ABSTRACT
The Ecloga Theoduli, or Eclogue of Theodulus, was one of the most widely known and culturally significant poems in Europe from the eleventh century, and perhaps earlier, to the Renaissance. Its content, diction, and prosody indicate that it was written in a milieu that was either Carolingian or post-Carolingian, but under the continuing influence of the great cultural revival initiated by Charlemagne, in or around the tenth century. 1 All other details of its provenance remain unestablished. Over two hundred surviving manuscripts, most of which were bound up with commentaries on the poem or as part of the collected Auctores octo(Eight Authors) used as grammar school texts, attest to its remarkable popularity. Although the Ecloga was, like its companion texts in the school volume, used for Latin language study, it surpasses the others in importance because it was the principal work used to introduce young readers to the mythological heritage of pagan antiquity and the major stories of the Old Testament, and because it offered them their first extended experience of how these two essential traditions might be assimilated. Since “every medieval schoolboy knew by heart” (Raby, 226) Theodulus's eclogue, it is arguably the most important pastoral poem between Vergil and Mantuan, and its crucial role in forming a European-wide cultural literacy makes it a text whose influence on medieval culture can scarcely be exaggerated.
