Alfredian prose: Myth and reality

The term ‘Alfredian prose’ has long been established as a convenient way of referring to a body of Old English texts that were supposedly written or commissioned by King Alfred in the last years of the ninth century. This picture of the king as instigator of vernacular writing originated in Alfred’s own circle and was assiduously promoted by his advisers, but was then expanded and embroidered by subsequent Anglo-Saxon writers for a variety of reasons. But it probably had little basis in fact, and in its modern form, as a story of a royal programme of translation for the benefit of the English people in general, it has produced a distorted impression of the Old English prose writings of the period, and of their origins, purpose and readership.