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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
In this article I consider the possibility of using vocabulary to determine the original dialect of Old English poems later than Cynewulf and choose two poems on the same theme, Judgment Day I, reputedly Anglian, in the Exeter Book, and Judgment Day II, reputedly West Saxon, in order to illustrate the application of this method and test its validity.
1 Zur Geographie und Chronologie des angelsächsischen Worfschatzes, im Anschluss an Bischof Waerferth's Uebersetzung der “Dialoge” Gregors (Leipzig, 1928). Scherer uses his results to determine or confirm the dialect of a few poems, such as Solomon and Saturn and the Paris Psalter, p. 44.
2 Der Wortschatz der altenglischen Uebersetzungen des Matthaeus-Evangeliums untersucht auf seine dialektische und zeitliche Gebundenheit (Berlin, 1936).
3 See T. Miller's edition, EETS 110, Introduction, pp. xxiv-lvi; Deutschbein, Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur, xxvi (1901), 169-244.
4 Studien zum Wortschatz Ælfrics, Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen, clxv (1934), 1-11; clxvi, 30-39, 205-215.
5 Heinrich Henel, Aelfric's De Temporibus Anni, EETS 213 (London, 1942), pp. xlv-xlvi.
6 Meissner (164, 17) writes that 
occurs ‘erst spät’ in WS, overlooking Pastoral Care (PC) 91.20, 245.6 (ed. Sweet). He calls cynestōl (165, 18) a revival in LWS of an Anglian poeticism (=WS Ðrymsetl), disregarding the instance in PC 39.17, and similarly dœgrēd (166, 31), disregarding PC 461.2. The one case oí fūl in Alfred's Boethius he disposes of as scribal (166, 32), overlooking PC. 421.3; and to hlīsa he assigns Anglian origin and a Renaissance in LWS (166, 34), overlooking PC. 66.3, 322.17, 339.25. Most of these Alfred-ian instances are to be found in Bosworth-Toller's indispensable Supplement (Oxford, 1921).
7 For 
see Meters xxx.5, and for worn ix.7, xxvi.33; and for the prose use Jordan, pp. 66-67.
8 Medium Aevum, xiii (1945), 32.
9 The Poetical Dialogues of Solomon and Saturn, MLA Monograph Series, xiii (New York, 1941), pp. 20-21.
10 MS claudas coreffes (185) seems to be an error for clūdus Corejfes ‘the rocks of Horeb.’ The word clūd is listed by Scherer as Saxon (p. 21); but clūd occurs in Orm (cludess, ‘hills,’ 2656).
11 PBB, ix (1884), 273; x (1885), 464 f.
12 Beowulf, 3d ed., p. xcv. Klaeber does not go so far as Sarraxin, who thought the vocabulary of Beowulf distinctly Northumbrian rather than Mercian, Von Kädmon bis Kynewulf (Berlin, 1913), p. 67.
13 For a recent summary of views of Alfred's authorship see G. P. Krapp, Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, v (1932), xlv f. That the poem is Saxon has been generally admitted since the analysis of Sievers, PBB, x, 465-467.
14 See above, p. 585.
15 See Scherer, p. 15, for līxan, and for tēon or tēogan Jordan, pp. 66-67, who remarks that this word and worn and 
, though Anglian, do not disprove West Saxon authorship. Jordan considers hlēoÐor (Meters xiii.47) Anglian (p. 43; cf. Scherer, p. 15); but it occurs also in Ælfric Cath. Hom. i.38.8. Jordan lists fēon ‘to hate,‘ frignan, Ðrāg, and recene, all of which occur in the Meters, among the Common OE words which were retained longer in Anglian than in WS: fēoung (fīoung) occurs in PC 166.14, 222.2, 278.10, 11; frignan likewise in PC, e.g. 103.4 and Oros. 166.12; Ðrāg in Bo. 111.28 and ricene in Ælfric, Cath. Hom. i.8.34, ii.144.19, 160.7.
