342. Chron. Petrib. 1046. “Eadward cyng sende þider Dudoce [the Abbots only and not Dudoc are mentioned by the Worcester Chronicle, 1050] ... þæt hi sceolden þam cynge cyðan hwæt þær to Christendome gecoren wære.”
345. Chron. Ab. 1049. “Forðferde Eadnoð se goda biscop on Oxnafordscire.” The same words seem to have dropped out of the Worcester Chronicle.
346. Chron. Ab. 1049. “Eadwerd cing geaf Ulfe his preoste þæt biscoprice, and hit yfele beteah.” Chron. Wig. 1050. “Ac he wæs syððan of adryfon, forþan þe he ne gefremede naht biscoplices þæron, swa þæt us sceamað hit nu mare to tellanne.” Flor. Wig. “Regis capellanus Ulfus genere Nortmannus.”
349. Chron. Petrib. 1047. “Her on þisum geare wæs mycel gemót on Lundene to midfestene, and man sette ut ix. litsmanna scipa, and fif belifan wið æftan.” The Abingdon Chronicle, 1049, to much the same account as that just quoted, adds the words, “and se cyng heom behet xii. monað gyld.”
350. Chron. Ab. 1050 (the chronology of this Chronicle is utterly confused); “and man geinlagode Swegen Eorl.”
352. Chron. Ab. 1049. “On þæs cinges ærende.”
353. See the charter in Cod. Dipl. iv. 173, and the accounts in Æthelred of Rievaux, 379. Estorie de S. Ædward, 65 et seqq.
354. Besides the many exalted persons who followed the example of Cnut, some of whose pilgrimages are of historical importance, the prevalence of the fashion is shown by its incidental mention in more than one charter. Thus in Cod. Dipl. iv. 140 we find the mention of the Roman pilgrimage of a Lincolnshire Thegn whose name of Anskill or Anscytel witnesses to his Danish origin. (The charter may be quoted for such a point as this, though there is clearly something wrong in the signature of “Wulfwinus Lincolniensis episcopus.”) And at p. 141 we find “Leofgyva femina Lundonica” (a holder of property in Lincolnshire) dying on her way to Jerusalem.
355. Chron. Petrib. 1047. “On þysum ilcan geare wæs se myccla sinoð on Rome”—like our own “mycel gemót” just before.
356. Ib. “Hi comon þyder on Easter æfen.”
357. Vita Lanfr. c. 10. ap. Giles, i. 288. Will. Malms. iii. 284. Sig. Gemb. 1051. See Milman, Latin Christianity, iii. 24.
358. Æthel. Riev. ap. X Scriptt. 381. If the letter there given be genuine, the dispensation was granted by the authority of the synod as well as of the Pope. Eadward was either to build a new or restore an old monastery of Saint Peter; “aut novum construas aut vetustum augeas et emendes.” Cf. the French Life, 1601 et seqq., where the Bishops are both quartered on wrong sees, Ealdred prematurely at York, Hermann at Winchester. The story does not occur in the contemporary Life, p. 417.
360. Our ancient tongue appears to advantage in the pithy narrative of this affair given in the Peterborough Chronicle (1047); “And eft se Papa hæfde sinoð on Uercel, and Ulf biscop com þærto; and forneah man sceolde tobrecan his stef, gif he ne sealde þe mare gersuman; forðan he ne cuðe don his gerihte swa wel swa he sceolde.” Florence passes by the story; his Latin would be feeble after such vigorous English.
362. Chron. Petrib. 1047. Flor. Wig. 1050.
363. Vita Eadw. 400. Ælfric was “secundum canonica instituta electus,” by a “petitio et electio ecclesiastici conventûs.”
364. Ibid. 399. “Ex supradicti ducis Godwini stirpe.”
365. Ib. 399–400. “Quem tam totius ecclesiæ universales filii quam ipsius monasterii monachi in archipræsulem sibi exposcunt dari, huncque et affectu communi et petitione eligunt præesse regulari. Mittunt etiam ad supradictum Godwinum, qui regio favore in eâ dominabatur parte regni, commonent eum generis sui, precantur ut ex affectu propinquitatis Regem adeat, et hunc, utpote in eâdem ecclesiâ nutritum et secundum canonica instituta electum, sibi pontificem annuat. Promittit fideliter pro viribus suis Dux inclitus, Regemque adiens innotescit petitionem et electionem ecclesiastici conventûs.”
