Chapter M: H. B. = Monumenta Historica Britannica, vol. i (all published) (2)

§ 27. Something may be done for the text of Asser by cautious conjectural emendation. There are a certain number of obvious blunders in it due to the carelessness of scribes, the ignorance of editors, possibly even to the mistakes of compositors[109]. Most of these are concerned with minor details. There is one correction however, with which I will trouble you, as it relates to a point of some historical interest; and, moreover, converts into a proof of Asser’s accuracy, what might have been used as an argument against him, though I am not aware that it has actually been so used. In the somewhat magniloquent passage in which are described the extensive relations which Alfred cultivated with foreign parts, the following sentence occurs[110]: ‘nam etiam de Hiersolyma Abel patriarcha [v. l. patriarchae] epistolas … illi directas uidimus et legimus.’ The passage as it stands is open to two objections, one historical, the other grammatical. The historical objection is that no one of the name of Abel held the patriarchate of Jerusalem during Alfred’s reign; though our historians go on copying and recopying the name without ever dreaming of verifying the point. The grammatical objection is that the passive participle ‘directas’ cries aloud for a preposition of agency. By the addition of two vowels and the subtraction (if necessary) of another the passage can be brought into harmony both with history and grammar, thus: ‘ab Elia patriarcha.’ Elias III was patriarch of Jerusalem from 879 to 907[111]. In the earlier of the two versions which occur in Simeon of Durham the word ‘Abel’ is printed ‘a Bel[112].’ This does justice to the grammar, but not to the history. In the later version, Simeon himself, following Florence, omits the passage altogether. One would be glad to know whether Florence omitted it because he saw the objections to which it was open.

[Sidenote: Evidence of the Leechbook, and of the Anglo-Saxon Martyrology.]

I was first put on the track of this correction by the curious passage of the Leechbook printed by Mr. Cockayne in the second volume of his interesting Anglo-Saxon Leechdoms, where the writer, after giving certain medical recipes, says at the end: ‘all this my Lord Elias, patriarch of Jerusalem, bade thus say to King Alfred[113].’ As the MS. from which this is taken is, according to Mr. Cockayne, of the early part of the tenth century[114], we are brought very near indeed to Alfred’s time. Moreover in the Anglo-Saxon Martyrology printed by the same editor in his work called ‘The Shrine; a collection of occasional papers on dry subjects,’ two Eastern saints, martyred in Persia in 341, SS. Milus and Senneus, are commemorated at November 15[115]. These are found in no Western Calendar, and Mr. Cockayne thinks that the knowledge of them must have come to England through Alfred’s intercourse with Elias of Jerusalem. The martyrology, which is unfortunately incomplete, was not improbably drawn up by Alfred’s directions, and cannot be later than his reign, as it mentions St. Oswald’s body as resting at Bardney[116], whence it was translated to Gloucester by Æthelflæd, lady of the Mercians, and her husband Æthelred, not long after Alfred’s death[117].

In one instance, I may remark in passing, the editors have altered Asser’s text for the worse, what the Germans call ‘Verschlimmbesserung.’ It is the passage where Athelney monastery is said to be unapproachable ‘nisi cauticis, aut etiam per unum pontem[118].’ Here ‘cauticis’ has been altered to ‘nauticis.’ But ‘cautica’ is a perfectly good word, and means causeway, _chaussée_[119], a much better sense than any that can be got out of ‘nauticis[120].’

[Sidenote: Evidence of the work as to the author. He was a native of South Wales.]

§ 28. But even when all has been done that criticism can do for the restoration and purification of the text, the work still remains a puzzle almost insoluble. What can we make out as to the author? It is clear that he was a Celt from South Wales. This is proved partly by his language and terminology, partly by his knowledge of South Welsh affairs. As to the former point, he has the special Celtic use of the terms ‘right-hand’ and ‘left-hand,’ to express the ideas of south and north. The Celt always faced the east, and named the quarters of the heaven from that point of view. Thus Chippenham is in the left-hand part of Wiltshire[121]. The author’s own home was to the left and west of Severn[122]. The Danes throw up earthworks on the right-hand side of Reading[123]; Sussex is the region of the right-hand Saxons[124]; and, lastly, all the regions of the right-hand part of Britannia belonged to Alfred[125]. This does not, however, exclude the use of the more ordinary words ‘meridianus’ and ‘aquilonaris’ for south and north[126].

[Sidenote: Ambiguous use of the term _Britannia_.]

§ 29. The example last cited brings me to another characteristic of the author’s terminology; viz. his ambiguous use of the word _Britannia_, which sometimes means Britain in the ordinary sense[127], but more often means Wales. Historians have gone wrong through ignoring this distinction. Thus Dr. Pauli[128], in the passage just quoted, takes _Britannia_ in what is to us the ordinary sense. But that all the southern parts of Britain belonged to Alfred is so obvious as not to be worth saying. That all the southern districts of Wales had submitted to Alfred is a new and most interesting fact. And this clearly is the meaning; for the statement is introductory to that sketch of the troubles in South Wales which explains both why the South Welsh princes commended themselves to Alfred, and why the author consented to enter his service. Moreover this use is paralleled again and again in the Book of Llandaff, a primary South Welsh authority. We find there Asser’s very phrase ‘dextralis pars Britanniae’ several times repeated[129]. We have the clergy and people, the inhabitants, the churches, the archbishop, the kings and princes, the kingdom, the islands, ‘Dextralis Britanniae[130].’ To return to Asser:—Æthelwulf reduces ‘Britannia’ under Burgred of Mercia[131]; Offa’s dyke divides Mercia from ‘Britannia[132],’ and finally Asser himself agrees to spend half his time ‘in Britannia’ and half with Alfred ‘in Saxonia[133].’

[Sidenote: Use of the terms _Saxones_ and _Saxonia_. Limitation of the term _Saxonia_.]

