VI. EDWARD THE ELDER AND DUNSTAN
Settlement of the Danes--Edward the Elder and his Cousin--Reconquest of the Danelagh--Edward becomes King of all England--Conspiracy of Alfred against Athelstan--Wars in Northumbria--The Death of Edwin--The Battle of Brunanburgh--The Power of Athelstan--Edwin's Wars with the Danes--Their Submission to Edmund--Rebellion and Reconquest--The Conquest of Cumberland--Death of Edmund--Final Conquest of Northumberland--The Rise of Dunstan--His Banishment--Edgar's Rebellion--His Accession to the Throne--Wars with the Welsh--Dunstan Archbishop of Canterbury--His Ecclesiastical Policy--The Reign of Edward the Martyr--Dunstan's Struggles with the Opposition--Death of the King.
By this time the settlement of the Danes in England was complete, and exhausting though the process had been by which it was accomplished, in the end it strengthened the nation through the infusion of a new and more vigorous element. Practically speaking, they occupied, as we have seen, the whole of the district north of the Thames, but in some parts the new colonists must have been exceedingly few in numbers. The Danish population lay thickest round what were called the "five Danish boroughs," i.e. Lincoln, Derby, Leicester, Stamford, and Nottingham. After the first storm of their fury was spent, the Danes mixed readily with the English population, and became converts to Christianity. The fusion was easy, because the language and customs of the two races were very similar. The title, Earl, which at this period is introduced into our language, is of Danish origin; so are the local divisions of Yorkshire, known as Ridings and Wapentakes; so also the names of towns ending in "by" and "holm."
Both parties were weary of war--of mutually destroying each other--and a brief repose was welcome. To the new settlers the retreat of their piratical countrymen was as acceptable as to the English; for the hordes who invaded the island with no other object than obtaining plunder cared very little whose possessions they ravaged; and the consequence was that the Danes suffered at times as much as the earlier possessors of the soil.
Alfred was succeeded by his son, Edward the Elder, who had not long obtained possession of the crown before a civil war broke out, which ultimately strengthened the English as a nation. Alfred's elder brother, Ethelred, left two sons, the eldest of whom, Ethelwald, having arrived at man's estate, claimed the throne, on the plea that his grandfather, Ethelwulf, had no right to make a will leaving the succession to his three sons, according to their seniority, to the exclusion of their issue--a claim which in these days would undoubtedly be looked upon as valid, but was worthless when the monarchy was elective. A numerous party supported his pretensions, and Edward was compelled to draw the sword to maintain himself in his inheritance.
Defeated in his first attempt, the pretender fled to the Danes, who received him hospitably, and, seeing the use which such an instrument might be made of in their hands, at once proclaimed him King of Northumbria.
In this crisis Edward proved himself worthy of his illustrious father, and acted with a promptitude and decision which ultimately secured to him his crown. Immediately after the battle of Wimborne, in which he had defeated his rival, he marched against him and his new allies, his army increasing daily. The Danes, unable to resist the overwhelming forces led against them, dismissed the pretender from amongst them, and ceded several strongholds as the price of peace.
In 910 the war between the two races broke out once more, and lasted, with brief intermission, for ten years; when the Danes, finding they were losing ground, sued for peace. Those who inhabited Mercia were the first to submit; the East Anglians followed their example, and the Northumbrians were the last.
Edward was materially assisted in these struggles by his warlike sister Ethelflæd, the widow of the Alderman of Mercia, who, despite her sex, appears to have delighted in arms. Aided by her brother's troops, she attacked the Welsh, who had sided with the Danes, and obliged them to pay tribute to her. Nothing, indeed, is more remarkable in the history of this time than the ease and rapidity with which Edward and his sister reconquered the Danelagh, as the district inhabited by the Danes was called. The reason of this prompt submission was that the two warriors, as we may fairly call them, were not content with merely winning battles, but took care to fortify and garrison the towns that fell into their hands. At the time of her death, in 918, the Lady of the Mercians had reconquered the country as far north as York, and was actually treating for the surrender of that city. She had, moreover, built a strong fortress at Chester, which held down the turbulent Welsh. On her death, however, Edward took the administration of Mercia into his own hands, instead of leaving it to be governed by a separate alderman. This is an important step in the consolidation of the kingdom.
There was something like a general rising in 921, but it was easily suppressed, and soon the various states of England and Scotland submitted in succession. The kings of the Welsh submitted in 922; they were followed by the king of the Scots, by Northumbria and Strathclyde. So Edward became lord of all England. The Danish invasion had indirectly helped towards this end, for by it several of the lines of under-kings had been exterminated. The kings of England from this time forward regarded themselves as emperors, and showed their independence of the Emperor of Germany by assuming the titles of Imperator and Basileus. Edward did not do so as far as we know, probably because he had no time, for in the year which followed his great success he died (925).
Edward was a great man; in statecraft and war certainly his father's equal. He was held in high regard on the Continent; five of his daughters married foreign princes, of whom Otho afterwards became Emperor of Germany. But in learning and in purity of life he compares indifferently with Alfred, and it has been thought that Athelstan, who succeeded him, was illegitimate.
Concerning Athelstan's mother, the chronicler, William of Malmesbury, relates that she was the daughter of a shepherd, and, whilst watching her father's flock, fell asleep in the fields, and had an extraordinary dream. She dreamt that a globe of light, resembling the moon, shone out from her body, and that all England was illuminated by it. This she related to Edward's nurse, who was so struck by it that she adopted her, gave her a good education, and purposely threw her in the way of the king, by whom she had three children.
On the death of Edward, the Mercians and West Saxons chose Athelstan for king, to the secret discontent of many of the nobility and clergy. Concerning this conspiracy, which was headed by a member of the royal house, named Alfred, William of Malmesbury tells a story which, even though we find it repeated several times in old English history, can hardly be accepted as genuine.
Alfred, he says, had even taken private measures to seize Athelstan at Winchester, and put out his eyes. The plot being discovered, he was apprehended by the king's order, but would confess nothing; he obstinately persisted in protesting his innocence, and offered to purge himself by oath in the presence of the Pope, an ordeal looked upon in that age as infallible in discovering the truth, since he who was rash or wicked enough to forswear himself was certain, according to the superstition of the time, to meet with a signal punishment. Athelstan agreed to this, and sent him to Rome, to take the oath before Pope John. Shortly after the arrival of the accused in Rome, word was sent that Alfred, having sworn to his innocence before the Pope, suddenly fell into a fainting fit, which, lasting three days, ended with his life; and that the Pope, convinced by his death that he had committed perjury, had ordered his body to remain in the English college till the king's pleasure should be known; upon which Athelstan, pleased with being thus rid of his enemy, consented he should have Christian burial. His lands were, however, confiscated, and given to Malmesbury monastery, and the king had inserted in the grant an account of the whole conspiracy, "to testify to the world that he dedicated to God what was His own."
The death of Edward, and the troubles which succeeded, affording the Danes, as they imagined, a favourable opportunity to revolt, they had begun to take such measures as obliged Athelstan to march into their country; but as they had not yet drawn their forces together, they were so surprised by the arrival of the king on their frontiers, that, without endeavouring to defend themselves, they returned to their allegiance; and Sithric of Northumberland sued for peace upon whatever terms the king might be pleased to impose. Athelstan being desirous to live in peace with the Danes, in order that he might have time to establish himself on the throne, not only pardoned his revolt, but gave him his sister Edith in marriage, on condition that he would receive baptism.
The dissensions in the north being appeased, he returned to Wessex, where he soon afterwards heard of the death of Sithric, who left two sons, Anlaff and Godfrid, by a former marriage. Athelstan, instead of disbanding his army, instantly retraced his march, and the two princes avoided falling into his hands only by a hasty flight, which gave him an opportunity of making himself master of all Northumbria, except the castle of York, which alone held out against him.
Although he had taken the precaution of placing garrisons in most of the cities, the conqueror was far from feeling himself secure in his new possessions. The sons of Sithric were still at liberty, as well as Reginald, another Danish prince, who had fled with them. It was not known what had become of the latter. Anlaff had fled to Ireland, whilst his brother, Godfrid, had found an asylum with the King of Scotland, Constantine, whom Athelstan immediately summoned to deliver him into his hands. Constantine being perfectly aware that he was not in a position to refuse anything to the victor at the head of a powerful army, promised to deliver the prince into his hands; but whilst he was preparing for his journey, Godfrid made his escape, either through the negligence or connivance of Constantine, who, however, met Athelstan, accompanied by Owen, King of Cumberland. Athelstan admitted Constantine's excuses for the Danish prince's escape, but, if English historians are to be credited, obliged both the kings to do homage for their kingdoms.
Before Athelstan quitted the north, Godfrid made an attempt upon York, by means of the castle, where he had still some friends; but failing in the attempt, he surrendered himself to the King of England, who received him kindly, and allowed him a handsome pension; but in a few days he wearied of that way of life and escaped to sea, where he lived the life of a pirate.
For the next few years Athelstan was occupied in wars against the Welsh, whom he drove back behind the Wye, and caused to pay tribute. The western Welsh also gave him trouble; Athelstan therefore expelled those who inhabited Exeter, and extended the boundaries of his kingdom as far as the Parret.
In 933 Athelstan lost his brother Edwin, who was apparently drowned at sea. William of Malmesbury, however, relates the following story concerning his death:--
One of those fawning flatterers who are the curse of courts persuaded the king that his brother Edwin had connived at the conspiracy of Alfred. This accusation Athelstan unhappily gave ear to, and affected to believe the charge, whether he did or not. The prince was arrested by his unnatural brother, who, fearing to put him to death publicly, had him conveyed on board a vessel without sails or rudder, which he ordered to be let drift away to sea. Edwin, to avoid perishing by hunger, cast himself into the waves, and was drowned.
No sooner was the object of his terror removed for ever, than remorse seized upon the murderer, who, to quiet his conscience, founded the Abbey of Middleton, in Dorsetshire, where masses were daily offered for the repose of the victim's soul, and Athelstan did penance for seven years.
Edwin's accuser had not reason long to rejoice at the success of his malicious calumnies; for one day, as he waited at table with the king's cup, one of his feet slipping, he would have fallen, had he not, by the nimbleness of the other leg, recovered himself. Whereupon he jokingly said, "See how one brother helps another!" which silly jest cost him his life; as Athelstan, who overheard it, and considered it as a covert reproach addressed to himself, ordered him to be immediately executed; and thus, says the old chronicler, revenged his brother's death by that of his false accuser.
The whole story, however, is a mass of contradictions, and is demolished by Professor Freeman, who points out that tales about people being exposed in boats are very numerous; that the story about brother helping brother is related again in the history of Earl Godwin; and, further, that the story evidently belongs to the first years of the reign, whereas we know from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that Edwin died in 933, and that it is improbable that Athelstan would have been doing penance at the time when he was winning his greatest victories.
For in the year 937 Athelstan was engaged in war against a formidable combination, and won immortal renown. The Danes by this time had formed settlements in Ireland as well as England, and we are told that one of their kings, named Anlaff, whom some think to be identical with Anlaff, the son of Sithric, others a different person, arrived from Ireland with many ships, and was joined by Owen of Cumberland, and Constantine, the king of the Scots. According to a late, and not very trustworthy, account of the campaign, it would appear that it was arranged so secretly that Anlaff entered the Humber with a fleet of six hundred sail, and invaded Northumbria before Athelstan had any intelligence of his landing; and with such forces, and the assistance of the Danes settled there, he easily became master of several small ill-guarded towns. But the fortified places that were well garrisoned by the English stopped his progress, and gave Athelstan time to draw his army together. He used such expedition, that he surprised the two confederate princes upon their march towards Bernicia. It had been agreed that this small kingdom, if conquered, should be apportioned to the King of Scotland; but the prompt measures of Athelstan, by surprising the invaders, totally defeated their plans.
This much is certain; that a great battle was fought at Brunanburgh, probably near Beverley in Yorkshire, an account of which is preserved in the famous song of the battle of Brunanburgh, in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. In this battle Athelstan's brother Edmund distinguished himself, and the slaughter was immense.
Of the enemy, five Danish kings, seven earls, and the son of the King of Scots were slain; but Anlaff and Constantine made good their escape. Various stories have gathered round this campaign, in one of which Olaf is represented as going into the English camp in the guise of a minstrel just before the battle, to discover what he could concerning the resources of the enemy, which is evidently a duplicate of the tale told concerning Alfred.
Three years afterwards Athelstan died, after a brief but glorious reign. The marriage connections between his sisters and foreign princes had caused his influence throughout western Europe to be very great; for instance, we find that it was through his influence that Louis d'Outremer, the son of Charles the Simple, was restored to the throne of the Franks. He was also a benefactor of religious foundations, particularly of the abbey of Malmesbury. Further, he was a lawgiver of considerable originality, and added a number of excellent statutes to those of his grandfather. His ordinances are particularly directed to the enforcement of the system of mutual assurance and association, which forms a distinctive feature of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence.
Athelstan was succeeded by his brother, who had covered himself with so much renown at the battle of Brunanburgh.
