Aelfric's homilies on Judith, Esther, and the Maccabees
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~stuart/kings/
The website 'Aelfric's Homilies on Judith, Esther, and the Maccabees' makes available Stuart D. Lee's electronic edition of these Old English texts. The texts themselves are reproduced in PDF format. The site also contains introductory materials including: notes; a glossary; and an extensive bibliography. The editor describes the manuscript sources for Aelfric's Homilies and also discusses questions of: authorship; style; and date of composition. There is a section on the themes of the homilies, which locates the texts in their historical and intellectual contexts. Users may need to download Anglo-Saxon fonts in order to display some of the resources correctly (a link is provided to a free source of such fonts). This site would interest those studying Old English language or religious texts.
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Anglo-Saxon charms
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~kjolly/unc.htm
The Anglo-Saxon Charms website consists of Old English charms in modern English translation. The charms are taken from Karen Louise Jolly's book 'Late Saxon England: Elf Charms in Context'. The translations include: a field remedy; several miscellaneous Lacnunga charms; the lay of the nine herbs and lay of the nine twigs of Woden; three Lacnunga elf charms; some leechbook elf charms; and the prayer of St. John used for snake bite in Bald's leechbook. The manuscript sources are given, but the texts are not reproduced in their original language. The site does not offer any analysis of the charms, but students of medieval English Literature or medieval history may find these interesting.
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Anglo-Saxon dictionary [Bosworth and Toller]
http://lexicon.ff.cuni.cz/app/
The 'Anglo-Saxon Dictionary' website provides online access to Bosworth and Toller's dictionary, which has been the primary lexical reference for study of the Anglo-Saxon language since its publication in 1898. With the sponsorship of the University of California, Berkley, the text of the dictionary can be searched in a limited way online, and also accessed via a Windows / Mac application. Both the application and the texts can be downloaded free from the website, along with images of the original printed dictionary. Also provided alongside these resources are: a list of other Middle English and Old English printed dictionaries; a guestbook; and a small section of related Web links. This is a valuable resource for both students and researchers studying Old English texts in the original language.
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Anglo-Saxon manuscripts in microfiche facsimile
http://mendota.english.wisc.edu/~ASMMF/index.htm
The "Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile" (ASMMF) website provides information on this initiative, which aims to make available in an economical format the entire manuscript corpus of the Old English language. There are over 500 manuscripts in the entire series. The microfiche volumes are being published at 2-3 months intervals by the Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies at the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Arizona State University, and are available by subscription or by individual volume. The website lists all the published and forthcoming volumes, the manuscripts included in the project, the libraries participating in the project, and some links to Anglo-Saxon related sites. The project also publishes its guidelines for preparing manuscript descriptions on this website. This site would be of interest to academic libraries, and to those studying or teaching Anglo-Saxon literature or history.
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Anglo-Saxonists from the 16th through the 20th century
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~ctb/saxon.html
Anglo-Saxonists From the Sixteenth Through the Twentieth Century is an online bibliography of secondary works relating to the history of Anglo-Saxon and Old English scholarship and scholars. The bibliography is organised on a century-by-century basis, listing general works and works about specific scholars in each period. There is also a list of general studies. References are not annotated, and the compiler does not claim that the bibliography is comprehensive, although it is extensive enough to be of use to those researching the history of Anglo-Saxon scholarship.
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AnsaxDAT database
http://raptor.library.mun.ca/LuceneSearch/?collection=ansax§ion=none
AnsaxDAT is a searchable full-text database of postings to the Ansaxnet (Ansax-l) email discussion list. ANSAX-L is the listserv discussion group for ANSAXNET, the Anglo-Saxon Network. Discussions cover not only Old English language and literature, but also Anglo-Saxon archaeology, history, philosophy, and the arts. The archive contains postings from 1991 to the present day. Postings of interest can be marked for later printing or downloading. Unfortunately the pages surrounding the search engine are all empty so, for example, there are no instructions given for joining the Ansax-l email discussion list.