§ 30. This brings me to my next point. For our author, as for all branches of the Celtic race, the Germanic tribes settled in Britain bear the common name of Saxons[134]. So much is this the case that he once writes ‘regnum Orientalium Saxonum, quod Saxonice Eastengle dicitur[135].’ This is a mere slip, for in other cases he has ‘Orientales Angli’ quite correctly[136]. But it shows how much more natural the word ‘Saxones’ was to him than the other. So too their language is ‘Saxonica lingua[137],’ as opposed to Welsh, which is ‘Britannicus sermo[138]’; a place bears one name, ‘Saxonice,’ ‘in English[139],’ and another, ‘Britannice,’ ‘in Welsh[140]’; and we hear of the ‘Saxon’ poems which Alfred loved from his boyhood[141], and of the ‘Saxon’ books[142], in which they and other English writings were contained. So too the country of these tribes is ‘Saxonia[143].’ But here it is important to notice the precise limitations under which Asser uses this last term. It is not coextensive with the whole of Germanic Britain. It includes Wessex, Sussex, Kent, Surrey, and Essex. Cornwall is excluded as being Celtic[144]; but Mercia is also excluded[145], and _a fortiori_, though this is not expressly mentioned, East Anglia and Northumbria[146]. In other words it includes that part of the island which, at the death of Egbert, was under the direct rule of Wessex; or, to borrow Bede’s useful distinction, it connotes the ‘regnum’ as opposed to the ‘imperium[147]’ of the West Saxon house. It is possible that in many cases the term ‘Saxones’ should be understood with a like limitation, for the Mercii, Northanhymbri, and Orientales Angli are generally mentioned separately. But I do not think that this limitation can be carried out quite so rigorously, for instance where Asser speaks of the ‘Schola Saxonum’ at Rome[148], answering to the ‘Angelcynnes scolu’ of the Chronicle. In one case he does expressly distinguish ‘Angli et Saxones[149].’

[Sidenote: Alfred ‘king of the Anglo-Saxons.’]

§ 31. And in this connexion it is deplorable to remark that for Asser Alfred is always ‘king of the Anglo-Saxons[150]’; but then we must remember that Asser never had the advantage of reading Mr. Freeman’s history of the Norman Conquest, or of attending the lectures of Professor Napier. But, jesting apart, it is important to note that by the use of this title our author intends to mark a real advance in power and dignity on the part of Alfred as compared with his predecessors, none of whom bears any higher style than that of king of the West Saxons[151], and the change of style is justified by the fact that a large number of Mercian Angles became Alfred’s immediate subjects in 878. On the other hand Asser does not exaggerate Alfred’s position, as later Chroniclers do, calling him ‘monarch of the whole of Britain’ and so on[152]. If the heading of the work is genuine, as I am inclined for this very reason to think it is, Alfred is addressed as ‘ruler of all the Christians of the isle of Britain[153].’ In other words the writer recognises exactly the same limitations to Alfred’s power as does the Saxon Chronicle, where it says that, after Alfred’s occupation of London, all the English kin submitted to him, except what was under the thraldom of the Danes[154].

[Sidenote: Other Celtic terms.]

Another term of Celtic origin is probably to be found in the unique title of ‘secundarius’ given by Asser to Alfred during the reign of Æthelred[155]; but of this I shall have more to say in another lecture; while for ‘graphium’ in the sense of ‘donation’ or ‘written grant,’ the only other authority quoted is from the life of a Welsh saint[156].

[Sidenote: Celtic use of the term _Germania_.]

§ 32. Another trace of Celtic influence is to be found, I believe, in the innocent-looking passage where it is said that in 884 an army of pagans from Germany, ‘de Germania,’ invaded the Old _or_ Continental Saxons[157]. It might be thought that this merely refers to the fact that part, at any rate, of the invading army had wintered at Duisburg on the Rhine[158]. But could they be said to be going _from_ Germany when they invaded Saxony? I cannot speak positively as to all the mediaeval uses of the word ‘Germania,’ but one would think that it must include Saxony[159]. But however this may be, the fact remains that Asser nowhere applies the name ‘Germania’ to any part of the Carolingian empire. The people of that empire are Franks[160]. Charles the Great[161], Charles the Bald[162], Charles the Fat[163], Louis the Stammerer[164], Louis, king of Northern France[165], are all kings of the Franks. Carloman, king of Aquitaine and Burgundy, is king of the Western Franks[166]. We hear also of the kingdom or region of the Western Franks[167]. The territory included in the empire as a whole is called Francia[168]. The eastern kingdom is Francia Orientalis[169]. The western territory is sometimes called Gallia[170], and its inhabitants are Gauls[171], or of Gallic race[172]. Charles the Fat, before he gained the western kingdom, is king of the Alamanni[173]. I believe that Germania here means Norway, a meaning which, strange as it may seem, it unquestionably has in the Welsh Annals. Thus at 1036 the Brut y Tywysogion calls Canute king of England, Denmark, and Germania, while at 1056 the title king of Germania is given to Harold Hardrada. In other words, the invaders of Saxony, according to Asser, came from Norway, and not from Denmark, which he calls Danubium[174].

[Sidenote: Other Celtic characteristics.]

Another very obvious characteristic of the writer is his fondness for giving Welsh equivalents for English names of places[175].

May I add without offence that I think another Celtic trait in our author is a certain largeness of statement? Mons. Henri Martin, a great admirer of the Celts, notes as characteristic of them a certain ‘rebellion against facts[176]’; and there are many things in Asser which we can hardly accept as literally true, though, as I have shown already, and shall have to show again, some of the criticisms directed against him rest on misunderstandings of his words.

[Sidenote: Knowledge of South Welsh affairs.]

