Felix’s Life of St Guthlac and Its Two Old English Versions

Felix’s Vita Sancti Guthlaci, composed towards the middle of the eighth century at the request of King Ælfwald of East Anglia (r. 713–49), is the earliest substantial literary work from the middle kingdoms of pre-Viking England. Written in Latin and modelled on the ornate style of Aldhelm, the Vita offers a vivid account of Guthlac, a Mercian noble turned hermit who died at Crowland in 714. It stands as both a literary landmark and an important historical source for early Anglo-Saxon life.

The Vita also shaped the development of vernacular hagiography, notably inspiring two major Old English poems preserved in the Exeter Book. Though the original Mercian translation is lost, its legacy endures in the ‘Gates of Hell’ sequence reworked in the Vercelli Book, in the fuller Life at the end of a collection of Ælfric’s writings, and in entries both for Guthlac and his sister Pege in the Old English Martyrology.

This volume presents, for the first time, a complete text of Felix’s Vita together with the Old English Homily and Life, offering a comprehensive view of Guthlac’s cult across languages and centuries. It is essential reading for scholars of early medieval history and literature. All the texts are accompanied by translations and commentaries.