318 Domesday book. This invaluable record, which has been printed by order of the House of Commons, contains a survey of the kingdom, noting, generally, for there are some variations in different counties, the proprietors and value of lands, both at the time of the survey and during the reign of Edward the Confessor, the quantity of arable, wood, and pasture, &c. the various kinds of tenants and slaves on each estate, and, in some instances, the stock; also the number of hides at which it was rated, for the public service, with various other particulars.

319 Sweyn succeeded to the kingdom of Denmark on the death of Magnus in 1047.

320 Man and Anglesey.

321 Nicolas reigned from A.D. 1105 to A.D. 1135, June 25, when he was murdered.

322 “Hoveden, who follows Malmesbury, adds that Alexius married, crowned, and then burnt alive his female accomplice.”—Hardy.

323 Archdeacon, and afterwards chancellor. Baronius, x. 289.

324 He was elected pope the 22nd of April, 1073, and died 25th May, 1085.—Hardy.

325 Investiture was a symbolical mode of receiving possession of a benefice, dignity, or office.

326 This seems intended to denote his absolute submission, and willingness to undergo any kind of penance which might be enjoined upon him. Sometimes excommunicated persons wore a halter about their necks; sometimes they were shorn or scourged prior to receiving absolution. Vide Basnage, pref. in Canisium, p. 69, 70.

327 “The abbey of St. Stephen’s, Caen, is stated to have been completed in 1064, but when it was dedicated is not accurately known: some fix the dedication in 1073, others in 1081, and Orderic in 1077. There was, however, a foundation charter granted subsequently to 1066, for in it William styles himself King.”—Hardy.

328 “The convent of the Holy Trinity was founded by Matilda 1066, and its church dedicated on the 18th of June in that year. Duke William on the same day, presenting at the altar his infant daughter Cecilia, devoted her to the service of God in this monastery, where she became the second abbess.”—Hardy.

329 “This disgraceful contention happened in the year 1083. It seems to have arisen from the abbat (Thurstan) attempting to introduce a new chant, brought from Feschamp, instead of the Gregorian, to which the monks had been accustomed.”—Hardy.

330 Bracton says (lib. ii. c. 8, sec. 4), that the bishop of Durham had as full power in the county of Durham as the king in his own palace. The privileges of the see of Durham trace back to the time of St. Cuthbert.

331 Walker offered to purge himself by oath from all participation in the murder. See Flor. Wig. A.D. 1080.

332 “Matilda died 2nd Nov. 1083. She bequeathed to this monastery her crown, sceptre, and ornaments of state. A copy of her will may be seen in the Essais Historiques, by the Abbé de la Rue, tom. ii. p. 437.”—Hardy.

333 Some MSS. omit from “a dreadful spectacle,” to the end of the paragraph, and substitute thus, “Here he willingly passed his time, here he delighted to follow the chase, I will not say for days but even months together. Here, too, many accidents befell the royal race, which the recent recollection of the inhabitants supplies to inquirers.”

334 Agatha and Adeliza were their names, according to Ordericus Vitalis, (lib. iv. 512.)

335 Some MSS. omit from “money,” to “I have,” and substitute, This he sought all opportunities of collecting, provided he could allege that they were honourable, and not unbecoming the royal dignity. But he will readily be excused, because a new government cannot be administered without large revenues. I have, &c.

336 The Romish ritual directs the woman to kneel, with a lighted taper in her hand, at the church door, where she is sprinkled with holy water, and afterwards conducted into the church. The practice seems connected with the festival of the Purification. Vide Durand, lib. vii. c. 7.

337 Sixty shillings down, and as much more afterwards. Orderic. Vital.

338 ... lanistarum vel pellificum. It seems a sneer at the sanguinary disposition of the Roman people, and at the bulls of the pope. In a dispute on the credibility of evidence adduced, it is observed, that the oral testimony of three bishops was certainly to be preferred “to sheep-skins blackened with ink and loaded with a leaden seal.” Edmer. Hist. Nov. p. 65.

339 Marianus was born in Ireland A.D. 1028, and was compiler of a celebrated chronicle, which is the basis of Florence of Worcester. His imagined correction of Dionysius is founded in error.