§ 33. We have next to consider the author’s knowledge of South Welsh affairs. The principal passage is the one already alluded to where Asser describes his motives for entering Alfred’s service[177]. He and his friends hoped thereby to check the mischief inflicted on St. David’s by Hemeid, king of Dyfed, who had on one occasion expelled Archbishop Novis, Asser’s relative, and himself. Alfred was in a position to help, for some time previously all the princes of South Wales had commended themselves to Alfred; Hemeid himself, and Helised ap Teudyr, king of Brecheiniog, owing to the pressure of the sons of Rotri Mawr, king of North Wales; while Howel ap Rhys, king of Glewissig, Brochmail and Fernmail, sons of Mouric, kings of Gwent, took the same step, owing to the pressure of Æthelred of Mercia. Even Anaraut, son of Rotri himself, with his brothers, leaving the friendship of the Northumbrians (by which I take the Northumbrian Danes to be meant) sought the king’s friendship; and after being honourably received by him, and made his godson at confirmation, agreed to stand to him in the same relation of subordination as Æthelred did in Mercia, and was dismissed with rich presents—a scene which almost repeats the submission of Guthrum, and incidentally perhaps supports the view that the defect of which Augustine complained in Welsh baptismal practice, was the omission of the rite of confirmation[178]; while the comparison with Æthelred of Mercia illustrates the semi-royal position of Alfred’s son-in-law[179] at least as forcibly as it illustrates Anaraut’s dependence.

[Sidenote: Relations of Wales to Wessex.]

§ 34. Many years ago the late Mr. Bradshaw laid stress on the forms of these Welsh names as showing that Asser could not be a late forgery[180]. This argument becomes of less importance in view of the results we have already arrived at as to the date, and of the fact that names of the same type occur in documents later than the latest date which any reasonable critic could propose for Asser[181]. But the whole passage throws a flood of light on the state of Wales, and its relations to the house of Wessex. We see South Wales forced to submit to Wessex by the joint pressure of North Wales and Mercia; while North Wales, which had remained hostile at any rate up to 880, when a battle was fought which was regarded as avenging the slaughter of Rotri Mawr by the Saxons in 877[182], ultimately found it to its interest to seek the shelter of the West Saxon overlord. Thus we see actually going on before our eyes the transition from the state of things under Egbert, when the Celtic population joined eagerly with the Scandinavian invaders in the hope of undoing the work of the Saxon Conquest[183], to a state of things in which they combine with their Saxon rivals against the common foe. It seems to me that such a passage, introduced so incidentally and naturally, could only have been written by a contemporary writer. Moreover all the South Welsh princes, with two exceptions, are mentioned in the Book of Llandaff, several of them occur in the Annals. Hemeid of Dyfed, Asser’s enemy, died in 892 or 891[184]. Howel ap Rhys is probably the Howel who died at Rome in 885[185] whither he had gone, it is not unlikely, in expiation of the crime—a peculiarly foul case of treachery—recited in the Book of Llandaff[186]. His district, Glewissig, is often mentioned in the same authority; it is ‘roughly the district between the lower courses of the Usk and Towy[187].’ Mouric of Gwent and his sons Brochmail and Fernmail also occur frequently[188]. Mouric is probably the one whose death is recorded in 873[189]. The only prince as to whom I can find nothing is Helised ap Teudyr of Brecheiniog. But there is a Teudyr ab Elised, king of Brecheiniog[190], contemporary with Llunwerth or Llwmbert, the successor of Novis in the see of St. David’s, who is not impossibly his father. Of Novis himself I have said enough above (p. 20).

[Sidenote: Events of 878.]

Another place where the author shows his knowledge of South Welsh affairs is in the interesting addition which he makes to the Chronicle under 878, to the effect that the heathen force which besieged Cynwit on the north coast of Devon, had wintered in Dyfed, and massacred many Christians there[191]. Facts like this explain the change of attitude on the part of the Welsh. South Wales also suffered severely in 895[192].

[Sidenote: Question as to unity of authorship. Peculiar sense of the word _aedificia_.]

§ 35. I have so far spoken of ‘our author’ in the singular. But the question must now be faced: is the work (apart from actual and possible interpolations) the composition of a single hand? When I first took up this question I rather hoped that the result to be arrived at would be, that the annals were the work of one author, the biographical notes of another, while the florid head-links, of which I spoke before[193], would be the work of the later editor who combined the two documents. This would have been a result dear to the heart of the higher critic. But any such theory, however pretty, will not stand a moment’s examination. Allowing for the difference of subject-matter, the same characteristics appear both in the annalistic and biographical sections. Thus of five instances of the Celtic use of left and right instead of north and south, two occur in the annals and three in the biography; ‘Britannia,’ in the sense of ‘Wales,’ occurs six times in the biography and once in the annals[194]. So there are some not quite common words and expressions, for which the writer has an evident predilection, which are sprinkled about both parts of the work. The details are too dry for reproduction here, and may be safely relegated to the obscurity of a footnote[195]. But one instance is of sufficient general interest to merit discussion. This is the use of the word ‘aedificia’ in the sense of articles of goldsmiths’ work. To this I can produce no parallel from any other writer; but the meaning seems to me practically certain in three instances, and probable in the fourth; and of these four cases one occurs in the annals, and the rest in the biography. The first instance is where Alfred, after Guthrum’s baptism, gives him ‘multa et optima aedificia[196].’ It is clear that Guthrum did not carry away with him edifices, in the ordinary sense of the word. Lappenberg would alter ‘aedificia’ into ‘beneficia[197]’; ‘mit vollem Rechte,’ says Pauli[198]; but this will hardly do in other cases, as we shall see.

