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Description: Old English Biblical Prose
Old English Biblical Prose
buy the print edition
  • Old English Biblical Prose
  • Old English Biblical Prose
  • Anglo-Saxon Studies
  • Old English Biblical Prose
  • Copyright
  • Dedication
  • Illustrations
  • Acknowledgements
  • Abbreviations
  • Prefatory Note on Methodology and Translation Theory
  • Introduction
  • 1 Translating the Psalms for the Clergy and the Laity
  • 2 From the Old Law to the New: The Mosaic Prologue to King Alfred’s Domboc
  • 3 Studying, Reading and Preaching the Gospels
  • 4 A Perilous Task: Making the Old English Heptateuch
  • 5 A Book for Many: Ælfric’s Treatise on the Old and New Testaments
  • Conclusion
  • Bibliography
  • Index
  • Anglo-Saxon Studies
  • Open Access Titles
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Copyright

Old English Biblical Prose

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© Francis Leneghan 2026
Some rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, any part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise)
The right of Francis Leneghan to be identified as
the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with
sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
First published 2026
D. S. Brewer, Cambridge
ISBN 978-1-84384-760-1 (Hardback)
ISBN 978-1-84384-761-8 (Paperback)
ISBN 978-1-80543-927-1 (ePub)
D. S. Brewer is an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd
and of Boydell & Brewer Inc.
website: www.boydellandbrewer.com
Our Authorised Representative for product safety in the EU is Easy Access System Europe – Mustamäe tee 50, 10621 Tallinn, Estonia, gpsr.requests@easproject.com
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library
Open Access Licence: CC–BY–NC–ND
Funding Body: Leverhulme Trust [grant number RF-2023-040\1] and the Arts and Humanities Research Council [grant number AH/Y003276/1]
The publisher has no responsibility for the continued existence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate
Cover image: MS London British Library Claudius B. Iv (Old English Hexateuch) fol. 16: God establishes the covenant with Noah.
Cover design by waynekehoe.com
Cross references refer to page numbers in the print edition

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Description: Old English Biblical Prose
Old English Biblical Prose
buy the print edition
View details
    • Old English Biblical Prose
    • Old English Biblical Prose
    • Anglo-Saxon Studies
    • Old English Biblical Prose
    • Copyright
    • Dedication
    • Illustrations
    • Acknowledgements
    • Abbreviations
    • Prefatory Note on Methodology and Translation Theory
    • Introduction
    • 1 Translating the Psalms for the Clergy and the Laity
    • 2 From the Old Law to the New: The Mosaic Prologue to King Alfred’s Domboc
    • 3 Studying, Reading and Preaching the Gospels
    • 4 A Perilous Task: Making the Old English Heptateuch
    • 5 A Book for Many: Ælfric’s Treatise on the Old and New Testaments
    • Conclusion
    • Bibliography
    • Index
    • Anglo-Saxon Studies

Details

Description: Old English Biblical Prose
Old English Biblical Prose
Stable URL:https://openaccess.boydellandbrewercms.com/?id=-307500
Open Access license
Provides the first in-depth study of the earliest attempts to make the sacred words of the Bible available to English readers, clerical and lay, in prose writing.

"This is a hugely valuable study - deeply informative about an important tradition of biblical translation from the early medieval period, bringing together material that has previously been considered in isolation, and drawing out a big-picture account of the ebb and flow of biblical translations into the vernacular. Will be a useful point of reference for any interested reader and includes surprises and delights for even the most specialist readers." Professor Jonathan Wilcox, University of Iowa


The story of the English Bible begins not with the King James Version or Wycliffe but in the Old English period. Between the ninth and eleventh centuries, a remarkably diverse corpus of biblical translations, paraphrases, adaptations and summaries were produced in Old English. Yet while Old English biblical verse has been extensively studied, the much larger corpus of vernacular biblical prose remains neglected by historians of the Bible and medievalists.

This book provides the first in-depth study of the genre. Dispelling the notion that access to the Bible was restricted to the Latinate clergy in the early medieval period, it demonstrates how Old English biblical prose made key elements of Scripture available and meaningful to laypeople. Through case studies of the Prose Psalms, Mosaic Prologue to the Domboc, Wessex Gospels, Heptateuch and Treatise on the Old and New Testaments, as well as many other works, it highlights the crucial contributions of well-known figures such as King Alfred and Ælfric of Eynsham while also showcasing the work of anonymous authors who translated, adapted and interpreted the Bible, sometimes in creative and surprising ways. Cumulatively, these case studies show how vernacular biblical prose played a central role in the emergence of English national identity before the Norman Conquest.

This book is available as Open Access under the Creative Commons licence CC BY-NC-ND.
Author
Francis Leneghan
PublisherD.S.Brewer
Print publication date Jan, 2026
Print ISBN 9781843847601
EISBN 9781805439271

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Francis Leneghan. "Copyright." In Old English Biblical Prose. D.S.Brewer, 2025. Accessed November 17, 2025. Librios IMS, https://openaccess.boydellandbrewercms.com/?id=-307505CITANCHOR.
Francis Leneghan. "Copyright." In Old English Biblical Prose. D.S.Brewer, 2025. Accessed November 17, 2025. https://openaccess.boydellandbrewercms.com/?id=-307505CITANCHOR.
Francis Leneghan
Old English Biblical Prose
Librios IMS
D.S.Brewer
October 22, 2025
November 17, 2025
https://openaccess.boydellandbrewercms.com/?id=-307505CITANCHOR