16 Zur Geographie, pp. 20, 23. Scherer, p. 24, also lists unmyndlinga (Meters xxv, 30), but it occurs in Werferth's Dialogues 176.21 (earlier version).
17 Das Wortschatz des Malthaeus-Evangeliums, p. 30.
18 For ealneg, see Oros. 142.7, 184.8, 214.4, PC 8.4, 66.15, 262.16, 328.17, 395.29; for ēaÐmētto (WS word corresponding to Anglian-poetic ēaÐmēdu) see Oros. 254.7, and cf. the WS prose Psalter 9.13; for ofermētto (Anglian-poetic ofermēdu) see Oros. 38.38, 256.5; PC 307.7; for recelīest PC 195.4, 453.25; for tōhopa PC 167.19, 173.9, 180.24. All these words occur in other WS texts and none appears in the Lindisfarne or Rushworth Gospels, Durham Ritual, or Vespasian Psalter. ĒaÐmētto, recelīest and tōhopa occur nowhere else in the poetry, ealneg only in Aldhelm 13, and ofermētlo only in Gen. B, 332, 337, 351.
19 P. 46.
20 PBB, x (1885), 464. Tupper objects to this test on the ground that uncontracted forms appear occasionally in WS and may have been characteristic of EWS of Cynewulf's time (PMLA, xxvi [1911], 255-257); and Sievers himself is said in later years to have held that the uncontracted forms were characteristic of formal speech, contracted forms of informal speech (see G. Linke, Englische Studien, lxxiii [1920], 321). Linke, in the study just cited, ‘standeÐ und stent, und dergleichen in ags. sicher fixierten HSS,‘ finds no evidence for this alleged difference between formal and informal speech, and concludes that the full forms remain essentially a criterion of Anglian (p. 330).
21 ‘Streng beweisende Verse fehlen.‘—PBB, x, 474.
22 JD I is printed in Krapp-Dobbie, Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, iii, The Exeter Book (New York, 1936), pp. 212-215, and JD II in the same series vi, The Anglo-Saxon Minor Poems (New York, 1942), pp. 58-67. JD I, which begins “Đaet gelimpan sceal, þosette lagu flōweÐ,” was called Das jüngste Gericht by Grein-Wülker (iii.1. 171-174) and JD II, which begins “Hwaet! Ic āna sæt innan bearwe” was called Vom jüngsten Tage by Grein-Wülker (ii, 250-272) and Be Domes Dœge by J. W. Lumby, EETS 65 (London, 1876), and H. Löhe, Bonner Beiträge 22 (Bonn, 1907).
23 iii, xlii.
24 Löhe, p. 47, dates it about 950, and Dobbie, vi, xii, ‘late tenth century.‘
25 Similarly 54b, 55b, 73b, 74b, 77b, 78b, 79b, 83b, 84b, 96b, 107b, 109b, 119b.
26 Pp. 43-44.
26a This is listed as an Anglianism only by Miss Rauh, p. 12. It apparently is not found in West Saxon prose, but it occurs frequently in the poetry including JD II. 2.
27 F. J. Mather, Jr., MLN, 9 (1884), 152-156; Jordan, pp. 46-48; 62-63; Scherer, pp. 42-44.
28 BT, Suppl., s.v. gehlaeg; see Dialogues, ed. H. Hecht 209.21.
29 Pp. 15-16.
30 See above, p. 586.
31 Both bold and botl are from *bopl <*buþla according to E. Ekwall,‘Ae. botl, bold, boÐl in englischen Ortsnamen,‘ Anglia Beiblatt, xxviii (1917), 82-91; cf. Luick, Hist. Gram. §638.1.