The next instance is where Asser says that Alfred ‘by his novel contrivance made “aedificia” more venerable and precious than any of his predecessors[199].’ Here the ordinary meaning is just possible, though the epithet ‘pretiosiora’ and the fact that ‘aurifices et artifices’ are mentioned just before, point decidedly the other way. The third passage speaks of ‘aedificia of gold and silver incomparably wrought under his instructions[200].’ Even the most Celtic imagination cannot suppose that Alfred built edifices, in the ordinary sense, of the precious metals, especially as his own royal halls and chambers are expressly stated to have been of stone and wood[201]. The fourth passage tells how Alfred had workmen who were skilled ‘in omni terreno aedificio[202],’ where the meaning is probably the same. The use of the word in so strange a sense in both parts of the work seems to me a strong proof of unity of authorship. The usage, however, becomes a little less strange if we remember how much of the goldsmith’s art at that time would go to the making of shrines and reliquaries, which really were ‘edifices’ in miniature. The two middle passages which speak of Alfred’s ‘novel contrivance,’ and of his personal instructions to his workmen, are of singular interest in connexion with the Alfred Jewel; and the fact that my friend Professor Earle, who has made a special study of that jewel, agrees with my interpretation of these passages, adds greatly to my confidence in advancing it. Alfred’s love for this kind of art seems to have been hereditary. William of Malmesbury gives an account of a shrine which Æthelwulf had made to contain the bones of St. Aldhelm. ‘The covering is of crystal, whereon the king’s name may be read in letters of gold[203].’ This exactly answers to the character of the Alfred Jewel.

[Sidenote: Asser’s style.]

§ 36. Of Asser’s style two prominent characteristics are a fondness for long parentheses[204], and a tiresome trick of repeating a word or phrase, sometimes with a slight variation, at intervals, in some cases longer, in others very short[205]. He certainly would have had no chance with the editor who objected to the quotation ‘to the pure all things are pure,’ on the ground that it sinned against the rule of the office that the same word must not be repeated within six lines. Occasionally he seems as if he could not get away from a phrase, but clings to it, as a drowning man clings to a plank; and I think that this feature is due, not to any love for these particular words and phrases, but to a poverty of expression like that which causes the repetitions of an unpractised speaker. These characteristics come out most strongly no doubt in the biographical sections, but they are not wholly absent from the others[206].

[Sidenote: Relation of Asser to the Saxon Chronicle. Mistranslation, or misunderstanding.]

§ 37. The next question which must be considered is the relation of the Latin Annals of Asser to the corresponding passages of the Saxon Chronicle. Sir Henry Howorth indeed expresses roundly his conviction that Asser wrote (if indeed he would not rather say forged) the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle[207]. This I regard as quite inconceivable. Sir James Ramsay, without going so far as this, records that ‘several’ passages have convinced him that the Latin of Asser is more original than the Saxon of the Chronicle[208]. Unfortunately he does not indicate these passages. My own conviction is unfalteringly the other way. In the first place there is at least one passage in Asser which can only be explained as a mistranslation of the Chronicle. It occurs under 876. Here the Chronicle has a phrase which puzzled all translators of the Chronicle, mediaeval and modern, till it was cleared up by Professor Earle. It runs thus: ‘The mounted force (_i.e._ of the Danes) stole away from the fyrd and got into Exeter.’ Asser misunderstands this, making it a defeat of a native body of cavalry by the Danes[209]. At 886[210] there seems also to be a mistranslation or misunderstanding, but the text is possibly corrupt, and Florence has not improved it.

[Sidenote: ‘East-Seaxum.’]

Again, such forms as ‘Middel-Seaxum[211],’ ‘East-Seaxum[212],’ ‘Suð-Seaxum[213],’ ‘Eald-Seaxum[214],’ which contain the Saxon dative plural surely imply a Saxon original. It may be noted too that Asser retains the Saxon name of the river Seine, Signe[215], whereas the more classical Florence translates it into the Latin form, Sequana. Phrases again like ‘ipso eodem anno[216]’ for ‘þy ilcan geare,’ and the constantly recurring ‘loco funeris dominati sunt[217]’ for ‘ahton wælstowe geweald,’ ‘superius’ for ‘ufor[218]’ point the same way.

[Sidenote: Omission.]

Again, Asser accidentally omits the annal 884, which is a very brief one in the Chronicle. Consequently, he mechanically puts the events of 885 under 884.

[Sidenote: Chronology.]

Lastly, Steenstrup showed by a comparison of the continental Chronicles that the movements of the Danes from 879 to 897 in the Saxon Chronicle (= 878-896) are probably dated a year too late[219]. This is confirmed by the mention of a solar eclipse under 879 at one o’clock of the day. Now in 878 there was a solar eclipse on October 29, at 1.30 p.m. There was a solar eclipse also in 879, on March 26, but this was at 4 p.m. Asser gives the hour of the eclipse as ‘between nones and vespers but nearer to nones[220].’ In other words he has altered the hour of the eclipse given by the Chronicle to suit the wrong numbering of the Annal. The force of these arguments taken together seems to me overwhelming.

[Sidenote: Asser’s additions to the Chronicle.]

§ 38. But Asser is not content to be a mere translator. He makes considerable additions to the Chronicle, which vary very much in value. Some are pure rhetoric, others are mere inferences from the words of the Chronicle, legitimate enough it may be, but of no higher authority than similar inferences deduced by ourselves. Many consist of interpretations of Saxon names[221], or statements of their Welsh equivalents[222]. A considerable number are geographical glosses explaining the situation of the places mentioned[223]. These three last classes of additions occur only in the Annals, and all three seem to point to an interpreter wishing to make his original clearer to his readers, who are assumed to be unfamiliar with Saxon names and places. Even the situation of London is carefully explained. But other additions, like the one discussed above about the wintering of the Danish fleet in Dyfed[224], are of real value, and evidently rest on authentic information.

[Sidenote: Abrupt termination.]

§ 39. The abrupt termination of the work after the year 887 has always been a difficulty. If we could trust the statement that the work was written in Alfred’s forty-fifth year, i.e. about 894[225], we might account for this by supposing that the Chronicle, from which the writer borrows so much, had not at that time got much beyond 887. And the work may have been laid aside and never taken up again. Unfortunately this date occurs in one of those suspicious passages about Alfred’s illness, though not in the one most open to suspicion. Or, again, the work may be mutilated.

[Sidenote: Asser to be used with caution; but there is a genuine nucleus.]

