Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the new edition, AD 2000
- Introduction to the 1975 edition of The Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism
- PART I THE SEARCH FOR ANGLO-SAXON PAGANISM
- 1 The Romantic background
- 2 The English branch of the German tree
- 3 Christianity puts an end to folk-poetry
- 4 ‘Half-veiled remains of pagan poetry’
- 5 English and German views on the conversion of the English
- 6 J.M. Kemble
- 7 The views of the founders seen through the writings of their lesser contemporaries
- 8 English views of the late nineteenth century and after
- 9 Stock views disintegrating Old English poems and finding Germanic antiquities in them
- 10 The gods Themselves
- 11 Wyrd
- 12 Conclusion
- PART II ANGLO-SAXON TRIAL BY JURY
- I. Index of sources
- II. Index of scholars, critics, and authors
- III. General Index
7 - The views of the founders seen through the writings of their lesser contemporaries
from PART I - THE SEARCH FOR ANGLO-SAXON PAGANISM
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the new edition, AD 2000
- Introduction to the 1975 edition of The Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism
- PART I THE SEARCH FOR ANGLO-SAXON PAGANISM
- 1 The Romantic background
- 2 The English branch of the German tree
- 3 Christianity puts an end to folk-poetry
- 4 ‘Half-veiled remains of pagan poetry’
- 5 English and German views on the conversion of the English
- 6 J.M. Kemble
- 7 The views of the founders seen through the writings of their lesser contemporaries
- 8 English views of the late nineteenth century and after
- 9 Stock views disintegrating Old English poems and finding Germanic antiquities in them
- 10 The gods Themselves
- 11 Wyrd
- 12 Conclusion
- PART II ANGLO-SAXON TRIAL BY JURY
- I. Index of sources
- II. Index of scholars, critics, and authors
- III. General Index
Summary
THE GERMANIC SCHOLARSHIP which has been considered so far as the work of scholars, in the case of Grimm, Gervinus and Kemble, of very great scholars. Before leaving the formative period of modern Germanic scholarship it may be worth looking at the writings of men of less standing. Often they put more bluntly what seems to be implied in the works of men of greater sensitivity or more profound learning. The few quotations given here, and far more could have been relevantly quoted, are extreme statements.
J.P.E.Greverus, head master of the Gymnasium at Oldenburg, recommends in the Supplement to the school programme for 1848 the study of the Anglo-Saxon language at school and in the home:
For who does not long for better knowledge of the earlier language of his people! Yet this literature has, in addition to its age and linguistic interest, an inestimable factual value in relation to our oldest folk-characteristics; and it contains, moreover, a treasure of poetry and of poetic linguistic elements which in our day refreshes and strengthens the heart, all the more since the form in which it is presented is rough indeed, yet full of primitive strength, even though it has here and there been muddied and weakened by the influence of Christian clerics, and has been deprived of its pagan magnificence and soundness to the core.
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- Imagining the Anglo-Saxon PastThe Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism and Anglo-Saxon Trial by Jury, pp. 33 - 37Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2000
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