The text used for the present edition is that of G, which as far as we can tell is the earliest of our manuscripts. Despite its textual idiosyncrasies, it contains few obvious copying errors. As we have seen, it may not contain the text of DTA in an ‘original’ form if we are correct in believing that the hexameral section which opens the work in G was not placed there in the earliest exemplar(s). However, thematically this section sits more naturally at the beginning than at the end, and G's text represents a form which appears to go back to an authentic revision by Ælfric himself, and the one which has become most familiar to scholars. I have set it out as continuous text, as in the manuscript, rather than breaking it up into numbered paragraphs as Henel did, although I have placed each section heading on a new line in order to divide the text in a manageable way. The numbers of the corresponding paragraphs in Henel's edition are included in the margin to the right for ease of reference. The beginning of a new folio is indicated by a vertical line in the text, with a marginal note giving the new folio number.

In G, sentences are generally marked by an initial capital (including 7) and a final semi-colon, and punctuated by points at mid-position which serve more than one purpose; sometimes they mark the division between phrases or clauses, at other times they separate the individual items in a list. On occasions it is hard for a modern reader to see that they have any syntactical function. Colons are used occasionally. In G's text, long vowels are intermittently accented. For instance, in the opening lines of the text as set out below, G has: án (1), géarlicum (1), gehwǽde (4), láreow (5), hé (8), gód (9), geháten (12), and hí (14). In one case, the purpose of the accent is clearly to distinguish between homographs, and the usage regular amongst late Anglo-Saxon scribes: Đa geseah God þæt þæt leoht wæs gód (8–9; in the manuscript the initial letter of the divine name is not capitalised). Some of the others perhaps mark stress points as if for oral delivery, and some monosyllables (apparently an insular innovation in vernacular texts);205 the purpose of the remainder is no longer clear.