stone nor its writing then say anything certain concerning the age of the inscription. Kemble and Dietrich, on the other hand, reject altogether the view that the runic verses are by Caedmon. Kemble translated them. The inscription, he says, is in the usual Anglo-Saxon runes, and in the dialect which was spoken in Northumbria in the eighth and ninth centuries; and he finds their original in several passages in the Dream of the Holy Rood, passages which I have placed opposite to their runic resemblances on p. 144. That Dream has been allotted to Cynewulf by Dietrich and many others; and it is argued then that the lines on the Cross are Cynewulf's, and that the Cross is not earlier than the end of the eighth century. But it is a further question whether Cynewulf wrote the Dream of the Rood, and if he did not, we cannot for certain say that the Runes on the Ruthwell Cross are so late as the end of the eighth century. The matter then is open to debate; and if, as I think, the Dream of the Rood contains an old poem worked up by Cynewulf, and if the lines on the Ruthwell Cross belong to this old poem, it is just possible that the lines were written by Caedmon himself, or by some one of his school. Whoever wrote this poem, it became famous, and certain passages in it were used for inscriptions on crosses and relics. It is not only on the Ruthwell Cross that we find lines quoted from it. It seems to have supplied some words, or at least some suggestion for an inscription which has been found on a reliquary of the true cross in the treasure chamber of St. Gudule at Brussels, the latest history and criticism of which have been written by Dr. Logeman of Utrecht University.1 This inscription exists on a thin plate of silver which ran round the reliquary; and here is Logeman's arrangement of it. It is not in runes but in Roman letters, and is probably of the tenth century. "Rod is min nama geo ic ricne cyning baer,2 byfigynde blode bestemed.3 Thas rode het Ethimaer wyrican J Adhelwold hys berotho; Criste to lofe, for Elfrices saule hyra berothor." "Rood is my name; long ago I bore a goodly king; trembling, dripping with blood. Ethlmaer bade work this rood, and Adhelwold his brother. To the glory of Christ, for the soul of Elfric their brother!" On the back of the Cross the artist has placed his name "Drahmal me worhte" (Drahmal wrought 1 L'Inscription Anglo-Saxonne du Reliquaire de la Vraie Croix" au Trésor de l'Église des S.S. Michel-et-Gudule, à Bruxelles.-1891, Londres, Luzac et Cie, 46 Great Russell Street. 2" Rod waes ic araered: ahof ic ricne cyning." Dream of Rood, 1. 44. "Eall ic waes mid blode bestemed." - Dream of Rood, 1. 48. me). The phrases "blode bestemed" and "ricne cyning" are from the Dream; and the trembling of the rood, and the personal cry of it, are suggested also by the same poem. I am glad to close this chapter with the verses that Baeda recited on his death-bed, and perhaps in no better place since I wish to bind up the great scholar with the poetry of England - can I more fitly insert part of that pure and touching story, which, like a solemn evening landscape seen from the bill-top of a long life of faithful work, breathes so quietly the gentle and clear air of death.1 "To Cuthwin, my fellow-reader, beloved in Christ, Cuthbert his school fellow- Health for ever in the Lord! I have received with much pleasure the small gift you sent to me, and with equal pleasure read your letters . . . in which I found that you carefully celebrate masses and holy prayers for our father and master Baeda, whom God loved. He was much troubled with shortness of breath, yet without pain, before the day of our Lord's resurrection, that is about a fortnight; and after that, he led his life in cheerfulness and joy, giving thanks every night and day-nay, every hour— to Almighty God, till the day of our Lord's ascension, that is the seventh of the calends of June (26th May), and daily read lessons to us, his disciples. As to the rest of the day, he spent it in singing psalms; but in the night he lay awake, full of praise and delight, save when a short sleep fell on him, but no sooner did he awake than he began at once his wonted exercises, and, with uplifted hands ceased not to give thanks to God. In sooth, I declare that I have never seen with my eyes, or heard with my ears, any man so earnest in giving thanks to the living God. O truly happy man! He chanted the text of the blessed Apostle St. Paul-'It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God,' — and much more from holy writ; and also in our tongue-that is in the English tongue, as he was learned in our songs - he said some things. Moreover, he spoke this saying, making it in English which means, 'No man is wiser than he need be, before this 1 The following account of Baeda's death occurs in a letter written by one of his pupils to another. necessary departure, that is, to think, before the soul go hence, what good or evil