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The Ecclesiastical History of the English People/The Greater Chronicle/Letter to Egbert
Starting with the invasion of Julius Caesar in the fifth century, Bede recorded the history of the English up to his own day in 731 A.D. A scholarly monk working in the north-east of England, Bede wrote the five books of his history in Latin. The Ecclesiastical History is his most famous
work, and this edition provides the authoritative Colgrave translation, as well as a new translation of the Greater Chronicle, never before published in English. His Letter to Egbert gives his final reflections on the English Church just before his death. This is the only edition to include all
three texts, and they are illuminated further by a detailed introduction and explanatory notes.
work, and this edition provides the authoritative Colgrave translation, as well as a new translation of the Greater Chronicle, never before published in English. His Letter to Egbert gives his final reflections on the English Church just before his death. This is the only edition to include all
three texts, and they are illuminated further by a detailed introduction and explanatory notes.
496 pages, Paperback
Published May 13, 1999
18 people are currently reading
215 people want to read
About the author
Bede
394 books94 followersborn perhaps 673
Saxon theologian Bede, also Baeda or Beda, known as "the Venerable Bede," wrote Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation , a major work and an important ancient source, in 731 in Latin and introduced the method from the birth of Jesus of dating events.
People referred to Saint Bede, a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth and at its companion of Saint Paul in modern Jarrow in the kingdom, for more than a millennium before canonization. Most fame of this well author and scholar gained him the title as "the father.”
In 1899, Leo XIII, pope, made Bede a doctor of the Church, a position of significance; only this native of Great Britain achieved this designation; from Italy, Saint Anselm of Canterbury originated.
Bede, a skilled linguist, moreover translated the Greek of the early Church Fathers, and his contributions made them significantly much more accessible to his fellow Christians. Monastery of Bede accessed a superb library, which included Eusebius and Orosius.
Saxon theologian Bede, also Baeda or Beda, known as "the Venerable Bede," wrote Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation , a major work and an important ancient source, in 731 in Latin and introduced the method from the birth of Jesus of dating events.
People referred to Saint Bede, a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth and at its companion of Saint Paul in modern Jarrow in the kingdom, for more than a millennium before canonization. Most fame of this well author and scholar gained him the title as "the father.”
In 1899, Leo XIII, pope, made Bede a doctor of the Church, a position of significance; only this native of Great Britain achieved this designation; from Italy, Saint Anselm of Canterbury originated.
Bede, a skilled linguist, moreover translated the Greek of the early Church Fathers, and his contributions made them significantly much more accessible to his fellow Christians. Monastery of Bede accessed a superb library, which included Eusebius and Orosius.
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
July 23, 2025
A beautiful example of what Christianity brings to historiography. St Bede writes honestly as a storyteller filled with wonder and explicitly in the vein of the Biblical histories. He reveals a church and kingdoms where the supernatural fearless permeates the secular regularly, which is wonderful to read of not disturbing at times.
December 9, 2014
Fascinating.
Bede was a monk in England and wrote this history in 731. Several themes are prominent, the last two being positive while the rest are more critiques.
1. Bringing the church in the British Isles under Roman customs. Bede was obsessed with the proper celebration of Easter, by the Roman calendar. Some see this positively as a zeal for church unity. It often appeared to me more pursuing a hegemony of the Roman bishop.
2. The power of miracles and relics to prove the faith. Missionaries to a new land would ask for relics from Rome to put in newly built churches (251). A couple times a devout and dead king would be invoked for aid (195). Many miracles connected to relics are related as an apologetic for the Christian faith that converts many.
3. Merit and works earning favor. Self-denying practices like fasting are used to atone for past offenses (161). One would live as a stranger to the world in the monastery, to attain heaven more easily.
4. Asceticism and gnosticism. The body is only a hindrance to spiritual life. Many acts of self-flagellation are lauded as worthy of imitation. At death “his holy soul was released from the prison house of the body” (177).