340 See the letters which passed on this subject between Lanfranc and Thomas archbishop of York in Lanfranci Opera, ed. J. A. Giles, 2 vols. 8vo. forming vols. 21 and 22 of Patres Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ.

341 Two of the MSS., used by Mr. Hardy, place here the dedicatory epistle of the author to Robert Earl of Gloucester, which we have placed at the commencement of the work.

342 “At this period the custom of receiving knighthood from the hands of bishops or abbats yet obtained. There is a law of Henry I., prohibiting abbats from making knights.”—Hardy.

343 The 27th of September.

344 Persius, Sat. i. 85.

345 On their own lands, it should seem from Sax. Chron., p. 465.

346 Nidering is supposed by Somner to denote such as were infamous enough to rifle a dead body. Gavelk. 65. Lye renders it, nequam, exlex,—infamous, outlaw. MS. Nithing. Spelman derives it from nidus: but there is no authority for either interpretation; and in such cases it is safer, to confess ignorance than to mislead the reader by fanciful etymologies.

347 This crucifix was very celebrated; it being pretended that it was the work of Nicodemus. “See further on this subject in the Rev. J. E. Tyler’s interesting volume, entitled, ‘Oaths, their origin, nature, and history.’ London: 8vo, pp. 289–296.”—Hardy.

348 Cicero de Officiis, ii. 15. Much of the argument is borrowed from the same source.

349 Some read, “The king used to laugh,” &c.

350 This is unintelligible to the English reader. The author uses the word “firmarius,” which certainly would not have conveyed the idea of a “farmer” to the mind of either Cicero or Horace.

351 Those who followed the court, being under no kind of control, were in the habit of plundering and devastating the country wherever they went. When they were unable to consume whatever they found in their lodgings, they would sell it to the best bidder, or destroy it with fire; or if it were liquor, after washing their horses’ legs with a part, they let the remainder run. “As to their cruelty towards their hosts, or their unseemly conduct towards their wives and daughters, it is shameful even to remember.”—Edmer. Hist. Nov. p. 94.

352 These shoes, which gave occasion for various ordinances for their regulation or abolition, during several successive centuries, are said to have owed their invention to Fulk, earl of Anjou, in order to hide his ill-formed feet. Orderic. Vitalis, p. 682: who also observes, that the first improver, by adding the long curved termination, was a fellow (quidam nebulo) in the court of William Rufus, named Robert.

353 Others read, “The palace of the king was not the abode of majesty, but the stews of pathics.”

354 Edmer, besides constant mention of Anselm in his Historia Novorum, wrote his life also, in a separate form.

355 A Jewish youth imagined that St. Stephen had appeared to him, and commanded him to be baptized: this he obeyed. His father immediately flew to the king, earnestly entreating an order for his son to be restored to the faith of his ancestors. The king not discovering any advantage as likely to accrue to himself, remained silent: on this the Jew offers him sixty marks, on condition that he would restore his son to Judaism. William then orders the youth to be brought before him; relates his father’s complaint, and commands him to renounce his baptism. The lad, astonished, replies, “Your majesty is joking surely.” “I joke with thee,” exclaims the king, “thou son of ordure! begone, and obey my commands instantly, or by the cross at Lucca I will have your eyes torn out.” The young man remaining inflexible, he drove him from his presence. The father was then ordered before the king, who desired him to pay down the money he had promised; but, on the Jew’s remonstrating that he had not reconverted his son, and the king’s declaring that his labour was not to go unrewarded, it was agreed that he should receive half the sum. Edmer, Hist. Novor. p. 47.

356 “Compater” sometimes means a friend or companion.

357 Pharsalia, lib. ii. 515—v. 580.

358 “It has been inferred from this passage, that Malmesbury states the tower of London was built by William Rufus. There appears, however, little doubt that the principal building, now called the White Tower, was commenced by the Conqueror, and finished by Rufus, under the superintendence of Gundulph, bishop of Rochester.”—Hardy.

