Anglo-Saxon Poetry


S.A.J. Bradley
    A well–received feature is the grouping by codex to emphasize the great importance of manuscript context in interpreting the poems. The full contents of the Exeter Book are represented, summarized where not translated, to facilitate appreciation of a complete Anglo-Saxon book. The introduction discusses the nature of the legacy, the poet's role, chronology, and especially of translations attempt a style acceptable to the modern ear yet close enough to aid parallel study of the old English text. A check–list of extant Anglo-Saxon poetry enhances the practical usefulness of the volume. The whole thus adds up to a substantial and now widely–cited survey of the Anglo–Saxon poetic achievement.

A Choice of Anglo-Saxon Verse


Richard Hamer - 1970
    The essential canon of Old English poetry, with parallel verse translation, in this now classic edition. A Choice of Anglo-Saxon Verse contains the Old English texts of all the major short poems, such as The Battle of Maldon', The Dream of the Rood, The Wanderer and The Seafarer, as well as a generous representation of the many important fragments, riddles and gnomic verses that survive from the seventh to the twelfth centuries, with facing-page verse translations.

The Exeter Book Riddles


Anonymous
    Ranging from natural phenomena to animal and bird life, from the Christian concept of creation to prosaic domestic objects, the riddles are full of sharp observation and earthy humour.

The Word Exchange: Anglo-Saxon Poems in Translation


Greg Delanty - 2010
    Offered here are tales of battle, travel, and adventure, but also songs of heartache and longing, pearls of lusty innuendo and clear-eyed stoicism, charms and spells for everyday use, and seven "hoards" of delightfully puzzling riddles.Featuring all-new translations by seventy-four of our most celebrated poets—including Seamus Heaney, Robert Pinsky, Billy Collins, Eavan Boland, Paul Muldoon, Robert Hass, Gary Soto, Jane Hirshfield, David Ferry, Molly Peacock, Yusef Komunyakaa, Richard Wilbur, and many others—The Word Exchange is a landmark work of translation, as fascinating and multivocal as the original literature it translates.

Looking for the Lost Gods of England


Kathleen Herbert - 1994
    The names Tiw, Woden, Thunor and Frig/Freo have been preserved in place names and in the days of the week. The old Gods and the festivals and rituals associated with them lived on after the 'official' conversion to Christianity. Eostre, the Goddess associated with Spring, is still with us as Easter. The Yuletide celebrations which marked the turning of the year were deep-rooted so they were Christianised to give us Christmas. Ing the god associated with regrowth and renewal was replaced with Christ. Much the same happened with rituals for bringing fertility to the earth, and with healing charms. The author sifts through royal genealogy, charms, verse and other sources to find clues to the names and attributes of the Gods and Goddesses of the early English.

Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburgh (College)


Unknown
    

The Great Heathen Army (The Saga of Wessex and the Danes #1)


H.A. Culley - 2020
    A youth called Alric is captured and his brother, thirteen year old Jørren, decides to undertake the seemingly impossible task of rescuing him. Accompanied only by a slave not much older than he is, Jørren sets out to find Alric. His quest takes him into war-torn East Anglia and up through Northumbria as far as Hadrian’s Wall. On the way he gathers a rag-tag collection of orphans and welds them into a small, tightly-knit, warband. They play a small, but important, part in the struggle against the Vikings before eventually reaching Wessex, where Alfred has just become king. Now older and an experienced warrior, Jørren joins him and over subsequent years rises in status to become one of Wessex’s ealdormen. However, the Vikings are determined to defeat Alfred and complete their conquest of England. By 871 AD it is doubtful whether Jørren or Wessex itself can survive their onslaught. This first novel in the Saga of Wessex series will enthral all readers who have come to love H A Culley’s previous books set in early medieval Northumbria.

Spears of Britannia


Scott Hurst - 2013
    And two brothers are turning on each other in a fight that will determine the fate of a nation.The mighty Roman Empire is on the wane.Under attack from its enemies, it is losing interest in its far-flung colony - Britannia.The Saxons are threatening the land.Unless the native tribes come to together to create a united Britain they will be crushed by a fresh invader.‘Since the Empire will not defend us, we must defend ourselves,' goes the cry of the British warriors. 'We Britons no longer need Rome. We need only each other.’Maximus has returned to his tribe. With his father, Severus, old and feeble, he is ready to take back his seat as the prodigal son, next in line to lead the Catuvalluni tribe.However, his drunkard younger brother, Dye, ruled by his cruel and manipulative wife, Calista, has set his sights on the title and is ready to challenge Maximus for their father’s position.With his family torn apart and his right to rule undermined, does Maximus have any hope of recovering the legendary Great Torc - a revered symbol of peace and unity - to bring the British tribes together against the ruthless Romans and blood-thirsty Saxons?And can the 'Spears of Britannia' ever be turned on the real enemy?Description from Amazon.com

The Lost Gods of England


Brian Branston - 1957
    A survey of the myths, legends and religious beliefs of the ancient Anglo-Saxons.