Edmund was only eighteen years of age when, in A.D. 940, he succeeded to the crown of his brother, whose activity and vigour had secured to England for a few years before his death a profound repose. The Welsh paid their tribute with the utmost regularity; the Danes, who had so frequently experienced his prowess, desired no better than to remain at peace; and the unfortunate Anlaff, who, after the defeat of his hopes, had once more retired to Ireland during the reign of his conqueror, did not renew his attempts.
No sooner was it known, however, that Athelstan was dead, and a mere youth upon the throne, than the Danes prepared to revolt. Several years of fighting followed, but the accounts are so conflicting that it is almost impossible to harmonise them. According to one version, Anlaff, who was informed of all that passed, deemed that the time was come for the prosecution of his claims, and entered into a treaty with Olaf, King of Norway, for assistance, which being liberally granted, he once more appeared in his father's kingdom of Northumbria, and obtained possession of York, the inhabitants opening the gates to him.
This example being followed by most of the neighbouring towns, the long-exiled prince soon found himself in a position to carry the war into Mercia, where his countrymen received him as a deliverer, and by their united efforts many strong places were recovered which Edward had taken from them.
Edmund, though both young and inexperienced, appears to have inherited the courage of his race. The success of the enemy, instead of depressing him, rendered him more eager for battle; he marched at once to the north, and Anlaff, with equal confidence, advanced to meet him.
A battle was fought between these rival princes near Chester, in which success was so equally balanced, that it was impossible to say on which side it preponderated. Then, according to the chronicler Simeon, the Archbishops of York and Canterbury, to avoid any further effusion of blood, prevailed upon the parties to make peace. Anlaff was permitted to retain possession of the kingdom of Northumbria, and the whole country north of Watling Street.
The Northumbrians had not reason long to rejoice at the restoration of Anlaff, which they had so ardently desired; for this prince, having contracted a large debt with the King of Norway for the troops he had lent him, was anxious to pay it; and to this end laid heavy taxes on the people, by which he forfeited their affection. The inhabitants of the ancient kingdom of Deira were the first that revolted, and having sent for Reginald, his brother Godfrid's son, crowned him king at York.
Reginald was no sooner on the throne, than he armed against his uncle, who was also preparing to dispossess him. The quarrel between these two kings incited Edmund to march towards the north at the head of an army, to appease the troubles there, being apprehensive they might give occasion to the foreign Danes to return into England. He arrived upon the borders of Northumbria, when the uncle and nephew, wholly intent upon their private quarrel, thought of nothing less than repulsing the English. He probably might with ease have made himself master of that kingdom; but he was contented with procuring peace between the two kings, in such a manner that Reginald was to keep the crown he had lately received; but at the same time, Edmund obliged them both to swear allegiance to him, and be baptised, himself standing godfather.
This forced peace did not last long, and Edmund had hardly returned into Wessex, when the two Danish princes took up arms to free themselves from his yoke, having engaged the Mercian Danes and the King of Cumberland to espouse their quarrel. Whereupon Edmund immediately marched into Mercia, and before the Danes there could be joined by the Northumbrians, took from them the five boroughs, i.e. Leicester, Stamford, Derby, Nottingham, and Lincoln; and then, advancing with the same expedition towards Northumbria, he surprised the two kings before they had drawn their forces together. This sudden attack threw the Northumbrians into such disorder, that their rulers, fearing to fall into the hands of Edmund, believed it their only refuge to abandon the island, where they could not possibly remain in safety, so closely were they pursued; and as their flight deprived the Danes of all hope of withstanding Edmund, they threw down their arms, and gave him allegiance. According to other accounts, the attack upon the Mercian Danes is placed earlier in the reign.
Before he returned to Wessex, Edmund resolved to punish the King of Cumberland, who, without cause, had taken part with the Danes; and he easily subdued that petty kingdom, whose forces bore no proportion to his own, and presented it to the King of Scotland, in order to attach him to his interest, and prevent him from again assisting the Northumbrians; reserving, however, the sovereignty of it, and obliging that king to do him homage, and appear at the court of England at the time of the solemn festivals, if summoned.
Edmund was not wholly employed in military affairs; and some of his laws still exist which demonstrate how desirous he was of the people's welfare and happiness. Having observed that pecuniary punishments were not sufficient to put a stop to robberies, which were generally committed by people who had nothing to lose, he ordered that, in gangs of robbers, the oldest of them should be condemned to be hanged.
Probably this prince would have rendered his people happy, had his reign been longer; but a fatal accident robbed him of his life. On May 26th, 946, as he was solemnising a festival at Pucklechurch, in Gloucestershire, Liofa, a notorious robber, though banished the kingdom for his crimes, had the effrontery to enter and seat himself at one of the tables in the hall where the king was at dinner. Edmund, enraged at his insolence, commanded him to be apprehended; but perceiving he was drawing his dagger to defend himself, leaped up in fury, and, catching hold of him by the hair, threw him on the ground. Liofa stabbed him in the breast with his dagger, and the King immediately expired upon the body of his murderer. Thus died Edmund in 946, in the twenty-fourth year of his age, and the sixth of his reign. By Elgiva, his wife, he had two sons, Edwy and Edgar, who did not succeed him, on account of their minority; Edred, his brother, being placed on the throne by the unanimous election of the Witena-gemot. His glorious deeds had deservedly gained for Edmund the title of "Magnificent."
Edred was a mere youth when he succeeded to the crown, a circumstance which the Northumbrians were not slow to take advantage of, and instantly attempted to throw off their allegiance; but after a variety of contests they were ultimately subdued, and Earl Oswulf appointed to govern them. The last-mentioned personage, who was an Englishman, appears to have acted with no less vigour than prudence, erecting many strongholds, and placing efficient garrisons within them, to keep the natives of the newly-conquered province in subjection. These methods were so efficacious that Northumbria remained, for a long time tranquil, and the descendants of Oswulf were earls there for quite a hundred years.
The young king, perfectly master of his own kingdom, and respected by the Scots, had now time to direct his attention to religious affairs, and during his brief reign contributed largely to churches and monasteries. To this course of action he was led by the powerful influence of Dunstan, one of the most remarkable personages in old English history, and the first of those great ecclesiastical statesmen who have played a leading part in the annals of Britain.
Dunstan was born in the year 925, and being of aristocratic family, rapidly obtained advancement in the Church. By the age of eighteen he had become abbot of Glastonbury, and from the first proved an extremely able administrator, restoring the discipline of the monastery, and rebuilding the great church. His personal character appears to have been morbid and eccentric, but the stories told concerning him come for the most part from his enemies, and it is extremely difficult to know what to make of them. He had been an old playmate of Edred's, and the weak and sickly king was entirely in his hands. Dunstan by no means confined his activity to ecclesiastical matters, but took an active part in the war against the Northumbrian Danes. It was probably on his advice that the country was bestowed as an earldom on Oswulf. His object here, as elsewhere, was to allow the smaller kingdoms to maintain their individuality, their own laws and customs, subject to the leadership of Wessex. Such a policy was naturally not popular in Wessex, and when Edred, "the Chosen," as he was called, died in 955, Dunstan was doomed to a period of eclipse.
In 955 the Witena-gemot chose Edwy, the son of Edmund, for their king, and within a short while Dunstan was banished from the kingdom. As to the facts of his fall very little is accurately known; indeed, the annals of the time are so completely under the influence of party spirit, that it is impossible to make out what is true and what is false. The partisans of Dunstan represent Edwy as being exceedingly depraved. About the time of his election he married Ælfgifu, or Elgiva, as the Latin form of the name was written. It appears that she was within the degrees prohibited by the church of Rome, and Dunstan's party not only tried to prevent the marriage, but afterwards spoke of the queen as if she were Edwy's mistress. According to a well-known story, Edwy on the day of his coronation retired from the feast at which all the notabilities of the realm were present to enjoy the society of his bride. Dunstan, angry at what he considered a slight upon the company, rushed into the apartment and dragged the king from her. Such conduct is quite possible in the case of an overbearing man like the abbot, and fully explains any dislike that the king and queen may have entertained towards him. His fall took place about 956; and, as far as we can gather, it was effected through his enemies at Glastonbury, who were angry at the zeal with which he pushed his reforms.
Edwy's triumph was, however, exceedingly brief. In the year 957 all England north of the Thames rebelled against him, and chose Edgar, his brother, to be their king. Dunstan, who probably was by no means unacquainted with what was going on, was immediately recalled, and in a very short space of time made Bishop of Rochester and of London. In the following year the Archbishop of Canterbury compelled Edwy to put away his wife, and in 959 Edwy died. There is a story that the unhappy Ælfgifu was branded on the forehead, and banished to Ireland; from which place of exile when she ventured to return, she was seized by her priestly persecutor and hamstrung, of which outrage she died at Gloucester. This repellent tale, however, rests on indifferent authority, and can be at once rejected.
Edwy dying without issue, his brother Edgar was elected as his successor, and thus united the two kingdoms once more. He was known as the "Peaceable," and the kingdom enjoyed under him a tranquillity to which it had long been unaccustomed. Acting with wise foresight he kept up a large fleet, so that the Danes were not able to land, and we read that he punished malefactors with great severity.
His chief war was with the Welsh, who refused to pay tribute, and it was completely successful. William of Malmesbury tells us that Edgar, in order to free the country from the wolves which infested it, commuted the tribute of the Welsh into three hundred wolves' heads, and granted a pardon to criminals on condition that each one within a given time brought in a certain number. In three years, he continues, the tribute was remitted because no more wolves were to be found; a statement which it is impossible to believe, as wolves were plentiful in England and Wales for many a year afterwards. He also broke up Northumberland into the old divisions of Bernicia and Deira, and granted Lothian to Kenneth, King of the Scots, to be held by him in homage. It was after this that the Scottish kings came to live in the south of their kingdom, and made Edinburgh its capital.
For some reason Edgar was not crowned until he had reigned thirteen years. Shortly after the ceremony he visited Chester, and it is said--though the incident is possibly of a legendary character--that he was rowed on the Dee from the city to the minster of St. John by his eight vassal kings, Kenneth of Scotland, Malcolm of Cumberland, Maccus of the Isles, and five Welsh princes.
Edgar continued to give Dunstan fresh marks of esteem, and his regard for him was strengthened by the miracles attributed to him. After the death of Athelm, who held the see of Canterbury, Odo, by birth a Dane, was made archbishop; and to him succeeded Elfsige, who died as he was going to Rome for his pall, in the beginning of Edgar's reign. Brithelm, Bishop of Bath, was elected to the vacant see; but Edgar, being desirous of making Dunstan archbishop, called a general council, where he represented Brithelm as unqualified for so great a station; whereupon he was ordered to return to his old diocese, and Dunstan was chosen in his place. This election not being perfectly canonical, it was deemed necessary that Dunstan should go to Rome, on pretence of receiving his pall, and at the same time justify these proceedings. The Pope, who was perfectly aware how extensive the influence of Dunstan was at the court of England, and who was gratified by the zeal with which he had espoused the interest of the Church of Rome and of the monks, readily confirmed his election, constituting him at the same time his legate in England, with most extensive powers.
In justification of this remarkable man's favourite project of removing the secular clergy from their benefices and supplying their places by the monks, it is enough to say that the former, as a body, had become fearfully corrupt; that luxury, gluttony, avarice, and lust reigned amongst them. Dunstan caused a council of the Church to be held, at which Edgar assisted in person, and made a remarkable oration, which is both curious and interesting as a picture of the corruptions of the clergy of the time, and his subserviency to the views of Dunstan. This harangue, which was most probably written by Dunstan himself, had the desired effect. The three bishops, Dunstan, Ethelwald of Winchester, and Oswald of York, expelled the secular priests, and gave their benefices to the monks, the objects of the king's and archbishop's favour. In many cases, however, expulsion was unnecessary, so depopulated were all the livings through the Danish massacres; and though the celibacy of the clergy which Dunstan enforced was not altogether a step in the right direction, there can be no doubt that the times called for drastic remedies. Nor was the restoration of monasticism the only reform that Dunstan had at heart. "He was," says Bishop Stubbs, "the prime minister, perhaps the inspirer of the consolidating policy of Edgar; he restored through the monastic revival the intercourse between the English church and that of France, and established a more intimate communication with the Apostolic See; in so doing he did what could be done to restore piety and learning. Under his influence the Mercian bishoprics again lift up their heads: the archbishops henceforth go to Rome for their palls: the Frank writers begin to record the lives of the English saints."
The monks were bound in gratitude to make a suitable return for the service Edgar had done them; and, accordingly, their historians have endeavoured, by their excessive commendations, to make him pass for a real saint. But whether from want of attention, or some other reason, they have related some particulars of his life which certainly do not tend to sustain that idea of him. If, indeed, his political actions are only considered, it must be confessed he was a great prince; but a great king and a great saint are two very different characters.
Edgar died in 975, in the thirty-second year of his age. He was afterwards canonised, and miracles are said to have been worked at his shrine.
He left two sons and a daughter. The eldest son, Edward, was the son of Elfleda, surnamed "The Fair," and he was supported by Dunstan; his opponent, who had a large following, was his half-brother Ethelred, the son of Edgar's second wife, Elfrida. The Archbishop, however, in the Witena-gemot promptly and bravely took Edward by the hand, led him towards the church, attended by the other bishops and a crowd of people, and anointed the young prince king, without regarding the opposition of the party against him. The nobles deplored their falling once more under the government of that imperious prelate; but, seeing the people ready to support him, they were compelled to submit.
