Editing Asser (section)

==Name and early life==
[[Image:Asser map.png|thumb|420px|A map of southern England and Wales showing places Asser is known to have visited. The monasteries he was given by Alfred are also shown. The exact location of Ashdown is uncertain, though it is known to be on the [[Berkshire Downs]].  The identification of Leonaford with [[Landford]] is also not certain.<ref>Abels, ''Alfred the Great'', p. 350.</ref><ref name="KL" />]]Asser (also known as John Asser or Asserius Menevensis) was a Welsh [[monk]] who lived from at least AD 885 until about 909. Almost nothing is known of Asser's early life. The name Asser is likely to have been taken from Aser, or [[Asher]], the eighth son of [[Jacob]] in [[Book of Genesis|Genesis]]. Old Testament names were common in Wales at the time, but it has been suggested that this name may have been adopted at the time Asser entered the church. Asser may have been familiar with a work by [[Jerome|St Jerome]] on the meaning of [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] names (Jerome's given meaning for "Asser" was "blessed").<ref name="KL" />

According to his ''Life of King Alfred'', Asser was a monk at [[Monastery of Saint David, Wales|St David's]] in what was then the [[kingdom of Dyfed]], in south-west Wales. Asser makes it clear that he was brought up in the area, and was [[tonsure]]d, trained and ordained there. He also mentions [[Nobis (bishop)|Nobis]], a bishop of St David's who died in 873 or 874, as being a kinsman of his.<ref name="KL">[[Simon Keynes]] and [[Michael Lapidge]], ''Alfred the Great'', pp. 48–58, 93–96, and 220–221.</ref>