Old English Literature is sometimes called Anglo-Saxon Literature. Old English was used from the 7th century to a little after the Norman conquest in 1066. The language Old English is a West Germanic language that is related to Old Frisian and Old Saxon. From the 9th century it was also influenced by Old Norse and North Germanic.

Survey Works

• Adams, Eleanor
  • Old English Scholarship in England from 1566-1800

Early Old English (650-900)

Anonomous Poetry

• Beowulf
• Doer
• The Finnsburh fragment
• The Ruin
• The Seafarer
• Waldhere
• The Wanderer
• Widsith
• The Wife's Complaint
• The Husband's Message

Named Poets

• Caedmon
  • Caedmon's Hymn
• Bede
  • Ecclesiastical History of the English People
    Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (latin)
• Alfred the Great
• Cynewulf
  • The Fates of the Apostles
    about the mission and death of each Apostle
    • digital text IBUKI (Old English)
  • Elene
    about St. Helena
    • digital text IBUKI (Old English)
    • Zupitza 1877 (Old English)
    • Zupitza 1883 (Old English)
    • Wulker
    • Kent 1898
    • Zupitza 3rd (includes Napier)
    • Weymouth
    • The Elene of Cynewulf - Holt 1904 from Kent 1889 (English)
      
  • Christ II (the ascension)
    part of a trilogy by different authors
    • Cynewulf's Christ - Gollancz 1892 (Old English-English)
  • Juliana
    a life of St. Juliana
    • digital text IBUKI (Old English)
• Aldheim

Late Old English (900-1066)

• The Wanderer
• The Seafarer
• The Wife's Complaint
• The Husband's Message
• Ruin
• The Battle of Brunanburh

History

• The Anglo Saxon Chronicle
  • The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (English) - Giles 1914
    
  • Two of the Saxon Chronicles - Plummer
    Volume 1 UofMI (18092) - Volume 2 - NYPL (1899) (bad but only scan)
  • The Anglo Saxon Chronicle (old English - English) - Ingram 1823
    
  • "In Mr. Charles Plummer's edition of "Two Sason Chronicles parallel" the text of G is indicated by the letter A as being a copy of the Cambridge MS., which he distinguishes by the symbol K. To his introduction to those parallel texts K and E (Clarendon Press, 1899) every student who requires an exhaustive description, audlysis and comparison of all the existing texts in referred."
    Giles 1914 p vi footnote
    Two of the Saxon Chronicles - Introduction -Plummer 1899 volume 2
• Ethelwerd - Chronicle (English)
• Asser - Life of Alfred (English)
• Geoffrey of Manmouth - British History (English)
• Gildas - The works of Gildas (English)
• Nennius - History of the Britons - Nennius (English)
• Richard of Cirencester - The Ancient State of Britain (spurious) (English)

Old English poetic manusctipts

• Janius
• Exeter Book
  • Codex Exoniensis Thorpe 1842
    Old English and translations
  • Cynewulf - Juliana
  • Cynewulf - Christ II (the Ascension)
• Vercelli Book
  • Cynewulf - Elene
  • Cynewulf - Fates of the Apostles
• Nowell Codex
  Cotton Vitellius A xv (in the British Museum)
  The Beowulf Manusctipt

Major Scriptoria

• Wincester
• Exeter
• Worchester
• Abingdon
• Canterbury
• Canterbury
• St. Augustine's Abbey