The Blickling Homilies

The Blickling Homilies predates Ælfric’s well-known sermons. It describes the lives of saints and salvation history, and looks ahead to the Day of Judgment. This edition, with a newly edited Old English text and fresh translation, includes ten homilies unique to the Blickling manuscript as well as three others not found whole in any other source.

A unique collection of sermons, many unique to the Blickling manuscript, predating Ælfric and attesting to earlier English religious traditions. One of the oldest collections of its kind, The Blickling Homilies bears witness to a tradition that existed before the well-known sermons of Ælfric. It presents eighteen homilies, preserved in a manuscript written around the year 1000, that reflect an English religious culture that predates the Benedictine reform movement. The anonymous homilists explain major events in salvation history, describe the lives of saints, provide moral admonition, and look ahead to the end of the world and the Day of Judgment. Each prescribed for a particular day in the liturgical year, the texts vary widely in their contents—from exegesis of scripture derived from patristic authors to lengthy narratives drawn from early Christian hagiography and apocrypha. This edition, with a newly edited Old English text and fresh translation, includes ten homilies unique to the Blickling manuscript as well as three others that are not found whole in any other source.