Aldhelm — Carmen Rhythmicum and Letter to Geraint

Primary-source dossier

The excerpts below are reproduced from the Ictis Anthology — a working paper produced during research for the project. Some of the results were spun off into New Perspectives on the Ictis of Pytheas of Massalia.

Carmen Rhythmicum

Aldhelm’s poem shows that Wessex and Dumnonia were not always enemies and that people, goods and information could at times travel freely between the kingdoms. If information could travel freely, why did knowledge of a Dumnonian tin industry not reach the ear of Bede writing less than a century later?

Source: Lapidge & Rosier (2009) “Alhelm: The Poetic Works” D S Brewer, Cambridge

(p. 24) Gentle reader, catholic Helm- [i.e. ‘helmet] and heroic al (ie. hostage]’ driven on by your prayers earnestly en-feating (me), I the poet have composed this poem and have thereby fulfilled the undertaking I contracted long ago (7).

When I had set out for nasty Devon¹ and was proceeding through Cornwall² – which is devoid of any flowering vegetation or grasses in any abundance – the mighty elements and the chaotic masses (of the universe) were driven to collision under the fiery dome of the vaulted sky: /p. 525/ while the structure of the universe trembles under the power of the winds, suddenly, during the night a wintry gale arises whose force shatters the earth and whose might overwhelms it, since, once the compact (which holds the winds in check) has been broken, the winds may rage unchecked in the upper atmosphere, and, with their bonds shattered,’ they howl furiously throughout the world. Then, once they have seized power and their bondage has been cast off, their impulsive blasts muster in battle-array – the winds whose twelve names are found in learned books. Their leader, violently sweeping along the foam and surging wildly with its impetus, came from that compass-point where the burning lanterns of Titan [i.e. the sun] set; and since those winds were not raging (as it were) at some undistinguished victory, the earth shuddered in disorder, and the (mighty) oaks uprooted (by the wind) crashed down with their crowns and their roots both shattered. Nor did the raindrops sprinkle down gently, but rather they threateningly drenched the entire expanse of the universe with their saturating downpour. And when the rivers were nearly filled to overflowing with this violent rainfall, the storm attacked the earth with polished hailstones which poured down in masses from the black clouds above.

Letter IV: to Geraint

Alhelm’s letter to Geraint of Dumnonia clarifies the sociopolitical relationship between the far west and the rest of the British Isles. In essence it shows that communication and potentially even trade between Dumnonia and other British kingdoms could have been possible, together with information. This means that scholars of the period can be assumed to potentially have had access to good intelligence on Devon & Cornwall when it concerns their narratives. For example, when Bede writes of the metalliferous resources of the British Isles it can be assumed that knowledge of a tin industry, if it existed, was not beyond the scope of his learning.