Page:King Alfred's Version of the Consolations of Boethius.djvu/309

Rh P. 112. The word used by Alfred for giants is gigantes, whereas we might have expected an equivalent word taken from Germanic legend. In the Beowulf, however, the word gigant occurs.

In Anglo-Saxon MSS. we find classical and biblical proper names curiously distorted, as, for instance, in Alfred's translation of Orosius. This probably was due to corruptions in the Latin MSS.

The biblical story is suggested by a commentary in this connexion.

P. 115. Parmenides, as quoted by Plato in the Timaeus, said that the divine substance was 'like a massive perfect sphere.' Alfred was probably misled by a Latin gloss immediately following the Greek words.

A precept of the wise Plato; from the Timaeus.

'''P. 120. The heavenly city.' A commentary has paradysum''. The Latin is domum.

Saturn, Gelidi senis are the words of the original.

Pp. 125-127. An expanded and very free version.

P. 129. As once it was the custom of the Romans, &c, The Latin words are uti currendi in stadio, propter quam curritur, iacet praemium coronae.

'''P. 133. Ithacige' means literally 'the island of Ithaca,' the ending -ige, akin to the modern English -ey or -y'', or its Norse equivalent, being found in many modern names, such as Athelney, Bermondsey, &c.

Retie is doubtless a mistake for the Latin Neritii, an adjective applied to Ulysses, the word in some MSS. being written ne ritii. Neritos was a mountain in Ithaca.

Wendelsea. This is the usual Anglo-Saxon name for the Mediterranean. Cf. the Introduction to Alfred's Orosius.

'''P. 140. Doomsday.' The Latin has aeterna''.

Pp. 146-147. Alfred has availed himself of the commentaries for most of his astronomical notes here. The Wain Shafts are for the Latin Arcturi sidera.