32 Bold is regarded by Ekwall as characteristically Mercian in place-names, but it also appears in Northumbria beside botl, boÐl (pp. 82-85). For the absence of the word in any form as a place-name element in the South, see Ekwall, p. 87; A. Mawer, Problems of Place Name Study, pp. 9-10; A. Mawer and F. M. Stenton, Place-Names of Worcestershire, EPNS, iv, p. six and note.
33 F. Liebermann Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, i, 70. There is no doubt of the word, since it occurs twice in the same sentence in all three MSS. In his glossary (iii, 26) Liebermann translates Eöfe-Gemeinde, suggesting that the word may mean what later came to be called ‘hundred.‘
34 Alfred says in his preface that he used the laws of Ine (King of Wessex), Offa of Mercia, and Ethelbert of Kent (Liebermann, i, 46). There is, of course, no mention of bold or bold-getœl in the Laws of Ine preserved by Alfred, though he uses botl, chap. 67 (Liebermann, i, 119). Alfred may have borrowed boldgetœl from the Laws of Offa or from Werferth (see the text above and the next note).
35 Scherer, p. 38. The word occurs (ed. Hecht) 45.23 (where the second version has scīrum), 185.23, 229.6, 11.
36 Mk. v.11, 13.
36a See above, note 26a.
37 Jordan, pp. 93-94; 89-90; 94-95; 99; 92.
38 Meters i.34, xix.4, xx.208, xxiv. 17, xxviii.16. Jordan, p. 98, note 2, thinks that the i-form of Ælfric, also found frequently in the poetry, is characteristically WS, and that the word was originally Common Old English and not a borrowing from Anglian because it is not frequent in Mercian, but common in Northumbrian. It may, however, be a literary loan-word.
39 Jordan, pp. 92-94.
40 Jordan, pp. 89-90, 94-95.
41 Bealu (196) an archaic poetical word, Jordan lists as ‘nicht sicher’ (p. 74), remarking that it is found also in the Southern poetry. The emended a[n]gnes (267) ‘sorrow,’ ‘anxiety,’ based on the rare ange which is poetical except for Oros. 48.11, is not significant; see Scherer, pp. 10-11.
42 The emendation fleaxes, translating Latin linum, for flœces was proposed by Brandi (Anglia, iv, 103), and has been accepted by subsequent editors.
43 Der Wortschatz der altenglischen Uebersetzungen des Matthaeus-Evangeliums, pp. 25-30.
44 Rauh, pp. 32-39; for cweartern, cf. Scherer, p. 28, who lists it among the late words in the revised version of Werferth's Dialogues.
45 fe(o)r(mie) 2253, and the masc. cons. stem based upon it feormynd 2256. The Lindisfarne Gospels and Rushworth I have respectively 
and 
in Mt. 3.12 where the LWS Gospels translate permundauit by āfeormaÐ, and the late Saxonizing version of Werferth's Dialogues substitutes feormian for his 
(ed. Hecht, 97.23); but these preferences are hardly significant over against the plain evidence of Beowulf, and the facility with which ä was prefixed to simple verbs.
46 Ed. Schipper, 540.12.
47 VPs. 12 times, see C. Grimm, Glossar (Heidelberg, 1909), p. 4; LG 9 times, see A. S. Cook, Glossary of the Old Northumbrian Gospels (Halle, 1896), p. 7; āgēotan appears in Werferth's Dialogues at least twice, and both ongēotan and tōgēotan, see BT, Suppl.
48 See Grein-Holthausen, Sprachschatz, p. 259.
49 Rauh, p. 30. The word occurs also in Apollonius of Tyre, ed. Thorpe, p. 23, line 16, which Miss Rauh concludes is WS on the basis of this and other words (p. 46). Of the two occurrences in Napier's Wulfstan, one is in the passage paraphrasing JD II (137.65), and the second 193.17/18 is in Napier's xlii, which is not Wulfstan's. I hope to show elsewhere that Wulfstan's vocabulary is chiefly Saxon, and that the large Anglian element attributed to him by Scherer, pp. 42-43, and Miss Rauh, p. 47, is the result of their failure to distinguish the genuine from the spurious homilies.
