The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday in Cotton Vespasian

D. xiv: Role and Contextualisation

Concetta Giliberto

The legend of the Fifteen Signs before Doomsday is a narrative of eschatological content which was widely popular in Western Europe throughout the Middle Ages. It
consists of a list of prodigious events, cosmological phenomena and portents which are
said to take place in the fifteen days preceding the end of the world.1 In the British
Isles, the legend of the Signs preceding the Last Judgement enjoyed great success, and
its fortune lasted well into the Renaissance.2 The earliest English version of the legend
is the Fifteen Signs list (Notes 22), preserved in London, British Library, Cotton Vespasian D. xiv, 102r103v (s. xii), which is characterised by a series of original aspects. In
the present essay, I shall focus on the most noticeable features of this Old English list
of the Fifteen Signs, and analyse it in its relationship to the other items in the manuscript. This first vernacular witness of the legend was probably copied in the codex to
serve a didactic function and has a special affinity with other numerological and prognosticatory material in the Vespasian manuscript.
The text has been edited by Assmann3 and Warner4 and was known to both Grau5
and Heist.6 Grau considered this text as modelled on the most common Latin sources
1

On the eschatological themes and particularly on the legend of the Signs before Doomsday, see
E. Sommer, Die fnfzehn Zeichen des jngsten Gerichtes, ZDA 3 (1843), 52330; C. Michaelis, Quindecim Signa ante Judicium, Archiv 46 (1870), 3360; and, above all, G. Nlle, Die Legende von den
fnfzehn Zeichen vor dem jngsten Gerichte, BGdSL 6 (1879), 41376, which offers the first systematic
investigation of the legend and of its sources. The volume by G. Grau, Quellen und Verwandtschaften der
lteren germanischen Darstellungen des Jngsten Gerichtes (Halle a. S., 1908) devotes to the legend of the
Signs before Doomsday a section in the appendix. The monumental work by W. W. Heist, The Fifteen
Signs before Doomsday (East Lansing, MI, 1952), examines a great number of lists of the Fifteen Signs
before Doomsday written in the vernacular languages of Western Europe.
2
In this respect, see C. H. Conley, An Instance of the Fifteen Signs of Judgment in Shakespeare,
Modern Language Notes 30, no. 2 (1915), 414.
3
B. Assmann, Vorzeichen des jngsten Gerichts, Anglia 11 (1889), 36971.
4
Early Homilies from the Twelfth-Century MS. Vespasian D. XIV, ed. R. D.-N. Warner, EETS os 152
(London, 1917), 8991.
5
Grau, Quellen und Verwandtschaften, 275.
6
Heist, The Fifteen Signs, 12530.

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of the legend, the so-called pseudo-Bede and Peter Damian redactions, whereas Heist
highlighted the motifs that the Old English version shares with other literary representations of the last days of the world belonging to different traditions, particularly with
works of Irish origin.

GENESIS AND DISSEMINATION OF THE LEGEND

In early medieval Europe, the growth of millennialist movements favoured the development of a multifarious eschatological literature,7 in whose core the legend of the Fifteen
Signs before Doomsday plays a significant role.
Allusions to a number of signs announcing the parousia and the Last Judgement are
attested in various passages of the Bible, both in the Old and in the New Testament.8
Among the most recurrent signs there are the darkening of the sun and moon and the
falling of the stars. Thunderbolts and earthquakes are also prophesied, as well as the
resurrection of the dead and the dissolution of the entire world through the universal
conflagration, which is the emblematic miraculous sign in the eschatological tradition.
Apocalyptic signs occur in the apocrypha9 and in the works of the Church Fathers,10

Lattente des temps nouveaux: eschatologie, millnarisme et visions du futur du Moyen Age au XX sicle, ed.
A. Vauchez (Turnhout, 2002); Ende und Vollendung. Eschatologische Perspektiven im Mittelalter, ed.
A. Aertsen and M. Pickav (Berlin and New York, 2001); Last Things: Death and the Apocalypse in the
Middle Ages, ed. C. Walker Bynum and P. Freedman (Philadelphia, 2000); The Apocalypse in the Middle
Ages, ed. R. K. Emmerson and B. McGinn (Ithaca, 1993); The Use and Abuse of Eschatology in the Middle
Ages, ed. W. Verbeke, D. Verhelst and A. Welkenhuysen (Louvain, 1988).
8
Isaiah II.1821, XXIV, XXV.2, XXVI.1920, XXVII.813, XXXIV.4, XL.4; Ezekiel XXXII.68,
XXXVIII.1922; Joel I.15; Amos VIII.9; Micah V.10,12; Zechariah XIIXIV; Matthew XXIV.29; Mark
XIII.24, Revelation VI.12, Matthew XXIV.29, Luke XXI.25, Mark XIII.25, Revelation VI.13, Revelation
VIII.5, Matthew VIII.12, XIII.42, Revelation VI.1517, Acts XVII.32; I Corinthians XV.52, 2 Peter
III.12.
9
Among them, IV Esdras (chs. 57 and 1516) offers a description of the events occurring before the
Last Judgement which is particularly rich in dreadful images, see Der lateinische Text der Apokalypse des
Esra, ed. A. F. J. Klijn (Berlin, 1983).
10
A series of eschatological references is provided in Lactantiuss Divinae institutiones (VII.xvi, xvii and
xix), ed. S. Brandt, CSEL 19 (Prague, Vienna and Leipzig, 1890), containing the description of several
portents that later will occur in Fifteen Signs lists, such as the destruction of cities through fire and sword,
earthquakes, floods, diseases, famines, aridity of earth, the drying up of water sources and rivers; the
alteration of waters to blood; the death of any kind of animals; signs in comets, sun, moon and stars; the
collapse of mountains and their levelling; the alteration of the sea which becomes unnavigable; a trumpet
from heaven.

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287

which contained a batch of material that was used and reshaped in the later representations of the Signs of Judgement.
A number of these portents and phenomena, drawn from Biblical and patristic
sources, were remolded and itemised in a catalogue of fifteen signs distributed over the
last fifteen days before Doomsday. The first datable version of the Fifteen Signs list is
that included in the Epistola de die iudicii of Peter Damian, a work composed around
1062.11 A catalogue of the Fifteen Signs is also contained in the Collectanea attributed
to Bede,12 and in the Historia scholastica (Historia evangelica, ch. 141) by Peter Comestor (11691173).13 Relevant is also a passage on the Fifteen Signs in the concluding
part of an Anglo-Norman play dated to the mid-twelfth-century, the Jeu dAdam,
preserved in Tours, Bibliothque municipale, 927;14 finally, another seminal list is
encompassed in the first chapter of the Legenda aurea sanctorum, sive Lombardica historia, or simply Legenda Aurea, by Jacob of Voragine (1270).15 These five listings, which
are different in the kind of the signs included and in their sequence, have been considered the prototypes of a large number of Latin and vernacular Fifteen Signs lists, which
have been conventionally grouped into the following families: Damian, pseudo-Bede,
Comestor, Anglo-Norman, and Voragine (hereafter referred to by these names),
according to the title of their respective ancestor.16
11
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. K. Reindel, vol. 3, MGH Die Briefe der deutschen Kaiserzeit IV
(Munich, 1989), 203.
12
This text was formerly attributed to Bede and printed in 1563 by J. Herwagen in his Opera Bedae
Venerabilis presbyteri Anglosaxonis, on the basis of a codex which is now lost. The most recent edition is
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. M. Bayless and M. Lapidge, Scriptores Latini Hiberniae 14 (Dublin, 1998),
178.
13
PL 198, 1611.
14
Le mystre dAdam (Ordo represantacionis Ade), ed. P. Aebischer (Geneva and Paris, 1963), lines 945
1305. The passage containing the Fifteen Signs was first included in the editions of the Jeu dAdam: Adam,
Drame anglo-normand du XIIe sicle, ed. by V. Luzarche (Tours, 1854) and Adam, mystre du XIIe sicle, ed.
L. Palustre (Paris, 1877); in the first edition of Das Adamsspiel, Anglonormannisches Gedicht des XII. Jahrhunderts, ed. K. Grass (Halle a.S., 1891) this excerpt was published, but in the second and third editions
it was left out.
15
Iacopo da Varazze, Legenda Aurea, ed. G. P. Maggioni, 2nd edn. (Florence, 1998). The catalogue of the
Fifteen Signs contained in the Legenda Aurea is a conflation of the versions of Comestor and Damian, see
H. Sandison, Quindecim signa ante iudicium, ASNSL 124 (1910), 7382, at 735.
16
An identification of archetypes of the legend along with a taxonomy of the Fifteen Signs lists were first
proposed by Nlle, Die Legende von den fnfzehn Zeichen, 41376. Further classifications were provided by Heist, The Fifteen Signs; H. Eggers, Fnfzehn Vorzeichen des Jngsten Gerichts, Die deutsche
Literatur des Mittelalters. Verfasserlexikon, ed. K. Ruh et al., 12 vols. (Berlin and New York, 1977..) II,
101420; C. Gerhardt and N. F. Palmer, Das Mnchner Gedicht von den fnfzehn Zeichen vor dem Jngsten
Gericht (Berlin, 2002), 5967. Such groupings of the versions of the Fifteen Signs list into different families are not to be interpreted as strict and rigid classifications, but rather as a kind of systematisation of the

