Ælfric of Eynsham

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English abbot and prolific writer in Old English of hagiography, homilies and biblical commentaries (c.955-c.1010)

WritersLived 950 to 1010 · aged 60

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Fame49.9

MomentumNot measured

Languages21

Peak2010s

In century#173

Also inDeutsch

Photos 1

The Tower of Babel, from an illustrated English manuscript (11th century) in the British Library, containing some Latin excerpts from the Hexateuch. Ælfric was responsible for the preface to the Book of Genesis as well as some of its translations. Another copy of the text, without lavish illustrations but including a translation of the Book of Judges, is found in Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud Misc. 509.

Writers born in the 950s 6

Bogomil50.3

Rinchen Zangpo48.0 Leo the Deacon50.4 Wang Yucheng46.4

Gregory of Narek55.3 Kisai Marvazi46.1

About this person

Ælfric of Eynsham was an English abbot and a student of Æthelwold of Winchester, and a consummate, prolific writer in Old English of hagiography, homilies, biblical commentaries, and other genres of Christian literature. He is also known variously as Ælfric the Grammarian, Ælfric of Cerne, and Ælfric the Homilist. In the view of Peter Hunter Blair, he was "a man comparable both in the quantity of his writings and in the quality of his mind even with Bede himself". According to Claudio Leonardi, he "represented the highest pinnacle of Benedictine reform and Anglo-Saxon literature".