50 LG has ymbsealla nine times Mt. 21.33, 27.28, Mk. 9.42, 12.1, Lu. 5.9, 19.43, 21.70, Jn. 10.24, 19.2 (cf. Cook, Glossary, for this and the following words), ymbsetta Lu 19.43, 21.20; and ymbbinda Mk. 9.42. Rushworth II follows except in Mk. 9.42 where there is obvious miscopying; Farman in Rushworth I has ymbtynan Mt. 21.33.
51 Mt. 27.66.
52 Ymbsellan occurs 24 times in VPs. (see C. Grimm, Glossar), and getrymman three: 59.11, 70.3, 107.11.
53 Ymbsellan for circundare Bede, ed. Schipper., 265.20 (3.16), 355.8/9 (4.3), 418.1, 421. 13/14 (4.13), 445.11, 449.13, 452.2 (4.19), 536.16 (4.30), 621.9 (5.12); ymbsettan 167.20 (2.13), getrymman for munire 193.16 (3.1), 359.8 (4.3), 490.17/18 (4.24); begyrde and gefaestnode 17.18/19 (1.5). These examples were found by looking up all the instances of the Latin words as recorded in Putnam F. Jones, Concordance to the Historia Ecclesiastica of Bede, Cambridge, Mass., 1929.
54 For these glosses see Edward Brenner, Das altenglische Junius-Psalter, Bibl. der ags. Prosa 7 (Hamburg, 1910); Guido Oess, Der altenglische Arundel Psalter, Angl. Forsch. 30 (Heidelberg, 1910); F. Harsley, Eadwine's Canterbury Psalter, EETS 92 (London, 1889). The glosses of the Bosworth Psalter (ed. U. Lindelöf, Mémoires de la Société Néophilologique à Helsingfors, v, 137-227) cover only a small portion of the Psalms and happen to omit every Psalm containing circumdare; the sole instance involving munire (munitam) is Ps. 70.3: getrymede. Arundel happens to preserve the Anglian vocabulary here, but sometimes introduces Saxon words; see below on murcnian and note 68. In finding the instances of circumdare and munire, I have used F. P. Dutripon, Concordanliae Bibliorum Sacrorum (Paris, 1861).
55 3.7, 7.8, 17.6, 16.9, 21.17, 47.13, 48.6, 54.11, 87.18, 90.5, 117.11 (twice). In the italicized numbers it is used alone, in the other instances as a variant of ymbÐringan, ymbhwyrfan, ymbsellan, ymbsellan.
56 U. Lindelöf, Das Lambeth-Psalter, ii, Acta Societatis Scientiarum Fennicae 43.3 (Helsingfors, 1914), pp. 56, 82-83. Lindelöf's Lambeth-Psalter i, Text und Glossar are in the same series 35.1 (Helsingfors, 1909).
57 Fritz Roeder, Der altenglische Regius-Psalter (Halle, 1904). The Tiberius gloss, which is dependent on Royal, follows it in having ymbsellende vel ymbtrymmende in 3.7; see the selection in U. Lindelöf, Studien zu ae. Psalterglossen, Bonner Beiträge 13 (Bonn, 1904), p. 11, and for the dependence of Tiberius on Royal, p. 93).
58 John Spelman, Psalterium Davidis Latino-Saxonicum vetus (London, 1640). The instances in the Stowe Psalter, not all in the corresponding verses in Lambeth, are 7.8, 17.5, 17.6, 21.11 (= 21.13), 31.9 (=31.7) first instance, 108.3, 117.11. There are no instances of ymbtrymman for munire. For the relation of Lambeth to Stowe, see U. Lindelöf, Studien, p. 121, and O. Heinzel, Kritische Entstehungsgeschichte des ags. Interlinear-Psalters, Palaestra 151 (Leipzig, 1926), p. 64.
