Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: The interlinear Old English gloss to the so-called Rushworth or Macregol Gospel Book1 (MS Oxford Bodleian Auct. D.2.19) is generally recognized as having been written some time during the second half of the 10th century2 by two scribes identifying themselves as Farman and Owun in the colophons. Farman glossed Matthew and a few verses of Mark (from the beginning to verse 2:15) and of John (18:1–3) in Mercian dialect, leaving it to Owun, who wrote in Northumbrian dialect, to complete the work.3 It is therefore customary to distinguish a Rushworth 1 (Mercian) gloss (Ru1) from a Rushworth 2 (Northumbrian) gloss (Ru2). Farman’s and Owun’s work is one of the oldest surviving English translations of the Gospels, the other being the continuous Northumbrian gloss to the Lindisfarne Gospel Book (London, British Library Cotton MS Nero D.IV; Li for brevity), which is commonly dated to around 950.4 It has been long and hotly debated whether Farman actively translated his portions of the Gospels or if he merely acted as a copyist reproducing a preexisting version. Skeat, who produced one of the first and most authoritative editions of the Lindisfarne and Rushworth glosses, was of the opinion that the whole of Ru was based on Li.5 Later studies by Murray, Lindelöf and Jordan objected to this; Menner, in particular, strongly argued in favour of Ru1’s substantial originality, recognizing its dependence on the Lindisfarne gloss only in its small section of Mark.6 In the late 1970s, the Italian linguist Giancarlo Bolognesi advanced the radical hypothesis that Ru1 depended on Li in its entirety, thus effectively reverting to Skeat’s view,7 while Ross and Squires, though still recognizing Farman’s substantial autonomy as a translator, suggested that Li’s influence on Ru1 could also be detected in the last two chapters of Matthew, from verse 26:8 onwards.8 Lastly, Kotake ruled out any influence of Li on Ru, proposing that the latter actually served as a model for the former.9
Source: Notes and Queries
Author: Giuseppe Pagliarulo
Institution: University of Turin
Language: English
Subfield: Classics
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W4401447198