page 56 note 1 The Latin quotations for this passage and the following are taken from R. Pei-per, Boetii Phil. Consol. Leipzig : Teubner, 1871.

page 57 note 1 The OE translator throughout the treatise is not at all slavish in his rendering and does not hesitate to alter or even reverse the thought of the original at times.

page 58 note 1 An occurrence of the comparative plus nominative that may possibly be taken for an intended case-construction is found at Boeth. 32.16, þæt eall eowre woroldgod sien dierran ge selfe, ‘That all your worldly goods are more precious than yoursetf’.

This is probably to be explained as an omission of þonne, even though such a keen observer as Wülfing (Syntax Alfred § 65) thinks it is meant to be the case-construction. As usual, the Latin has been recast and does not throw much light upon the syntax of the passage :

Book II, Prose 5.77, Nam si omne cuiusque bonum eo cuius est constat esse pretiosius, cum vilissima rerum vestra bona esse judicatis, eisdem vosmet ipsos vestra existimatione summittitis, quod quidem haud inmerito cadit.

page 58 note 2 See the Appendix for statistics, which cannot be conveniently placed here.

page 63 note 1 H. R. Bramley, S. Gregor ii Magni Regulae Pastoralis Liber. Oxford : Parker, 1874.

page 65 note 1 Hecht, in his treatise on the language of the Dialogues (A-S Prosa, V, Part 2) does not recognize the case-construction, although he cites examples of the particle.

page 65 note 2 Benedictine Edition, Gregorii... Opera Omnia. Paris, 1705.

page 65 note 3 Cf. Chapter II, § 2, note 2. Ufor did not become a preposition in Old English, as ofer did, but always retained its adverbial function.

page 66 note 1 This use of the genitive instead of the dative is only sporadic, being found occasionally in the glosses. On the possibility of a genitive of comparison in Germanic, see Chapter V, below.

page 66 note 2 On the use ot a, ab, after the comparative to introduce an ablative in Late Latin, see Pease, Notes on Jerome's Tractates on the Psalms; Journal of Biblical Literature 26.117 ff. (1907); and Small, Inequality 49 ff.

page 68 note 1 J. M. Kemble, Dialogues of Salomon and Saturnus. London : Aelfric Society, 1848. This prose interpolation is not to be confused with the complete prose Salomon and Saturn (Kemble 178-92).

page 69 note 1 The symbol ł means ‘ or ‘, and is used regularly by the glossators to indicate an alternate means of translating the Latin. In this instance Latin se may be rendered either by đon he, or by him.

page 69 note 2 A strange accusative form appears in Lindisfarne, Mark, 1.7 : cymes strongre meo æfter mec (fortior me post me), and occasionally elsewhere in MSS Rush, and Lind.

page 72 note 1 Pauls Grundriss germ. Phil. ², 1015-6. ‘Während man anderseits nicht vor Aelfrics Homil. cathol. zurückgehen kann, wegen des von Aelfric für die vorausgehenden Jahrzehnte bezeugten Mangels an guten theologischen Unterrichtswerken in ags. Sprache. ‘

page 75 note 1 A similar construction with the word wana, calls for attention at this point, although a close examination of it will show that its syntax is different from that of comparison :

Chronicle 119, A.D. 792, E. : Ond he wæs þa ana wana XXX wintra.

' And he was there twenty-nine years. ' The form wana in such constructions has the function of an adjective (participle). Although it comes to mean ' less than ' in its later stereotyped uses, it would be hazardous to assume that the following numeral represents a dative of comparison, much as it may resemble such a construction. One is rather inclined to see in this word a shift in function to that of a quasi-preposition, with a shift in meaning to ' lacking ', ' lacking from ', ' from '. The change from the function of a participle to that of a preposition, or possibly of a subordinate conjunction, in which it pointed forward to the following word, was sometimes indicated, and probably bridged over, by the addition of one of the particles of or þe, as for example,

Aelfric's Grammar (Zupitza) 202.11 :Ic eom wana of đam getele.

Andreas 1040 : Anes wana þe fiftig.

Bosworth-Toller 1165 bring together some occurrences of this use of wana, and their attempt to classify its uses is the only previous discussion of the syntax that I know of. Compare also Wülfing, Syntax Alfred § 1092, for a few examples.

page 76 note 1 See Bright, Reader xlvi, 4 and 5.

page 77 note 1 Cf. Neville, Cornell Studies Classical Philology 15. 69 ff. (1901); and Small, Inequality 47 ff.

Plautus, Stich. 160 : plus annos decem.

Cicero, Fam. 8. 12. 4 : amplius quadriginta.

page 78 note 1 The thirty-one occurrences of the overlapping particle in Ælfric's Lives (ed. Skeat): Vol. 1, 14. 59; 18, 148; 18. 149; 58. 148; 88. 647; no. 335; 132. 249; 132. 264; 136. 309; 176. 111; 306. 323; 306. 324; 360. 336; 380. 238; 426. 186; 478. 96; 530. 701; Vol. II, 6. 59; 104. 66; 150. 117; 192. 43; 202. 199; 218. 461; 228. 129; 304. 1362; 304. 1379 (2 examples); 304. 1380; 336. 34; 358. 41;404. 78.

page 79 note 1 The following five examples from the glosses of the Durham Ritual and the Latin Hymns of AS Church should probably be mentioned here also. Since they are part of a slavish gloss based on a careless Latin writing, which degenerates into a mere word list at many places, I do not consider them as legitimate evidence. Besides these five datives there is only one other construction of inequality in the Ritual, namely, 18. 33, not overlapping the case, and no others whatsoever in the Hymns.

Dur. Rit. : 3. 19 : Forđon betro aron tido þino wine, (meliora vino.)

81. 3 : Betre is to-socnung his cepinge seolferes. (melior negotiatione.)

90. 4 : Herra heofnum. (excelsior caelis.)

Hymns : 98.14 : þe o fæder we gelefad, þam þe naht wensumlicor. (te nil jocundius.)

104.5 : Næs baligre ænig acenned Johanne, (sanctior Johanne.)

page 83 note 1 The Vulgate probably represents Ælfric's original in Bible translations very closely. See Crawford, OE Heptateuch, EETS (OS) 160, Introduction; and Grein, Prosa I, Preface.