This imprisonment of William of Aquitaine is described at greater or less length by a whole crowd of writers. See the Gesta Consulum (257, 258), where the war is very fully narrated; the Angevin Chronicles under 1033; Chron. S. Mich. ap. Labbe, i. 350. Will. Pict. 86. Will. Malms. iii. 231. Chron. S. Maxent. 1032, 1035. According to the Gesta the war began out of the quarrel about Saintonge, and it is probably with reference to that County that both William of Poitiers and William of Malmesbury speak of the Duke of Aquitaine as the “lord” (dominus) of Geoffrey. The Chronicle of Saint Maxentius also speaks of the battle “juxta monasterium Sancti Jovini ad Montem Cærium” (Labbe, ii. 207). It is of course dwelt on at much greater length in the Gesta.
The cession of Bourdeaux, asserted by William of Malmesbury, seems hardly credible. The author of the Gesta, generally not indisposed to underrate the successes of the Angevin house, speaks only of the cession of the disputed territory of Saintonge. William of Poitiers (86) says only “argenti et auri pondus gravissimum, atque prædia ditissima extorsit.” And the Chronicles of Saint Maxentius (a. 1036) speak of no territorial cession at all, but only of a ransom; “Isembertus Episcopus Pictavis fecit synodum, ubi magnam pacem [doubtless the Truce of God] firmavit. Qui, cum Eustachiâ uxore Guillelmi Comitis, aliquantulùm exspoliavit monasteria auro et argento, unde redimerent eum.” He then mentions the deaths of William and Eustachia. It was perhaps the flourish of William of Poitiers (86) about Poitiers, Bourdeaux, and other cities obeying Geoffrey (“Andegavi, Turoni, Pictones, Burdegala, multæ regiones, civitates plurimæ”) which suggested a formal cession of Bourdeaux to the mind of William of Malmesbury.
There can be no doubt that Eustachia was the real wife of William the Fat, the prisoner of Geoffrey, and that Agnes, whom Geoffrey married, was only his father’s widow. William of Poitiers says distinctly that, after the death of William, Geoffrey “novercam præcipuè nobilitatis [she was daughter of Otto-William, Count of Burgundy] toro suo sociavit” (p. 86). He is followed by William of Malmesbury (iii. 231), who says, “Martellus, ne quid deesset impudentiæ, novercam defuncti matrimonio sibi copulavit.” So the Chronicle of Saint Maxentius, which places the death of William in 1036, places the marriage in 1037. This last Chronicle is the only one which gives us an intelligible reason for Geoffrey’s conduct in contracting this marriage. Agnes could not have been very young, fifteen or sixteen years after her first marriage in 1018 (Art de vérifier les Dates, ii. 354. The date, according to the Chronicle of Saint Maxentius, is 1023, but then the second marriage is put later also); but Geoffrey had a political motive. “Willermo Comite mortuo, Pictavenses in magno angore et anxietate positi de morte principis sui, sicut oves sine pastore relicti, Odonem Comitem, germanum ejus ex patre supradicto, ex Gasconiâ convocaverunt. Per hæc tempora Gaufredus Martellus duxerat uxorem supradictam Agnetem, caussâ Pictavensium, ut haberet sibi subditos adhuc duobus filiis suis, scilicet Petro et Gaufredo parvulis” (Labbe, ii. 207). The two boys were in the end (1044) established by Geoffrey as Counts of Poitiers and Gascony respectively.
Some of the Angevin and Norman Chroniclers seem to have confounded the two Williams, William the Great, the husband of Agnes, and William the Fat, her stepson, who was imprisoned by Geoffrey. They therefore make a strange hash of the story, making Geoffrey marry the wife of the prince whom he imprisoned, and that even during her husband’s lifetime. The Angevin Chronicler in Labbe, i. 276, puts the marriage of Agnes a year before the imprisonment of William (1032 and 1033). “Gaufridus Martellus,” he says, “Agnetem duxit incesto conjugio.” It is not clear whether there was any kindred between Geoffrey and Agnes, or whether the Chronicler called the marriage “incestum” because he fancied that Agnes had a husband alive. The Chronicle of Saint Michael’s Mount (Labbe, i. 350) is still more express. The marriage is recorded under 1032, and under 1033 we read that Geoffrey took prisoner William “cujus uxorem Agnetem ante duxerat.” There can be no doubt that both the chronology and the facts are altogether confused, and we are thus led to look with some little suspicion on the other events which the Angevin Chronicler connects both with the imprisonment and with the marriage. Under 1032, after recording the marriage, he adds, “Inde bellum illud exsecrabile quod contra patrem suum per annos ferè septem subsequentes impiè gessit.” On the imprisonment in 1033 he adds, “Quare orta est discordia inter patrem et matrem.” What could these things have to do with one another?
The only writer who puts on anything like a tone of censure with regard either to Harold’s conduct at Porlock or to Godwine’s plundering along the south coast, is William of Malmesbury, and he does not draw the proper distinction between the doings of father and son. His words (ii. 199) are, “Exsulum quisque, de loco suo egressi, Britanicum mare circumvagari, littora piraticis latrociniis infestare, de cognati populi opibus prædas eximias conjectare.”
