, 274.888. Marc van Uytfanghe discusses the passage concerning St. Catherine in “Modèles bibliques dans l'hagiographie,” in Le Moyen Âge et la Bible, Bible de tous les temps 4 (Paris, 1985), 475.Google Scholar

121 The general pattern of a saint's proving his sanctity and then being associated with miracles is traditional: see Kurtz, Benjamin P., “From St. Antony to St. Guthlac: A Study in Biography,” University of California Publications in Modern Philology 12 (1926): 103–46.Google Scholar

122 For a cogent discussion of scholarship on the fall of the angels in Genesis A, see Russell, , Lucifer (as in n. 11), 133–34, 138–41, 319. As noted above in the discussion of the verb scufan, nine other Old English texts also use that verb in describing the fall of the angels, but none with the full reversal of the Daniel material seen here. Perhaps the striking inversion in Genesis A caught the poetic imagination, so that traces of that inversion are frequently found in descriptions of the fallen angels.Google Scholar

123 Doane, A. N. silently rejects Krapp's emendation of the Junius MS's sceop to sceof; cf. George Philip Krapp, ed., “The Junius Manuscript,” in Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records (New York, 1931), 1:4, to Doane, Genesis A: A New Edition (Madison, Wis., 1978), 110. The scribal error of sceop is readily seen as a repetition of the word sceop (line 36) in a similar visual environment, namely following punctuation “between one hemistich and the following hemistich”; Krapp, pp. xxii–xxiii. It would not make sense for the poet to have God “shape” the angels in lines 65–67 when they have already been mentioned in the opening lines of the poem. Moreover, the nine other uses of the verb scufan in describing the fall of the angels argue for the soundness of Krapp's emendation.Google Scholar

124 Cf. Phoenix, where the noble plain, home of the Phoenix, is preserved “eadig, unwemme, Þurh est godes” (46), unharmed by water (41) or fire (39). For an illustration of “how the Genesis A poet expanded and sometimes embellished the poem with original ideas and inventive diction not found in the traditional poetic corpus,” see Butcher, John W., “Formulaic Invention in the Genealogies of the Old English Genesis A,” in Comparative Research on Oral Traditions: A Memorial for Milman Parry, ed. John Miles Foley (Columbus, Oh., 1987), 73–92.Google Scholar

125 The quoted words are from Lord, “Perspectives” (as in n. 11), 209. The following scholars have my gratitude for critiquing early drafts of this essay: John Miles Foley, Milton McCormick Gatch, Antonette diPaolo Healey, Martin, Lawrence A., and Mary Richards.Google Scholar