About Cursor Mundi

This site contains articles on literature, focussing on historical context and significance. Some of the articles originally appeared at another of the author's web sites (see link below).

The title Cursor Mundi comes from a medieval poem written about 1300 CE. It contains a history of the world derived form Biblical and legendary sources, and is extremely long, running to about 30,000 lines. In his Middle English Literature (OUP 1986) J. A. W. Bennett comments 'The Author ... could never recognize his own fault: a failure to control his penchant for versifying'.

The title is explained in the prologue:


The words differ in the various manuscripts but the meaning remains the same. Cursor is the Latin for runner or messenger, and Cursor Mundi has the sense of encompassing the world.

This site is run by Harry Marshall. Click the link below for his other sites.