Rolf Bremmer
Encyclopedia
Rolf Hendrik Bremmer is a Dutch
academic. He is professor of Old and Middle English
, and extraordinary professor of Old Frisian
, at Leiden University
.
. He married Lucie Gera Arina Lindeboom (b. 1918) in 1943 in The Hague
; she was the daughter of a Reformed
preacher (Cornelis Lindeboom). Rolf Jr.'s older brother J.N. Bremmer is professor of church history at the University of Groningen
.
Bremmer received his master's degree in English language and literature from the University of Groningen
in 1977. From 1976 to 1977 he studied at Oxford University as a Harting Student, with Anglo-Saxonists such as Bruce Mitchell
, Tom Shippey
, and J. M. Wallace-Hadrill. In 1986 he gained his Ph.D. from Radboud University Nijmegen
, with a dissertation on a late Middle English treatise on the five senses, directed by F.N.M. Diekstra.
He taught English from 1977 to 1979 at Gomarus College in Groningen, and Old and Middle English and historical linguistics at Radboud University from 1979 to 1986. Since 1986 he has been with Leiden University. In 1994 Bremmer was the Erasmus professor at Harvard for Dutch Culture and History. He is a premier Dutch authority on Frisian language and literature, occupying a special professorship in Frisian studies.
Bremmer has published and edited books on a variety of topics in Old English language
and literature, Middle English language and literature
, and Frisian language and literature
. He has published on the seventeenth-century scholar and collector Franciscus Junius
, he has translated the work on Beowulf
by Dutch Anglo-Saxon scholar P.J. Cosijn, and has lectured on J.R.R. Tolkien. His Introduction to Old Frisian (2009), according to E.G. Stanley, is "a book for the twenty-first century...a book of essentials, from which nothing essential has
been omitted." In 2009 he published a kind of alphabet book
with 26 terms from the Christian lexicon, Van Ambt tot Zonde ("From office to sin"), illustrated by Geert de Groot, which explains the Christian connotations of such concepts as sin
and foreskin
; the booklet collects articles originally published in the national daily Nederlands Dagblad
.
Bremmer serves on the editorial board of the journals The Heroic Age, Neophilologus
, and NOWELE, and on the advisory board of the journals Anglo-Saxon and Studies in Medievalism and of the series Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library
. In 2010 Bremmer delivered the Toller Lecture at the Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies.
Dutch people
The Dutch people are an ethnic group native to the Netherlands. They share a common culture and speak the Dutch language. Dutch people and their descendants are found in migrant communities worldwide, notably in Suriname, Chile, Brazil, Canada, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, and the United...
academic. He is professor of Old and Middle English
Middle English
Middle English is the stage in the history of the English language during the High and Late Middle Ages, or roughly during the four centuries between the late 11th and the late 15th century....
, and extraordinary professor of Old Frisian
Old Frisian
Old Frisian is a West Germanic language spoken between the 8th and 16th centuries in the area between the Rhine and Weser on the European North Sea coast. The Frisian settlers on the coast of South Jutland also spoke Old Frisian but no medieval texts of this area are known...
, at Leiden University
Leiden University
Leiden University , located in the city of Leiden, is the oldest university in the Netherlands. The university was founded in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, leader of the Dutch Revolt in the Eighty Years' War. The royal Dutch House of Orange-Nassau and Leiden University still have a close...
.
Biography
Rolf Bremmer's father, also named Rolf Hendrik Bremmer (1917–1995), was a theologian and preacher associated with the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (Liberated) and a student of Klaas SchilderKlaas Schilder
Klaas Schilder was a theologian and professor in the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and later in the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands .Schilder was born into a state church family...
. He married Lucie Gera Arina Lindeboom (b. 1918) in 1943 in The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...
; she was the daughter of a Reformed
Reformed Churches in the Netherlands
The Reformed Churches in the Netherlands was the second largest Protestant church in the Netherlands until it merged into the Protestant Church in the Netherlands in 2004.-History:...
preacher (Cornelis Lindeboom). Rolf Jr.'s older brother J.N. Bremmer is professor of church history at the University of Groningen
University of Groningen
The University of Groningen , located in the city of Groningen, was founded in 1614. It is one of the oldest universities in the Netherlands as well as one of its largest. Since its inception more than 100,000 students have graduated...
