warntjes2011 the computus cottonianus of ad 689 a computistical formulary written for willibrord’s...

8/19/2019 Warntjes2011 the Computus Cottonianus of AD 689 a Computistical Formulary Written for Willibrord’s Frisian Mission

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HE COMPUUS COONIANUS OFAD 689: A COMPUISICALFORMULARY WRIEN FOR

WILLIBRORD’S FRISIAN MISSION

Abstract

Te Anglo-Saxon mission to Frisia led by Willibrord must have brought un-damental texts to the Continent, not only or preaching the Gospels and or li-turgical services, but also or teaching converts and or educating uture priests.Still, not a single computistical text has been associated with Willibrord’s mis-sion, which is particularly surprising when considering the act that the Easter

controversy had been a central episode in Willibrord’s lie beore (and presum-ably even during) his missionary lie. Tis paper presents the case that the Com- putus Cottonianus o AD (London, British Library, Cotton Caligula A XV, r–r) was compiled in Rath Melsigi under the auspices o Ecgberht or Willibrord’s mission on the basis o its sources and comparable material in Wil-librord’s calendar, the date o composition, the provenance o the manuscript,and the reception o the work.

Keywords

Frisian mission, Rath Melsigi, Echternach, Willibrord, Ecgberht, Wilrid, Com-

putus Digbaeanus o AD , Computus Cottonianus o AD , Computus Rhenanus o AD .

Introduction

Te manuscript known as Cotton Caligula A XV, kept in the BritishLibrary in London, is, or various reasons, one o the most celebrated

computistical manuscripts. It consists o two independent parts, com-monly labelled A and B. Te second part, B, o English provenance anddated to the eleventh (pre-Conquest) century, is one o the principalsources or Old English computistica, since it not only contains impor-

Te Easter Controversy o Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Immo Warntjesand Dáibhí Ó Cróinín, Studia raditionis Teologiae, (urnhout, ), pp. –.

© BREPOLSHPUBLISHERS ./M.S-EB..


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tant ragments o Ælric’s De temporibus anni, but also various Old Eng-lish computistical bits. Te main section o the first part, A, however, which is the section that concerns us here, is o eighth-century origin. Te exact date o its compilation is highly disputed: A dating clause onolio r suggests AD , but then this might only reflect the inclu-sion o an earlier tract in a later manuscript, especially when consideringthe act that earlier dating clauses can be ound in the same manuscript. An analysis o this dating clause certainly supports this theory. It reads:

In Christi nomine. Incipit cyclus per indictionem XImam. Et annoquota uerit luna Kalendis Ianuarii? Prima, et dies dominicus esti pas-

chalis XVIII Kalendas Maii luna XV. Et quotus annus est ab incarna-tione domini nostri Ihesu Christi? DCCXLIII, et recapitulatio VicturinoCLXXXIIII annus est, et primus annus Childerici regis Francorum cumconsulibus suis Carlemanno et Pipp\h/ino.

‘In the name o Christ. Te cycle begins, through the th indiction.And which lunar age occurred on January in this year? Te first, andEaster Sunday (was) on April, luna . And which year is this romthe incarnation o our Lord Jesus Christ? Te th, and in the Victo-rian recapitulation (i.e. the second revolution o the Victorian Eastertable) it is the th year, and the first year o Childeric, the king o theFranks, with his consuls Carloman and Pippin.’

Tere are three possible reasons or the composition o this passage.First, the phrase incipit cyclus may suggest that this passage introduces anEaster table (apparently starting with what Bede considers the first yearo the cyclus lunaris; or was it supposed to introduce only the years

1

For this section o Cotton Caligula A XV see especially Henel (), xxi–xxiv;Ker (), –; Liuzza (), –; Chardonnens (), –; and also Plan-ta (), –; Lowe in CLA , ; Gneuss (), (no. ); Blake (), –.

2 Part A, which extends to , contains two ninth-century insertions, ols. – (Cyprian) and ols. – (Computus); c. CLA , ; Bischoff (), .

3 For the question o which material in Cotton Caligula A XV can be ascribed toAD c. also James Palmer’s contribution in the present volume.

4 Tis passage is also transcribed in Krusch (), and transcribed and trans-lated pp. – o the present volume, where also a acsimile can be ound.

5 Bede, De temporum ratione (ed. by Jones (), –, trans. by Wallis

(), –). As is apparent rom the Dionysiac Easter tables and especially Dio-nysius’ Epistola ad Boniatium et Bonum (Krusch (), –), the first year o thecyclus lunaris matches the ourth year o the cyclus decemnovenalis exactly. Contrary toDionysius, however, Bede defines the years o the cyclus lunaris as stretching rom luna o the January lunation to luna o the December one. Bede, very suggestively, starts


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HE COMPUUS COONIANUS OF AD 689

o the cyclus lunaris starting with this year?); in this case, however, one would expect an Easter table (possibly consisting only o the years othe cyclus lunaris) to ollow, which is not the case. Second, the year inquestion, AD , was a problematic one concerning the date o EasterSunday. In Francia, the Dionysiac reckoning was not unanimously ac-cepted at this stage; in act, the Victorian reckoning appears to have stillenjoyed wide popularity. For this year, Victorius had listed his notoriousdouble dates or Easter Sunday, namely April, luna , and April,luna . Te Dionysiac date, or its part, agreed with the first o thesetwo dates. Te Cotton passage in question reers both to Dionysius’ annus domini and to the Victorian table afer recording only one date as

lawul or the celebration o Easter in this year, namely the one shared byboth reckonings. Accordingly, this passage may have been part o a tractadvising Frankish Christians ollowing Victorian Easter tables with dou-ble dates to celebrate Easter on April rather than the alternative, April; or, it may simply have placed Dionysiac authority over Frankish

the cyclus lunaris with the year in which the beginning o the January lunation coincided with January (i.e. luna on January). In this, however, Bede starts that cycle a yearearly when compared to Dionysius’ practice, at least rom an epactal point o view: Te

epact o March alling in the first year o the Bedan cyclus lunaris is , which isthe epact or the third year o the Dionysiac cyclus decemnovenalis and thereore o theth year o the Dionysiac cyclus lunaris. As Dionysius’ lunar year stretches rom luna o the Easter lunation to the Easter ull moon o the ollowing year, the first year othe Bedan cyclus lunaris coincides with the ourth year o the Dionysiac cyclus decem-noenalis and thereore the first year o the Dionysiac cyclus lunaris or ½ lunations(rom luna o the Easter lunation on April to luna o the December lunationon December). C. especially the discussions in Jones (), ; Pillonel-Wyrsch(), –; Warntjes (), ; and the too ofen neglected commentary by vander Hagen (), –, –.

6 Te table o ols. r–v o this manuscript is certainly independent rom

this dating clause, not only because it does not physically ollow the dating clause in themanuscript, but more importantly because it starts with AD ; or this table see Jones(), –; Warntjes (), .

7 Krusch (), . Among the Victorian Easter tables listing double dates orthis year, representative or some Frankish churches may be, besides the amous Gothatable, the Victorian Easter table or AD – in Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Lat., r and the closely related Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica, Reg. Lat. , r, asthe provenance o the older, ninth-century Paris MS is Reichenau (or this MS see espe-cially Mommsen (), –; idem in MGH Auct. ant. , –; Jones (), ;Borst (), –; idem (), –; Springseld (), –; or the VictorianEaster table o this MS see Mommsen in MGH Auct. ant. , and Warntjes (),

LXXXIV–LXXXV).8 See the tables in CCSL C, and Wallis (), .9 Tat such guidance was needed is illustrated by Gregory o ours account o the

Easter o AD in his Historiarum libri decem X (ed. by Krusch in MGH SS rer.


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churches; the ocus o this passage, however, is not on the Easter date.Tird, the phrase primus annus Childerici regis Francorum may suggestthat this dating clause was part o a text commemorating the accession oChilderic III; again, however, the ocus o this passage is not on the dateo the accession o Childeric.

In any o these three cases, the passage itsel certainly does not appear in its original context in the Cotton manuscript, since the immedi-ately preceding tract deals with the increase o moonlight per day, theimmediately ollowing tract lists the calendrical characteristics o each Julian calendar month, with both texts being, in terms o content, in no way related to the dating clause. Tus, the dating clause appears to have

been part o a longer tract or table originally, and is here transmittedoutside o its original context in a compilation o excerpts, suggestingthat only this dating clause can confidently be dated to AD , but noother part o the manuscript. Indeed, Lowe dates section A o CottonCaligula A XV to the latter hal o the eighth century, arguing that it was ‘copied rom an exemplar written in AD ’. Even i, then, romthe second hal o the eighth century, Cotton Caligula A XV certainlyis one o the oldest computistical manuscripts that have survived. Asor the provenance o this manuscript, which is as disputed as its date,

Merov. ,, –): Dubietas paschae uit ob hoc, quod in cyclum Victuri luna XV. pa- scham scripsit fieri. Sed ne christiani ut Iudei sub hac luna haec solemnia celebrent, addidit: Latini autem luna XXII. Ob hoc multi in Galliis XV. luna celebraverunt, nos autem XXII. Inquesivimus tamen studiosae sed ontes Hispaniae, quae divinitus implentur, in nostrum paschae repleti sunt .