§ 40. On the whole, then, Asser is an authority to be used with criticism and caution; partly because we have always to be alive to the possibility of interpolation, partly because the writer’s Celtic imagination is apt to run away with him. But that there is a nucleus which is the genuine work of a single writer, a South Walian contemporary of Alfred, I feel tolerably sure, and I know no reason why that South Walian contemporary should not be Asser of Menevia. There is a slight confirmation of this view in the quotation which the writer makes from Gregory’s Cura Pastoralis[226], for we know from Alfred’s own mouth that Asser was one of those who helped him in the translation of that work. Another coincidence with Alfred’s preface to the Cura Pastoralis is to be found in the phrase ‘aliquando sensum ex sensu ponens,’ which Asser uses in reference to the translation of Gregory’s Dialogues[227]. Anyhow, as I have shown[228], the work which bears Asser’s name cannot be later than 974, and the attempt to treat it as a forgery of the eleventh or twelfth century must be regarded as having broken down. I may add that I started with a strong prejudice against the authenticity of Asser, so that my conclusions have at any rate been impartially arrived at.

[Sidenote: A puzzling work.]

§ 41. Still the book remains a puzzle both in form and substance. It was a curious work to offer to Alfred if it contained the scandals about Æthelbald and Judith, and what we must regard as the idealised description of Alfred’s court and administration. I am conscious that I am very far from having solved the problem. I shall be content if I am thought to have contributed something towards a solution, which will perhaps be given before long by Mr. Stevenson. The suggestion of Mr. Macfadyen that the work was drawn up with a view to Alfred’s canonisation[229] may be dismissed at once. People are not canonised in their lifetime.

[Sidenote: Lives of saints.]

§ 42. In one class of historical literature, which often very usefully supplements more formal histories, the reign of Alfred is singularly barren, I mean the lives of saints. We have nothing like the lives of Dunstan, Oswald, and Æthelwold, which give us so much help towards the end of the next century; or like the lives of Wilfrid and Cuthbert at an earlier period. The times, indeed, were not favourable to the development of saintship of the mediaeval pattern. The monasteries, the chief schools of that type of sanctity, suffered more than any other institutions at the hands of the Danes; and the virtues which the age required were of a more active kind than those which went to make up the mediaeval ideal. The title of saint is indeed given by one authority to Werferth, bishop of Worcester; but this rests, as we shall see, on a misconception; though in truth, as Mr. Taylor has remarked, the conduct of Werferth in accepting the see of Worcester in 872, the very year preceding the expulsion of Burgred, king of Mercia, Alfred’s brother-in-law, by the Danes, was as heroic as that of any Christian missionary[230].

[Sidenote: Lives of St. Neot; their mythical character.]

§ 43. The only hagiological literature relating to Alfred’s reign consists of the lives of St. Neot. And these are late, and not merely unhistorical, but anti-historical. To them are due some of the prevalent misconceptions as to Alfred’s reign. For this very reason something must be said about them.

[Sidenote: Five Lives. The Bodleian Life. The Bollandist Life. The Metrical Life. The Anglo-Saxon Life.]

The existing Lives of St. Neot are, as far as I know, five in number, four in Latin, of which three are in prose and one in verse, and one Anglo-Saxon Life. Besides these there is, as we have seen, a fragment of another Latin Life, embodied in the Annals of St. Neot, and thence transferred by Archbishop Parker to the text of Asser[231]. Roger of Wendover’s account of St. Neot[232] seems also to be based on some Life different from any of those mentioned above. Of the Latin Lives that have come down to us the earliest is that contained in MS. Bodley 379, and printed at the end of Whitaker’s Life of St. Neot[233]. It may sufficiently characterise this writer’s style to say that he describes Wessex as the country of ‘the Anglican Saxons who dwell beneath the Zephyr wind[234].’ The next Latin Life is that printed by the Bollandists[235] from a MS. formerly belonging to Bec. It bears within itself clear evidence of being later than the Norman Conquest[236]. This is a very pedantic writer. He talks much of form and matter, genus and species[237], ‘the dry notions of Logicians,’ as one translator of Thomas à Kempis[238] depreciatingly calls them; and is fond of using Greek words like ‘anatole,’ ‘mesembria,’ ‘dysis[239].’ The Metrical Life, printed by Whitaker[240] from a MS. belonging to Magdalen College, Oxford, is clearly based on this, of which also John of Tynemouth’s Life[241] is a mere abridgement. The Anglo-Saxon Life (or rather Homily) is preserved in a Cottonian MS. (Vesp. D. xiv), whence it was printed by the Rev. G. C. Gorham in his History and Antiquities of Eynesbury and St. Neot’s (1824)[242], and more recently by Cockayne[243] and Wülker[244]. As to its date widely different views have been held, based on divergent interpretations of a passage near the end, where the writer contrasts the evils of his own times with the prosperity of Alfred’s later years. Sir T. Duffus Hardy thought that this description pointed to the year 986 as the date of composition[245], while Professor Earle would place it in the eleventh or twelfth century[246]. But the mistake of the writer in making Neot contemporary with Ælfheah of Canterbury is absolutely conclusive against the earlier date[247]. Wülker is inclined to attribute it to Ælfric[248]; but this also is unlikely. It is clearly based on earlier Lives, for the expressions occur: ‘as books say,’ ‘it is told in writings,’ &c.[249] But I do not think it is directly derived from any of the preceding Lives, and, though not ancient, it may be earlier than any of them. It certainly contains one miracle which is not found in any of the others, a very quaint story (probably a folk-tale) of a fox which stole the Saint’s shoe while he was bathing[250].

[Sidenote: Analysis of the Lives.]