.
Bremmer received his master's degree in English language and literature from the University of Groningen
University of Groningen
The University of Groningen , located in the city of Groningen, was founded in 1614. It is one of the oldest universities in the Netherlands as well as one of its largest. Since its inception more than 100,000 students have graduated...
in 1977. From 1976 to 1977 he studied at Oxford University as a Harting Student, with Anglo-Saxonists such as Bruce Mitchell
Bruce Mitchell (scholar)
-Early life, Australia:Mitchell was born in Lismore, New South Wales. He won a free place at the University of Melbourne but was unable to take it up and instead after leaving school at 15, worked as a student teacher while studying part-time...
, Tom Shippey
Tom Shippey
Thomas Alan Shippey is a scholar of medieval literature, including that of Anglo-Saxon England, and of modern fantasy and science fiction, in particular the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, about whom he has written several scholarly studies. He is widely considered one of the leading academic scholars...
, and J. M. Wallace-Hadrill. In 1986 he gained his Ph.D. from Radboud University Nijmegen
Radboud University Nijmegen
Radboud University Nijmegen is a public university with a strong focus on research in Nijmegen, the Netherlands...
, with a dissertation on a late Middle English treatise on the five senses, directed by F.N.M. Diekstra.
He taught English from 1977 to 1979 at Gomarus College in Groningen, and Old and Middle English and historical linguistics at Radboud University from 1979 to 1986. Since 1986 he has been with Leiden University. In 1994 Bremmer was the Erasmus professor at Harvard for Dutch Culture and History. He is a premier Dutch authority on Frisian language and literature, occupying a special professorship in Frisian studies.
Bremmer has published and edited books on a variety of topics in Old English language
Old English language
Old English or Anglo-Saxon is an early form of the English language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons and their descendants in parts of what are now England and southeastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century...
and literature, Middle English language and literature
Middle English literature
The term Middle English literature refers to the literature written in the form of the English language known as Middle English, from the 12th century until the 1470s, when the Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, became widespread and the printing press regularized the language...
, and Frisian language and literature
Frisian literature
Frisian literature is works written in the Frisian languages, particularly that of West Frisian spoken in the province of Friesland in the Netherlands, from which most texts were produced or have survived. The first texts written in Frisian emerge around the 13th century...
. He has published on the seventeenth-century scholar and collector Franciscus Junius
Franciscus Junius (the younger)
Franciscus Junius , also known as François du Jon, was a pioneer of Germanic philology. As a collector of ancient manuscripts, he published the first modern editions of a number of important texts.-Life:...
, he has translated the work on Beowulf
Beowulf
Beowulf , but modern scholars agree in naming it after the hero whose life is its subject." of an Old English heroic epic poem consisting of 3182 alliterative long lines, set in Scandinavia, commonly cited as one of the most important works of Anglo-Saxon literature.It survives in a single...
by Dutch Anglo-Saxon scholar P.J. Cosijn, and has lectured on J.R.R. Tolkien. His Introduction to Old Frisian (2009), according to E.G. Stanley, is "a book for the twenty-first century...a book of essentials, from which nothing essential has
been omitted." In 2009 he published a kind of alphabet book
Alphabet book
An Alphabet book is a book primarily designed for young children. It presents letters of the alphabet with corresponding words and/or images. Some alphabet books feature capitals and lower case letter forms, keywords beginning with specific letters, or illustrations of keywords...
with 26 terms from the Christian lexicon, Van Ambt tot Zonde ("From office to sin"), illustrated by Geert de Groot, which explains the Christian connotations of such concepts as sin
Sin
In religion, sin is the violation or deviation of an eternal divine law or standard. The term sin may also refer to the state of having committed such a violation. Christians believe the moral code of conduct is decreed by God In religion, sin (also called peccancy) is the violation or deviation...
and foreskin
Foreskin
In male human anatomy, the foreskin is a generally retractable double-layered fold of skin and mucous membrane that covers the glans penis and protects the urinary meatus when the penis is not erect...
