Anglo-Norman Literature - Hagiography

Hagiography

Among the numerous lives of saints written in Anglo-Norman the most important ones are the following, the list of which is given in chronological order:

• Voyage de Saint Brandan (or Brandain), written in 1121, by an ecclesiastic for Queen Aelis of Louvain (Rom. St. i. 553-588; Z. f. r. P. ii. 438-459; Rom. xviii. 203. C. Wahlund, Die altfr. Prosaübersetz. von Brendan's Meerfahrt, Upsala, 1901);
• life of St. Catherine by Clemence of Barking (Rom. xiii. 400, Jarnik, 1894);
• life of St Giles, c. 1170, by Guillaume de Berneville (Soc. Anc. Textes fr., 1881; Rom. xi. and xxiii. 94);
• life of St. Nicholas, life of Our Lady, by Wace (Delius, 1850; Stengel, Cod. Digby, 66); Uhlemann, Gram. Krit. Studien zu Wace's Conception und Nicolas, 1878;
• life of St. George by Simon de Fresne (Rom. x. 319; J. E. Matzke, Public. of the Mod. Lang. Ass. of Amer. xvii. 1902; Rom. xxxiv. 148);
• Expurgatoire de Ste. Patrice, by Marie de France (Jenkins, 1894; Eckleben, Aelteste Schilderung vom Fegefeuer d.H. Patricius, 1851; Ph. de Felice, 1906);
• La vie de St. Edmund le Rei, by Denis Pyramus, end of 12th century (Memorials of St. Edmund's Abbey, edited by T. Arnold, ii. 1892; Rom. xxii. 170);
• Henri d'Arci's life of St. Thais, poem on the Antichrist, Visio S. Pauli (P. Meyer, Not. et Extr. xxxv. 137–158);
• life of St. Gregory the Great by Frère Angier, 30 April 1214 (Rom. viii. 509–544; ix. 176; xviii. 201);
• The Vie de seint Clement, early 13C (D. Burrows, Vie de seint Clement, 3 vols., Anglo-Norman Text Society: London, 2007-9/10); a version of the Pseudo-Clementine Recognitiones and Epistula Clementis ad Iacobum translated by Rufinus of Aquileia, and the Passio sanctorum apostolorum Petri et Pauli attributed to Pseudo-Marcellus
• life of St. Modwenna, between 1225 and 1250 (Suchier, Die dem Matthäus Paris zugeschriebene Vie de St. Auban, 1873, pp. 54–58);
• Fragments of a life of St Thomas Becket, c. 1230 (P. Meyer, Soc. Anc. Text. fr., 1885); and another life of the same by Benoit of St. Alban, 13th century (Michel, Chron. des ducs de Normandie; Hist. Lit. xxiii. 383);
• a life of Edward the Confessor, written before 1245 (H. R. Luard, Lives of Edward the Confessor, 1858; Hist. Lit. xxvii. 1), by an anonymous monk of Westminster; life of St. Auban, c. 1250 (Suchier, op. cit.; Uhlemann, "Über die vie de St. Auban in Bezug auf Quelle," &c. Rom. St. iv. 543-626; ed. by Atkinson, 1876).
• The Vision of Tnudgal, an Anglo-Norman fragment, is preserved in MS. 312, Trinity College, Dublin; the MS. is of the 14th century; the author seems to belong to the 13th (La vision de Tondale, ed. by Friedel and Kuno Meyer, 1906).

In this category we may add the life of Hugh of Lincoln, 13th century (Hist. Lit. xxiii. 436; Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1888, p. v; Wolter, Bibl. Anglo-Norm., ii. 115). Other lives of saints were recognized to be Anglo-Norman by Paul Meyer when examining the MSS. of the Welbeck library (Rom. xxxii. 637 and Hist. Lit. xxxiii. 338-378).