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George Hardin BrownALDHELM (640?–709/10)
The learned founder and fi rst major fi gure of Anglo-
Latin letters. Aldhelm was born of noble family with
royal connections in Wessex about the time of the
district’s conversion to Christianity. We have few details
of his life. Of his education William of Malmesbury
relates, without citing the source of his information, that
Aldhelm received his early training from one Máelduib
at the ancient Celtic foundation of Malmesbury. Later he
studied under the abbot Hadrian in the renowned school
of Canterbury but left after as little as two years, for
health and other reasons. In one letter from Canterburywritten between 670 and 673 Aldhelm lists the subjects
he was then pursuing, including Roman law, 100 types
of meter and poetic devices, the principles of mathemati-
cal calculation (especially fractions), and astrology (the
interpretation of the zodiacal signs).
Earlier scholars hypothesized that Aldhelm learned
his showy latinity from Irish tutors like Máelduib, but
recent specialists have established a convincing link
between Aldhelm’s writings and the work of continental
grammarians and poets, who gloried in the same pomp-
ous style. Aldhelm somehow acquired an astonishing
command of sacred and profane literature as he devel-
oped his extraordinary skill in writing ornate Latin.
He became involved in ecclesiastical affairs, attend-
ing a synod at Hertford in 672 and becoming abbot of
Malmesbury ca. 673. He was very active, traveling to
Rome and to sites in southern England; he labored to
establish the church in Wessex physically (he built or
rebuilt several churches) and spiritually (Bede speaks
of his energy and zeal). When Bishop Hæddi died in
705, the vast diocese of Wessex was split into two, with
sees at Winchester and Sherborne. In 705/06 Aldhelm,
well acquainted with neighboring Devon and Cornwall,
was unsurprisingly chosen and consecrated bishop of
the western portion, Sherborne. He presided over his
bishopric for four years until his death in 709/10.
For Aldhelm Latin was not only the language of
Christian culture; it was also the language of the clerical
elite. He therefore fostered a hermeneutic style of the
initiate, whose most striking feature is the ostentatious
parade of unusual, arcane, and learned vocabulary. Both
his prose and poetry exhibit fl orid ornament, especially
alliteration and rhyme. Aldhelm’s extant prose writ-
ings include a dozen letters. In epistles to his students
Heahfrith and Wihtfrith he tries to convince them of the
advantages of English over Irish education and demon-
strates his point by outdoing the rhetorical excesses of
Celtic Latin (e.g., every one of the fi rst fi fteen words
of his letter to Heahfrith begins with p). In his letter to
Geraint, king of Dumnonia (Devon), he discusses the
reckoning for Easter, a much-debated topic in the 8th
century among Irish and continental clerics; and in a
letter to the bishop of Wessex he addresses computistical
matters in addition to metrics.
His weightiest letter is the Epistola ad Acircium,
addressed to the well-educated King Aldfrith of North-
umbria (686–705). The preface of this massive tract
includes the longest recorded disquisition on the alle-
gorical signifi cance of the number seven; the main body
of the letter contains two complementary treatises on
Latin metrics. To illustrate the properties of the hexam-
eter he inserts 100 Aenigmata, following the example
of the late Latin poet Symphosius. These Aenigmata, or
Riddles, which express the mysterious nature of things,
proved popular in early-medieval Europe but especiallyALCUIN