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chapter. Three major riddle collections—or four, if we count the Exeter Book riddles—take great delight in describing various astronomical objects related to time-reckoning and chronometry, such as the moon, stars, and planets: the Enigmata of Aldhelm and Eusebius, and the Bern riddles. All three were written between the beginning of the seventh century and the first half of the eighth, a period in which Irish-authored computistica proliferated widely across early medieval England and the Frankish and Lombard kingdoms. The Bern collection includes sixty
Riddles at work is the first volume to bring together multiple scholarly voices to explore the vibrant, poetic riddle tradition of early medieval England and its neighbours. The chapters in this book present a wide range of traditional and experimental methodologies. They treat the riddles both as individual poems and as parts of a tradition, but, most importantly, they address Latin and Old English riddles side-by-side, bringing together texts that originally developed in conversation with each other but have often been separated in scholarship. The ‘General Introduction’ situates this book in its scholarly context. Part I, ‘Words’, presents philological approaches to early medieval riddles—interpretations rooted in close readings of texts—for riddles work by making readers question what words really mean. While reading carefully may lead to elegant solutions, however, such solutions are not the end of the riddling game. Part II, ‘Ideas’, thus explores how riddles work to make readers think anew about objects, relationships, and experiences, using literary theory to facilitate new approaches. Part III, ‘Interactions’, explores how riddles work through connections with other fields, languages, times, and places. Together, the sixteen chapters reveal that there is no single, right way to read these texts but many productive paths—some explored here, some awaiting future work.
returning services, respect and acts of friendship, see page 286. 64 Josephus, Antiquitates, pref.1, p. 27. 65 De Bello Iudaico, pref.5, p. 22, VI.3.3, p. 341, VI.5.3, p. 349. The passage from De Bello Iudaico, VI.3.3, p. 341, is quoted by Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, trans. G.A. Williamson (Harmondsworth, 1965), III.6, p. 115, III.10.9–11, p. 123. 66 De Bello Iudaico, pref.2, p. 21. 67 De Bello Iudaico, V.2.5, p. 283. 68 De Bello Iudaico, pref.4–5, pp. 22–3. 69 De Bello Iudaico, pref.12, p. 25. 70 De Bello Iudaico, pref.2, p. 21, IV.4.3, p. 243. 52
It is well known that riddling was particularly conspicuous as a literary genre in the British Isles. Indeed, riddles were much appreciated in monastic circles because their compact format conveniently favoured the teaching of Latin vocabulary, rhetoric, syntax, and metrics. Dating from about 686, Aldhelm’s Enigmata constitute the earliest riddle collection produced in England that has come down to us. Following in Aldhelm’s steps, Tatwine and Eusebius, both contemporary with Bede, took up the composition of a collection each. 2 In turn, an anonymous author
this age encompassed 2,242 years according to the calculation of Bede and Eusebius. The second age ran from Noah to Abraham; this lasted 942 years according to the calculation of Bede and Eusebius. The third age lasted from Abraham to David; this age had 940 years, and in it lived Moses. The fourth age lasted from David up to the exile of the Jewish people into Babylon; this age had 485 years. The fifth age was from the Babylonian exile up to the
at us is ‘the equinoctial of Queubus ’, which by now should not be difficult to recognize as Andrew’s drunken slurring of ‘the Equinoctial Rule of Eusebius’, the decree issued by the Nicaean Council. 14 But how did Eusebius get mixed up with Pigrogromitus and the Vapians ? To parse Pigrogromitus we must first correct a typesetter’s error. Typographical mistakes were
. 14 Mark 16.15. 15 Rufinus/Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica 3.1–2. 16 Eusebius/Jerome, Chronica 32; also Rufinus/Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica 2
better. 19 But the keen-eyed Barbara Everett recognized that ‘the “sub-title” [ or What You Will ] is really no sub-title, but a generic, perhaps primary, and certainly important part of the title.’ 20 In fact, the answer to this riddle is surprisingly simple and as calendrical as play’s title. The Equinoctial Rule of Eusebius
liturgical, pilgrimage, and other cult practices emerge. 15 The first evidence for a developing cult of the Ascension appears in the work of Church historian Eusebius ( c. 260–339). He reports in his Vita Constantini that the first basilica in memory of Christ’s ascent, known as the Eleona, was erected by Empress Helena on the side of the Mount of Olives near or over a cave in which Christ was said to have given his final instructions to the disciples. 16 Interestingly, Eusebius also states that Helena ‘accorded suitable adoration to the footsteps of the Saviour
, quando crucis eius impressione Adopt, adapt and improve 39 Elipandus’s use of this military metaphor also appears to invoke the image of Constantine the Great’s vision of a Chi-Rho sign in the heavens and his subsequent conversion before the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in 312. As such, the term occurs, for example, in the highly popular Latin translation and continuation of Eusebius’s Historia ecclesiastica made in the early fifth century by the monk Rufinus of Aquileia.29 Firstly, he describes how Constantine turned the sign shown to him into militaria vexilla