Afrisc Meowle: Exploring Race in the Old EnglishExodus

Abstract

AbstractAnAfrisc meowle(“African woman”) appears at the end of the Old EnglishExodus, a poem ostensibly celebrating religious freedom, migration, and divine justice. Amid the Hebrews’ final celebration, the explicit inclusion of theAfrisc meowle's racial difference from the Israelites exposes the horror and violence of the aftermath of war; a focus on her also invites questions about the poem's early medieval audience and how that audience could have understood her, especially since she does not appear in the source text of the Hebrew Bible. The scant critical analysis of this remarkable figure tends to provide a brief exegetical explanation before moving into more secure critical territory. My analysis of theAfrisc meowlereveals the limitations of source study and exegetical criticism forExodusand for the field of medieval studies; she thus serves as a case study for this deeper theoretical problem in the field.