Finn and Hengest: The Fragment and the Episode


J.R.R. Tolkien - 1982
    The story of Finn and Hengest, two fifth-century heroes in northern Europe, is told both in Beowulf and in a fragmentary Anglo-Saxon poem known as The Fight at Finnsburg, but so obscurely and allusively that its interpretation had been a matter of controversy for over 100 years. Bringing his unique combination of philological erudition and poetic imagination to the task, however, Tolkien revealed a classic tragedy of divided loyalties, of vengeance, blood and death. The story has the added attraction that it describes the events immediately preceding the first Germanic invasion of Britain which was led by Hengest himself.

The Eternal Collection: Books 1 - 10 (The Eternal Collection Compilations, #1)


Barbara Cartland - 2017
    The most successful author of Romance of all time, Barbara Cartland has sold over 1 Billion books worldwide in 36 different languages. Available now as 10 books for the price of 2 for the first time ever. Titles included are: 01. Elizabethan Lover 2 The Little Pretender 3 A Ghost in Monte Carlo 4 A Duel of Hearts 5 The Saint and the Sinner 6 The Penniless Peer 7 The Proud Princess 8 The Daredevil Duke 9 Diona and a Dalmatian 10 A Shaft of Sunlight

Roman Britain and Early England: 55 BC - AD 871


Peter Hunter Blair - 1963
    Because the source material is so meager for much of early British history, Mr. Blair is careful to explain just how scholars have arrived at an accurate knowledge of the first 900 years.The real history of Britain begins with the Roman occupation, for the Romans were the first to leave substantial documentary and archaeological evidence. After the governorship of Agricola the written sources almost entirely disappear until the early Anglo-Saxon era of the fifth century; but archaeologists have been able to gather a great deal of information about the intervening centuries from excavations of old walled towns, roads, and fortresses dating from the Roman period. Mr. Blair skillfully describes the transition from Roman to Saxon England and shows why Rome's greatest legacy to her former colony—Christianity—flowered within Anglo-Saxon culture. The source material on Saxon England is mainly documentary, as these new inhabitants built in wood and little archaeological evidence has survived. However, Bede's Ecclesiatical History of the English Nation and other great Christian writings, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Beowulf, the stories of Caedmon, and other poems and epics in the Germanic minstrelsy tradition, have revealed much about English economic, social, and cultural life up to the accession of Alfred the Great.

To Be A Queen


Annie Whitehead - 2013
    This is the true story of Aethelflaed, the ‘Lady of the Mercians’, daughter of Alfred the Great. She was the only female leader of an Anglo-Saxon kingdom. Born into the royal house of Wessex at the height of the Viking wars, she is sent to her aunt in Mercia as a foster-child, only to return home when the Vikings overrun Mercia. In Wessex, she witnesses another Viking attack and this compounds her fear of the enemy. She falls in love with a Mercian lord but is heartbroken to be given as bride to the ruler of Mercia to seal the alliance between the two Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. She must learn to subjugate her feelings for her first love, overcome her indifference to her husband and win the hearts of the Mercians who despise her as a foreigner and twice make an attempt on her life. When her husband falls ill and is incapacitated, she has to learn to rule and lead an army in his stead. Eventually she must fight to save her adopted Mercia from the Vikings and, ultimately, her own brother.

A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons: The Beginnings of the English Nation


Geoffrey Hindley - 2006
    400 (around the time of their invasion of England) and running through to the 1100s (the ‘Aftermath'), historian Geoffrey Hindley shows the Anglo-Saxons as formative in the history not only of England but also of Europe. The society inspired by the warrior world of the Old English poem Beowulf saw England become the world's first nation state and Europe's first country to conduct affairs in its own language, and Bede and Boniface of Wessex establish the dating convention we still use today. Including all the latest research, A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons is a fascinating assessment of a vital historical period.

Alfred the Great


Justin Pollard - 2005
    "This is the story of England's birth. A great story, beautifully told." (Bernard Cornwell, author of The Pale Horseman)Alfred was England's first kin, and his rule spanned troubled times. As his shores sat under constant threat from Viking marauders, his life was similarly imperiled by conspiracies in his own court. He was an extraordinary character - a soldier, scholar, and statesman like no other in English history - and out of adversity he forged a new kind of nation. Justin Pollard's enthralling account strips back centuries of myth to reveal the individual behind the legend. He offers a radical new interpretation of what inspired Alfred to create England and how it how it has colored the nation's history to the present day.