10 Note in this context that the Victorian Easter table attached as chapter to theFrankish Dial. Burg. o AD only records the Latin date o April, luna (Borst(), ). Likewise does the one in Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek, Scaliger , r;as the provenance o this early ninth-century manuscript is Flavigny and as the Easter

table proper contains Frankish annals, it is very likely that this table had been in use inFrancia in the eighth century (or the MS c. Krusch (), –; Lindsay (),; Jones (), ; Bischoff (), ; or the Victorian Easter table o this MS seeespecially Mommsen in MGH Auct. ant. , and Warntjes (), LXXXIV).

11 Interestingly enough, however, both this tract (which is transcribed under omis-sion o the ollowing incipit in Warntjes (a), ) and the dating clause start withsimilar phrases: In nomine Dei summi incipit [...] vs In Christi nomine incipit [...].

12 Lowe in CLA , (no. ) states that this part o the MS is ‘saec. VIII²’, ‘cop-ied rom an exemplar written AD , the year mentioned on ol. ’. Tompson, in hisearlier Catalogue o ancient manuscripts in the British Museum II , believes (according

to Jones) that the latest dating clause o the MS (i.e. AD ) agrees with the date ocomposition. Lindsay (), is more cautious, stating ‘written apparently in Francein [unless transcribed rom an original o that date]’. C. also Jones (), ;Gneuss (), (no. ); Bischoff (), ; Goméz Pallarès (), ; idem(), –.


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a northern-eastern French scriptorium with Insular connections is themost widely accepted opinion.

Now, Cotton Caligula A XV holds such a prominent place in mod-ern scholarship because o its early date and the material it contains: Formany letters originating in the late antique and early medieval Eastercontroversy, it transmits one o the best, certainly the oldest, surviving witness. Concerning other computistical texts, like the ps-CyprianComputus o AD and the curious Easter table at the end o this parto the manuscript, it transmits the only known copy. Tis latter actalso holds true or the text that is at the centre o the present article, theComputus Cottonianus o AD . A modern hand added the incipit

Cassiodorus de computo paschali at the top o the first page o the text (r; c. Plate in Appendix I), an attribution that ortunately ailed tomisguide modern scholars as the text itsel contains, already on its first page, dating clauses or AD , i.e. roughly years afer Cassiodorus’death.

Te first scholar to have studied this text in detail was the Witten-berg proessor Wilhelm Jan in or his still unsurpassed edition oDionysius Exiguus’ computistical works. When editing the Dionysiac Argumenta o AD rom a rather inappropriate manuscript (Oxord,Bodleian Library, Digby ), he regularly cited parallel passages rom theComputus Cottonianus. o be sure, however, both the Digby and the

13 CLA , (no. ): ‘written probably in North-east France, in a centre withInsular connexions’. C. also Bischoff (), ; Jones (), ; Goméz Pallarès(), ; Gneuss (), (no. ).

14 For the corpus o computistical letters and tracts included in this MS c. p below, under section .

15 Te ps-Cyprian text is known through two copies, o which the better one in a

Rheims MS is now lost, leaving the Cotton Caligula A XV copy the only surviving man-uscript witness; an edition o this text can be ound in CSEL ,, –, a translationin Ogg (), –; a new edition is currently being prepared by Alden Mosshammer.For the Easter table c. n .

16 Krusch (), – reers to Cotton Caligula A XV as the only manuscriptknown to him to contain the Computus attributed to Cassiodorus. Te Cotton text,however, is datable to AD /, the work ascribed to Cassiodorus to AD . Leh-mann (), repr. (), – clarified that the Computus Cottonianus o AD is not a later recension o the Computus paschalis o AD ; his own description othe Cotton text, however, is problematic in itsel, since it suggests that this computusconsists o the argumenta published under Dionysius’ name by Jan (i.e. that the Com- putus Cottonianus o AD contains the exact same argumenta as the Computus Dig-baeanus o AD ), which is not correct.

17 Jan (), – (or the use o the Cotton MS see also ibidem, –); Jan’sentire book on Dionysius’ computistica is repr. in PL , – (with the Argumenta


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Cotton text must be regarded as independent treatises, ultimately basedon the Dionysiac Argumenta, but considerably extending the originalDionysiac corpus. In the end, Dionysius set a trend with his Argumenta, which present, as ar as we know, the earliest computistical ormulary written in Latin. Latin computistical ormularies started to flourish (orrather mushroom) to an exceptional degree rom the eighth century onwards; beore the end o the seventh century, however, only five compu-tistical ormularies are known, namely Dionysius’ original Argumenta oAD , its slightly extended version (transmitted in Group B manu-scripts), the Computus paschalis o AD attributed to Cassiodorus,the Computus Digbaeanus o AD just mentioned, and the Computus

Cottonianus o AD under discussion here.

I have dealt with the development o computistical ormularies written in Latin rom Dionysiusto the Computus Digbaeanus o AD at the first conerence on thescience o Computus two years ago, so that it is hoped that this study othe text immediately ollowing in that development will round off the picture o Latin computistical ormularies composed beore the start oexcessive compilation in the eighth century.

Beore the th century, then, modern scholars principally studiedthe Computus Cottonianus only or its relation to Dionysius’ and Cas-siodorus’ ormularies, arriving at the conclusion that this text was nota simple adaption to AD / o either Dionysius’ or Cassiodorus’

published on cols. –, the use o the Cotton MS on cols. –). Krusch’s edi-tion o the Dionysiac Argumenta in (), –, is inerior to Jan’s, not least becauseKrusch did not consult the Computus Cottonianus as Jan had done.

18 Tere still is no reliable edition o Dionysius’ original Argumenta, which mustbe based on the manuscripts transmitting the extended version (classified as Group Bin Warntjes (a), –); the Cassiodorian computus is edited by Lehmann (),

–; the Computus Digbaeanus is edited under Dionysius’ name by Jan and Krusch(c. previous note); the first / o the Computus Cottonianus are edited by Goméz Pal-larès (), –, repr. () – (note that the edition in the article is here preerred to the reprint, as the apparatus appears strictly at the bottom o the pageonly in the ormer, while it breaks the Latin text in the latter). Only very recently I haverealized that the computistical argumenta or AD in Munich, Bayerische Staats-bibliothek, Clm , r–v belong to a cohesive ormulary extending olios r–v(an article on this text will be published shortly). A critical edition o all these texts is in preparation; only such an edition will provide conclusive evidence or the relationshipbetween them, while it will, at the same time, unveil the development o computisticalormularies written in Latin between AD and .

19

Warntjes (a). Again, note should be taken in this context o the ormularyo AD in Clm reerred to in the previous note; this text, which appears tohave also originated in the circle o Willibrord (like the Computus Cottonianus, as willbe proven in the ollowing), provides important insights into the development o certain argumenta, especially o Argumentum XIV .


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text. I this text, then, represents an original work o AD (obviouslydependent on the Dionysiac and ps-Dionysiac argumenta), by whom,or rather where was it compiled? Since the groundbreaking studies oCharles W. Jones on Bedan and pre-Bedan computistica in the first halo the th century, part A o the Cotton manuscript, and with it thetext in question here, was generally placed in an Insular context. A new perspective on the Computus Cottonianus was then introduced by Al-red Cordoliani in , repeating his arguments in a publication.Influenced by his recent work on Spanish manuscripts, he argued or aSpanish origin o this text. Cordoliani, a codicologist by training and proession, was one o the most prolific modern commentators on com-

putistical manuscripts, with his list o articles on this subject extendingover more than titles. Unortunately, he had never really ound a way o classiying computistical tracts, and as a textual scholar withoutscientific background, he trusted incipits o texts more than their con-tent, a practice most unsuitable or computistical treatises. As a result,many o his identifications are unreliable, and the same holds true orthe text in question here. Having studied the codex Nouvelle acquisitionlatine o the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, a ninth-century man-uscript written in a Visigothic hand, he arrived at the conclusion thatthe tract on olios v–v showed considerable parallels to the Compu-tus Cottonianus. Unortunately, however, Cordoliani had never seen theCotton manuscript in person; he simply worked rom Lehmann’s rathermeagre (and wrong, as pointed out in note above) description o thattext. Te ormulary in the Paris manuscript contains an algorithm orcalculating the Hispanic era; because o the alleged parallels betweenthis and the Cotton text, Cordoliani assumed that the latter may alsoinclude this era, which would certainly point to a Spanish origin o the

Computus Cottonianus. Yet, as long as he could not examine the Cottonmanuscript in person to veriy this hypothesis o the Spanish era eatur-ing in the Cotton text, he conceded that doubts must remain about this

20 Jones (), ; idem (), .21 C. the (incomplete) list o Cordoliani’s articles in CCSL, Clavis patristica

pseudepigraphorum medii aevi A, –. For Cordoliani’s career and work c. Borst(), .

22 A noteworthy exception, or possibly rather a late realisation o the inappropri-ateness o his earlier approach, is Cordoliani (a), –, where he lists argumenta by topic rather than incipits; this is the example that should be ollowed in the uture.


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theory. In act, the Hispanic era is nowhere to be ound in the Cottonmanuscript, neither in the text that concerns us here, nor in any other part o the codex. Cordoliani then returned to the topic years later. Inthis publication, he exclusively reerred to the aorementioned section inthe Paris MS as Computus Cottonianus as i it was identical with the rel-evant section in Cotton Caligula A XV, a most inappropriate and con-using choice o terminology. Tis Paris text he described and comparedin detail with the Dionysiac (and ps-Dionysiac) Argumenta, as well asthe Computus paschalis attributed to Cassiodorus. Yet, he apparently hadstill not studied the Cotton manuscript.