5. Bringing kings under the rule of Christ. Many letters from popes to the English kings call them "my son." Quite the audacity to write to a king you've never met, far away, and call him your son! Maybe it was a bit overdone, but it is right to seek to convert rulers and have them come under the yoke of Christ themselves (Psalm 2:10-12).
6. Teaching and preaching. Bede often castigates the Irish for their Easter observance, but commends them for their diligence and persistence in sending missionaries to Britain. Right beside the need for relics in the church, he places the need for good teaching. His letter to Egbert at the end of this edition movingly exhorts him to go out and teach the common man, rebukes lazy priests for not doing so, and commends translation of Scripture into the native language. On his deathbed he said, “My soul longs to see Christ my King in all His beauty” (302).
Bede was a monk in England and wrote this history in 731. Several themes are prominent, the last two being positive while the rest are more critiques.
1. Bringing the church in the British Isles under Roman customs. Bede was obsessed with the proper celebration of Easter, by the Roman calendar. Some see this positively as a zeal for church unity. It often appeared to me more pursuing a hegemony of the Roman bishop.
2. The power of miracles and relics to prove the faith. Missionaries to a new land would ask for relics from Rome to put in newly built churches (251). A couple times a devout and dead king would be invoked for aid (195). Many miracles connected to relics are related as an apologetic for the Christian faith that converts many.
3. Merit and works earning favor. Self-denying practices like fasting are used to atone for past offenses (161). One would live as a stranger to the world in the monastery, to attain heaven more easily.
4. Asceticism and gnosticism. The body is only a hindrance to spiritual life. Many acts of self-flagellation are lauded as worthy of imitation. At death “his holy soul was released from the prison house of the body” (177).
5. Bringing kings under the rule of Christ. Many letters from popes to the English kings call them "my son." Quite the audacity to write to a king you've never met, far away, and call him your son! Maybe it was a bit overdone, but it is right to seek to convert rulers and have them come under the yoke of Christ themselves (Psalm 2:10-12).
6. Teaching and preaching. Bede often castigates the Irish for their Easter observance, but commends them for their diligence and persistence in sending missionaries to Britain. Right beside the need for relics in the church, he places the need for good teaching. His letter to Egbert at the end of this edition movingly exhorts him to go out and teach the common man, rebukes lazy priests for not doing so, and commends translation of Scripture into the native language. On his deathbed he said, “My soul longs to see Christ my King in all His beauty” (302).
September 26, 2023
All around good job Bede, apologies that i won't take most of what you say at face value like at all <3
September 26, 2019
It really surprised even me how much I enjoyed this book, and how quickly it moved along. Sometimes when reading “heavier” nonfiction, I have to pace myself and have a daily goal of reading say 20 pages a day. But this book kept my interest.
I’ve read enough medieval-era books and books about the medieval period that I have a sort of mental picture of what it might have looked like, but for the Anglo-Saxon period, there was just a blank. I’m happy to say that I now have a bit of an idea of the period, and in fact, the snippets of daily life were the best parts of the book.
My favorite story was one of several that Bede relates about John of Beverley, Bishop of Hexham and later Bishop of York (he was canonized as a saint in 1037).
Bede continues with Herebald’s story that he was healed when the bishop prayed for him. But it is such a human story, and so typical of young men, isn’t it? They haven’t changed that much over the centuries. Can’t you just see Herebald having to hold back, watching, while the other guys are racing each other, until he can’t stand it any longer?!?
In addition to the Ecclesiastical History, this edition includes a few shorter works either by or about Bede. I particularly enjoyed reading the letter written by Bede’s fellow monk, Cuthbert, to one Cuthwin (who was perhaps an abbot) notifying him of Bede’s death. Cuthbert describes the short illness Bede suffered, which included periods of breathlessness and some swelling of the feet [congestive heart failure or perhaps pulmonary embolism?]. Cuthbert reports that Bede’s last day, 25 May 735, was spent in finishing some translation work, giving to his fellow monks his few possessions (pepper, incense and some cloths used in worship), and in prayer and singing of the Gloria Patri and other songs.
As for the so-called Greater Chronicle, I admit I skimmed over it. Still, the book was definitely a worthwhile read.