Edward was but fourteen years old when he began to reign under the guardianship of Dunstan, who immediately took all the power into his hands; and, as soon as he was fixed in the regency, exerted every possible means to maintain the monks in possession of the benefices they had acquired in the last reign, and made use of the king's authority to that end. But he met with more opposition than he contemplated, for as the king was but a minor, the orders given in his name were not so readily complied with. Dunstan assembled several councils about this affair; but most probably all his endeavours would have proved ineffectual, if, by means of several miracles, which were never wanting when requisite, he had not brought the people to believe that Heaven interposed on his behalf.
In one of these councils held at Winchester, the majority being against the monks, they would have infallibly lost their cause, if, on a sudden, a crucifix that hung aloft in the room had not pronounced these words with an audible voice: "It shall not be done; it shall not be done. You have decided the matter well hitherto, and would be to blame to change." Astonished at this oracle, the most obstinate immediately voted for the monks. It is likely that this trick was accomplished by a skilled ventriloquist.
The dispute between the regular and secular clergy gave rise to keen contentions in the kingdom, many of the nobility bitterly resenting the induction of the monks into the benefices. At last a synod was called at Calne, at which Archbishop Dunstan presided. The assembly had not long been met before the floor of the apartment gave way--the only portion which remained intact being the beams which supported the chair of the primate, whose preservation was regarded as a miracle by the common people and the party who acted with him. After such a manifestation of the divine will, for such it was considered, all further opposition ceased; the principal opponents of the measure having perished. A shrewd suspicion has been entertained that Dunstan knew beforehand what was about to occur, even if he had not secretly prepared the catastrophe, seeing that he had warned the king not to be present at the meeting.
The most remarkable circumstance attending Edward was his death, which took place on the 18th of March, 978, after a reign of three years. He had been hunting in the neighbourhood of Corfe Castle, the residence of his step-mother Elfrida, and resolved to pay her a visit. The queen hastened to receive him, and pressed him earnestly to alight; this the prince, who most probably had good reasons to suspect her feelings towards him, declined, observing that he had merely time to accept a draught of wine. In the act of drinking it, he was stabbed in the back by an assassin whom Elfrida had bribed to commit the crime which was to elevate her son Ethelred to the throne.
Finding himself wounded, the youthful monarch set spurs to his horse and fled; but, fainting from loss of blood, fell, and perished miserably. The parties sent after him by the murderess easily traced the route he had taken by the track of blood. The body was brought back to Corfe Castle and thrown into a well, where it was afterwards found, and removed first to Wareham and afterwards to Shaftesbury, where it was interred in a church founded by King Alfred.
Shortly after his death the monks spread the report that miracles were worked at his tomb; the blind were said to have received their sight, the lame to have recovered the use of their limbs. Elfrida, to atone for her crime, founded two convents, to one of which, at Andover, she retired, and passed the rest of her days in penitence. Edward was canonised by the Roman Church, and is generally known as St. Edward the Martyr.
VII. ETHELRED THE UNREADY
The Retirement of Dunstan--Character of Ethelred--Sweyn in Denmark--Character of the Invasions and the Resistance--The Danegeld--The Arrival of Sweyn--Ethelred's Expedition--The Massacre of St. Brice's Day--Return of Sweyn--Defeats of the English--Edric Streona--Failure of the English Fleet--Treacheries of Edric--Death of St. Alphege--Sweyn's Conquest of England and his Death--Return of Ethelred and Departure of Canute--Misgovernment of the King--Canute's Return and the Death of Ethelred.
On the death of Edward, his half-brother Ethelred was elected by the Witena-gemot, much to the dislike of Dunstan, who, it is said, foretold how disastrous the new reign would be. And now the great prelate's active career came to an end. His enemies had of late years been rapidly growing in strength, and it only needed the accession of a king who was unfriendly towards him to cause him to retire to his diocese. There he spent the remainder of his life (he died in 988), occupying his time in administering its affairs, and in cultivating literature and art. Faults he may have had of disposition and temper; but a careful investigation of the facts of his life would appear to prove that, although he made mistakes more than once, his career as a whole was eminent for statesmanship, and resulted in benefit to his country.
Bereft of his guiding hand, the kingdom was soon in a miserable plight. Even Dunstan would have found it difficult to keep the ship from sinking, and Ethelred was utterly unfit for such a task. His character shows no redeeming features; he was weak, cowardly, and revengeful; whenever he made an effort it was too late or in the wrong direction. He surrounded himself with foreign favourites on whose advice he trusted, and sought to oppose the Danish invaders, not by organising armies, but by marriage alliances and diplomacy.
The third period of the Danish invasions begins in this reign; when the Danes proceed to conquer England for their own. The reason why the old enemy now became particularly formidable is to be sought in the changes which were taking place in the north of Europe. There Denmark had become a formidable monarchy in close alliance with Norway and Sweden. For the first ten years of Ethelred's reign, however, it was not in a position to become aggressive, owing to the struggle that was going on between Harold Bluetooth and his son Sweyn. This terminated in the triumph of the latter, who drove out his father and re-established idolatry throughout the land. Having made himself supreme in Denmark, Sweyn determined to add England to his dominions.
It was owing to the fact that Denmark was divided by a struggle for the throne, that for the first ten years of the reign the descents upon England were of an intermittent character; nevertheless, they were extremely harassing, seeing that the English had not only an enormous extent of coast to guard, but never knew the exact spot at which their enemies would land.
Frequently when their army was in one part of the kingdom the invaders would debark at another, and before it could march to the place threatened, the barbarians would collect their booty and retire to their ships. The only efficient remedy for these misfortunes would have been to equip a powerful fleet, so as to have encountered the Danes at sea; but the youth and inexperience of the king prevented such a step, and the island was exposed, in consequence, to outrage, murder, and pillage.
Ethelred's efforts to stop these raids seem to have been inadequate, and he made matters worse by quarrelling with his great men. He had some dispute with the Bishop of Rochester, and proceeded to ravage his lands, oblivious of the fact that a disunited realm would fall an easy prey to a determined invader. All the English, however, were not equally unpatriotic; for when, in 991, the Danes, headed by two brothers, Justin and Guthmund, with whom was Olaf, the king of the Norwegians, invaded the country and plundered Ipswich, and then went into Essex, they were met at Maldon by Byrhtnoth, the alderman of the East Saxons. In the battle which followed, the alderman was slain, after a very brave resistance, and a fine old-English song was written about the fight, the greater part of which is still extant.
In spite of this bold, spirited conduct on the part of the English hosts, which showed that the nation had plenty of valour left in it, Ethelred began in this year the craven and short-sighted practice of buying off the Danes. For this purpose a tax, called the Danegeld, was levied, probably on cultivated lands, and was continued on one pretext or another long after the occasion for it had passed away. The first bribe paid to the Danes amounted to ten thousand pounds, and it obviously acted only as a further incentive to the rapacious hordes.
Gradually the hopes of the English grew very faint indeed, and we begin to hear of treachery and of battles converted into defeats by desertions to the enemy. At last, in 994, Sweyn himself appeared, accompanied by Olaf of Norway. The two kings, with a powerful fleet, sailed up the Thames, with the intention of making themselves masters of London. The courageous resistance of the inhabitants, however, obliged them to retire without obtaining possession of the city.
Determined not to be disappointed in the chief object of their expedition, which was plunder, the two Danish kings directed their troops into the interior of the island, levying contributions in Kent, Sussex, and Hampshire. The sufferings of the inhabitants became intolerable.
Ethelred once more had recourse to money, and promised the enemy a large sum, on condition that they ceased their cruelties and quitted the kingdom: the offer was accepted. The weak, cowardly monarch afterwards received the King of Norway as a friend and ally. Olaf quitted the country after taking an oath, which he kept, never to come back any more.
His colleague, Sweyn, had formed far different projects. When he returned home, he left his fleet at Southampton to keep the English in awe; and also to receive the payment of the money promised. No sooner had he taken his departure than his admiral became impatient for the tribute.
So matters went on until the year 1000, the Danes making descents upon all parts of the coast, and defeating such bodies of Englishmen as ventured in the field against them. Ethelred meanwhile did nothing to help his unfortunate subjects. He even allowed his forces to harry and oppress them. And as if the Danes were not enough to occupy him, he actually made an abortive expedition against the King of Cumberland, because he refused to pay the Danegeld, and even sent a fleet to harry the lands of Richard the Good of Normandy because he received Danish ships in his ports. The English were driven away ignominiously, and Ethelred shortly afterwards made peace with Richard, and in 1002 married his sister Emma, called the Pearl of Normandy on account of her beauty.
In 1001 the Danes invaded Devonshire, but were driven off from Exeter, and defeated at Pinhoe; nevertheless, they gained much booty, and ravaged the southern coast until they were bought off once more with a large sum of money. Suddenly Ethelred bethought himself of a device by which he might, at one blow, rid himself of a great portion of his opponents. As might be expected of a weak prince, his project was a cruel one, being neither more nor less than the massacre of all the Danes who had remained behind in England. To carry out this barbarous as well as useless policy, a vast conspiracy was entered into; and on the 13th of November, St. Brice's day, 1002, all the invaders were put to death, with circumstances of the most shocking barbarity.
The sister of Sweyn was not spared. Her name was Gunilda, and she is said to have been married to a noble Dane settled in England, named Pallig. Being a Christian, she had exerted all her influence with her brother to bring about the peace. Her children were first murdered in her presence, and their unhappy mother was afterwards slain.
Sweyn received the news of this massacre from some Danes, who succeeded in getting on board a vessel ready to sail for Denmark. Their relation of the cruelties of the English to those of his nation would have been sufficient to arouse him; but when informed of his sister's barbarous murder, he was seized with all the rage that such a crime was likely to excite in a vindictive nature. He solemnly swore he would never rest till he had revenged the atrocious outrage. It was not, therefore, with intent to plunder that he made a second expedition into England, but to destroy the whole country with fire and sword. However, as he did not doubt that Ethelred would take precautions to oppose his entrance, he would not sail without securing a place where he might safely land his troops. Exeter was then governed by a Norman, Hugh, placed in that important trust by the influence of the queen, in full confidence that, as her countryman, her husband might rely on his devotion and fidelity.
To this man Sweyn secretly despatched an emissary, with the offer of a great reward, provided he would assist him in his enterprise. The traitor yielded to the temptation, and allowed not only the fleet of the invader to enter his ports, but the Danes to land without offering the least opposition.
After debarking his forces, Sweyn marched them to Exeter, and as the first-fruits of his vengeance not only massacred the inhabitants, but after plundering the city broke down its wall. Wherever the furious monarch led his army the same cruelties were repeated; submission was useless, for he knew not the meaning of the word "mercy."
He then appeared in Wiltshire, where the people were prepared to meet him. But they had a traitor in command, who pretended to be ill, and so the English levies dispersed. Sweyn, therefore, burnt some of the chief towns, and then sailed homewards for the winter.
Early the next year, however, he returned, landing, it is supposed, at Yarmouth, and took the city of Norwich, which he burned to the ground. Ulfcytel, the alderman of the East Angles, gave him an immense sum of money to induce him to spare that part of the country from any further ravages. Regardless of his promises, the invader had no sooner received the tribute than he attacked Thetford, and destroyed it; which breach of faith so incensed Ulfcytel, that he collected as many troops as possible, and posted himself between the invaders and the fleet, in the hope of cutting them off. The Danish king marched back to give him battle, and the English were beaten, after a severe contest. The Danes were afterwards driven from England by famine.
At the termination of the scarcity, another expedition of the enemy landed at Sandwich, in Kent, and Ethelred levied an army to oppose them; on hearing which, the Danes retreated to the Isle of Thanet, well knowing that the English, who served at their own expense, would soon disperse. The event proved that their calculation was a just one; tired of waiting for an enemy who refused to come from their stronghold, the soldiers of Ethelred quickly melted away, and the unlucky king procured a peace only upon the payment of £36,000.
Ethelred, on their departure, gave one of his daughters in marriage to Edric, surnamed Streona (the gainer), the instigator of the massacre of St. Brice's Day, whom he had lately created Alderman of Mercia; but his new son-in-law, instead of assisting him, as he had a right to expect, leagued with the Danes, and betrayed the kingdom on every occasion. The year after the treaty, the Danish king demanded a similar sum of £36,000, pretending that it was a yearly tribute which the English had agreed to pay. Ethelred, by the advice of his council, employed the money in fitting out a powerful fleet, the command of which was given to Brihric, the brother of the new Alderman of Mercia. This measure obliged the enemy to retire.
Brihric was no sooner in command than he used his authority to ruin Wulfnoth, a noble who was his enemy, and began to accuse him of crimes to the king, who lent but too willing an ear to his rival. Finding his ruin determined upon, Wulfnoth persuaded nine of the captains of the fleet to put to sea with him, which they did, plundering the English coasts and committing fearful ravages. The admiral, incensed at his escape, set out with eighty ships to give him chase; but a terrible storm arising, he lost a great part of them, and the rest fell into the hands of Wulfnoth. Thus was the fleet which should have been the safeguard of the kingdom lost and destroyed.