366. Chron. Ab. 1050. “þa hæfde Eadward cing witenagemot on Lunden to Midlencten, and sette Hrodberd to arcebiscop to Cantwarebyrig, and Sperhafoc abbud to Lunden, and geaf Roðulfe biscop his mæge þæt abbudrice on Abbandune.”
367. See the Abingdon History, i. 463. He was a monk of Saint Eadmund’s, and was charged with alienating some of the lordships of the house to Stigand. The account of his promotion to London I do not fully understand; “Spearhavoc autem a Rege civitati Lundonensi [civitatis Lundonensis?] eodem prædictæ pactionis anno, in episcopatum promotus, dum auri gemmarumque electarum pro coronâ imperiali cudendâ, Regis ejusdem assignatione receptam haberet copiam.” Was Saint Eadward’s favour purchased by the materials of an earthly crown?
369. Rudolf’s kindred to the King is asserted more positively in the local Chronicle just quoted than in the local History (463); “Inde Rodulfum quemdam longævum abbatis loco ponendum Rex transmisit, qui episcopatum apud Norweiam gentem diu moderans, et tandem ab hujusmodi fasce privatum se agere malens, ad Regem ipsum suum, ut ferebatur, cognatum venit; a quo et susceptus est.”
370. Rudolf, in any of its forms, is not an usual English name, but it might occur, like the rare names of Carl and Lothar (Hloðhære). See vol. i. p. 334.
371. Adam Brem. iii. 16. “Rex Haraldus crudelitate suâ omnes tyrannorum excessit furores. Multæ ecclesiæ per illum virum dirutæ, multi Christiani ab illo per supplicia sunt necati.... Itaque multis imperans nationibus, propter avaritiam et crudelitatem suam omnibus erat invisus.” He goes on to give a full account of Harold’s dealings with the Archbishop of Trondhjem.
372. Hist. Mon. Ab. 463. “Ut vero tam Dei quam sui respectu eum monachi reciperent honorificèque tractarent, utpote summâ canitie jam maturum, eo discedente, licere eis dedit quem de suis vellent, potiùs successorem eligere. Paretur Regi. Reverentiæ subjectio debitæ a fratribus viro competenter impenditur. At ipsos regia nequaquam fefellit in posterum promissio.” Rudolf survived only two years.
373. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Þæs sylfan Lentenes he for to Rome æfter his pallium.... Ða com se arcebiscop fram Rome ane dæge ǽr Sc̃s Petrus mæsse æfene, and gesæt his arcebiscopstol at Xp̃es cyrcean on Sc̃s Petrus mæssedæg, and sona þæs to þam cyng gewænde.”
374. The Peterborough Chronicle (1048) is here again very graphic; “Ða com Sparhafoc abbod to him mid þæs cynges gewrite and insegle (see above, p. 120); to þan þet he hine hadian sceolde to biscop into Lundene. Þa wiðcweð se arcebiscop, and cwæð þet se papa hit him forboden hæfde.”
375. Chron. Petrib. The pithy narrative of this writer is cut much shorter in the Worcester Chronicler (1051), followed by Florence; “Spearhafoc ... feng to þan biscoprice on Lundene, and hit wæs eft of him genumen ær he gehadod wære.” Florence turns this into, “Antequam esset consecratus, a Rege Eadwardo est ejectus.” Now the Chronicles do not at all imply that the refusal of Robert was at all the King’s personal act. Florence is perhaps confounding this business with the final expulsion of Spearhafoc later in the year, which he however places under another year.
376. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Ða gewende se abbod to Lundene, and sæt on þam biscoprice, þe se cyng him ær geunnan hæfde be his fulre leafe.” This is one of those little touches which show the sympathies of the writer.
377. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Ealne þone sumor and þone hærfest.”
