Translated texts for historians

The Commentary on Revelation is Bede's first venture into Biblical exegesis - an ambitious choice for a young monastic scholar in a newly Christianized land. Its subject matter - the climax of the great story of creation and redemption, of history and of time itself - adds to the Commentary's intrinsic importance, for these themes lie at the heart of Bede's concerns and of his achievement as a historian, exegete, scholar, and preacher. But Bede was also a man of his age. When he penned the Commentary around 703, speculation and anxiety about the end of the world was in the air. According to conventional chronology, almost 6,000 years had passed since creation. If for God 'one day ... is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day' (2 Peter 3:8), the world was destined to last six millennia, corresponding to the six days of creation. The end, then, was close. Bede vigorously opposed the temptation to calculate the time of the end. The Commentary argues that Revelation is not a literal prophecy, but a symbolic reflection on the perennial struggle of the Church in this world. At the same time, the young Bede is starting to shape his own account of how the end-times would unfold. This translation, prefaced by a substantial Introduction, will be of interest to students of medieval religious and cultural history, of Anglo-Saxon England, and of the history of Biblical exegesis in the Middle Ages."--Jacket.

Contains a series of anecdotes about the lives and cults of Christians who witnessed to their faith through their exemplary lives. These anecdotes provide important historical evident, first, for the ways bishops and their congregations manipulated traditions about the development of the early Church, and second, for the contemporary functions and meanings of the cults of saints during the sixth century. The spontaneity and literary modesty of many of the anecdotes make them especially valuable for modern historians intent upon understanding the early Frankish Church. In addition to the translation, this volume includes an introduction and commentary. The introduction summarizes essential information about the chronology, composition and purposes of the "Glory of the Confessors", and also discusses other relevant topics, such as the role of these anecdotes in the celebration of the liturgy and the contrast between 'rusticity' and correct behaviour and beliefs. The commentary provides only basic identifications, dates, background and references to other secondary scholarly literature.

"The first translation into English of Life of the Fathers, a collection of twenty lives of saints which lives present a cross-section of the Gallic Church and are a counterpart to the secular society described in Gregory's History of the Franks." -- Publisher description.

"Focusing on the first and last years of Libanius' Antiochene career (AD 354-388), the speeches in this volume illustrate the great range of Libanius' rhetorical skills, while at the same time illuminating the intrigues of city politics and university life. The book's focal points are the great patriotic Antiochikos (Oration 11), delivered soon after Libanius' return to his native city, and the long defence of his educational system (Oration 62) from almost thirty years later, in which a bellicose tone is adopted to rebut a personal attack on Libanius' failure to produce a really successful student. The shorter speeches give unparalleled insights into problems of sharply contemporary relevance - teachers' pay, student indiscipline and rioting, threats from the rival Latin curriculum, accusations of professional incompetence, as well as everyday details of academic life. The majority of these speeches have not previously been translated into English. This volume will interest not only students of Libanius and of Antioch, but also those engaged in the broader study of education, rhetoric, Hellenic culture and upper-class pagan society in late antiquity."-- Publisher description.