King Alfred on the Love of Learning
King Alfred, in his introduction to the Pastoral Charge, by Gregory the Great, which he translated into Anglo-Saxon, gives a remarkable picture of the conditions of the time.
From: 871 C.E. To: 899 C.E.
Location: Wessex, England
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From Readings in European History: A Collection of Extracts from the Sources by James Harvey Robinson, 1906.
King Alfred, in his introduction to the Pastoral Charge, by Gregory the Great, which he translated into Anglo-Saxon, gives a remarkable picture of the conditions of the time.
King Alfred bids greet Bishop Waerferth with loving words and with friendship; and I let it be known to thee that it has very often come into my mind what wise men there formerly were throughout England, both of sacred and secular orders; and what happy times there were then; and how the kings who had power over the nation in those days obeyed God and his ministers; how they preserved peace, morality, and order at home, and at the same time enlarged their territory abroad; and how they prospered both in war and in wisdom; and also the sacred orders, how zealous they were both in teaching and learning, and in all the services they owed to God; and how foreigners came to this land in search of wisdom and instruction, the which we should now have to get from abroad if we were to have them.
So general became the decay of learning in England that there were very few on this side of the Humber who could understand the rituals in English, or translate a letter from Latin into English; and I believe that there were not many beyond the Humber. There were so few, in fact, that I cannot remember a single person south of the Thames when I came to the throne. Thanks be to God Almighty that we now have some teachers among us. And therefore I command thee to disengage thyself, as I believe thou art willing, from worldly matters as often as thou art able, that thou mayest apply the wisdom which God has given thee wherever thou canst. Consider what punishments would come upon us if we neither loved wisdom ourselves nor suffered other men to obtain it: we should love the name only of Christian, and very few of the Christian virtues.
When I thought of all this I remembered also how I saw the country before it had been all ravaged and burned; how the churches throughout the whole of England stood filled with treasures and books. There was also a great multitude of God's servants, but they had very little knowledge of the books, for they could not understand anything of them because they were not written in their own language. As if they had said: "Our forefathers, who formerly held these places, loved wisdom, and through it they obtained wealth and bequeathed it to us. In this we can still see their traces, but we cannot follow them, and therefore we have lost both the wealth and the wisdom, because we would not incline our hearts after their example."
When I remembered all this, I wondered extremely that the good and wise men who were formerly all over England, and had learned perfectly all the books, did not wish to translate them into their own language. But again I soon answered myself and said, "Their own desire for learning was so great that they did not suppose that men would ever be so careless, and that learning would so decay; and they wished, moreover, that the wisdom in this land might increase with our knowledge of languages." Then I remembered how the law was first known in Hebrew, and when the Greeks had learned it how they translated the whole of it into their own language, and all other books besides. And again the Romans, when they had learned it, translated the whole of it, through learned interpreters, into their own language. And also all other Christian nations translated a part of it into their own language.
Therefore it seems better to me, if you agree, for us also to translate some of the books which are most needful for all men to know into the language which we can all understand; and for you to see to it, as can easily be done if we have tranquillity enough, that all the free-born youth now in England, who are rich enough to be able to devote themselves to it, be set to learn as long as they are not fit for any other occupation, until that they are well able to read English writing; and let those afterwards be taught more in the Latin language who are to continue learning, and be promoted to a higher rank.
When I remembered how the knowledge of Latin had decayed throughout England, and yet that many could read English writing, I began, among other various and manifold troubles of this kingdom, to translate into English the book which is called in Latin Pastoralis, and in English Shepherd's Book, sometimes word by word, and sometimes according to the sense, as I had learned it from Plegmund, my archbishop, and Asser, my bishop, and Grimbold, my mass-priest, and John, my mass-priest. And when I had learned it, as I could best understand it and most clearly interpret it, I translated it into English.
I will send a copy of this to every bishopric in my kingdom; and on each copy there shall be a clasp worth fifty mancuses. And I command, in God's name, that no man take the clasp from the book, or the book from the minster. It is uncertain how long there may be such learned bishops, as thanks be to God there now are nearly everywhere; therefore I wish these copies always to remain in their places, unless the bishop wish to take them with him, or they be lent out anywhere, or any one wish to make a copy of them.
Robinson, James Harvey. Readings in European History: A Collection of Extracts from the Sources. Vol. 1. Ginn and Co. 1906.
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