There is however a marked difference of tone in the way in which the story of Harold’s landing at Porlock is told by the different Chroniclers. The Abingdon writer, as I have often noticed, may be looked on as to some extent hostile to Godwine, and the Worcester writer, though on the whole favourable to the Earl, yet constantly follows the Abingdon narrative. The Peterborough version, I need hardly say, is quite independent, and is always strongly for Godwine. According to Abingdon and Worcester (1052), Harold landed and plundered, and then the people of the country came together to withstand him. He landed, they say, and “þær mycel gehergode, and þæt landfolc him ongean gaderodan.” But the Peterborough writer makes the local force to have been already brought together, and speaks of no ravaging till after Harold had found the country hostile. Harold came to Porlock—“and wes þær mycel folc gegaderod ongean. Ac he ne wandode na him metes to tylienne; eode úp, and ofsloh þær mycelne ende þes folces.” That is to say, the partizan of Godwine tells the tale in the way least unfavourable to Harold, while the hostile or indifferent writer tells it in the way most unfavourable. But the pains taken in both directions show that both writers agreed in thinking that the harrying and slaying, unless done in strict self-defence, was discreditable.
The Biographer of Eadward seems to have thought differently. He greatly exaggerates the ravaging, and tells the tale (405) in a tone of distinct triumph; “Ab ipsis Occidentalium Britonum sive Anglorum finibus usque quò Dux consederat, ferro, igne, et abductâ prædâ omne regnum sunt devastati.” It has been ingeniously suggested to me from this passage that the Biographer was a foreigner. His way of looking at this particular matter certainly stands out in distinct contrast to that of all the native writers. The supposition that he was a foreigner would account for many of the characteristics of his work. It would quite explain his evidently minute personal knowledge of many things, combined with his frequent inaccuracy about others. It would account for his invariable tendency to dwell on all personal details about the King, the Lady, and the Earls, and rather to slur over the political affairs of the Kingdom. But, if he was a foreigner, the spirit in which he writes forbids the notion that he was a Frenchman. Probably he was a member of the other importation from Lotharingia.
But it is very singular that, in the account of the plundering of Godwine in Wight and Portland, it is the Peterborough writer who puts matters in the strongest light; “And eodon þær úp, and hergodon swa lange þær þæt þæt folc geald heom swa mycel swa hi heom on legden; and gewendon heom þa westweard, oð þet hi comon to Portlande, and eodon þær úp, and dydon to hearme swa hwet swa hi dón mihton.” Abingdon, on the other hand, mentions the plundering only incidentally, when saying that it ceased after the meeting of Godwine and Harold; “And hi na mycelne hearm ne dydon syððan hig togædere comon, buton þæt heo metsunge namon.” And the juxtaposition of the words which follow is remarkable; “Ac speonnon heom eall þæt landfolc to be ðam sǽ riman, and eac up on lande.” The people joined Godwine, notwithstanding his plunderings.
The mention of the plundering in Sheppey (see p. 323) comes also from the Peterborough Chronicle only. These differences show that the several writers, though one often wrote in a different spirit from another, all wrote honestly, and that they did not wilfully either invent or conceal things for party purposes.
In the name of common fairness, as wishing to give to our common hero his due praise and no more, I must protest against the way in which the Porlock story is slurred over by Thierry and Mr. St. John. This part of Harold’s conduct cannot be defended, and it ought not to be concealed. It is enough that he wiped out the stain by his refusal on a later day to ravage one inch of the Kingdom which had been given him to guard.
Of the return of Godwine, as of his banishment, we have three original narratives, those of the Abingdon and Worcester Chroniclers, which may be reckoned as one, that of the Peterborough Chronicler, and that of Eadward’s Biographer. Each again show’s its respective character; each has its characteristic tone; each brings some particular facts into greater notice than the others; but there are no really important contradictions among them. The Peterborough writer retains his old character as the stoutest of all adherents of Godwine. The Abingdon Chronicler may be looked on as in some sort an enemy; it is at the end of this year that he breaks out into that complaint about Godwine’s appropriation of ecclesiastical property of which I have spoken elsewhere (see above, pp. 32, 351, 546). But he is not an uncandid enemy; some of the points which tell most strongly in Godwine’s favour come out with great force in his narrative; it is from him that we get the fullest picture of the zeal with which Godwine was received by the maritime shires. He also, as we have seen (see Note R.), though he makes the most of Harold’s ravages, makes the least of those of Godwine. This last feature is not what one would have expected. His dislike to Godwine follows him to his death, but in his late narrative it certainly is not extended to Harold. On the whole we may say that, as a monk, he has a certain personal feeling against Godwine, but that, as an Englishman, he is true to Godwine’s cause.
