Electronic and Printed Dictionary of Old English Plant-names

Quite in contrast to earlier, negative assessments of Anglo-Saxon medicine, research of the past thirty years has shown that it was in fact by no means backward, but should be ranked on the same level as contemporary medieval medicine on the continent. However, a special characteristic of Anglo-Saxon medico-botanical literature is the fact that in England (as opposed to the primarily Latin literature on the continent) many texts were written in the vernacular, i.e. in Old English. Some of the texts include the Old English Herbarium Apuleii, the Laeceboc, Lacnunga and Peri Didaxeon, all of which were edited as early as 1864-6 by Oswald Cockayne in his monumental three volumes of Leechdoms, Wortcunning and Starcraft of Early England. The interest of the Anglo-Saxons in medico-botanical writings can also be seen from the enormous number of more than 6000 Latin-Old English plant- glosses. Apparently as a consequence of this earlier negative attitude research into the botanical vocabulary of Old English was the most neglected area of English vocabulary until the 1970s when Bierbaumer published his three-volume study Der botanische Wortschatz des Altenglischen (1975-79), in which the relevant vocabulary of the texts and glosses mentioned above was completely documented and interpreted. Further, the situation has changed substantially over the last few years as a result of the studies by the Munich Anglicist Hans Sauer, and thanks to the Anglo-Saxon Plant-Name Survey, founded by Carole Biggam, at the University of Glasgow. At around the same time Bierbaumer and Sauer, albeit with slightly different focuses, started planning an electronically accessible dictionary of the botanical vocabulary of Old English and a dictionary of Old English plant-names respectively, using Bierbaumers study Der botanische Wortschatz des Altenglischen as a starting point. Both scholars felt much could be gained from co-operating together in the publication of this two-year project. This co-operation was established at the Munich conference of the International Society of Anglo- Saxonists, organised by Hans Sauer. Whereas Bierbaumer will focus on the documentation and identification of the plant-names, Sauer will mainly deal with morphological and etymological aspects. Due to their work load both scholars would be unable to carry out the necessary research on their own and therefore they require the help of part-time scientific assistants. Prof. Sauer will also send an application similar to this application to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.

Quite in contrast to earlier, negative assessments of Anglo-Saxon medicine, research of the past thirty years has shown that it was in fact by no means backward, but should be ranked on the same level as contemporary medieval medicine on the continent. However, a special characteristic of Anglo-Saxon medico-botanical literature is the fact that in England (as opposed to the primarily Latin literature on the continent) many texts were written in the vernacular, i.e. in Old English. Some of the texts include the Old English Herbarium Apuleii, the Laeceboc, Lacnunga and Peri Didaxeon, all of which were edited as early as 1864-6 by Oswald Cockayne in his monumental three volumes of Leechdoms, Wortcunning and Starcraft of Early England. The interest of the Anglo-Saxons in medico-botanical writings can also be seen from the enormous number of more than 6000 Latin-Old English plant- glosses. Apparently as a consequence of this earlier negative attitude research into the botanical vocabulary of Old English was the most neglected area of English vocabulary until the 1970s when Bierbaumer published his three-volume study Der botanische Wortschatz des Altenglischen (1975-79), in which the relevant vocabulary of the texts and glosses mentioned above was completely documented and interpreted. Further, the situation has changed substantially over the last few years as a result of the studies by the Munich Anglicist Hans Sauer, and thanks to the Anglo-Saxon Plant-Name Survey, founded by Carole Biggam, at the University of Glasgow. At around the same time Bierbaumer and Sauer, albeit with slightly different focuses, started planning an electronically accessible dictionary of the botanical vocabulary of Old English and a dictionary of Old English plant-names respectively, using Bierbaumer`s study Der botanische Wortschatz des Altenglischen as a starting point. Both scholars felt much could be gained from co-operating together in the publication of this two-year project. This co-operation was established at the Munich conference of the International Society of Anglo- Saxonists, organised by Hans Sauer. Whereas Bierbaumer will focus on the documentation and identification of the plant-names, Sauer will mainly deal with morphological and etymological aspects. Due to their work load both scholars would be unable to carry out the necessary research on their own and therefore they require the help of part-time scientific assistants. Prof. Sauer will also send an application similar to this application to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.