Taking advantage of this state of affairs, the Danes, who had their spies both in the court and country of England, prepared another expedition. Two fleets arrived in the kingdom--one in East Anglia, under Thurkill; and the second in the Isle of Thanet, commanded by two leaders, Heming and Eglaf. They attacked the city of Canterbury, and would, doubtless, have destroyed it, had not the inhabitants ransomed it at an enormous sum.
Whilst the Danes were pillaging Kent, Ethelred drew an army together to oppose their ravages; and as soon as he was ready, he posted himself between them and their ships to prevent them from embarking and carrying off their booty. Probably he might have executed his project, and gained much advantage, considering the superiority of his forces, if Edric had not found means to relieve the Danes. The traitor, perceiving their danger, represented to the king, his father-in-law, that it would be more prudent to let them retire, than hazard a battle, which might prove fatal to him; and this pernicious advice made such impression on the weak-minded monarch, that he suffered the Danes to depart with all their plunder, unmolested. But instead of sailing for Denmark, as it was expected, they threw themselves into the Isle of Thanet; from which, during the whole winter, they made incursions into the neighbouring counties, and even made several attempts upon London; in which, however, they were always repulsed. During this period, Ulfcytel of East Anglia, willing once more to try the fortune of a battle in the defence of his territory, had the misfortune to be overthrown.
Hitherto the Danes had wanted cavalry, on account of the difficulty of transporting horses from Denmark; but as soon as they were in possession of East Anglia, which abounded with horses, they mounted part of their troops, and by that means extended their conquests. Shortly after, they subdued Essex, Middlesex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Northamptonshire, Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire, Wiltshire, and Devonshire, whilst Ethelred, who had scarce anything left, kept himself shut up in London, not daring to take the field and stop their progress. In all the above-named counties, London and Canterbury were the only places in the king's power. But at length the last was attacked so vigorously that it was captured, plundered, and reduced to ashes; and Alphege, the archbishop, being taken prisoner, was afterwards murdered by these barbarians at Greenwich, to which place, the station of their ships, they had brought him.
In the old church of Greenwich, on the top of the partition wall between the nave and the chancel, was formerly the following inscription: "This church was erected and dedicated to the glory of God, and the memory of St. Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, here slain by the Danes, because he would not ransom his life by an unreasonable sum of money, An. 1012." He was first buried at St. Paul's in London, and afterwards removed to Canterbury. He was honoured as a martyr, and stands in the Roman Martyrology on the 19th of April. The money, £8,000, being paid, the greater part of the Danish fleet dispersed.
In 1013, however, Sweyn returned, and proceeded to conquer the whole of England. He began from the north-east, and soon the Danish settlements had submitted to him, and their example was followed by all the English to the north of Watling Street. Mercia was forced to yield after it had been cruelly ravaged, and then the Danish warrior took Oxford and Winchester, the chief towns of the old kingdom of Wessex. Leaving his son Canute with the fleet, he on a sudden laid siege to London, where Ethelred was shut up. Though he was but ill provided with necessaries to besiege in form a place of such importance, he imagined the citizens would be terrified at his menaces; but finding they were not moved by them he desisted from his enterprise, and passed on and ravaged the western parts of Wessex, where he found no opposition to his arms. However, as he could not be satisfied whilst London was out of his power, he resolved to besiege it once more; but whilst he was preparing for the siege with greater precaution than before, he had information of Ethelred's departure from thence. This worthless prince, ever dreading to fall into the hands of an enemy he had so cruelly injured, and perceiving himself unsafe in England, retired into Normandy with all his family, upon which the Londoners resolved to submit to the King of Denmark, to whom all the rest of the kingdom was now subject; and now Sweyn was looked upon as King of England without any opposition, no one in the kingdom daring to dispute his title.
It does not appear that Sweyn was ever crowned. His first act of sovereignty was to levy a heavy tax to pay his Danish troops, by whose assistance he had conquered England. But at any rate his reign was exceedingly brief, for he died in 1014. Some writers say that he was poisoned, others that he died of a cold, while a third set declare that he was killed by the apparition of St. Edmund, formerly King of East Anglia, armed with a lance, in order to save the town and monastery in which his canonised bones lay from being plundered by the invaders. This is only a legendary version of what was probably a fact, that shortly before his death Sweyn had contemplated an attack on the town of Bury St. Edmunds.
On the death of Sweyn, Canute, his son, was proclaimed king; but their common danger had given something like energy and combination to the councils of the English. They recalled Ethelred from his exile in Normandy, and pledged themselves to support him on the throne against the Danes, whose government was arbitrary, cruel, and oppressive.
Ethelred at first was unwilling to trust to their promises, being apprehensive of a design to deliver him into the hands of his enemies; but being encouraged by the reception met with by his son, whom he had sent before to sound the people's inclinations, he returned to England, and was welcomed with every demonstration of joy; and his subjects swore allegiance to him again, as if he had begun a new reign, his flight being considered as a sort of abdication of the crown. He, on his part, promised to reform whatever was amiss; and the eagerness of the English to throw off a foreign yoke, made them flock to the king with such zeal and haste that he soon found himself at the head of a powerful army. His first expedition plainly showed his misfortunes had made no alteration in him; for instead of marching against the Danes, he employed his forces to be revenged on the men of Lindsey--one of the three divisions of Lincolnshire; the other two being named Holland and Kesteven. The inhabitants of the first-named division, it appeared, had provided the Danes with horses, and had also offered to join them. After Ethelred had punished these traitors, he prepared to march and fight the enemy, who little expected so sudden a revolution. Although Canute was undoubtedly a great prince, and had the same forces his father Sweyn had conquered England with, he did not think fit to hazard a battle; but, on the contrary, before Ethelred was advanced near enough to oblige him to fight, he led his troops to the sea-side, and embarking them, set sail for Denmark. Before his departure, he ordered the hands, noses, and ears of the hostages he had in his power to be cut off, leaving them thus mangled on the shore.
As soon as Ethelred found himself freed from the Danes, he took no heed of his promise to his subjects, but on the contrary resumed his old maxims, and imposed, on various pretences, excessive taxes, which raised much murmuring among the nobles and people. To these causes for public discontent he added others of a more private nature, which destroyed all the hopes entertained of his amendment. Morkar and Sifforth, the chief men of the five Danish boroughs, were sacrificed to his avarice. To draw these two earls into his power, the king convened the Witena-gemot at Oxford, where he caused them to be murdered, and then seized their estates, as if they had been condemned by the common forms of justice. Algitha, widow of Sifforth, was shut up in a monastery, to which circumstance she was indebted for her later good fortune; for Edmund, the king's eldest son, passing that way some time after, was desirous to see one so renowned for her beauty, and fell so desperately in love with her, that he married her even against his father's consent.
The calm enjoyed by England lasted only a year, for in 1015 Canute came again. Edward being sick, his brave son Edmund, called Ironside for his deeds of valour, and Edric Streona were sent against the enemy with two armies gathered from the north and south of England. Edric, however, true to his previous villainies, first attempted to murder the gallant youth, and then went over to Canute with a considerable body of troops and forty ships of war. Edmund retired northward, leaving Canute in possession of Wessex.
The next year was the last of this disastrous reign. There was much resultless fighting in which Ethelred refused to support his son, because there were traitors in the English camp. Gradually the area of war moved northwards, and Canute entered York, placing his own earl, Eric the Dane, over the Northumbrians. (We find that the Danish title of earl now begins to supplant that of alderman, which had been used by the English for the military governor of a shire.) Edmund thereupon gave up the useless struggle, and joined his father in London. He had not long been there when the king died, in 1016, at the early age of forty-eight, having done all that a false and incapable man could, during the reign, to bring the nation to ruin.
VIII. EDMUND IRONSIDE AND CANUTE
A Double Election--Battles of Pen Selwood and Sherstone--Treacheries of Edric--Division of the Kingdom--Death of Edmund--Election of Canute--His Treatment of his Rivals--The Four Earldoms--Canute's Marriage with Emma--His Popular Government--His Expeditions to Northern Europe--Submission of the King of Scots--Canute at Rome--The Story of his Rebuke to his Courtiers--His Death.
Immediately on the death of Ethelred, his son Edmund, who had given so many proofs of courage and devotion to this unhappy country, was elected king by the citizens of London. But most of the chief men of the kingdom, weary of the war, elected Canute, and joined him at Southampton, where they swore allegiance to him. Thus there were two kings in England, and of the two Edmund had a great advantage in being the holder of London.
This city the Danish monarch felt it necessary to possess; and in the absence of the new king, who was gathering troops in Wessex, he laid siege to it with a very considerable force; but the citizens defended themselves so well, that Canute broke up the siege and went back into Wessex in search of Edmund.
Both parties were impatient to decide their claims by battle. The armies met at Pen Selwood, where the English gained a victory. After which a second battle took place at Sherstone, in Wiltshire, and so obstinately was it contested that neither side could claim the victory, although the English, it is recorded, were nearly being defeated by the cunning of Edric Streona, who fought on the side of the Danes. Perceiving that the English troops fought with such desperate courage, he cut off the head of Osmer, a soldier who so resembled Edmund that he might easily have been mistaken for him. Placing the bleeding head upon his lance, he advanced with it to the front of the English army, and exclaimed, "Fly, English, fly! Edmund is dead." This stratagem had nearly succeeded; the soldiers of Edmund began to waver, on seeing which the king threw aside his helmet and rode bareheaded through the ranks, when he was received with cheers of delight.
The battle lasted till night, without any decisive advantage on either side. In the morning Edmund intended to renew the battle, but Canute, who had other intentions, retired to his ships and set sail, hastily landed his forces, and besieged London a second time with no better success than the first.
As soon as Edric saw that Canute's fortunes were on the decline, he changed sides again, and Edmund, yielding to the extraordinary influence which this villain appears to have possessed, admitted him into his confidence. He soon had to rue his folly, for after winning three battles against the Danes, and freeing London of their presence, Edmund would have utterly overthrown them at Otford had not the advice of Edric dissuaded him from continuing the pursuit. His pretext was that, if hardly pressed, despair might cause them to rally, and convert defeat into victory. Perhaps his idea was to weary out both sides, and so establish himself upon the ruins of their power.
A fifth battle was accordingly fought at Ashdon, in Essex, and here Edric once more acted the part of a traitor, for perceiving that the Danes were being put to flight, he drew off his men, and Canute finally won a crushing victory, slaying many of the chief men on the side of the English. It is hard to believe that his conduct on this occasion can have been as openly base as the chroniclers represent it, for we find that he is still trusted by the king, who, undaunted by his previous disasters, prepared to renew the conflict yet a sixth time. The two armies, therefore, confronted one another yet again, but no battle took place. A famous story is told concerning the two kings on this occasion, but it is not found in the more trustworthy accounts. It is said that Edmund proposed that they should decide their claims to the crown in single combat; an offer which his rival declined, under the plea that he was small of stature and of a sickly constitution; but added that, if the English king wished to avoid the effusion of blood, he was quite willing to consent to a division of the kingdom.
The more probable account of what occurred is that Edric Streona persuaded Edmund that it would be unwise to risk another battle, and that he had better agree to a partition of the kingdom. Anyhow, no battle was fought, and the two kings met on the island of Olney, in the Severn, and agreed that Edmund should be over-king, and should possess Wessex, Essex, and East Anglia, with London, while Canute should have Mercia and Northumberland. As Professor Freeman points out, the division differed from that made between Alfred and Guthrum, for Edmund gave to Canute all that part of Mercia which Alfred had kept, while he retained East Anglia and Essex, which by the old partition had belonged to Guthrum.
Edmund did not live to enjoy the rest he had won so dearly for many weeks, for on St. Andrew's Day, 1017, he died, and his death, like other unexpected events of the period, was attributed to Edric Streona. Upon this point, however, nothing can be asserted with safety, despite the circumstantial accounts of the chroniclers. Edmund had reigned only seven months, but in that brief space he had proved himself a very different man to his father.
On the death of Edmund Ironside, Canute's position in England was naturally much stronger than when he was maintaining an obstinate contest with the brave English king. Edmund's children were very young, and their claims were not to be entertained when it was of the utmost importance to have a man of courage and resource at the head of affairs. There was, however, a formidable competitor in Edwy, the late king's brother, who was much beloved by the people. But the Witena-gemot, weary of the contest for the kingdom, was convened at London, and Canute was chosen king over all England. It is said that in order to weaken the claims of his rivals he exacted from the assembly a promise that none of Edmund's sons or brothers should be king, and they even advised that Edwy should be outlawed. The pretext for this exclusion was that no mention had been made of the members of the line of Wessex in the treaty between Canute and Edmund.
Edwy was outlawed in 1017, and shortly afterwards died, murdered apparently by order of Canute, although there is another story that an unsuccessful attempt at his assassination was made shortly before his outlawry. In any case he disappears from history. The children of Ethelred and Emma were in Normandy with their mother. Edmund's two sons, Edward and Edmund, were sent to the King of Sweden, with secret orders, it is said, that they should be put to death. But Olaf, though placed in an embarrassing position by this infamous request, resolved to spare them. However, to avoid being drawn into war with his powerful neighbour he in his turn sent them to Stephen, King of Hungary, to be educated at his court. There Edmund died young; but Edward lived and married Agatha, the niece of Stephen's queen. She bore him Edgar Atheling, of whom we shall hear again, and Margaret, who afterwards became Queen of the Scots.
