New Judgements on the Artistry of Andreas: The Case of Christ III

Abstract

The Old English poem Andreas has long been considered to be indebted both to the signed works of Cynewulf and to Beowulf. Recent studies have demonstrated Andreas’s debt to a number of other ‘Cynewulfian’ poems. This paper argues that the poet of Andreas likewise borrowed from Christ III (an earlier poem concerned with the Second Coming of Christ at Doomsday). The influence of the latter on the former is apparent on the basis of a large number of unique or almost unique verbal parallels listed in an appendix to this paper. The later poet does not just parrot his hypothesised source, but originally and artistically recasts his borrowings with various kinds of embellishment. The influence of Christ III on Andreas is also apparent on a thematic level. This paper demonstrates that the Andreas-poet was attracted to the twin themes of ignorance and judgement in Christ III, creating a miniature Doomsday narrative out of the conversion of the Mermedonians. In doing so, the Andreas-poet reveals himself as a sophisticated consumer of earlier poetry and an original artist, turning his Latin prose source into a novel, theologically imaginative narrative.