View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.ukbrought to you by CORE provided by Sydney eScholarship COPYRIGHT AND USE OF THIS THESIS This thesis must be used in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1968. Reproduction of material protected by copyright may be an infringement of copyright and copyright owners may be entitled to take legal action against persons who infringe their copyright. Section 51 (2) of the Copyright Act permits an authorized officer of a university library or archives to provide a copy (by communication or otherwise) of an unpublished thesis kept in the library or archives, to a person who satisfies the authorized officer that he or she requires the reproduction for the purposes of research or study. The Copyright Act grants the creator of a work a number of moral rights, specifically the right of attribution, the right against false attribution and the right of integrity. You may infringe the author’s moral rights if you: - fail to acknowledge the author of this thesis if you quote sections from the work - attribute this thesis to another author - subject this thesis to derogatory treatment which may prejudice the author’s reputation For further information contact the University’s Director of Copyright Services sydney.edu.au/copyright ‘As if it never were’: The Construct and Poetics of Time in Anglo-Saxon Literature A. M. Wallace A thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences The University of Sydney 2014 Abstract This thesis examines the construction and poetics of time in Anglo-Saxon literature through a holistic approach to works of history, science, exegesis, and poetry. St Augustine conceived of time as distentio animi, the distention of the mind, and the thesis argues that the texts under discussion form responses to the problems of being in time, by looking to the stillness of eternity. Chapter one demonstrates how the scientific, historical, and exegetical works of the Venerable Bede form a sustained project to construct time. In the conversion of King Edwin in the Historia ecclesiastica, the famous flight of the sparrow in the hall emphasises the meaning that Christian time gives to both individuals and communities. Bede’s works both lay the foundation for the poetry of the later chapters and are texts worth studying in their own right. The second chapter investigates two Old English saints’ lives. Elene affects historicity by beginning with a precise date, though incorrect. The duration of the narrative of Andreas comes to a biblically significant forty days. Through study of the likely sources of these poems, it can be seen that the poets made deliberate choices to construct time in their narratives. The poetics of time in these two works suggests that the two are alike both as saints’ lives and in their approaches to time. Temporal markers within Beowulf provide clues to when certain events take place, as the third chapter discusses. The diurnal cycle that structures Beowulf on the micro level continues to the macro, and the poem as a whole depicts the day and the night of Beowulf’s life. The poem also engages in the elegiac mode, defined in chapter four as one in which time is largely unmarked, causing instability. The speakers of the Old English elegies are trapped in the present while their minds experience the distension described by Augustine; they recall memories of the past but to do so is painful. For some, time can come to seem ‘as if it never were’. Table of Contents Preface............................................................................................................................................. 1 Abbreviations and Conventions ...................................................................................................... 2 Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 3 Contexts: Time and Writing in Anglo-Saxon England ............................................................... 7 Augustine and Beyond: Theoretical Frameworks..................................................................... 17 Overview of Thesis ................................................................................................................... 35 Chapter One: Bede’s Time............................................................................................................ 41 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 41 The Historia ecclesiastica and the ‘Present Life of Man on Earth’ (‘uita hominum praesens in terris’) ........................................................................................................................................ 45 What Went Before (‘quidue praecesserit’) ............................................................................... 64 The Reckoning of Time ............................................................................................................ 75 The Politics of Time.................................................................................................................. 86 What Follows (‘quid autem sequatur’) ..................................................................................... 97 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 106 Chapter Two: Religious Poetry of the Vercelli Book ................................................................. 108 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 108 Performative Historicity in Elene ........................................................................................... 114 Typology and Number Symbolism in Andreas ...................................................................... 141 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 167 Chapter Three: Beowulf .............................................................................................................. 172 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 172 Nostalgia and Community .................................................................................................. 179 ‘When Morning Came’: Night and Day ................................................................................. 181 Ahistoricity and in Geardagum .............................................................................................. 195 Beowulf and The Elegiac Mode .............................................................................................. 199 The Ages of Man and World .................................................................................................. 207 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 219 Chapter Four: The Old English Elegies ...................................................................................... 221 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 221 Genre ....................................................................................................................................... 225 Past, Present, and Future ......................................................................................................... 229 Seasons .................................................................................................................................... 248 Uhta......................................................................................................................................... 256 Conclusion: ‘As if it never were’ ............................................................................................ 259 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 264 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 273 Manuscripts and Archival Documents .................................................................................... 273 Primary Sources ...................................................................................................................... 273 Secondary Studies ................................................................................................................... 277 1 Preface I am extremely grateful to my supervisor, Dr Daniel Anlezark, and to my associate supervisors, Dr Margaret Rogerson and Dr Jan Shaw, for their supervision of this thesis. While the majority of this thesis is formed from new research, a small part of chapter four emerged from research conducted for my MA thesis at the University of Leeds, titled ‘Elegy, Exile, and Extinction: The Lay of the Last Survivor in Beowulf’, supervised by Dr Alfred Hiatt and submitted in 2008. I wish to thank my parents and siblings, Patrick, and the Marlands for their loving support, and Roberta Kwan, Sabina Rahman, and Tahlia Birnbaum for their