The Biographer takes his usual line. He is a courtier, comparatively careless of the march of public events, but full of personal incidents which are not to be found elsewhere. His narrative is nowhere richer than in those little indirect and unconscious touches which are often worth more than direct statements. I need hardly say that he is the most careless as to chronology of all three. The Peterborough writer, on the other hand, is the most attentive. I therefore make him my main guide throughout the story, but I draw touches and incidents from both the other sources without hesitation.
Thus, at the very beginning, the Abingdon writer makes the great accession which the men of Kent and Sussex made to Godwine’s force (p. 322) happen immediately on his first coming from Flanders, before he was pursued by the King’s ships. This is hardly possible, and we accordingly find from the Peterborough narrative that it really happened later, after the storm and the return to Flanders, incidents which the Abingdon writer leaves out. But it is from the Abingdon writer that we get that most emphatic expression of the popular attachment to Godwine, how the men of Kent, Surrey (a shire which I should have mentioned more distinctly in p. 322), and the other south-eastern districts, pledged themselves to “live and die” with the Earl. William of Malmesbury, as he so often does, follows Peterborough, though he is not without touches of his own.
Somewhat later in the story (p. 324), we find a good illustration of the peculiar value of the Biographer. The Abingdon and Worcester Chronicles clearly imply that Eadward knew nothing of the second attempt of Godwine till the Earl had reached Sandwich; “Þa Eadwerd cyng þæt geaxode,” &c. The question in the text as to the whereabouts of the King naturally occurs. Florence (1052) made a very obvious inference from his authorities, when he wrote, “Regi Eadwardo, tunc temporis Lundoniæ demoranti, illorum adventus nunciatur.” But these words are simply an inference; they do not translate any statement in the Chronicles, and we find from the Biographer, the best authority for the King’s personal movements, that it is a wrong inference; “Audito itaque Rex ejus [Godwini] violento et absque ejus nutu in regnum suum ingressu, quamquam fidem referentibus non accommodaret, tamen cum militari copiâ quâ poterat, Lundoniam venit” (Vita Eadw. 405). He therefore was elsewhere when he heard the news. The writer goes on to say, “Utque acri erat animo et promptissimæ strenuitatis, ingressum civitatis, quà tendebat, prohibere tentabat.” The words in Italics must apply to Eadward, and the Biographer would hardly venture upon satire. Æthelred himself, as we have seen, had his fits of energy, and Eadward also had his fits, if not of energy, at least of passion.
When we get to the negotiations on the evening of Monday, it is to the Peterborough Chronicler only that we owe our knowledge of the personal agency of Stigand (p. 329). A year before, the Biographer was the only writer who spoke of him. This is just the way in which, in a story of this kind, our several accounts fill up gaps in each other, and strengthen each other’s authority. The conduct attributed to Stigand at one time by one account exactly agrees with the conduct attributed to him at another time by another and quite independent account. The Abingdon Chronicle simply says, “Geræddon þa þæt man sende wise men betweonan, and setton grið on ægðre healfe.” So Florence, “Sapientiores quique [Roger of Wendover, or his copyist, or his editor, turns this into “sapientes quinque,” i. 491] ex utrâque parte, inter Regem et Ducem pacem redintegrantes, exercitum ab armis discedere jusserunt.” The Canterbury writer follows Peterborough in mentioning Stigand, but adds, rather unluckily, “þe was þes cinges rædgifa and his handprest.”
The adjournment till the morning of Tuesday appears from the words of Florence, “Mane autem facto, concilium Rex habuit.” These words answer to nothing in the actual narrative of any of the Chroniclers; but they are implied in what the Abingdon writer says afterwards; “Ðæt wæs on þone Monandæg æfter Sc̃a Marian mæsse þæt Godwine mid his scipum to Suðgeweorce becom, and þæs on merigen, on þone Tiwesdæg hi gewurdon sehte, swa hit her beforan stent.” We thus see that, in the flow of narration, especially in the rhetorical language of the Biographer, the events of two days have been run into one. This is especially shown in one expression of the Biographer. He makes one of the reasons which made Eadward finally yield at the Gemót to be because he saw that Godwine’s military force was the stronger (“Ducem, quem utique videbat, sibi satis, si uti vellet, superiorem armis”); this consideration would rather belong to the former day. It is clear that the “mycel Gemót,” as the Peterborough Chronicler triumphantly calls it, was held on Tuesday morning. Its details must be gathered from all sources. Bits of the official decrees peep out both in Abingdon and Peterborough, but it is the Peterborough writer, the stoutest Englishman that ever took pen in hand, who loves emphatically to dwell on the democratic character of this great gathering. It is from his expression “wiðutan Lundene,” combined with the description which the Biographer gives of Godwine and Eadward afterwards going together to the Palace (see p. 337), that we learn that the assembly was held in the open air. The Biographer cares little for the political character of the meeting, but there is no part of his whole narrative in which he is richer in those little personal touches which give him his chief value. His account is most graphic and animated, and the reader will easily see that I have largely drawn upon him.
