This course provides an introduction to Old Saxon, the language of the continental Saxons and closely cognate with many dialects of Old English. This language has left very few surviving texts; its principal witness is one of the great poetic works of the period, the Heliand, a Bible epic based on a gospel harmony, composed in Germanic alliterative metre. Also extant is a fragmentary poem on Genesis, which is generally agreed to be the basis of the Old English Genesis B. This course will be devoted to reading and translating excerpts of the Heliand and in so doing also acquiring a competent reading ability in Old Saxon as well as an introduction to the literary, cultural, and historical context of the Heliand.