This two-part post set will pull out moments in the Old English Genesis where I found translation questions particularly pertinent. First, I will compare some residual effects the most proximate language of translation left on the Modern English versions of the Old English and Vulgate descriptions of the Flood, respectively, how the two poems look at the horror of the destruction. In this moment, the two versions are mostly similar,…
On a chaotic battlefield in some unknown place, good and evil are fighting to the death in an ecstatic battle for the soul. Chastity slices through lust causing fountains of blood to erupt into the air. Good works has greed held in a chokehold watching her face turn blue and then purple as the last vestiges of air slip away. Faith strikes the head of worship of the Old Gods…
The extreme violence and war-like imagery of Prudentius’ Psychomachia can be quite startling—and even shocking—for many, especially for those who associate the Christian scripture on which this text is based with the loving and peaceful preaching of Jesus. However, quite a few aspects of the Psychomachia are directly reminiscent of Christian scripture—most closely, the Book of Revelation in the New Testament. Prudentius describes an epic battle between the forces of…