59 This example in R I was missed by Miss Rauh, p. 26.
60 E. Ekwall in his Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names (Oxford, 1926) assumes that Flaxley (West Riding) and Flaxton (North Riding) contain flax, but A. H. Smith, in the Place-Name Society volume on the North Riding (Cambridge, 1928), p. 37, considers that the ON by-name Flak is more likely because of the early form Flacstune. Apart from these Yorkshire place-names the element flax has been noted or suggested for place-names in Cambridge (Flecks Lane Farm), Gloucestershire (Flaxley), Sussex (Flex-borough), Surrey (Flexlands), Wiltshire (Flexlands). Compounds with flax occur in three charters (see BT, Suppl.), two of Berkshire (Birch, iii, 88, 147 nos. 919, 963, and one of Surrey (Birch, iii, 136, no. 955), and in flexline ‘a cord for hanging on’ (?) in the Gerefa (Wessex or South Mercia) published by Liebermann (Gesetze 455.15). It seems possible that there was some geographical restriction originally: OE fleax has cognates in West Germanic, while OE līn is found in Scandinavian (Olcel. lín), which also has 
= OHG haro (see Hoops, Reallexikon, s.v. Flachs). Furthermore lin(e) is the regular Scottish and Northern word for ‘flax,‘ and flax is not given in Jamieson's Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language. The Middle English examples of line seem to be Northern and Midland and those of flax Southern and South Midland. Perhaps līn in the OE period was largely Northern and Midland and flax Southern and Midland.
61 For examples, see Rauh, p. 27, and BT and Suppl. It may be noted that gehende, like ymbtrymman, appears in the Lambeth Royal, and Eadwines Psalters, 21.12 translating proximus and Lambeth 33.19 translating iuxta.
62 Jul. 528; Ph. 265; Par. Ps. 81.1, Rid. 31.4, 11, Rim. Poem 41.
63 LG Mt. Pref. 18.13 bitwih vel himong, Mt. 10.16 in middum vel inmong.
64 Rauh, p. 28, and BT and Suppl.
65 I have not found time to examine all the translations of inter or in medio in Bede's History or Werferth's Dialogues, where betwih and in middum are the usual renderings; gemang is not recorded in the dictionaries for either of these texts.
66 Rauh, p. 28 and BT and Suppl.
67 LG has hwaestria, Mt. 20.11; Lu. 19.7; Jn. 6.41, A3, 61, 7.32; lycetta Lu. 5.30; gehyrsta Lu. 15.2; and misspreca (as a variant) Jn. 6.41, 43, 61.
68 R I uses grornian Mt. 20.11; and R II kwispria Lu. 19.7, Jn. 6.41, 43, 61, 7.32.
69 Junius substitutes geomriaÐ for VPs. gnorniaÐ in Ps. 58.16 and grornedon for gnornadun in Ps. 105.25. The word murmurare does not occur in Bede.
70 On Royal, Lambeth, and Stowe see above, p. 593 Arundel, which is Saxon in phonology, retains only a small number of the original Anglian words, Oess, pp. 16-17.
71 Mt. 5.25; 14.3, 10; 18.30, 25.31, 43.44; cf. Rauh, 34, who assumes that quartern is borrowed by Farman from Saxon. The etymology is uncertain: Holthausen, Allenglisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch related cweartern to ON kvarta, but Pogatscher thought it came from Lat. quarterium+œrn. See Zur Lautlehre der grieschischen, lateinischen und romanischen Lehnworte im Altenglischen (Strassburg, 1888), §381.
72 Bischofs Waerferth von Worcester Uebersetzung der Dialoge Gregors des Grossen (Leipzig, 1901-1907), ii, 140, note 9, says that cweartern does not appear in R II, VPs, Life of Chad, Blickling Homilies, and that the late version of the Dialogues substitutes it for the carcern of the earlier, 107.20 (22).