The flight of Robert, Ulf, and the other Normans (see p. 300) certainly happened before the meeting of the Gemót, therefore doubtless on Monday evening. From the account in the Abingdon Chronicle and in Florence it might seem that it was on Tuesday, after sentence had been pronounced against them in the Gemót. But, in the more careful order of the Peterborough writer, it becomes plain that it happened immediately after the mission of Stigand, that is, on Monday; “Ða geaxode Rotberd arcebiscop and þa Frencisce menn þæt [the agreement made by Stigand] genamon heora hors and gewendon.” Then, after the details of their ride, comes the account of the Gemót. So William of Malmesbury, ii. 199. Before the Gemót, “Ille [Robert], non exspectatâ violentiâ, sponte profugerat, quum sermo pacis componeretur.” And this is confirmed by one of the incidental references in the Biographer. He does not directly describe the flight of Robert and his companions, but he speaks of the King at the Gemót as “destitutus imprimis fugâ Archipræsulis et suorum multorum, verentium adspectum Ducis, qui scilicet auctores fuerant illius concitati turbinis.”
The personal reconciliation between the King and Godwine, distinct from, and following after, the public votes of the Gemót (see p. 337), rests on the direct authority of the Biographer only. The Chroniclers naturally think mainly of the proceedings in the Assembly, and merge the private reconciliation in the public one. The chaplain of the Lady, as naturally, looks at things in an opposite way. It is possible however that, in one passage of his story, the Peterborough writer had the private reconciliation in his mind. Once, and once only, is his way of speaking less popular than that of his Abingdon brother. Where Abingdon says, “And man sealde Godwine clæne his eorldom swa full and swa forð swa he fyrmest ahte,” Peterborough has “and se cyng forgeaf þam eorle and his bearnum his fulne freondscype and fulne eorldom,” &c. This sounds very much as if the Peterborough writer was combining in his mind the public restoration by the Gemót and the personal reconciliation with the King. But in any case we cannot mistake the minute and local description given by the Biographer; “Rex itaque coactus tum misericordiâ et satisfactione Ducis ... devictus quoque precibus supplicantium, redditis armis suis, cum Duce in palatium processit, ibique, paullatim defervente animi motu sedatus, sapientium consilio usus, Duci osculum præbuit,” &c. (p. 406).
One or two points maybe here noticed. In the text (p. 337) I have said that the King and the Earl went “unarmed to the Palace.” But “redditis armis suis” would rather mean that Eadward returned to Godwine the arms which Godwine had laid at his feet (p. 334). The restoration of the official axe was not unlikely to be the outward sign of the restoration of the office itself. Again, it may be asked whether “sapientium consilio usus” means merely “following the advice of wise men,” or whether it is a technical expression, “in accordance with the decree of the Witan.” In a simpler writer I should be inclined to take it in the latter sense; but the Biographer, if he had chosen to talk directly about the Witan at all, would probably have used some more rhetorical phrase. Besides we have already, in the course of the story, read in the Chronicles of “wise men,” where the reference is clearly not to official but to personal wisdom.
There is certainly something very striking in the way in which our account of this great event has to be put together from several independent accounts, and in the amount of precision, even in very minute points, which we are able to reach by carefully comparing one with another. It is hardly necessary to collect together the shapes which the story takes in later writers, but I cannot pass by the way in which the Winchester annalist (p. 25) weaves the return of Godwine into the legend of Emma, which he places in 1043 (see above, p. 570). Eadward recalls Godwine at the prayer of his mother; “Precibus matris suæ revocavit Godwinum Comitem et filios ejus ab exsilio, et conceptum in eos rancorem remisit ad plenum, et singulis honores suos reddidit.” Selden also (Titles of Honour, pp. 525, 526) seems to have confounded this reconciliation between Eadward and Godwine with that imaginary reconciliation soon after Eadward’s election of which Bromton is so full. See vol. i. p. 574.
The story adopted by some writers, ancient and modern, about Godwine giving his son Wulfnoth and his grandson Hakon as hostages to the King, by whom they were immediately handed over to the keeping of Duke William, I mention here only lest I should seem to have forgotten it. It is part of the story of Harold’s oath, which I shall discuss at large in my next volume.
