• DOI:10.1215/10829636-34-1-147
• Corpus ID: 170978121

Rome: Capital of Anglo-Saxon England

@article{Howe2004RomeCO,
  title={Rome: Capital of Anglo-Saxon England},
  author={Nicholas Phillies Howe},
  journal={Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies},
  year={2004},
  volume={34},
  pages={147 - 172}
}

• N. Howe
• Published 11 March 2004
• History
• Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies

In its attention to the death of one pope and the ordination of his successor, the opening sentence of this entry is typical of others in the Chronicle. Popes died with predictable regularity, and for reasons both religious and political, it was necessary to record the end of one term and the start of the next one. Every iteration of this sequence served as well to remind the English readership of the Chronicle that Rome was the center of western Christendom as a spiritual realm subject to the authority of a single leader. The substance of the second sentence in the annal is, however, more unusual within the Chronicle: “& py ilcan geare forbarn Angelcynnes scole.” Scolu can be translated as “school” or “quarter” or “hostelry”; but it here designates the wellknown institution for English pilgrims in Rome that was founded originally in the late eighth century.2 The Vita Paschalis, found within the Liber Pontificalis, records that members of the gens Anglorum were in the habit of describing this location as a burh: “quae in eorum lingua burgus dicitur.”3 Given that burh in Old English typically designates a fortified site or stronghold, it may not be too misleading to read the scolu of the 816 entry as referring to a hostelry where those of the Angelcynn could lodge in safety when in Rome, whether there as students, pilgrims, or visiting ecclesiastical dignitaries. Pope Paschal con-