In the end, what Cordoliani should have done (but never did) is a

detailed comparison between the relevant sections o London, BritishLibrary, Cotton Caligula A XV and Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Nou- velle acquisition latine . He would then have realized that he wasmistaken in his assumption that the Cotton and the Paris texts are close-ly related (save or the trivial act that many o the ormulae o both textsare ultimately based on the Dionysiac Argumenta, as is the case with allo the other numerous computistical ormularies that have survived),and that thereore conclusions drawn about the Paris text o AD (!)have no bearings on the Cotton text o AD . Still, the quintessenceo Cordoliani’s articles, particularly due to his misleading terminologyand the misguided title o especially his second publication on the topic(‘extes de comput espagnol du VIIe siècle. Le Computus Cottonianus’), was the (completely unounded) theory that the text in Cotton CaligulaA XV ascribed by a modern hand in that manuscript to Cassiodorus andcontaining various dating clauses or AD / was, in act, o Spanishorigin.

It appears that it was precisely this theory that triggered Joan Gómez

Pallarès’s interest in the Cotton manuscript. His initial study, a Bar-celona Ph.D. thesis entitled Estudis sobre el Computus Cottonianus, wassubsequently ollowed by the publication o his main results in variousarticles. Goméz Pallarès did what Cordoliani should have done beore publishing his unounded theory, namely a detailed comparison o theCotton text with the known early ninth-century Spanish computistical

23 Cordoliani (). For Lehmann’s problematic description o the Cotton textc. n .

24 Cordoliani ().25 As Leoranc Holord-Strevens has kindly inormed me, Goméz Pallarès’s Ph.D.

thesis is now available online at: http://www.tesisenxarxa.net/DX--/index.html.


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manuscripts. His thorough analysis, then, led to the main result that theComputus Cottonianus was textually not close enough to the early ninth-century Spanish texts to conclude or a direct dependency betweenthem. By establishing this act that the Computus Cottonianus was dis-connected rom Spanish computistica, the only argument orwarded byCordoliani or a Spanish origin o the Cotton text was proven wrong. Inact, his detailed study convinced Goméz Pallarès that Jones’s placemento Part A o the Cotton manuscript, and with it o the Computus Cot-tonianus o AD , in an Insular context was to be endorsed.

Yet, the Insular context o the eighth-century Cotton manuscriptdoes not necessarily imply an Insular origin o the text datable to AD

/; like the Paschal letters incorporated in this codex, it may onlyhave been the transmission o this text, not its origin that was Insular.A detailed study o the contents o the Computus Cottonianus is neededto draw conclusions about its origin. Te present paper, then, providessuch an analysis, suggesting that the Computus Cottonianus was writtenor Willibrord’s Frisian mission o AD in the Anglo-Saxon monas-tery o Rath Melsigi (or in whichever Anglo-Saxon centre in Ireland thisundertaking was prepared) under the auspices o Ecgberht.

Definition o the Computus Cottonianus o AD 689

First o all, the Computus Cottonianus o AD needs to be defined.Goméz Pallarès, the only scholar who has worked intensively on thismanuscript, and especially the section in question, regularly reers to theComputus Cottonianus as comprising olios r to r o Cotton Ca-ligula A XV. Tere can hardly be any doubt about the beginning o this

text, since it starts on a new quire and the immediately preceding olio(v) is, in act, blank, as Plate in Appendix I illustrates.

Te end o this text is less easy to establish, and the reasons or settingit on olio r appear, principally, to be three-old: First, the calendri-cal ormulae end here, with the ollowing tracts being o an explanatory

26 Goméz Pallarès (), –, especially –; idem (), –, especially–.

27 Goméz Pallarès (), ; idem (), .28 Since Cordoliani had never studied the Cotton MS, he did not comment on the

extent o this ormulary. Goméz Pallarès (sometimes mistakenly giving the impressionthat he relied on Cordoliani in this question) defines this text as covering olios v–rin (), –; (), , –; (), ; he also edits this part in (), –.


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rather than an algorithmic nature. Second, the comparison o the Cot-ton ormulae with the Computus Digbaeanus o AD (i.e. the Argu-menta published under Dionysius’ name) has shown that the two textsare somehow related; accordingly, it is a natural reflex to set an end orthe Computus Cottonianus at a point when the material o this relatedormulary ends; in act, the last o the argumenta shared by both texts,the pseudo-Dionysiac Argumentum XIII , can be ound on olio v(with this overlooking the act that § o Argumenta XVI and III canbe ound later in the manuscript, on olio r–v). Tird, none o the argumenta beore olio r have the character o an independent treatise;on olio r, then, occurs the text known as Suggestio Boniati primiceri,

a very short letter o the primicerius Boniace to the pope, explainingthe Easter data or the year AD ; Boniace had been the addresseeo Dionysius Exiguus’ amous letter outlining the details o the -yearcycle, and he thereore appears to have been appointed by the pope withthe task o establishing the correct date or the celebration o Easter oAD ; or this year, Victorius had calculated luna or Easter Sun-day, which was considered uncanonical by the Alexandrians.

Consequently, the crucial question concerning the extent o theComputus Cottonianus is whether or not it appears likely that this Sug- gestio was an integral part o a computistical ormulary. Since the lunarage or Easter Sunday o the year AD is calculated in detail in theSuggestio on the basis o the Dionysiac Argumentum IX , the character othis short tract (though explaining the Easter data o only a single year)is very much that o a ormula. Hence, in terms o content there is noobvious reason why the Suggestio should not have been just one o many argumenta included in a ormulary. In the case o the Computus Cotto-nianus, the palaeographic evidence suggests, in act, that the Suggestio is

an integral part o this ormulary rather than marking its end: Tere isno indication on olio r that would suggest a break between two texts,as Plate in Appendix I illustrates (at least not as long as every singleormula is considered as an independent tract).

On the contrary, the more general composition o the computisti-cal hal o Part A o Cotton Caligula A XV reveals that the Computus

29 Tis text is edited by Krusch (), –.30 Te Epistola Dionysii ad Boniatium et Bonum is ed. by Krusch (), –; or

the Victorian and Dionysiac data or Easter Sunday o this year see Krusch (), and respectively.

31 C. Dionysius’ Argumentum IX (ed. Krusch (), ); or the differences be-tween the Suggestio and this argumentum c. Krusch (), .


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Cottonianus extends to olio r, as only there is a break between twosections (or rather texts) evident. Te computistica o Part A o CottonCaligula A XV can be divided into the ollowing sections:

1) ols. r–r: A ormulary o unknown date (since it does notcontain an explicit dating clause), defined by the beginning othe computistical part o the manuscript and the blank olio v,clearly marking the end o a section; Lowe, in act, argues that thisquire ( double leaves) is a ninth-century addition.

2) ols. r–r: Te Computus Cottonianus o AD ; the begin-ning is clearly defined by the preceding blank olio v and the

beginning o a new quire on olio r; rom olio r there is noevident break in the text until olio r, o which roughly the lastfifh was originally lef blank, with this space being filled by a laterhand with an interesting sequence o Victorian epacts (c. Plate in Appendix I); note that in the Catalogue o Cotton manuscripts in the British Museum, Planta also treats this section as onesingle text.

3) ols. v–v: Compilation o Paschal letters and tracts in theollowing order: Acta synodi Caesareae, recension B ( De ordina-tione eriarum); Disputatio Morini; Epistola Dionysii ad Bonia-tium et Bonum; De sollemnitatibus; Epistola Proterii; Epistola Pascasini; Epistola Cyrilli; excerpts rom Gaudentius’ De pascha; ps-Cyprian Computus o AD .

4) ols. r–v: Computistical ormulae, tables and diagrams.5) ols. r–v: A very interesting table (or rather text), still un-

published, apparently analyzing which data o the Dionysiac - year Easter table have to be recalculated afer the expiration o

this period; since the first year discussed is AD , it may be as-sumed that the text itsel was compiled in the years preceding; itmay be noteworthy in this respect that the Easter table originallybrought by Willibrord to the Continent consisted only o the pe-riod AD – (c. n ), so that the analysis outlined in thetext in question here may, in act, reflect the need o Willibrord’scircle to extent the table ending in AD .

32 CLA , .33 Planta (), .34 For this table, c. n .


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Te Computus Cottonianus o AD 689: A Product o the Cir-cle o Ecgberht and Willibrord

Having defined the extent o the Computus Cottonianus o AD ascomprising olios r–r o Cotton Caligula A XV, we can now turnto the question o the origin o this text. Te analysis will ocus on theollowing criteria, each discussed in turn: the sources and content o thistext, its date o composition, its transmission, and finally its reception.