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Arthurian sources and texts
http://britannia.com/history/artdocs.html
Arthurian Sources and Texts is an online collection of excerpts from primary source documents which make significant reference to King Arthur. These range from the fifth century, when Arthur may have lived, to the sixteenth century. The extent to which these sources are historically reliable as a chronicle of Arthur's existence as portrayed in the mythical terms in which he is now recognised is unclear. The site benefits from its secondary source historical contextualisation of its excerpts. All sources are footnoted. As a collection, the site would serve as a good starting point for teachers and students to explore the clearer parts of the historical chronology and its transition over time into myth, as well as the meaning of that transition. The site is run off a commercial server which prompts pop-up advertisements with each click to a new screen, which hamper navigation.
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ASPNS. Anglo-Saxon plant-name survey
http://www2.arts.gla.ac.uk/SESLL/EngLang/ihsl/projects/plants.htm
The plant-name of Anglo-Saxon England survive in a variety of media, such as manuscripts and inscriptions, and are of more than linguistic interest, shedding light on a wide variety of social matters such as dialect, land-use and economy, diet, medical treatment, clothing and the wider perception of the landscape. The Anglo-Saxon Plant-Names Survey (ASPNS), based at the University of Glasgow, aims to produce a comprehensive database of these names and interpret this linguistic information within an interdisciplinary context of other humanities and sciences. The resource provides the ASPNS annual report from 2000 onwards, details of the personnel working on the project and a list of plant names arranged in tabular form which is still under construction. These include: bushes and trees; ferns; fungi; lichen; moss; grasses and reeds; fruits and nuts; edible roots; various types of grains; spices and herbs; medicinal plants and plants yielding fibres for cloth making. Also included is the database of Latin plant-names in all their variant forms which were current in Anglo-Saxon England. The website also includes the ASPNS bibliography as well as a select but wide-ranging bibliography of general Anglo-Saxon studies (such as language and palaeography, history and archaeology but also fiction and children's literature) as well as page of weblinks. Although largely a specialist resource aimed at researchers in the historical development of the English language, the bibliographies and weblinks will also benefit students and the general public.
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Battle of Brunanburh
http://loki.stockton.edu/~kinsellt/litresources/brun/brun1.html
The Battle of Brunanburh is a website dedicated to the Old English poem of the same name. The poem appears in four of the manuscripts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and celebrates the victory of Aethelstan and Eadmund over the Picts and Vikings at Brunanburh in 937 AD. (The actual location of Brunanburh is disputed.) The website includes the text of the poem in Old English with a modern English translation. The Old English text is hyperlinked to a glossary and notes on the grammatical constructions used. Tennyson's translation of the poem is also included, as are: a brief summary of the historical background to the poem; a paragraph on the Old English language; and a short bibliography with links to other websites. The site also provides a sketchy map of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (entitled 'A Pitiful Map'!). Two undergraduate essays on 'The Wanderer' are also provided. This site would be of interest to students of Anglo-Saxon literature.
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Battle of Maldon
http://www.battleofmaldon.org.uk/
'The Battle of Maldon' is an enthusiast website providing details on the historical battle, linking it to the Anglo-Saxon poem describing the battle. The site provides: a short introduction to the battle; a commentary and modern translation of the poem; a map of the battlefield; photographs of the area; information on the resting place of Brithnoth, the leader of the Anglo-Saxon army involved in the battle; and related links. This is an interesting site, which adds background to the poem and the battle for students of English literature and history, and would make a good introduction to the subject.
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Beowulf in hypertext
http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~beowulf/
The website Beowulf in Hypertext, developed under the supervision of Dr. Anne Savage (Department Of English, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario), is an online learning aid for the study of: the Old English poem; its characters; and history. To add to the Anglo-Saxon text, the site provides: a modern English translation; notes; and a select bibliography. The 'History' section includes: an introduction to the Anglo-Saxon manuscript; its authorship; supporting archaeological evidence; and possible sources explaining the Christian traces in the poem. The 'Character' section elucidates on real characters (the: Geats; Danes; and Swedes) as well as fictional ones (Grendel and Grendel's mother). This site would be of interest to students studying the poem and its background, and Anglo-Saxon literature more generally.