Canute, having rid himself of his rivals, divided England into four parts, keeping Wessex under his immediate rule, making Danes the Earls of East Anglia and Northumberland, and giving Mercia to Edric Streona. But he speedily caused Edric to be put to death, "and very rightly too," says the Chronicle, because no doubt he feared to have such a perfidious man among his chief men and Edric's body was thrown into the Thames. These earldoms continued until the Conquest, and their holders played a great part in the history of the subsequent reigns. It is remarkable that this arrangement of the government of the kingdom was very much in agreement with the policy of Dunstan.
In the same year Canute put away his Danish wife and contracted an alliance of a very wise character if regarded as a measure of precaution. Alfred and Edward, Ethelred's sons, were still a source of anxiety to him, and a quarrel was, above all things, to be avoided with Richard Duke of Normandy. In order to acquire the friendship of the duke, he paid addresses to Queen Emma, the widow of Ethelred, and the curious marriage was concluded. It is said, but the story is probably without foundation, that she made him promise that the crown of England should go to the issue of her second marriage, to the exclusion of her children by Ethelred and of Canute's two sons.
Canute was an admirable ruler, although we find him, in 1018, laying a very heavy tax upon the kingdom, especially in London, which, it will be remembered, had held out so bravely for Ethelred. The money, however, which amounted to £83,000, was used for a good purpose, namely, to pay off the Danish fleet. With the fleet departed the larger part of the Danish army, a bodyguard remaining which was known as the King's House-carls, and which formed a little standing army. Canute had doubtless seen that the English national levies were not to be relied upon at a pinch, and wished to have a trusty force with which to oppose a sudden invasion.
Having thus established himself upon the throne, he proceeded to rule England by the English and for the English. The chief Danes were banished from the kingdom, or put to death one by one, and their places were taken by Englishmen. Leofric became Earl of Mercia in the room of Edric Streona, and the famous Godwin was made Earl of Wessex, which the king no longer kept under his special care. He also renewed the English laws and customs, King Edgar's laws, as they were called, and made no distinction between Dane and Englishman in the administration of justice. He sought also to gain the favour of the people by religious foundations, by gifts to monasteries and churches, by doing reverence to the saints and holy places they revered, by preferring the churchmen they honoured, and by many other gracious acts. A very politic proceeding was his translation of the bones of St. Alphege from Greenwich to Canterbury, by which he sought to bury the bitter memories of the past.
But though Canute spent most of his time in England, and valued his English possessions more than any other of his lands, he was during the greater part of his reign occupied in foreign wars with the object of building up a grand empire in northern Europe. It was in the first of these wars that Earl Godwin gained his confidence. In 1019, Canute having settled his power beyond all danger of a revolution, made a voyage to Denmark, in order to make a campaign against the King of Sweden; and he carried along with him a large body of the English, under the command of Earl Godwin. The Earl was stationed next the Swedish camp; and observing a favourable opportunity, which he was obliged suddenly to seize, he attacked the enemy in the night, drove them from their trenches, threw them into disorder, pursued his advantage, and obtained a decisive victory over them. Next morning, Canute, seeing the English camp abandoned, imagined that those disaffected troops had deserted to the enemy: he was agreeably surprised to find that they were at that time engaged in pursuit of the discomfited Swedes. He was so pleased with this success, and with the manner of obtaining it, that he bestowed his niece in marriage on Godwin, and treated him ever after with entire confidence and regard.
The wars with Sweden terminated in the submission of that kingdom to Canute as over-king, and in 1028 he attacked Norway, and drove the just, but unwarlike Olaf from the land. Canute was thus ruler over Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, and none of the English kings, either before or since his time, have ever been rulers over so large a portion of Europe.
It was not likely that so powerful a monarch would tolerate the existence of an independent kingdom to the north of England, and Malcolm of Scotland forced an issue by invading Northumberland at the beginning of the reign. In 1031, therefore, Canute found occasion to approach the Scottish frontier with a powerful army. The King of Scots had no choice but to submit, and acknowledge Canute as his lord, and his nephew, Duncan, did homage for Cumberland at the same time. Duncan is well known to us through Shakespeare's play, and it is remarkable that among the under-kings who did homage to Canute was a certain Mælboethe, who is doubtless identical with Macbeth.
Meanwhile England was at peace, in spite of a threatened invasion from Normandy in 1028, which was driven back by storms in the Channel. Canute, despite the crimes which had stained his earlier career, was developing more and more into an admirable monarch and good man. In 1027 he made a pilgrimage to Rome, and wrote from thence a letter to the English people full of penitence for his past misdeeds, promises for the future, and much elevated moral sentiment.
In particular he ordered the royal officers to do justice to all men of whatever estate, and not to exact money wrongfully under pretext of the royal necessities. "I have no need," he says, "of money gathered by unrighteousness." There is also a famous story told of him by Henry of Huntingdon, which shows that he was not blinded by the greatness of his position, but estimated his authority at its true value. He was at Southampton; and there, in answer probably to some over-charged flatteries from his courtiers, bade a chair be placed at the water's edge, challenging the sea at the same time to wet the feet of him whose ships sailed over it, and against whose land it dashed. The tide came rushing in, and soon it had wetted the feet and clothes of the king. Then he turned to his followers and said, "Behold how feeble is the power of kings and of men, for the waves will not hear my voice. Honour the Lord only, and serve him, for to him all things give obedience."
Men lived hard in those days, and the span of life was short, for when Canute died, in 1035, he was only forty years old.
IX. EARL GODWIN AND HAROLD
Harold and Harthacanute--The Murder of Alfred--Accession of Harthacanute--His Reconciliation with Godwin--The Punishment of Worcester--Edward the Confessor--His Election--Influx of Normans--The Family of Godwin--Conduct of Sweyn--The Outbreak at Dover--Godwin's Rebellion and Outlawry--William of Normandy's Visit to England--Godwin's Attempt to Return--His Appearance in the Thames--His Restoration to Power--Death of Godwin--His Place taken by Harold--Siward's Invasion of Scotland and his Death--Death of Leofric and Punishment of Ælfgar--Church Building of Harold and Edward--Harold's Conquest of Wales--Turbulence of Tostig--Death of the Atheling Edward--Candidature of Harold.
By the death of Canute the prospect of a disputed succession was opened up once more. By his second marriage he had issue one son, named Harthacanute; by the first, two, named Sweyn and Harold; but the parentage of these two was considered to be very doubtful. Sweyn nevertheless succeeded to Norway, and Harthacanute to Denmark, but the question was not settled so easily in England. There was a double election, in which the Northerners, under the leadership of Leofric of Mercia, chose Harold; and the Southerners, among whom Godwin was the most influential, chose Harthacanute. Having, however, learnt wisdom by misfortune, the Witena-gemot agreed that the kingdom should be peacefully divided; and as Harthacanute did not come over from Denmark, Earl Godwin, despite his obscure origin, for he appears to have been the son of a wealthy ceorl, was practically King of Wessex. But in 1037, when Harthacanute showed no signs of visiting England, Harold was elected by the Witena-gemot king over all England, and ruled during two years and some months (1037-1040). Of his reign we know absolutely nothing of importance, but he appears to have resembled very little his great father, being in fact more or less of a barbarian.
During the period in which Godwin was administering Wessex for Harthacanute, Alfred, the son of Emma and Ethelred, came over from Normandy, apparently with some designs on the crown. He met Earl Godwin at Guildford, and shortly afterwards was seized by Harold's servants and taken to Ely, where he was blinded, and soon afterwards died. At the time, Godwin was universally held to have had the chief hand in the deed; although it is not easy to see why he should have been leader in a crime which was committed to further the interests of Harold, whose election he had opposed. The feeling nevertheless was very strong against him, and perhaps he may have used the betrayal to make his peace with Harold. Queen Emma was soon afterwards driven from England, but found a hospitable abode at Bruges, where she was received by Count Baldwin of Flanders. She was believed to have been privy to the death of Alfred, in order that the crown might pass to Harthacanute.
Harthacanute, or Canute the Strong, had never resigned his pretensions to the crown of England; and the country was spared the horrors of a civil war only by the death of Harold. Under pretence of visiting the widowed queen in Flanders, he had assembled a fleet of sixty ships, his real intention being to make a descent upon England. The news of Harold's death induced him at once to set sail. He shortly afterwards entered London in triumph, and was acknowledged king without opposition.
The first act of Harthacanute's government promised badly for his future conduct. He was so enraged at Harold for depriving him of his share of the kingdom, and for the cruel treatment of his half-brother Alfred, that in an impotent desire of revenge against the dead, he ordered his body to be dug up and to be thrown into the Thames; and when it was found by some fishermen, and buried in London, he ordered it again to be dug up, and to be thrown once more into the river; but it was fished up a second time, and then interred with great secrecy. Godwin and the Archbishop of York submitted to be his instruments in this unnatural and brutal action.
The earl knew that he was universally believed to have been an accomplice in the barbarity exercised on Alfred, and that he was on that account obnoxious to Harthacanute; and perhaps he hoped, by displaying this rage against Harold's memory, to free himself from the suspicion of having had any participation in his counsels; but the king preferred an accusation against Godwin for the murder of Alfred, and compelled him to clear himself. Godwin, in order to appease the king, made him a magnificent present of a galley with a gilt stern, rowed by four-score men, who wore each of them a gold bracelet on his arm, weighing sixteen ounces, and were armed and clothed in the most sumptuous manner. Harthacanute, pleased with the splendour of this spectacle, quickly forgot his brother's murder; and on Godwin's proving his innocence by compurgation, he allowed him to be acquitted.
Though Harthacanute, before his accession, had been called over by the vows of the English, he soon lost the affections of the nation by his misconduct; but nothing appeared more grievous to them than his renewing the imposition of Danegeld, and obliging the nation to pay a great sum of money to the fleet which brought him from Denmark. The discontents ran high in many places. In Worcester the populace rose, and put to death two of the collectors (1041). The king, enraged at this opposition, swore vengeance against the city, and ordered three noblemen--Godwin, Earl of Wessex, Siward, Earl of Northumberland, and Leofric, Earl of Mercia--to execute his orders with the utmost rigour. They were obliged to set fire to the city, and deliver it up to be plundered by their soldiers; but they saved the lives of the inhabitants, whom they allowed to fly to a small island on the Severn, called Beverly, till by their intercession they were enabled to appease the anger of the tyrant. This violent reign was of short duration. Harthacanute died three years after his accession, in consequence of his excesses in drinking. This event took place at the marriage feast of a Danish nobleman at Lambeth, on June 8, 1042.
The English, on the death of Harthacanute, saw that a favourable opportunity had occurred for recovering their ancient independence and shaking off the Danish yoke, which was insufferably galling to a proud and spirited people.
Prince Edward was in Normandy at the time of his brother's death; but though the true English heir was the descendant of Edmund Ironside, the absence of that prince in Hungary appeared a sufficient reason for his exclusion. Delays might be dangerous; the occasion might not again present itself, and must be eagerly embraced before the Danes, now left in the island without a leader, had time to recover from the confusion into which the death of their king had thrown them.
But this concurrence of circumstances in favour of Edward might have failed of its effect, had his succession been opposed by Godwin, whose power, alliances, and abilities gave him great influence at all times, especially amidst those sudden opportunities which always attend a revolution of government, and of which advantage can be taken only by great promptitude. There were opposite reasons which divided men's hopes and fears with regard to Godwin's conduct. On the one hand, the credit of that nobleman lay chiefly in Wessex, which was almost entirely inhabited by English. It was therefore presumed that he would second the wishes of that people in restoring the English line, and in humbling the Danes, from whom he, as well as they, had reason to dread, as they had already felt, the most grievous oppression. On the other hand, there was strong reason for animosity between Edward and Godwin, on account of Alfred's murder, which the latter might deem so deep an offence that it could never, on account of subsequent merits, be sincerely pardoned. Nevertheless, in those turbulent days men's memories were short; a strong union of interests was sufficient to cause the temporary burial of past wrongs. At the Witena-gemot, which was summoned at Gillingham, every measure was taken for securing the election of Edward. The English were unanimous and zealous; the Danes, who were in favour of Canute's nephew, Sweyn, were divided and dispirited, and Godwin's eloquence easily won the day. Two years afterwards the friendship was cemented by a marriage between the king and Godwin's daughter, Edith. It was thought advisable also to depress the Danish element by exile and confiscation of property in several instances.
The new king also treated his mother, who had returned to England, not only with coldness, but some degree of severity, on account of her having neglected him in his adversity. He accused her of preferring her son by Canute to his brother and himself--which, when the characters of her first and second husbands are compared, appears by no means improbable. He stripped her of the great wealth she had amassed, and compelled her to live in seclusion at Winchester. The accusation of her having been a party to the murder of her son Alfred, and of her criminal intercourse with the Bishop of Winchester, from which she is said to have cleared herself by walking barefoot over nine red-hot ploughshares, must be regarded as tradition merely.
