Chapter M: H. B. = Monumenta Historica Britannica, vol. i (all published) (5)

A great deal of unnecessary mystery has been made about this Handbook. Asser’s account shows that it was simply what we should call a commonplace book. In the course of years Alfred may have made more than one such commonplace book. The one started at Asser’s suggestion contained, according to him, ‘flosculi diuinae scripturae’; that is, probably, extracts from the Bible and the Fathers. But other parts of the volume, or, it may be, a later volume of the same kind, contained historical jottings; for William of Malmesbury quotes Alfred’s Handbook as an authority for the life of Aldhelm, citing Alfred’s high appreciation of Aldhelm’s Saxon poems, and adding the beautiful tradition how by his skill as a minstrel he would gather the people round him, and gradually turn his song to sacred themes[641]. Florence of Worcester[642] also cites a work which he calls ‘Dicta regis Ælfredi’ as an authority on the West Saxon genealogy. Even if we reject the evidence of Malmesbury and Florence as being so much later than Alfred’s time, it seems to me quite impossible to identify a theological commonplace book, such as Asser describes, with the translation of Augustine’s Soliloquies, as Wülker was once inclined to do[643], partly on the ground that Asser applies the term ‘flosculi’ to the Handbook, while the translation of the Soliloquies bears the title ‘Blostman’ or Blooms. But the latter work, however free in the way in which it deals with its original, is very much more than a book of extracts. Besides, according to Asser, the Encheiridion was the very first of Alfred’s works, whereas all critics are agreed that the Soliloquies are among the last, probably the very last of his works.

[Sidenote: The translation of Gregory’s Dialogues, attributed by Asser to Werferth.]

§ 91. Besides the Encheiridion, the only one of the literary works which owed their origin to Alfred mentioned by Asser is the translation of the Dialogues of Gregory the Great[644]. The existence of the Chronicle, at any rate up to 887, is implied in Asser’s use of it, but it is nowhere mentioned. The easiest explanation of Asser’s silence as to Alfred’s other works is that they did not then exist. The date at which Asser professes to be writing is, as we have seen, 894; and this in turn confirms the view derived from the chronology of Grimbald’s life, as to the comparatively late date at which Alfred commenced his independent literary career.

According to Asser, the translation of the Dialogues was not made by Alfred himself, but by Bishop Werferth at his command[645]; and in the little preface which Alfred prefixes to the work he makes no claim of authorship, but merely says: ‘I besought my trusty friends that out of God’s[646] books of the lives and miracles of the saints they would write for me the instruction which follows, so that, strengthened in my mind through memory and love, I may, amid the troubles of this world, sometimes think on the things of heaven.’ Whether the expression ‘trusty friends’ is merely an impersonal plural for Werferth, or whether others really co-operated, I cannot say; but we may take it that Werferth was mainly responsible, and that in this case the share of Alfred was confined to furnishing a preface; just as authors nowadays are glad to get some man of light and leading to commend their works to the public.

[Sidenote: Assistance given to Alfred by his literary advisers.]

The degree in which Alfred made use of the help of his learned advisers would vary no doubt with the difficulty of the work in hand, and the degree of the king’s own progress. In the case of the Pastoral Care, Alfred himself has told us who his helpers were[647]; in other cases, as we shall see, interesting traditions have been preserved. But I imagine that in all cases a good deal of the drudgery would be done by others, Alfred supplying the final literary form. Similar instances of co-operation have not been unknown in Oxford in the nineteenth century.

[Sidenote: Evidence of the Dialogues as to Alfred’s religious thought.]

§ 92. If any evidence were needed to show that Alfred, with all his true and earnest piety, was yet in his religious thought the child of his century, it would be found in the fact that he should have chosen the Dialogues of Gregory as the first of all books to be translated. The work was enormously popular in the Middle Ages[648]; but to our thought it is the least edifying of all Gregory’s writings. In it the principle of St. James, that ‘the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much,’ is materialised, until the prayers of the saints become a mere sort of lucky bag or wishing cap for the obtaining of anything that is wanted, from the raising of the dead, or the punishment of an enemy, to the supply of the most ordinary articles of domestic economy, such as oil, and wine, or the mending of a broken sieve; while the fact that Gregory professes in many cases to have these stories from the mouth of eyewitnesses[649], illustrates the truth of what Dr. Gore has said[650], that ‘there are … ages when belief is so utterly uncritical, that it does seem as if they could not under any circumstances afford us satisfactory evidence of miraculous occurrences.’

[Sidenote: Relics.]

In this connexion may be mentioned the stress which Asser lays on Alfred’s veneration for the relics of the saints[651]. In this too, if it is authentic, Alfred was the child of his age. The natural feeling of Christian reverence for the body which had once been a temple of the Holy Ghost, degenerated into an unhealthy passion for collecting dead men’s bones, which reached its height in the ninth century[652]. And this passion led to a hungry relic-mongering, a system of pious thefts, and a wholesale manufacture of spurious relics, of which Rome was the head-quarters, which are among the least pleasant features of the mediaeval Church. We may be sure that there was nothing unworthy either in Alfred’s reverence for the relics, or in his belief in the wonder-working powers of the saints. And for the rest, I think one realises more and more how a really religious spirit assimilates the good and is immune from the evil of the particular system in which it is placed by Providence. There is no one, for instance, who knows anything of the lives of the devout peasantry, say, of Scotland, or of Roman Catholic countries on the Continent, but must feel that the somewhat hard creed of the one, and the somewhat superstitious creed of the other are absolutely as nothing compared with the effectual power of religion which is the same in both.