; the booklet collects articles originally published in the national daily Nederlands Dagblad
Nederlands Dagblad
The Nederlands Dagblad is a Dutch newspaper, available throughout the country, with a daily circulation of about 33,000 issues in 2006. In 2000, the circulation was 32,000 issues....
.
Bremmer serves on the editorial board of the journals The Heroic Age, Neophilologus
Neophilologus
Neophilologus, in full Neophilologus: an international journal of modern and mediaeval language and literature, is a peer-reviewed journal devoted to the study of modern and mediaeval languages and literature, including general linguistics, literary theory and comparative literature...
, and NOWELE, and on the advisory board of the journals Anglo-Saxon and Studies in Medievalism and of the series Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library
Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library
The Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library is a new series published by in collaboration with the which presents original medieval Latin, Greek, and Old English texts with facing-page translations designed to make written achievements of medieval and Byzantine culture available to English-speaking...
. In 2010 Bremmer delivered the Toller Lecture at the Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies.
Books authored
- An Introduction to Old Frisian: History, Grammar, Reader, Glossary. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2009.
- Van Ambt tot Zonde: Een greep uit onze christelijke woordenschat. Heerenveen: Protestantse Pers, 2009.
- Manuscripts in the Low Countries. Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile 13 (with Kees Dekker). Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2006
- Hir is eskriven'. Lezen en schrijven in de Friese landen rond 1330. Hilversum: Verloren / Ljouwert: Fryske Akademy, 2004.
- A Bibliographical Guide to old Frisian Studies. Odense: Odense UP, 1992.
- The Fyve Wyttes. A Late Middle English Devotional Treatise, Edited from BL MS Harley 2398 with an Introduction, Commentary and Glossary. Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi, 1987.
Books edited
- Practice in Learning. The Transfer of Encyclopaedic Knowledge in the Early Middle Ages (with Kees Dekker). Paris, Leuven, and Dudley: Peeters, 2010.
- Advances in Old Frisian Philology (with Stephen Laker and Oebele Vries). Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2007.
- Signs on the Edge. Space, Text and Margin in Medieval Manuscripts (with Sarah Larratt Keefer). Paris, Leuven, and Dudley: Peeters, 2007.
- Foundations of Learning. The Transfer of Encyclopaedic Knowledge in the Early Middle Ages (with Kees Dekker). Paris, Leuven, and Dudley: Peeters, 2007.
- Rome and the North: The Early Reception of Gregory the Great in Germanic Europe (with Kees Dekker and David F. Johnson). Paris, Leuven, and Sterling: Peeters, 2001.
- In skiednis fan de Fryske taalkunde (with Anne Dykstra). Ljouwert: Fryske Akademy, 1999.
- Franciscus Junius F.F. and His Circle. Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi, 1998.
- Companion to Old English Poetry (with Henk Aertsen). Amsterdam: VU Press, 1994.
- Approaches to Old Frisian Philology (with Thomas S. B. Johnston and Oebele Vries). Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi, 1998.
- Notes on Beowulf (trans. of P.J. Cosijn, Aantekeningen op den Beowulf, with Jan van den Berg and David F. Johnson). Leeds: School of English, University of Leeds, 1991.
- Aspects of Old Frisian Philology (with Geart van der Meer and Oebele Vries), Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi, 1990.
External links
- "'Zelfs vindt de mus ...'", Bremmer's commentary on Psalm 84Psalm 84Psalm 84 is the 84th psalm of the Book of Psalms, composed by sons of Korah.-Judaism:*Verse 5 is the first verse of Ashrei.*Verse 13 is the tenth verse of V'hu Rachum in Pesukei Dezimra is found in Uva Letzion, and is part of Havdalah.-Songs:...
, in the Nederlands DagbladNederlands DagbladThe Nederlands Dagblad is a Dutch newspaper, available throughout the country, with a daily circulation of about 33,000 issues in 2006. In 2000, the circulation was 32,000 issues.... - "Adam en Eva en het moderne taalparadijs", lecture by Marijke Mooijaart at the presentation of Van Ambt tot Zonde