De natura rerum (Bede) explained

De natura rerum ("on the nature of things") is a treatise by the Anglo-Saxon monk Bede, composed in 703 as a companion-piece to his De temporibus ('on times'). In the view of Eoghan Ahern, 'though it is an early work that does not approach the complexity and innovation of Bede's later thought, DNR provides us with an insight into the cosmological assumptions that undergird his understanding of theology and history'.^[1]

The work comprises fifty-one short chapters with titles such as:

De Quadrifario dei opere (on the fourfold work of God)
De mundi formatione (on the formation of the earth)
Quid sit mundus (what the world is)
De elementis (on the elements)
De firmamento (on heaven)
De varia altitudine cœli (on the differing height of the sky)
De cœlo superiore (on the upper sky)
De aquis cœlestibus (on the celestial waters)
De quinque circulis mundi (on the five circles of the earth)
De plagis mundi (on the climes of the earth)
De stellis (on the stars)
De cursu planetarum (on the course of the planets)
De ordine eorum (on their arrangement)

For example, chapter 3, 'Quid sit mundus' ('what the world is') runs:

Translations

Bede, On the Nature of Things and On Times, trans. by Calvin B. Kendall and Faith Wallis, Translated Texts for Historians, 56 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010),

Notes and References

Eoghan Ahern, 'De Natura Rerum', The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.01: Anglo Saxon England, 500-1066, ed. by Richard William Dance and Hugh Magennis (2016).

De natura rerum (Bede) explained

Contents

Translations

Notes and References