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Beowulf on steorarume
http://www.heorot.dk/
The "Beowulf in Cyberspace" website is an online edition of the Old English epic poem Beowulf. A sophisticated and multimedia project, Beowulf on Steorarume contains a fully annotated text of Beowulf, along with new modern English and German translations of the poem. The editor, Benjamin Slade, also provides other relevant Old English texts such as: the Finnsburh Fragment; Waldere; Deor, and Charm Against a Sudden Stitch, for the purposes of contextualisation. Each section of the poem can be heard on an audio recording, and some sections also feature images. There are explanatory and background materials, as well as links to off-site resources.
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Beowulf Translations
http://www.beowulftranslations.net/
The Beowulf Translations web site brings together various people's work on the poem, and is edited by Syd Allan, who refers to himself as a 'Beowulf hobbyist' whose labours 'are not meant for scholars'. But Allan's nicely illustrated website provides detailed information on a very impressive range of 'Beowulf'-related subject matters and is very useful to several aspects of the study of this Old English text. The site's main feature is a compilation of bibliographic and photographic information on Modern English translations, as well as: film; theatre; and comic-strip adaptations of the text. These can be accessed from the main page, either chronologically under date of publication (between 1805 and 2002) or alphabetically under author. In addition, the site offers a great number of other features, including: scans (of: nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century editions and translations; parts of the manuscript; and further illustrative material); audio-files; selections of text; and bibliographies. Mr Allan also provides elementary information (of limited but consistent scholarly value) on text-interpretation (discussion of: the contents; the genre; the manuscript; and the language), and the historical background. Finally, a major strength of this site is that it is extremely well hyper-linked, providing access to other websites and discussion groups on 'Beowulf'.
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Bibliography and methods in medieval studies
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/cdwright/www/medsyll.html
The Bibliography and Methods in Medieval Studies website is an online course outline with detailed bibliographies and links to resources for bibliographic research in medieval studies. The site is divided into sub-sections, representing the topics covered each week in the course, including: general bibliographies and Internet sources; medieval history sources; ecclesiastical sources; Latin authors and texts; interpretations of the Bible; the liturgy; hagiography; iconography; manuscript research; science; and popular culture and folklore. Each section is linked to a bibliography, covering "the major reference guides, encyclopaedias, bibliographies and electronic databases". Some of the links to electronic resources are only available to students and staff of the University of Illinois, but those that are freely available are worth looking at. There are also eight library exercises designed to train the undergraduate medievalist in the scholarly tools which make the discipline possible.
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Boethius in early medieval Europe : Commentary on the Consolation of Philosophy from the 9th to the 11th centuries
http://www.english.ox.ac.uk/boethius/index.html
The 'Boethius in early medieval Europe' website provides an overall view of a project based at the Faculty of English, University of Oxford. The project aims to investigate understanding of late Roman culture as appropriated by Anglo-Saxons. In particular the project will focus its attention on Anglo-Saxon versions of the 'De Consolatione Philosophiae' (On the Consolation of Philosophy), by Boethius (480-c.524) and aims to publish a new edition of the Alfredian Boethius complete with glossary, commentary, and translation. The website gives details of: the project's aims; the makeup of the advisory board; and contact details for project staff. This project has received funding from the Leverhulme Trust. This site would be of interest to those researching Boethius and the transmission of his work.
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Brief outline of medieval English literature
http://www.accd.edu/sac/english/bailey/medeng.htm
A Brief Outline of Medieval English Literature is part of the San Antonio College British Literature Index, and provides a solid introduction to the principal writers and genres of the medieval period. The site begins with a section on Old English prose and poetry, providing details of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts and modern English translations. The Middle English section offers critical and biographical information on the major writers such as: Geoffrey Chaucer; William Langland; the Pearl Poet; Robert Henryson; and Thomas Malory, as well as details of their major works and links to e-texts and other relevant sites. The main strength of the site lies in its links to excellent pages, such as those concerning: the mystics Julian of Norwich and Margery Kempe; medieval lyrics; and medieval drama. This would make a good introduction to the literature of the period for undergraduate English students.
