Books.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.
Overview
Found in a manuscript of Anglo-Saxon verse known as Junius 11, the biblical poems Genesis, Exodus, Daniel, and Christ and Satan have fascinated scholars for centuries. The manuscript, published by its owner Franciscus Junius in 1655, was the first codex of Old English poetry to appear in print. Written sometime around 1000, these works were originally attributed by Junius to the poet Caedmon, but they are now generally believed to be the work of several authors. However, the selection and arrangement of the texts continue to pose questions about their meaning, source, authorship, and audience that challenge our efforts to understand the manuscript as a whole and the individual poems themselves.In this volume, R.M. Liuzza has brought together an outstanding collection of essays that analyze the Junius poems from a variety of theological, rhetorical, cultural, textual, and literary perspectives. The contributors illuminate the Junius poems as treasuries of Anglo-Saxon religious lore, rich fusions of sources and influences, and complex sites of the acculturation of Christianity in the Germanic world. Together, the essays illuminate the challenges of these intriguing poems and enrich our understanding of their literary significance, their unique material context, and the hybrid culture that produced them.
Synopsis
Taken from the same manuscript as Cynewulf, the Junius 11 poems-Genesis, Exodus, Daniel, and Christ and Satan-comprise a series of redacted Old English works that have been traditionally presented as the work of Bede's Caedmon. Medieval scholars have concluded that the four poems were composed by more than one author and later edited by Junius in 1655. All of the poems are notable for their Christian content. Apart from its focus on the Junius 11 manuscript, this collection of essays is also important as a study of how to read, edit, and define any medieval literary text.