it hath done, and how it is to be judged after its departure.'" So far writes Cuthbert, Baeda's pupil, on this part of his master's dying hours. I give an accurate translation of the Anglo-Saxon, and place below, in a note, the old Northumbrian of the little song. It will be found in Sweet's Oldest English Texts no one becomes than behoves him to be, Before the need-faring ere his hencegoing, 1 Fore there neidfaerae naenig uuiurthit MS., St. Gall. 254. CHAPTER XXI NORTHUMBRIAN LITERATURE OTHER THAN ENGLISH From 670 to the death of Baeda — 735 THE death of Oswiu and the accession of Ecgfrith in 670 are probably coincident with the first verses by which Caedmon began the religious poetry of England and founded the school of whose writings I have now given an account. About the same date, or a little before it, the Latin learning and literature of Northumbria began, and it flourished till the coming of the Danes. The history of this is, as far as the death of Baeda, the subject of this chapter. English poetry has two distinct periods, the first of which belongs to the time of the glory of Northumbria, and the second to the time of its anarchy and decay. The first is bound up with the school of Caedmon, and may be said to close with the death of Baeda. The second, hereafter to be treated, may be collected round the name of Cynewulf. One is unconscious of sorrow and regret; the other is deeply conscious of both. There was then a division of sentiment, answering partly to a change in the fortunes of the kingdom, which breaks into two branches English Verse in Northumbria. There is no such break in the history of Latin literature in the North. It was only slowly affected by the internal troubles of the kingdom. Pursued in its monastic centres, apart from the strife of kings and pretenders, by men whom all sides honoured, concentrated finally in the ecclesiastical and political capital of the North where it was safest from disturbance and most easily patronised, it lived through all the anarchy, and may even have continued a miserable existence after the Danes had taken and settled in York. York was its last refuge. It may be said to have begun in the reign of Ecgfrith, when Wilfrid obtained possession of the See of York, when he built new churches at Ripon and Hexham and founded their libraries, and when Benedict Biscop set up his monastery of Wearmouth in 674. Benedict, however, far more than Wilfrid, was the real founder of the Latin school; the true source of all that Northumbrian learning which, passing through Baeda and the scholars of York, restored to life, by English voices, the letters and sciences of Europe. He had brought to Northumbria the knowledge and arts he had acquired at Rome, and the methods of teaching he had practised with Theodore at Canterbury. In a few years, as we have already seen, he had collected two brother libraries at Wearmouth and Jarrow, founded one great school in these monasteries, and started science and literature on the path over which his scholar Baeda led them to a greater glory. In a long life he was never inactive in the cause of learning and beauty. Architecture, painting, music, glassmaking, embroidery were part of his religion. When ill and sleepless, he lessened the weariness of the night and soothed his pain by the reading of the Scriptures, and chiefly of the patience of Job. He was half palsied, and no wonder, for he had made five times that terrible journey to Rome, the woes of which seemed, however, as nothing to the eagerness of this great collector. No man did more for the materials of Northumbrian learning, and it is not uninteresting to contrast this impassioned traveller with his scholar Baeda, who never left, save for a visit or two to York, the shelter of his monastery. When Benedict Biscop died in 690, Aldfrith was reigning, and this king's West Saxon and Irish learning gave a fresh impulse to Northumbrian culture. had a ready inspirer and helper in Abbot Ceolfrid, Biscop's successor at Wearmouth and Jarrow. The school of Ceolfrid became famous. The Pope asked his advice on ecclesiastical questions. Naiton, King of the Picts, desired a letter from him concerning the Roman tonsure and time of celebrating Easter, and this tractate, which Baeda gives in full, places him with justice among clear and vigorous writers. Baeda himself wrote his life, and a delightful piece of literature it is. There is no better picture of the daily life of an English monastery. He Both he and King Aldfrith are further connected by their literary relation to the book in which Adamnan of Iona gave 1 Aldfrith, we are told by Baeda in the Life of Cuthbert, "in insulis Scotorum ob studium literarum exulabat"-"in regionibus Scotorum lectioni operam dabat"-"ipse ob amorem sapientiae spontaneum passus exilium." Malmesbury (26) gives the same testimony, and Eddius calls him rez sapientissimus. Wilfrid trained him also, and he was a fellow-pupil of Ealdhelm. |