378. Chron. Ab. 1050. “And þæs ylcan geare he settle ealle þa litsmen of male.”
379. Chron. Wig. 1052. “On þan ylcan geare aléde Eadward cyng þæt heregyld þæt Æþelred cyng ær astealde; þæt was on þam nigon and þrittigoðan geare þæs þe he hit ongunnon hæfde.” Flor. Wig. 1051. “Rex Eadwardus absolvit Anglos a gravi vectigali tricesimo octavo anno ex quo pater suus Rex Ægelredus primitus id Danicis solidariis solvi mandârat.” See vol. i. p. 391. The Heregyld is a tax for the maintenance of the here or standing army as distinguished from the fyrd or militia.
380. Chron. Wig. 1052. “Þæt gyld gedrehte ealle Engla þeode on swa langum fyrste swa hit bufan her awriten is; ðæt was æfre ætforan oðrum gyldum þe man myslice geald, and men mid menigfealdlice drehte.”
381. See Bromton, 942. Estoire de S. Ædward, 919 et seqq. Leofric is also Eadward’s partner in another vision. Æthel. Riev. X Scriptt. 389. Bromton, 949.
382. See Appendix K.
384. There is a grant of lands to Godwine (uni meo fideli Duci nuncupato nomine Godwino) as late as 1050. Cod. Dipl. iv. 123. The description of the grantee as “Dux” of course identifies him with the Earl.
385. The only absolutely certain instances that I can find at this time are the signatures of Earl Ralph in 1050. See above, p. 111. His name is added to doubtful charters at pp. 113, 121, and another doubtful one is signed by Robert the son of Wimarc, of whom more anon. The signatures of ecclesiastics, Rægnbold the Chancellor and others, are more common.
386. Ralph’s wife bore the name of Gytha, and their son was named Harold. Robert the son of Wimarc had also a son named Swegen, afterwards famous in Domesday. See Ellis, i. 433, 489. ii. 117. These names certainly point to a certain identification with England, and suggest the idea that the sons of Ralph and Robert were godsons of the two sons of Godwine.
389. “Nescia gens belli solamina spernit equorum,” says Guy of Amiens of the English (Giles, p. 38), but his following lines are, however unwittingly, a noble panegyric.
390. Thuc. iv. 40. ἀπεκρίνατο αὐτῷ πολλοῦ ἂν ἄξιον εἶναι τὸν ἄτρακτον (λέγων τὸν ὀϊστὸν), εἰ τοὺς ἀγαθοὺς διεγίγνωσκε.
391. Vita Eadw. 400. “Totius ecclesiæ filiis hanc injuriam pro nisu suo reclamantibus.”
393. Vita Eadw. 400. See Appendix E.
395. Ord. Vit. 487 D, 655 C.
396. A daughter of Æthelred and Emma must have been thirty-five years old at this time, and she may have been forty-seven. Considering the position held by her son, Godgifu is likely to have been approaching the more advanced age of the two.
397. Will. Malms. ii. 199. “Collocutus cum eo, et re impetratâ quam petierat.” This perhaps comes from Chron. Petrib. 1048; “And spæc wið hine þæt þæt he þa wolde.”
399. I reserve an examination of the authorities for this narrative for the Appendix. See Note L. I here refer to the Chronicles only for details.
400. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Ða he wæs sume mila oððe mare beheonan Dofran, þa dyde he on his byrnan, and his geferan ealle, and foran to Dofran.”
401. Thirty-one, reckoning from Godwine’s appointment as Earl of the West-Saxons in 1020. See vol. i. p. 469. If Godwine really became Earl of Kent in 1017 or 1018 (see vol. i. p. 451) two or three years more must be added.
402. Chron. Petrib. “Þa com an his manna, and wolde wician æt anes bundan huse, his unðances, and gewundode þone husbundon, and se husbunda ofsloh þone oðerne.” So Will. Malms. ii. 199; “Unus antecursorum ejus ferociùs cum cive agens, et vulnere magis quam prece hospitium exigens, illum in sui excidium invitavit.” I do not know why Mr. Hardy says that William implies that all this happened at Canterbury. Surely “per Doroberniam” means Dover.
403. Chron. Petrib. “Ða wearð Eustatius uppon his horse, and his gefeoran uppon heora, and ferdon to þam husbundon, and ofslogon hine binnan his agenan heorðæ.” It shows how impossible it seemed to a French noble of that age to strike a blow except on horseback, that Eustace and his companions mounted their horses at such a moment as this, when one would have thought that horses were distinctly in the way.
404. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Forþan Eustatius hæfde gecydd þam cynge þet hit sceolde beon mare gylt þære burhwaru þonne his. Ac hit næs na swa.” So Will. Malms. “Inde ad curiam pedem referens, nactusque secretum, suæ partis patronus assistens, iram Regis in Anglos exacuit.”
405. Herod, vii. 104. ἔπεστι γάρ σφι δεσπότης νόμος, τὸν ὑποδειμαίνουσι πολλῷ ἔτι μᾶλλον ἢ οἱ σοὶ σέ· ποιεῦσι γῶν τὰ ἂν ἐκεῖνος ἀνώγῃ.
406. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “And wearð se cyng swyþe gram wið þa burhware.”
408. “Baldwines mage” says the Worcester Chronicler; Florence (1051) alters this into “filia.” The Biographer of Eadward, p. 404, says “soror,” making her Eadward’s niece, which is hard to understand. It is from this passage that we learn that all this happened just at the very time of Tostig’s marriage; “Acciderant hæc in ipsis nuptiis filii sui ducis Tostini.” The title of “Dux” is premature.
409. Chron. Petrib. “And ofsænde se cyng Godwine eorl, and bæd hine faran into Cent mid unfriða to Dofran.” The full force of the word “unfriða” may be understood by its being so constantly applied to the Danish armies and fleets. See vol. i. p. 327. So William of Malmesbury (ii. 199); “Quamvis Rex jussisset illum continuò cum exercitu in Cantiam proficisci, in Dorobernenses graviter ulturum.”
411. Chron. Petrib. “And se eorl nolde na geðwærian þære infare; forþan him wæs lað to amyrrene his agene folgað.” One might be tempted to believe that this last word implied some special connexion between Godwine and Dover, were it not that we directly after read, “on Swegenes eorles folgoðe,” where it can hardly mean more than that the place was within his jurisdiction as Earl. The very first entry in Domesday represents Godwine as receiving a third of the royal revenues in Dover, but this was of course simply his regular revenue as Earl. The relations of the townsmen to the Crown are rather minutely described. They held their privileges by providing twenty ships yearly for fifteen days; each had a crew of twenty-one men. There is not a word to show that the demands of Eustace and his followers were other than utterly illegal.
412. I get my speech from William of Malmesbury (ii. 119), whose account is very clear and full, and thoroughly favourable to Godwine. “Intellexit vir acrioris ingenii, unius tantùm partis auditis allegationibus, non debere proferri sententiam. Itaque ... restitit, et quòd omnes alienigenas apud Regis gratiam invalescere invideret, et quòd compatriotis amicitiam præstare vellet. Præterea videbatur ejus responsio in rectitudinem propensior, ut magnates illius castelli blandè in curiâ Regis de seditione convenirentur; si se possent explacitare, illæsi abirent; si nequirent, pecuniâ vel corporum suorum dispendio, Regi cujus pacem infregerant, et Comiti quem læserant, satisfacerent: iniquum videri ut quos tutari debeas, eos ipse potissimum inauditos adjudices.” Here are the words which either tradition put into the mouth of Godwine, or else which a hostile historian deliberately conceived as most in keeping with his character. Who would recognize in this assertor of the purest principles of right the object of the savage invectives of William of Poitiers?
413. Will. Malms. ii. 199. “Ita tunc discessum, Godwino parvi pendente Regis furorem quasi momentaneum.” On these occasional fits of wrath on the part of Eadward, see above, p. 23.
414. The revival of the story about Ælfred and the special part played by Archbishop Robert comes from the Biographer of Eadward. I shall discuss this point in Appendix L.
415. The summoning of the Witan is distinctly set forth in the Peterborough Chronicle; “Ða sende se cyng æftre eallon his witan, and bead heom cuman to Gleaweceastre neh þære æfter Sc̃a Maria mæssan.” The charge against Godwine comes from the Life of Eadward, p. 401; “Ergò perturbato Rege de talibus plus justo, convenerunt de totâ Britanniâ [did any Scottish or Welsh princes appear?] quique potentes et duces Glaucestræ regio palatio, ubique in eo querimoniam talium habente, perlata est in insontem Ducem tanti criminis accusatio.”
