The Heliand () is an epic poem in Old Saxon, written in the first half of the 9th century. The title means saviour in Old Saxon (cf. German and Dutch Heiland meaning "saviour"), and the poem is a Biblical paraphrase that recounts the life of Jesus in the alliterative verse style of a Germanic epic. Heliand is the largest known work of written Old Saxon. The poem must have been relatively popular and widespread because it exists in two manuscript versions and four fragmentary versions. It takes up about 6,000 lines. A praefatio exists, which could have been commissioned by either Louis the Pious (king from 814 to 840) or Louis the German (806–876). This praefatio was first printed by Matthias Flacius in 1562, and while it has no authority in the manuscripts it is generally deemed to be authentic. The first mention of the poem itself in modern times occurred when Franciscus Junius (the younger) transcribed a fragment in 1587. It was not printed until 1705, by George Hickes. The first modern edition of the poem was published in 1830 by Johann Andreas Schmeller. Sample passages Lines 4537-4549 from the Eucharist (â ê î ô û are long vowels, đ is , ƀ is ): Manuscripts The 9th-century poem on the Gospel history, to which its first editor, J. A. Schmeller, gave the appropriate name of Heliand (the word used in the text for Savior, answering to the Old English hǣlend and the modern German and Dutch Heiland), is, with the fragments of a poem based on the Book of Genesis, all that remains of the poetical literature of the old Saxons, i.e. the Saxons who continued in their original home. It contained when entire about 6000 lines, and portions of it are preserved in two nearly complete manuscripts and four fragments. The Cotton MS. in the British Library, written probably in the second half of the 10th century, is one of the nearly complete manuscripts, ending in the middle of the story of the journey to Emmaus. It is believed to have an organization closer to the original version because it is divided into fitts, or songs. The Munich MS., formerly at Bamberg, begins at line 85, and has many lacunae, but continues the history down to the last verse of St. Luke's Gospel, ending, however, in the middle of a sentence with the last two fitts missing.