[Sidenote: Double recension of the translation of the Dialogues.]

To return, however, from this digression to Werferth’s translation of the Dialogues. One very interesting fact about this translation is that, for the greater part of the first two books[653], it exists in two recensions, of which the later is not an independent translation, but stands to the older text in the relation of a revised version[654]. It is, as a rule, much nearer to the original; it retrenches the redundancies[655], and corrects the mistakes[656] of the earlier version. Sometimes we can see that the reviser had a different reading in the Latin text from that adopted in the unrevised translation[657]. Moreover the vocabulary is considerably modified, certain words being systematically substituted by the reviser for others of like meaning[658]. This last feature makes it likely that the reviser was a different person from the original translator. Who he was we shall probably never know. It is unlikely to have been Alfred himself. For the rest, both versions keep pretty close to the original without substantial additions or omissions.

[Sidenote: The Anglo-Saxon martyrology. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.]

§ 93. In the class of works which owe their inspiration to Alfred, though not actually written by him, we may possibly place the Anglo-Saxon martyrology alluded to above[659]. We may certainly place in this class the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle[660] in its original form, and may inscribe upon it the legend which encircles Alfred’s Jewel, ‘Alfred bade make me.’ I have shown elsewhere that all the MSS. of the Chronicle up to 892 are traceable to a common original. From that point they diverge. The explanation is that at that point copies were made[661] and sent to different religious houses, where they were continued to a large extent independently of one another. This view of Alfred’s relation to the Chronicle is strongly confirmed by the genealogical preface in MS. A of the Chronicle, in which the West Saxon genealogy is carried down to the accession of Alfred and no further, showing clearly that it was drawn up for a chronicle compiled in his reign.

Another fact which points the same way is the strong resemblance between the phraseology of the Chronicle and that of Alfred’s translation of Orosius, of which I shall have more to say when I come to speak of that translation[662]. Gaimar also, as is well known, has a most interesting passage in which he connects the composition of the Chronicle both with Alfred and with Winchester. Of course Gaimar is a very late authority. But his statement harmonises so well with the indications furnished by the Chronicle itself, and with the inherent probabilities of the case, that I am inclined to attach much weight to it. Moreover the moderation of Gaimar’s statement is distinctly in its favour. He does not say that Alfred wrote the Chronicle, but merely that he caused it to be written.

Of the materials available for carrying out Alfred’s design for a national Chronicle I have said enough elsewhere.

[Sidenote: Works attributed to Alfred.]

§ 94. It may be convenient to mention here one or two works which have been attributed to Alfred more or less doubtfully, in order to clear the way for the consideration of those works as to the authenticity of which there is practically no doubt.

[Sidenote: Translation of the Psalter. The Paris MS. Partly in prose, and partly in verse. Arguments for and against Alfred’s authorship of the prose portion.]

In William of Malmesbury’s account of Alfred’s literary works there occurs this very interesting statement: ‘He began to translate the Psalter, but died when he had barely finished the first part of it[663].’ By the first part is probably meant the first fifty psalms. The Psalter was frequently regarded in the Middle Ages as consisting of three divisions of fifty psalms each; so much so, that one of the regular names for the Psalter in Irish is ‘the three fifties[664].’ Now it is an interesting fact that in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris, there is an eleventh century MS. containing a Latin and an Anglo-Saxon version of the psalms in parallel columns[665]; each psalm, with one or two exceptions, being headed by a Latin rubric, and, in the case of the first fifty psalms, also by an explanation in Saxon of the circumstances which gave rise to the psalm, and of the applications of which it is susceptible. The MS. formerly belonged to Jehan, Duc de Berry (1340-1416), the brother of Charles V of France, who possibly acquired it during his nine years’ sojourn as a hostage in England after the peace of Brétigny, 1360. Now it is a striking fact that in this Psalter the first fifty psalms are translated into prose, while the remainder are in alliterative verse. The question therefore arises, did the scribe of the MS. (or of its archetype) take the latter part of an existing alliterative version, in order to complete a fragmentary prose translation? or did he, on the other hand, take part of an existing prose translation to make good a copy of the poetical version which had been accidentally mutilated at the beginning? The former is, on every ground, more probable; especially as we have evidence of the existence of a complete alliterative version of the Psalter identical with that in the Paris MS.[666], whereas there is no such evidence available in the case of the fragmentary prose version. It was therefore an attractive suggestion of Professor Wülker’s[667] that in this fragment we have the incomplete Alfredian version mentioned by William of Malmesbury. The question has been elaborately discussed on the affirmative side by Dr. Wichmann[668], on the negative side by Dr. J. Douglas Bruce[669]. I cannot say that the arguments of either have carried any strong conviction to my mind. Dr. Bruce’s reasoning that the translation and headings imply a knowledge of ecclesiastical modes of interpretation impossible to a layman, overlooks the possibility that Alfred might derive that knowledge from his clerical assistants. On the other hand I cannot attach much weight to Dr. Wichmann’s arguments from coincidences with the Cura Pastoralis, or from the applicability of certain interpretations to the circumstances of Alfred’s life. When we consider that David and Alfred were both kings, that both had enemies from whom they were both very marvellously delivered, we shall readily see that an interpretation which would suit the one might very easily be applicable to the other. The most striking instance of this has not, as far as I remember, been cited. It is in the introduction to Ps. xxiii (xxiv), where it is said that in this psalm David was prophesying how his ealdormen (principes) would be fain of his return from exile[670], words which recall the expression of the Chronicler how Alfred’s people ‘were fain of him’ when he emerged from his retreat at Athelney.