The English fondly believed that by the accession of Edward they had delivered themselves for ever from the dominion of foreigners, but they soon found out that they were in error; for the king, who had been educated at the court of his uncle in Normandy, had contracted so strong an affection for the natives of that country that his court was speedily filled by them. This partiality will be considered by no means an unnatural one, when it is remembered that the natives of that populous and wealthy state were far more polished than the comparatively rude, unlettered English, and that their culture was much superior. The example of the monarch had its influence; the courtiers imitated the Normans both in dress and manners. French became the language not only of the court, but of the law; even the Church felt its influence, Edward creating Robert of Jumièges (1044), and Ulf (1049), two Norman priests, respectively Bishops of London and Dorchester. In 1051 Robert was made Archbishop of Canterbury. Similar appointments were made in secular affairs, and the whole country was filled with a swarm of Norman strangers. All these changes gradually excited the jealousy of the English nation; although it may be justly doubted whether the most far-sighted amongst them foresaw that they were preparing the way for a fresh conquest of the country.
The natural result of this unwise partiality for foreigners was the growth of a strongly national party, and with it Earl Godwin was not slow to identify himself. By a process of deliberate family aggrandisement, he had succeeded in making the influence of his house nearly paramount in England; and this was based not only on immense possessions and administrative authority, but on the great personal talents of himself and his sons, which were wedded to dispositions of a more than ordinarily ambitious nature. Their power was, indeed, most formidable. Godwin, as has been already mentioned, was Earl of Wessex; his eldest son, Sweyn, was Earl of a district partly in Wessex and partly in Mercia; his second son, Harold, was Earl of the East Angles; and his nephew, Beorn, was Earl of the Middle Angles, a district which included Bedfordshire and Lincolnshire.
It was inevitable that a trial of strength should occur between the two parties sooner or later, and the unruly conduct of Godwin's family was, unfortunately, by no means a source of credit to his cause. In 1046, Sweyn, his eldest son, carried off the Abbess of Leominster, and in consequence had to leave the kingdom, his possessions being divided between Harold and Beorn. After futile attempts to gain pardon and restitution, he decoyed Beorn on to one of his ships and foully murdered him. He was thereupon outlawed, but soon afterwards the king weakly allowed him to return, and his earldom was restored to him.
Meanwhile, the feeling of animosity between the Norman and English parties at court, and in the country generally, was becoming terribly strong. Robert of Jumièges lost no opportunity of setting the king against Earl Godwin, and the English people were very angry when they saw the Norman favourites beginning to build castles, as strongholds of oppression, over the face of the land. It was not long before this animosity broke into action. Eustace, Count of Boulogne, who had married Edward's sister, having paid a visit to the king, passed by Dover in his return. One of his train being refused entrance to a lodging which had been assigned him, attempted to make his way by force, and in the contest he wounded the master of the house. The inhabitants revenged this insult by the death of the stranger; the count and his train took arms, and murdered the wounded townsman; a tumult ensued; nearly twenty persons were killed on each side; and Eustace, being overpowered by numbers, was obliged to save his life by flight from the fury of the populace. He hurried immediately to court, and complained of the usage he had met with. The king entered zealously into the quarrel, and was highly displeased that a stranger of such distinction, whom he had invited over to his court, should, without any just cause, as he believed, have been exposed to such insult and danger. Edward felt so sensibly the insolence of his people that he gave orders to Godwin, in whose government Dover lay, to repair immediately to the place, and to punish the inhabitants for the crime; but Godwin, who desired rather to encourage than repress the popular discontents against foreigners, refused obedience, and endeavoured to throw the whole blame of the riot on the Count of Boulogne and his retinue; he declared also that no man in his earldom should be put to death without trial. Edward, touched in so sensible a point, saw the necessity of exerting the royal authority; and he threatened Godwin, if he persisted in his disobedience, to make him feel the utmost effects of his resentment.
The earl, perceiving a rupture to be unavoidable, and pleased to embark in a cause where it was likely he should be supported by his countrymen, made preparations for his own defence, or rather for an attack on Edward. He assembled a great army, and was approaching the king, who, on his side, had collected his Norman favourites about him at Gloucester. Edward applied for protection to Siward, Earl of Northumberland, and Leofric, Earl of Mercia, two powerful noblemen, whose jealousy of Godwin's greatness on the one hand, and their hatred of the Normans on the other, caused them to adopt a policy of watchful neutrality. They hastened to him with such of their followers as they could assemble on a sudden; and finding the danger of a collision much greater than they had at first apprehended, they issued orders for mustering all the forces within their respective governments, and for marching them without delay to the defence of the king's person and authority. Edward, meanwhile, endeavoured to gain time by negotiation; while Godwin, who thought the king entirely in his power, and was willing to save appearances, fell into the snare; and not perceiving that he ought to have no further reserve after he had proceeded so far, lost the favourable opportunity of rendering himself master of the government.
The English, though they had no idea of Edward's vigour and capacity, bore him much affection on account of his humanity, justice, and piety, as well as the long race of their native kings from whom he was descended; and they hastened from all quarters to defend him from the present danger. His army was now so considerable that he ventured to take the field; and, marching to London, he summoned the Witena-gemot to judge the rebellion of Godwin and his sons. These nobles, angry at being treated as criminals, demanded hostages for their safety, which were refused. Soon afterwards, finding themselves deserted by the majority of their adherents, they disbanded their remaining forces, and fled the country. Baldwin, Count of Flanders, gave shelter and protection to the earl and three of his sons, Sweyn, Gurth, and Tostig. Harold and Leofwine, two other brothers, took refuge in Ireland.
Godwin and his sons were outlawed in 1051, and shortly afterwards occurred a most important event, namely, the visit of Duke William of Normandy to England. He was the king's cousin, through the marriage of Ethelred and Emma of Normandy, and the two had been thrown together in their boyhood. It may fairly be conjectured that the absence of Godwin from England and the visit of William of Normandy were two events which were not unconnected, and that the latter was invited over at the instigation of the French party, in order to pave the way to his accession to the throne. In after days William based his claims to a great extent on the promise which he declared that Edward had made to him at this time. It is more than probable, therefore, that some such stipulation was made by the weak king, but it should be observed that it was perfectly unconstitutional and illegal, because the English monarchy being purely elective, and the election lying in the hands of the Witena-gemot, the sovereign of England had no power to bequeath the kingdom to any successor, whether he were Englishman or foreigner.
Godwin and his sons were hardly the men to submit supinely to banishment without making an attempt to regain the position from which they had been thrust through an unwise confidence in the impotence of their enemy. Diplomacy having been exhausted, they resolved to use force, and in 1052, Baldwin of Flanders allowed Godwin to fit out an expedition in his harbours, while Harold made a descent from Ireland. The first attempt failed; Harold made a descent upon the coast of Somersetshire, and fought a battle with the inhabitants, who opposed his landing for provisions, but failed to effect a junction with Godwin, who had to retreat before the royal fleet, which was stationed at Sandwich in greater numbers than his own.
The exile, however, appears to have been more politic and more clear-sighted than the king, who, satisfied with his success, and deeming his enemy completely crushed, disbanded his men and neglected his ships, whilst Godwin kept his in readiness. Deeming the time at last had come, he put to sea once more, and sailed for Portland, where he was joined by his son Harold, with his Irish contingent. Being now master of the sea, he sailed along the southern coast, plundering where he could obtain no ready gifts of provisions, and called upon his followers in those counties which owned his authority to take arms in his cause. The appeal was not made in vain; such numbers flocked to his standard that he entered the Thames, where he found the king ready to meet him with forty ships.
Edward, it is said, desired to fight, but could find no one to support him, so hated were his Norman favourites, and the national party was accordingly completely triumphant. Godwin and his sons were recalled and restored to their former positions, and the Normans, with a few exceptions, were driven from the land, although a few of the better ones were afterwards allowed to come back. Among the outlaws was Robert of Jumièges, and the vacant archbishopric of Canterbury was given to Stigand, the Bishop of Winchester, who had effected the reconciliation between the king and Earl Godwin. So the family of Godwin was once more established in England, with the exception of Sweyn, who, smitten with remorse for his sins, went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and died abroad.
Godwin's new tenure of power did not last long, for in 1053 he died. At Easter he was dining with the king, at Winchester, and fell down in a fit. The superstition of the times did not fail to discover in this sudden death the direct intervention of God, and stories were told how the Earl, on being accused by the king of the murder of Alfred, had impiously taken a morsel of bread from the table, and had desired that it might choke him if he had had a hand in that crime. No sooner had he swallowed it, ran the legend, than he fell backwards and died. The tale is obviously one that was published by Godwin's Norman opponents to blacken his memory; but, apart from its inherent improbabilities, it is one that might easily be circulated concerning anyone that had suddenly died at table. Godwin was sincerely lamented by the English, and with justice, for though he may have been ambitious, and have made the aggrandisement of his family the first object of his concerns, he was none the less a true patriot, and strove, at considerable personal sacrifice, for the welfare of his country. His influence, and that of his son Harold after him, for the time beat back the Norman influx and secured for the English a further brief span of independence from Norman aggression.
Godwin's place was taken by his son Harold, who succeeded him as Earl of Wessex. Being of a more courtly disposition than his father, Harold managed to keep on excellent terms with the king. At the same time, the earldom of East Anglia was not at once given to a member of the Godwin family, but to Ælfgar, the son of Leofric of Mercia, who seems to have been put forward by the weak king as in some sort a rival to Harold. In 1055, however, Ælfgar was outlawed, whether with or without justice it is impossible to say, and Harold was thus freed for the time being of a dangerous opponent. The earldom, moreover, was given to his brother Gurth.
The death of Siward, Earl of Northumberland, in 1055, opened the way still more to the ambition of Harold. Siward, besides his other merits, had added new honours to England by his successful conduct of an expedition against Scotland, where Macbeth was king. According to the well-known version of the story which Shakespeare has made immortal, Duncan, the former king, was a prince of gentle disposition, but possessed not the genius requisite for governing a country so turbulent, and so much infested by the intrigues and animosities of the great. Macbeth, a powerful nobleman, and nearly allied to the crown, not content with curbing the king's authority, carried still further his pestilent ambition. He put his sovereign to death, chased Malcolm Canmore, Duncan's son and heir, into England, and usurped the crown. It would appear, however, that the murder of Duncan is really a fiction, that he was killed while flying from a battle between the two parties, and that Macbeth, so far from being a tyrant, was really a very able and worthy ruler. Be that as it may, Siward, whose cousin was married to Duncan, undertook, by Edward's orders, the protection of this distressed family. He marched an army into Scotland; and having defeated and killed Macbeth in battle, he restored Malcolm to the throne of his ancestors. This service, added to his former connections with the royal family of Scotland, brought a great accession to the authority of Siward in the north; but as he had lost his eldest son, Osberne, in the action with Macbeth, it proved in the issue fatal to his family. His second son, Waltheof, appeared, on his father's death, too young to be entrusted with the government of Northumberland; and Harold's influence obtained that earldom for his own brother, Tostig.
There are two circumstances related of Siward which discover his high sense of honour and his martial disposition. When intelligence was brought to him of his son Osberne's death, he was inconsolable, till he heard that the wound was received in the breast, and that he had behaved with great gallantry in the action. When he found his own death approaching, he ordered his servants to clothe him in a complete suit of armour; and sitting erect on the couch, with a spear in his hand, declared that in that posture, the only one worthy of a warrior, he would patiently await the fatal moment.
Harold now found his path to the throne obstructed only by the family of Leofric. In 1057, however, death removed Leofric, that great earl of whom we would fain know more; for, from the meagre information we are able to gather concerning him, he would appear to have been anxious to bring to a close the quarrels that distracted and weakened the nation. He and his wife, the Lady Godiva of legend, founded many churches and monasteries, of which the most important was the church at Coventry.
Ælfgar was still a source of uneasiness to Harold. On being outlawed, he made a compact with Griffith, the king of the Welsh, and the two agreed to invade England. Ralph the Norman, Edward's nephew, was disgracefully defeated by the enemy, who took possession of Hereford, but on the arrival of Harold at the head of the English they retired into Wales and made peace, Ælfgar being restored to his earldom for a few months, probably through the influence of his father, who was still alive at the time. Soon after the death of Leofric, Ælfgar was outlawed again, but, pursuing his former tactics, was made Earl of Mercia, succeeding his father, through the armed intervention of Griffith, whose daughter he married. During the brief remainder of his life he plays no prominent part in events, having probably discovered by painful experience that Harold was an antagonist whom it was dangerous to provoke. The power of the house of Godwin was completed by the formation of Essex and Kent into an earldom for Leofwine, Harold's remaining brother.
The influence obtained by Harold's strength of character over the amiable but feeble king was increased by their common sympathies. Both were of considerably higher culture than the average Englishman, and they both had leanings towards the superior civilisation of France, a country to which Harold had paid a visit. Moreover, both of them were genuinely pious men, and their piety took the outward form of the building and endowment of churches. The Confessor's chief edifice was the Abbey of Westminster, and parts of the building which still stands there are his work. Harold, in a kindred spirit, founded an abbey at Waltham in 1060, and established a college there, inviting learned men from the Continent to teach the scholars. Unlike Dunstan, he befriended the secular priests, but he was in every respect rigidly orthodox, and refusing to acknowledge Stigand, because he had been consecrated by the anti-Pope Benedict, caused the abbey at Waltham to be hallowed by the Archbishop of York.
