ALCUIN IN ENGLAND *
Edo Nyland
edonon@islandnet.com
THE BENEDICTINES COME TO ENGLAND
In 597 A.D. the papal librarian
Augustine and forty Benedictine monks arrived in England, sent by Pope
Gregory the Great, to begin the conversion of the local people to orthodox
Christianity. They brought enough books with them to form the nucleus of the
scriptorium library that they included in their monastery built at Canterbury in Kent. In line with their teaching duties
they named their establishment Kanterburi, analyzed as
.ka-an.-.te-er.-.bu-uri: .ka ika ikasi learned an. ana anaia brothers .te ate ateratu to take advantage of er. era erabide education .bu abu aburu eman to express (opinion, idea) uri uri urrikimendu repentance Take advantage of an education from the learned brothers and express repentance.
Once the
buildings were finished, the grammarians among them settled down to the
demanding but creative task of laying the foundation for the new language.
Little is known about the amount of progress achieved during the next decades
until the year 635 A.D. In that year King Oswald of Northumbria offered his
help to establish a new monastery in the NE of England on an island near the
mouth of the Humber river, called Holy Island. He asked the Gnostic St.
Aidan, who had built the Irish monastery on Iona, to send priests to build a
new monastery on the island in a location that was within sight of his fort
at Bamburgh. St. Aidan decided to lead the delegation himself and the
monastery buildings were started, as was the habit at the time, on the ruins
of the sacred site of the Ashera religion. The ruins
visible there today are those of the subsequent monastery built in 1083. The
island is about 2 km off shore and can be reached on foot at low tide. After
the Vikings burned the monastery in 793 the island was known as Lindisfarne.
Some other early monasteries were built after this in England such as
Wearmouth in 674, Jarrow in 681 and Rochester in about 780, to expand the
language conversion effort. The principal language center became York, not
far from Holy Island, where a scriptorium was attached to the Cathedral
school. Around 1100 a large Benedictine monastery was also built there. Contact
between these centers of learning was regular and frequent, as remaining
records show. It was from Holy Island and Rochester that regular contact was
maintained with the Benedictine monastery of Egmond in Holland. The name Holy
Island was changed to Lindisfarne after the Viking raid of 793. With
the VCV formula the name breaks down to: .li-in.-.di-is.-.fa-arne: .li ili ilintu to set fire in. inu inular sundown .di udi udikan get away! is. isi isilume bastard .fa ifa ifar northern arne arne arnegatu cursed Get away from here! At sundown the cursed bastards from the north have set fire!
ALCUIN, THE BENEDICTINES' TEACHER
If any
person can be identified as having had the greatest influence upon the
formation of English and the other Germanic languages, this person must be
Alcuin. His absolute dedication to the task, his organizing ability and his
tireless work during a long life had such an influence that he must be
regarded as the greatest of west European language teachers. The name Alcuin
was apparently given to him at the time that he became head of the Cathedral
school in York and is composed of three words: al.-.ku-in.: al. ala alaiki happily .ku aku akuilatu to stimulate in. inu inurritu to inspire Happily stimulating and inspiring.
Alcuin
was born around 732, in or near York.
He grew up at the Cathedral school of which Egbert was the head
master. Egbert was especially "concerned to carry on the tradition of
learning which he had known under his master Bede, a tradition already
founded by its former bishops Bosa, John of Beverley and Wilfrid the
Second." Egbert
These
bishops had been trained in Irish Gnostic discipline of books under Abbess Hild
of Streanaeshalch, the later Whitby. Streanaeshalch is made up of five
words: .st.-.re-ana-esha-alk: .st. ezta eztabaidazale fond of discussions .re are arrerazko hospitable ana ana anaiak brothers esha esa esalditu to talk (the "s" is pronounced as "sh") alk alk. alkarbatu to get together Fond of discussions, the hospitable brothers get together to talk.
Under
Egbert, the York Cathedral school became the most famous center of learning in
England that attracted young men not only from nearby Northumbria, but also
from the rest of England and the mainland. Although at first the school had
concentrated on religion, Egbert expanded the curriculum to include the
liberal arts and secular literature and science, such as Bede had written
down at Yarrow. It was in this energetic atmosphere that Alcuin grew up.
Egbert loved all his boys but he took a special interest in Alcuin, who would
run errands for him in the streets of York, learn about its history from the
pages of Orosius and Bede and roam the Roman ruins on the banks of the river
Ouse. He
learned how the Roman Emperor Severus had come to crush the northern Picts
and the Caledonian Scots. Emperor Constantius had come to see Britain under
his power and here he had also died. Here his son Constantine had started his
reign which had been of such importance to Christianity. The city was already
old at the time of the Romans, having been a trading center and important
harbour on the navigable Ouse, dating back to long before Christ was born.
The first Church had been built in 627 by Bishop Paulinus who had dedicated
it to St. Peter. This little wooden building was soon replaced by Paulinus'
successor, King Oswald, who completed a splendid structure of stone. As Alcuin
grew up, another teacher became even more important to him than Egbert had
been. His name was Aelbert, whose special interest was in books and teaching.