On the whole then we must leave the question undecided, until further evidence or further argument is brought forward.

[Sidenote: Even if not by Alfred, this may be the work alluded to by Malmesbury.]

§ 95. I would however point out that even if the decision should be against Alfred’s authorship, it is still possible that the prose portion of the Paris Psalter may be the work referred to by William of Malmesbury. The colophon at the end of the MS. gives the name of the scribe in the Latin form Wulfwinus. In the Cottonian Collection there is a MS. of the Saxon Gospels with the colophon: ‘Wulfwi me wrat.’ This was certainly a Malmesbury book, as is shown by the insertion of a Malmesbury Charter between the Gospels of St. Luke and St. John. If this Wulfwi could be identified with the Wulfwinus of the Paris Psalter, or its archetype[671], it would make it likely that that also was a Malmesbury book. William of Malmesbury was librarian of his monastery[672], and there may have been a tradition there that the prose translation was the work of Alfred; a tradition which would be interesting even if it were not strictly true[673].

[Sidenote: Statement that Alfred translated the whole Bible, probably due to a misunderstanding.]

There is a statement in the twelfth-century Liber Eliensis that ‘Alfred translated the whole Old and New Testaments for the blessing of the English nation[674].’ I know no earlier evidence for this, and I believe the statement to have arisen from a misunderstanding of one of William of Malmesbury’s rhetorical flourishes in which he says that Alfred ‘gave to English ears the greater part of the Roman library[675] (bibliothecae)’, meaning by the last phrase Latin authors. But Bibliotheca is a common name in the Middle Ages for St. Jerome’s Latin translation of the Bible, the library of divine books[676]; hence Malmesbury’s statement was misunderstood as meaning that Alfred had translated the greater part of the Latin Bible.

[Sidenote: Alleged Domesday Book of Alfred.]

The statement of Ingulf[677] that Alfred made a Domesday Book like William the Conqueror rests either on a confusion of Dómbóc (Book of Laws) with Domesday Book[678]; or possibly on a confusion of William’s Rotulus Wintoniae, as Domesday was sometimes called[679], with Alfred’s Winchester Book; i.e. the Chronicle.

[Sidenote: Other works.]

Other works which popular tradition has ascribed to Alfred are a collection of proverbs, a translation of Æsop’s fables, and a treatise on falconry[680].

[Sidenote: Alfred’s translation of Gregory’s Pastoral Care. Its relation to the original. Omissions and additions.]

§ 96. Very different in value from the Dialogues, according to our notions, is the other work of Gregory, the translation of which is due to Alfred, the Pastoral Care. It is a beautiful book, full of wise and loving spiritual counsel, and of sayings both shrewd and tender. It is greatly to the credit of the mediaeval Church that it set such store by this little manual[681]. Alfred sent a copy of his translation to each of his bishops, to aid them in what Gregory himself[682] so beautifully calls ‘the art of arts, the care of souls.’ I agree with Professor Wülker[683] in thinking this the earliest of Alfred’s translations, and largely for the reason that, as he points out, the Preface, as we have learnt to know it, is so obviously a preface, not merely to this work, but to the whole series of translations which Alfred contemplated, of ‘the books which it is most needful for every man to know.’ If what was said above is correct, the date of it cannot be earlier than 894, and it may be a little later. It has often been noticed that of all Alfred’s works (not reckoning among these the Dialogues), this is the one in which he keeps closest to his original. I attribute this rather to his reverence for that original, than to any inability on his part to deal more freely with it, had he so desired. The omissions are few and unimportant[684]. The additions are much more numerous, but as a rule they are very slight. They are mostly of the kind which a modern editor would place on the margin or in a footnote. A very large class consists merely of the insertion of the names of the various books of the Bible from which Gregory’s scriptural quotations are taken[685]. In the case of the psalms the number of the psalm is often given[686], which is possibly an illustration of Asser’s statements[687] as to the special fondness of Alfred for the Psalter. Other insertions consist of brief explanatory notes; an allusion or metaphor is cleared up[688], a foreign word or custom is explained[689], a quotation or story is completed[690]. Thus after a reference to the institution of the Levirate among the Jews, Alfred adds: ‘this was good law under the old covenant, and to us now it is a parable[691].’ The manna is ‘the sweet food that came down from heaven[692].’ Shittim wood, we are told, never rots[693]. It does not follow that the explanation is always correct. Thus to Christ’s denunciation of the Pharisees for scrupulosity in tithing herbs is added the statement that they left untithed their more valuable possessions[694].

[Sidenote: Interpretation by Saxon analogies. The original toned down, expanded and mistranslated. The phraseology bears the stamp of Alfred’s own experience.]