I’ve read enough medieval-era books and books about the medieval period that I have a sort of mental picture of what it might have looked like, but for the Anglo-Saxon period, there was just a blank. I’m happy to say that I now have a bit of an idea of the period, and in fact, the snippets of daily life were the best parts of the book.
My favorite story was one of several that Bede relates about John of Beverley, Bishop of Hexham and later Bishop of York (he was canonized as a saint in 1037).
Nor must I pass over in silence a miracle which Herebald, servant of Christ, tells as having been performed upon him by the bishop. At the time he was one of the bishop’s clergy. . . It happened one day, as we were on a journey with him, that we came up on a level and dry road suitable for galloping our horses. The young man who were with him, mostly laymen, began to ask the bishop for leave to gallop and try out their horses against one another. At first he refused, saying that it was an idle request; but at last he gave way to their unanimous pressure and said, ‘Do as you like, but let Herebald have absolutely no part in the game.’ Thereupon I earnestly begged him to give me leave to compete with them, for I had great faith in the splendid horse which he himself had given me; but I was unable to gain his consent.pages 242-243.
While the bishop and I were watching, and the horses were galloping back-and-forth along the course, I was so overcome by a spirit of wantonness that I could hold back no longer; so in spite of his command, I mingled among the contestants and began to race with them. As I did so, I heard him behind my back, saying with a sigh, ‘Oh how you grieve me by riding in such a way!’ I heard, yet I went on against his orders; immediately, as my fiery horse took a great leap over a hollow in the road, I fell and at once lost all feeling and power of movement just as if I were dead. For in that place there was a stone, level with the ground and covered by a thin layer of turf, and no other stone was to be found over the whole plain. Thus it happened by chance, or rather by divine intervention in order to punish my disobedience, that I hit it with my head and with the hand which I had put under my head as I fell; so my thumb was broken and my skull fractured and, as I said, I lay like a corpse.
Bede continues with Herebald’s story that he was healed when the bishop prayed for him. But it is such a human story, and so typical of young men, isn’t it? They haven’t changed that much over the centuries. Can’t you just see Herebald having to hold back, watching, while the other guys are racing each other, until he can’t stand it any longer?!?
In addition to the Ecclesiastical History, this edition includes a few shorter works either by or about Bede. I particularly enjoyed reading the letter written by Bede’s fellow monk, Cuthbert, to one Cuthwin (who was perhaps an abbot) notifying him of Bede’s death. Cuthbert describes the short illness Bede suffered, which included periods of breathlessness and some swelling of the feet [congestive heart failure or perhaps pulmonary embolism?]. Cuthbert reports that Bede’s last day, 25 May 735, was spent in finishing some translation work, giving to his fellow monks his few possessions (pepper, incense and some cloths used in worship), and in prayer and singing of the Gloria Patri and other songs.
As for the so-called Greater Chronicle, I admit I skimmed over it. Still, the book was definitely a worthwhile read.
August 28, 2024
This ‘ecclesiastical’ history, written in 731 CE by an English monk called Bede (weirdly not a name that caught on, although equally you don’t see many Cuthberts about these days), is frequently unintentionally hilarious. Bede has a few Key Items on his agenda that he would like to litigate extensively and repetitively. These are, in no particular order:
Easter, the timing of.
Tonsures, the shape of. Bede is VERY into monkish hairdos, but only the RIGHT ones.
Splinters and how putting splinters from chairs that holy people sat on into water can cure sick people. Same for fibres of their hair or clothes. This does seem, idk, WILDLY UNHYGIENIC, but given that the main thought process of the holy people is an impatient wish to be dead and behold the beauty of their Lord Jesus in person*, maybe all their ‘healing’ is just covert assassination in the name of God.
*or … not, depending on if you’re a HERETIC or not, and think you WON’T ascend bodily
Comets, being omens of stuff. Sounds a bit PAGAN to me.
Opening the graves of dead holy people decades later to find their incorruptible corpses, which is more than a little concerning both for undiagnosed vampirism and whatever the grave-openers might catch from bodies clearly bloated with mad bacteria.
