Skip to main content
Log in

The Opus Geminatum and Anglo-Saxon Literature

  • Published:
Neophilologus Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This article traces the development of the opus geminatum (a twinned pair of texts, one in verse, one in prose, treating the same subject) as this grows out of late antique literary practices surrounding the conversio (paraphrase) and as it is adopted by Anglo-Saxon authors, becoming one of their most distinctive literary forms.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Barquist, C. R. (1987). Phonological patterning in Beowulf. Literary and Linguistic Computing, 2, 19–26.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bartlett, C. (1966). The larger rhetorical patterns in Anglo-Saxon poetry. New York: AMS.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berendsohn, W. (1935). Zur Vorgeschichte des Beowulf. Copenhagen: Levin & Munksgaard.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brandt, S. (Ed.). (1890). Divinae Institutiones. CSEL 19. Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Bredehoft, T. (2006). Early English metre (pp. 81–90). Toronto: Toronto University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Butler, H. E. (Ed. & Trans.). (1980). The Institutio Oratoria of Quntilian. Loeb Series 4. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

  • Colgrave, B., & Mynors, R. (Eds. & Trans.). (1985). Two lives of Saint Cuthbert: A life by an anonymous monk of Lindisfarne and Bede’s prose life. New York: Cambridge University Press.

  • Colgrave, B., & Mynors, R. (Eds. & Trans.). (1991). Historia ecclesiastica gentis anglorum. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

  • Corsaro, F. (Ed.). (1956). Tristicha and Carmen de Iesu Christi beneficiis. Catania: Edigraph.

    Google Scholar 

  • Creed, R. (1957). The Andswarode-System in Old English poetry. Speculum, 32, 523–528.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Croft, W., & Cruse, A. (2004). Cognitive linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cunningham, M. (Ed.). (1966). Carmina. CCSL 126. Turnhout: Brepols.

  • Curtius, E. (1990). European literature and the Latin Middle-Ages (W. Trask, Trans.). Princeton: Princeton University Press.

  • Daur, K. D., & Martin, J. (Eds.). (1958). Augustine, De doctrina Christiana. CCSL 32. Turnholt: Brepols.

  • Doane, A. N. (1991). Influence and intertextuality in literary history. In J. Clayton & E. Rothstein (Eds.), Oral texts, intertexts, and intratexts: Editing Old English (pp. 75–117). Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dümmler, E. (Ed.). (1881). De vita sancti Willibrordi episcope. MGH Antiquitates PL 1 (pp. 207–227). Berlin: Weidmann.

  • Ehwald, R. (Ed.). (1891). Aldhelmi Opera. MGH AA 15. Berlin: Weidmann, prose 228–323; verse 350–471.

  • Fredborg, K. M. (2000). Ciceronean rhetoric and the schools. In J. Van Engen (Ed.), Learning institutionalized: Teaching in the Medieval University 9. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedrich, L. (Ed.). (1881). Opere poetica. MGH AA 4(1). Berlin: Weidmann.

  • Godman, P. (1981). The Anglo-Latin Opus Geminatum: From Aldhelm to Alcuin. Medium Ævum, 50(2), 215–229.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godman, P. (Ed. & Trans.). (1982). The Bishops, Kings and Saints of York. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

  • Green, R. P. (1995). Proba’s Cento: Its date, purpose and reception. Classical Quarterly, 45, 551–563.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hagendahl, H. (1958). Latin fathers and the classics: A study on the Apologists, Jerome and other Christian Writers. Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia 6, Göteborg: Almqvist & Wiksell.

  • Harbus, A. (2007). Anglo-Saxon mentalities and Old English literary studies. Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses, 55, 13–22.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hartel, W. V. (Ed.). (1894). Sancti Pontii Meropii Paulini Nolani Carmina. CSEL 30(2). Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Hilberg, I (Ed.). (1918). Epistulae, Pars IIII. CSEL 54. Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Hovingh, P. (Ed.). (1960). Alethia. CCSL 128. Turnhout: Brepols.

  • Huemer, J. (Ed.). (1885). Sedulii opera omnia. CSEL 10. Vienna: Gerould.

  • Huemer, J. (Ed.). (1891). Evangeliorum Libri Quattuor. CSEL 24. Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Jaager, W. (Ed.). (1935). Bedas Metrische Vita Sancti Cuthberti. Leipzig: Mayer & Müller.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kim, S. (2005). As I once did with Grendel: Boasting and nostalgia in ‘Beowulf’. Modern Philology, 103(1), 4–27.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lamont, B. (2005). First impressions. Edinburgh: Penbury.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lapidge, M., & Herren, M. (Trans.). (1979). Aldhelm: The prose works. Cambridge: Brewer.

  • Lapidge, M. (1993). Bede as poet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lapidge, M. (2003). The earliest manuscript of Bede’s metrical Vita S. Cudbercti. Anglo-Saxon England, 32, 43–54.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lapidge, M. (2006). The Anglo-Saxon library. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leclercq, J. (1963). L’amour des lettres et le désir de Dieu: Initiation aux auteurs monastiques du Moyen age (2nd ed.). Paris: Le Cerf.