§ 97. Occasionally Alfred interprets biblical things by Saxon analogies. Thus the Hebrew cities of refuge become a Saxon ‘frithstow[695],’ as they do also in Alfred’s preface to his laws[696]. The Doctors among whom the child Jesus was found were the wisest ‘Witan’ that there were in Jerusalem[697]. Uriah, whom David murdered, was ‘his own loyal thane[698].’ In the Soliloquies Alfred speaks of the Apostles as Christ’s thanes[699]. This process is carried yet further in the sacred epic poetry both of the insular and continental Saxons, the disciples becoming Christ’s ‘comites’ or ‘gesiths,’ who are bound to die with their Lord[700]. Alfred here also, as in some of his other works[701], and in the Laws[702], lays great stress on the position of the Lord[703]. Once or twice Alfred tones down his original; thus where Gregory speaking of the death of impenitent sinners says: ‘they lament that they refused to serve God now that they can in no wise by service make good the evils of their former negligence,’ Alfred in his pity inserts the clause: ‘unless they be helped by repentance and God’s mercy[704].’ In one instance the explanation given is dogmatic, the reception of ‘the spirit of adoption’ of which St. Paul speaks, being referred to baptism[705]. No doubt for many, if not most, of these additions Alfred was indebted to his clerical assistants. Often, without any very distinct addition being made to the text, it is rather freely expanded[706]. Sometimes the rendering is rather loose[707], as if the meaning of the original had been imperfectly grasped; sometimes it is distinctly wrong[708]. And throughout one may say that the translation is made (to use Alfred’s own expression) rather ‘sense by sense’ than ‘word by word[709].’ And sometimes, though the phrase may be very close to the original, it seems to bear the stamp of Alfred’s own experience. The heading of the fourth chapter must have come straight from his heart: ‘that many times the business of government and rule distracts the mind of the ruler[710].’ ‘What,’ he exclaims in another place, ‘is rule and authority but the soul’s tempest which is always buffeting the ship of the heart with the storms of many thoughts, so that it is driven hither and thither in very narrow straits, wellnigh wrecked among many mighty rocks[711]?’ Or again: ‘the patient must be admonished to strengthen their heart after their great victory, and hold the burg of their mind against marauding bands, and fortify it with battlements[712].’ Lastly: ‘every host (_here_) is the less effective when it comes, if its coming is known beforehand. For it finds them prepared whom it thought to take unprepared[713].’ In these two last passages we seem almost to hear the echo of Alfred’s experience in 878[714].

[Sidenote: Question as to the order of the Orosius and Bede translations.]

§ 98. The next two works of Alfred to be considered are both historical, viz. the translations of Orosius’ Universal History, and of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation. There has been however considerable difference of opinion as to the order of these two works. The earlier critics, however much they might differ among themselves as to the succession of Alfred’s works taken as a whole, all, with the exception of Dr. Bosworth, agreed in placing the Orosius before the Bede[715]. But in recent times Wülker[716], August Schmidt[717], and my friend Professor Schipper of Vienna[718] have argued in favour of the other view. The chief ground on which they have based their conclusion is the greater freedom of the Orosius both in translation and arrangement as compared with the Bede. In the latter the translation is sometimes quite unduly literal, so as to be almost unintelligible in places without a reference to the original[719]; while as to arrangement, the modifications of the original are, for the most part, limited to omissions of matters like the Easter Controversy which had ceased to have any living interest, the additions and transpositions being very unimportant. The Orosius on the other hand is not only freer in translation, but is so recast by transposition, addition, and omission, as to be practically a new work.

[Sidenote: Character of the two originals, and of the translations.]

It is argued that this greater freedom implies a more practised hand, and therefore a later date. The argument seems to me fallacious. As regards substantial alterations we must bear in mind the different character of the two originals. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History has always been an almost sacred book to Englishmen. It needed no recasting, beyond a few omissions, to make it suitable for English readers in Alfred’s day. But Orosius’ work, written with the polemical object of enforcing the argument of Augustine’s De Ciuitate Dei against the pagan contention that the troubles of the times were due to the introduction of Christianity, by showing, in a survey of universal history, that the evils of pre-Christian days were far greater, and full therefore of ecclesiastical gloating over the crimes and calamities of pagan history, required much more drastic treatment. On the occasional over-literalness of the Bede translation I shall have something to say presently. As regards the greater freedom of the Orosius, any one who has examined in one of our Pass Schools will bear witness that there is a kind of free translation, which is very far from implying a perfect mastery of the original. And I must confess that Alfred’s freedom in the Orosius is often of the latter kind[720]. I should say that there are far more serious blunders in translation in the Orosius than in the Bede; though on the other hand it must be remembered that Bede’s Latin is a good deal easier than that of Orosius.

[Sidenote: Arguments in favour of the priority of the Orosius. Argument on the other side.]

§ 99. In the Introduction to the second volume of my Saxon Chronicle[721] I argued in favour of the priority of the Orosius, on the ground of the affinity in diction and expression between it and the Saxon Chronicle. That argument I need not repeat here; I still think that it has force, though I possibly laid too much stress upon it, as one is apt to do when one gets hold of an idea which one fancies to be new[722]. It is however capable of being reinforced. The second chapter of Bede’s first book contains an account of Caesar’s invasions of Britain. This is a matter which one would take to be of great interest to all inhabitants of this island[723]. Yet in the Bede translation it is, in the older recension, omitted altogether, and even in the later recension is passed over with the barest mention[724]. But this chapter is almost wholly taken from Orosius; and when we turn to the Orosius version, we find that Alfred has not only translated the passage in question, but has enriched it with his own local knowledge, telling us that Caesar’s first two engagements with the natives were ‘in the land which is called Kent-land,’ and that the third took place ‘near the ford which is called Wallingford[725].’ If the Orosius translation preceded the Bede, we can understand why Alfred omitted the corresponding passage in the latter. Again, in chapter v of the same book, Bede expressly corrects a mistake of Orosius’ as to the wall of Severus, saying that it was not properly a wall, but a rampart of sods with a ditch; Alfred not only adopts this correction here[726], but in another place of the Bede seems to emphasise it[727], where there is no special emphasis in the original. In the Orosius passage the mistake is uncorrected[728]. Alfred shows in many ways that he had a good memory, and that he did not shrink from correcting his authors where he thought they needed it; he would hardly have ignored Bede’s correction had he been cognisant of it when he was making the translation of Orosius. The only serious argument on the other side is one which has not, as far as I am aware, been previously noticed. I mean the affinity of passages in the Orosius with passages in the Boethius, which is, as we shall see[729], almost certainly later than either the Orosius or the Bede. Of these the most important are two in which Alfred without any hint from the original protests against the doctrine that all things happen by fate[730], a subject which occupies a prominent place in the Boethius. There would, however, be nothing impossible in the supposition that Alfred may have read the Consolation of Boethius before he undertook the work of translating it, or the subject may have been suggested to his active mind in some other way. On the whole the question of precedence as between the Orosius and the Bede must be left uncertain; though in accordance with my own view I shall take the Orosius first.

