Anglo-Saxon Bible History (3os)

**List: Anglo-Saxon Ministry the Bible ( [the Bible] ) Anglo-Saxon... OLD SAXON. "THE Heliand and the Niederdeutsche Psalmen present the best specimens of the pure Old Saxon. Although no version, strictly so called, of the Scriptures exists in this ancient dialect, yet it possesses a Harmony of the Gospels, translated in the ninth century, which has a special claim on the attention of philologists, and which can, therefore, be scarcely passed over without notice.   This harmony is the earliest document extant which exhibits the stock whence Anglo-Saxon sprang.   The language in which it is written has been spoken almost from time immemorial in the greater part of Low, Platt, or Northern Germany.   The Saxons who emigrated from this part of Germany to Britain, and founded the various kingdoms of the Heptarchy, spoke this language; but from various causes, hereafter to be men- tioned, it underwent several modifications in consequence of their residence in this country.   Their brethren, on the contrary, who remained in their fatherland, preserved the purity of their language; and the original vernacular idioms of our Saxon progenitors are still to be heard, with comparatively little variation, among the peasantry of Hanover, Holstein, Sleswick, Mecklenburg, Magdeburg, Brandenburg, Pomerania, and the kingdom of Prussia; in part of Westphalia and of Jutland, and as far north as Livonia and Esthonia. I.--CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LANGUAGE.    The Old Saxon, more appropriately designated by Grimm the Alt-nieder-deutsch (i. e. Old Low German), was probably cognate with the Gothic, for it is impossible to say which has the stronger claims to antiquity: judging from the close similarity of structure which prevails between these two dialects, the Friesic, and the Alemannic, or Old High German, we may infer that at some very remote period they all branched off from the language originally common to the whole Teutonic family.   Old Saxon, like all the Low German dialects, is far more soft and flowing than High German.   It sub- stitutes smooth consonants for the harsh aspirated sounds of High German, and regularly changes sch into s, and sz, or z into t.    The most flourishing period, it has been remarked, of Low German was that immediately pre- ceding the Reformation; and many have regretted that the influence of Luther should have caused the harsh High German dialect, spoken by him, to prevail as the language of the educated classes throughout Germany, to the exclusion of the Low German dialects, now confined to the poorer classes in the regions above mentioned.   Dr. Bosworth observes that the Low German equals the High in strength and compositive power, while it exceeds it in richness and facility of enunciation; and that "the true Old German freedom, sincerity, and honesty, can have no better medium to express its full mental and political independence, its genuine and confidential feelings of the heart, than its old, unsophisticated, open, Low German dialect." II.--HARMONY OF THE GOSPELS IN THIS LANGUAGE.    This ancient harmony, written by some unknown author in the ninth century, bears the title of Heliand, or the Healer.   The reason of this appellation can be best explained in the words of our own King Alfred, who says that the history of our Lord is thus designated, because He "sothliee hys fole HAL gedeth fram hyra synnum:" that is, He truly maketh His people to be healed from their sins.   The Heliand is written in alliterative lines, and adheres pretty closely to the original.   It is of some importance to the biblical student, from its showing the interpretation affixed by the early Saxons to the various passages of Scripture in which the words and actions of the Saviour when on earth are recorded.    Two MS. copies of this poem have been preserved, although in a very mutilated condition.   One of these copies belongs to the Cottonian Library in the British Museum, and is marked Caligula, A. vii. An old tradition has been circulated, to the effect that this very copy formed part of Canute’s collection, and hence it is still generally known as "Canute’s Bible;" but we possess no direct evidence in proof that it was ever in the hands of that monarch.   The other codex was found in 1794 by Gerard Gley, a Frenchman, in the library of the cathedral church at Bamberg: it has since been removed to Munich.   Some extracts from the Heliand were published (erroneously under the name of Franco- Theotisc), in the second volume of Hicks’s Thesaurus, and also by Nyerup at Copenhagen in 1787. A complete and splendid edition was published at Munich in 1830, by Schmeller.   The Munich MS. was taken as the base of this edition, and the various readings occurring in the London MS. are given in the notes.    It may here be mentioned that, in the year 890, a Harmony of the Gospels, erroneously attributed to Tatian, was translated by an unknown writer into a sort of Old Saxon.   The dialect of this translation is softer than the Alemannic and Bavarian; it contains words peculiar to Old Saxon, and may be considered as a kind of transition between Low and High German.   MSS. are preserved at Oxford and St. Gallen.   In an edition published by Palthenius, in 1706, the dialect is styled "the ancient Theotisc."   This work was republished by Schilter in the second volume of his Thesaurus."--The Bible of Every Land. (1860, Second Edition)   Samuel Bagster   [Info only] OLD SAXON.--1860   S. Bagster   [Info only: Language   n.d. John 1:1-4 unknown {col. #1 used Got}, Language   n.d. John 1:1-4 unknown {col. #2 used Deus}.]

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