I cannot help noticing the strange perversion of the story of Swegen which has been adopted by a writer generally so accurate as Dr. Lingard. “But to Sweyn,” he tells us (i. 341), “Eadward was inexorable. He had been guilty of a most inhuman and perfidious murder; and seeing himself abandoned by his family, he submitted to the discipline of the ecclesiastical canons.” This seems to come from Roger of Wendover (i. 491); “Rex ... pristinum honorem restituit Godwino et filiis ejus omnibus, præter Suanum, qui Beornum peremerat Regis [sic] consobrinum, unde, pœnitentiam agens, de Flandriâ nudis pedibus Hierosolymam petens, in reditu suo per viam defunctus est.” This would most naturally mean that Swegen set out on his pilgrimage after the restoration of his family, and it might also seem to imply that the pilgrimage was an imposed penance. But there is no doubt that Swegen had already set out for Jerusalem before his father left Flanders, and the expressions of the best writers seem to show that the penance was altogether self-imposed. On the former point the words of the Abingdon Chronicle (1052) are decisive; “Swegen for æror to Hierusalem of Bricge.” So Florence (1052), who also gives a hint on the other point; “Ille enim ductus pœnitentiâ, eo quod, ut prælibavimus, consobrinum suum Beorn occiderat, de Flandriâ nudis pedibus Jerusalem jam adierat.” William of Malmesbury (ii. 200; see above, p. 102) does not mention the time, but says that he went “pro conscientiâ Brunonis cognati interempti.” About the chronology then there is no doubt, and there is no reason to suppose that the pilgrimage was other than a self-imposed one. Swegen, in short, if a great criminal, was also a great penitent, and it is rather hard to deprive him of that character in order to exalt Saint Eadward and the ecclesiastical canons. Eadward had no opportunity of being inexorable; Swegen’s family had no opportunity of abandoning him; he probably did not need the discipline of the ecclesiastical canons; his own conscience had already pronounced sentence upon him. It was probably Florence’s expression “pœnitentiâ ductus” which suggested Roger’s “pœnitentiam agens,” and from the latter Dr. Lingard clearly got his idea of the ecclesiastical canons.
Thierry (i. 201) seems, contrary to the best accounts, but in conformity with a possible interpretation of Roger, to bring Swegen to the Gemót, and to make him banish himself there; “Tous les membres de cette famille populaire rentrèrent dans leurs honneurs, à l’exception d’un seul, de Sweyn, qui y renonça volontairement.” Out of this view Lord Lytton (Harold, i. 196 et seqq.) has made a fine scene.
The Abingdon Chronicle makes Swegen die at Constantinople; Florence places his death in Lykia. He adds that he died of the cold—“invalitudine ex nimio frigore contractâ.” Florence, writing with the Abingdon Chronicle before him, could have no motive to change the well known Constantinople into the less known Lykia, unless he had good information that Lykia really was the place. But the Chronicler might very easily put Constantinople, a thoroughly familiar name, instead of Lykia, of which he had perhaps never heard. William of Malmesbury (ii. 200) has quite another story; “A Saracenis circumventus et ad mortem cæsus est.”
A close parallel to the pilgrimage of Swegen is found in that of Lagman (on the name see vol. i. p. 510) King of Man, 1075–1093 (Munch, p. 4); “Rebellavit autem contra eum Haraldus frater ejus multo tempore. Sed tandem captus a Lagmanno, genitalibus et oculis privatus est. Post hæc Lagmannus, pœnitens quod fratris sui oculos eruisset, sponte regnum suum dimisit, et signo crucis dominicæ insignitus, iter Jerosolimitanum arripuit, quo et mortuus est.”
Stigand, as might have been expected, is as favourite an object of Norman abuse as Godwine himself. And abuse of Stigand is one degree more reasonable than abuse of Godwine. For, though Stigand’s conduct seems to have in no way infringed the laws of England, and though it might easily have been justified by abundance of English precedents, there can be no doubt that it offended against the strict laws of the Church as understood by continental canonists. Of the mingled state of English feeling with regard to him I have spoken in several passages of the text (see above, pp. 343, 432, 446); I will here bring together some of the chief authorities on the subject.
The offences of Stigand, as seen in the eye of the Canon Law, are thus stated by Florence, when recording his degradation in 1070;
“Stigandus Doruberniæ archiepiscopus degradatur tribus ex caussis, scilicet, quia episcopatum Wintoniæ cum archiepiscopatu injustè possidebat; et quia, vivente archiepiscopo Roberto, non solum archiepiscopatum sumpsit, sed etiam ejus pallium, quod Cantwariæ remansit, dum vi injustè ab Angliâ pulsus est, in missarum celebratione aliquamdiu usus est; et post à Benedicto, quem sancta Romana ecclesia excommunicavit, eo quod pecuniis sedem apostolicam invasit, pallium accepit.”
On Stigand’s plurality of Bishopricks, an offence in which he was far from standing alone, William of Malmesbury, as might be expected, gets more rhetorical, and yet, after all, he seems to see that, as things went, there was nothing so very monstrous in it. He mentions the matter in the Gesta Regum, ii. 199;
“Invasit continuò, illo [Roberto] vivente, Stigandus, qui erat episcopus Wintoniæ, archiepiscopatum Cantuariensem; infamis ambitûs pontifex, et honorum ultra debitum appetitor, qui, spe throni excelsioris, episcopatum Saxonum Australium deserens, Wintoniam insederit, illam quoque cum archiepiscopatu tenuerit.”
But in the Gesta Pontificum (116 b), after a good deal of abuse, he gets somewhat mollified;
“Nonne illud belluinæ rapacitatis dices, quod Wintoniæ episcopatum et Cantuariæ archiepiscopatum, præterea multas abbatias [see Hist. Eliens. ii. 41] solus ipse possidebat, quæ singula satis superque sufficerent alicui probo viro? Sed ego conjicio illum non judicio sed errore peccâsse, quod homo illiteratus (sicuti plerique et penè omnes tunc temporis Angliæ Episcopi) nesciret quantùm delinqueret, rem ecclesiasticorum negotiorum sicut publicorum actitari existimans.”
