Beowulf - Official Movie Site: Beowulf Movie. Anglo-Saxons.net : Bede: Ecclesiastical History of England I. FORMERLY, at your request, most readily transmitted to you the Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation, which I had newly published, for you to read, and give it your approbation; and I now send it again to be transcribed and more fully considered at your leisure. And I cannot but recommend the sincerity and zeal, with which you not only diligently give ear to hear the words of the Holy Scripture, but also industriously take care to become acquainted with the actions and sayings of former men of renown, especially of our own nation.
For if history relates good things of good men, the attentive hearer is excited to imitate that which is good; or if it mentions evil things of wicked persons, nevertheless the religious and pious hearer or reader, shunning that which is hurtful and perverse, is the more earnestly excited to perform those things which he knows to be good, and worthy of God. Beowulf in Hypertext. The Adventures of Beowulf. The first page of the Beowulf manuscript. Beowulf, written in Old English sometime before the tenth century A.D., describes the adventures of a great Scandinavian warrior of the sixth century. A rich fabric of fact and fancy, Beowulf is the oldest surviving epic in British literature.
Beowulf exists in only one manuscript. This copy survived both the wholesale destruction of religious artifacts during the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII and a disastrous fire which destroyed the library of Sir Robert Bruce Cotton (1571-1631). The poem still bears the scars of the fire, visible at the upper left corner of the photograph. Please enjoy our adaptation from the Old English version by Dr. A note on the translation by Dr. . | Return to Culture Cafe | Days of the Moon | | The Miller's Tale | The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell |