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The Library

Forty Centuries of Christian Writing

1774 works catalogued century by century, from the literature the Bible was written among to the present — each with a note on what it is, why it lasted, and where to read it.

801–900

The Ninth Century

3 works

c. 885–899

Old English

The Laws of Alfred

Domboc

Alfred the Great · 849 – 899

A West Saxon law code prefaced by the Ten Commandments, chapters of Exodus, and the apostolic decree of Acts 15 in English, after which Alfred explains that Christ came not to break the law but to fulfil it, and that the golden rule is the one judgement a man needs.

Anglo-Saxon · Law codeExodusActsMatthewDeuteronomyRead elsewhere

c. 890–896

Old English

The Old English Pastoral Care

Alfred the Great · 849–899

Gregory's handbook for bishops translated into English by a king, with a preface lamenting that learning had so decayed that few south of the Humber could understand Latin.

Anglo-Saxon · TranslationRead elsewhere

893

Latin

The Life of King Alfred

Asser · d. c. 909

A Welsh bishop's account of the king he served, including the illness that plagued him, his late acquisition of Latin, and his reading aloud with his children.

Anglo-Saxon · BiographyRead elsewhere