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The archetypes Damian, pseudo-Bede, Comestor and Voragine all share a spurious attribution of the list to Jerome,17 and they may all descend from the same work
somehow attributed to Jerome. There is no early witness of such a text, and a number
of manuscripts, all dating from the twelfth century onwards, contain lists which the
rubrics (and the catalogues) attribute to Jerome,18 but which, on closer inspection,
coincide with pseudo-Bede. It is likely, therefore, that pseudo-Bede might overlap
with this pseudo-Jerome list. That its circulation is much earlier than the Collectanea
is demonstrated not only by the many Latin witnesses,19 but also by the vernacular
versions such as the Old English one in the Vespasian manuscript, which is indeed the
earliest one (followed, among others, by the Middle English Pricke of Conscience,20 the
Old Frisian21 and the Old Norse22 ones). From this text (pseudo-Jerome alias pseudo-

material of the Fifteen Signs, which allows us to compare similarities and differences among the lists, and
to shed light on their possible relationships.
17
Among the works which are assigned to this Church Father with certainty, no allusion to the Signs
before Doomsday occurs, although it cannot be excluded that a work of Jeromes treating such a subject is
now lost. Moreover, the versions of pseudo-Bede, Comestor and Voragine quote some Hebrew records,
vaguely identified as Annales Hebraeorum, from which Jerome is said to have drawn the material for the
Fifteen Signs legend; yet, the Jewish manuscript tradition has shown no trace of this alleged source, so far.
18
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 2701, B. Lambert, Bibliotheca Hieronymiana
Manuscripta IIIB (Steenbrugge, 1969), 53435 (no. 652).
19
Pseudo-Bede occurs as a single item (separated from the Collectanea) in a number of later continental
and insular manuscripts, dating from the twelfth centuries onwards. It probably circulated on the continent quite early in the Middle Ages. According to Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 12,
the majority of its localisable contents originated either in Ireland or England, or in an Irish foundation
on the continent, and [] the majority of its datable contents are most plausibly assigned to the middle
decades of the eighth century. For a preliminary list of the manuscripts preserving pseudo-Bede as a single
item, see Grau, Quellen und Verwandtschaften, 2745; a number of bibliographical references concerning
the manuscript tradition of pseudo-Bede is also contained in Heist, The Fifteen Signs, 96, and in Gerhardt
and Palmer, Das Mnchner Gedicht von den fnfzehn Zeichen, 60. H. Schenkel, Bibliotheca patrologia
Britannica (published in the Sitzungsberichte der kaiserlichen sterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften,
phil.-hist. Klasse, 18901904) listed a number of texts of the Fifteen Signs, all of which he ascribed to
Bede. According to Schenkel, the earliest manuscripts containing this list are Eton, Eton College Library,
k. 2. 8. (s. xii) and Cambridge, Trinity College O.1.59 (s. xii).
20
Prick of Conscience, ed. R. Morris (London and Berlin, 1863), 12931.
21
De Eerste Riustringer Codex, ed. W. J. Buma (The Hague, 1961), 1223; W. J. Buma, Geestelijke
literatuur in Oud-Friesland, Trijeresom. Ynliedingen halden yn de Fryske seksje fan it Nederlansk Philologekongres 1950 (Grins [Groningen] and Djakarta, 1950), 550, at 918; C. Giliberto, The Fifteen Signs of
Doomsday of the First Riustring Manuscript, Advances in Old Frisian Philology, ed. R. H. Bremmer Jr,
S. Laker and O. Vries, ABG 64 / Estrikken 80 (Amsterdam and New York, 2007), 12952.
22
J. W. Marchand, Early Scandinavian Variants of the Fifteen Signs before Doomsday, Acta Philologica
Scandinavica 31 (1976), 11732.

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289

Bede) the other Latin traditions of Peter Damian and Peter Comestor23 are most likely
descended.
THE LISTS OF SIGNS BEFORE DOOMSDAY IN ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND
In Anglo-Saxon England there were in circulation several works, both in Latin and in
vernacular, dealing with the Last Judgement and the signs which precede it; their
frequency is clearly related to the chiliastic expectations that were fostered at least from
the tenth century onwards. The author of the list of the Fifteen signs in Vespasian D. xiv
certainly drew on a version of pseudo-Bede and he also knew Peter Damians list.24
Moreover, alongside the Fifteen Signs legend, there were also a number of texts in
which somewhat different signs are described and allocated to the last week preceding
the Last Judgement. This so-called Seven Days legend is found in the following anonymous Old English homilies:
Vercelli XV, De Die Judicii,25 in Vercelli, Biblioteca Capitolare, CXVII (s. x2);26
Apocalypse of Thomas, partial,27 in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41 (s. xiin);28
Apocalypse of Thomas, partial,29 in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41;
Blickling VII, Dominica Pascha,30 in Princeton, University Library, W. H. Scheide Collection 71 (c. 1000);31
23
Comestors redaction differs from pseudo-Bedes in the omission of the third sign (with the consequent moving back of all the subsequent signs of one day) and in the allocation in the fifteenth day of a newly invented
sign. Furthermore, Comestors text regularly inverts the order of the twelfth and thirteenth signs of pseudo-Bede.
Other differences in the style and in the choice of words contribute to distinguish these two types.
24
Damian is otherwise attested in a number of late Anglo-Saxon manuscripts; I have found five versions
of Damian (independent of his Epistola de die iudicii). Damian lists occur in London, British Library, Cotton Faustina A. v, 99102 (s. xiex/xiiin; Ker, Catalogue, no. 152, Gneuss, Handlist, no. 330.5); Cambridge,
Corpus Christi College 267 (c. 1200) (R. Gameson, The Manuscripts of Early Norman England (c. 1066
1130) [Oxford, 1999], no. 67); Oxford, St Johns College 17 (c. 111011; Ker, Catalogue, no. 360);
London, British Library, Burney 357 (s. xii2; Gameson, The Manuscripts of Early Norman England, no.
363); Chicago, University Library, 147 (c. 1150).
25
The Vercelli Homilies and Related Texts, ed. D. G. Scragg, EETS os 300 (Oxford, 1992), 25065.
26
Ker, Catalogue, no. 394; Gneuss, Handlist, no. 941.
27
M. Frster, A New Version of the Apocalypse of Thomas in Old English, Anglia 73 (1955), 635, at
1727.
28
Ker, Catalogue, no. 32; Gneuss, Handlist, no. 39.
29
R. Willard, Two Apocrypha in Old English Homilies, Beitrge zur englischen Philologie 30 (Leipzig,
1935, repr. 1967), 46.
30
The Blickling Homilies. Edition and Translation, ed. R. J. Kelly (New York, 2003), 5867; The Blickling
Homilies of the Tenth Century, ed. R. Morris, EETS os 58, 63 and 73 (London, 187480; repr. in one vol.,
1967), 915.
31
Ker, Catalogue, no. 382; Gneuss, Handlist, no. 905.

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Wednesday in Rogationtide,32 in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 162 (s. xiin);33

In Letania maiore,34 in Oxford, Bodleian Library, Hatton 116 (s. xiiin).35

The ultimate source of this Seven Days legend can be identified in the so-called Apocalypse of Thomas, an apocryphal work, probably composed in Latin, which claims to be
a letter from Christ to Thomas, referring to the end of the world and to the signs that
will take place on each of the seven days preceding the Last Judgement.36
It is not clear if there is a connection between the legend of the Fifteen Signs and
that of the last Seven Days or if one is the source of the other.37 What is certain is that
the Old English homilies on the last Seven Days show signs which are absolutely different from those listed in the Fifteen Signs legend. The only features which the two
traditions have in common are the earthquake, the resurrection of the bodies38 and a
generic similarity in the signs concerning the celestial bodies. And still, such affinities
appear rather superficial, since both legends might have derived these signs from the
Bible, independently and separately.39 Therefore, the Seven Days homilies and the
Fifteen Signs legend belong to two different traditions, and the text in Vespasian D. xiv
represents the only instance of the Fifteen Signs list in Old English.