Sources and Content

As mentioned in the introduction, only our computistical ormularies

pre-dating the Computus Cottonianus are known at present, namely theoriginal corpus o the Dionysiac Argumenta, its slightly extended version(transmited in Group B manuscripts; it is thereore termed the Group Bcorpus in the ollowing), the Computus paschalis o AD (an adaptiono the Dionysiac Argumenta to AD ), and the Computus Digbaeanus o AD (an extension o the Group B corpus). Since the author o theCotton text adapted the Dionysiac Argumenta to his annus praesens, and since otherwise these argumenta show little variation, it is difficultto establish i he worked rom any o these our texts directly, or rom a

now lost recension. Argumenta III and IV appear in their original Dio-nysiac orm (except or the adaption to AD , o course) in the Com- putus Cottonianus, i.e. they do not include the ps-Dionysiac additionstransmitted in the Group B corpus and the Computus Digbaeanus; thissuggests that the author o the Cotton text may have worked directlyrom the original Dionysiac corpus. On the other hand, he also includedmaterial that was not part o the original corpus, but which was trans-mitted in the Group B corpus as well as the Computus Digbaeanus, like

the ps-Dionysiac Argumenta VII and XIV , while the addition to Argu-mentum III appears later in his text. Tereore, at this stage, it is impos-sible to be more specific than to argue that this author worked rom one,

35 A ull inventary o the contents o the Computus Cottonianus o AD can beound in Appendix III.

36 Argumentum III can be ound on r, Argumentum IV on v o London,British Library, Cotton Caligula A XV (ed. in Goméz Pallarès (), –; c. thecommentary in Jan (), –). For the additions c. especially Warntjes (a), –, –; more generally or the Dionysiac and ps-Dionysiac Argumenta in the ComputusCottonianus ibidem, –.

37 Argumentum VII on v, Argumentum XIV on ols. r–r (ed. in GomézPallarès (), –; or Argumentum XIV c. Jan (), –), § o Argumentum III on r–v (that this paragraph occurred later in this MS is not mentioned by Goméz


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possibly even two recensions o the Dionysiac Argumenta. One o theserecensions, however, appears to have been the Computus Digbaeanus or aclosely related text. Tis is evident rom the act that the Computus Cot-tonianus contains the second part o the ps-Dionysiac Argumentum XVI which is first attested in the Computus Digbaeanus o AD . Tesetwo texts also transmit the ps-Dionysiac Argumenta XI–XIII , which areotherwise only known in one earlier version, to be ound in the Frag-mentum Nanciacense; most conclusively in this respect, the ComputusCottonianus and the Computus Digbaeanus share the same version (withsome variation) o Argumentum XIII , which differs markedly rom theone in the Nancy ragment. Moreover, i the argumenta o the Compu-

tus Digbaeanus are compared in detail with those o the Computus Cot-tonianus, many more correspondences reveal themselves. It may be su-ficient here to draw attention to the parallels in Argumentum I outlinedin Appendix II, which demonstrates that the argumenta o the Cottontext are in many instances closer to the Computus Digbaeanus than tothe Group B corpus o the Dionysiac Argumenta, which is the ormat in which these Argumenta circulated in the Latin West (note especially theomission o the phrase qua argumentum integrum possit custodiri XV non adsumas, sed ad sumam primam unum semper adicias, ut puta in both theDigby and the Cotton computus).

Now, the important aspect or the present study is the act the Com- putus Cottonianus is closely related, in whatever orm, to the Computus Digbaeanus. Tis suggests that both texts originate rom a similar, i notthe same, intellectual milieu. Concerning the Computus Digbaeanus,it has been argued that the place o its composition probably is to be

Pallarès or especially Jan (), ); or these c. especially Warntjes (a), –,–, –, –.

38 § o Argumentum XVI on r (see Jan (), ). Note that the palaeograph-ical evidence o Oxord, Bodleian Library, Digby , v may suggest that Argumentum XVI constituted a tract independent o the rest o the Computus Digbaeanus; or this argumentum see especially Warntjes (a), , , –.

39 Argumenta XI – XII on v, Argumentum XIII on r–v (ed. in Goméz Pal-larès (), –; c. the commentary in Jan (), –, where Argumentum XII is transcribed in ull rom this MS, while its variants are given or the other two argu-menta); or these three argumenta c. especially Warntjes (a), –, –, .

Argumentum XIII is edited rom the Fragmentum Nanciacense in Warntjes (a),–, rom the Computus Digbaeanus in Jan (), and Krusch (), , rom theComputus Cottonianus in Goméz Pallarès (), –; or the differences betweenthem c. the detailed discussion in Warntjes (a), –. For the Fragmentum Nan-ciacense see especially Warntjes (a), – (description), – (acsimile).


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identified with an Anglo-Saxon monastery in Ireland. Accordingly,due to the close relation between these two texts, the same appears to betrue or the Computus Cottonianus.

From this perspective, then, a connection o this ormulary with thecircle o Willibrord seems justified: Te most reliable inormation con-cerning Willibrord’s career comes rom Bede, who wrote his Historiaecclesiastica gentis Anglorum at a time when Willibrord was still alive,and who may have been very well inormed about Willibrord’s missionthrough Bishop Acca o Hexham. Valuable additions to Bede’s accountcan be gathered rom Alcuin’s Vita Willibrordi, which, however, has tobe read with caution not only because o its chronological distance rom

the events described, but also because o its partisan character, with Al-cuin probably being a relative o Willibrord and composing this text orthe Echternach abbot Beornrad. Still, this should not trouble us here,since we are only interested in the basic ramework o Willibrord’s lie.Alcuin relates that Willibrord entered the monastery o Ripon as a boyand stayed there until the age o , when he went to Ireland or the sakeo studying. Te same author argues that Willibrord stayed in Irelandor years and lef or Frisia in the rd year o his lie, and this mission,

40 Warntjes (a), –.41 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i ): Ipse autem Uilbrord,

cognomento Clemens, adhuc superest, longa iam uenerabilis aetate, utpote tricesimum et sextum in episcopatu habens annum, et post multiplices militiae caelestis agones ad prae-mia remunerationis supernae tota mente suspirans. In chapter III (Plummer (), i–), Bede relates that Acca o Hexham spent some time with Willibrord on his wayto Rome and that on this occasion the missionary told many stories about miracles per-ormed in the name o St Oswald, which Acca then in turn passed on to Bede; rom thisaccount especially Kirby (–), ; Fritze (), –; idem (), –;

and others suppose that Acca was Bede’s principal source also or Willibrord’s mission ingeneral; more cautious Levison (), –. A general overview o the sources (andtheir limits) or Willibrord’s continental activity is magisterially presented by Levison(a).

42 Tat Alcuin belonged to Willibrord’s wider amily has been concluded romAlcuin’s own statement in the praeatio o his Vita Willibrordi (MGH SS rer. Merov., ; note that the praeatio is omitted in Veyrard-Cosme edition), in which heargues that he presides, at the time o composition, over a oundation o Willibrord’sather by right o legitimate succession; c. Dümmler (), –; Levison in MGHSS rer. Merov. , ; Angenendt (), ; von Padberg (), . Te dedicationto Beornrad can also be ound in the praeatio (MGH SS rer. Merov. , ; omitted inVeyrard-Cosme ()). For the date o Alcuin’s Vita Willibrordi see Levison in MGHSS rer. Merov. , –.

43 Alcuin, Vita Willibrordi – (MGH SS rer. Merov. , –; Veyrard-Cosme(), , ).


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as will be outlined presently, took place in AD . Accordingly, i Al-cuin’s Vita Willibrordi is reliable in this chronological data, Willibrordturned , the age at which he lef Ripon, in AD .

Tis inormation has numerous implications. Ripon itsel holds a prominent place in the seventh-century Easter controversy. Te Deiranking Alhrith, sub-king to his ather Oswiu, ounded that monastery inthe AD s and gave it to ollowers o Irish traditions. Shortly afer- wards, Alhrith converted to Roman customs, apparently impressed bythe imposing figure o Wilrid or Benedict Biscop. In the course o this process, Alhrith expelled the monks clinging to Irish traditions romRipon and made Wilrid himsel abbot o that monastery. From this

time, then, Ripon must be regarded as a Romanist stronghold, and therecan hardly be any doubt that Willibrord was educated an ardent Rom-anist (especially in terms o the method or calculating Easter) being an alumnus o Wilrid. In the afermath o the Synod o Whitby, Wilrid

44 Alcuin, Vita Willibrordi – (MGH SS rer. Merov. , ; Veyrard-Cosme(), ). For the date o Willibrord’s mission see pp. – below.

45 Doubt about the accuracy o this inormation may arise rom the act that theage ascribed to Willlibrord when starting his missionary activity corresponds suspicious-ly with the age traditionally assigned to Christ at the time o his crucifixion. More gener-ally or Alcuin’s use o hagiographical eatures and his remodelling o historical acts seeFritze (), –; Schäerdiek (), –; the most detailed study o Alcuin’shagiographical style and his models is Veyrard-Cosme (), –, where the pas-sage in question is discussed pp. –.

46 For Ripon and the relation between Alhrith and Wilrith see Bede, Historiaecclesiastica III , V (Plummer (), i –, ); idem, Vita Cuthberti – (Col-grave (), , , ); Stephen o Ripon, Vita Wilfidi – (Colgrave (),–). For the relation between Alhrith and Benedict Biscop see Bede, Vita beatorum abbatum (Plummer (), i ).

