<P> The Dream of the Rood is one of the Christian poems in the corpus of Old English literature and an example of the genre of dream poetry . Like most Old English poetry, it is written in alliterative verse . Rood is from the Old English word rod' pole', or more specifically' crucifix' . Preserved in the 10th - century Vercelli Book, the poem may be as old as the 8th - century Ruthwell Cross, and is considered one of the oldest works of Old English literature . </P> <P> A part of The Dream of the Rood can be found on the 8th century Ruthwell Cross, which was an 18 feet (5.5 m), free standing Anglo - Saxon cross that was perhaps intended as a' conversion tool' . At each side of the vine - tracery are carved runes . There is an excerpt on the cross that was written in runes along with scenes from the Gospels, lives of saints, images of Jesus healing the blind, the Annunciation, and the story of Egypt, as well as Lating antiphons and decorative scroll - work . Although it was torn down and destroyed during a Protestant revolt, it was reconstructed as much as possible after the fear of iconography passed . Fortunately during that time of religious unrest, those words that were in the runes were still protected in the Vercelli Book, so called because the book is kept in the Italian city of Vercelli . The Vercelli Book, which can be dated to the 10th century, includes twenty - three homilies interspersed with six poems: The Dream of the Rood, Andreas, The Fates of the Apostles, Soul and Body, Elene and a poetic, homiletic fragment . </P> <P> The author of Dream of the Rood is unknown, but by knowing the approximate date of the Ruthwell Cross, scholars have been able to suggest possible authors . These include the Anglo - Saxon poets Cædmon and Cynewulf . </P> <P> Knowledge about Cædmon, who flourished in the middle of the 7th century, comes from Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People . According to Bede, Cædmon was an illiterate herdsman who one night dreamt how to praise God by singing beautiful Christian verses . Cædmon then became the foremost Christian poet, who led the way for others such as Bede and Cynewulf. Old English scholar and noted commentator on the Ruthwell Cross Daniel H. Haigh argues that the inscription of the Ruthwell Cross must be fragments of one of Cædmon's lost poems, stating "On this monument, erected about A.D. 665, we have fragments of a religious poem of very high character, and that there was but one man living in England at that time worthy to be named as a religious poet, and that was Caedmon". Another runic scholar, George Stephens contends that the very language and structure of the verses in Dream of the Rood could only have come from the 7th century and a time before Bede . Considering that the only Christian poet before Bede was Cædmon, Stephens makes the point that there could have been no one else during this time period or living in the same area that could have authored the poem other than Cædmon . Furthermore, Stephens claims that there is a runic inscription on the Ruthwell Cross, that, when translated, comes to mean "Caedmon made me". Despite this evidence most scholars reject the Haigh and Stephens assertion that there is in fact such an inscription . </P>

What does the narrator command at the end of dream of the rood