Telling at least two stories where someone refused to repent before death because it was too late, and Bede is COMPLETELY CERTAIN they’re now in hell, no proof just vibes, don’t let this happen to you!!!
Replacing pagan ‘idols’ with Christian ‘relics’ without any sense of irony or comparison.
Springs bouncing up on the sites of holy murders.
Easter again. Oh my word. It’s on the 14-20th day of the first month NOT the 16-22 OMG you UNWASHED HEATHENS. If it’s on the 22 you are TRANSGRESSING AND VIOLATING THE LEGITIMATE LIMITS OF EASTER.
And how does one decide the ‘first month?’ Why, by the VERNAL EQUINOX, duh. This is the 21st of March, by ‘lunar computation’. And then you look at the moon. Like what shape is the moon right now friendos? I think Bede would have loved modern astrologists but I would pay all I have to be in the room when Resurrected Bede discovers the invention of Easter eggs.
Some hilarious quotes:
‘Ireland is broader than Britain, is healthier and has a much milder climate, so that snow rarely lasts there for more than three days. [...] No reptile is found there nor could a serpent survive; for although serpents have often been brought from Britain, as soon as a ship approaches land they are affected by the scent of the air and quickly perish. In fact almost everything that the island produces is efficacious against poison.’
Some examples of being irony-pilled:
Gregory to Augustine: ‘But it is my wish that if you have found any other customs in the Roman or the Gaulish church or any other church which may be more pleasing to Almighty God, you should make a careful selection of them and sedulously teach the Church of the English, which is still new in the faith, what you have been able to gather from other churches.’
HMM I THINK THIS IS A WEIRD TAKE FROM ONE OF THE GREAT FOUR? Sharing is NOT caring in later sects of Christianity.
Other gems from Greg:
‘So also it is forbidden to marry a brother’s wife, because by a former union she had become one flesh with his brother.’
Also
‘Nevertheless a woman must not be prohibited from entering a church during her usual periods, for this natural overflowing cannot be reckoned a crime: and so it is not fair that she should be deprived from entering the church for that which she suffers unwillingly.’
Also
‘But when it is not the love of getting children but desire which dominates the act of coition, the couple have cause to lament.’
‘As well as other merchandise [Gregory] saw some boys put up for sale, with fair complexions, handsome faces, and lovely hair.’
AS WELL AS WHAT NOW??
‘Thus the prophecy of the holy Bishop Augustine was fulfilled, although he had long been translated to the heavenly kingdom, namely that those heretics would also suffer the vengeance of temporal death because they had despised the offer of everlasting salvation.’
Very demure and mindful. Also convenient.
‘The apostate king, however, did not escape the scourge of divine punishment in chastisement and correction; for he was affiliated by frequent fits of madness and possessed by an unclean spirit.’
I really really do not know what is different between the suffering of the bad people and the suffering of the good, both divinely inflicted on purpose.
A heathen priest called Colfi agreed to convert because ‘If the gods had any power they would have helped me more readily seeing that I have always served them with greater zeal.’
‘Aidan’s life was in great contrast to our modern slothfulness’
HAHA IN 731
‘[...] for the use of the poor or for the redemption of those who had been unjustly sold into slavery.’
UNJUSTLY
King Oswiu killed his rival Osric, but that’s okay, because he built a monastery and had prayers said for himself!
‘Chaste is my song, not wanton Helen’s rape’
OMG
You could literally just not bring it up in a song about Christianity?!
Archbishop Theodore ‘of blessed memory’ asked what he could do for a dying girl when he would have to leave his dinner to do it … like, pray, my dude? Offer consolation to her grieving relatives, idk.
‘When the viceroy whom they wished to see heard of it, he was extremely angry that the pilgrims had not been permitted to see him as they wished. So he sent and slew all those villagers and burned their village. These priests and servants of Christ suffered on 3 October.’
I just found this passage funny. 3 October! It wasn’t the 4th!
