ABSTRACT
According to c. 79 of his Vita Ælfredi, Asser, sometime bishop of St David’s in Wales, first met King Alfred at Dean in Sussex, probably in 885, and was invited by the king to become a member of the royal household. Asser’s presence at Alfred’s court will have afforded the king the immense benefit of insight into Welsh politics, but the English realm will also have derived ‘benefit in every respect from the learning of St David’ (illa adiuvaretur per rudimenta Sancti Degui in omni causa), at least to the best of Asser’s abilities, as he modestly observes.1 There is no doubt that, once arrived in England (probably in 886), Asser became involved in the various scholarly projects which Alfred was sponsoring. Thus Alfred explicitly acknowledges help received æt Assere minum biscepe (‘from Asser my bishop’) in the preface to his translation of Gregory’s Regula pastoralis.2 Several centuries later William of Malmesbury recorded in his Gesta pontificum Anglorum (c. 1125) that Asser expounded the text of Boethius, De Consolatione Philosophiae, for the king:
As an intimate of the king, Asser may also have participated in other translations, but the extent of this involvement cannot be defined.