32

Eleven Old English Rogationtide Homilies, ed. J. Bazire and J. Cross (Toronto, 1982), 4754.
Ker, Catalogue, no. 38; Gneuss, Handlist, no. 50.
34
M. Frster, Der Vercelli CXVII nebst Abdruck einiger altenglischer Homilien der Handschrift,
Festschrift fr Lorenz Morsbach, ed. F. Holthausen and H. Spies, Studien zur englischen Philologie 50
(Halle a. S., 1913), 20179, at 12837.
35
Ker, Catalogue, no. 333.
36
See F. M. Biggs, Sources of Anglo-Saxon Literary Culture. The Apocrypha (Kalamazoo, MI, 2007), 712;
C. D. Wright, The Apocalypse of Thomas: Some New Latin Texts and their Significance for the Old English Versions, Apocryphal Texts and Traditions in Anglo-Saxon England, ed. K. Powell and D. G. Scragg
(Cambridge, 2003), 2764; M. Swan, The Apocalypse of Thomas in Old English, LSE 29 (1998), 33346;
M. McC. Gatch, Two Uses of Apocrypha in Old English Homilies, Church History 33 (1964), 37980;
Frster, A New Version of the Apocalypse; M. R. James, The Apocryphal New Testament (Oxford, 1924),
5556; F. Wilhelm, Deutsche Legenden und Legendare (Leipzig, 1907), 40*42*.
37
For a discussion on the relationship between the Fifteen Signs legend and the Apocalypse of Thomas
(and the Seven Days legend), see Gatch, Two Uses of Apocrypha, 380; Frster, A New Version of the
Apocalypse, 16; Heist, The Fifteen Signs, 323, 635, 978, 106; Grau, Quellen und Verwandtschaften,
269.
38
A difference in the representation of this sign must be also remarked: in the seven days legend the
reunion of the bodies with their souls is described, while in the Fifteen Signs legend the bones of the dead
gather together and rise up as far as the tomb.
39
Earthquakes are prophesied in Revelation VIII.5 and the resurrection of the dead occur in Acts XVII.32
and I Corinthians XV.52. The darkening of the sun and moon is predicted in Matthew XXIV.29; Mark
XIII.24, the change of the moon to blood in Revelation VI.12 and the falling of heavenly bodies in
Matthew XXIV.29, Luke XXI.25, Mark XIII.25, Revelation VI.13.
33

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291

Notwithstanding these conclusions, the coexistence in Anglo-Saxon England of these

two different traditions betrays a strong penchant for eschatological themes and for
their employment in the production of literary accounts about the final destiny of the
world and of humankind.40

THE OLD ENGLISH VERSION OF THE FIFTEEN SIGNS BEFORE JUDGEMENT

The Old English version of the Fifteen Signs list, as we have seen, is preserved in London, British Library, Cotton Vespasian D. xiv, 102r103v. This is a composite codex;41
its first part (fols. 4169)42 is dated to the middle of the twelfth century; its second part
(fols. 170224)43 was probably written in Italy and came to England by the early tenth
century. The two parts were joined in all likelihood in the early seventeenth century.44
The first part (fols. 4169), most of which is drafted in a single hand, contains
chiefly homiletic and theological texts; these were printed as a whole by Warner.45 The
style of script as well as the insertion at 151v157v of a translation of a Latin sermon
by Ralph dEscures (bishop of Rochester, 11081114, archbishop of Canterbury,
11141122) suggest that Rochester46 or Canterbury47 could be the places of origin of
40
In this respect, see M. McC. Gatch, Perception of Eternity, The Cambridge Companion to Old English
Literature, ed. M. Godden and M. Lapidge (Cambridge, 1986), 190205.
41
Ker, Catalogue, no. 20910, Gneuss, Handlist, no. 392. For a fuller description of the manuscript, see
no. 245 in Wulfstan Texts and Other Homiletic Materials, ed. J. Wilcox, ASMMF 8 (Tempe, AR, 2000),
5364; J. Wilcox, The Transmission of lfrics Letter to Sigefyrth and the Mutilation of MS Cotton
Vespasian D. xiv, Early Medieval English Texts and Interpretations: Studies Presented to Donald G. Scragg,
ed. E. Treharne and S. Rosser (Tempe, AR, 2003), 285309; R. Handley, British Museum Ms. Cotton
Vespasian D. xiv, N&Q 219 (1974), 24350; M. Richards, On the Date and Provenance of the MS
Cotton Vespasian D.XIV ff. 4169, Manuscripta 17 (1973), 315; M. Frster, Der Inhalt der altenglischen Handschrift Vespasian D. XIV, Englische Studien 54 (1920), 4668.
42
Ker, Catalogue, no. 209.
43
Ibid. no. 210.
44
The two parts were still not united by 1560, when Laurence Nowell used the first part without showing any knowledge of the second part; yet they had been joined by 1621, when both were described
together in the first manuscripts catalogue of Sir Robert Cotton, see Wilcox, Wulfstan Texts and Other
Homiletic Materials, 54; J. Wilcox, The Transmission of lfrics Letter, 291 and n. 16; V. Schmetterer,
Drei altenglische religise Texte aus der Handschrift Cotton Vespasianus D XIV (unpubl. PhD dissertation,
Univ. of Vienna, 1981), 9.
45
Warner, Early Homilies.
46
Particularly Richards, On the Date and Provenance, inclines to a Rochester origin.
47
Handley, British Museum Ms. Cotton Vespasian D. xiv, 249 insists on linking the compilation of the
codex to Anselms activity as archbishop of Canterbury (10931109). A further clue for Christ Church,
Canterbury, as place of origin is proposed by L. S. Chardonnens, Context, Language, Date and Origin of

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Giliberto

the first part of Vespasian D. xiv.48 By 1621 the manuscript belonged to Sir Robert
Cotton. The majority of the pieces here clustered are drawn from the two series of
lfrics Catholic Homilies,49 and Lives of Saints,50 but there is also a selection of items
of miscellaneous genre, such as a fragment of lfrics Letter to Sigefyrth (6v),51 the
Disticha Catonis in Old English (7r11v),52 a version of Mosess Decalogue excerpted
from lfrics Second Letter for Archbishop Wulfstan (13v15r), lfrics version in Old
English of De.xii. abusivis (15r21r), a version of the Old English Gospel of Nicodemus
(87v100r), an Old English translation of the first sixteen chapters of Alcuins De virtutibus et vitiis (104r119r), an account of the ages of the world (158r159r), two
extracts translated in Old English from the Elucidarium attributed to Honorius of
Autun (159r165r).
The second part of Vespasian D. xiv (170224) is written in a continental minuscule, which Ker dated to the ninth century. By the year 912 the manuscript was in use
in England, where additional texts were added in square Anglo-Saxon minuscule.
Alongside some excerpts from the Meters of Boethiuss De consolatione Philosophiae, it
includes a copy of Isidores Synonyma.
The text on the Fifteen Signs before Doomsday is recorded in Vespasian D. xiv,
102r103v, and is probably a later addition made by the main hand in an originally
blank space, at the end of the quire.53 It is preceded by a condensed version of the
Embassy of Nathan in Old English (100v102r) and followed by a month brontology
(103v). Yet, although it was added later, the inclusion of the Fifteen Signs list in this
section of the manuscript does not seem absolutely random, since it was copied at the
end of a quire with items related to the Second Coming and Doomsday, such as a piece
on the coming of Antichrist (76v), which opens the quire, and an abridged version of

Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, Foundations of Learning: the Transfer of Encyclopaedic Knowledge in the Early
Middle Ages, ed. R. H. Bremmer Jr and K. Dekker, Mediaevalia Groningana n.s. 9 (Leuven, 2007), 317
40, at 323, n. 17.
48
For a recent discussion of the place of origin of Vespasian D. xiv, fols. 4169, see S. Irvine, The Compilation and Use of Manuscripts Containing Old English in the Twelfth Century, Rewriting Old English
in the Twelfth Century, ed. M. Swan and E. Treharne (Cambridge, 2000), 4161, at 4854.
49
lfrics Catholic Homilies: the First Series. Text, ed. P. Clemoes, EETS ss 17 (Oxford, 1997); lfrics
Catholic Homilies: the Second Series. Text, ed. M. Godden, EETS ss 5 (London, 1979); M. Godden, lfrics
Catholic Homilies, Introduction, Commentary and Glossary, EETS ss 18 (Oxford, 2000).
50
lfrics Lives of Saints, ed. W. W. Skeat, EETS os 76, 82, 94, 114 (London, 18811900, repr. as two
volumes 1966).
51
Wilcox, The Transmission of lfrics Letter.
52
R. S. Cox, The Old English Distichs of Cato, Anglia 90 (1972), 142.
53
Ker, Catalogue, no. 209; Handley, British Museum Ms. Cotton Vespasian D. xiv, 243; Wilcox, AngloSaxon Manuscripts, 55.

