extras

notes

OSWALD ASKS THE IRISH TO SEND HIM A BISHOP

As the son of Edwin's rival Æthelfrith, Oswald had gone into exile in the Scottish kingdom of Dál Riata after his father's defeat and death in 616. In exile, Oswald received religious instruction from Irish priests. Soon after assuming the throne of a reunited Northumbria in 634, Oswald sent to Dál Riata for an Irish bishop to reconvert Northumbria to Christianity. The bishop they sent was Aidan (ca. 590–651), from the monastery on the island of Iona. In Northumbria, Aidan's episcopal see was on the island of Lindisfarne.

nōn … secundum scientiam: a quotation from Romans 10:2 (Vulgate): testimonium enim perhibeō illīs quod aemūlātiōnem Deī habent sed nōn secundum scientiam ("I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but it is not enlightened" RSV). Bede explains the relevance of this quotation in the next sentence: Aidan was mistaken about the calculation of Easter.

Anatoliī:Anatolius of Alexandria was a 3rd c. CE scholar and saint who wrote a book on the computation of the date of Easter; the Irish seem to have based their computation of the date of Easter on a forged work attributed to Anatolius.

secūtam:secūtum esse, the infinitive in the accusative-infinitive construction of indirect discourse after aestimāns; the construction is: aestimans sē secūtam esse scrīpta; the subject of aestimans is nātiō: “the nation of the Picts…, thinking that they followed the writings….”

(6) morābantur: > moror, morārī = “to dwell,” “to live (in)”

apostolicae sēdis antistitis: “of the bishop of the apostolic seat,” i.e., the Pope

canonicō rītū: “in the canonical (or orthodox) manner”

AIDAN AND OTHER IRISH MONKS PREACH TO THE ANGLES

(7) ubi ipse:ipse refers to Aidan

(8) rheumate:rheuma, -matis: the tide, from the Greek ῥεῦμα = “stream” or “current.” Bede gives a similar description of the tides around Lindisfarne in his prose Life of St. Cuthbert. Today, the island (known since the 12th century as The Holy Island) is reached by a causeway that is submerged at high tide.

īnstar īnsulae: “like an island”

maris: with undīs

atque eius … cūrāvit: the subject is rex (Oswald).

auscultāns:auscultāre, “to obey,” can take a dative object (here, admonitiōnibus)

in omnibus:omnibus is a neuter substantive (“in all things”)

multum: “very”

(9) Vbi: picking up on in rēgnō suō: “in his kingdom…, where…”

pulcherrimō … spectāculō contigit:spectāculō is probably a dative of purpose or end (AG 382): “it happened as a beautiful sight” (i.e., it was a beautiful sight).