Harold was not only pious, but a great warrior, and in 1063 he put a stop to the incursions of Griffith of Wales by completely conquering that country. Despite the lesson they had previously received from Harold, the Welsh continued the terror of the West of England, which they systematically plundered, retreating with their booty to their mountain strongholds. Harold found he could do nothing more acceptable to the public, and more honourable to himself, than the suppressing of so dangerous an enemy. He formed the plan of an expedition against Wales; and having prepared some light-armed foot to pursue the natives into their fastnesses, some cavalry to scour the open country, and a squadron of ships to attack the sea-coast, he employed at once all these forces against the Welsh, prosecuted his advantages with vigour, made no intermission in his assaults, and at last reduced the enemy to such distress that, in order to prevent their total destruction, they made a sacrifice of their prince, whose head they cut off and sent to Harold; and they were content to receive as their sovereigns two brothers of Griffith appointed by Edward to rule over them. The new princes swore oaths to Harold and Edward, and thus the monarchy over united Wales came to an end, although the country was not annexed to England until long years afterwards.
Another prominent feature in Harold's character besides his valour, was his sense of justice, of which he gave very favourable indication in the year 1065, when his brother Tostig, the Earl of Northumberland, being of a violent, tyrannical temper, acted with such cruelty and injustice that the inhabitants rose in rebellion, and chased him from his government. Morcar and Edwin, two brothers, who were the sons of Ælfgar, Edwin the elder of the two having succeeded him in the earldom of Mercia, concurred in the insurrection; and the former, being elected earl, advanced with an army to oppose Harold, who was commissioned by the king to reduce and chastise the Northumbrians. Before the armies came to action, Morcar, well acquainted with the generous disposition of the English commander, endeavoured to justify his own conduct. This was a bold step, but the event fully proved the wisdom of adopting it. He represented to Harold that Tostig had behaved in a manner unworthy of the station to which he was advanced; that no one, not even a brother, could support such tyranny without participating in some degree in the infamy attending it; that the Northumbrians, accustomed to a legal administration, and regarding it as their birthright, were willing to submit to the king, but required a governor who would pay regard to their rights and privileges; that they had been taught by their ancestors that death was preferable to servitude, and had taken the field, determined to perish rather than suffer a renewal of the indignities to which they had long been exposed; and they trusted that Harold, on reflection, would not defend in another the violence he had repressed in his own government. This remonstrance, sustained as it was by the arguments that have just been summarised, was accompanied by such proofs of the justice of the complaints that Harold felt himself compelled to abandon his brother's cause; and, returning to Edward, persuaded the king to pardon the Northumbrians, and to confirm Morcar in the government. He afterwards married the sister of that nobleman. Tostig, in a rage, quitted England, and took refuge at Bruges with his father-in-law, Baldwin of Flanders.
But meanwhile the question of the succession to the throne was becoming daily more pressing. Edward was evidently rapidly sinking into the grave. He had never loved his wife, Harold's sister, and had no children by her. The natural choice of the Witena-gemot would have been Edward, the son of Edward's elder brother, who had been sent to Hungary by the King of Sweden. Accordingly, an embassy was sent to Hungary, and in 1057 the Atheling, or member of the royal line, arrived with his children, Edgar, Margaret, and Christina. But the prospect of his one day becoming King of England, which would have solved a most difficult problem, was speedily cut short by his death within a few days. Of the royal family, Edgar, his son, was now the only direct male representative, and he, as being a mere boy, was hardly a candidate on whom the choice of the Witena-gemot would fall. It should be observed that Harold appears to have placed no obstacle in the way of the advent of the members of the house of Cerdic to England, and throughout he seems honestly to have acted for the best.
To look upon the election of Harold to the throne as in any sense a usurpation is to import purely modern ideas about royalty into days when hereditary descent was never for a moment recognised as giving an indefeasible right. To pass over the members of the royal line was no doubt an unusual measure, because there were as a rule some members of that line who were fully competent to succeed, but, failing such a candidate, the Witena-gemot were quite within their right in electing any one whom they believed to combine the necessary qualities of valour and statesmanship. And of all men in England, it could hardly be doubted that Harold was pre-eminently the possessor of the attributes that went in those days to make a good king. He was therefore tacitly designated as Edward's successor by universal consent; but in William of Normandy he had a dangerous and unscrupulous opponent who would hesitate to use no means that force or fraud might throw in his way. One effective instrument he had already acquired during his visit to England, and chance speedily placed a second in his path, of which he availed himself with equal dexterity.
X. THE NORMAN INVASION
The Normans--Their Settlement in France--Their gradual Civilization--Richard the Good--Robert the Devil--William's earlier years--His Consolidation of Power--Harold's Adventures in Normandy and the Story of his Oath to William--Death and Character of Edward--Election of Harold--William's Claims--He obtains the Sanction of the Church--His Preparations--Proceedings of Tostig--Harold's Forces dwindle--Invasion of Tostig and Harold Hardrada--Battle of Stamford Bridge--Landing of William--Harold in London--Desertion of Edwin and Morcar--Negotiations--Harold at Senlac--Account of the Battle--Death of Harold and Discomfiture of the English--His Burial--Legend of his Escape.
Before narrating Harold's adventures in Normandy, and the oath which he is said to have sworn to William there, it may be well to give an account of the rise of the formidable power of which William was now the ruler. The Normans, or Northmen, were, when they first come within the ken of history, bands of piratical adventurers, and were practically identical with the Danes, the term being loosely used for the inhabitants of what we now call the Scandinavian kingdoms of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. In the previous chapters, a description has been given of the invasions and settlements of these barbarians in England; but England was by no means the only country which they vexed by their depredations, and the northern coast of France afforded an equally suitable place of debarkation for their hordes.
Upon the French, as upon the English, the enemy at first contented themselves with inflicting yearly raids, without any intention of occupying the land; but in 912, Rollo the Ganger, or Walker, so called because he was too tall to ride, a leader after the stamp of Guthrum, seized from Charles the Simple, king of the West Franks--for France was not as yet a united kingdom--land on both sides of the Seine, with Rouen for its capital, and an arrangement was made between the two at Clair-sur-Epte, which has been compared to the treaty of Wedmore. By it Rollo promised to embrace Christianity, and to do homage to Charles. The well-known story has it that he was too proud to go through the ceremony, which consisted in kissing the king's feet, but deputed it to one of his soldiers, who, by raising the royal foot to his mouth, instead of stooping towards it, well-nigh upset his Frankish majesty. Despite his promise, Rollo speedily relapsed into heathendom, and, together with his son, William Longsword, proceeded to add to his territories. A large district passed into the hands of the Normans by conquest, including Avranches, Lisieux, and Caen.
It was some time before the Normans became French, but they were gradually assimilated to the people round them, even as the Danes had been in England. The change was accomplished in the reign of the third duke, Richard the Fearless (943-996), when the whole race embraced Christianity, and adopted the French language, Norse being the speech, however, of the people who dwelt round Bayeux. The Normans were a very receptive race, and wherever they wandered throughout Europe they adopted whatever customs were best in the people with whom they came in contact. They learned new modes of fighting; they acquired new weapons, the shield, the hauberk, the lance, and the long-bow; they became masterly horsemen. Further, they developed that impressive style of architecture which is still called by their name, and built churches and monasteries, important among which is the Abbey of Bec, whence came both Lanfranc and St. Anselm in aftertimes; they founded bishoprics. In a word, they transformed themselves with remarkable swiftness from a race of depredators into one of the most cultivated of the peoples of Europe. It was during the reign of Richard the Fearless that Hugh Capet, on the death of the last of the descendants of Charles the Great, founded the French monarchy by a process of conquest, and made Paris his capital. In this great achievement he would never have succeeded had it not been for the assistance of Richard, who was his brother-in-law. In return, the Duke of Normandy ceased to be called by his neighbours "Dux Piratarum" ("the Duke of the Pirates"), and became the loyal vassal of the King of the French. Normandy formed one of the noblest territories dependent on the Capetian dynasty, but its dukes took care that their liberties were in no degree infringed.
The next duke, Richard the Good, Ethelred's contemporary, has been already mentioned in this work (see p. 58). His reign is chiefly remarkable for the fact that in it we begin to hear of those noble families which afterwards played so great a part in English history. The marriage between Emma and Ethelred was the first link in the chain of events which led to the conquest of England, and it was at the Norman court that Edward the Confessor acquired his foreign sympathies. After a reign of about thirty years, Richard died in 1026.
On his death the kingdom was distributed between the rival brothers, Richard the Third and Robert. Richard, however, was regarded as duke during the two ensuing years, and on his death, in 1028, was succeeded by Robert. He is known to history as "the Devil," though it is very difficult to tell why, and after a somewhat brief reign he died, in 1035, on his way back from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.
On the death of Robert, his son William was about eight years old; moreover, of illegitimate birth, his mother being the daughter of a tanner at Falaise. But Robert, before his departure, had caused his nobles to swear allegiance to William, and the law of hereditary descent was far more strictly regarded in France than in England. These facts, joined to the consideration that possible successors of the line of Rollo were not easily to be found, caused William's accession to be undisputed. Nevertheless, the period of his minority was one of much confusion, during which the boy-duke's life was in perpetual danger, and his position was the more precarious because the King of the French began to show signs of animosity towards the great semi-independent state to the north of his dominions. In 1047 William began to act for himself, and when an attempt was made by the nobles to wrest the western part of his dominions from him, he overthrew the rebels, with the grudgingly offered aid of Henry of France, at Val-ès-Dunes. After this crushing triumph, his power was secure. He surrounded himself with a splendid nobility, of whom William Fitz-Osbern and Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, his two half-brothers by his mother's marriage with Baldwin of Conteville, and Robert of Mortain, were to make themselves feared on the other side of the channel. The Church was munificently rewarded for its support, and among his most magnificent buildings was the Abbé aux Hommes at Caen. Not only did he recover all the dominions that the Norman dukes had ever held, but he twice defeated the French king, Henry, when he invaded his dominions, and in 1063 made his great Continental acquisition in the conquest of Maine. Despite the Papal inhibition, he took to wife Matilda, the daughter of Count Baldwin of Flanders, in 1052, and endured the ban without much inconvenience until 1060. His visit to England, and the claim, worthless though it was, that he built upon it, have already been mentioned (see p. 70). In the last years of the reign of the Confessor (the exact date is unknown) the hazard of fortune placed his rival, Harold, in his power for the time being, and he made excellent use of the opportunity.
One day Harold, while sailing in the channel, was driven by tempest on the territory of Guy, Count of Ponthieu, who, being informed of his quality, immediately detained him prisoner, and demanded an exorbitant sum for his ransom. Harold found means to convey intelligence of his situation to the Duke of Normandy; and represented that he had met with extremely harsh treatment from the mercenary disposition of the Count of Ponthieu, who was William's vassal.
William was immediately sensible of the importance of the incident: he foresaw that if he could once gain Harold, either by favours or menaces, his way to the throne of England would be open, and Edward would meet with no further obstacle in executing the favourable intentions which he had entertained on his behalf. He sent, therefore, a messenger to Guy, in order to demand the liberty of his prisoner; and that nobleman, not daring to refuse so great a prince, put Harold into the hands of the Norman, who conducted him to Rouen. William received him with every demonstration of respect and friendship; and even persuaded him to take part in a campaign which he was waging with Count Conan of Brittany, in which Harold highly distinguished himself, and was rewarded with the compliment of knighthood. In his anxiety to be allowed to return home, Harold appears to have compromised himself by taking some sort of oath, which William attempted to make additionally binding by a curious trick. He caused Harold, when he swore, to place his hand on a chest, and then, withdrawing the cover, showed the Englishman the relics of the saints, which had been collected from all parts of Normandy. This device is quite in keeping with the ideas of that time, and any breach of the engagement would have been considered a most wicked act of perjury, even though the taker of the oath was not aware of the solemnity of the promises he had made.
The terms of the oath are quite uncertain. Harold remained, so far as we know, absolutely silent on the subject, and his silence naturally conduces to the belief that he must have made some stipulations that he had no right to make. Professor Freeman strives hard to prove that he only promised to marry William's daughter, and that he did homage to him as his future father-in-law. The Norman chroniclers assert that he did homage to William as his future king, and promised in the meantime to deliver to him the castle of Dover, and to marry his daughter. It is hardly credible that Harold, though his position was a very difficult one, can have compromised himself in this manner; but it is possible that he may have thought that no price was too heavy to pay for freedom, and may have consoled himself by reflecting that to pledge himself to William as his future king was perfectly illegal, inasmuch as the election lay in the hands of the Witena-gemot. In any case, whatever understanding was concluded, Harold made no attempt on his return to carry it out, but continued in that line of conduct by which he accustomed the people of England to regard him as their future sovereign; and broke one of the conditions, at any rate, by marrying the daughter of Ælfgar, the widow of Griffith of Wales. He was so completely successful that the Confessor, on his death-bed (he died on January 5th, 1066) requested the Witena-gemot to choose Harold as his successor, and said nothing concerning William of Normandy, or any promises that had been made to him at the time of his visit to England.
