The Ormulum, in 20,000 lines of septenarian Middle English verse, being a fragment (about one-eighth of the whole) of the homilies on the gospels written by Orm, an Augustinian canon, probably of Danish origin, about 1200 A.D. in or near Lincolnshire, and dedicated to his brother Walter. The orthographical peculiarities (the doubling of the consonant after a short vowel, and the use of three kinds of 'g' first shown by A. S. Napier, Notes on the Orthography of the Ormulum, Oxford, 1893), have made this manuscript of great importance, and the place of origin has been much disputed (cf. Athenaeum, May 19 and July 14, 1906). Since the editions by dr. R. M. White (Oxford, 1852) and by the rev. Robert Holt (Oxford, 1878) the tendency has been to bring the work farther south for philological reasons.

The MS. itself is plainly holograph and contains a number of small inserted leaves which have been foliated separately but are not included in the numeration of columns, which is by Junius. These are fols. 11, 13-16, 19, 26-9, 37, 39, 47, 49-50, 56-62, 64, 67, 71, 78, 82, 108. Since the columns were numbered, nos. 13-28, 45-52, 69-76, 97-104, 137-44, 157-60, 181-204, 221-4, 237-44, 257-60, 277-80, 297-300, 399-406 have been lost. The bulk of the work is preceded by a dedication, beg. 'Nu, broperr Wallterr, broperr min Affterr pe flæshess kinde' (fol. 3), texts, beg. 'Secundum Lucam I [i. 5]. Fuit in diebus illis' (fol. 5), preface, beg. 'piss boc iss nemmnedd Orrmulum Forrpi patt Orrm itt wrohte', introduction, beg. 'All mannkin, fra patt Adam wass purrh Drihhtin wrohht off eorpe' (fol. 10). The text beg. 'An preost wass onn Herodess da33, Amang Judisskenn peode' (fol. 10, col. 2). An Alphabetum Anglicum with runic equivalents (13th cent.) is on fol. 2.