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the Old English Gospel of Nicodemus (87v100r) devoted to the theme of the Harrowing of Hell, which was considered to be a type of the parousia.54
The language of the text is basically Late West Saxon, interspersed with elements of
other dialects and displaying a number of phenomena which point to the development
towards Middle English forms.55 The text which is here presented is taken from Warners edition:56
On an nexten fiftene dagen beforen domesdge, sculen gewuren
foretacnen, e bodie 7 tacnie one styrnlicne ege, e God sceawe
an arleasen, one he demen sceal rihtwisen 7 unrihtwisen.
On an formen dige, se s heo onhef ofer ealle dunen feowertig
elnen on hehnysse swa swa weall, 7 swa hit by fram morgen o fen.
On an oren dige, seo s besinc inn agean swa deope, t uneae
man gesic t ufemeste, 7 swa hit by eallne dig.
On an ridden dige, heo gecer to hire rihte gecynde mid eallen hire
streamen, e heo hfde t frymen, a a God rest toscelede wter
fram lande.
On an feoren dige, ealle slice deor 7 fissces heo teowigie
bufe an yen 7 bellgige swa swa mid mnnisscre reorde, ac
ehhweere ne understant nan mann heora gereord bute God ane;
7 t by to tacnunge re eorre, e God cy an synfullen on
domes dige.
On an fiften dige, ealle wyrte 7 ealle treowwes ageafe read
swat swa blodes dropen. t do a wyrten, for y t a synfulle
mn heo trden, 7 a treowwen, for an e a synfulle hfden freome
of heom 7 of heora wstmen.
On an sixten dige sculen slean togdere ealle stanes lytle
7 mycele, 7 lc stan tobrytt on feower hloten, 7 lc re hloten fiht
wi oer, oet heo eall to duste gewure. t heo do foran, t a
arlease mnn of heom worhten steples 7 castles, t heo r
mid swncten geleaffulle mnn 7 Godes earefen.
On an seofeen dige wure geemnode denen 7 dunen, swa t
eall eore by smee 7 emne. t betacned, t God ne forsih

54

10

15

20

25

Handley, British Museum Ms. Cotton Vespasian D. xiv, 245.

It is certainly the transcription of an older exemplar which cannot have been written before the middle
of the tenth century, as the occurrence of modignysse (line 27) and of a form of the typically Late West
Saxon verb tobrytan (line 21), here used as an intransitive verb, seems to suggest, see W. Hofstetter, Winchester und der sptaltengliche Sprachgebruch (Munich, 1987), 208 and H. Schabram, Superbia. Studien zum
Altenglischen Wortschatz. Teil I: die dialektale und zeitliche Verbreitung des Wortguts (Munich, 1965), 1189.
56
Warner, Early Homilies, 8991. All translations in this paper are mine, unless noted otherwise.
55

294

Giliberto

s earfendan ansene, ne ne wure s mihtiges mannes modignysse,

ac besie to lces mannes gewyrhten.
On a ehteen dige gewur swylc eorstyrung, t eall
middeneard beofe fram eastdle to westdle,
for an e he abr r mannen unrihtwisnysse.
On an nigeen dige tofealle castles, 7 steples, 7 hus,
7 circen, 7 ealle getimbrunge lytle 7 mycele, for an e a
synfulle hfden ron heora wununge.
On an tenen dige, heo gegaderige ealle deaddre manna
lymen, swa t gyf an mann wre dead on middewearden, 7
his an hand oe fot wre on eastdle, 7 his oer lym on westdle,
ehhweere heo cume togdere lc to his lichame, 7 lc
lichame arist o his byrigeles brerd.
On an ndeleften dge eorne wilddeor
beo tunen, 7 felden, 7 manna wunungen, swa swa heo beon wittlease.
On an twelften dige eorne mnn geon(d) eall middeneard byfigende
7 drdende Cristes tocyme to demene cwican 7 deaden, swa t se
were ne gret his wif, ne t wif hire were, eh heo heom gemeten,
ac by swa swa wittlease 7 unspecende. Ne heo ne ete, ne heo ne
drinca.
On an reottende dige fealle sunne 7 mone, 7 ealle steorren,
for an e heo geafen leome an yfelen mannen.
On an feowertenen dige, ealle libbenden mnn
gewure deade, swa t heora nan ne by gebyrod, ac fyr cum
7 forbrn a eore, for an e heo fostrede a synfulle 7 a arlease.
On an fiftene dige cum flod 7 geswyle a sscen, 7
besnc ealle a unclnnyssen into re eore deopnysse, swa t
on middenearde ne belf naht unclnes gesene.

30

35

40

45

50

On the last fifteen days before Doomsday, signs will take place that announce and designate the harsh terror that God will show to the wicked, when he shall judge the righteous
and unrighteous. On the first day, the sea it will rise up over all mountains, forty ells in
height, like a wall, and so it will stay from morning until evening. On the second day,
the sea will sink again so deep that one hardly sees its surface, and so it will stay for the
entire day. On the third day, it will turn back to its proper place with all its streams that
it had in the beginning, when God first divided the water from the land. On the fourth
day, all animals of the sea and fishes they will appear above the waves and bellow as if
with a human voice, but nevertheless no-one will understand their speech, except for
God; and that will be a sign of the anger that God will show to the sinful on Doomsday.
On the fifth day, all plants and all trees will produce red sweat like drops of blood. The
plants will do so because the sinful people stepped on them and the trees because the
sinful profited from them and from their fruits. On the sixth day all stones, small and
big, will strike against one another, and each stone will break in four parts, and each one

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

295

of these parts will fight against the other, until they all become dust. They do so because
the wicked people constructed from them towers and castles, so that they therewith vexed
the faithful people and Gods poor. On the seventh day, valleys and mountains will be
levelled, so that the whole earth will be smooth and even. This designates that God does
not overlook the face of poor people, nor exalts the arrogance of mighty people, but look
upon the deeds of each man. On the eighth day, there will be such an earthquake that
the whole earth will shake from the east to the west, because it carried mens wickedness.
On the ninth day, castles and towers and houses and churches and all buildings, small
and big, will fall to pieces, because the sinful people had their dwelling in them. On the
tenth day, the limbs of all the dead will gather, so that if a man died in the middle of the
earth and a hand or a foot of him were in the east, and his other limbs were in the west,
yet they will each come together to his body, and each body will rise up to the surface of
the grave. On the eleventh day, wild beasts will run by gardens and fields and mens
dwellings, as if they were mad. On the twelfth day, men will run all over the earth, trembling and dreading the coming of Christ to judge the quick and the dead, so that a man
does not greet his wife, nor the wife her man, even though they meet each other, but they
will be like mad and dumb people. They will neither eat, nor drink. On the thirteenth
day, the sun and the moon and all stars will fall down, because they gave light to the evil
people. On the fourteenth day, all living people will die, so that none of them will be
buried, but a fire will come and burn down the earth, because it nourished the sinful and
evil people. On the fifteenth day, a flood will come and wash away the ashes and will
drown all the impurities into the deep of the earth, so that on earth no impurity will
remain to be seen.

The text opens with a general preamble (lines 13) which briefly introduces the theme
of the signs, but which does not contain the attribution of the legends authorship to
Jerome as do the Latin versions. What emerges in this introduction is the attitude of
the anonymous author to move the text towards a homiletic mood, as the wording
seems to suggest: one styrnlicne ege, e God sceawe an arleasen (lines 23).
A first element of novelty is represented by the order by which the signs are arranged
in the fifteen days. Except for the first four signs, concerning the waters and the aquatic
animals, in the Old English text the sequence according to which the signs are listed
was radically altered in comparison to pseudo-Bede and Damian. Moreover, the Old
English text leaves out a number of signs from the Latin sources: the burning of the
waters (pseudo-Bedes fifth), the assembling of the flying creatures, speaking and weeping together (Damians fifth), the torrents of flames (Damians sixth) and finally the
tails of fire scattered from the stars (Damians seventh).
Comparison with the known archetypes of the legend reveals that the Old English
Fifteen Signs list starts off as a translation based chiefly on pseudo-Bedes version (with
occasional traits derived from Peter Damian). Yet, it is not slavishly derived from the
Latin sources, since its author has transformed the basic text by adding a number of

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Giliberto

innovations and original properties which have no parallels in pseudo-Bede, nor in

Damian.
On the first day the sea is said to rise up over all mountains, forty ells in height, like
a wall, and to stay so from morning to evening. pseudo-Bede reads:
Prima die eriget se mare in altum quadraginta cubitis, super altitudines montium, et erit
quasi murus, et amnes similiter.57

While Damian has:

Signum, inquit, primi diei: Maria omnia in altitudinem quindecim cubitorum exaltabuntur super montes excelsos, orbem terre non affligent, sed sicut muri equora stabunt.58

The strongest similarity with pseudo-Bede (rather than with Damian) is clearly revealed
in the general description of the sign and in the choice of the words; furthermore the
sea is said to raise up over all mountains, forty ells in height, as in pseudo-Bede (quadraginta cubitus), and not fifteen ells as in Damian (quindecim cubitis). An addition introduced by the Old English text, along with the adjective heo referred to s (line 4), is
the sentence swa hit by fram morgen o fen (line 5) which seems echo a formula.59
Again, in the representation of the sign of the second day, when the sea is said to
sink so deep that one hardly sees its surface, the Old English text translates the pseudoBedes passage quite faithfully (note the use of ufemeste in line 7 to render summitas
eorum of the Latin source):
Secunda die descendent usque ad ima, ita ut summitas eorum uix conspici possit.60

While Damian has a slightly different reading:

Signum secundi diei: Omnia equora prosternuntur in imum profundi ita, ut vix queant
humanis obtutibus conspici.61

57

Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the first day, the sea will rise to the
height of forty cubits, above the height of the mountains, and will become like a wall, and the rivers too.
58
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 212. The sign, he says, of the first day: all the seas will
rise up, in height, fifteen cubits above the eminent mounains, without afflicting the earth, but seas will
stay like walls.
59
This expression is also recorded in a homily on the observance of Sunday, Be am drihtenlican sunnandg folces lar, A. S. Napier, Contributions to Old English Literature 1: an Old English Homily on
the Observance of Sunday, An English Miscellany Presented to Dr. Furnivall, ed. W. P. Ker and A. S. Napier
(Oxford, 1901), 35562, at 356.
60
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the second day they will descend right
to the bottom, so that one can scarcely see the surface.
61
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 22. The sign of the second day: all the seas will be plunged
down into the lowest depth, so that they are hardly visible to the human eyes.