[Sidenote: Relation of the Orosius translation to the original.]

§ 100. It would be impossible to discuss in detail the modifications made by Alfred in his original. They occur on almost every page. I can only indicate their general character, and give a few specimens of some of the more important. And in doing this I very willingly acknowledge the help which I have derived from Dr. Hugo Schilling’s useful dissertation on the subject[731].

[Sidenote: Additions. Voyages of Ohthere and Wulfstan.]

It may give some measure of the extent of Alfred’s changes to note that whereas the original consists of seven books divided into 236 chapters, the Saxon version contains six books with only 84 chapters[732]. The most important additions are to be found in the geographical introduction which Orosius prefixes to his work. It is here that Alfred inserts the well-known description of the geography of Germany, which for him includes all central Europe from the Rhine on the west to the Don on the east, and from the Danube on the south to the White Sea on the north[733]. Here too are inserted the yet more famous accounts of the voyages of Ohthere[734] and Wulfstan[735], on which so much has been written. Ohthere’s account begins: ‘Ohthere told his lord king Alfred that of all the Northmen he dwelt furthest to the North’; and this is the only direct evidence which the work contains as to its authorship. These accounts and also the description of Germany, which, like them, must have been carefully derived from oral information, illustrate what Asser tells of Alfred’s intercourse with strangers and his eagerness to learn from them[736], a trait which was characteristic also of the great Charles[737]. In the historical part the chief additions are the description of a Roman triumph[738], and of the temple of Janus[739]. But there are endless smaller additions; and of these one of the most interesting is the anecdote, ultimately derived from Suetonius, how Titus used to say that the day was a lost day on which he had done no good to any one[740]. This saying is quoted also in the Chronicle, and is one of the links connecting the two works[741]. We can understand how this saying of the ‘deliciae generis humani’ would come home to the heart of England’s darling[742]. Some of these shorter insertions are brief explanatory notes[743] like those which we have already met with in the Cura Pastoralis, and, like them, are by no means always correct.

[Sidenote: Editorial explanations.]

§ 101. Sometimes the explanations are longer; and many of these are due entirely to Alfred’s imagination, and are intended to make clear to us how, in his view, the event narrated came about. It is not in accordance with our modern notions that editorial explanations of this kind should be incorporated in the text of an author. But the idea of literary property is a comparatively modern one, and footnotes and appendices had not then been invented. It is more questionable when the phrase ‘cwæð Orosius’ which Alfred frequently[744] uses to indicate that a sentiment or a statement is his author’s, not his own, is used, as is the case in one or two instances, to introduce something for which there is no warrant in the original; for instance, one of the passages about fate alluded to above[745].

[Sidenote: These frequently relate to military matters.]

Of these editorial explanations the most interesting perhaps are those which relate to military matters; because they seem in some cases to reflect Alfred’s own military experience—a point which Schilling has not noticed. For instance, when Alfred gives as Hannibal’s reason for his terrible winter march over the Apennines, that ‘he knew that Flaminius the consul was fancying that he might remain securely in his winter quarters, … being fully persuaded that no one would attempt such a march by reason of the intense cold[746],’ we think of the sudden swoop of the Danes on Alfred at Chippenham that Epiphany tide 878[747]; the stratagem of a simulated flight, by which he explains the defeat of Regulus[748], is one which there is reason to believe that the Danes more than once resorted to[749]; as also the device which he attributes to Hannibal, without any warrant from the original text, of sending out parties to ravage in various directions in order to make the enemy imagine that his whole force was occupied in this manner[750]; though this also closely resembles the feigned attacks which Alfred himself made from Athelney, in order to mask his advance in force to Ethandun[751].

[Sidenote: Passages in Orosius illustrated by Alfred’s own experience. Anecdote of Nelson.]

§ 102. The same is true of some things for which there is a basis in Orosius himself; for instance, the story how, within sixty days from the felling of the trees, Duilius had a fleet of 130 ships ready ‘both with mast and sail[752]’ recalls Alfred’s own shipbuilding efforts; the story how Dercyllidas dealt with the opposing forces of Pharnabazus and Tissaphernes is extraordinarily like Alfred’s attempt to detach the Danes of Milton from those at Appledore in 893 [894][753]: ‘As soon as the Lacedemonian general knew that he had to deal with two hosts (_heras_), he thought it more advisable to make peace with the one, in order that he might the more easily overcome the other[754]’; while I have already suggested that the twofold division of the Amazonian host[755], one to remain at home while the other was on active service, may have even suggested Alfred’s similar division of the native fyrd _or_ militia. And, indeed, if the workings of the human mind were always traceable, I fancy we should find, more often than is commonly supposed, that what seem like brilliant intuitions on the part of great commanders and statesmen, had really been suggested by their reading. Nor is this any detraction from their originality. To remember at the right time, and apply in the right way, the hints furnished by previous experience, is as much a mark of genius as invention. There is an interesting tradition that Nelson’s manœuvre of anchoring his vessels by the stern at the bombardment of Copenhagen in 1801, was suggested by the fact that he had that morning been reading the twenty-seventh chapter of the Acts, which tells how St. Paul’s shipwrecked companions ‘cast four anchors out of the stern, and wished for the day[756].’

