De abbatibus

De abbatibus (fully Carmen de abbatibus, meaning "Song of the Abbots") is a Latin poem in eight hundred and nineteen hexameters by the ninth-century English monk Æthelwulf (Ædiluulf), a name meaning "noble wolf", which the author sometimes Latinises as Lupus Clarus.

It recounts the history of his monastery (possibly at Bywell, or, less probably, Crayke, twelve miles north of York) from its foundation through its six first abbots and ending with Æthelwulf's two visions.

Ludwig Traube produced a respected edition of his own, but based on the poor version of Dümmler.

De abbatibus is, like all Anglo-Latin poetry, constructed out of borrowings and imitations, yet it is not completely unoriginal, and though history has at times been subordinated to a literary trope, it is not without eloquence.

Prominent among the works on which Æthelwulf relied are those of Virgil, though Dümmler also found references to Ovid and Cyprianus Gallus.