Selim 20.indb


María del Mar Gutiérrez-Ortiz, SELIM 20 (2013–2014): 297–307ISSN: 1132–631X

Moralejo Álvarez, José Luis 2013: Historia eclesiástica del pueblo 
de los anglos. Beda el Venerable. Madrid, Akal. pp. 336. ISBN: 978-
84-460-3223-⒍  24 €.

As Bertram Colgrave states in his introduction to the canonical edition of Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica 
Gentis Anglorum (henceforth, HE ), it “is probably one of 

the most popular history books in any language and has certainly 
retained its popularity longer than any rival” (1969: xvii). More 
than thirty years aft er Colgrave wrote these words, a century aft er 
Charles Plummer’s seminal edition and almost thirteen centuries 
aft er Bede’s completion of the HE, José Luis Moralejo Álvarez 
has translated this historiographical masterpiece into Spanish for 
the fi rst time. Providing such treasure for Spanish medievalists 
is a laudable enterprise in itself. Beyond the inherent worthiness 
of the project, Moralejo Álvarez’s skillfully executed translation 
deserves our praise: its accuracy makes it a perfect companion for 
the study of the original text and its naturally rendered Spanish 
makes us forget that we are dealing with a translation. This edition 
is supplemented by an introduction, explanatory footnotes and a 
translation of Cuthbert’s Letter on the Death of Bede.

The introduction is divided into fi ve sections providing relevant 
information on Bede’s life and work, as well as on this particular 
translation. The fi rst one, “Beda el Venerable,” sketches a brief 
biography with the few known details about the quiet life of 
this scholar and monk. He devoted most of his time to his great 
interests, namely “aprender, enseñar o escribir” [“learning, teaching 
or writing”] (5), as he himself states in the last chapter of his 
history. Thus, Moralejo Álvarez describes him as “un historiador 
sin historia” [“a historian without history”] (6), like the Roman 
Livy, as he led a life that was, in Colgrave’s words, “almost devoid 
of incident” (1969: xxi). Moralejo Álvarez suggests that Bede, as a 
typical “scholar-monk,” probably combined his intellectual work 
with the manual labors that a monastery in construction like 



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Wearmouth and Jarrow required. He completes the portrait with 
an anecdote included in an anonymous Life of Ceolfr ith and also 
reported by Plummer and Colgrave. According to this text, aft er an 
epidemic, only a little boy was left  to sing the divine offi  ce together 
with abbot Ceolfr ith. At fi rst they decided to sing it partially, but 
soon they took up the whole offi  ce. Even though Bede does not 
include this episode in his autobiography, Moralejo Álvarez follows 
earlier scholars in identify ing the boy with him and provides the 
anecdote as evidence of his modesty. The section concludes with 
a short summary of Cuthbert’s account of Bede’s death, the last 
appendix to this book, and details about the fate of his mortal 
remains.

Aft er this short biography, Moralejo Álvarez proceeds to 
classify  and briefl y analyze the author’s extensive and diverse 
production: inspired by Plummer’s classifi cation, he divides the list 
of 30 works provided by Bede as well as nine more that can be 
confi dently attributed to him into four groups: didactic, historical-
biographical, theological-exegetical and poetic writings. Bede’s 
didactic writings reveal his preoccupation with the education of his 
pupils. Moralejo Álvarez distinguishes between textbooks dealing 
with arts, exact and natural sciences and computistics. The HE is 
the most important of his historical-biographical works, which also 
include pious biographies of previous Anglo-Saxon monks. Most 
of Bede’s production is devoted to theological-exegetical writings: 
he wrote commentaries, books and even letters interpreting the 
Holy Scriptures. His poetical works were written both in Latin and 
Anglo-Saxon, although there is only one short poem written in 
this last language extant. His large Latin production was religious 
for the most part, and Moralejo Álvarez values it as just passable, 
relying on Brunhölzl’s judgment: “no era un gran poeta; por lo 
general sus versos tienen el sabor de la mesa del estudioso, y en 
ellos se encuentra poco de poesía” [“he was not a great poet; in 
general, his lines have the flavor of the scholar’s table, and little 
poetry can be found in them”] (12).