The feeling on the subject among strict churchmen comes out very forcibly in the words of the Abingdon Chronicler in 1053, when he records the foreign consecration of Wulfwig and Leofwine; “On ðisson geare næs ná arcebisceop on ðissan lande, butan Stigand bisceop heold þæt bisceoprice on Cantwarabyrig on Christes cyrcean, and Kynsige on Eoforwic; and Leofwine and Wulfwi foran ofer sæ and leton hig hadian hær to bisceopum.” I suppose all that is meant about Cynesige is that he had not yet received the pallium, as I do not know of any objection having been made to his appointment. The Waltham writer (De Inventione, c. 16) has an expression which in a contemporary writer would be still more forcible. He tells us that Harold had his minster consecrated by Cynesige, “quia tunc vacabat sedes Cantuariæ.” But, a hundred years later, the words may simply imply an imperfect understanding of the facts.
I have mentioned in their proper places the various Bishops who declined consecration at the hands of Stigand, and sought it elsewhere (see pp. 343, 453). The most important instance is that of Saint Wulfstan (see p. 466), on account of the distinct, though at first sight apparently contradictory, evidence which we have on the subject. I think that the distinct statement of Florence (1062) cannot be got over. It runs thus;
“Consecratus est igitur Episcopus à venerando Aldredo Eboracensium Archiepiscopo, eò quòd Stigando Doruberniæ Archiepiscopo officium episcopale tunc à Domino Apostolico interdictum erat, quia, Rodberto Archiepiscopo vivente, archiepiscopatum suscipere præsumpsit; canonicâ tamen professione præfato Dorubernensi Archiepiscopo Stigando, non suo ordinatori Aldredo, factâ.”
This seems to show that, in Florence’s belief, the Legates brought with them a distinct and fresh decree against Stigand (“officium ... tunc interdictum est.” Cf. Vita Wlstani, Ang. Sacr. ii. 251; “Quod Cantuariensi Stigando Romanus Papa interdixisset officio”); that Wulfstan, in obedience to the Papal orders, refused consecration at the hands of Stigand, but that he nevertheless made canonical profession to him as the de facto Archbishop. Now this account is not a mere obitèr dictum of Florence; it is one of those statements of his which have a controversial force. It is evidently meant as an answer to some other statement; it is akin to his memorable description of Harold’s election and coronation, in which every word disposes of some Norman calumny. It expresses, in short, the deliberate conviction of a man of local knowledge and sound judgement. On the other hand, the words of the later profession of Wulfstan to Lanfranc (a document which is not printed, but for a copy of which I have to thank Professor Stubbs) seem to deny that he had ever made any earlier profession at all. His words are;
“Quo tempore ego Wulstanus ad Wigorniensem Wicciorum urbem sum ordinatus episcopus, sanctam Dorobernensem ecclesiam, cui omnes antecessores meos constat fuisse subjectos, Stigandus jampridem invaserat, metropolitanum ejusdem sedis vi et dolo expulerat, usumque pallii quod ei abstulit contemptâ apostolicæ sedis auctoritate temerare præsumpserat. Unde à Romanis Pontificibus, Leone, Victore, Stephano, Nicolao, Alexandro, vocatus, excommunicatus, damnatus est. Ipse tamen, ut cœpit, in sui cordis obstinatione permansit. Per idem tempus jussa eorum Pontificum in Anglicam terram delata sunt prohibentium nequis ei episcopalem reverentiam exhiberet, aut ad eum ordinandus accederet. Quo tempore Anglorum præsules, alii Romam, nonnulli Franciam sacrandi petebant; quidam vero, ad vicinos coepiscopos accedebant. Ego autem Alredum Eboracensis ecclesiæ antistitem adii; professionem tamen de canonicâ obedientiâ usque ad præsente diem facere distuli.”
I suspect that Wulfstan meant to say that he had made no profession to Ealdred, and that Lanfranc, or some cunning foreign clerk, wrapped the matter up in the folds of a subtilty which the English Bishop most likely did not above half understand. A document which ventures to say that Stigand—and not the English people—drove Robert into exile could hardly be the genuine composition of the chosen friend of Harold. The simplicity of the saint was doubtless imposed upon, and his hand was set to a paper which gave a false view of the case. Florence seemingly thought it his duty to put a counter-statement on record.
The Biographer gives no details of the death of Godwine. He merely says (408) that he died in the year after his return (“reconciliatis ergo Duce et ejus filiis cum Rege, et omni patriâ in pacis tranquillitate conquiescente, secundo post hæc anno, obiit idem Dux felicis memoriæ”). He then mentions the grief of the nation, the Earl’s solemn burial in the Old Minster (“tumulatur condigno honore in monasterio, quod nuncupant, veteri Wintoniæ”), and the offerings made for the repose of his soul.
