Felix’s Life of St Guthlac and Its Two Old English Versions

Felix’s Vita Sancti Guthlaci, composed in the mid-eighth century at the request of King Ælfwald of East Anglia (r.

713–49), is the earliest substantial literary work from the middle kingdoms of pre-Viking England.

Written in Latin and modelled on the ornate style of Aldhelm, the Vita offers a vivid account of Guthlac,