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Centre for medieval studies, University of York
http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/cms/
The Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of York website is the online home of one of the UK's largest interdisciplinary centres for research into the medieval period. The website introduces the centre and its courses, as well as providing information about the various research projects hosted at the centre, and access to student essays (in PDF format) published in the 'York Medieval Yearbook'. There is also: an online directory of staff and students at the Centre; a diary of forthcoming lectures and events; and links to other relevant websites. Essay topics represented in the two Medieval Yearbooks available include: the Old English Judith; the decline of Norse Greenland; various art history subjects; William Worcester's account of the Hundred Years war; the continuity of Christian practices in Kent after the Roman evacuation; and female owner-portraits in continental books of hours. Another useful online resource accessed via this site is an online gazetteer of the religious gilds and services of late Medieval Yorkshire. This constitutes an alphabetical reference guide to various parishes, detailing subsidies and poll tax populations. It complements the printed book, 'Piety, Fraternity and Power', by David J. F. Crouch. This site would be of use to students studying or contemplating the study of the medieval period.
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Chronological bibliography of books about Tolkien
http://www.forodrim.org/bibliography/tolklist.html
'A Chronological Bibliography of Books About Tolkien' is a scholarly bibliography by Åke Bertenstam of the Swedish
Forodrim Society. His bibliography lists 711 titles that relate to the author J.R.R. Tolkien, covering materials from 1959 until 2003. It is organised by year. Works included are only those that are "about Tolkien and his writings" rather than attempting to deal with the dense undergrowth of 'Tolkienalia' such as games, comics, plays or music. There is, however, a short addendum that lists works related to film adaptations. Some entries are annotated. The bibliography also endevours to include reprinted titles. All encyclopaedias were excluded from the bibliography.
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Complete corpus of Anglo-Saxon poetry
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/ascp/
The Complete Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Poetry is a Web page that contains plain-text electronic editions of a considerable number (but not all, despite its title) of Old English poems, produced by O.D. Macrae-Gibson on the basis of Greg Hidley's original work. Initially Hindley produced texts that were collations of the electronic texts of the 'Old English corpus' held by the 'Dictionary of Old English' with the printed texts of the 'Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records'. Macrae-Gibson has revised Hindley's work on the basis of more recent updates from the 'Dictionary of Old English', as well as further collations with printed material, facsimiles and manuscript readings. The resulting website aims to make available highly reliable editions of the extant Old English texts. The site offers only texts, with no: editorial comments on the collations; notes and background information; or Modern English translation. The site would benefit from a better organised main menu and from a more user-friendly navigation, but would be of use as a abasic tool for undergraduates and graduates studying these texts in their original language.
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Dictionary of Old English
http://www.doe.utoronto.ca/
The Dictionary of old English is the website of an electronic dictionary based on the DOEC (Dictionary of Old English Corpus) and is an ongoing project of the University of Toronto. The DOEC contains the full-texts of nearly all known Anglo-Saxon texts - from the law code issued by Athelbert of Kent (c.580-616) to the closing annal of the Old English Chronicle in 1154. Versions of texts that have been transcribed in different dialects or at different times are included in the DOEC. The corpus consists of over 3,000 documents and is available (via subscription) online. As of 2006, volumes 'A' to 'F' of the Dictionary of Old English have been completed and published, with work continuing further down the alphabet. These volumes can be bought on CD-ROM. The website does allow users to search freely for variant spellings in the Dictionary, but citations can only be viewed if the user or their institution has a subscription to the Corpus. A list of texts cited in the Dictionary (with bibliographic information) is also available free. This site would be of use to researchers working in the fields of Anglo-Saxon literature or language, but gives limited options without subscription. The corpus can be ordered via the Oxford Text Archive (OTA) (formerly part of the Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS)) on completion of the request access form.