47

In the older Vita Wilfidi by Stephen o Ripon (cap. ), Willibrord is called Wilrid’s filius, Inbripis nutrius (Colgrave (), ). A good, balanced discussion o Wilrid’s Romanism can be ound in Mayr-Harting (), –. For Wilrith’s careerrom the perspective o the Easter controversy see especially Harrison (), –,–; his influence on Willibrord in this matter is also stressed ibidem, –, whilealready Hauck (), ; Levison (), ; idem (), have more generallyargued that Willibrord had been brought up and educated in a ervently Roman envi-ronment (a view subsequently challenged on various grounds – especially in the contexto Benedictine monasticism, church organisation, and missionary ideas and ideals –, notso, however, in respect o the method or calculating Easter; c. especially Fritze (),Angenendt (), –, van Berkum (–), and also Weiler (), –; when

reassessing Willibrord’s Roman influences, Angenendt (), – omits the Easterquestion; c. also n below); Flaskamp (), even goes so ar as to call Willibrorda ‘second Wilrith’, but he is also one o the first to note that Willibrord’s monastic or-ganisation owed plenty to Irish customs (p ); or the close relation between Wilrithand Willibrord see also Wampach (–), i –. Just very recently, Ó Cróinín


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became bishop o York, but was deposed by King Ecgrith in AD .In act, he was not only deposed, but driven out o Northumbria and hedid not return beore the death o the king. Wilrid’s expulsion musthave had wider than only personal consequences. His students certainlyaced a difficult situation with their mentor alling out o avour withthe reigning king. It may thereore not have been a coincidence that Wil-librord’s departure corresponded, chronologically, with Wilrid’s depo-sition. Yet, while Wilrid spent the ollowing years on the Continent, Willibrord joined Ecgberht’s community in Ireland, to be identified with Rath Melsigi.

Accordingly, Willibrord was educated by the person who apparently

first introduced the Dionysiac reckoning into England (at least the first whose efforts showed ar-reaching success) and who became its most ar-dent propagator in England in the second hal o the seventh century,not the least as the main advocate o the Roman cause at Whitby; Willi-brord then became the student o the greatest champion o that reckon-ing in Ireland, his ellow Northumbrian Ecgberht, the very man wholater converted the last and most passionate stronghold o Irish customs,Iona, to the Dionysiac system. Tis certainly implies that computistics played an immensely important role in Willibrord’s education and that

(), n has advanced the suggestion that Wilrid and Willibrord may even havebeen related.

48 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica III , IV , , (here the date o Wilrid’s expul-sion), , V , (here also the date o Wilrid’s expulsion) (Plummer (), i –,–, –, –, –); Stephen o Ripon, Vita Wilfidi –, (Colgrave(), –, –). For Wilrith’s career in general see especially Poole ();Duckett (), –; Farmer (); Kirby (); Isenberg (); Mayr-Hart-ing (), –, –; idem ().

49 C. Hauck (), –; Wampach (–), i –; Levison (), –; idem (), . Van Berkum (–), –, and then Weiler (), ollow-ing his lead, question this view on the basis that the sources do not explicitly connectthe two departures; these two Dutch scholars rather suggest the opposite chronology oevents by arguing that Willibrord probably lef Ripon beore Wilrith’s departure.

50 Alcuin, Vita Willibrordi (MGH SS rer. Merov. , –; Veyrard-Cosme(), ). For Rath Melsigi see especially Ó Cróinín ().

51 For Wilrid being taught in Roman customs, including the calculation o Easter,by Archdeacon Boniace in Rome in the AD s see Stephen o Ripon, Vita Wilfidi (Colgrave (), ); Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i ). For

him advocating Roman methods or calculating Easter in England see Stephen o Ripon,Vita Wilfidi , (Colgrave (), –, –); Bede, Historia ecclesiastica III ,V (Plummer (), i –, , ). For Ecgberht’s role in the Irish Easter con-troversy see Bede, Historia ecclesiastica III , , V , , (Plummer (), i –,–, –, –, ); idem, Chronica maiora § (MGH Auct. ant. , ).


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he himsel must have been very well acquainted with the Dionysiac reck-oning. More conclusively, Willibrord studied or more than ten yearsin an Anglo-Saxon monastery in Ireland, the very milieu which prob-ably saw the production o one o the principal sources or the Compu-tus Cottonianus, namely the Computus Digbaeanus o AD . Whenhe was sent over to the Continent to set up a missionary base in Frisia,there can hardly be any doubt that his mentor Ecgberht, a ervent ol-lower o Dionysius, provided him with a ormulary containing the mostbasic rules o the Dionysiac reckoning, like the Computus Cottnoiaus oAD ; this argument is even more plausible when considering the actthat the Frankish church still ollowed the Victorian reckoning, so that

texts teaching Dionysiac truth could not be acquired in or close to thearea o Willibrord’s activity. Judging rom the sources and the historicalbackground, then, it appears absolutely probable that the Computus Cot-tonianus was composed under the auspices o Ecgberht or Willibrord’sFrisian mission.

Tis hypothesis is urther strengthened by one o the original pas-sages o the Computus Cottonianus. On olios v–r, the author othis text introduces, or the first time, a comparison o the lengths o thelunar months (lunations) according to different customs, headed uat-tuor differentiae lunae, which became airly popular in eighth-centuryFrankish computistics. In this comparison, the sequence o lunations

52 Note that the question o the Easter reckoning ollowed by Willibrord lies out-side o the debate about Anglo-Saxon versus Irish influence on Willibrord’s continen-tal activity, airly recently summarized by Eugène Honée (): Both in Northumbriaand in Ireland Willibrord studied only under staunch supporters o Dionysius and in theEaster controversies o both regions as well as later on the Continent he certainly will have promoted the Dionysiac reckoning, not least by use or introduction o the Computus Cot-

tonianius; so in this question, he was Roman through and through; c. also n above.53 London, British Library, Cotton Caligula A XV, v–r: IIII deerentiae lu-nae: Victorini XXX; Anatolius et laterculus alius XXX, alius XXVIIII; apud Ebraeos XX-VIIII et semis; apud Aegyptus XXVIIII . For the eighth- and early ninth-century receptiono this passage c. Bobbio Computus (PL , ); Lib. ann. (Borst (),–); and also the Computus Rhenanus to be discussed below (C r; W r). Ana-tolius’ name is, in act, spelt correctly only in very ew o the manuscripts used by Borstor the edition o this passage o Lib. ann. o AD , a act that led Springseld (),– to the wrong conclusion that the spelling Anatolius was a later correction; theearliest witness, rom a textual as well as rom a manuscript point o view, the ComputusCottonianus, clearly reads Anatolius; this evidence was not known to Springseld, and

neither was the act that Anatolius and the latercus applied the same sequence o luna-tions. Te laterculus o this passage was first identified with an -year Easter table byKrusch (), n , without any urther specification; the table reerred to is, inact, the ()-year Easter table ollowed by the Irish (i.e. the latercus); or the correla-tion/dependency between Anatolius and the latercus in the sequence o lunations and a


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o the latercus (here laterculus, i.e. the -year Easter reckoning unani-mously used by the Irish until the early seventh, in the northern part, particularly in Iona, until the early eighth century) is reerred to as be-ing identical with the one applied by Anatolius. Anatolius’ writings werecited as authoritative by both parties involved in the Synod o Whitby,in particular by Wilrid. Wilrid, being the main advocate o the Ro-man party, would not only have known the details o the most impor-tant texts on the paschal question, but also the technicalities underlyingthe system supported by his adversaries. It would not surprise, then, i astudent o Wilrid included such details in his computistical work.

Most intriguingly, however, another original passage o the Com-

putus Cottonianus can be directly connected to Willibrord. Among theCotton ormulae occurs an algorithm or the calculation o the week-day on the Calends (first day) o each month rom the concurrentes (the weekday o March) o the year in question and a certain regular oreach month (which is to be identified as the weekday-difference between March and the Calends o the respective month). Te Computus Cot-tonianus is the first text to outline this algorithm, but it soon becameextremely popular, as it eatures in the Bobbio Computus, Bede’s Detemporum ratione o AD , the Frankish Dial. Neustr. o AD and Lect. comp. o AD , and many other texts and manuscripts. Now, inmost texts and manuscripts the list o regulars starts with the one orMarch; almost all remaining texts and manuscripts, including Bede’s Detemporum ratione, begin this list with the January regular. In the Com- putus Cottonianus, however, the first regular is the one or October. Ac-cording to Borst’s edition o Lect. comp., the passage in question oundits way into (at least) manuscripts; only one o these has the sameorder as the one given in the Computus Cottonianus, namely Munich,

Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm ; this manuscript is amous orcontaining the only known copy o the Munich Computus, an Irishcomputistical textbook o AD , and this may strengthen the general

thorough discussion o this passage see Warntjes (), –, especially n . Note thatthis passage in particular reveals that the Computus Cottonianus must have been writtenon the British isles, i urther evidence was needed or this general act.

54 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica III (Plummer , i –).55 January: Bede, De temporum ratione (Jones (), ), which is cited by

Rabanus Maurus, De computo (ed. by Stevens in CCCM , ). March: BobbioComputus (PL , ); Dial. Neustr. (Borst (), ); Lect. comp. I (Borst(), –); Lib. comp. II B (Borst (), ); Lib. calc. A (Borst (),); Pacificus o Verona, Computus §§– (Meersseman and Adda (), ); variouscalendars (c. Borst, (), –). Both: Computus Rhenanus (C v; W r).


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argument o an Insular origin o the Cotton text. More revealing,however, is the act that among the very ew argumenta accompanying Willibrord’s Easter table and its continuations occurs this list o regularsstarting with October. Tough the phrasing and some numbers showconsiderable variations, the very rare act that the list o both the Cot-ton text and Willibrord’s Easter table begin with October alone suggeststhat both texts derive rom the same intellectual milieu, namely the cir-cle o Willibrord.

Te Date

One o the most suggestive arguments or the ascription o the Compu-

tus Cottonianus to the circle o Willibrord is the correspondence o the

56 Borst (), –. In Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm , therelevant passage occurs on v. For this MS see especially Warntjes (), CCXI–CCXXI; the Munich Computus is there ed. and trans. on pp. –.

