A Diachronic Syntactic Study on Wulfstan’s Antichrist

Wulfstan’s Antichrist’s language allows impersonal verbs, which means that it is a + Null-subject parameter language, a typical OE characteristic. With regard to Head-parameter, the language of The Antichrist is characterized by the Head-final parameter in that concerning the word order, V2 appears in main clauses and V-final in the underlying subordinate clauses. Relative pronouns are frequent, including the simple þe and þe preceded by a demonstrative. The simple relative pronouns were regarded as typical in the late West Saxon dialect as used in Wulfstan’s Antichrist and later OE. Van Gelderen (2018) is frequently inaccurate through her misconception of the Antichrist regarding the tense of the verb bēon ‘to be.’ The only OE verb which has a unique future form is the verb bēon ‘to be’, which may be used for the future or for a statement of an eternal truth (gnomic use). The Antichrist in the Bible is a figure due to appear in the future, particularly in the period just prior to the Second Coming of Jesus Christ and the Last Judgment. Therefore, the OE verbs bið and wyrð in Wulfstan’s Antichrist should be translated as ‘will be’ and ‘will become’ in many sentences. This shows that understanding an OE text and tense requires knowledge of its background, in this case, knowledge of the reference in the Bible to the Antichrist due to appear in the future.