The Idea of Anglo-Saxon England in Middle English Romance

As the point of origin both real and imagined of English law and group identity the Anglo-Saxon past was important in the construction of a post-Conquest English society that was both aware of and placed great stock in its Anglo-Saxon heritage; yet its depiction in post-Conquest literature has been very little studied. This book examines a wide range of sources [legal and historiographical as well as literary] in order to reveal a 'social construction' of Anglo-Saxon England that held a significant place in the literary and cultural imagination of the post-Conquest English. Using a variety of texts but the Matter of England romances in particular the author argues that they show a continued interest in the Anglo-Saxon past from the localised East Sussex legend of King Alfred that underlies the twelfth-century Proverbs of Alfred to the institutional interest in the Guy of Warwick narrative exhibited by the community of St. Swithun's Priory in Winchester during the fifteenth century; they are part of a continued cultural remembrance that encompasses chronicles folk memories and literature. Dr ROBERT ALLLEN ROUSE teaches in the Department of English University of British Columbia.