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Once Bede’s books have been organized into these diff erent 
shelves, Moralejo Álvarez takes up the study of his most important 
historiographical work. In order to cover all aspects of the HE, he 
divides this section into the following six subsections. Moralejo 
Álvarez examines the words of the title to analyze the time and 
genre of this work (“La obra en su tiempo y en su género”). 
Although HE is considered the fi rst written history of the future 
“England,” Moralejo Álvarez points out that Bede does not write 
the history of a country, but the history of the Angli, the peoples 
that settled in Britain in the fi ft h century. This gives him the 
chance to make an interesting remark about how places usually 
took their name fr om the nation that populated them and not the 
other way round like nowadays. As for the genre, Moralejo Álvarez 
follows Colgrave’s idea that the HE might have taken hints fr om 
the Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History and Gregory of Tours’s History 
of the Franks and states that it may be fr amed within the long 
tradition of national histories by means of which “los nuevos reinos 
surgidos de las invasiones bárbaras se fueron haciendo un lugar en 
la gran crónica de Europa” [“the new kingdoms that had emerged 
from the Barbarian Invasions made a place for themselves in the 
grand chronicle of Europe”] (13) but also within the tradition of 
ecclesiastical histories. Thus, the innovation of Bede’s project lies in 
the combination of both historiographical traditions: he writes the 
fi rst ecclesiastical history devoted to a particular nation.

The second subsection (“La Historia eclesiástica como documento 
histórico”) studies the HE as a historical document by considering, 
on the one hand, Bede’s partiality and, on the other, his most 
relevant contributions to the genre of historiography in Europe. 
Given that Bede’s work is almost the only historical account of 
seventh-century Britain that we have, our picture of that time is 
necessarily a partial one. All the more so when his record of the 
events had the aim of showing “that his people, the English, the 
gens Anglorum, and above all his own particular branch of that 
people, the Northumbrians, had been called by God to a special 



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role in the history of salvation” (Thacker 2005: 462). Based on 
Thacker’s considerations, Moralejo Álvarez defi nes Bede as an 
activist historian: besides his evangelistic mission, he has a historical 
mission in favor of his nation. Traditionally, the omission of two 
important fi gures for Christianity in the British Isles, namely Saint 
Patrick, evangelist of Ireland, and Saint Boniface, the apostle of 
Germany, has been considered the most important fault.

Although Moralejo Álvarez borrows fr om Colgrave the idea that 
Bede’s use of the Christian era represents a fundamental novelty for 
the genre of historiography in Europe, he explains in further detail 
the origin and the subsequent relevance of this chronology, which 
Dionysius Exiguus developed in the 6th century. In addition, he 
describes how the HE is not annalistic, but it is organized with 
a fl exible chronological system: although Bede’s account usually 
follows the course of time, it is the relevance of events and not their 
date that places them at the beginning of the books. At the end 
of this section, Moralejo Álvarez provides a useful outline of each 
book that reveals their organization and sums up their contents.

The third subsection, “Las fuentes de la Historia eclesiástica,” 
is a survey of the works that documented Bede’s HE. Moralejo 
Álvarez recommends Colgrave & Mynors’s chapter on “Bede’s 
library” for further information regarding the author’s acquaintance 
with his prologue’s sources—mostly writers fr om the beginning of 
Late Antiquity. As for the documents used for the actual HE, he 
mainly refers to the information that Bede provides in his preface 
about his oral and written sources. Additionally, he takes a moment 
to discuss the importance of miraculous elements in a work that 
aimed to reveal a “providential system of causation” (Higham 2006: 
98). Moralejo Álvarez notes that, for these events, Bede must have 
relied on models of the genre such as hagiographical literary works, 
in addition to the traditional stories and personal information that 
he himself acknowledges.

Moralejo Álvarez’s detailed description of the HE ’s language 
(“La lengua y el estilo”) centers on the idea that Latin was not 



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only an ancient language, but also a foreign language for Bede. 
The distance implied by these conditions prevents the infl uence of 
macaronic Latin, making his language simple but pure. Despite 
giving this grammarian and teacher credit for his remarkable 
display of rhetorical training, Moralejo Álvarez adds a new category 
to the four vulgarisms that, according to Michael Lapidge, 
characterize Bede’s Latin as medieval, namely the periphrasis of 
habeo with infi nitive to indicate future time. He (23) also qualifi es 
André Crépin’s statement that “[l]e latin de Bède ne montre aucune 
infl uence de la grammaire de l’anglais” [Bede’s Latin does not evince 
any infl uence of English grammar] (2005: I, 29) by citing Lapidge’s 
discussion of the construction of toponymys in the Old English 
manner, that is with a preposition attached to the noun.