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

297

Still, the Old English text differs from its Latin source for the detail added at the end
of the signs that the sea will stay in that position for the entire day: 7 swa hit by
eallne dig (line 7).
In the description of the third sign, which foresees the return of the waters to their
original level, the Old English text diverges significantly from pseudo-Bedes, whose
account is extremely concise:
Tertia die erunt in aequalitate, sicut ab exordio.62

As far as this sign is concerned, the Old English text seems to recall Damians, which
reads as follows:
Signum tercii diei: Maria omnia redigentur in antiquum statum, qualiter ab exordio
creata fuerunt.63

Yet, the Old English text introduces the phrase mid eallen hire streamen (lines 89)
and concludes the narration of the sign with an explicit reference to the event described
in Genesis I.9, when, at the beginning of the creation God separated the earth form the
water (lines 910).
In the fourth sign, concerning the water creatures, the Old English text is indebted
chiefly to pseudo-Bede:
Quarta die pisces et omnes beluae marinae, et congregabuntur super aquas, et dabunt
uoces et gemitus, quarum significationem nemo scit nisi Deus.64

Of the Latin source it reproduces the syntactic construction and translates almost verbatim expressions such as pisces et omnes beluae marinae, rendered with ealle slice
deor 7 fissces heo (line 11) and nemo scit nisi Deus, translated as understant nan
mann [] bute God ane (line 13). The Old English author adds a new detail, namely
that the voices emitted by the fishes are human, a point not mentioned in pseudoBede.
The fourth sign in Damian, on the other hand, has a more elaborate and extensive
structure:

62

Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the third day they will be level, as they
were in the beginning.
63
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 22. The sign of the third day: all the seas will be brought
back to their original position, as they had been created in the beginning.
64
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the fourth day the fish and all the
monsters of the sea will gather on the surface of the water and will utter cries and groans whose meaning
is known only to God.

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Giliberto

Signum quarti diei: Belue omnes et omnia, quae moventur in aquis marinis, congregabuntur et levabuntur supra pelagus more contentionis invicem mugientes et rugientes;
nescient homines, quid cantent vel quid cogitent, sed tantum scit Deus.65

From this sign onwards the Old English text adds to the narration of the portents a
kind of explanation to clarify the meaning of the events described. These are newly
invented sections, whose character is clearly admonishing and moralising. In the fourth
sign, the gathering of the fishes above the waves, roaring with a human voice, which is
understandable only by God, is interpreted as an omen of the divine anger that will be
manifest on the day of judgement: 7 t by to tacnunge re eorre, e God cy
an synfullen on domes dige (lines 145).
Starting from the fifth sign, the Old English list reshuffles the order of the signs and
follows neither the sequence of pseudo-Bede, nor that of Peter Damian. The fifth sign,
the bloody dew on the plants, corresponds to the sixth of pseudo-Bede and to the tenth
of Damian. The Old English narrative is undoubtedly modelled on pseudo-Bedes
description, both its syntax and its choice of the words, as the comparison makes clear:
ealle wyrte 7 ealle treowwes ageafe read swat swa blodes dropen (lines 167) is nearly
identical to:
Sexta die omnes herbae et arbores sanguineum rorem dabunt.66

The representation of this phenomenon is then completed with a moralisation which

provides a justification for the red bloody sweat excreted from the plants; it is explained
as a punishment for the sinful people who benefited from them and from their fruits
(lines 168).
The sixth sign (the battle of the stones) matches the eighth of pseudo-Bede and the ninth
of Damian. Also in this sign, the Old English text tends to reproduce pseudo-Bede:
Octaua die debellabunt petrae adinuicem, et unaquaeque in tres partes se diuidet, et
unaquaeque pars collidet aduersus alteram.67

The basic structure is then modified with slight variations with respect to pseudo-Bede,
both in the terminology (as, for example, sculen slean in line 20 to render debel-

65

Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 22. The sign of the fourth day: all the beasts and all things
that move in the waters of the sea will gather together and will be lifted up above the sea, bellowing and
roaring against each other as if in a fight; and men will not know what they sing or what they think, but
only God will know.
66
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the sixth day all herbs and trees will
give forth a bloody dew.
67
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the eighth day the rocks will fight one
another, and each one will divide into three parts, and each part will dash against another.

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

299

labunt and fiht on line 21 translating collidet) and in the addition of the sentence
oet heo eall to duste gewure (line 22). Other details could have been derived
from Damian, such as the clause with the word-pair ealle stanes lytle 7 mycele (201),
which translates the corresponding Omnes lapides tam magni quam parvi, or the fact
that each stone splits into four parts, as in Damian, and not into three, as in pseudoBede. The account of the battle of the stones is followed by a moralising exegesis (lines
224), which interprets the event as a sign against the wicked, who used stones to build
palaces and to torment devout Christians.
The seventh sign, concerning the levelling of valleys and mountains, corresponds to
the tenth in pseudo-Bede:68
Decima die omnes colles et ualles in planiciem conuertentur, et erit aequalitas terrae.69

The Old English text translates the expression omnes colles et ualles with the alliterative half pair denen 7 dunen (line 25) and renders aequalitas with the double expression smee 7 emne (lines 26). The moralisation attached to the description of the sign
explains that the Supreme Judge will take into consideration the deeds of all people,
without any kind of discrimination.
The eighth sign, which predicts a huge earthquake, matches the ninth in pseudoBede and the eighth in Damian. For the presentation of this sign, the Old English text
does not follow any of its Latin sources:
Pseudo-Bede: Nona die erit terraemotus, qualis non fuit ab initio mundi.70
Damian: Signum octavi diei: Terremotus erit magnus ita, ut nullus homo stare possit aut
ullum animal, sed solo sternentur omnia.71

The announcement of the earthquake is accompanied by the formulaic expression

fram eastdle to westdle (line 30),72 conveying the idea that the whole earth will be
shaken, while the moralising comment states that this portent has the purpose of eradicating human injustice.
68

The sign in Damian which can be compared with the seventh of the Old English list is the eleventh,
which has the pulverisation of both mountains and buildings.
69
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the tenth day all the hills and valleys
will be turned into a plain, and the earth will all be the same level.
70
Collectanea pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the ninth day there will be an earthquake unlike any since the beginning of the world.
71
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 23. The sign of the eighth day: there will be a great earthquake, so that neither man nor animal can stand, but everything will be knocked down to the ground.
72
A parallel to his Old English is found in the Old Frisian fon asta there wralde to westa there wralde,
recorded in the Fifteen Signs list of the First Riustring Codex, in the fifth, in the seventh and in the
fifteenth signs, see Giliberto, The Fifteen Signs of Doomsday, 139, 146.

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Giliberto

The ninth sign of the Old English text, which describes the collapse of all the buildings in the world, coincides with the seventh in pseudo-Bede and partially with the
eleventh in Damian,73 but it is much more detailed, listing several kinds of buildings
which will be destroyed (castles, 7 steples, 7 hus, 7 circen, 7 ealle getimbrunge, lines
323). It is also embellished with the word-pair lytle 7 mycele (line 33) and provided
with the usual moralistic conclusion, which explains the destruction of all edifices as
the right means to deprive the wicked of their dwellings.
The tenth sign, which concerns the reassembly of the limbs, matches the thirteenth in
both pseudo-Bede and Damian, but the narration of this event in Vespasian D. xiv is
original and more elaborate. Unlike Damians version, which has only the opening of the
graves, and pseudo-Bedes, which briefly describes the gathering of the bones, the Old
English text has a more extensive representation, speaking of the reunion of the limbs
with their respective corpses; the image which it offers is quite macabre and gruesome.
The eleventh sign of the Old English text has no correspondence in pseudo-Bede.
Basically, this sign, which describes the roaming about of untamed animals as if they
were mad, recalls Damians twelfth sign, except for the fact that the animals in the
Latin text neither eat nor drink:
Signum duodecimi diei: Omnia animalia terre de silvis et de montibus venient ad campos rugientia et mugientia non gustantia neque bibentia.74

