This review refers to the facsmile version of the Cotton manuscript of Beowulf.

The text of Beowulf as we know it today is based on a single surviving manuscript, and that sole manuscript was damaged in a fire, to the extent that the last word or so of nearly every line of the poem was obliterated. This copy is a facsimile reproduction of that manuscript, with a facing-page transliteration by Norman Davis.

This is, admittedly, not a version of the poem that will be useful to the majority of readers. For one thing, the text is transcribed but not translated, and the notes refer to the textual issues and not to the words of the poem itself. It's not even a particularly useful text for the purposes of translation, since, again, the notes do not refer to linguistic issues, but rather to issues of the text itself.

But to a student of Old English who wishes to have a glimpse into the textual history of the most famous Old English poem, this is an invaluable work. The story of the Cotton manuscript is in itself an epic saga, and its narrow survival emphasizes the volumes of Old English literature that did not survive, and will always be lost to us. ( )

2nd ed. contains new reproduction of the MS. Orig. publ. as EETS OS 77 (1882) ( )