THE UNPUBLISHED HOMILIES OF THE OLD ENGLISH VERCELLI BOOK

135 Pages·06.187 MB·English

by  PETERSON, PAUL WARD

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1.0975 1 PoTtohroa ounn,p uPbalulal nWcdo rhd,o m19il2lo0*a or tho Old
• Pq. Engliah Vercolll book.
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School. 1951.
Bibliography: p .. 77-9fi«
07Wi?». rc.m book. 2.Sermons, Anglo*
Saxon. 3.Dissertations, Acosmic *
U.Y.O. - 1951* 1 .Title*
)
Shtil List
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UMI •

THE UNPUBLISHED HOMILIES
Of THE OLD ENGLISH
VSHCELLI BOOK
Paul w / Peterson
November -3-7 / 1950
A d issertation in the department of L inguistics
submitted in partial fu lfillm en t of the require­
ments for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at
New York U niversity
I
PREFACE
Vercelli-Codex CI7II commonly known as the V ercelli
Book, is a collection of 136 parchment folio s containing
twenty-three prose homilies and six metrical compositions,
religious in content. The m aterial is important for the
study of the Late West Saxon d ialect as well as for that
of medieval hom iletics. The MS has been reproduced photo­
graphically by Max Forster, but certain of the hom ilies
.c
have not been edited The same Max Forster published
Homilies I-V III as vol. XII of Grein-Wulker, Bibliothek
n
der ange1sachsischen Prosa, and it is to be hoped that this
excellent work w ill be completed in the future. It is the
purpose of th is dissertation, however, to make accessible
now the text of the unpublished portions of the MS, together
with notes on lin g u istic features and on the notable details
of content. The lexicography of the homilies has been treat­
ed by Arthur Napier, 3 and h is findings are incorporated in
the Supplement to Bosworth-Toller, An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary.^
1For a fu ll description of the MS c f. George P h ilip Krapp,
n
The V ercelli Book, and Max Forster, "Der V ercelli Codex
CIVII* in Studlen zur angllachen P h llologie. v o l. L, p .21.
II
^Max Forster, Codice V eroellese. Roma, 1913*
3Arthur Napier, "Contributions to Old English Lexicography*,
Transactions of the Philologies*. Society. London, 1906.
^T. Northcote T o ller, An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary Supplement.
Oxford, 1921.
a<mo<»
II
TABLE oh COETEET3
I I j'.DEX OF' PVFLISHED PORTIONS OF' TEE VERCELLI LOOK
II i'riji IviS
I Paleography
II A bbreviations
I I I Pune tvs 13. on
IV Accentuation
I II t v/iij Ox1 j. I...S
IV COi.'Tj-Rj'i' Oi' THE VS
V i_A.. EO' ii' ■ :"i Ox' i :i}:] I.S
I Eorphology
II Phonology
I II Vocabulary
VI EE IV OR x A L P0J_iCY
VII J.
VIII NOTES
IX blLLlOVnAPEY
I ll
INDEX OF THE PUBLISHED PORTIONS
OF THE VERCELLI BOOK
I. Verse
Krapp, George P h ilip , The V ercelli Book as vol. II
of The Anglo- Saxon Poetic Records, contains text
and notes of a ll the m etrical m aterial: Andreas.
Fates of the A postles. Soul and Body I, Homiletic
Fragment I, Dream of the Rood, and l ^ -
II. Prose Homilies
I-V III, Forster, Max, Die V erc elll-Homlllen as vol.
XII of Bibliothek der angelsachsischen Prosa
IX, XV, XXII, Forster, Max, "Der Vercelli-Codex
CXVII" in Studlen zur engll3chen P hilologie.
vol. L, p .21.
X, Napier, Arthur, W ulfstan, Samralung der ihm
gugeschriebenen Homlllen nebst Untersuch-
t»
ungen uber ihre B ch th eit. as vol. IV in
Sammlung englisober Denkmaler. Homily XLIX.
The introduction is slig h tly different in
Napier; for the V ercelli introduction see
Forster, "Der V eroelli-C odex CXVII", p.73-
XI, W illard, Rudolph, "V ercelli Homily XI and Its
Sources", Speculum, v o l. XXIV, p .76.
XIII, wiilker, Richard, "Uber das Vercellibuch", Ang­
lia vol. V p .451.