The twelfth sign, that of the account of the running around of all human beings like
mad, corresponds to the eleventh in pseudo-Bede and to the fourteenth in Damian,
but it displays some very interesting innovations. The Latin versions have the following
narrations:
Pseudo-Bede: Undecima die homines exibunt de cauernis suis, et current quasi amentes,
nec poterit alter respondere alteri.75
Damian: Signum quartidecimi diei: Omne humanum genus, quod inventum fuerit de
habitaculis et de locis, in quibus erunt, velociter descendent, non intelligentes neque
loquentes, sed discurrent ut amentes.76

73

See n. 68.
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 23. The sign of the twelfth day: all the animals of the earth
will come from the forests and the mountains to the fields, roaring and bellowing, neither eating nor
drinking.
75
Collectanea Pseudo-Bedae, ed. Bayless and Lapidge, 1789: On the eleventh day, men will come out
from their caves and will run around like madmen, but each one will not be able to understand another.
76
Die Briefe des Petrus Damiani, ed. Reindel, 23. The sign of the fourteenth day: all the human race that
will be found will come down rapidly from the houses and the places in which they were, neither understanding nor speaking, but they will run hither and thither like madmen.
74

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

301

The text of Vespasian D. xiv prophesied that all people will run (eorne on lines 42
translates current of pseudo-Bede) throughout the earth, trembling for the fear of
Gods judgement, so that a husband will not greet his wife, nor a wife her husband;
they will behave like mad, unable to utter a word, without eating or drinking; yet, the
occurrence of their issuing from houses and caves which is predicted in pseudoBedes and Damians versions is here omitted. The idea of mens madness is expressed
through the use of the loan rendition wittlease (line 45) created from amentes,
recorded in both the Latin sources; while their condition of being dumb is denoted by
unspecende (line 45), used to render the neque loquentes of Damian. The fact that
they neither speak nor drink could have been derived from Damian, but this trait is
present in Damians twelfth sign, and relates to animals, rather than to humans. Finally,
the motif of men shaking for fear of the divine verdict, conveyed through the word pair
byfigende 7 drdende (lines 423), is an innovation added by the Old English
author.
The inability of people to communicate with each other is clearly expressed in
pseudo-Bede (nec poterit alter respondere alteri) and is further developed in the Old
English text, in which it is associated with the theme of the loneliness of each human
being on the Day of Judgement. This passage shows the emotional distress which will
affect every human; when overpowered by the appearance of the Lord, nobody will be
able to speak or recognise their lifetime partners.77
Within the tradition of the signs preceding Doomsday, the motif of the loneliness of
every man in front of the Supreme Judge is also expressed in an Irish poem on the
Fifteen Signs by Donnchadh Mr Dlaigh, dated to the thirteenth century:
Ni urmhais neach n do rdh
Acht bheith ar sraons ar seachrn
G deach ar aghaidh gach fhir
n labhair neah r naoidhin.
Sgarfar gach fear r mhnaoi a muigh
Sgarfar gach mae r mhthair
Nocha mbia dias ar domhan
Bhias Dhia gan dealoghadh.78
77

This motif resembles the theme of human isolation on Judgement Day, when no one can receive any
kind of assistance from their relatives or friends, who had always provided comfort and support in worldly
life, in time of sorrow and troubles. For a scrutiny of this motif, exploited in various forms in Anglo-Saxon
homilies, see P. Lendinara, frater non redimit, redimet homo: a Homiletic Motif and its Variants in
Old English, Early Medieval Englis Texts, ed. Treharne and Rosser, 6780. Lendinara has named this motif
no aid from kin.
78
No man can speak / but overwhelmed and distraught; / no man says a word to his child. / though it
dies before his eyes. / Every man shall be torn from his wife / every son from his mother / so that no

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Giliberto

In this passage the motif is more complex, since, along the impossibility of communication, it expresses the separation of each man not only from his partner, but also from
any other relative, parent or child; nobody can give the slightest help to any family
member and vice versa. The comparable accounts in this late Irish poem and in the
Old English version testify to the wide circulation of this motif in the British Isles.79
The thirteenth sign, which predicts the falling down of the sun, moon, and stars is
comparable to the twelfth in pseudo-Bede,80 yet with the addition of the moralising
tail-piece (line 48), explaining that the sign has the purpose to deprive the evil of
light.
The portent of the fourteenth sign is the death of all people combined with a universal conflagration. This sign of Vespasian D. xiv merges the fourteenth and the fifteenth of pseudo-Bede and the fifteenth of Damian, but unlike its Latin models, it
omits the resurrection of the dead, introducing the information that nobody will be
buried, and joining a moralistic comment with the basic description of the sign (line
51).
Finally, in the representation of the fifteenth sign, the text of Vespasian D. xiv
diverges significantly from its Latin sources. For the fifteenth day a flood is foretold
which will remove the ashes produced by the great fire and submerge every piece of dirt
into the depth of the earth. The occurrence of an apocalyptic deluge has no parallel in
the tradition of the Fifteen Signs of Doomsday (as far as I know). Yet, a comparison
may be attempted with the eschatological poem entitled Judgement Day I,81 preserved
in the Exeter Book, which opens with a description of a flood coming in the day of
Judgement to destroy all life, lines 13a:

couple on earth / but shall be separated by God. Translation from Heist, The Fifteen Signs, 126. This text
was edited by E. C. Quiggin, Poems from the Book of the Dean of Lismore (Cambridge, 1937), 11, and by
L. S. J. McKenna, The Signs of the Judgement, The Irish Monthly 55 (1927), 2604.
79
The poem was written by Donnchadh Mr Dlaigh who died in 1244, and is preserved in the
famous codex known as the Book of the Dean of Lismore, one of the most important surviving collections
of Gaelic poetry from the medieval period; it was compiled by Sir James Macgregor, dean of Lismore in
Argyllshire, and his brother Duncan, between the years 1512 and 1526. This fascinating miscellany contains various materials from both Scotland and Ireland, concerning science, history and arts.
80
Damian does not contain this sign, but presents other phenomena concerning the celestial bodies and
the firmament, prophesied for the sixth day (streams of fire in the firmament) and for the seventh (fiery
rays emitted from the planets).
81
The Exeter Book, ed. G. P. Krapp and E. V. K. Dobbie, ASPR 3 (New York, 1936), 21215. On this
poem see also G. D. Caie, The Judgement Day Theme in Old English Poetry (Copenhagen, 1974), especially
at 95114, and H. T. Keenan, The Apocalyptic Vision in Old English Poetry (unpubl. PhD dissertation,
Univ. of Tennessee, 1968).

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

303

t gelimpan sceal, tte lagu flowe,

flod ofer foldan; feores bi t ende
anra gehwylcum.82

In Vespasian D. xiv the flood at the end of the world has the purifying effect of destroying the wicked and saving the faithful. Like the fire, the flood might be considered as
an archetypal symbol of purgation,83 necessary for the redemption of humanity. In
some Old English poems of eschatological content comparison is made between the
flood and the apocalyptic fire, as for example in Christ III, lines 9816:
onne wihta gehwylce,
deora ond fugla,dealeg nime,
fre fter foldanfyrswearta leg,
weallende wiga.Swa r wter fleowan,
flodas afysde,onne on fyrbae
swela sfiscassundes getwfde.84

and in Judgement day II85 where the fire is described as a bursting flood (lines 1667):
t ree flod rscet fyre
and biterlice brn a earman saula.86

This theme is also present in a prose work, namely in Wulfstans homily Luke on the
Last Days,87 surviving in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 421,88 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 201,89 Oxford, Bodleian Library, Hatton 113,90 all datable to
82

The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, 212. It will happen that the sea will flow, a flood over the
earth; for everyone life will be at an end.
83
Caie, The Judgement Day Theme, 97.
84
The Exeter Book, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, 30. then the deadly flame will catch every creature, beast and
bird; across the earth the fiery blackened flame will travel, a raging warrior. Whereas formerly the waters
flowed, the excited floods, then in a fire-bath the fishes of the sea will burn, cut off from the ocean.
85
Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 201 (s. ximed; Ker, Catalogue, nos. 4950; Gneuss, Handlist, nos.
656). The poem, based on Bedes De die iudicii, is edited in The Anglo Saxon Minor Poems, ed.
G. P. Krapp and E. V. K. Dobbie, ASPR 6 (New York, 1942), 5867, and in The Old English Poem Judgement Day II: A Critical Edition with Editions of De die iudicii and Hatton 113 Homily Be domes daege,
ed. G. D. Caie (Cambridge, 2000). See also Caie, The Judgement Day Theme, especially at 11559, and
L. Whitbread, The Old English Poem Judgement Day II and its Latin Source, PQ 45 (1966), 63556.
86
The Anglo-Saxon Minor Poems, ed. Krapp and Dobbie, 61. That fierce flood will rush with fire, and
cruelly burn the wretched souls.
87
D. Bethurum, The Homilies of Wulfstan (Oxford, 1957), 1237.
88
Ker, Catalogue, no. 69; Gneuss, Handlist, no. 109.
89
Ker, Catalogue, nos. 4950; Gneuss, Handlist, nos. 656. The same manuscript contains Judgement
Day II, see n. 85.
90
Ker, Catalogue, no. 331; Gneuss, Handlist, no. 638.