359 “The tradition of William having met his death by the hand of Sir Walter Tirel, whilst hunting in the New Forest, is generally received; but Suger, a contemporary historian, and, as it seems, a friend of Tirel, in his Life of Louis le Gros, king of France, alluding to the death of Rufus, observes, ‘Imponebatur a quibusdam cuidam nobili Gualtero Tirello quod eum sagitta perfoderat: quem, cum nec timeret nec speraret, jurejurando sæpius audivimus quasi sacrosanctum asserere, quod ea die nec in eam partem silvæ, in qua rex venebatur, venerit, nec eum in silva omnino viderit.’ See also Edmer, Hist. Nov. p. 54, and Ord. Vit. Hist. Eccles. lib. x. p. 783.”—Hardy.

360 It fell A.D. 1107. An. Winton.

361 By this probably is to be understood the payment of Peter-pence. Anselm had offended the king, by acknowledging Urban without consulting him.

362 Juvenal, Sat. i. 37.

363 A kind of woollen shirt.

364 The concluding psalms of the matin service.

365 The Horæ, or canonical services, were matins, primes, tierce, sexts, nones, vespers, and complines.

366 The Ambrosian ritual prevailed pretty generally till the time of Charlemagne, who adopted the Gregorian. Durandus (lib. v. c. 1) has a curious account of an experiment, on the result of which was founded the general reception of the latter, and the confining the former chiefly to Milan, the church of St. Ambrose.

367 The learned Mabillon appears much displeased with Malmesbury, for the motives here assigned for abbat Robert’s quitting Citeaux. Vide Ann. Benedictinor.

368 From the French “losenge,” adulation.

369 Alluding to the legend of St. Peter and Simon Magnus; who having undertaken by means of enchantment, to fly, was, by the adjuration of St. Peter, dashed to the earth and killed. Vide Fabricius, Codex Apocryphus.

370 His letters, long supposed to be lost, were found by the editor of this work in a MS. belonging to the Burgundian library at Brussels, and have been since published by R. Anstruther, 8vo. Bruxellis, 1845.

371 Joscelyn’s “Life and Translation of St. Augustine” is printed in the “Acta Sanctor. Antwerp. 26 Maii.” See the Preface to Bede, p. xxxix.

372 Another famous writer of Lives of Saints, several of which exist still in MS.

373 “The council of Clermont, in Auvergne, continued from 18th to 28th of Nov. A.D. 1095; wherein the decrees of the councils held by pope Urban at Melfe, Benevento, Troie, and Plaisance, were confirmed, and many new canons made. Malmesbury’s is perhaps the best account now known of that celebrated council. See the acts of the council of Clermont; Conc. tom. xii. p. 829, &c.”—Hardy.

374 The practice of private wars; for an account of which, see Robertson’s Hist. of Charles V. vol. i.

375 If orders could not be completely conferred on Saturday, the ceremony might be performed on Sunday; and the parties continuing to fast the two days were considered as one only.—Durand.

376 The Truce of God, was so called from the eagerness with which its first proposal was received by the suffering people of every degree: during the time it endured, no one dared infringe it, by attacking his fellows. See Du Cange: and Robertson’s Charles V. vol. i. It was blamed by some bishops as furnishing an occasion of perjury, and was rejected by the Normans, as contrary to their privileges. The Truce of God was first established in Aquitaine, 1032.

377 There are other orations, said to have been delivered by Urban in this council, remaining; and L’Abbe (Concil. T. x.) has printed one from a Vatican MS.; but they are all very inferior to Malmesbury.

378 He alludes to St. Augustine and the fathers of the African church.

379 This gratuitous insult on a brave and noble people is unworthy a writer like William of Malmesbury; but the monkish historians were as deficient in taste as in style. The cloister was a useful seminary to teach the plodding accuracy which is required to write a chronicle; but for elevation of mind and diffusion of liberal sentiment, it was as inefficient as it is still.

380 The rustic, observes Guibert, shod his oxen like horses, and placed his whole family on a cart; where it was amusing to hear the children, on the approach to any large town or castle, inquiring, if that were Jerusalem. Guib. Novigent. Opera, p. 482.

381 Fulcher says, those who assumed the cross were estimated at that number; but that multitudes returned home ere they passed the sea. Fulcherius Carnotensis ap. Gesta Dei per Francos, p. 387.

382 However repugnant this representation may be to the generally received opinion, it is that of an eye-witness, when describing the army assembled at Constantinople. Fulch. Carnot. p. 389.

