Note 892 — LECTURE VI LITERARY WORKS (continued); SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

Lib. I. metr. 6; Lib. II. metr. 2; Lib. IV. metr. 7. The reason of this omission is probably due to the fact, that in these three instances Alfred’s prose translation omits the formula with which it generally introduces the Metra: ‘Then Wisdom began to sing.’ This has been made an argument against Alfred’s authorship of the Metra. But it is surely quite possible that Alfred, coming back to his work after some time (see below, pp. 189 f.), and making his alliterative version without fresh reference to the Latin, should, in the absence of the usual formula, have overlooked the poetical character of these sections. In one case, Lib. I. metr. 7, the introductory formula is wanting, and yet the section exists in the verse translation. But here the poetical character of the section is much more obvious, and it is followed by a formula which often follows the Metra, ‘then was Wisdom silent for a while,’ c. vii. ad init.; so cc. xvii. ad init., xxiv. ad init., xxxix. §§ 2, 4, xli. § 2. A still more frequent concluding formula is ‘ða ongan he eft spellian.’