Conclusion

With the production of the Mosaic Prologue and the Second Prologue to the laws, Alfred aimed to rectify the poor standard of education among his judges by equipping them with a streamlined translation of the Laws of Moses and Christ. These prefatory materials also provided Alfred’s judges with the tools to understand the dynamic relationship between the Old and the New Law and to administer the law with justice and mercy. The generally communicative approach to biblical translation taken throughout both prologues can be compared with that adopted in the Alfredian Prose Psalms. However, at times the author was remarkably creative in translating and adapting Scripture, notably in the revoicing of Christ’s second commandment to shore up Alfred’s own earthly authority. As Pratt notes, the survival of six manuscript witnesses, as well as frequent references and allusions to the work in subsequent laws and charters, demonstrates that the Domboc was something that members of the English aristocracy were expected to know.1 Pratt, Political Thought, pp. 238–41. Moreover, the Mosaic Prologue’s summary of biblical law, along with the Second Prologue’s reference to the laws of Kent, Mercia and Wessex, establishes the Domboc as the sole law code for all the Angelcynn – a Christian nation ruled by a single West Saxon king whose authority comes from God.