§ 44. These lives cover much the same ground. St. Neot is made the son of Æthelwulf and his wife, granted to their prayers as a reward for their piety[251]. Æthelwulf is represented not incorrectly as king of one of the four English kingdoms, viz. of Wessex with Kent[252], the other three of course being Mercia, East Anglia, and Northumbria. Of the relations of these kingdoms a very ideal sketch is given. As the Metrical Life says, in verses which are as open to criticism on prosodical as they are on historical grounds:—

‘Suffecit cuique sua pars, nec plura petebat,
Alter in alterius nil sibi iure petit.
Pax stabilis, uita concors, discordia nulla;
Inter eos regnat gratia, liuor abest[253].’

Neot becomes a monk at Glastonbury under Dunstan[254] (who was made abbot of Glastonbury in 946!), and was the special friend of Æthelwold[255] (bishop of Winchester 963!) or of his successor Ælfheah[256]! After this Neot becomes an anchorite in Cornwall, whence he goes to Rome to Pope Marinus[257]. On his return he founds a monastery in Cornwall[258], and now it is that Alfred first hears of him (though according to the pedigree he would be his own brother). Alfred visits him, and Neot rebukes him for his licentiousness and tyranny[259], compelling him, in the words of the Bollandist Life, ‘to tremble at the sulphureous flames of Gehenna’; he prophesies Alfred’s expulsion from the throne, and his ultimate restoration, and then dies[260]. Next comes the invasion of Guthrum. Alfred gives up everything and flies to Athelney; the cakes are duly burnt[261], and then St. Neot appears in a vision and finally leads the English hosts to victory at Ethandun[262].

[Sidenote: Absurdity of the story.]

§ 45. It would not be necessary to quote this precious stuff, even in outline, were it not that people still continue to treat it as more or less historical. I have already adverted to the strange inconsistency of making Alfred first hear of Neot’s fame after the latter’s return from Rome, although he was his own brother according to the pedigree. This seems to show that the making Neot a son of Æthelwulf was a later development, and not part of the original legend. And, indeed, in the fragment of the Life interpolated in Asser he is no more than Alfred’s ‘cognatus[263],’ which in mediaeval Latin means cousin, or sometimes brother-in-law, like ‘cognato’ in modern Italian[264]. But if St. Neot ever existed, his connexion with the royal house of Wessex has probably as little basis in fact, as the forged Carolingian pedigree which the later Lives of St. Hubert give to that Saint[265]. Another noteworthy point is that the only pope contemporary with Alfred known to these Lives is Marinus[266], though his obscure pontificate only lasted a little over a year (December, 882, to the beginning of 884[267]), and was some time posterior to the death of Neot, who is represented as dying before the campaign of 878[268]. The reason for this prominence is, of course, to be found in the privileges which this pope was said to have granted, at Alfred’s request, to the English School at Rome[269], and still more in the story that he had sent a fragment of the true cross to Alfred[270]. I need hardly say that the idea of Alfred’s early licentiousness, or of his tyranny at the beginning of his reign, is absolutely inconsistent with authentic history. The year 871, when Wessex was at deathgrips with the foe, was not the time, even if Alfred had been the man, for establishing a tyranny. It is pitiable that modern writers should lend even half an ear[271] to these wretched tales, which besmirch the fair fame of our hero king, in order to exalt a phantom saint.

[Sidenote: Alfred’s withdrawal to Athelney.]

§ 46. But perhaps the worst misconception, and the one which has most injuriously affected English history, is that connected with the withdrawal to Athelney. The Lives represent Alfred on the invasion of Guthrum as becoming not merely a helpless, but a cowardly and criminal fugitive. This view is put most strongly in the Saxon Life, which runs as follows[272]: ‘Then came Guthrum the heathen king with his cruel host first to the eastern part of Saxland (Saxonia).… When King Alfred … learnt that the host … was … so near England, he straightway for fear took to flight, and forsook all his warriors and his captains and all his people, … and crept by hedge and lane, through wood and field, till he … came to Athelney,’ where the cakes are burnt. Now there is no doubt that Wessex was thoroughly surprised by the sudden attack of the Danes at mid-winter, after twelfth-night, 878[273]. And it is possible that in this the Danes were hardly ‘playing the game.’ Military operations were generally suspended in the winter. Chippenham was a ‘villa regia’ as Asser notes; and it looks as if the Danes, with Boer ‘slimness,’ had tried to surprise Alfred in his winter home[274]. Happily they failed in this, and, as Pauli has finely said[275], Alfred’s cause was not hopeless as long as Alfred was alive. For the moment the struggle was converted into a guerilla war. But this is what authentic history has to say about it: ‘Here the host … stole on Chippenham and surprised Wessex, … and most of the people they reduced except the King Alfred[276], and he with a little band made his way with difficulty by wood and swamp; … and then after Easter he with his little band made a fort at Athelney, and from that fort kept fighting against the foe[277],’ until he in his turn surprised the Danes, and forced them to submit. Athelney, in fact, played no small part in the redemption of England.

[Sidenote: Later Chroniclers; Ethelwerd.]

§ 47. Of later Chroniclers, Ethelwerd, at the end of the next century, bases his work mainly on the Chronicle. But, like Asser, he has good additions here and there; and as he was closely connected with the royal house of Wessex, being descended from Æthelred, Alfred’s brother, and was also highly placed as an ealdorman in Wessex, he may well have had access to authentic sources of information. Unfortunately there is no one who has worked at Ethelwerd, who will not echo Ranke’s sigh: ‘wenn er nur verständlich wäre[278]!’ ‘If only he were intelligible!’ The designation which he gives to himself: ‘Patricius consul Fabius Quaestor Ethelwerdus’ is but too true an index of the puerile pomposity of his style. Something of this unintelligibility is no doubt to be put down to the corruption of the text[279], of which no MS. is known to exist. But if he fails to make us understand his Latin, his blunders in translating the Chronicle show that he had a very imperfect acquaintance with the Saxon language[280]. It is possible that this fact may be due, as Professor York Powell once suggested to me, to his having been brought up on the Continent.

[Sidenote: Florence of Worcester.]

