Ebook: Ælfric's Catholic Homilies: Introduction, Commentary and Glossary

This is the third and final volume in the Early English Text Society's edition of Ælfric's "Catholic Homilies", a set of preaching texts in two series composed in Old English around 900 for the use of preachers throughout England. Ælfric (monk of Winchester, and then Cerne Abbas, and the first abbot of Eynsham) was one of the leading scholars of his time and the foremost prose stylist of the Anglo-Saxon period.

The "Catholic Homilies" represent the longest extant text in Old English, and are Ælfric's most important work. The text of the Second Series, edited by M. R. Godden, was published in 1979, and the text of the First Series, edited by Peter Clemoes, in 1997; both volumes included an analysis of manuscripts and a detailed account of the textual history.

This final volume gives an account of the origin, function, and dating of the "Catholic Homilies" and their Latin sources; a detailed commentary on all eighty homilies; and a glossary of all words occurring in the text.