SOURCE: “Of Mice and Men: Ælfric's Second Homily for the Feast of a Confessor,” in Leeds Studies in English, Vol. 24, 1993, pp. 1-26.

In the following essay, Clayton surveys Ælfric's sources for his second sermon for the feast of a Confessor and explains how it demonstrates Ælfric's reaction to political circumstances of his day.

Ælfric's second homily for the Common of a Confessor (Assmann IV) is a work which has received little attention since it was published in 1889.¹ This two-part text is, however, a most interesting witness to two common Ælfrician practices: his freedom in combining points from very different authorities to produce a thematically coherent exegesis, and his willingness to disrupt this careful cohesion to introduce a theme which testifies to that increasing concern with addressing issues of contemporary relevance which is so characteristic of his later career. In this article I should like to examine the homily...