The careful Florence gives us less help than usual in this reign, because, as we have seen, he borrows so much from Asser. His splendid and inspiring panegyric on Alfred[281] is almost his only serious addition, though a worthy one, to what we learn from Asser and the Chronicle.

[Sidenote: Henry of Huntingdon.]

Henry of Huntingdon makes no use of Asser, and does little more than reproduce the Chronicle. There is no trace of the use of ancient ballads[282], such as we find in other parts of his history; no survival of personal traditions, like the splendid anecdotes of old Siward a century and a half later, one of which is the ultimate source of Shakespeare’s glorious lines:—

‘Had he his hurts before?’
‘Ay, on the front.’
‘Why then, God’s soldier be he!
Had I as many sons as I have hairs,
I would not wish them to a fairer death.’

One picturesque phrase Huntingdon has, where, describing the sudden swoop of the Danes on Chippenham in January, 878, he says that ‘they covered the land like locusts[283].’

[Sidenote: Simeon of Durham. Legend of St. Cuthbert.]

§ 48. Of the double recension of the annals of this reign in Simeon of Durham I have spoken above. In the second one, which is Simeon’s own, there is very little which is not derived from Florence, Asser, and the Chronicle, except a few notices of northern affairs, taken mainly from his own history of the Church of Durham. The earlier recension also adds little to our authorities, except the writer’s own rhetoric, of which the following specimen from the opening of the battle of Ethandun may suffice[284]:—‘When the most limpid ray of the sun arose, the king and all the glory of his people put on their warlike adornments, that is to say, the threefold breastplate of faith, hope, and love of God. They, rising from the ground, boldly challenged the caitifs[285] to the fight, trusting in the clemency of the Creator, secure and fortified as with a rampart by the presence of their king, whose countenance shone like that of a resplendent angel,’ with more to the same purpose—or want of purpose. In these northern accounts St. Cuthbert plays very much the part which St. Neot plays in southern legend, appearing to Alfred in his distress, and promising him victory[286], a trait adopted also by William of Malmesbury[287]. And with this stream of legend Mr. Freeman[288] ingeniously connects the dedication of the parish church[289] of Wells to St. Cuthbert, a very unusual dedication for a south-country church. Moreover, some of these northern accounts prolong the retreat of Alfred in the marshes of Somerset from three months to three years[290]. We are fast entering the world of legend.

[Sidenote: William of Malmesbury.]

William of Malmesbury uses both Asser and the Chronicle, though he declines ‘to unravel separately the inextricable labyrinths of Alfred’s labours.’ He adds not only the legend of St. Cuthbert, but also the stories of the golden bracelets, and of Alfred visiting the Danish camp disguised as a minstrel[291]; wandering folk-tales which get attached to more than one historical character. There is no reason to believe that Malmesbury had for Alfred’s reign any historical authority not open to ourselves, as he unquestionably had for that of Athelstan; unless, indeed, he had seen Alfred’s Handbook, of which I shall have more to say later on[292]. He has, however, some very interesting remarks on Alfred’s literary works[293].

[Sidenote: Knowledge of early English History declines.]

§ 49. After William of Malmesbury men ceased to consult, indeed were unable to consult, the authentic sources of English history[294], and there is nothing to check the growth of legend. We get into a world where cakes are freely burnt, where Alfred is sent to Ireland to be cured (Irish fashion) of an incurable disease by St. Modwenna[295], where he invents tithings, hundreds and shires[296], translates into Saxon the Martian law, originally drawn up by Martia, a wise British queen[297]. Here, too, Alfred rules as monarch of all Britain[298], appoints ‘custodes regni[299],’ yet is considerate enough to abstain from all interference with the Church[300]. Here he founds[301], or better still, reforms, the University of Oxford, to which he sends his son Æthelweard[302], and to which, by an improvement on Asser’s scheme, he devotes a fixed proportion of his revenues[303]. His supreme effort in his mythical realm is marked by the invention of trial by jury[304], and the hanging of forty-four judges in one year for unjust judgements[305]. I think it must be admitted that these achievements were highly creditable to one who, in the same mythical realm, had shown in his early years such licentiousness and tyranny[306].

[Sidenote: Origin of some of the myths.]

§ 50. In some cases we can trace how the later myth arose; and this furnishes us with an instructive warning as to the danger of listening to the unsupported statements of later chroniclers, as many modern writers are half inclined to do.

[Sidenote: Simeon of Durham.]

The following is a good instance:—

The Chronicle under 885 tells how Alfred sent a fleet to East Anglia, which defeated a force of sixteen wiking ships at the mouth of the Stour, but on their way home fell in with a superior force of the enemy, and were totally defeated. In the earlier text of Simeon of Durham an elaborate explanation is given of the cause of this defeat[307]; how the English were surprised, an unarmed multitude, when plunged in lazy sleep; so that to them, says the moralising writer, would apply the proverb: ‘many shut their eyes when they ought to see.’ Will it be believed that this elaborate tale, with its attendant moral, has all grown out of a false reading in the parallel account of Asser? He says that the English were attacked ‘cum inde uictrix classis dormiret,’ where ‘dormiret’ is a corruption of ‘domum iret,’ the ‘hamweard wendon’ of the Chronicle[308]. Florence has ‘rediret,’ whether that be his substitution for ‘domum iret,’ or his own correction of the obviously nonsensical ‘dormiret.’ This example is further interesting as showing how early the text of Asser was corrupted. Simeon in his turn is misunderstood by later writers. The Chronicle of Melrose says[309] that in 883 Alfred ‘began to inhabit the devastated provinces of Northumbria.’ This is a misreading of a passage in Simeon[310], in which the nominative to ‘prepared to inhabit’ is ‘exercitus,’ i.e. the Danish army.

[Sidenote: Langtoft.]

