The Anglo-Norman Bible’s Book of Joshua
A Critical Edition (BL Royal 1 C III)
By (author) B. A. Pitts
The Anglo-Norman Bible’s Joshua includes tales of spies, giants, the prostitute Rahab, the punishment of Achan, oracles, and Joshua’s brilliant military victories. Joshua stops the sun. The first half of the book relates Joshua’s stunning conquests in Canaan. The second half, the apportionment of the land among the tribes, detailed geographical surveys of territorial boundaries, and the death of Joshua. Skilful, well-paced story telling is a feature of the ANB’s Joshua. To the accounts of Rahab and Achan we may add the chronicle of Joshua’s successful, crushing campaign in the wake of the destruction of Makkedah. In rapid succession, and in an annalistic style involving staccato repetition of key phrases, the narrator relates the destruction of Libnah, Lachish, Eglon, Hebron, and Debir. The text of the ANB’s Joshua is extant in British Library Royal 1 C III (base manuscript, L) and Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France, MS francais 1 (P), both c. 1350 and both the Bibles of kings. L belonged at some point in the fifteenth century to Reading’s Benedictine abbey, entering the royal library in 1530. Characteristic of L is its occasional insertion of short glosses in English or Latin to clarify or correct the Anglo-Norman text. An illustrated text, P was prepared by an English workshop for the fourth baron de Welles, John, and his wife, Maud, daughter of William, Lord Ros. This is clearly the Bible of a wealthy and well-connected English family. After the Welles family, the manuscript belonged to Louis de Bruges (1492), then to King Louis XII of France.
The Anglo-Norman Bible’s Joshua includes tales of spies, giants, the prostitute Rahab, the punishment of Achan, oracles, and Joshua’s brilliant military victories. Joshua stops the sun. The first half of the book relates Joshua’s stunning conquests in Canaan. The second half, the apportionment of the land among the tribes, detailed geographical surveys of territorial boundaries, and the death of Joshua. Skilful, well-paced story telling is a feature of the ANB’s Joshua. To the accounts of Rahab and Achan we may add the chronicle of Joshua’s successful, crushing campaign in the wake of the destruction of Makkedah. In rapid succession, and in an annalistic style involving staccato repetition of key phrases, the narrator relates the destruction of Libnah, Lachish, Eglon, Hebron, and Debir. The text of the ANB’s Joshua is extant in British Library Royal 1 C III (base manuscript, L) and Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France, MS francais 1 (P), both c. 1350 and both the Bibles of kings. L belonged at some point in the fifteenth century to Reading’s Benedictine abbey, entering the royal library in 1530. Characteristic of L is its occasional insertion of short glosses in English or Latin to clarify or correct the Anglo-Norman text. An illustrated text, P was prepared by an English workshop for the fourth baron de Welles, John, and his wife, Maud, daughter of William, Lord Ros. This is clearly the Bible of a wealthy and well-connected English family. After the Welles family, the manuscript belonged to Louis de Bruges (1492), then to King Louis XII of France.
- By (author) B. A. Pitts
Other Titles in this Series
The Old English Life of Saint Pantaleon
Old English text with introduction, translation and Latin version
Volume 33
A Late Fifteenth-Century Commonplace Book
Edited from Cambridge University Library MS Gg.6.16
Volume 23
Un inquisiteur non sanguinaire
les vies inedites de saint Pierre Martyr en francais medieval
Volume 21
The Anglo-Norman Bible’s Books of Kings, a Critical Edition
(BL Royal 1 C III, fols 234r-274v)
Volume 37
Le Brut moyen-anglais en prose (version commune des origines a 1333)
Traduction francaise de Marie-Francoise Alamichel
Volume 16
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