From The Greater Chronicle:
‘[Titus] was a man so admirable in all forms of virtue that he might have been dedicated to the love of humanity.
He build the amphitheatre in Rome, and in its dedication killed five thousand wild beasts.’
WHO WERE THE BEASTS FIGHTING BEDE?! COULD IT BE … HUMANITY?!
Synods exist just to chat about the latest heresy. But don’t ever tell me what the heresies ARE though. What did the heretic-curious do before Wikipedia? Honest question.
Apostle John: ‘Dearest, do not love the world, nor those things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Because everything that is in the world is the longing of the flesh and the longing of the eyes and the pride of life, which are not from the Father but from the world.’
Truly the basis of Christian theology is the same as Stoic and Buddhist and modern mindfulness – don’t get attached, let things go, suffering is self-created. Woop.
Easter, the timing of.
Tonsures, the shape of. Bede is VERY into monkish hairdos, but only the RIGHT ones.
Splinters and how putting splinters from chairs that holy people sat on into water can cure sick people. Same for fibres of their hair or clothes. This does seem, idk, WILDLY UNHYGIENIC, but given that the main thought process of the holy people is an impatient wish to be dead and behold the beauty of their Lord Jesus in person*, maybe all their ‘healing’ is just covert assassination in the name of God.
*or … not, depending on if you’re a HERETIC or not, and think you WON’T ascend bodily
Comets, being omens of stuff. Sounds a bit PAGAN to me.
Opening the graves of dead holy people decades later to find their incorruptible corpses, which is more than a little concerning both for undiagnosed vampirism and whatever the grave-openers might catch from bodies clearly bloated with mad bacteria.
Telling at least two stories where someone refused to repent before death because it was too late, and Bede is COMPLETELY CERTAIN they’re now in hell, no proof just vibes, don’t let this happen to you!!!
Replacing pagan ‘idols’ with Christian ‘relics’ without any sense of irony or comparison.
Springs bouncing up on the sites of holy murders.
Easter again. Oh my word. It’s on the 14-20th day of the first month NOT the 16-22 OMG you UNWASHED HEATHENS. If it’s on the 22 you are TRANSGRESSING AND VIOLATING THE LEGITIMATE LIMITS OF EASTER.
And how does one decide the ‘first month?’ Why, by the VERNAL EQUINOX, duh. This is the 21st of March, by ‘lunar computation’. And then you look at the moon. Like what shape is the moon right now friendos? I think Bede would have loved modern astrologists but I would pay all I have to be in the room when Resurrected Bede discovers the invention of Easter eggs.
Some hilarious quotes:
‘Ireland is broader than Britain, is healthier and has a much milder climate, so that snow rarely lasts there for more than three days. [...] No reptile is found there nor could a serpent survive; for although serpents have often been brought from Britain, as soon as a ship approaches land they are affected by the scent of the air and quickly perish. In fact almost everything that the island produces is efficacious against poison.’
Some examples of being irony-pilled:
Gregory to Augustine: ‘But it is my wish that if you have found any other customs in the Roman or the Gaulish church or any other church which may be more pleasing to Almighty God, you should make a careful selection of them and sedulously teach the Church of the English, which is still new in the faith, what you have been able to gather from other churches.’
HMM I THINK THIS IS A WEIRD TAKE FROM ONE OF THE GREAT FOUR? Sharing is NOT caring in later sects of Christianity.
Other gems from Greg:
‘So also it is forbidden to marry a brother’s wife, because by a former union she had become one flesh with his brother.’
Also
‘Nevertheless a woman must not be prohibited from entering a church during her usual periods, for this natural overflowing cannot be reckoned a crime: and so it is not fair that she should be deprived from entering the church for that which she suffers unwillingly.’
Also
‘But when it is not the love of getting children but desire which dominates the act of coition, the couple have cause to lament.’
‘As well as other merchandise [Gregory] saw some boys put up for sale, with fair complexions, handsome faces, and lovely hair.’
AS WELL AS WHAT NOW??
