This is a diplomatic and digital edition of the first four pages of the Southwick Codex. Traditionally, the first three and a half pages of the manuscript have had the role of prefacing the Old English Soliloquies. The Old English Soliloquies itself would then begin half way down the fourth page. In Leslie Lockett’s recent edition, however, what is called the prologue ends at the bottom of the third page, and the first book of the Old English Soliloquies begins at the top of the fourth (2022, 186). In this edition, the first three pages are treated as a fragment from a now lost text that once preceded the Old English Soliloquies in the manuscript. This fragment is understood to be a separate text from the Old English Soliloquies and is called here the Southwick Idyll. The fourth page as a whole is treated as the complete introduction to the Old English Soliloquies. The reasoning that supports my re-interpretation of these two texts can be found in my introduction to this edition.

The edition presents and interprets the text as found in the manuscript without emendation or correction. However, where there is damage to the manuscript and letters have become partially legible or entirely illegible, the edition may complete partially legible letters or supply missing letters. It does so in consultation with Franciscus Junius’s transcription that he made in the middle of the seventeenth century, well before the manuscript suffered damage from the fire at Ashburnham House in 1731. Both completed letters and supplied letters are placed in square brackets.

The edited text is displayed in different formats. It comes both in lineated format, with the text keeping to its lines in the codex, and in block format, with the text divided into paragraphs. Both formats offer the text in two modes, Original and Regularized. In the Original mode, the letter forms of the manuscript are followed as closely as Unicode fonts allow. In this mode, readers will find some letters that may look unfamiliar. The scribe usually writes the letter g in the Insular form (ᵹ), but sometimes writes it in a Caroline form, which closely resembles the contemporary form (g). Likewise, the scribe usually writes the letter s in the long form (ſ) but sometimes, particularly for majuscules, uses the curved form (S). The scribe always writes the letter d in the insular form (ꝺ), always leaves the letter i undotted (ı), always uses the insular form for the letter t (ꞇ), and always dots the letter y (ẏ). The Original mode also preserves the scribe’s use of runic wynn for the letter w (ƿ). In the Regularized mode all these letters are put into contemporary letter forms. However, the Regularized mode leaves unchanged the form of thorn with a stroke (ꝥ), representing þæt, and the Tironian note for Latin et (⁊), representing and.

As is frequently the case in medieval manuscripts, the scribe’s spacing between words varies. Most often words are separated with a space, but sometimes two words have no intervening space between them. On the other hand, the scribe sometimes leaves a space between elements of the same word. This especially occurs with compound words. In the Original mode, where two distinct words have no intervening spacing, the two words remain unseparated. On the other hand, where there is a space between parts of a word, a hyphen is provided to indicate a single word. In the Regularized mode the manuscript’s spacing is adjusted so that distinct words are separated by spaces and words with separate parts are unified without a hyphen.

The scribe uses the punctus sparingly, but not simply for punctuation. Usually, of course, it indicates a break in syntax, whether a full stop or a partial stop. But it may also indicate emphasis, or call for heightened attentiveness, such as when placed in front of the name Ieronimus on fol. S 1v, or in front of the title Soliloquiorum on fol. S 2v. On the second page (fol. S 1v), the punctus appears above the line a few times and is represented in the transcription with a raised dot. The Original mode records the punctus as written in the manuscript. The Regularized mode sometimes interprets the punctus as a comma instead of a period, and in a very few places adds a punctus or period in square brackets where a full stop seems necessary. Those added full stops have square brackets around them. In the edition of the Old English text, no commas are added for partial stops; the Old English syntax is left to speak for itself. In the translation, however, commas are added at times so that the text conforms to written modern English.

To toggle between the Original and Regularized modes, readers will find a button on the webpage with the transcription and its translation. The translation into modern English remains the same for both modes. Readers will find a similar button to remove square brackets and simplify the text for ease of reading.

The accompanying translation and commentary interpret the text as found in the manuscript. The translation appears in a central column on the webpage, to the right of the edited text. Comments on the text are accessible through superscript letters throughout the transcription: C for codicological, H for historical, LG for linguistic, LX for lexical, P for paleographic, and T for textual. Clicking on a superscript letter makes a note appear in stable text in a column to the right of the translation. Hovering over a superscript letter makes a note appear as a pop-up that overlays the edited text.

The edition is designed for readers to consult the manuscript as they read the text. A link to the British Library’s facsimile image of each page is embedded in the folio number for that page. The folio numbers for the Southwick Codex are twofold. There is one number in the upper margin of the parchment’s recto side and a second number above and to the right on the parchment’s paper frame. This edition gives precedence to the Southwick Codex’s first foliation, as is explained in the Introduction. In the lineated format, readers will find both folio numbers at the head of each edited manuscript page, with the later folio number placed in parentheses, e.g. 1r (4r). In the block format, however, the text is divided into paragraphs instead of manuscript pages. Here folio numbers are in superscript and identify only the first foliation. The now commonly used later foliation can readily be identified by adding three to that of the Southwick Codex.

This edition was first developed in XML code, in accordance with TEI guidelines, with the expert assistance of the University of Exeter’s Digital Humanities Lab. It has since been rendered into HTML at the University of British Columbia where this website is currently hosted.

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© 2026 Michael Treschow. All rights reserved.