57 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Lat. , r. Willibrord’s Easter table and itscontinuations survive in our separate parts in this MS: ) AD – on r; ) AD– on v; ) AD – on r–v (which is the one containing the passagein question); ) AD – on r–v. Only the first three parts (with part concern-

ing us here) are generally dated by Lowe (CLA , (no. a)) to ‘ante A.D. ’, but healso states more specifically: ‘In the Paschal table, on ol. v, in the margin, is a cross opposite the year , perhaps marking the year in which the MS. was written’; part mayalready have been written in Ireland, the ollowing parts, then, on the Continent, prob-ably in Echternach. For Willibrord’s Easter table see especially CLA , (nos. a andb); Wilson (), ix-x; Kenney (), –; Ó Cróinín (), –; Obrist(), –; Warntjes (), XC-XCI.

58 Computus Cottonianus (London, British Library, Cotton Caligula A XV, v;Goméz Pallarès (), transcription is misleading, since he did not realize that thelist is to be read in columns rather than lines): Item Kalendae mensium, qua die intrent,hoc calculo cognoscitur uoluentibus annis: Octember II habet litteram, Nouember V, De-

cember VII, Ianuaris II, Februarius V, Martius V, Aprilis I (add. later) , Maius III, IuniusVI, Iulius I, Augustus IIII, September VII. His semper adiectę aepactas solis anni cuius uolu-eris, et deinceps partire per septiam partem, septies asse aut septies bini, sicque calculationis seriem sine errore reperis. Willibrord’s Easter table (Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Lat., r): Argumentum ebdomadarum: In Octembri I, in Nouembri IIII, in DecembriVI, in Ianuario II, in Februario V, in Martio V, in Aprili I, in Maio III, in Iunio VI, in Iulio I, in Agusto IIII, in Septembri VII; et adiece postea concurrentes. Note the difference in theregulars or October to December. In Willibrord’s Easter table, the values are correctlycalculated or October, November, December preceding the concurrentes o March; those in the Computus Cottonianus are calculated or October, November, December ollowing the concurrentes o March and are subsequently shifed to the be-

ginning o the list. It appears, thereore, that the original custom was to list the regularsrom January to December, that the author o the Computus Cottonianus then decided tochange that order to an October beginning by artificially shifing the final three monthsto the beginning. Tis order was then kept in Willibrord’s Easter table, the regulars orOctober to December, however, corrected to agree with this order.


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date o composition o this text with the date o Willibrord’s mission.Te Computus Cottonianus includes numerous explicit dating clauses, which reer to AD at the beginning, but later in the text turn to theollowing year, AD . Tis suggests that the text was written over a period o two years, or, given the rather small size o the text, at the turnrom AD to . Willibrord’s mission, on the other hand, is securelydatable to AD : First, Bede’s account suggests that Willibrord set outor Frisia in AD . Tis is ully confirmed by the only written pas-sage that can confidently be ascribed to Willibrord’s own hand. On theNovember page o Willibrord’s amous calendar the ollowing statementcan be ound:

In nomine domini Clemens VVillibrordus anno sexcentesimo nonagesimo ab incarnatione Christi uen\i/ebat ultra mare in Francia.

‘In the name o the Lord, Clemens Willibrordus came across the seato Francia in the th year rom the incarnation o Christ.’

Te reason or this entry occurring on the November page is not that thetrip to Frisia was undertaken in that month (at a most unsuitable time o

year), but rather because Willibrord’s consecration as archbishop, whichis mentioned immediately afer the above given quote, took place on November in AD . Hence, the entry only reveals that Willibrord

59 Te AD datings on r–v, the AD datings on v o London, BritishLibrary, Cotton Caligula A XV.

60 Bede explicitly reers to AD in Historia ecclesiastica V ; he then introducesthe ollowing chapter (V ), which relates Ecgberht’s preparations or his trip to Frisiaand the divine command that he should turn to Iona instead, with the phrase eo tempore,

beore turning to Willibrord setting out or Frisia as a direct consequence o God’s com-mand to Ecgberht in cap. V (Plummer (), i –).

61 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Lat. , v; a acsimile o the passage inquestion can be ound in CLA , acing p , in Wilson (), under ol. b with atranscription on p , in Flaskamp (), between pp. and with a transcription p, and in Weiler (), ; c. also Arndt (), ; Hauck (), –; Levisonin MGH SS rer. Merov. , –; idem (), ; Wampach (–), i –; andthe most recent detailed discussions in Howlett (a), – (with translation) andPelteret (orthcoming; I would like to thank David Pelteret or providing me with themanuscript o his paper beore publication).

62

Besides the note in the lef-hand margin o the November page, there is a briecomment under XI Kal. Dec., i.e. November, in Willibrord’s calendar: ordinatiodomni nostri clementis. Tis inormation contradicts Bede’s statement in his Historia ec-clesiastica V (Plummer (), i –), arguing that Willibrord was consecrateda year and a day later, on Caecilia’s day, i.e. November, in AD . Te evidence o


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travelled to Frisia (or rather to the Frankish court) in AD . Springor summer would generally have been the most likely seasons or such along sea journey. On the other hand, i Alcuin’s chronological data in hismetrical and prose lives o Willibrord are taken at ace value, then theexpedition would, in act, have been undertaken in the final two monthso AD .

Te one-year difference between the latest dating clauses in the Com- putus Cottonianus and the beginning o Willibrord’s mission should notirritate us here. It may well be that the book production or such an expe-dition started well in advance o the expedition proper, since not only acomputistical manual, but also ar larger books had to be produced, like a

Gospel book, all kinds o liturgical texts, a grammar, etc.;

the computis-tical ormulary may simply have been compiled first. On the other hand,the expedition to Frisia may equally likely have been scheduled or AD and was then postponed by a year due to unknown circumstances.In act, Bede explicitly says that the initial expedition under Ecgberht was abandoned, with the leadership then being given to Willibrord; thespace o time between Ecgberht’s abandonment and Willibrord’s settingsail to the Continent may only have been a ew days, but it may also havebeen a ew months. Moreover, Bede relates the story o an unsuccessulattempt to convert the Frisians to the true aith by one Wihtberht, andhis return afer two years o preaching in vain may have led to a periodo reconsideration o such an undertaking. A third possible reason ora postponement o Willibrord’s Frisian mission is also implicit in Bede’saccount. He argues that Willibrord and his companions went to Pip- pin II, the Frankish major domus, who had just recently conquered Frisia

Willibrord’s own calendar must obviously be regarded as superior to Bede’s account, themore so since November was a Sunday in AD (c. Wilson (), ; Wam- pach (–), i ; Harrison (), –; however, Flaskamp (), – arguesstrongly or Caecilia’s day on the basis that Willibrord’s consecration took place, accord-ing to Bede, in the church o St Caecilia in rastevere: thereore, the date was dependenton the place o consecration).

63 Wampach (–), i –, .64 For the texts that an Anglo-Saxon missionary would have brought with him to

the Continent see Schüling’s excellent study o Boniatius’ Handbibliothek (–);or the need o extensive preparations or Willibrord’s mission, not only in terms o book production, see also Weiler (), .

65 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V – (Plummer (), i –).66 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i ). C. Flaskamp (),

, who argues that Wihtberht’s ailure resulted in an attitude among the Anglo-Saxonmissionaries to wait or more avourable circumstances.


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citerior . Te fighting between Franks and Frisians and Pippin’s victoryare confirmed by Frankish sources, though their dating relies heavilyon Bede’s statement and the note in Willibrord’s calendar: At the bat-tle o ertry in AD (the date being inerred rom internal evidenceo the Liber Historiae Francorum), the Austrasian major domus Pippindeeated his Neustrian counterpart, the latter being subsequently killedthe ollowing year. Tis made Pippin actually the ruler o the unitedFrankish kingdoms, and he immediately, in AD (i this event is con-nected to Bede’s narrative), waged war against the Frisian dux Radbod, whom he deeated at Duursted that year. With this victory he occupiedthe south-western part o Frisia. Tus, in AD , Frisia was in political

turmoil, and i a missionary expedition was planned or that year, the cir-cumstances certainly did not allow or its execution; a postponemento the undertaking to the ollowing year, when the political situation was stable and even more avourable with a Christian ruler now officiallyruling a part o this heathen region, appears like a logical consequence.Tereore, keeping the dearth o inormation about the beginning o Willibrord’s mission in mind, the date o the Computus Cottonianus

67 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i ).68 Liber Historiae Francorum (MGH SS rer. Merov. , –; or the date, n

); Fredegarii chronicarum continuationes (MGH SS rer. Merov. , ); Annales Met-tenses priores s.a. (MGH SS rer. Germ. , –; the date given here is AD ).

69 Liber Historiae Francorum (MGH SS rer. Merov. , –); Fredegariichronicarum continuationes (MGH SS rer. Merov. , ); note that the year is notexplicitly mentioned in these accounts; Bede’s statement that Pippin had just recently(nuper ; c. n ) deeated the Frisians when Willibrord set out or Frisia in connectionto Willibrord’s calendar entry relating that he sailed to the Continent in AD makesRettberg’s dating (), o Pippin’s victory over the Frisians to AD very plausi-ble (though AD / would be more accurate). Te Annales Mettenses priores s.a.

