Page "Old English literature" Paragraph 2

Anglo-Saxon literature has gone through different periods of research — in the 19th and early 20th centuries the focus was on the Germanic roots of English, later the literary merits were emphasised, and today the focus is upon paleography and the physical manuscripts themselves more generally: scholars debate such issues as dating, place of origin, authorship, and the connections between Anglo-Saxon culture and the rest of Europe in the Middle Ages.