common that differ sharply from those found in “Saxon.”

Manuscripts in the Southern dialect are fairly abundant, and contain poems, homilies, land-charters, laws, wills, translations of Latin treatises, glossaries, etc.; so that there is considerable variety. One of the most precious documents is the history known as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which was continued even after the Conquest till the year 1154, when the death and burial of King Stephen were duly recorded.

But specimens of the oldest forms of the Northern and Midland dialects are, on the other hand, very much fewer in number than students of our language desire, and are consequently deserving of special mention. They are duly enumerated in the chapters below, which discuss these dialects separately.

Having thus sketched out the broad divisions into which our dialects may be distributed, I shall proceed to enter upon a particular discussion of each group, beginning with the Northern or Northumbrian.

CHAPTER III

THE DIALECTS OF NORTHUMBRIA; TILL A.D. 1000

In Professor Earle’s excellent manual on Anglo-Saxon Literature, chapter v is entirely occupied with “the Anglian Period,” and begins thus:—“While Canterbury was so important a seminary of learning, there was, in the Anglian region of Northumbria, a development of religious and intellectual life which makes it natural to regard the whole brilliant period from the later seventh to the early ninth century as the Anglian Period.... Anglia became for a century the light-spot of European history; and we here recognise the first great stage in the revival of learning, and the first movement towards the establishment of public order in things temporal and spiritual.”

Unfortunately for the student of English, though perhaps fortunately for the historian, the most important book belonging to this period was written in Latin. This was the Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum, or the Church History of the Anglian People. The writer was Beda, better known as “the Venerable Bede,” who was born near Wearmouth (Durham) in 672, and lived for the greater part of his life at Jarrow, where he died in 735. He wrote several other works, also in Latin, most of which Professor Earle enumerates. It is said of Beda himself that he was “learned in our native songs,” and it is probable that he wrote many things in his native Northumbrian or Durham dialect; but they have all perished, with the exception of one precious fragment of five lines, printed by Dr Sweet (at p. 149) from the St Gall MS. No. 254, of the ninth century. It is usually called Beda’s Death-song, and is here given:

Literally translated, this runs as follows:

It is from Beda’s Church History, Book iv, chap. 24 (or 22), that we learn the story of Cædmon, the famous Northumbrian poet, who was a herdsman and lay brother in the abbey of Whitby, in the days of the abbess Hild, who died in 680, near the close of the seventh century. He received the gift of divine song in a vision of the night; and after the recognition by the abbess and others of his heavenly call, became a member of the religious fraternity, and devoted the rest of his life to the composition of sacred poetry.

He sang (says Beda) the Creation of the world, the origin of the human race, and all the history of Genesis; the departure of Israel out of Egypt and their entrance into the land of promise, with many other histories from holy writ; the incarnation, passion, and resurrection of our Lord, and His ascension into heaven; the coming of the Holy Spirit and the teaching of the Apostles. Likewise of the terror of the future judgement, the horror of punishment in hell, and the bliss of the heavenly kingdom he made many poems; and moreover, many others concerning divine benefits and judgements; in all which he sought to wean men from the love of sin, and to stimulate them to the enjoyment and pursuit of good action.

It happens that we still possess some poems which answer more or less to this description; but they are all of later date and are only known from copies written in the Southern dialect of Wessex; and, as the original Northumbrian text has unfortunately perished, we have no means of knowing to what extent they represent Cædmon’s work. It is possible that they preserve some of it in a more or less close form of translation, but we cannot verify this possibility. It has been ascertained, on the other hand, that a certain portion (but by no means all) of these poems is adapted, with but slight change, from an original poem written in the Old Saxon of the continent.

Nevertheless, it so happens that a short hymn of nine lines has been preserved nearly in the original form, as Cædmon dictated it; and it corresponds closely with Beda’s Latin version. It is found at the end of the Cambridge MS. of Beda’s Historia Ecclesiastica in the following form:

I here subjoin a literal translation.

The locality of these lines is easily settled, as we may assign them to Whitby. Similarly, Beda’s Death-song may be assigned to the county of Durham.

A third poem, extending to fourteen lines, may be called the “Northumbrian Riddle.” It is called by Dr Sweet the “Leiden Riddle,” because the MS. that contains it is now at Leyden, in Holland. The locality is unknown, but we may assign it to Yorkshire or Durham without going far wrong. There is another copy in a Southern dialect. These three brief poems, viz. Beda’s Death-song, Cædmon’s Hymn, and the Riddle, are all printed, accessibly, in Sweet’s Anglo-Saxon Reader.

There is another relic of Old Northumbrian, apparently belonging to the middle of the eighth century, which is too remarkable to be passed over. I refer to the famous Ruthwell cross, situate not far to the west of Annan, near the southern coast of Dumfriesshire, and near the English border. On each of its four faces it bears inscriptions; on two opposite faces in Latin, and on the other two in runic characters. Each of the latter pair contains a few lines of