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around the eleventh century. It is an eschatological homily, in which Wulfstan interprets the misfortunes of the Anglo-Saxon people (such as the depredations of the
Vikings) as the right castigation inflicted by God and admonishes his audience to
repent in the short time before the end of the world. This homily contains a passage in
which the outbreak of the fire before Doomsday is likened to the flood which once
came to punish mankind for their sins:91
is godspel seg 7 swutela t fela fortacna sculon geweoran wide on worulde, ger
ge on heofonlicum tunglum ge on eorlicum styrungum, r am e se dom cume e us
eallum wyr gemne. And witodlice ealswa flod com hwilum r for synnum, swa cym
eac for synnum fyr ofer mancynn, 7 rto hit nealc nu swye georne.92

Finally, the mention in the fifteenth sign of the ashes washed out by the flood can be
interpreted as an eschatological motif whose symbolic meaning is linked to the idea of
repentance. An echo of such an allegory is found in Blickling VII, Dominica Pascha,
which reads:
Ond on m dge heofon bi befealden swa swa bc. Ond m dge eore bi forbrned to axan.93

From this analysis it emerges that notwithstanding the differences in the sequence
of the signs the affinities of the Fifteen Signs list of Vespasian D. xiv with pseudoBede are irrefutable, especially as far as the first half of the text (until the seventh sign)
is concerned. The Old English work seems to begin as a paraphrase of pseudo-Bede,
but it is gradually modified and enriched by its author with a deal of new and innovative features. A number of expressions find a parallel in pseudo-Bedes version, such as
in the case of ufemeste (line 7) which renders summitas eorum, or ealle slice deor
7 fissces (line 11) which translates pisces et omnes beluae marinae or still ealle wyrte
7 ealle treowwes (line 16), which is a faithful reproduction of omnes herbae et arbores.
Along with a certain correspondence in the syntactic structures, such examples suggest
that the anonymous Old English author might have known pseudo-Bede and that the

91

The comparison with the flood to which this passage alludes is drawn from Luke XVII.267: 26 Et
sicut factum est in diebus Noe, ita erit et in diebus Filii hominis. 27 edebant, bibebant, uxores ducebant,
dabantur ad nuptias, usque in diem, qua intravit Noe in arcam, et venit diluvium et perdidit omnes.,
Biblia Sacra. Iuxta vulgatam versionem, ed. R. Weber (Stuttgart, 1983).
92
The Homilies of Wulfstan, ed. Bethurum, 123. This gospel says and explains that many signs will happen widely in the world, both in the heavenly stars and in earthly motions, before the judgement comes
that will be common to us all. And certainly, just as a flood came once because of sins, likewise a fire will
come over mankind because of sins, and, moreover, that moment is now approaching very quickly.
93
The Blickling Homilies, ed. Kelly, VII/625. And on that day, heaven will be rolled up like a book. On
that day, the earth will be burnt to ashes.

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

305

Fifteen Signs list of Vespasian D. xiv could be considered as the earliest indirect, vernacular witness of this Latin archetype.
Occasionally, the Old English text derives some details from Damian, as the sentence
with the word-pair ealle stanes lytle 7 mycele (line 20), in the battle of the stones,
which translates the corresponding Omnes lapides tam magni quam parvi, or the fact
that each stone is divided into four parts. Also the sign which describes the wandering
of wild beasts through gardens and fields is inspired by Damians twelfth sign.
Nevertheless, the Old English Fifteen Signs list is embroidered with a number of
stylistic elements, especially the use of word-pairs, some of which are alliterative and
half rhymed, such as denen 7 dunen (line 25). Other double expressions are simply
rhymed, as bodie 7 tacnie (line 2), byfigende 7 drdende (lines 423), or lytle 7
mycele, which occurs twice, in the first case (lines 201) to translate a corresponding
Latin expression, whereas, in the second case (line 33) it represents an original addition
made by the Old English author. Finally, the double expression smee 7 emne (line
26) is introduced to render the single word aequalitas of the Latin pseudo-Bede.
Furthermore, the Old English Fifteen Signs list of Vespasian D. xiv shows a number
of small additions and of unconventional aspects and motifs, such as the singular
description of the gathering of the limbs. Most importantly, this text reveals a peculiar
propensity to find an explanation, namely an acceptable reason for all the calamities
heralding the Last Judgement. Signs four to nine and thirteen and fourteen include a
moralising tail-piece, which is alien to the traditional accounts of the Fifteen Signs. Its
function is to offer a justification for the occurrence of the fatal events predicted before
Doomsday and to reinforce the idea that the ultimate purpose of the apocalyptic signs
is the triumph of Gods justice and the delivery of humankind from the bondage to sin.
The apogee of human redemption is symbolised by the immense deluge flooding all
incinerated uncleanness, and the mention of the ashes is an explicit emblem of repentence. The tone which pervades the whole text is that of an edifying sermon. It should
be kept in mind that this version of the Fifteen Signs of Doomsday has been inserted
within a literary context which is of a predominantly homiletic genre. For this reason,
the eschatological material has been used, modified and made suitable for conveying
preaching motifs.

THE FIFTEEN SIGNS LIST

IN THEIR CODICOLOGICAL CONTEXT

For the theological subjects and motifs dealt with, this Old English version of the Fifteen Signs before Doomsday is perfectly integrated in Vespasian D. xiv, which is a
handbook useful for those teaching and preaching to less educated lay-persons or
monks, [that] incorporates homilies, saints lives, teaching texts and basic catechetical

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materials, and prognosticatory texts.94 Along with some texts which do not occur elsewhere, as for example the translation of the sermon of Ralph dEscures, Vespasian D.
xiv also contains a number of works of an unequivocally didactic nature, such as the
English version of the Disticha Catonis,95 a compilation of proverbial wisdom and
moral advice in the form of rhymed maxims, imparted by a father to his son with the
purpose of conveying elements of general knowledge and doctrine. This was the most
popular medieval schoolbook for teaching Latin. The manuscript also transmits two
excerpts translated in Old English from the Elucidarius, a work traditionally ascribed to
Honorius of Autun (c. 1098) and organised in the pattern of a dialogue between a
teacher and a student, discussing themes of theology, biblical history, cosmography,
geography and ethnography. A textbook of theological instruction, it was quite popular
within the religious encyclopaedic tradition of Medieval Europe.96 According to H.
Rima it seems that Vespasian D. xiv was compiled and edited in such a way as to
include pieces which are particularly useful in the teaching of the basic elements of the
Christian faith, perhaps particularly as they apply to monks. The book may have been
intended as a teaching manual for young religious.97
In addition to these last statements, it should be emphasised that, in Vespasian D.
xiv, the catalogue of the Fifteen Signs of Doomsday is followed by a prognosticatory
text (which has been added later at the end of the quire [103v]), an Old English brontology, i.e. a prediction of the future according to the month in which the first thunder
of the year occurs. Furthermore, Vespasian D. xiv, 75v, preserves another later addition
at the end of a quire, a vernacular version of the so-called Revelatio Esdrae, a Year Prognosis, which foretells the weather for the coming year, as well as other, mostly agricultural events, on the basis of the weekday on which New Years Day (or in some versions,

94

E. Treharne and P. Pulsiano, An Introduction to the Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Vernacular Literature,

A Companion to Anglo-Saxon Literature. Context and Perspective, ed. E. Treharne and P. Pulsiano (Oxford,
2001), 310, at 7.
95
Disticha Catonis, ed. M. Boas (Amsterdam, 1952); R. Hazelton, The Christianization of Cato: the
Disticha Catonis in the Light of Late Mediaeval Commentaries, Mediaeval Studies 19 (1975), 15773;
F. Alcamesi, Remigiuss Commentary to the Disticha Catonis in Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, Form and
Content of Instruction in Anglo-Saxon England, in the Light of Contemporary Manuscript Evidence, ed.
P. Lendinara, L. Lazzari, and M. DAronco (Turnhout, 2007), 14385.
96
Das Elucidarium des Honorius Augustodunensis. Untersuchungen zu seiner berlieferungs- und Rezeptionsgeschichte im deutschsprachigen Raum mit Ausgabe der niederdeutschen bersetzung, ed. D. Gottschall, Texte
und Textgeschichte 33 (Tbingen, 1992); N. Klunder, Lucidarius: de Middelnederlandse Lucidarius-teksten
en hun relatie tot de Europese traditie (Amsterdam, 2005); Y. Lefvre, LElucidarium et les Lucidaires. Contribution, par lhistoire d un texte, lhistoire des croyance religieuses en France au moyen ge (Paris, 1954).
97
Handley, British Museum Ms. Cotton Vespasian D. xiv, 247.

