The study of Anglo-Saxon literature is comparatively recent, for its treasures have not been long accessible. Its most famous poem, _Beowulf_, was not printed until the dawn of the nineteenth century. In 1822 Dr. Blume, a German professor of law, happened to find in a monastery at Vercelli, Italy, a large volume of Anglo-Saxon manuscript, containing a number of fine poems and twenty-two sermons. This is now known as the _Vercelli Book_. No one knows how it happened to reach Italy. Another large parchment volume of poems and miscellany was deposited by Bishop Leofric at the cathedral of Exeter in Devonshire, about 1050 A.D. This collection, one of the prized treasures of that cathedral, is now called the _Exeter Book_. Many valuable manuscripts were destroyed at the dissolution of the monasteries in the time of Henry VIII., between 1535 and 1540. John Bale, a contemporary writer, says that "those who purchased the monasteries reserved the books, some to scour their candlesticks, some to rub their boots, some they sold to the grocers and soap sellers, and some they sent over sea to the bookbinders, not in small numbers, but at times whole ships full, to the wonder of foreign nations." The Anglo-Saxon Scop and Gleeman.--Our earliest poetry was made current and kept fresh in memory by the singers. The kings and nobles often attached to them a _scop_, or maker of verses. When the warriors, after some victorious battle, were feasting at their long tables, the banquet was not complete without the songs of the _scop_. While the warriors ate the flesh of boar and deer, and warmed their blood with horns of foaming ale, the _scop_, standing where the blaze from a pile of logs disclosed to him the grizzly features of the men, sang his most stirring songs, often accompanying them with the music of a rude harp. As the feasters roused his enthusiasm with their applause, he would sometimes indulge in an outburst of eloquent extempore song. Not infrequently the imagination of some king or noble would be fired, and he would sing of his own great deeds. We read in _Beowulf_ that in Hrothgar's famous hall-- "...ð=aer was hearpan sw=eg, swutol sang scopes." ...there was sound of harp Loud the singing of the scop. In addition to the _scop_, who was more or less permanently attached to the royal court or hall of a noble, there was a craft of gleemen who roved from hall to hall. In the song of _Widsið_ we catch a glimpse of the life of a gleeman:-- "Sw=a scriðende gesceapum hweorfað gl=eomen gumena geond grunda fela." Thus roving, with shapéd songs there wander The gleemen of the people through many lands. The _scop_ was an originator of poetry, the gleeman more often a mere repeater, although this distinction in the use of the terms was not observed in later times. The Songs of Scop and Gleeman.--The subject matter of these songs was suggested by the most common experiences of the time. These were with war, the sea, and death.