The reign of King Edgar (959-975) has been greatly emphasised in recent years as a period of substantial achievements in both intellectual and religious terms. It is within this context that the flgures of tEthelwold of Winchester, Dunstan of Canterbury and Oswald of Worcester stand out. They are generally regarded as the leaders of the so-called Benedictine Reform which is generally accepted to have changed the landscape of the Anglo-Saxon church through an intensive process of establishment of Benedictine monasteries throughout Edgar's realm. Although the intensity of such reformation has been under thorough scrutiny recently, scholars generally agree on the impact that particularly.IEtheIwold and Dunstan had on the (mostly religious) literary production of the period. One of the texts that the bishop of Winchester composed is a historical record of the reforming endeavour (Edgar's Establishment of the Monasteries). This piece also gives evidence of how .lEthelwold was commissioned by the royal family to translate RSB into the vernacular. Only nine copies (some fragmentary) of this translation have survived, all of them from different periods and, arguably, from different origins. Their format is mostly bilingual (with the Latin text preceding the Old English translation chapter by chapter) and they range in date from the late tenth century to the early thirteenth. Departing from a general historical contextualisation of the moment when the translation was composed, this thesis presents a detailed investigation of each extant copy, its palaeographical and codicological features and the historical context in which it was produced and used. Each chapter is devoted to a full manuscript (or its relevant part In the case of composite volumes), which is presented in the contemporary context of the monastic community where it was manufactured andlor used (when known) before being thoroughly described. Finally, a conclusion to the thesis is presented to comparatively examine the outcome of all the individual analyses offered in the previous sections. The results of this analysis allow us to obtain a more accurate picture of the transmission of the vernacular RSB showing that this was much more widespread than generally believed. In addition, it evidences the persistent use of the tEthelwoldian translation beyond 1066, while providing valuable information about the ways in which this (mostly) bilingual text was employed in the context of a bilingual (and later trilingual) society.

PART ONE. THE VOWELS OF ACCENTED SYLLABLES. t I - INDEPENDENT CHANGES. 1. WGmc a appears as ~ (~, e), occasionally~; WGmc ~ appears as e (occasionally ~); WGmc 1 appears as i (occas . WGmc 2, ~, appear as Q, y. in C., E., 2. WGmc a appears as ~ (~), also frequently ~, and occas. { ei in C.i WGmc ~ appears as~; WGmc r appears as 1 (ii); WGmc 0, B, appear as Q (QQ), ~ (~). 3. WGmc ~ appears as ~ (~); WGmc ~ appears as ~, ally ~ (especially in C.), ~;, (Ef.), and ~ (C., Ef.)j warne eu appears as ~, occasionally~, !2i iu (occas. i,~ [Ef.], ~ [E.]). II - DEPENDENT CHANGES. WGmc iu appe ars as -icr 4. Before nasals WGmc ~appears as Q or ~ (mostly Q in C., both 2 and ~ in Ef., invariably ~ in E.); WGmc i appears -o'· WGmc ~, ~ .. L ~ + nas. + fricative appears as Q, 1, !:!i a + ~ appears as Qi 1 + ~ appears as 1; PrOE Q before ill, appears as B. 5. Breaking: (i) Before ~ + consonant PrOE ~ appears as ~, occas ional ~t(also ~ in Ef.); PrOE ~ appears as ~ (also ~ in Ef.); ! appears as ! (occasionally 12 [C.], ~~~], and Z [C., Ef. after ~]). Before smoothing groups (~, £g, £h) the spel11) is usually ~. (ii) Before 1 + consonant PrOE m appears as~; PrOE ~ pears as ~ (2x ~ + l! in C.); PrOE 1 appears as 1. (iii) Before h (+ cons.) the effect of breaking is obscured by smoothing, so that the spelling of PrOE ~, ~, i, before h (+ cons.) is ~, ~,i. But~,~, io occur~ when h is lost hefore the time of smoothing. 6. In open syllables when a back vowel follows WGmc ~ appears as ~, also as ~ (e., E.), ~ (especially in Ef.), and ~ WGmc a appears as ~. Influence of front consonants: generally the primary _ front vowels ~, ~, i, are unaffected; ~ appears as ~ after ~ (not invariably, however), and 2 appears as ~ after g. 7. I-mutation: PrOE ~ appears as ~ (occas. ~ before cons. groups); ~ appears as~; PrOE ~ + cons. appears as aalor ~(mostlY e in -ae in e~,~Ef., usually ~ in E.); FrOE ~ + nas. appears as or ~ (mostly ~ in e., Ef., mostly ~ in-E.); PrOE ~ + c appears as -e (occas. -ae); ., PrOE 2 appears as ~ (occas . ~)j IJ \ - PrOE u appears as Z (occas. i, u1,~; PrOE ea appears as ~ (occas. ~ e., Ef.). 