All the Chronicles mention the Earl’s death. The Winchester Chronicle, in one of its rare entries at this time, says simply, “1053. Her Godwine Eorl forðferde.” The late Canterbury Chronicle adds the exact date; “1053. Her was Godwine Eorl dead on xvii. Kal. Mai.” Peterborough adds the place of burial; “1053. Her on þisum geare forðferde Godwine Eorl on xvii. Kal. Mai, and he is bebyrged on Winceastre on ealda mynstre.” But it is from the Worcester, and still more from the Abingdon Chronicler, that we learn the details which I have followed in the text, and on a perversion of which the Norman romance is evidently founded. The Worcester writer’s account (1053) is put out of place, after events which happened later in the year. He tells us that the Earl was taken ill while he sat with the King at Winchester “him geyfelode þær he mid þam cynge sæt on Wincestre”). The Abingdon Chronicler is much fuller. He mentions the death of Godwine twice. First, in 1052, he gives us the very important fact that the Earl began to sicken soon after his return (see above, p. 348), and it is here that he makes his complaint of Godwine’s spoliations of holy places (see above, p. 545). Under 1053 he gives the story of his death. The King is at Winchester at Easter, and Godwine, Harold, and Tostig (“Godwine Eorl, and Harold Eorl his sunu, and Tostig.” See p. 567 on the way of describing the two brothers) are with him. He then goes on,
“Ða on oðran Easter dæge sæt he mid þam Cynincge æt gereorde; þa færinga sah he niðer wið þæs fotsetles spræce benumen, and ealre his mihte; and hine man ða brǽd into ðæs Kinges bure, and ðohtan þæt hit ofergán sceolde; ac hit næs na swa, ac þurhwunode swa unspecende and mihteleas forð oð þone Ðunresdæg, and ða his lif alét, and he lið þær binnan ealdan mynstre.”
Florence (1053) translates this account, with the addition of one or two touches;
“Eodem anno, dum secunda paschalis festivitatis celebraretur feria Wintoniæ, Godwino Comiti, more solito Regi ad mensam assidenti, suprema evenit calamitas, gravi etenim morbo ex improviso percussus, mutus in ipsâ sede declinavit. Quod filii ejus, Comes Haroldus, Tosti, et Gyrth videntes, illum in Regis cameram portabant, sperantes eum post modicum de infirmitate convalescere; sed ille expers virium, quintâ post hæc feriâ, miserabili cruciatu vitâ decessit, et in veteri monasterio sepultus est.”
I am not sure that we do not here, in our own Florence, find the first touches of romance, or rather the first influence of the romantic tales which were doubtless already afloat in his time. He leaves out the mention of Godwine’s previous illness, he enlarges on the suddenness of the stroke, and he adds the “miserabilis cruciatus,” of which we hear nothing in the Chronicles, and which seems to come from the death of Harthacnut (see vol. i. p. 591).
We are now fairly landed in the region of romance. The sudden death of Godwine at the royal table probably suggested the thought of that form of ordeal in which the guilt or innocence of the accused person was tested by his power of swallowing a morsel, blessed or cursed for the purpose. It is possible that the tale of Ælfred the conspirator against Æthelstan was not forgotten. Ælfred, according to the story (Will. Malms. ii. 137), was in the like manner struck before the altar after his false oath before Pope John, and died on the third day. The legend of Godwine appears in shapes in which both these sources can be recognized. According to William of Malmesbury (ii. 197), Eadward and Godwine were sitting at table discoursing about the King’s late brother Ælfred (“orto sermone de Elfredo regis fratre”); Godwine says that he believes that the King still suspects him of having had a hand in his death (“Tu, Rex, ad omnem memoriam germani, rugato me vultu video quod aspicias”); but he prays God that the morsel which he has in his hand may choke him (“non patiatur Deus, ut istam offam transglutiam”) if he had ever done anything tending to Ælfred’s danger or to the King’s damage (“ad ejus periculum, vel tuum incommodum”). Of course the morsel does choke him, and he dies then and there; he is dragged from under the table by his son Harold, who is in attendance on the King (“qui Regi adstabat”), and is buried in the cathedral of Winchester (“in episcopatu Wintoniæ”). The moral of course is not wanting—“Deum monstrâsse quam sancto animo Godwinus servierit;” but it is only fair to William to say that his infinitive mood shows that he is telling the tale only as part of the Norman version of Godwine’s history (see above, p. 536).
