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Cultural Difference and the Meaning of Latinity in Asser’s Life of King Alfred

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Cultural Diversity in the British Middle Ages

Part of the book series: The New Middle Ages ((TNMA))

Abstract

Asser’s biography of Alfred the Great of Wessex is often read as a principal site of ninth-century West Saxon hegemonic consolidation. Yet at the same time, this essay argues, its rhetorical pragmatics encode an implicit, and often overlooked, assertion of continued cultural diversity in Britain.

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Notes

  1. Allen J. Frantzen, Desire for Origins: New Language, Old English, and Teaching the Tradition ( New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1990 ).

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  2. Nicole Guenther Discenza, The King’s English: Strategies of Translation in the Old English Boethius ( Albany: SUNY Press, 2005 ).

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  3. Thomas Miller, ed., The Old English Version of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, Part I.2, Early English Text Society, Original Series 96 ( Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1891 ), 344.

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Authors

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Jeffrey Jerome Cohen

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© 2008 Jeffrey Jerome Cohen

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Townsend, D. (2008). Cultural Difference and the Meaning of Latinity in Asser’s Life of King Alfred. In: Cohen, J.J. (eds) Cultural Diversity in the British Middle Ages. The New Middle Ages. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230614123_4

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