[Sidenote: The alterations sometimes illustrate Alfred’s own sentiments. Mistakes. Alfred’s character displayed.]

§ 103. Often the additions and expansions let us see Alfred’s own sentiments; his religious feelings[757], his admiration for genius, patriotism, and courage, as exemplified in such men as Alexander[758], Scaevola[759], Regulus[760], the two Scipios[761] and Caesar[762]; his disgust at ingratitude to God[763] and man[764], at cruelty[765], treachery[766], or sloth[767]. The omissions are often dictated by similar motives. He leaves out or abridges many of the civil wars, the calamities, the crimes, the unclean mythologies[768], over which Orosius gloated as proofs of heathen depravity; though often the omissions have no special motive beyond the necessity for shortening the work. It must be confessed that these omissions frequently have the effect of wholly dislocating the succession of events. And it may be said generally that Alfred, though he apprehends individual incidents with extraordinary vividness, is by no means clear as to the connexion of events. For the latter quality greater knowledge was required than was accessible in his day. In regard to the additions, moreover, we must bear in mind the possibility that some of them may be due, not to Alfred himself, but to interpolations or glosses in the MSS. which he used. This, as we shall see[769], is a consideration of great importance in the case of the Boethius, but it has been proved to apply to one or two passages of the Orosius also[770]. That there are many errors as to persons bearing the same or similar names[771], many confusions of personal and geographical appellations[772], many quaint mistakes of translation[773] and of fact, as when he says that Augustus took his name from the eighth month of the year instead of vice versa[774], turns the snake-charming tribe of Psylli[775] into a kind of serpent, and infers from Augustus’ heart-broken exclamation, ‘Vare, redde legiones,’ that that ill-fated commander had escaped alive from his defeat[776]; this is only what we might expect, and it would be ungracious to dwell upon such things[777]. Dr. Schilling has truly and excellently said[778] of the Orosius: ‘We see Alfred here weak in historical and linguistic knowledge; but we see him also simple, high-hearted, and earnest; full of warm appreciation for all that is good, and of scorn for all that is evil; putting himself to school that he may educate and raise his people.’

LECTURE VI

LITERARY WORKS (_continued_); SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

[Sidenote: Authorship of the Orosius translation undisputed. Recent doubts as to the Bede translation. Ælfric distinctly attributes it to Alfred, which he does not do in the case of the Dialogues.]

§ 104. We have seen[779] that in the case of the Orosius, the only direct hint of authorship contained in the book itself is the address of Ohthere to ‘his lord King Alfred’; and the earliest external testimony on the subject is to be found in William of Malmesbury in the early part of the twelfth century. But no one has ever doubted King Alfred’s authorship. Till recently the same might have been said of the Bede; in 1877 Professor Wülker spoke of Alfred’s authorship of the Bede as ‘a fact which no one hitherto has doubted or could doubt[780].’ Since then, however, Mr. Sweet, in his Anglo-Saxon Reader[781], and Dr. Thomas Miller in his edition of the Bede translation, published by the Early English Text Society[782], have tried to overthrow the traditional view; the former, mainly on the ground of that occasional over-literalness of the version already alluded to[783]; the latter, because he thinks that it shows Mercian characteristics incompatible with a West Saxon origin. Now we must admit at once that the book itself contains no direct evidence of authorship, not even such a hint as is dropped in the Orosius. On the other hand the external evidence is very much earlier. Ælfric, the homilist, distinctly quotes the book as Alfred’s. In his homily on St. Gregory he says: ‘Many books tell of his conversation and holy life, as does Historia Anglorum, which King Alfred translated out of English into Latin.… We will however tell you something about him because the fore-said book is not known to all of you, although it is translated into English[784].’ This was written within a hundred years of Alfred’s death. For many books of which the authorship has never been doubted we cannot produce evidence anything like as early. I may note in passing that in speaking of the translation of Gregory’s Dialogues Ælfric makes no assertion as to the Alfredian authorship, merely saying ‘the book has been translated into English, and in it any one who will read it may learn profitably of these matters[785].’ In another place he gives interesting evidence that, till he himself took pen in hand, Alfred’s translations were the only books accessible to those who did not know Latin[786].

[Sidenote: Evidence of MSS.]

Moreover the Cambridge University MS. of the Anglo-Saxon Bede, which is said to be of the middle of the eleventh century, has at the beginning and end the following distich:—

‘Historicus quondam fecit me Beda Latinum,
Alfred, rex Saxo, transtulit ille pius.’

The same MS. contains, between Bede’s Preface and the History proper, a copy of the West Saxon genealogy in the exact form in which it appears in MS. A of the Saxon Chronicle; i.e. it comes down to the accession of Alfred, and no further. This again connects the work with Alfred. The Cambridge MS. is, as far as we can test it, an undoubted copy of one which exists in the library of my own college. This is unfortunately imperfect, both at the beginning and the end. But if, as is likely, it also contained originally the distich and the pedigree, the evidence is thrown yet further back[787].

