Aldhelm Riddle 69: Taxus

ALEXANDRAREIDER

Date: Thu 14 Apr 2022
Original text:

Semper habens virides frondenti in corpore crines
Tempore non ullo viduabor tegmine spisso,
Circius et Boreas quamvis et flamina Chauri
Viribus horrendis studeant deglobere frontem;
Sed me pestiferam fecerunt fata reorum,
Cumque venenatus glescit de corpore stipes,
Lurcones rabidi quem carpunt rictibus oris,
Occido mandentum mox plura cadavera leto.

Translation:

Always having green foliage on my leafy body,
At no time am I deprived of a thick covering,
Although Circus and Boreas and Chaurus’ gusts 
Devote themselves to peeling off my covering with horrible force;
But the fates of things made me pestilential:
Whenever a poisonous branch grows from my body
Which frenzied gluttons consume with gaping mouths,
I immediately kill dead the chewers’ many corpses. 

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Yew-Tree


Notes:

This edition is based on Rudolf Ehwald, ed. Aldhelmi Opera Omnia. Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi, 15. Berlin: Weidmann, 1919, pages 59-150. Available online here



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