Lecture 1 theme: introduction. Literature of middle ages

It was not until the end of the 6th century that monks carpe from Rome to Britain again. The head of the Roman Church at that time was Pope Gregory. He thought he could spread his influence over England, if he converted the people to Christianity. Firm in this purpose, he sent monks to the island. They landed in Kent and built the first church in the town of Canterbury. Up to this day the Archbishop of Canterbury is the head of the English Church.

• It was not until the end of the 6th century that monks carpe from Rome to Britain again. The head of the Roman Church at that time was Pope Gregory. He thought he could spread his influence over England, if he converted the people to Christianity. Firm in this purpose, he sent monks to the island. They landed in Kent and built the first church in the town of Canterbury. Up to this day the Archbishop of Canterbury is the head of the English Church.
• The centres of learning. Now that Roman civilization poured into the country again, Latin words once more entered the language of the Anglo-Saxons, because the religious books that the Roman monks had brought to England were all written in Latin. The monasteries, where reading and writing were practiced, became the centres of learning and education in the country. No wonder poets and writers imitated those Latin books about the early Christians, and also made up stories of their own about saints.

Caedmon and Cynewulf. The names of only two of those early poets have reached our days:

• Caedmon and Cynewulf. The names of only two of those early poets have reached our days:
• Caedmon lived in the 7th century. He was a shepherd at Whitby, a famous Yorkshire abbey. He composed in his native language that is in the Northumbrian dialect of Anglo-Saxon. He was no longer young when the gift of song came to him. The monks took him to the abbey and he spent the rest of his life in making up religious poetry. He composed hymns and poems. The "Paraphrase" is one of his poems. It retells fragments from the Bible in alliterative verse. Many other monks took part in this work, but their names are unknown to us.
• Cynewulf was a monk who lived at the end of the 8th century. His name was not forgotten, as he signed his name in runes in the last line of his work. Two of his poems, "Evelene" and "Juliana" are notable because they are the first Anglo-Saxon works to introduce women characters.
• Along with religious poetry, folk-tales about worldly affairs were written down at the monasteries and put into verse by poets.
• These were wedding-songs, songs to be sung at feasts, war-songs, death songs, and also ploughing-songs and even riddles. In the 11th century these were prohibited by the Church.