(MGH SS rer. Germ. , ) record a victory o Pippin over Radbod under the year AD, but because o their late date (early ninth century) and generally unreliable chro-nology (or which see especially Levison () and Haselbach (), –), Bede’saccount is given more credence here; still, it is worth noting that the same annals datethe battle o ertry to AD , an event that is securely datable to AD (c. previousnote); i, thereore, the Metz annalist is consistent in his relative chronology, i.e. in thethree-year difference between the actual event and his own dating, then AD o the Annales Mettenses would, in act, lead to AD or Pippin’s victory against the Frisians;on the basis o the Annales Mettenses, which record not only this one battle between theFrisians and Pippin, but also a second one, ought at Duursted five years later (MGHSS rer. Germ. , ), Fritze (), , – (c. also Haselbach (), ) datesthe battle o Duurstedt to AD /, believing that Bede reers to the earlier clashbetween the two armies recorded by the Metz annalist, while the other Frankish sourcesappear to have telescoped these two events. See also n below.

70 Levison (), suggests that news o the political developments in Franciao these years would have reached Ireland and Britain very quickly.


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agrees reasonably well with that o the beginning o the Willibrordianmission.

O course, the date can also be interpreted differently. Te end o theAD s saw one o the peaks o the Insular Easter controversy, whichled to an extensive production o computistical texts. On a diplomatic visit to Northumbria in AD , the Iona abbot Adomnán, the heado the community that most ardently supported the latercus (i.e. the ()-year Easter reckoning), was converted to the Dionysiac reckoning.Even though his own brethren did not ollow his example, Adomnán’sconversion certainly led to renewed discussions about the correct meth-od o calculating Easter, especially in his native Ireland, which he visited

directly afer his conversion.

Te southern Irish church ollowed theVictorian reckoning since AD , while the northern Irish, under Io-na’s lead, still adhered to the latercus. Some o the Irish churches, as wellas the Anglo-Saxon monasteries in Ireland, may already have convertedto the third reckoning, i.e. the Dionysiac system, which was to oust thetwo others in the decades to come; but only Adomnán’s conversion toDionysius in AD appears to have set a trend with ar-reaching conse-quences. It does not surprise, thereore, that one o the ew datable Irish

71 Bede argues in his Historia ecclesiastica V and V (Ceolrith’s letter to thePictish king Nechtan) (Plummer (), i –, –) that Adomnán was convertedto the Dionysiac reckoning when visiting Northumbria on a diplomatic mission; thisdiplomatic mission probably was Adomnán’s negotiation o the release o Irish pris-oners o war noted in the Annals o Ulster s.a. . (Mac Airt and Mac Niocaill (),; or the dating o this passage see Mc Carthy’s reconstruction o the chronologyo the Irish annals at http://www.scss.tcd.ie/misc/kronos/chronology/synchronisms/Edition_/K_trad/Synch_tables/s-.htm). Te act that Adomnán did notmanage to convert his own community but was ar more successul in Ireland is alsorelated by Bede in the same chapters. Picard (), – is certainly right in arguing

that this account o Bede has to be read with caution, as it is unlikely that Adomnánspent most o the rest o his lie in exile in Ireland, expelled by his own community,as Bede has it. Still, Adomnán’s conversion to the Dionysiac reckoning can hardly bedoubted, as Ceolrith could not have twisted the truth or simply invented this event when writing the letter to Iona’s neighbour, the Pictish king Nechtan, only some six yearsafer Adomnán’s death. Kirby (), , more vehemently than Picard, concludes that‘supporting evidence that he [Adomnán] campaigned in Ireland or the acceptance othe Roman Easter is non-existent’. Adomnán may not have expressed missionary zealor promoting Roman customs, but his example alone must have led to serious discus-sions; the influx o computistical texts in AD , as witnessed by the now lost Victoriancomputus o AD cited by the Munich computist and the tract De comparatione epac-

tarum Dionysii et Victorii o the same year (to be discussed presently), provide just thesource material that Kirby was missing, as they demonstrate that considerable debatestook place in this year between southern Irish adherents o Victorius and presumably anorthern Irish clergy convinced by Adomnán’s example that the Dionysiac method wasthe one to be ollowed. For the context c. Warntjes (), CLVII–CLVIII.


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computistical texts o the seventh century, a Victorian computus whichhas not survived, but which is quoted in the later Munich Computus oAD , was evidently compiled in AD . Tis text may have been written by some southern Irish churchmen as a direct response to Adom-nán’s conversion in order to make a stand or the Victorian reckoningollowed by them. In act, direct evidence or adherents o Victoriuschallenging the Dionysiac system in AD on the basis that the latterdid not provide data or Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection in accord-ance with the Gospels comes rom a text just recently introduced intoscholarship and located in this very context.

I, then, the Computus Cottonianus had originated in this Irish con-

text, one would expect some influence o this text in Ireland itsel. Yet,all Irish computistical textbooks written in the late seventh, early eighthcenturies avoid the Dionysiac Argumenta and their seventh-century re-censions, apparently preerring older and simpler methods o calendricalcalculations. In general, the Computus Cottonianus has lef almost notraces in the rich Irish computistical literature o the late seventh, earlyeighth centuries. Te analysis o the sources and contents o the Com- putus Cottonianus outlined above rather revealed that this text is to beconnected to a different context, Willibrord’s Frisian mission, and thedate o composition o this text fits very well into that argument, which will be urther strengthened by the discussions o the provenance andreception o this ormulary.

Te ransmission

Te Computus Cottonianus survives in only one manuscript, London,British Library, Cotton Caligula A XV. As outlined above, the prove-nance o this codex is highly disputed, since palaeographers have ailed

to connect it to a specific scriptorium. Still, the rather vague localisationo the origin o this manuscript in north-eastern France appears to haveound general acceptance. Tis provenance o the only manuscripttransmitting the Computus Cottonianus certainly agrees well with Wil-librord’s area o activity on the Continent. Shortly beore Willibrord’s

72 For the chapters o the Munich Computus that were copied rom this now lostVictorian computus o AD c. Warntjes (), CXXIV–CXXVI.

73 Tis text, termed De comparatione epactarum Dionysii et Victorii according to

its content, is edited or the first time in Warntjes (), – and discussed ibidem,CLII–CLVIII.

74 Warntjes (a), ; idem (), LXXII–LXXIII, CLX–CLXI.75 C. n above.


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mission a certain Wihtberht, also a monk rom the circle o Ecgberht inIreland, had spent two years among the Frisians unsuccessully preach-ing the Gospel with the permission o their king, Radbod. Tis experi-ence apparently led to a change in tactics in Ecgberht’s circle concerningthe Frisian mission. Willibrord, rather than directly approaching theFrisian king, went to the Frankish major domus Pippin instead to seeksupport or his activity. Tis support was graciously granted, with Pip- pin obviously hoping that the spread o Christianity in the newly con-quered south-western part o Frisia would consolidate Frankish rule. Inact, Pippin’s victory over Radbod in AD may have been decisiveor the timing o Willibrord’s expedition; the mission itsel, however,

as outlined above, appears to have been planned urther in advance.

Five years later, Willibrord went to Rome to receive the pallium withthe consent, i not under directions, o Pippin, who appears to have real-ized the potential o archbishoprics or the consolidation and structureo secular power. Te city chosen to be the see o the Frisian archbishop was modern-day Utrecht. Here Willibrord spent most o his mission-ary lie, retreating to his monastery Echternach (o which more in due

76 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i ).77 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i ); Alcuin, Vita Willi-

brordi (MGH SS rer. Merov. , –; Veyrard-Cosme (), , ). Alcuin’s state-ment that Willibrord first went to Utrecht is unreliable, as Angenendt (), n and others have demonstrated; Fritze (), –, on the other hand, is inclined tobelieve Alcuin’s account (as did Hauck (), earlier), but Schäerdiek (), has urther shown that Alcuin here employs literary models rather than outlining his-torical truth, bracketing Willibrord’s continental activity by reerences to Utrecht at thebeginning and end o his narrative o the saint’s mission (chapter and respectively);or Alcuin’s urther application o this technique and more generally or the structure ohis Vita Willibrordi see Reischmann (), –. For the connection between Wil-librord’s mission and Pippin’s victory over the Frisians see especially ibidem, –, an

argument that can already be ound in Rettberg (), (c. also n above); theact that Willibrord approaching the Frankish major domus rather than the Frisian kingconstitutes a major change in Anglo-Saxon missionary tactics is stressed by Angenendt(), –. Flaskamp (), suggests that Wilrith coordinated the mission andthereore the agreement with Pippin rom York. I Willibrord was o royal blood, as ÓCróinín (), – suggests, then this may have helped to secure Pippin’s support.