‘Thus the prophecy of the holy Bishop Augustine was fulfilled, although he had long been translated to the heavenly kingdom, namely that those heretics would also suffer the vengeance of temporal death because they had despised the offer of everlasting salvation.’
Very demure and mindful. Also convenient.
‘The apostate king, however, did not escape the scourge of divine punishment in chastisement and correction; for he was affiliated by frequent fits of madness and possessed by an unclean spirit.’
I really really do not know what is different between the suffering of the bad people and the suffering of the good, both divinely inflicted on purpose.
A heathen priest called Colfi agreed to convert because ‘If the gods had any power they would have helped me more readily seeing that I have always served them with greater zeal.’
‘Aidan’s life was in great contrast to our modern slothfulness’
HAHA IN 731
‘[...] for the use of the poor or for the redemption of those who had been unjustly sold into slavery.’
UNJUSTLY
King Oswiu killed his rival Osric, but that’s okay, because he built a monastery and had prayers said for himself!
‘Chaste is my song, not wanton Helen’s rape’
OMG
You could literally just not bring it up in a song about Christianity?!
Archbishop Theodore ‘of blessed memory’ asked what he could do for a dying girl when he would have to leave his dinner to do it … like, pray, my dude? Offer consolation to her grieving relatives, idk.
‘When the viceroy whom they wished to see heard of it, he was extremely angry that the pilgrims had not been permitted to see him as they wished. So he sent and slew all those villagers and burned their village. These priests and servants of Christ suffered on 3 October.’
I just found this passage funny. 3 October! It wasn’t the 4th!
From The Greater Chronicle:
‘[Titus] was a man so admirable in all forms of virtue that he might have been dedicated to the love of humanity.
He build the amphitheatre in Rome, and in its dedication killed five thousand wild beasts.’
WHO WERE THE BEASTS FIGHTING BEDE?! COULD IT BE … HUMANITY?!
Synods exist just to chat about the latest heresy. But don’t ever tell me what the heresies ARE though. What did the heretic-curious do before Wikipedia? Honest question.
Apostle John: ‘Dearest, do not love the world, nor those things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Because everything that is in the world is the longing of the flesh and the longing of the eyes and the pride of life, which are not from the Father but from the world.’
Truly the basis of Christian theology is the same as Stoic and Buddhist and modern mindfulness – don’t get attached, let things go, suffering is self-created. Woop.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 11, 2015
Bede has not always received a good rap from his readers. Being nicknamed the Venomous Bede is only one indication of the dislike that some readers has for him. To some degree, that is a little unfair. Bede's learning for his age was extensive, given the lack of resources available to the historian of the age. He does have a taste for the miraculous and rather an annoying obsession with the controversies around the date of Easter which divided the Roman and the Celtic churches in Britain. His account of the development of Christianity in Britain is punctuated by the minor skirmishing of British kings and the ecclesiastical controversies of the age and the miraculous stories of saints and bishops. He is well worth reading, if only to understand the nature of English Christianity. For an Anglican, that can be helpful thing.
November 26, 2013
Sigh. I didn't really do well in this. Skimmed it, looked at the maps, read the intro and many of the notes. But the actual text reminded me too much of Medieval History class and reading piles of primary source material till my head hurt. I wonder if one of those assignments was Bede and I've blocked it. Anyway, I only really READ up to about A.D. 750. The Angles, Jutes and Saxons had just been forcibly ejected from Britain, those horrible folks...
So now I can at least say I've read Bede.
So now I can at least say I've read Bede.
January 21, 2017
Romans, Britons, Picts, Irish, Angles, & Saxons. Tales of kingdoms being converted, the educated class of monks, miracles and incorrupt bones of saints, the authority of the Bishop of Rome, continuous controversy about the dating of Easter, and on. The Churches of the British Isles mirror the customs of the Imperial Churches more than those of modern times. A fascinating look into a former world.
April 4, 2021
Another paradigm-shifter. Also, excellent.