Curiously enough both Laȝamon[788] and Rudborne[789] speak of the Saxon version as if it were Bede’s own.

[Sidenote: The negative arguments inconclusive. The argument from dialect.]

§ 105. The question of its authorship must not be regarded as outside the pale of discussion. Only I do not think that the arguments hitherto advanced are sufficient to establish a negative conclusion. As to Dr. Miller’s Mercian theory, I may say at once that I have no pretensions to pose as an expert in early English dialects. I can get up no enthusiasm for the minute distinctions of form and spelling which form their criteria. They have for me only the practical and unpleasant interest that they oblige me often to look up a word in three or four different places in the dictionary before finding it. I may however mention that Professor Schipper, the latest editor of the Anglo-Saxon Bede[790], does not regard the Mercian theory as established[791]. But even if it were established, it does not seem to me incompatible with Alfred’s authorship. It is agreed that all our existing MSS. go back to a single archetype, though they branch off into two groups which form to some extent a twofold recension[792]. The scribe of that archetypal MS. may have been a Mercian, and there may have been other MSS. in which these Mercian peculiarities were wanting. Even if it be assumed (for it certainly could not be proved), that this Mercian archetype was the original MS. of all, it is equally open to us to suppose that the scribe to whom Alfred dictated his translation in the first instance may have been a Mercian. Or again it is quite possible that the Mercian characteristics, if they exist, may be due to the influence of the Mercian scholars who assisted Alfred in his work—Plegmund, Werferth, and the two Mercian chaplains mentioned by Asser[793]. And it is some confirmation of this that there is a certain affinity noticeable between the diction and style of the Bede translation and that of the earlier or unrevised version of the Dialogues, which, as we have seen, there is good reason to attribute to Werferth[794].

[Sidenote: Argument from style. Influence of Latin on early prose. The Bede may never have been finally revised.]

§ 106. As to the over-literalness of the translation in places, the fact must be admitted, though the extent of it has been, I think, somewhat exaggerated. The cases fall under three heads: (1) where a Latin construction is unidiomatically imitated in the Saxon[795]; this applies especially to constructions with the ablative absolute[796], the accusative and infinitive[797], and the use of the passive voice[798], the range of which is much more restricted in Saxon than in Latin[799]; (2) where a Latin word is translated by a Saxon one which may correspond fairly well with the general meaning of the Latin word, but does not give its sense in the particular passage[800]; (3) where a phrase or sentence is translated, to use Alfred’s own expression, ‘word by word,’ instead of ‘sense by sense[801].’ To all these classes the explanation suggested by Professor Schipper would often apply, viz. that the translator may have embodied in his work interlinear glosses which had been made to assist him; and he cites in illustration the difference between the West Saxon and Northumbrian versions of the Gospels, the former of which is a genuine translation, while the latter is an interlinear gloss made word for word[802]. Some however of the cases where Latin constructions are reproduced, and also one or two of the second class, give me the impression, not that the translator could not have translated more idiomatically if he had pleased, but rather that he was trying experiments with the language. The development of early prose in almost all European languages has been largely influenced by Latin models, and it was only experience which could show how far the process of assimilation might be carried. Similarly for some two centuries after the Renaissance English prose literature is full of experimentally transplanted Latinisms, of which a large proportion failed to make good their footing in the language. Another possibility must also be borne in mind; that the Bede may never have received Alfred’s final revision. We have seen that in the case of the Dialogues an extensive revision was found desirable at a later time, and we seem to have traces of a partial revision of the Bede in the younger group of MSS. mentioned above, in which not only does the translation vary, at times very considerably[803], but a passage is inserted which the earlier recension omits[804], and conversely[805]. When this partial revision was made I cannot say, but probably not by Alfred himself. On the whole, then, I do not regard Mr. Sweet’s or Dr. Miller’s argument as conclusive, either against Alfred’s authorship of the Bede translation, or against the priority of the Orosius.

[Sidenote: Omissions made by Alfred in the Bede. The Easter Controversy.]

§ 107. I have already said[806] that the principal changes made by Alfred in the Bede are in the way of omission, the additions being comparatively slight. It is worth while to see what considerations guided him in this. First of all he omits almost all documents[807], in two instances he just gives a brief summary of a letter in oratio obliqua[808]. He seems at first to have intended to omit the interrogations and responses of Augustine and Gregory, but afterwards to have changed his mind, as in all the MSS. they occur after the third book instead of in their proper place near the end of the first[809]. He also omits all the metrical compositions, epitaphs, &c.[810], which occur in the course of the work. Then, too, he omits almost everything bearing on the Easter Controversy[811]; partly no doubt because he felt, as modern readers feel, the intolerable tediousness of the whole thing; but partly also, we may well believe, because he disliked the bitterness which even the gentle Bede shows on this question[812], for there are little touches which seem to prove that the piety and self-devotion of the Celtic missionaries had made a deep impression on his heart[813]. The early history prior to the conversion of the Saxons is also a good deal abbreviated[814], no doubt as having less direct interest for his readers. So the description of the sacred places which Bede largely borrowed from Arculfus is omitted, probably for similar reasons[815].

[Sidenote: The additions unimportant.]

§ 108. It has often formed a subject both of wonder and regret that Alfred should not have enriched the Bede with additions drawn from his own knowledge of the traditions of his people, as he might so easily have done. Reverence for his original may have had something to do with this; but I agree with Professor Wülker[816] that the main reason probably was, because all that Alfred desired in this line had already been done in the compilation of the Saxon Chronicle. It is confirmatory of this that the chronological summary appended to his history by Bede, which had, as I have elsewhere shown[817], such an important influence on the development of annalistic writing in general, and of the Saxon Chronicle in particular, is omitted in the Bede translation.