The Hyde writer (p. 289) tells the story in a shape which is still more distinctly borrowed from the story of Ælfred. The scene is changed to London. Godwine sees that the King’s mind is still kept back from a thorough reconciliation by the remembrance of the death of his brother (“animadvertens animum Regis Edwardi pro injustâ fratris sui interfectione erga se non esse sincerum”). He therefore constantly tries to regain his favour by frequent assertions of his innocence. He and the King are present in a church at the time of mass; Godwine, of his own free will (“nullo cogente sed ipso Rege cum Principibus vehementer admirante”), steps forward to the altar, takes the chalice in his hand, and pledges himself by a solemn oath (“cunctis audientibus inaudito se juramento constrinxit”) that he had had no share in the death of Ælfred. The King and the Earl then go to dinner, and the rest of the story is told in nearly the same way as by William of Malmesbury, only in a rather more impressive style. The morsel sticks in Godwine’s throat (“buccellam ori impositam, urgente eum divino judicio, nec glutere potuit, nec revertere, sed in amentiam versus terribiliter cœpit exspirare”). Harold, who, as in the other version, is in attendance on the King (“qui servitoris officio Regi adstabat”), carries him out while still breathing (“jam extremum spiritum trahentem, foras asportavit”).
In Henry of Huntingdon (M. H. B. 760 B) the chief difference from the version of William of Malmesbury is that the death of Ælfred is not mentioned. The scene is removed to Windsor (“apud Windleshores, ubi plurimùm manere solebat”); the conversation at dinner between the King and the Earl turns upon Godwine’s supposed treasons against the King himself, a subject quite as strange as the death of Ælfred; Godwine (“gener suus et proditor, recumbens juxta eum”) seemingly volunteers the remark that he has been often falsely accused of plotting against the King, but that he trusts that, if there be a true and just God in heaven, he will make the piece of bread choke him, if he ever did so plot. The true and just God, we are told, heard the voice of the traitor, who, as the chronicler charitably adds, “eodem pane strangulatus mortem prægustavit æternam.”
But there was something very lame in both these shapes of the story. Why should Eadward and Godwine choose as the subject of their discourse the topics which of all others one would have thought that both of them would have wished to avoid? Why should either Eadward or Godwine, in the familiar intercourse of the dinner-table, fall talking either about the murder of Ælfred or about any other treasonable doings of the Earl? William and Henry give us no clue. The Hyde writer solves the difficulty, but in rather a desperate way. In the next stage of the legend the explanation is much more ingeniously supplied. Some teller of the story lighted on an ancient legend which William of Malmesbury had recorded in its proper place (ii. 139), but which he had not thought of transferring to this. There was an old scandal against King Æthelstan, to the effect that he exposed his brother Eadwine at sea, on a false charge of conspiracy brought by his cup-bearer. Seven years after, the cup-bearer, handing wine to the King, slips with one foot, recovers himself with the other, and adds the witty remark, “So brother helps brother.” But King Æthelstan is thereby minded how this same man had made him deprive himself of the help of his brother, and he takes care that, however strong he may be on his feet, he shall presently be shorter by the head, which had no brother to help it. This story (of which I have spoken in an article in the Fortnightly Review, May 1, 1866) is worked into the legend of Godwine by Æthelred of Rievaux (X Scriptt. 395), in the French Life of Eadward (3253 et seqq. p. 117), in Roger of Wendover (i. 492), the Winchester Annals (p. 25), Thomas Rudborne’s Winchester History (Ang. Sacr. i. 239), Bromton (X Scriptt. 944), and Knighton (X Scriptt. 2333). In all these accounts we read, with no difference of any importance, how, as Eadward and Godwine are at table, the cup-bearer slips and recovers himself, how Godwine says, “So brother helps brother,” how Eadward answers, “So might my brother Ælfred have helped me, but for the treason of Godwine.” The Earl’s protestations of innocence, and the fearful test which he offers, have now a certain propriety, and the rest of the story follows much as in William of Malmesbury. The ball however has grown somewhat in its rollings, and some characteristically strong language is put into the mouth of the Saint. “Drag out the dog” (“extrahite canem,” or “canem istum”) is the King’s terse command, as it appears in Æthelred and Bromton. In the French Life this is, by a slight improvement, developed into “this stinking dog” (“treiez hors ceu chen punois”); while in most of the versions Eadward goes on to order his father-in-law to be buried in the highway, as unworthy of Christian burial (“extrahite canem hunc et proditorum et illum in quadrivio sepelite, indignus est ut Christianam habeat sepulturam”). The burial in the Old Minster was, we are assured by Roger of Wendover, done wholly without the King’s knowledge (“Rege id penitus ignorante”). One or two other smaller points may be noticed. Bromton and Knighton, like Henry of Huntingdon, transfer the story to Windsor, and the Winchester Annals more strangely transfer it to Odiham. Roger of Wendover and Thomas Rudborne make the King bless the morsel, before Godwine takes it; and the latter mentions another version, according to which it was blessed by Saint Wulfstan. The presence of the Prior of Worcester at the royal banquet is not accounted for. The Winchester Annals, with an obvious scriptural allusion, tell us that with the morsel Satan entered into Godwine (“introivit in illum Sathanas”). Lastly, Bromton turns the cup-bearer whose foot slips into no less a person than the Earl of the East-Angles. One wonders that the legend of the quarrel between Harold and Tostig was not dragged in here also.
After all this, it is with some relief that one turns to honest Wace (10595), who at least had the manliness to confess that there were things which he did not know;