78 C. pp. – above.79 For the date o Willibrord’s consecration see the two notes on the November

page o his calendar (c. n above); the narrative in Bede, Historia ecclesiastica V (Plummer (), i –); Alcuin, Vita Willibrordi –, (MGH SS rer. Merov. ,

–, ; Veyrard-Cosme (), , , ); Epistola Boniatii (MGH Epp. sel., ). For Pippin’s initiative and interest in Willibrord’s consecration see Wampach(–), i –; Levison (), ; Angenendt (), – (who later, in (),, presents doubts about the Carolingian interest in archbishoprics); Fritze (),– places more emphasis on the papal missionary zeal o the time, but still concludes


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course) at the end o his lie, as well as during the periods when the po-litical situation made it impossible to retain the archdiocese. His contact with the Carolingian dynasty also remained very positive throughouthis lietime, receiving dominions or his monastery Echternach as gifsrom Pippin II and his wie Plectrudis; the monastery was then in returnto become an Eigenkloster o the Carolingians. Tat the avourablerelations to this dynasty survived the death o Pippin and the ensuingstruggle or succession between Plectrudis and Charles Martell is illus-trated by the acts that Charles Martell donated part o his inheritanceto Echternach, that Willibrord baptized Charles Martell’s son PippinIII, that he called Charles dominus and senior in his so-called testament,

and that his calendar records many o the important events o Charles’slie. Tese observations alone suggest that Willibrord was in constantcontact with the Carolingian majores domus, who had their main area oactivity and centre o power in the region between Paris and the Rhine,and that he regularly lived in and travelled through the north-eastern parts o Francia whenever he lef Utrecht and southern Frisia. It doesnot surprise, thereore, to find a text rom the circle o Willibrord inan eighth-century manuscript rom north-eastern France; in act, such a provenance is exactly what would have been expected or the transmis-sion o a text brought to the Continent by Willibrord.

Te Reception

Due to the very nature o computistical ormularies, it is extremely di-ficult to establish the reception o any such work. Te general algorithms

that a Frankish reconquest o the Frisian area around Utrecht initiated Pippin’s sendingo Willibrord to Rome; similarly Schroeder (), –.

80 For the close ties between Echternach and the Carolingians see especially Ech-ternach Charters –, (Wampach (–), ii –, –); c. also n be-low. Te term Carolingians here obviously also reers retrospectively to the ancestors oCharles Martell, as Charles himsel did not ound a new dynasty but largely built on hisather’s successes.

81 For Charles Martell’s donation to Echternach see Echternach Charter (Wam- pach (–), ii –); c. also Echternach Charter (Wampach (–), ii –). Te baptism o Pippin at the hands o Willibrord is recorded in Alcuin, Vita Wil-librordi (MGH SS rer. Merov. , ; Veyrard-Cosme (), ); or this passage seenow Palmer (), –. Willibrord’s testament is Echternach Charter (Wampach

(–), ii –; the terms in question on pp. , ); a discussion o the titles givento Charles Martell in this instance can be ound in Angenendt (), –. Te eventso Charles Martell’s lie noted in Willibrord’s calendar are thoroughly discussed in Le- vison (), –. For the succession crisis and Willibrord’s role in it see especiallyGerberding (), – and now Fouracre (), –, here – on Willibrord.


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outlined in the ormulae usually remain unaltered, while the phrasingmay vary considerably. As long as the wording is not exactly the same, di-rect dependency between two ormularies is difficult to prove and suchan analysis may, in act, lead to very controversial results. Besides iden-tical (not similar!) wording (including especially identical mistakes),the only other criterion that proves dependency o one ormulary romanother is corresponding dating clauses; e.g., the act that the Computus Digbaeanus o AD preserves Dionysius’ original dating o AD or all argumenta copied rom his ormulary proves that the author o

82 E.g., Cordoliani (), and Springseld (), , have reerred to MSS

Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica, Reg. Lat. , starting r and Basel, Universitätsbib-liothek, F III k, starting r respectively as containing the original Dionysiac Argu-menta; they have been deceived by the incipit , which is the same as the one in the printededition o Dionysius’ Argumenta ( Incipiunt argumenta de titulis pascalis Aegyptioruminestigata solertia; Krusch (), ); had they analyzed the argumenta proper, how-ever, they would have realized that these contain dating clauses or AD and AD respectively, which alone are proo enough that the ormulae are later recensions oDionysius’ orginal composition; c. Warntjes (a), –. More problematic is Borst’sapproach to the text Lect. comp. o AD , edited by him or the first time in (),–; he lists some manuscripts or this text, divided into our recensions: α) theoriginal complete text, composed in the Rhine region rom AD onwards; β) a rear-

ranged complete West-Frankish recension rom c .AD onwards; ) ragments romAD onwards in calendar manuscripts; δ) ragments rom AD onwards in non-calendar manuscripts. Yet, even o the our manuscripts listed or the α-recension, onlyone (Cologne, Dombibliothek, ; Ko in Borst) contains the texts as it is published; inthe other three, the text is not only arranged differently, but it is also not cohesive, as itappears scattered throughout the MSS; additionally, some o the ormulae o these MSSlisted as belonging to the original text show dating clauses which are markedly differentrom the AD date. In act, at least in one instance a part o an α-manuscript declaredby Borst to be a copy o a section o Lect. comp. constitutes a separate text in its own right,namely r–v o the α-MS Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Phillipps (Bg in Borst); thistext is clearly a strictly defined, separate ormulary datable to AD , a Vorläuer to the

AD -text (c. Borst (), –, ), and thereore deserves to be treated andedited separately. Te situation is even more complex concerning the - and δ-MSS. Oneexample may suffice: Te excerpts listed under the -MS Cologne, Dombibliothek, (ols. v–v and v–r; Borst (), ) are, in act, part o an independ-ent text extending ols. v–v, the Computus Rhenanus o AD to be discussedbelow; a copy o this text can also be ound in Borst’s α-MS Wolenbüttel, Herzog-Au-gust-Bibliothek, Weissenburg , r–v (note that Borst records the relevant or-mulae only or the Cologne MS, not the Wolenbüttel one, as I have mistakenly statedin (a), : the argumenta o the Wolenbüttel version o the Computus Rhenanus were used by Borst or the edition o Lib. ann. rather than Lect. comp.; or his edition o Lect. comp. he used a different part o the Wolenbüttel MS); the ormula providing this

dating clause o AD , a variation o Argumentum II , is edited as Lect. comp. IIII inBorst (), –, with AD not being the only variation o date: others are AD (rom the Berlin text mentioned above), , , (recte ), , , ,, , and all o these should be treated separately, as part o the collections or textsin which they are contained.


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the Digby computus worked directly rom Dionysius’ original, or ratherthe extended version o the Dionysiac Argumenta that has survived tothe present day (the Group B corpus).

As or the Computus Cottonianus, there is only one text, to my presentknowledge, which also incorporates dating clauses or AD , namely acomputistical ormulary ound in Cologne, Dombibliothek, , v–v (= C) and Wolenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Weissenburg, r–v (= W). For ease o reerence, this ormulary, which hasescaped the attention o modern scholars, may be termed Computus Rhenanus o AD . As the title suggests, the latest dating clause giv-en in this text reers to AD , but it nevertheless also mentions the

earlier AD three times.

Now, all ormulae which include the AD dating in the Computus Rhenanus can also be ound in the Compu-tus Cottonianus, though the date given there is AD rather than AD. Tis difference o one year should not lead us to the conclusionthat the author o the Computus Rhenanus worked rom an entirely di-erent text: Te Computus Cottonianus also has the AD dating laterin the text, and it is not unlikely that the examples in the ormulae werestandardized to AD in a subsequent copy o that ormulary, and thatthe author o the Computus Rhenanus then worked rom this standard-ized version now lost. Indeed, a detailed analysis o the relevant passagesreveals that the Computus Rhenanus is dependent on the Cotton text. Itmay suffice here to illustrate this dependency between the two texts byonly one example. When the different recensions o the Dionysiac Argu-mentum I as outlined in Appendix II are compared, it becomes immedi-ately obvious that the author o the Computus Rhenanus worked directlyrom an updated copy o the Computus Cottonianus: Not only do bothtexts omit the same sentences when compared to earlier versions, they

also incorporate the same mistakes, e.g. the regular is wrongly given as XV rather than XII , while indictiones is misspelled as dictiones in both.As mentioned above, the Computus Rhenanus o AD is the

only text, to my present knowledge, which evidently used the Computus

83 Te Computus Digbaeanus is edited as Dionysius’ Argumenta by Jan (),– and Krusch (), –. Te Group B corpus o Dionysiac argumenta has notbeen edited yet; in act, a new edition o the original Dionysiac Argumenta will have tobe based on the Group B manuscripts, or which see Warntjes (a), –. C. notes

and .84 Tis ormulary is first discussed in Warntjes (a), –.85 Te dating clause or AD can be ound C v–r; W r ( Argumen-

tum II ). For the AD date c. the passages listed in Appendix III below.


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Cottonianus as one o its sources. Accordingly, the discussion o the recep-tion o the Cotton text must solely be based on the Computus Rhenanus.Tis latter ormulary o AD is transmitted in two manuscripts o di-erent provenance, one rom Cologne, the other rom Worms (or, pos-sibly, Weissenburg). Te act, then, that the reception o the ComputusCottonianus can geographically be placed in the middle to lower Rhineregion strongly supports the argument that the Cotton text is to be as-cribed to the circle o Willibrord. In AD or , the abbess Irmina oOeren handed over part o the villa Echternach to Willibrord by coun-sel o the bishops o rier; this estate was then urther increased by do-minions presented to the Anglo-Saxon missionary by Pippin II and his

wie Plectrudis, Irmina’s daughter, in the early eighth century.

On thisestate, Willibrord ounded the amous monastery o Echternach, whichhe regularly used as a place o retreat, and to which he eventually retiredin the final years o his lie. As ar as can be reconstructed rom the lim-ited source material, Willibrord’s area o activity rom this base appearsto have been mainly to the East and obviously especially to the Northtowards the Frisian

warntjes2011 the computus cottonianus of ad 689 a computistical formulary written for willibrord’s...

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