8. Back mutation: Is generally absent from E. and Ef. (Ix ~ in each). e. has back mutation before single consonants before exceptAback consonants in the case of ~, i. The spelling i ~, ~,io. Back mutation is not invariable, however. 9. Smoothing o~ ~, ~, 12 is usua1Iy~, ~, 1. (see 5.); PrOE ~ is anoothed to ~ (but !!!!. frequent 1n E. ); PrOE ~ smoothed to ~ in e. (exs. are few). 10. ~ causes diphthongization of preceding 1. to 12 in C.j "" ., occasional rounding of !, r occurs after~; in e. !i- > under conditions of ~-mutation; PrOE Q frequently becomes ~ in the neighbourhood of a labial consonant. II - UNACCENTED SYLLABLES In E. and Ef. PrOE i, B, in unaccented syllables are generally preserved; in C. both 1, ~, and~, £, occur. In E. and Ef. J !TOE !!! in unaccented syllables usually apJ~ ears as ~ (~, 2)' beside occasional~; in C. the spelling is usually ~ (beside occasional ~). Syncope occurs rarely. In final syllables it occasional1) open occurs in C. in the suffix -11; inAmedial ionally occurs in C., E., Ef., when a long stem syllable pr cedes. Secondar~ vowels before 1, m, a, are rare; before ~ s examples occur, either ~, 2 (occasionally ~, ~) after a vowel, or ~, 1, also ~, after a front vowel. Generally ing secondary vowels do not occur in medial syllables. Svarabhakti vowels are rare. The reduction of vowels in the second elements of compounds is not complete in E. and Ef. II - CONSONAN'rS WGmc ~ appears as ~, Y.1l, P (mostly p in C., mostly ~, in EE.)j WGmc l appears as gj WGmc~, 1, ill, a, ~, as ~, 1, m, n, ~, bj WGmc f, ~, occur as !, £, the distinction being well kept in E.j i, d, ~, occur as 1, d stances o~ t, especially i n E~.),~; WGmc Q occurs as 0, Q, th, t, d (occas • . dh, Qh): mostly 0 in C., mostly th in E" mostly d in Ef.; OE [c][k] occur as ~ (but [kw] as ~), and [co][kk] as ££.; OE [j][gHg.J occur as g (occasionally 1. is written ~or [j]); OE [~~J[gg] occur as g, gg (occas. ~, g)j II; OE h occurs as h, and medially and ~inally as h, £h (~inallY ~ is ~requent in E. and E~ .); examples of loss of h between vowels and between consonants and vowels are rarer in E., Ef., than in C.; OE hi is frequently spelt ct in E. and Ef.; OE [hs] normally occurs as x. III - ACCIDENCE. Nouns and adjectives generally follow the normal OE declensional system, except that PrOE -1, -~, in inflexional syllables do not always show weakening to -~, especially in . E. and Ef. in which the spellings -i,-~, are usual. Verbs generally have -y or -2 for 1 sg.pres.indic., -ib, -11, -!1h, occasionally -~, -~, for 3 sg.pres.indic.j weak verbs of Class II have 3 sg.pres. -at, -ao,-~; the pl. usually ends in -ao, -at, -ad, but exs. are few. ~ L TheiPret.sg. of strong verbs has no ending; weak verbs o~ Class I have pret.sg. -ide, -ede (E. -idae , Ef. -~, - after short stems, -~ (-d~,-dm) after long stems; to -te (-tae) occurs after a voiceless cons.; weak Class II usually have pret.sg. -ade (-~). The pret.pl. generally ends in -~ (occas. -~). The present participle usually ends in -~ j -~ [C.], -aendi, -indi, -rendi [EE.]); the past participle of strong verbs ends in -~ in C. (occas. -~, -2g, -in, -£ll)' in -aen in E. (OCC8S. -i~' -~~ ~ -!a~, and in -~ in Ef. (occas • -~, -~, -En, -~, -2ll, -~); the past perticiple of weak verbs of Class I ends in -!£. (occasionally -ed, -it); the pest participle of weak verbs of Class II is usually -ad (occasionally -od). Adverbs in PrOE~ generally have the ending -~ ...... ~ ~~, in C.; in EE. the spelling is usually -~ or -Eo CONCLUSION. All three Glossaries are distinctively Mercian and are probably derived from a Mercian archetype written somewhere between 675 and 700. The language represented by E. and Er. is that of about 700 (although the MSS are of the ninth century), and the language represented by C. 1s that of about 750 (the MS can be dated 750-800). There is some evidence to suggest that Er. is derived from a copy made by a Kent lsh scribe; the present MS has been copied by an OHG scribe, who occasionally introduces OHG features.

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