    Google Scholar 

  • Levison, W. (Ed.). (1919). Vita Willibrordi archiepiscopi Traiectensis auctore Alcuino. MGH SRM 7 (pp. 81–141). Hanover: Weidmann.

  • Manitius, M. (1881). Geschichte der christlich-lateinischen Poesie bis zur Mitte des 8. Jahrhunderts. Stuttgart: Cotta.

    Google Scholar 

  • McKeon, R. (Ed.). (1941). Aristotle, the basic works of Aristotle. New York: Random House.

  • McKinlay, A. (Ed.). (1951). De actibus apostolorum. CSEL 72. Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Migne, J (Ed.). (1846). Epigrammata: Prosperi Aquitani opera. PL 51. Paris: Garnier.

  • Migne, J. (Ed.). (1861). Beati S. Felicis Confessoris Vita. PL 94. Paris: Garnier.

  • Niles, J. D. (1981). Compound diction and style of Beowulf. English Studies, 62, 489–503.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • O’Brien O’Keeffe, K. (1997). Diction, variation and the formula. In R. E. Bjork & J. D. Niles (Eds.), A Beowulf handbook (pp. 85–104). Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Orchard, A. (1994). The poetic art of Aldhelm. Cambridge studies in Anglo-Saxon England 8. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

  • Peiper, R. (Ed.). (1883). Poemata. MGH AA 6(2) (pp. 203–94). Berlin: Weidmann.

  • Petschenig, M. (Ed.). (1888). Carmina. CSEL 16. Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Poncelet, A. (1903). La vie de saint Willibrord par le prêtre Egbert. Analecta Bollandiana, 22, 419–422.

    Google Scholar 

  • Roberts, M. (1985). Biblical epic and rhetorical paraphrase in late antiquity. Liverpool: Francis Cairns.

    Google Scholar 

  • Robinson, F. C. (1973). Syntactical glosses in Latin manuscripts of Anglo-Saxon England. Speculum, 48, 443–475.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Robinson, F. C. (1985). Beowulf and the appositive style. Knoxville: Tennessee University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ruff, C. (2005). The place of metrics in Anglo-Saxon Latin education: Aldhelm and Bede. Journal of English and Germanic Philology, 104(2), 149–170.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schenkl, K. (Ed.).(1887). Carmen sacrum. CSEL 16. Vienna: Tempsky.

  • Scragg, D. G. (1991). The nature of Old English verse. In M. Godden & M. Lapidge (Eds.), The Cambridge companion to Old English literature (pp. 54–70). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spengel, L. (Ed.). (1856). Rhetores Graeci (Vol. 3). Leipzig: Teubner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Springer, C. (1988). The gospel as epic in late antiquity: The Paschale Carmen of Sedulius. New York: Brill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanley, E. G. (2006). Aesthetic evaluations of the sound of Old English: ‘About the Anglo-Saxon tongue there was the strength of iron, with the sparkling and beauty of burnished steel. Leeds Studies in English, 37, 451–472.

    Google Scholar 

  • Townsend, D. (1993). Alcuin’s Willibrord, Wilhelm Levison, and the MGH. In R. Frank (Ed.), The politics of editing medieval texts (pp. 109–130). New York: AMS.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vollmer, F. (Ed.). (1905). Carmina. MGH, AA 14. Berlin: Weidmann.

  • White, C. (2000). Early Christian Latin poets. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • White, H. (2003). Anomalies of genre: The utility of theory and history for the study of literary genres. New Literary History, 34(3), 597–615.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wieland, G. (1981). Geminus Stilus: Studies in Anglo-Latin Hagiography. In M. Herren (Ed.), Insular Latin studies: Papers on Latin texts and manuscripts of the British Isles, 5501066 (pp. 113–133). Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies.

  • Wilkins, A. (Ed.). (1892). Cicero, De oratore. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Williams, J. (2007). Style: Lessons in clarity and grace (9th ed.). New York: Pearson Longman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Winterbottom, M. (Ed.). (1970). Institutio oratoria. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Woll, D. (1988). übersetzungstheorie bei Cicero. In A. Jörn (Ed.), Energeia und Ergon: sprachliche Variation–Sprachgeschichte–Sprachtypologie: Studia in honorem Eugenio Coseriu 3. Tübingen: G. Narr.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wood, I. (2001). The missionary life: Saints and the evangelization of Europe 400–1050. New York: Longman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wright, N. (1995). History and literature in late antiquity and the Early Medieval West: Studies in intertextuality. Aldershot: Variorum.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Bill Friesen.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Friesen, B. The Opus Geminatum and Anglo-Saxon Literature. Neophilologus 95, 123–144 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11061-010-9213-5

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11061-010-9213-5

Keywords

Navigation