383 It should probably be the Elbe, as he appears to describe the people of northern Germany.

384 Virgil, Æneid i. 281.

385 “Hildebert was translated to Tours, A.D. 1125, upon the death of Gislebert, who died at Rome about the middle of December, 1124, in the same week with pope Calixtus. (Ord. Vit. lib. xii. p. 882.)”—Hardy.

386 For a very interesting account of the walls and gates of Rome, see Andrew Lumisden’s “Remarks on the Antiquities of Rome and its Environs, London, 4to. 1797.”

387 Now called Porta del Popolo.

388 Porta Pinciana.

389 The Two Hundred and Sixty are said to have been shot with arrows in the amphitheatre, by order of Claudius. The Thirty suffered under Diocletian.

390 Porta Salaria.

391 Porta Pia.

392 Porta di San Lorenzo.

393 Porta Maggiore.

394 The Forty Soldiers suffered martyrdom under Licinius at Sebastia in Armenia.

395 So called, because for a long time after they had suffered martyrdom (martyrio coronati) their names were unknown; and though afterwards their real names were revealed to a certain priest, yet they still continued to retain their former designation.

396 Porta di San Giovanni.

397 There is no notice of this in Lumisden: it is probably now destroyed.

398 Porta Latina.

399 Porta di San Sebastiano.

400 Porta di San Paolo.

401 Aquas Saluias, now Trefontane. The tradition is, that St. Paul was beheaded on this spot: that his head, on touching the ground, rebounded twice, and that a fountain immediately burst forth from each place where it fell. See Lumisden.

402 Porta Portese.

403 Porti di San Pancrazio.

404 Sacred places and bodies of saints long since deceased, are but feeble safeguards against the outbreak or even moderate agency of human passions, which, in every country and under every form of superstition, act always in the same way.

405 Aldhelmi Opera, page 28.

406 The story of Silvester’s having baptized Constantine is considered as altogether unfounded. See Mosheim, vol. i.

407 This, in Aldhelm, is the Labarum, or imperial standard.

408 The place of his birth is contested.

409 Geor. i. 103.

410 “The Danube empties itself through six mouths into the Euxine. The river Lycus, formed by the conflux of two little streams, pours into the harbour of Constantinople a perpetual supply of fresh water, which serves to cleanse the bottom, and to invite the periodical shoals of fish to seek their retreat in the capacious port of Constantinople.”—Hardy.

411 After all the researches of the last fifty years, the “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,” by Gibbon, will be found to contain the best history of these Byzantine emperors.

412 His Turkish name was Killidge-Arslan: his kingdom of Roum extended from the Hellespont to the confines of Syria, and barred the pilgrimage of Jerusalem. (See De Guignes, tom. iii. p. 2, pp. 10–30.)—Hardy.

413 When Urban II addressed the multitude from a lofty scaffold in the market-place of Clermont, inciting the people to undertake the crusade, he was frequently interrupted by the shout of thousands in their rustic idiom exclaiming “Deus lo vult!” “It is indeed the will of God!” replied the pope; “and let those words, the inspiration surely of the Holy Spirit, be for ever adopted as your war-cry.”—Hardy.

414 Hegesippus, a Greek author of the second century, wrote an account of the Jewish war, and of the destruction of Jerusalem; said to have been translated into Latin by St. Ambrose. He also wrote an ecclesiastical history, in five books, a fragment of which only remains.

415 “The siege of Antioch commenced on the 21st of October, 1097, and ended 3rd June, 1098.”—Hardy.

416 Pharsalia, iv. 579.

417 The balista was a warlike engine for casting either darts or stones: the petrary, for throwing large stones only.

418 Owing to the scarcity of fuel.

419 “Phirouz, a Syrian renegade, has the infamy of this perfidious and foul treason.”—Hardy.

420 “In describing the host of Corbaguath, most of the Latin historians, the author of the Gesta, (p. 17,) Robertus monachus, (p. 56,) Baldric, (p. 3,) Fulcherius Carnotensis, (p. 392,) Guibert, (p. 512,) William of Tyre, (lib. vi. c. 3, p. 714,) Bernardus Thesaurarius, (c. 39, p. 695,) are content with the vague expressions of ‘infinita multitudo,’ ‘immensum agmen,’ ‘innumeræ copiæ,’ ‘innumeræ gentes.’ The numbers of the Turks are fixed by Albertus Aquensis at two hundred thousand, (lib. iv. c. 10, p. 242,) and by Radulphus Cadomensis (c. 72, p. 309) at four hundred thousand horse. (Gib. Decl. Rom. Emp. vii. pp. 364, 5.)”—Hardy.