Smaller additions and expansions there are, but they seldom really add anything to the narrative. They are as a rule merely inserted to make it a little more clear[818], or a little more vivid, or a little more in accordance with the translator’s ideas[819]. Occasionally, though rarely, they show a touch of personal feeling; as where Diocletian is characterised as the bad emperor[820], Constantine as the good emperor[821], and Aidan as the good bishop[822]. Sometimes, as in the other works, they are brief explanations of things which the readers might not know[823]. Occasionally statements of Bede’s are altered[824], or omitted[825], because they were no longer applicable, or they are marked distinctly as being Bede’s and not Alfred’s[826]. But in other cases similar statements are retained, though it would not be safe to argue from this that the state of things indicated still subsisted in Alfred’s day[827].

[Sidenote: Mistakes.]

Here too there are mistakes[828], though fewer and less serious than in the Orosius. In some cases they may be due to erroneous readings in the MS. which Alfred used[829]. In one or two instances Alfred’s version shows a remarkable divergence of historical fact, which can hardly arise wholly from misunderstanding[830].

[Sidenote: Merits of the translation.]

But on the whole the translation is a worthy one, preserving, and in one or two instances enhancing[831], the beauty of the original, the most beautiful historical work which the Church had produced since Luke and John wrote their Gospels.

One incidental merit of the translation, as Stubbs has remarked[832], is that it enables us to equate the Saxon technical terms of officers and institutions with the corresponding Latin ones[833].

[Sidenote: The translation of Boethius. Fame of the original in the Middle Ages. Causes of this popularity; its form. Sympathy with the author.]

§ 109. We come now to what is in many respects the most interesting and important of all Alfred’s literary works, viz. the translation of Boethius on the Consolation of Philosophy. It is here that the additions made by Alfred to his original give us the clearest insight into his own character and modes of thought. And the original is in itself one of the most noteworthy books of the Middle Ages. Just as Orosius was to those ages the accepted manual of universal history[834], and the Cura Pastoralis their accepted manual of Spiritual Counsel, so the Consolatio of Boethius was their accepted manual of practical and speculative philosophy; the one channel through which some tincture of ancient speculation passed into the popular thought of the early Middle Ages. Perhaps no book except the Bible and the Imitatio has been translated into so many languages; and in more than one European country the early translations of the Consolatio have had an important influence on the development of a vernacular literature[835]. For this popularity several reasons may be given. Something was probably due to the form of the work, which is written in that mixture of verse and prose known as the Satura Menippaea[836]. The lyrics of the Consolatio won the enthusiastic admiration of the great Renaissance scholar, F. C. Scaliger[837], and I must confess that to me they seem extremely beautiful, though their beauty is of a somewhat frosty order. But if they have something of the hardness and coldness of marble, they have also its purity and high polish[838]. But the chief reason was, no doubt, sympathy with the author’s misfortunes, whose sudden fall, from being the favourite and chief minister of Theodoric, to prison and to death, made him one of the most signal examples in that ever-lengthening treatise De casibus illustrium uirorum, on which the Middle Ages pondered with intense and morbid interest, feeding that contempt for the world[839] and all things human, which finds such passionate expression in many mediaeval writings:—

‘O esca uermium, o massa pulueris,
O ros, o uanitas, cur sic extolleris?[840]’

[Sidenote: Was Boethius a Christian? The Consolatio not distinctively Christian.]

To this power of the work as a record of human suffering pathetic testimony is borne by the title of an anonymous French translation of the fifteenth century, which announces itself as the work of ’un pauvre clerc désolé, quérant sa consolation par la traduction de cestui livre[841]’; it is the book to which Dante resorted for comfort after the death of Beatrice[842]; and our own Sir Thomas More while in prison wrote an imitation of Boethius, which he calls ‘Three Books of Comfort in Tribulation[843].’ ‘Dost thou think,’ asks Philosophy of Boethius in Alfred’s translation, ‘that to thee alone such change of state and sorrow have come[844]?’ And, in spite of Tennyson, the fact ‘that loss is common’ does ‘make Our own less bitter[845]’; and the ‘sense of tears in mortal things[846]’ knits mankind together in bonds of sympathy which do make the common burden lighter. And in the case of Boethius this natural feeling was heightened by the erroneous impression, which prevailed in the Middle Ages, that the sufferings of Boethius were due to the rage of an Arian ruler against his Catholic servant[847]. A superficial inspection of dates is sufficient to dispel this illusion[848]; and how little support it derives from the work itself is shown by the fact, that few questions in literary history have been more keenly debated than the question, whether the author was a Christian at all[849]. The question turns largely on the authenticity of certain theological tracts which bear the name of Boethius, and do not concern us here[850]. On the whole it is probable that Boethius was by profession a Christian, though it would seem that his Christianity did not go very deep. Certainly in the hour of trouble, which generally shows the real basis of a man’s thought and character, he turns for consolation, not to the doctrines of Christianity, but to the teachings of Neo-platonic philosophy; and I unhesitatingly affirm that there is far more of the spirit of Christianity in the writings of acknowledged pagans like Seneca and Marcus Aurelius, than in this work of a nominal Christian, who enforces the duty of prayer, not by the authority of Christ and His Apostles, but by that of Plato in the Timaeus[851].

[Sidenote: This non-Christian character concealed by glosses and commentaries, from which many of Alfred’s additions are derived.]