Langtoft says that Æthelred died at Driffield, which shows that he first of all confused him with Aldfrid of Northumbria[311], who reigned just two hundred years earlier; he next goes on to confuse him with his own brother Alfred[312]. As he writes Æthelred’s name ‘Elfred’ the confusion of names is not surprising. We are reminded of Fuller’s quaint protest against the similar confusion in the case of Ceadda (Chad) and Cedd: ‘though it is pleasant for brethren to live together in unity, yet it is not fit by errour that they should be jumbled together in confusion[313].’

[Sidenote: Roger of Wendover.]

Roger of Wendover says that Alfred sent alms to Jerusalem[314]. The thing in itself is not impossible. But the context in which the statement occurs shows that it rests simply on a false reading in two MSS. of the Saxon Chronicle ‘Iudea’ for ‘Indea[315].’

[Sidenote: Liber de Hyda.]

Lastly the Liber de Hyda gives Alfred a pedigree which seems to make him a descendant of Offa of Mercia[316]. If this pedigree was the only one which we possessed, we might rack our brains to discover what the connexion was. But on reference to the authorised West-Saxon pedigree we find that the compiler of the Liber de Hyda has simply made a confusion between Offa of Mercia and Eafa, one of the steps in the descent of the royal house of Wessex.

One wonders how many statements, usually accepted as historical, would, if they could be traced to their origin, prove to have no better foundation than these.

[Sidenote: Ingulf.]

§ 51. Curiously enough, among the statements of later writers, some of those which sound most authentic occur in Ingulf, one of the most notable forgeries of the Middle Ages[317]. It seems to me that the accounts of the ravages of the Danes[318] may rest, at least in their outlines, on genuine local traditions. Other statements, though probably false considered as descriptions of concrete facts, may be true as types of things which must almost certainly have occurred. For instance, when we are told[319] that a monk of Croyland named Tolius, formerly a Mercian soldier of repute, organised military resistance to the Danes, I take the freedom very seriously to doubt the historical existence of any person of that name. But that in the time of their country’s need, more than one world-weary warrior may have come forth from their monastic retreats, to lead their countrymen against the foe, just as two centuries earlier Sigbert, ex-king of the East Angles, had been dragged from the cloister to lead his former subjects against the heathen Penda[320], is more than likely. So when we read how Beornred, king of Mercia, took advantage of the confusion caused by the Danish raids to annex monastic estates[321], how, owing to the ravages of the Danes, and the exactions of their puppet king, Ceolwulf, Croyland became so poor that no one could be found to take the monastic vows there[322], we have every disposition to accept the statements.

It is in Ingulf that Alfred is praised for his devotion to St. Neot and _St._ Werferth[323]. It is curious to find the very definite connexion of Alfred with the human friend who helped him so much in his literary and other tasks, converted into the shadowy relation of a votary to a saint.

[Sidenote: ‘A land where all things are forgotten.’ Alfred eclipsed by Edgar. Decline of Alfred’s fame.]

§ 52. Where, on the other hand, this growth of legend does not appear in later chroniclers, we seem to come into ‘a land where all things are forgotten.’ And it is, I think, unquestionably true, that Alfred’s fame was in after times largely obscured by that of Edgar. The connexion of the latter with the monastic revival secured him the homage of monastic historians, and his imperial position appealed more to the imagination of posterity than the weightier achievements of Alfred. And then he was three-quarters of a century nearer to their view. It is not unnatural therefore that the laws and homilies of Æthelred’s reign should look back to the reign of Edgar as a golden age[324]; that here in Oxford, in 1018, Canute and his conquered subjects should be reconciled on the basis of Edgar’s law[325]. The one exception is the Anglo-Saxon homily on St. Neot, in which the later years of Alfred are regarded as the golden age[326]. The motive of this is too obvious to be dwelt on. But to show how small a space Alfred occupies in some of the later Chronicles, I may point out that in the Annals of Waverley[327] the only thing mentioned about him is his foundation of the three monasteries of Athelney, Newminster, and Shaftesbury, that in the Annals of Dunstaple[328] the only act recorded of him is the sending of alms to St. Thomas in India; while this is what his reign shrinks to in the pages of Capgrave, the first to apply the English tongue once more to the original writing of history in prose:—

‘In this tyme regned Alured in Ynglond, the fourt son of Adelwold. He began to regn in the ȝere of our Lord 872. This man, be the councelle of St. Ned, mad an open Scole of divers sciens at Oxenford. He had many batailes with Danes; and aftir many conflictes in which he had the wers, at the last he overcam hem; and be his trety Godrus (a nominative inferred from Godrum = Guðrum) here king was baptized, and went hom with his puple. XXVIII ȝere he regned, and deied the servaunt of God[329].’

And so through these dim pages the greatest name in English story moves like the shadow cast by some great luminary in eclipse[330].

LECTURE III

LIFE OF ALFRED PRIOR TO HIS ACCESSION TO THE THRONE

[Sidenote: Date of Alfred’s birth.]

§ 53. There has been a good deal of discussion as to the date of Alfred’s birth. Asser at the beginning of his work places it in 849. And in the annalistic portions he dates each year, not only by the Incarnation, but by the nativity of Alfred. From 851 to 869 inclusive this latter series (with one exception) is correctly reckoned from Asser’s own date 849; from 870 to 876 the dates are reckoned as if from 850; from 878 to 887 they are reckoned as if from 852. In one case, the annal for 853, the resulting year of Alfred’s nativity is 843. With this single exception all the other errors are accounted for by the accidental repetition of numbers, combined with the occurrence of blank annals which are not allowed for[331]. I have shown elsewhere how the chronology of the Saxon Chronicle is dislocated in various places by similar causes of a purely mechanical nature[332]. It is idle to build anything on this. Sir James Ramsay indeed seizes on the one eccentric annal 853 as giving the true date of Alfred’s birth[333]. But, to say the least, the doctrine of chances is strongly against this. We cannot indeed account for this date by progressive degeneration, but it is simply one of those scribal errors to which numerals are peculiarly liable[334].

[Sidenote: The true date is 848.]