According to Moralejo Álvarez, his section on manuscripts is 
mainly a summary of Mynors’s “Textual Introduction,” but it also 
includes the opinions of more recent editors. Thus, he basically 
divides the codices that Mynors mentions according to Plummer’s 
distinction between Class c and Class m. Even though the last 
subsection about the HE (“La tradición manuscrita”) surveys all 
published editions fr om the editio princeps presumably printed by 
Heinrich Eggestein in the 15th century to Lapidge’s 2008–2010 
edition, it mainly focuses on the three main critical editions: the 
fi rst defi nite text, which was produced by Plummer at the end of 
the 19th century together with a learned commentary, Colgrave 
& Mynors’s canonical edition, which is the base text for this 
translation, and Lapidge’s recent edition, the fi rst one which takes 
into account three diff erent witnesses instead of two. Even though 
Moralejo Álvarez praises Lapidge’s philological work, the recent 
publication of his edition has limited its use for this translation.

The abundant scholarship about Bede’s life and works in general 
and about the HE in particular makes it diffi  cult for our translator 
to contribute new knowledge. Plummer’s massive introduction to 
his 19th century edition already includes an extensive section about 
Bede’s biography and historical context, a classifi cation and brief 



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study of his diverse production, a refl ection about his religion and 
remarks about his style. Although with a diff erent organization 
and a laudatory overtone, Colgrave’s introduction touches on most 
of the key aspects of the author’s life and work that Moralejo 
Álvarez addresses: his biography, including the anecdote in the 
Life of Ceolfr ith, constitutes Colgrave’s section “Bede’s life,” and the 
author’s sources are recorded in “Bede’s Library” and “The History: 
its models and sources,” which also deals with the genre of the 
work. Moralejo Álvarez’s discussion of the language borrows fr om 
Colgrave in using the Hisperica Famina as an illustration of an 
overelaborated style of insular Latin opposed to Bede’s simplicity. 
However, he builds on Colgrave’s treatment of the style by 
incorporating Mariner’s concept of avulgaramiento and Lapidge’s 
medieval syntactic features. In short, Moralejo Álvarez’s brief but 
thorough synthesis introduces Spanish readers to the important 
contributions of these two major critical editions, as well as including 
insights fr om more recent scholarship. Moreover, the detailed 
notes that furnish the text provide readers with a bibliography to 
deepen their knowledge of the most relevant aspects of Bede’s life 
and work.

However, the introduction to this book also includes information 
unprecedented in previous editions: “Apuntes sobre Beda en la 
posteridad y sobre Beda en España” constitutes a ground-breaking 
section that, consistent with the fi rst translation into Spanish, 
sheds light on Bede’s reception in medieval Europe and especially 
in Spain. Moralejo Álvarez sums up the most relevant information 
available in the abundant scholarship about the author’s posterity: 
he deals with Bede’s early diff usion by virtue of two Anglo-Saxon 
scholars, namely his contemporary Saint Boniface and Alcuin of 
York and the consolidation of his fame in the time of Alfr ed the 
Great. Bede would not be well-known in Spain until the Carolingian 
Renaissance in the 10th century. Aft er that, he is mentioned in the 
Codex Calixtinus, as well as in Alfonso X’s General Estoria, but he 
became more relevant aft er the Reformation, when Spanish scholars 



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began to consider his work “testimonio de la ortodoxia primigenia 
de Inglaterra” [“evidence of England’s original orthodoxy”] (31). 
About his later posthumous fame, Moralejo Álvarez points out his 
infl uence on notable Spanish authors, as well as his relevance for 
English Romanticism and especially for the Oxford movement, for 
whom his work was again considered a product of the pure original 
Christianity.

