Yale Studies in English: LXIII

The Old English Physiologus

The Old English Physiologus, or Bestiary, is a series of three brief poems, dealing with the mythical traits of a land-animal, a sea-beast, and a bird respectively, and deducing from them certain moral or religious lessons. These three creatures are selected from a much larger number treated in a work of the same name which was compiled at Alexandria before 140 B.C., originally in Greek, and afterwards translated into a variety of languagesinto Latin before 431. The standard form of the Physiologus has 49 chapters, each dealing with a separate animal (sometimes imaginary) or other natural object, beginning with the lion, and ending with the ostrich; examples of these are the pelican, the eagle, the phoenix, the ant (cf. Prov. 6.6), the fox, the unicorn, and the salamander. In this standard text, the Old English poems are represented by chapters 16, 17, and 18, dealing in succession with the panther, a mythical sea-monster called the asp-turtle (usually denominated the whale), and the partridge. Of these three poems, the third is so fragmentary that little is left except eight lines of religious application, and four of exhortation by the poet, so that the outline of the poem, and especially the part descriptive of the partridge, must be conjecturally restored by reference to the treatment in the fuller versions, which are based upon Jer. 17.11 (the texts drawn upon for the application in lines 511 are 2 Cor. 6.17,18; Isa. 55.7; Heb. 2.10,11). It has been said: With the exception of the Bible, there is perhaps no other book in all literature that has been more widely current in every cultivated tongue and among every class of people. Such currency might be illustrated from many English authors. Two passages from Elizabethan literature may serve as specimensthe one from Spenser, the other from Shakespeare. The former is from the Faerie Queene (1.11.34): The other is from Hamlet (Laertes to the King): ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 14529
Author: Cynewulf
Release Date: Dec 30, 2004
Format: eBook
Language: Old English

Contributors

Translator: Cook, Albert S. (Albert Stanburrough), 1853-1927, Pitman, James Hall, 1896-