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

307

Christmas Day) falls.98 It has been observed that these two prognostic texts are inserted
here in a broadly homiletic context, and appear to be used as filler material, copied at
a later date by the main hand, just to fill up blank spaces at quire ends.99 Also the Fifteen Signs list on 102r103v seems to be a later addition at the end of a quire.100 The
inclusion of the Old English Fifteen Signs in Vespasian D. xiv as well as the two prognostics seems to confirm the encyclopaedic and quotidian nature of these texts.101
They were presumably destined for teaching purposes inside the monastery, but also
for the pastoral practice amongst the laity and therefore appropriate to the twofold
conceptual framework of the manuscript, which is both moral and instructive.
In spite of its name, the Revelatio Esdra pertains more properly to the genre of early
scientific and astrological literature, as well as to the prognostics, rather than to the
eschatological tradition or to the Apocrypha.102 The ascription of the Revelatio to
98

The most recent and comprehensive edition together with a systematic analysis of the prognostics in
Anglo-Saxon England is the monumental work by L. S. Chardonnens, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, 9001100:
Study and Texts (Leiden and Boston, 2007). On prognostics in the British Isles see, among others, Chardonnens, Context, Language, Date and Origin; R. M. Liuzza, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics in Context: a
Survey and Handlist of Manuscripts, ASE 30 (2001), 181230; R. M. Liuzza, What the Thunder Said:
Anglo-Saxon Brontologies and the Problem of Sources, RES ns 55 (2004), 123; R. M. Liuzza, The
Sphere of Life and Death: Time, Medicine, and the Visual Imagination, Latin Learning and English Lore.
Studies in Anglo-Saxon Literature for Michael Lapidge, ed. K. OBrien OKeeffe and A. Orchard, 2 vols.
(Toronto, Buffalo and London, 2005) II, 2852; R. H. Bremmer Jr, and L. S. Chardonnens, Old English
Prognostics: Between the Moon and the Monstrous, Monsters and the Monstrous in Medieval Northwest
Europe, ed. K. E. Olsen and L. A. J. R. Houwen (Leuven, 2001), 15366; M. Frster, Die Kleinliteratur
des Aberglaubens im Altenglischen, ASNSL 110 (1903), 34658; M. Frster, Beitrge zur mittelalterlichen Volkskunde IIX, ASNSL 120 (1908), 4352, 296305, ASNSL 121 (1908), 3046, ASNSL 125
(1910), 3970, ASNSL 127 (1911), 3184, ASNSL 128 (1912), 5571, 285308, ASNSL 129 (1912),
1649, ASNSL 134 (1916), 26493.
99
See Liuzza, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics in Context, 206, and Chardonnens, Context, Language, Date
and Origin, 323. More recently, Chardonnens, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, 456, 6970, 14950, uses the
term guest texts. See also the reference at n. 53.
100
See n. 53.
101
Treharne and Pulsiano, An Introduction to the Corpus, 7.
102
It is a commonly accepted opinion that the original version of the Revelatio Esdrae otherwise named
Year Prognosis (by Chardonnens) or Bauernpraktik was written in Greek and that it was in circulation from the seventh century onward. The earliest reference to the prognostic in association with Esdras
is found in the seventh-century Chronicle of John, bishop of Nokiou, an ecclesiastical figure of Upper
Egypt. The oldest Latin exemplar of the Revelatio Esdrae dates to the ninth century, while vernacular translations from the Latin were produced from the eleventh century onward. For the Revelatio Esdrae in AngloSaxon England, see Chardonnens, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, especially at 491500; Liuzza, Anglo-Saxon
Prognostics in context, 1834; Sources of Anglo-Saxon Literary Culture: a Trial Version, ed. F. M. Biggs,
T. D. Hill and P. Szarmach, Mediaeval and Renaissance Texts and Studies 74 (Binghamton, NY, 1990),
2930; A. Matter, The Revelatio Esdrae in Latin and English Translation, RB 92 (1982), 37692;
L. Thorndike, A History of Magic and Experimental Science, 8 vols. (New York, 192358) I, 6778.

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Esdras103 may result from the latters association with the apocalyptic tradition.104 In
this respect, the fourth Book of Esdras105 has been considered one of the sources from
which a number of signs heralding Doomsday were drawn. It was composed in the late
first century AD, and contains seven visions concerning the end of the world. A number
of motifs and events announcing the Last Judgement found in the fourth Book of
Esdras were subsequently included or reshaped into the legend of the Fifteen Signs: the
blood dripping from wood; the birds flying away; the sea throwing out its fishes; the
wild beasts roaming about; people losing their sense; the occurrence of earthquakes;
the stones emitting an awful noise; the collapse of buildings made up by human hand;
the eruption of fire.
The text of the Revelatio Esdrae opens with a prologue describing the events which
follow as a revelation to the prophet Esdras/Ezrah. Then, the predictions of the climatic, social, and political affairs of the year follow, apportioned in the order of the
weekdays, beginning with Sunday. The list is often preceded by an overview of the
weather for the four seasons, which can also include predictions about the amount of
crops, honey, wine, livestock, and prophecies about human concerns such as plagues,
robberies, deaths of young and old people, difficulty in childbirth, fires, shipwrecks,
and changes of rulers. An extract from the Revelatio in Vespasian D. xiv, 75v, will bring
out the structure of the text and make explicit the analogies with the Fifteen Signs:
onne forme gearesdig by sunendig: hit by god winter. 7 windig lnctetid. dryge
sumer. god hrfest. 7 scep tyrige. 7 hit by gri 7 wstme manigfeald.
onne hit by monendig: hit by scurfah winter. 7 god lncten. 7 windig sumer. 7
storemig. 7 geswyncfull hrfest.106

Maybe, the Fifteen Signs list and the Revelatio Esdrae were considered somehow to be
kindred, since they show similarities in subject and structure. They both predict and
enumerate future phenomena and (calamitous) events by connecting them to specific
103

In the course of its textual transmission, this prognosticatory text has also been attributed to Ezekiel
and even to Bede, see Chardonnens, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, 493; Matter, The Revelatio Esdrae in
Latin, 382; C. V. Jones, Bedae Pseudepigrapha. Scientific Writings Falsely Attributed to Bede (Ithaca and
London, 1939), 87.
104
For a survey of the prophetic and apocalyptic works attributed to Esdras, see R. A. Kraft, Ezra Material in Judaism and Christianity, Aufstieg und Niedergang der rmischen Welt, ed. H. Temporini and
W. Haase, 2 vols. (Berlin, 1980) II, 11936; Klijn, Der lateinische Text der Apokalypse des Esra; O. Wahl,
Apocalypsis Esdrae, Apocalypsis Sedrach, Visio Beati Esdrae (Leiden, 1977).
105
See above, n. 9.
106
Chardonnens, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, 495. When New Years day is on a Sunday, it will be a good
winter, and a windy spring, a dry summer, a good autumn, and sheep will grow, and there will be peace
and fruit will be abundant. When it is on a Monday, it will be a rainy winter, and a good spring, and a
windy summer, and a stormy and troublesome autumn.

The Fifteen Signs before Doomsday

309

days or to specific periods (the last fifteen days before Doomsday and the weekdays
from Sunday to Saturday). As Chardonnens has recently suggested,107 in the Revelatio
Esdrae the predictions are referred to the future of human beings on earth, that is to say
to their worldly existence. The Fifteen Signs, on the other hand, concern the fatal destiny of humanity after death and after the end of the world; therefore they are connected with the eternal life. On account of their prophetic contents, these texts
which seem to mirror two complementary aspects of the same image were both
recognised as useful and integral to a miscellany of homiletic and didactic materials,
like Vespasian D. xiv.108
In other terms, the Revelatio Esdrae and the Fifteen Signs were perceived as analogous by the scribe, because of their employment of numerological topoi, or the relationship of the phenomena predicted to specific days. It may be surmised that they
could have been transmitted together in the sources from which they were copied and
that the compiler of Vespasian D. xiv selected them from among the materials he had
at his disposal to fill up the blank spaces in the codex.
In conclusion, then, the typology of certain items included in the manuscript seems
to suggest that the Old English version of the Fifteen Signs before Doomsday was
employed as a didactic text, just like the Old English Disticha Catonis and the excerpts
drawn from the Elucidarius. With respect to the formal and stylistic aspects, as well as
in consideration of the structures and the use of certain literary topoi, this list of the
Fifteen Signs shows a number of affinities with prognostic items. Finally, the list displays a manifest preaching tone which is clearly expressed in the moralising tail-pieces
attached to the end of the description of the signs. Certainly, such a tone fits this version of the Fifteen Signs into the context of the miscellany of Vespasian D. xiv, which
is predominantly composed of homiletic and instructive materials.

107

Chardonnens, Context, Language, Date and Origin, 323; idem, Anglo-Saxon Prognostics, 9.
Interestingly, a Latin text of the Fifteen Signs list (more precisely, a Damian redaction) immediately
precedes a version of the Revelatio Esdrae in Oxford, St Johns College 17 (dated to c. 111011).

108