It was Aelbert who allowed Alcuin to teach the younger students. Alcuin said
later about Aelbert: "My master told me to rise with all that was in me
to the defense of the Catholic Faith if anywhere I should hear of the
springing up of strange sects, opposed to Apostolic doctrines". Aelbert
introduced more advanced studies such as Latin grammar, language and prose,
rhetoric, mathematics, arithmetic, geometry and astronomy. Natural
sciences were also taught including eclipses of the sun and moon, tides,
earthquakes and the laws that govern the lives of men, beasts and birds as
written by Pliny, Isidore and Bede. Alcuin also encouraged these teachings
and gave credit to pre-Christian teaching, saying: "They were the wisest
men who discerned these arts in nature. It is a great disgrace to us to let
them die out in our time". Canon law was required by those who wished to
enter the priesthood that also required knowledge of music such as the
Gregorian chant as composed by Pope Gregory himself. Every minute Aelbert
could spare was spent in his beloved Cathedral library, which expanded
rapidly under his devoted care. Alcuin then assembled for him a list of all
the books and documents in the library, the first library catalogue in
Britain. When time
permitted Aelbert would travel to the continental monasteries to borrow more
books to be copied in the scriptorium. On one of these trips he took Alcuin
along with him to Rome and Pavia and visited Frankish monasteries like
Murbach on the way back. "Murbach" comes
from: .mu-ur.-.ba-ak.:
All these travels and activities
resulted in more knowledge being accumulated and raised the profile of the
school and of its master to new heights and it generated a desire in Alcuin
to do the same if and when he became master of his own school. When Alcuin was 35 years old, he was
ordained a deacon, which was one step lower than a priest, as the analysis of
the word "deacon" shows: .de-ako-on. .de
ide ide
member
The title "priest" is agglutinated from: .p.-.ri-ist.:
The task
assigned to Alcuin was to establish and run a college where monks and priests
were taught the new language. They learned how to teach this to the people.
He became therefore the educator of the clergy. It is likely that it was one
of the local grammarians who coined the word "Library", when
he painted or carved the word on a sign which he hung over the door giving
access to the study hall: "Library" from .li - ib. - .ra - ari
ALCUIN MEETS CHARLEMAGNE
Alcuin
believed that the creation of the new English language had started in earnest
with Venerable Bede, acknowledged the most learned man of the time and the
foremost historian of England. He was Alcuin's hero and role model and tried
to pattern his life after him. Shortly before his death in 735, Bede had
written a severe critique of monastic living in England: "within very
many of these 'houses of God' monastic doors concealed homes of lust and
luxury, free from discipline, to which crowded all who gladly shook off for
comfort and idleness the burden of an honest life in the world". Alcuin
always remembered these words and warned his students never to give in to
temptation. The name "Venerable Bede" deserves to be translated
because it is exactly in line with the other Benedictine names. It analyses
as: .be-ene-era-ab.-.le be-ede: .be obe obeagotu to improve ene ene ene come to me era era erabide education ab. abe abe cross .le ele eleiza church be be bedeinkagarri blessed One ede ede ederki brilliant To improve yourself, come to me for an education under the church' cross. The Blessed and brilliant one.
In 781
Aelbert sent Alcuin to Frankland on a mission to king Charlemagne and, just
before Easter on his way to Parma, he had caught up with the king's party. It
was the second time he met the King of the Franks and King Charles had not
forgotten the brilliant young man, because by that time Alcuin's scholarship
was known throughout western Europe. Charles was looking for outstanding
scholars to staff the palatine school he was developing in Aachen (Aken),
attached to his Court. The Frankish king had great plans for the education of
his people and not the least of his goals was the replacement of the
indigenous "heathen" language of the Germans with an acceptable
Christian one, free from verbal imagery associated with the still omnipresent
Ashera religion. Alcuin refused Charlemagne's offer to become head of the
palatine school at Aachen, a refusal which the king did not accept. He was in
urgent need of an outstanding and strong-minded scholar with organizing
ability and he knew he had found his man.
Associated with the school, Charles planned to start an Academy to
train missionaries, priests and scholars, people badly needed if Christianity
was the prevail. With Alcuin at the head of this educational institute,
Charles was sure that his dream would become a reality. Alcuin's refusal
caused the king to change his approach and he then contacted co-workers of
Alcuin such as Eanbald, Elfwald and Willehad, who had no reservations about
leaving York and willingly accepted. His co-workers having taken the big step
to Aachen, this caused Alcuin to overcome his objections and he agreed to
leave his comfortable life in England, his many friends and his beloved
library to join the monarch. He had helped Aelbert build the best academy and
library in Europe and the thought of leaving all that behind for the
uncertainties of Charles' court was unnerving to him. He spent his last days
in York writing his "Verses on the Saints of the Church of York" a
long poem honoring the history of the great men in York's history in church
and state. After that was done, he declared himself ready to go. It was the
year 782, Alcuin was 50 years old and a completely new life lay ahead of him. |
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