Paper Summary:

A large amount of modern scholarship concerning the reign of King Alfred (871-899) relies upon "The Life of King Alfred" (893), a biography that is supposed to have been written by a Welsh monk named Asser in 893 AD. However, its authenticity has been questioned and disputed by many scholars. The paper examines the biography and the arguments for and against its authenticity.

From the Paper:

"Although some scholars continue to debate whether Asser was the author of Life, the majority accept him as its true author. Furthermore, and despite of the numerous mistakes it contains, the work is widely viewed as being historically accurate, although not all details are accepted. Life, however, is a work that does have errors that are inconsistent with what is known about Asser's life, and it is an unfinished draft, which means that it could be the work of a forger. Asser, for example, outlived the king, which makes it difficult to understand why he would have omitted important events that took place in his lifetime, and, as previously discussed, the work contains important mistakes that do not make sense. As such, not only is the authorship still to be questioned, but the work's historical accuracy must remain under some doubt."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Galbraith, V. H., "Who wrote Asser's Life of Alfred," in An Introduction to the Study of History (London: C. A. Watts & Co., 1964), 91-96; Stevenson, cii-civ; Plummer, 18-20.
• Sheppard, Alice. "The King's Family: Securing the Kingdom in Asser's Vita Alfredi." Philological Quarterly, Vol 80 (2001).

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