421 The greatest part of their march is most accurately traced in Maundrell’s Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem.—Hardy.

422 The church of St. Mary, at Bethlehem, contained within its walls a sort of grotto, in which it was pretended Christ was born.—See Bede, de Locis Sanctis.

423 “Jerusalem was possessed only of the torrent of Kedron, dry in summer, and of the little brook or spring of Siloe, (Reland, tom. i. pp. 294, 300). Tacitus mentions a perennial fountain, an aqueduct, and cisterns of rain-water. The aqueduct was conveyed from the rivulet Tekoe, or Etham, which is likewise mentioned by Bohadin, (in Vit. Saladin. p. 238.)”—Hardy.

424 It was pretended that the lamps in the church of the Holy Sepulchre were miraculously ignited on Easter Eve.

425 Bernard, with two companions, sailed from Italy to Alexandria, and travelled thence by land to Jerusalem in the year 870. Their travels are printed in “Mabillon’s Acta Benedictinorum.” The account is short, but has several interesting particulars. There is also a good MS. in the British Museum, Bib. Cott. Faust, b. 1, where, by a mistake of the scribe, it is dated A.D. 970, but this is clearly wrong, for Bernard mentions Lewis, king of Italy, as then living, and he died A.D. 875.

426 Some MSS. insert the name of another John after Juvenalis, but no patriarch of this name is known to have lived at that period. Malmesbury has, moreover, omitted the names of eleven patriarchs, between Juvenal, who died A.D. 458, and Zacharias who died A.D. 609.

427 Cosroes, or Chosroes the Second, king of Persia.

428 “The church of Jerusalem was vacant after the death of Sophronius, A.D. 644, until the year 705, when John V succeeded, whom Theodorus followed, A.D. 754.”—Hardy.

429 “The tower of David was the old tower Psephina or Neblosa; it was likewise called Castellum Pisanum, from the patriarch Daimbert. (D’Anville, pp. 19–23.)”—Hardy.

430 That is to say, with several floors or apartments, one above the other; each of which contained soldiers.

431 Interested motives and conduct, it is to be observed, are several times imputed to the adventurers from Sicily and Calabria.

432 In allusion to the custom of painting and gilding the ceilings.

433 Godfrey would not, however, accept the name of king, nor wear a crown of jewels in a city where his Saviour had been crowned with thorns. He therefore contented himself with the title of “Defender and Baron of the Holy Sepulchre.”

434 Pope Urban however died fourteen days after the taking of Jerusalem. Daibert was appointed patriarch of the captured city.

435 The church of Golgotha contains within it the rock on which the cross was fixed for the crucifixion. Bede, Eccles. Hist. p. 264.

436 Fulcher wrote an account of the transactions in Syria, where he was present, from A.D. 1095 to 1124. Malmesbury condenses much of his narrative with his usual ability. It is printed in the Gesta Dei per Francos, and, ap. Duchesne Hist. Franc. Scriptor. tom. iii.

437 Paul was bishop of Antioch in the third century. “He was better pleased with the title of ducenarius than with that of bishop. His heresy, like those of Noetus and Labellius in the same century, tended to confound the mysterious distinction of the Divine persons. He was degraded from his see in 270, by the sentence of eighty bishops, and altogether deprived of his office in 274 by Aurelian (Mosheim’s Ecc. Hist. vol.i. p. 702, &c.)”—Hardy.

438 The sugar cane. “This kind of herb is annually cultivated with great labour. When ripe they pound it in a mortar, strain off the juice, and put it in vessels until it coagulates, and hardens in appearance like snow or white salt. This they use scraped and mixed with bread, or dissolved in water. The canes they call Zucra.” Albertus Aquensis, ap. Gesta Dei, p. 270.

439 In token of victory, or the completion of their purpose, by having visited the holy sepulchre. Vide Albert. Aquens. ubi sup. p. 290.