Even if the introduction is certainly exhaustive, there are certain 
points that are hardly considered. The section on Bede’s posterity 
mentions Alfr ed the Great’s translation as an evidence of Bede’s 
posthumous importance, but this early Old English version is only 
briefl y and superfi cially studied. To begin with, although traditionally 
attributed to King Alfr ed’s late-ninth century translation program, 
the Old English version of the Historia Ecclesiastica (henceforth, 
OEHE ) was composed “anonymously some time at the end of the 
ninth or beginning of the tenth century” (Rowley 2011: 2). Sharon 
M. Rowley’s thorough study shows that “the OEHE produces and 
is produced by the complex interplay of continuity and change at 
work in early Britain” (2011: 56). Thus, the combined study of 
both the original and the translation evidences diff erences in time, 
culture, politics and demographics between Bede’s and Alfr ed’s 
world. Additionally, Frank M. Stenton claims that “there are many 
passages in which Bede’s indications of rank or offi  ce become 
clearer through a rendering into ninth century English” (1971: 
273). Either out of historical interest on the combined study of 
the original and its translation, or because the Old English version 
might shed light on particular aspects of the Latin version, a reader 
of Bede would likely wish to read more about the early Old English 
abridgement of his work; however, he or she cannot fi nd this in 
Moralejo Álvarez’s translation.

Furthermore, this introduction also leaves aside aspects that, 
according to Paul Meyvaert (1971: 137), Colgrave also fails to 
mention, such as:



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The chronological problems due to the use of a diversity of 
sources […]; the problem of the reorganisation of Book I 
due to the arrival at a late date—when the HE was almost 
complete—of the Gregorian letters brought fr om Rome by 
Nothelm […]; the problems connected with the manner in 
which Bede treats and modifi es his source (e.g. Gildas or 
Eddius’ Life of Wilfr id).

These defi ciencies are less signifi cant in the introduction of a 
translation than in the historical introduction of a major critical 
edition. However, all three of these issues would surely have 
been enlightening for the Spanish readers of Moralejo Álvarez’s 
translation, especially since they usually have more diffi  cult access 
to the secondary sources that address them.

The last section of the introduction informs the readership 
about the translation. Thus, we learn that it is based on Colgrave 
& Mynors’s text, although it adopts elements of Lapidge’s recent 
edition such as the convenient division of chapters into paragraphs 
and the repetition of each thematic epigraph at the beginning of 
every chapter, an idea that Lapidge takes fr om Plummer. These 
decisions considerably simplify  both citing and reference in the 
index of names, and reading. Moralejo Álvarez announces that the 
footnotes clarify  passages of uncertain interpretation, as well as realia, 
that is, culture-specifi c concepts, for the unfamiliarized modern 
reader. But most of this section is devoted to the explanation of the 
procedures followed to transcribe Anglo-Saxon and Celtic proper 
names into Spanish. Even though this new and copious onomastic 
wealth poses a challenge to the translator, who has not found a 
way of applying a “un sistema de transcripción riguroso y del todo 
coherente” [“a rigorous and completely coherent transcription 
system”] (34), decisions like the adoption of a morphological 
criterion of adaptation for the names with a tradition in Spanish 
or a general graphic simplifi cation produce versions of the names 
that naturally fi t the Spanish prose. Moralejo Álvarez’s editorial 
decisions are successful in facilitating the reading of the text.



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Even though the translation certainly off ers the readers a smooth 
Spanish prose, minor details like the recurrent use of the adverbial 
phrase “en efecto” for the conj unction “nam” (II.13.1, 124 or IV.22.5, 
233) retain some fl avor of translation. There are also inconsistencies: 
the noun “cultus” is translated as both “culto” (II.13.2, 124) and 
“religión” (II.13.4, 125 and II.13.5, 125) within the same passage, and 
“culto” and “devoción” (IV.22.1) are both used to translate “religio” 
even within the same paragraph. However, these decisions may be 
justifi ed on the grounds that, despite the lack of consistency, the 
chosen word, either cult, devotion or religion, better conveys the 
sense of the sentence. What is more diffi  cult to justify  is “caballo 
de postas” for “equum emissarium” (125). Du Cange’s Glossarium 
Mediæ et Infi mæ Latinitatis cites the following defi nitions for equus 
emissarius: “equus fortis et velox, qui extra alios eligitur, et ad equas 
mittitur ad coitum” [“strong and fast horse, chosen among the rest, 
and sent to the mares for coitus”] (Ezechiel. 33. Joan. de Janua) and 
“cheval estallon mit aux champs pour engendrer” [“stallion horse 
placed in the country to beget”] fr om a Latin glossary at Saint Gall 
(258). Consequently, even though the word “emissarius” certainly 
means emissary, “equus emissarius” is not a relay horse, but rather 
a stallion, as Colgrave & Mynors translate it. Given that the priest 
wants to destroy the idols, a stallion, which is considered stronger 
and faster than a castrated horse, fi ts much better the sense of the 
sentence than a relay horse, especially as it is replacing the mare 
that the priest is usually allowed to ride.