416. Richard, the son of Scrob or Scrupe, and son-in-law of Robert the Deacon (Flor. Wig. 1052), appears in Domesday, 186 b. His son Osbern, of whom we shall hear again, appears repeatedly in Domesday as a great landowner in Herefordshire and elsewhere. See 176 b, 180, 186 b, 260.
417. See the entries in the Chronicles, Wig. 1066, Petrib. 1087, 1137. In all these passages the building of castles is reckoned among the chief grievances of the reign of the Conqueror and of the anarchy of the time of Stephen. Compare Giraldus’ description of Ireland, after the invasions in the time of Henry the Second. (Exp. Hib. ii. 34. vol. v. p. 865 Dimock); “Insula Hibernica, de mari usque ad mare, ex toto subacta et incastellata.” Cf. ii. 38, 39.
418. On the different developements of fortification in England, see vol. i. pp. 64, 338. The Norman castle makes the fifth stage.
420. I shall have to speak of this destruction of castles in Normandy when I come to deal with the reign of William in that country. This is the real cause why Normandy contains so few castles earlier than the twelfth century. I can see no reason whatever to believe that the castles of the eleventh century, either in Normandy or in England, were commonly of wood. The temporary wooden towers which were often used in the military art of the time, and which sometimes are called castles, are also sometimes pointedly distinguished from the permanent stone fortresses. Thus in the Angevin Chronicle in Labbé, i. 286, 287, we read how in 1025 Count Odo of Chartres (see vol. i. p. 509, and in the next chapter) besieged the castle which Fulk of Anjou had built as an ἐπιτειχισμός against Tours (contra civitatem Turonicam firmaverat), and “turrem ligneam miræ altitudinis super domgionem ipsius castri erexit.” The donjon itself was surely of stone. We shall find other evidence of the same kind in the next Chapter. Stone was also fast coming into use for domestic as well as for military and ecclesiastical buildings. Avesgaud, Bishop of Le Mans, rebuilt in stone both the episcopal palace and also a hospital; before him they had been of wood—“quæ antea ligneæ fuerat, petrinas ... constituit.” Gest. Ep. Cenom. ap. Mabillon, Vetera Analecta, iii. 300*.
421. The word “castel” evidently appears at this stage to denote some new thing, quite distinct from the familiar “burh” of earlier times. So Orderic (511 C), in speaking of the rarity of castles in England before the Norman Conquest, speaks of the name as something specially French; “Munitiones (quas castella Galli nuncupant) Anglicis provinciis paucissimæ fuerant.” He adds, “ob hoc Angli, licet bellicosi fuerint et audaces, ad resistendum tamen inimicis exstiterant debiliores.”
422. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “þa hæfdon þa Welisce menn gewroht ænne castel on Herefordscire on Swegenes eorles folgoðe, and wrohton ælc þæra harme and bismere þæs cynges mannan þær abutan þe hi mihton.” These Welshmen are undoubtedly Frenchmen (see Earle, p. 345. Lingard, i. 337. Lappenberg, 508); Britons did not build castles, nor were they on such terms of friendly intercourse with King Eadward. William of Malmesbury’s misconception of the whole passage (ii. 199) is amusing; “ut Walenses compescerent qui, tyrannidem in Regem meditantes, oppidum in pago Herefordensi obfirmaverant, ubi tunc Swanus, unus ex filiis Godwini, militiæ prætendebat excubias.” This last is simply a misunderstanding of the words “on Swegenes eorles folgoðe,” which seems merely to mean “within Swegen’s government.”
423. Beverstone appears in Domesday (163) only as an appendage to the royal lordship of Berkeley, and is not mentioned as a possession of Godwine. Otherwise one would have expected to find one of the Earl’s many houses chosen as the place of meeting. But perhaps the suggestion in the text may explain matters.
On the other hand the mysterious connexion between Godwine and Berkeley (see Appendix E) must not be forgotten.
425. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Ða com Godwine eorl and Swegen eorl and Harold eorl togædere æt Byferesstane and manig mann mid heom, to ðon þæt hi woldon faran to heora cyne-hlaforde, and to þam witan eallon þe mid him gegaderode wæron, þæt hi þæs cynges ræd hæfdon, and his fultum, and ealra witena, hu hi mihton þæs cynges bismer awrecan and ealles þeodscipes.”
426. Vita Eadw. 401. “Quod ubi per quosdam fideles comperit [Godwinus], missis legatis, pacem Regis petivit, legem purgandi se de objecto crimine frustrà prætulit.”
427. Chron. Petrib. “Ða wæron þa Wælisce menn ætforan mid þam cynge, and forwregdon þa eorlas þæt hi ne moston cuman on his eagon gesihðe, forðan hi sædon þæt hi woldon cuman þider for þes cynges swicdome.”
428. Vita Eadw. p. 401. “Nam adeo super hujus sceleris fide animum Rex induxerat ut nec verbum aliquod oblatæ purgationis audire posset.”
429. Chron. Wig. 1052. “Ealle gearwe to wige ongean þone cyng, buton man ageafe Eustatsius and his men heom to handsceofe, and eac þa Frencyscan þe on þan castelle wæron.” “The castle” undoubtedly means Richard’s Castle, as it must mean in the entry of the next year in the same Chronicle. The Frenchmen in the castle are distinguished from Eustace and his men. So Lappenberg, 508. Florence (1051) clearly misunderstood the passage when he translated it “insuper et Nortmannos et Bononienses qui castellum in Doruverniæ clivo tenuerant.” It shows the impression which Richard’s Castle had made on men’s mind that it was known generally as “the castle,” and this reference by the Worcester Chronicler to a part of the story which he has not himself given at length is a strong confirmation of the truth of the Peterborough narrative.
430. Rog. Wend. iii. 294. “Juraverunt super majus altare, quod, si Rex leges et libertates jam dictas concedere diffugeret, ipsi ei guerram tamdiu moverent et ab ejus fidelitate se subtraherent.”
431. Flor. Wig. 1051. “Ob id autem ad tempus Rex perterritus, et in angore magno constitutus, quid ageret ignorabat penitus. Sed ubi exercitum Comitum Leofrici, Siwardi, et Radulfi adventare comperit, se nullatenus Eustatium aliosque requisitos traditurum constanter respondit.”
433. Chron. Wig. 1052. “Wurdan þa ealle swa anræde mid þam cynge, þæt hy woldon Godwines fyrde gesecan, gif se cyng þæt wolde.”
434. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “And wæs þam eorle Godwine and his sunan gecydd, þæt se cyng and þa menn þe mid him wæron woldon rædon on hi. And hi trymedon gefæstlice ongean, þæh him lað wære þæt hi ongean heora cyne-hlaford standan sceoldon.”
435. See the splendid panegyric of William of Malmesbury on this region in the Gesta Pontificum (Scriptt. p. Bedam, 161). He especially speaks of the abundance of the vineyards and the excellence of the wine, which was not sour, as seemingly other English wine was, but as good as that of France. No wine is now grown in the vale of Severn, but there is excellent cider and perry.
On the prospect here spoken of see Sydney Smith’s Sketches of Moral Philosophy, p. 218.
437. For descriptions of these two remarkable monuments of primæval times, by Dr. Thurnam and Professor C. C. Babington, see the Archæological Journal, vol. xi. (1854), pp. 315, 328.
438. Childe Harold, ii. 84;
440. Chron. Wig. 1052. “Þæt mycel unræd wære þæt hy togedere comon [see vol. i. p. 435], forþam þær wæs mæst þæt rotoste þæt was on Ænglalande on þam twam gefylcum; and leton þæt hi urum feondum rymdon to lande, and betwyx us sylfum to mycclum forwyrde.”
441. Chron. Petrib. 1048. “Ða gerædden þa witan on ægðer halfe, þæt man ða ælces yfeles geswác, and geaf se cyng godes grið and his fulne freondscipe on ægðre healfe.”
442. See Appendix L.
443. Ib.
444. So I infer from the Peterborough Chronicle, 1048; “Ða cwæð man Swegen eorl útlah, and stefnode man Godwine eorle and Harolde eorle to þon gemote.” The Worcester Chronicle puts it a little later, along with the demand for the hostages.