Monika Opalińska

The Lord’s Prayer played an important role in the formation of early Anglo-Saxon Church. The signifi cance of Oratio Dominica was raised in ecclesiastical epistles and refl ected in state charts and laws issued at the time. Poetical paraphrases of the prayer formed part of contemporary religious literature. Their authors continued the long-standing Cædmonian tradition and used the ancient Germanic poetic diction to express Christian values. Translation of these poems requires close reading of the manuscript or its facsimile and working with reliable editions. Scholarly commentary and editorial guidance help to analyse the poems’ thought and grammar. Therefore, the selection of a dependable critical edition is the prerequisite to the esthetically satisfying and adequate translation of these extraordinary Anglo-Latin poetical masterpieces

Medieval Manuscripts and False Go-Betweens. On Editions and Translations of Old-English Paraphrases of Pater Noster

The Lord’s Prayer played an important role in the formation of early Anglo-Saxon Church. The significance of Oratio Dominica was raised in ecclesiastical correspondence and reflected in state charts and laws issued at the time. Prose translations and poetical paraphrases formed part of contemporary literature. Their authors continued the long- standing Cædmonian tradition and used the ancient Germanic poetic diction to express Christian values. These texts, therefore, indirectly open the way to our understanding of the intricate relations existing in the Latin-Germanic world. Conveying these peculiar artefacts of the Anglo-Saxon Christian culture in another language imposes special duties on a translator. Above all, the extant manuscripts must be studied with meticulous care and compared with reliable editions. The selection of a dependable critical edition is the prerequisite to the esthetically satisfying and adequate translation. This prior condition is especially important when liturgical poetry is introduced into a distant culture to which the subtle beauty of the Anglo-Saxon literary world is virtually unknown.