Despite minor details of this sort, the translation generally 
renders Bede’s Latin closely and faithfully, while the footnotes 
clarify  uncertainties and enrich the text with historical references. 
For example, in the episode of Edwin’s conversion (II.13), Moralejo 
Álvarez cites Colgrave & Mynors to assert the importance of the 
passage, Plummer to explain Edwin’s apostasy and Wallace-Hadrill 
to look into the biblical antecedents of the bird image. But not 
all his cultural remarks point to other works: Moralejo Álvarez 
also draws an interesting parallel between Bede’s claim that Anglo-



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Saxon priests could only ride mares and the custom in certain 
Spanish dioceses that newly appointed bishops entered the church 
to take over on a mule. As for the realia, he quotes Colgrave & 
Mynors’s translation of “ducibus ac ministris” as “ealdormen and 
thegns” (124, fn. 119) to help the readers understand concepts that 
belong to the comitatus, a social structure locally and temporarily 
foreign to them. The note on Goodmanham, a small village close 
to Yorkshire, also clarifi es a toponymy probably unknown to the 
Spanish readership. Finally, he draws attention to an echo of Virgil’s 
Aeneid. Thus, the famous account of Edwin’s conversion serves as an 
illustration of the diff erent types of useful footnotes that the reader 
encounters in this translation.

In conclusion, despite the minor reservations mentioned, 
Moralejo Álvarez’s work no doubt meets the readers’ expectations: 
the faithful Spanish version is complemented by explicative 
footnotes and a well-organized and informed introduction with 
a body of citations to secondary sources. Furthermore, this work 
represents the fi rst attempt in our country to translate one of the 
most important references of Anglo-Saxon history into Spanish. 
Thus, the nature of the project and the quality of the result make 
José Luis Moralejo Álvarez’s Historia eclesiástica del pueblo de los 
anglos a priceless treasure for Spanish scholars of medieval literature.

María del Mar Gutiérrez-Ortiz
Cornell University

References
Brunhölzl, F. 1975: Geschichte der Lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters I. 

Munich, W. Fink.

Colgrave, B. & R. A. B. Mynors 1969: Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the 
English People. Oxford, Clarendon Press.



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Crépin, A., M. Lapidge & P. Monat 2005: Histoire ecclé siastique du peuple 
anglais. Paris, les Éditions du Cerf. 

Du Fresne, C., Sieur du Cange 1840–1850: Glossarium mediae et infi mae 
latinitatis, 7 vols. Paris, Firmin Didot.

Higham, N. J. 2006: (Re-)Reading Bede. The Ecclesiastical History in 
Context. London, Routledge.

Lapidge, M. ed. & P. Chiesa trans. 2008–2010: Beda, Storia degli Inglesi. 
2 vols. Milano, Fondazione Lorenzo Valla - Arnoldo Mondadori.

Meyvaert, P. rev. 1971: Colgrave, B. & R. A. B. Mynors (1969) Bede’s 
Ecclesiastical History of the English People. In Speculum 46.1: 135–137.

Plummer, C. 2002 [1896]: Venerabilis Baedae Historiam ecclesiasticam 
gentis Anglorum: Historiam abbatum, Epistolam ad Ecgberctum, 
una cum Historia abbatum auctore anonymo, ad fi dem codicum 
manuscriptorum denuo recognovit. Piscataway, Gorgias Press.

Rowley, S. 2011. The Old English Version of Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica. 
Cambridge, D. S. Brewer.

Stenton, F. M. 1971: Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford history of England), 
Oxford, Oxford University Press.

Thacker, A. 2005: England in the Seventh Century. In A. Fouracre ed. 
The New Cambridge Medieval History, Volume 1 c.500–c.700. 
Cambridge, Cambridge University Press: 462–495.

Wallace-Hadrill, J. M. 1988. Bede’s Ecclesiastical history of the English people: 
a historical commentary. Oxford, Oxford University Press.

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