As it stands, the Old English Daniel is a poem of just over 760 lines (preserved in Oxford, Bodleian Library, Junius 11), paraphrasing the opening parts of the biblical book of Daniel. The poem opens with a brief section accounting for the Babylonian defeat of the Israelites in terms of the latter’s misbehaviour, before following the biblical account of the spoliation of the temple, Nebuchadnezzar’s education of young Israelites, including Ananias, Misael and Azarias, and the failure of the Babylonian wise-men to interpret Nebuchadnezzar’s first dream, which Daniel successfully interprets. The poem goes on to recount Nebuchadnezzar’s creation of an idol in the plain of Dura, which Ananias, Misael and Azarias then fail to w…
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Citation: Shaw, Philip A.. "Daniel". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 13 April 2011 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=24336, accessed 22 November 2024.]
