10th century Exeter book among 'world's principal cultural artefacts'

Dating back more than 1,000 years, the Exeter Book, an Anglo-Saxon poetry anthology has been granted Unesco status as “the foundation volume of English literature”.

The Exeter book which has inspired writers from WH Auden to JRR Tolkien, has been housed in Exeter Cathedral since it was given to the institution by its first bishop, Leofric, in the 11th century. Guardian UK reported.

Written around 970, it contains some 40 poems and 96 riddles, a number of which are found nowhere else.

“It is one of only four surviving major poetic manuscripts in [the Old English] vernacular,” said Unesco. “Since it is the largest and probably the oldest of them, and since its contents are not found in any other manuscript, it can claim to be the foundation volume of English literature, one of the world’s principal cultural artefacts.”

Exeter Cathedral’s canon librarian Ann Barwood said it was only in the 19th century that the book “began to receive the attention it had deserved for centuries”.

On Tuesday, it was placed on Unesco’s Memory of the World register, where it will sit alongside works such as the Magna Carta, the Bayeux Tapestry, the Book of Kells and the Diary of Anne Frank.

The book can be viewed at regular open days at Exeter Cathedral.

And visit Guardian UK for more info.

ALSO READ: Nigerian photographer captures the 'Invisible people of the North' through breathtaking images