Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the new edition, AD 2000
- Introduction to the 1975 edition of The Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism
- PART I THE SEARCH FOR ANGLO-SAXON PAGANISM
- 1 The Romantic background
- 2 The English branch of the German tree
- 3 Christianity puts an end to folk-poetry
- 4 ‘Half-veiled remains of pagan poetry’
- 5 English and German views on the conversion of the English
- 6 J.M. Kemble
- 7 The views of the founders seen through the writings of their lesser contemporaries
- 8 English views of the late nineteenth century and after
- 9 Stock views disintegrating Old English poems and finding Germanic antiquities in them
- 10 The gods Themselves
- 11 Wyrd
- 12 Conclusion
- PART II ANGLO-SAXON TRIAL BY JURY
- I. Index of sources
- II. Index of scholars, critics, and authors
- III. General Index
2 - The English branch of the German tree
from PART I - THE SEARCH FOR ANGLO-SAXON PAGANISM
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the new edition, AD 2000
- Introduction to the 1975 edition of The Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism
- PART I THE SEARCH FOR ANGLO-SAXON PAGANISM
- 1 The Romantic background
- 2 The English branch of the German tree
- 3 Christianity puts an end to folk-poetry
- 4 ‘Half-veiled remains of pagan poetry’
- 5 English and German views on the conversion of the English
- 6 J.M. Kemble
- 7 The views of the founders seen through the writings of their lesser contemporaries
- 8 English views of the late nineteenth century and after
- 9 Stock views disintegrating Old English poems and finding Germanic antiquities in them
- 10 The gods Themselves
- 11 Wyrd
- 12 Conclusion
- PART II ANGLO-SAXON TRIAL BY JURY
- I. Index of sources
- II. Index of scholars, critics, and authors
- III. General Index
Summary
FROM THE POINT of view of Germany, English is German except to the extent to which it has been corrupted by alien elements. Count Friedrich Leopold zu Stolberg, who in his youth, in order to forget an incomparable English lady, had been Goethe's fellow-traveller to Switzerland, wrote lovingly still of the English language in his old age:
The German language became the language of England, and remained fairly pure though from the ninth century on the Danes introduced some alloy, till it was totally corrupted in the eleventh century through the Normans and French with whom William the Conqueror subjugated the beautiful land of England. There came into being then the English language of today, a composite of German, Danish, Norman, and French ingredients…. English is a mixture of many languages, very imperfect in itself, but, as a result of the constitution of the country which favours and practises eloquence, as a result of liberty which illumines the mind and gives it life and lifts up the heart, and for that reason also through a great number of ingenious authors, it has gained a position of honour secured by resoluteness, a language that has been made noble through forceful use in speech, writing, and song.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Imagining the Anglo-Saxon PastThe Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism and Anglo-Saxon Trial by Jury, pp. 7 - 9Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2000