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Digital medievalist
http://www.digitalmedievalist.org/
Digital Medievalist is the website of an online community of practice for medievalists working with digital media, particularly the digital representation of historical source material. The project runs: an email discussion list to enable the sharing of experience and knowledge amongst scholars working with medieval sources in a digital environment; a refereed online journal; and a news server for calls for papers and announcements. The Project also arranges conference sessions at relevant congresses. Full texts of journal issues are available on the website, as are guidelines for contributors. The Executive Board of the project has an international membership, reflecting the scope of this area of research. The site would be of interest to researchers already in the field, and anyone considering starting a digital project using medieval sources.
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Dragons in the sky : English speaking communities at the close of the millenia
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~stuart/dits/
'Dragons in the Sky' is an electronic book, published online by Stuart Lee of the University of Oxford. The aim of the book is to compare and contrast the beliefs, practices and attitudes of English-speaking communities at the turn of the year 2000 CE, with their Anglo-Saxon counterparts in 1000 AD. The essays published here discuss topics such as: 'The Worship of Technology'; 'Religious Icons'; fashion in both periods; 'Marriage and the Family'; 'National Identity'; and 'Attitudes to War'. The articles, while scholarly, aim to encourage popular interest in the Anglo-Saxon period through explanation of academic terminology and translation of Old English texts into modern English. This site adds a fresh perspective to the study of medieval culture, and would be of interest to researchers, students and general readers alike.
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Electronic introduction to Old English
http://www.wmich.edu/medieval/resources/IOE/
The Electronic Introduction to Old English is an online edition of the book by Peter S. Baker of the University of Virgina. The aim of the online resource is to promote interest in Old English by making information about the language widely available. The site invites readers' comments and suggestions, with the promise that any subsequent corrections will appear in the online version, and at a later date, in the printed edition. The website is divided into chapters, including: 'The Anglo-Saxons and their language'; 'The Grammar of Old English Poetry'; and 'Reading Old English Manuscripts', as well as chapters on: pronunciation; word order; basic grammar; nouns; cases; adjectives; and verbs. The chapters are preceded by an introduction to the electronic edition of the work, and details relating to system requirements and accessibility. Appendices to the main work include a bibliography and suggested further reading. This resource would be of use to English and history students wishing to read Anglo-Saxon poems and documents in their original language.
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Electronic sermo lupi ad Anglos
http://english3.fsu.edu/~wulfstan/
The electronic 'Sermo Lupi ad Anglos' is an online hypertext version of Wulfstan II's Old-English sermon (Sermon of the Wolf to the English). The manuscript from which the main critical text is taken is the BL MS Cotton Nero A.1. fol 110r, although the website also contains the texts from the Bodleian's Hatton MS 113, the Bodley MS 343, the CCCC MS 113, and the CCCC MS 419. The Old-English text can be viewed simultaneously with a glossary, with notes, or with a translation into modern English. The site also includes: a photograph of the Cotton Nero manuscript; a bibliography; grammatical notes; and some analogous texts, which include: sections from the Bible; and the 'Sermo ad Milites' (Sermon to the Knights). This website provides an enormous amount of useful material in a layout that allows easy comparisons between texts. It should prove invaluable to scholars working on the Sermon of the Wolf, and may also prove popular with undergraduates wishing to verify their translations of the original.
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Engliscan gesiðas
http://www.tha-engliscan-gesithas.org.uk/
Ða Engliscan Gesiðas (The English Companions) is a website belonging to a society for enthusiasts of Anglo-Saxon culture and history. The site contains a number of resources likely to be of interest to undergraduate students of Old English. There is a select bibliography of secondary works grouped into fields such as: Old English literature; Old English language; Anglo-Saxon archaeology; history; numismatics; palaeography; Anglo-Latin ecclesiastical texts; and onomastics. Other sections of the site include Old English poems, in their original language and modern English translations. Audio files (requiring RealAudio Player) are also included. Another section describes the Saxby Anglo-Saxon Village Project. A runes page includes runic fonts to download. There is an Anglo-Saxon calendar page, which includes a JavaScript program for converting dates into their pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon form. Other resources include the first couple of chapters of a teach-yourself Old English course, and an essay on the ornithology of Anglo-Saxon England.
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