April 22, 2023
An interesting read that, while clearly not historically accurate by any objective analysis, gives an interesting weave of various pre-Norse legends and stories that were popular in the Anglo-Saxon domains after Roman rule... but with the added relish of being "true" because Bede has those events occur through the lens of canonized/legitimized "saints" of the Roman Church rather than the lens of these stories' much older and more obviously fictitious/folklore origins.
November 8, 2023
Obviously unique. Fascinating window into Saxon England Christianity; all its heroes and miracles.
March 5, 2024
my favourite history so far.
October 13, 2024
too long learn how to fit a 2000 word limit
March 21, 2020
You know, I really enjoyed the first half of this. I expected to give it four stars, but it went on and on and, with the best will in the world, I do not give the tiniest shit about the various methods of dating Easter. I especially do not care when the bunfight of who is dating Easter better is elucidated, over and over again, in excruciatingly painful detail. (I can't believe people actually cared about this. No, scratch that. I absolutely can believe it, but it doesn't make me any more sympathetic. Surely the point is that they're celebrating it at all?)
Bede deserves credit as one of the great chroniclers of the time, and one who determined to do his best to make an actual rigorous history, rather than a poorly researched collection of myths. I'd say that it was hardly his fault that his history became so repetitive, but then he is deciding what to leave in and what to leave out, as well as the general focus of the Ecclesiastical History overall so he does bear some responsibility. People fight and convert and die, or fight and backslide and die, on a numbingly frequent basis, and by the end of the book I just wanted it to be over. I think it's fair to say, too, that the second half is less well put together than the first, which helped to lessen my interest I think.
Bede deserves credit as one of the great chroniclers of the time, and one who determined to do his best to make an actual rigorous history, rather than a poorly researched collection of myths. I'd say that it was hardly his fault that his history became so repetitive, but then he is deciding what to leave in and what to leave out, as well as the general focus of the Ecclesiastical History overall so he does bear some responsibility. People fight and convert and die, or fight and backslide and die, on a numbingly frequent basis, and by the end of the book I just wanted it to be over. I think it's fair to say, too, that the second half is less well put together than the first, which helped to lessen my interest I think.
October 19, 2019
Sometimes when I assign this book I think that maybe I should assign something different, that I'm indulging myself at my students' expense. Then I re-read it with them and I am reminded how imminently readable it is (OK, maybe a couple of the letters he quotes are a little dry...), how suitably tendentious it is (but in an open-ended kind of way--does he really admire "the venerable Bishop Wilfrid" or is he being deliberately vague and obfuscatory?), and how useful it is as a historical source. I don't think any other text from this period of Anglo-Saxon history can compete--so, no, I don't regret assigning it yet again.
January 9, 2016
This is an odd sort of history: lots of fighting among Christians about the right day to celebrate Easter, lots of death due to the plague and other illnesses, lots of healing--some through prayer, mostly through access to relics, some from proximity to those who gained merit through good works, occasional expansion of the church, and a few good wars. The venerable Bede does show the draw of the monastic movement, tonsures and pilgrimages to Rome. All in all, for my tastes, the venerable Bede wrote venerable malarky.
February 17, 2016
A fascinating, yet deeply strange, book that proves quite how much of a foreign country the past is. And contrary to Bede's intention, it doesn't so much provide an outline of how to live a faithful life based on the example of history, rather more than how to establish an hegemonic power base with Grant Morrison's assertion that "we live in the stories that we tell ourselves" as its overriding principle.
August 19, 2016
As one of the other reviewers has written, this is a very hard book to rate – a history written by a monk 1300 years ago for an audience of other monks, whose ideas about the world were decidedly pre-modern! But it is an easy read, full of fascinating little stories, which gives a real insight into a nearly invisible period of European history. Well worth the (small amount) of effort.
Also, who knew anyone cared so much about the date of Easter?
Also, who knew anyone cared so much about the date of Easter?
December 30, 2008
This is one I'll probably go back to. I was really enjoying it...I just kept getting distracted by other, faster-paced books.
March 10, 2016
Theology English 12, 12th grade. fall 2010
March 14, 2011
Bede is a great historian.
February 28, 2016
Superb.
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews