Anglo-Saxon England

Medium Aevum, Spring, 2005 by Daniel Anlezark

Anglo-Saxon England, 32 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). x 406 pp. ISBN 0-521-813,44-1. 51.00 [pounds sterling]. This volume of Anglo-Saxon England maintains the high standards and diversity of previous issues. Fulk questions philological feebleness in a recent edition of Beowulf, Biggs argues Beowulf's childlessness is a guiding theme in the latter part of the poem.

Lake evaluates knowledge of John Cassian in early Anglo-Saxon England; Gneuss and Lapidge reconstruct the earliest witness to Bede's metrical Vita S. Cudbercti. Two essays focus on the Benedictine reform: Jayatilaka on the Benedictine Rule; Gretsch on a chapter house book. Rauer assembles the Old English martyrologist's sources, if not his library. Runes feature in two studies: Niles provocatively reassesses runes in Old English poems, Clunies Ross looks at an Offa penny. Okasha and Youngs discuss a newly found inscribed pendant. Semple's fascinating study of damnation illustrations looks at hell in the landscape. Sharpe considers the transitional state of late Anglo Saxon law. The volume includes a bibliography of Anglo-Saxon studies for 2002. [Daniel Anlezark]