Migration and Mythmaking in Anglo-Saxon England

224 Pages·1989·9.92 MB·English

by  Nicholas Howe

IIIICKAIIUU ÄUD
IDYTHdlÄKlHC
m
AHCLO'SÄXOU
eHCLAUD
NICHOLAS HOWE
In this original and revisionist interpretation
of Anglo-Saxon England, Nicholas Howe pro­
poses that the Anglo-Saxons fashioned a myth
out of the fifth-century migration of their
Germanic ancestors to Britain. Through the
retelling of this story, the Anglo-Saxons
ordered their complex history and identified
their destiny as a people. Howe traces the
migration myth throughout the literature of
the Anglo-Saxon period, in poems, sermons,
letters, and histories from the sixth to the
eleventh centuries.
According to the myth of origin that the
Anglo-Saxons constructed, the ancestors who
made the exodus from continent to island
were a chosen people, New Israelites, to
whom a promised land — and spiritual salva­
tion —had been entrusted. The representa­
tive works of the period joined biblical and
national history to form a pattem that defined
the cultural and religious identity of the
Anglo-Saxons and preserved their social cohe­
sion. Howe discusses historical works such
as Bede's Ecclesiastical History and the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. He then examines
Old English poetry. He suggests that the
Exodus is a profound retelling of the biblical
Continued on back flap

MIGRATION AND
MYTHMAKING IN
ANGLO-SAXON
ENGLAND

MIGRATION AND
MYTHMAKING IN
ANGLO-SAXON
ENGLAND
NICHOLAS HOWE
YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS
NEW HAVEN AND LONDON
The ship's prow (carbon-dated ca. 400 a.d.) that illustrates the title page and the
chapter openings is reproduced by courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum.
Copyright © 1989 by Yale University. All rights reserved. This book may not be
reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that
copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by
reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publishers.
Set in Trump Medieval type by The Composing Room of Michigan, Inc. Printed in the
United States of America by Book Crafters, Inc., Chelsea, Michigan.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Howe, Nicholas.
Migration and mythmaking in Anglo-Saxon England / Nicholas Howe.
p. cm.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-300-04512-3 (alk. paper)
1. English literature—Old English, ca. 450-1100—History and criticism.
2. Migrations of nations in literature. 3. Mythology, Germanic, in literature.
4. Germanic tribes in literature. 5. Civilization, Anglo-Saxon. 6. Myth in
literature. 7. England—Church history—Anglo-Saxon period, 449-1066. I. Title.
PR179.M53H68 1989
829'.09'15—dcl9 89-30744
CIP
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the
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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The author and publisher gratefully acknowledge permission to quote copyrighted
material from the following: Roy J. DeFerrari, Paulus Orosius: The Seven Books of
History Against the Pagans, The Fathers of the Church Vol. 50, copyright 1964 by The
Catholic University of America Press; Ephraim Emerton, The Letters of Saint Boniface,
copyright 1940 by Columbia University Press; S. A. J. Bradley, Anglo-Saxon Poetry,
copyright 1982 by J. M. Dent and Sons; Dorothy Whitelock, English Historical
Documents: Volume I, 2d edition, copyright 1979 by Eyre and Spottiswoode; Beowulf,
A New Prose Translation by E. Talbot Donaldson, by permission of W. W. Norton &
Company, Inc. Copyright © 1966 by W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.; Bertram Colgrave
and R. A. B. Mynors, Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, copyright
1969 by Oxford University Press; Peter Godman, Alcuin: The Bishops, Kings, and
Saints of York, copyright 1982 by Oxford University Press; Michael Winterbottom,
Gildas: The Ruin of Britain and Other Works, copyright 1978 by Phillimore and Co.,
Ltd. and Rowman and Littlefield, Totowa, New Jersey; Stephen Allott, Alcuin of York:
His Life and Letters, copyright 1974 by Sessions of York England; C. H. Talbot, The
Anglo-Saxon Missionaries in Germany, copyright 1954 by Sheed and Ward, Ltd.
To my parents