Edward, to whom the Church has given the title of Saint and Confessor, was the last of the direct line of the West Saxon kings that ruled in England. Though his reign was peaceable and fortunate, he owed his prosperity less to his own abilities than to the conjunctures of the times. The Danes, employed in other enterprises, did not attempt those incursions which had been so troublesome to his predecessors, and fatal to some of them. The facility of his disposition made him acquiesce in the government of Godwin and his son Harold; and the abilities, as well as the power of these noblemen, enabled them, while they were entrusted with authority, to preserve domestic peace and tranquillity. The most commendable circumstance of Edward's government was his attention to the administration of justice; and he is said to have compiled, for that purpose, a body of laws, which he collected from the laws of Ethelbert, Ina, and Alfred. This compilation, if it ever existed, is now lost (for the laws that pass under Edward's name were composed afterwards), and it is thought that when we find the English in after-times asking for a renewal of King Edward's laws, they do not allude to any definite code, but simply to the old customs generally. But, while praising Edward for his rectitude of conduct, we ought not to forget that his weak dependence upon Norman favourites in the earlier part of the reign was the cause of infinite disaster to the nation in the years that followed his death. He was, in fact, as it has been often said, more fitted for a Norman cloister than for the English throne.
The election of Harold by the Witena-gemot was duly effected on the Feast of the Epiphany, the claims of the Atheling, Edgar, apparently not having been taken into serious consideration, so important was it felt to be that a capable man should have command in times when an invasion might be expected at any moment. William, as may be imagined, was not long in putting in his claim to the throne; and, having summoned Harold to fulfil the promises that he had made in Normandy (to which summons answer was returned that the promises were such as Harold could not possibly perform), he proceeded to set out a most ingenious statement of the rights which he asserted were his. They were absolutely worthless, but probably produced the desired effect on the Continent--an impression that William was the victim of fraud. In the first place, he based his claim to the crown on his descent; he was, he declared, Edward's next-of-kin through Edward's mother, Emma. This, of course, was not true, Edgar being considerably nearer in relationship; and even so, it would only entitle him to a certain amount of preference. Secondly, he declared that Edward had left him the crown, but such a bequeathal was, as we have seen, quite beyond the power of an English king, even if it was ever definitely made, of which no written proof was produced. Thirdly, he told the story of Harold's oath, which the latter had no right to take. Very few men among the English appear to have been won over by these specious arguments, but upon the Continent, and especially in France, where men were probably in ignorance of English customs, it is not improbable that they carried considerable weight, especially when backed by the authority of the Church. For William was careful to obtain this powerful sanction, and thereby he invested the invasion with the character of a war of religion.
To the shallow arguments about the perjury of Harold, he was cunning enough to add others of more solid worth, namely, that he would bring the Church of England more thoroughly under the control of Rome than it had hitherto been, and especially would cause the Papal dues to be more regularly paid. These last considerations could not but have much influence with the Pope, Alexander II., and William's envoys were fortunate to gain over the man who had the entire ascendency in the Papal counsels, the famous Hildebrand, who afterwards became Pope Gregory the Seventh. The Pope, therefore, announced his cordial sanction of the enterprise, and despatched to the Norman Duke a consecrated banner, and a ring containing some of St. Peter's hair.
William now set himself seriously to work to gain allies, and to get an army ready. He applied in the first instance to the King of France; but William was already too powerful a vassal, and his overtures were rejected from policy. Nothing daunted, he next addressed himself to his father-in-law, Count Baldwin of Flanders. Baldwin listened to him, and helped him to the utmost of his power. His own subjects were at first unwilling to take part in the undertaking, but William won them over by his cajoleries. By the middle of August, 1066, the Duke of Normandy had collected or built upwards of 900 large vessels, without counting those destined to serve as means of transport, and had under his command 50,000 horsemen and 10,000 foot soldiers. However, he did not hurry his preparations, for everything was turning out in his favour.
For William was not the only enemy against whom the unfortunate Harold had to contend. His unscrupulous and selfish brother, Tostig, also determined to make a dash for the crown, hopes of which he had entertained previously to his banishment, since he was a favourite with the Confessor, and the king had been very unwilling to part with him. Early in the year he applied for assistance to William, but the duke, although eager enough to profit by his folly, would give him no assistance. Thereupon, having collected some ships from the ports of Flanders, Tostig made a wild descent upon the south of England, and plundered the coast from the Isle of Wight to Sandwich. Driven away by the approach of Harold, he directed his forces to the Humber, but was beaten off by Edwin and Morcar, and forced to take refuge in Scotland.
All this while Harold had been watching the south coast, daily expecting to see the ships of William in the channel. But William never came, and the English churls were longing for their homes and harvests, so that the forces began to dwindle away. The English army, it should be remembered, was a militia, serving without pay and under compulsion. Such a force was particularly unwieldy, and particularly hard to keep together. At last, on September the 8th, the provisions failed, and Harold was compelled to disband his forces, leaving the southern coast bare.
Hardly had he done so, when he received tidings of a most formidable invasion of the north. The restless Tostig, undismayed by the utter miscarriage of his previous ventures, went in quest of allies to the courts of the North, and after an unsuccessful visit to the King of Sweden, obtained the powerful assistance of the King of Norway, Harold Hardrada, one of the greatest warriors of his time. The Norwegian king made his appearance with a powerful fleet at the mouth of the Tyne, and there Tostig joined him with the remnants of his former expedition.
They sailed some way up the Ouse, and then struck inland towards York, but at Fulford were met by the Earls Edwin and Morcar, at the head of a numerous host. The earls, however, were defeated with heavy loss, and the city of York, after a mutual exchange of hostages with the invaders, agreed to open its gates to receive Harold Hardrada as their king, and to join him in a war against Harold of England.
Harold Hardrada thereupon withdrew to Stamford Bridge, and it was there that Harold found him and the traitor Tostig. He had hastily gathered together an army consisting of his house-carls, thegns, and such men as could be collected on the spur of the moment, and advanced northwards by forced marches. On September the 25th he was in York, and, passing rapidly through it, fell upon the Northmen at Stamford Bridge, before they were aware that he was in the neighbourhood. The battle was fiercely contested, nevertheless, and though the Northmen, on the nearer side of the river Derwent, were driven into it and drowned, those on the farther side put themselves in battle array, and, by the time the English were over the bridge, were ready to meet them. After a tough contest, however, Harold Hardrada and Tostig were slain, and the enemy completely dispersed. According to the spirited account of Henry of Huntingdon, there was a parley between the two hosts before the battle, in which Harold offered Northumberland to Tostig, but to Harold Hardrada "six feet of the ground of England, or perchance more, seeing that he is taller than other men." This version of the story is, however, rejected by Professor Freeman, because of its inaccuracies of detail, though the conversation is consistent with what we know of the characters of Harold and Tostig. Harold was no less humane than brave. Instead of putting to death Olaf, the son of Hardrada, and the other captives who had fallen into his hands, he allowed them to go in peace. William of Malmesbury also relates that he offended a portion of his army by refusing them a share of the plunder, and that many in consequence abandoned his standard.
Had it not been for the impossibility of keeping the English host together, and for the absence of Harold in the north, it is difficult to see how William could ever have effected a landing. As it was, however, his course was perfectly unopposed upon the sea, and a landing was safely effected at Pevensey on September 29th, four days after the battle of Stamford Bridge. It is said that as William stepped on shore he fell, and rose with a morsel of earth in his hand, whereupon one of his followers happily remarked that he had taken seisin of the land. The investment, or seisin, in landed property was accomplished in those days by the lord presenting a clod of earth to his vassal, hence the remark was very pertinent.
From Pevensey, William marched to Hastings, and ravaged the country for provisions, constructing at the same time a wooden fort as a secure basis of operations. Harold was at York when he received the intelligence of the landing of the Norman host, and he made hot haste to London, whence he issued a summons to all the men of England to come to his aid against the invader.
But in the supreme hour of the fortunes of the English kingdom, it was found that the old disunion which the kings of Wessex had in vain attempted to overcome, was still as potent a factor for evil as in the days of the Danish invasions. From Wessex, and from the earldoms of Harold's brothers, men readily came to defend the fatherland; but Edwin and Morcar, with a short-sightedness and ingratitude which are almost incredible, kept back the men of the North, under the expectation that William, if he overcame, would be content with Wessex and the South, and that so the house of Leofric would profit by the overthrow of the house of Godwin.
Harold abode in London for six days, gathering his host together, and entered into negotiations with Duke William. That there was any sincerity on either side may be doubted, and probably the first proposal, which was sent apparently by Harold, was only made to gain time. It is said that William was offered a sum of money to depart. To this William replied by a series of clever propositions, of which the first was that Harold should give up the kingdom in exchange for the earldom of Northumberland, an offer which, if made, shows that the Norman duke by no means felt the ground to be safe under his feet. Then he is related to have appealed to the mediation of the Pope, a tolerably safe proposal, considering his previous dealings with the Holy See. Lastly, he is said to have challenged Harold to single combat, an offer which the king likewise declined, on the ground that this was not a mere personal quarrel, but a matter in which the whole English nation was concerned.
By the end of six days, Harold had collected a considerable force, and determined to risk a battle, and a consideration which influenced him not a little was the difficulty of provisioning so large a host without causing annoyance to the people. Here, as on previous occasions in his career, Harold was actuated by motives of humanity; but it may be doubted whether it would not have been wise to wait for more levies, and then overwhelm the Normans, who, man for man, were far better warriors than the English, by sheer numbers. He advanced, however, southwards, and halted on a hill called Senlac, to the north-west of Hastings.
The position was a very strong one, and Harold, with great military skill, fortified it with a palisade, thereby making a most formidable barrier against the Norman cavalry. The battle of Senlac, or Hastings, as it is popularly called, was fought on the 14th of October, and the evening before it was spent, it is said, by the Normans in prayer, and by the English in drinking and the singing of songs.
The battle began about nine o'clock. The English host was marshalled behind the palisade, all on foot, for they, unlike the Normans, were never fond of fighting on horseback, and Harold, with his brothers Gurth and Leofwine, stood under the royal standard. Against them the Normans advanced in three divisions, of which William commanded the centre. On the left was Alan of Brittany, with a force of Bretons, and troops from Maine and Poitou; on the right was Roger of Montgomery, at the head of the mercenary troops, whom William had hired from wherever they could be collected. The first attack failed completely, and the Normans, after a vain attempt to break down the palisade, were driven back in confusion, the Bretons being the first to fly. Unfortunately, in their excitement, some of the English soldiers pursued beyond the palisade, and were easily cut down in the plain. In the second attack, William of Normandy was unhorsed by Earl Gurth, but went against him on foot and cut him down; about the same time Leofwine was also slain.
Still, the English barrier was intact, and it seemed as if the Normans must withdraw in discomfiture. But William's generalship was equal to the occasion. He had seen how helpless the English were upon the open plain, and he resolved, therefore, to lure them from behind their defences by a feigned flight. The ruse was successful, and a considerable portion of the English army suffered for disobedience of Harold's orders by being compelled to make their escape as best they could to the broken ground to the back of the hill.
Still Harold fought on, and as evening was coming on, it seemed as if he might even yet be able to hold the field. Then William bethought him of another plan, and ordered his archers to shoot into the air, whereby the English were seriously incommoded. One of the falling shafts pierced Harold through the eye, and he was mortally wounded. The battle was to all intents ended when he died; his house-carls were killed at their posts, the light-armed troops fled into the rocks and swamps, inflicting severe losses upon such of their enemies as ventured to pursue them.
Thus did William of Normandy win the great battle of Hastings, which lasted from sunrise to sunset, and which, for the valour displayed by both armies and their leaders, was worthy to decide a contest for a crown. William, in the course of the battle, had three horses killed under him, and lost nearly fifteen thousand men; the loss of the English was probably considerably more.
William, at the height of his success, gave orders for the whole army to fall on their knees, and return God thanks for so signal a victory; after which he caused his tent to be pitched on the field of battle, and spent the residue of the night among the slain. Not less perhaps in gratitude for the past, than in the hope that such a work would procure him heavenly favour for the future, he solemnly vowed that he would erect a splendid abbey on the scene of this his first victory; and when this vow was accomplished, the altar of the abbey church stood on the spot where the standard of Harold had been planted. The holy house thus founded was called Battle Abbey.
On the morrow, he ordered his own dead to be buried, and gave the English peasants leave to do the same office for the others; but William refused to give up Harold's body to his mother, Gytha. An ancient manuscript in the Cottonian library, apparently written at Waltham Abbey about a hundred years after the battle, relates that two monks were deputed by William to search for the body of the king. Unable to distinguish it among the nameless dead by which it was surrounded, they sent for Harold's mistress, Edith, called "The Swan-necked," whose eye of affection was not to be deceived. It was buried under a heap of stones, whence William afterwards permitted it to be removed to Waltham.
There is a story related by Giraldus Cambrensis, that Harold, after receiving his wound, escaped from the field, and lived several years an anchorite in a cell near St. John's Church, in Chester. This account is, however, in the highest degree improbable, and there is no reason to doubt that the last of the Saxon kings died a soldier's death on the field of Hastings.
XI. ENGLISH AND NORMAN ARCHITECTURE AND CUSTOMS
Saxon Architecture; Theories about it--Documentary Evidence--Ancient Churches--Characters of the Saxon Style--Illustrations from an Anglo-Saxon Calendar--Old Manuscripts--English Scholarship--Music and the Minstrels--Musical Instruments--Games and Sports--Costume--The Table--Household Furniture--Material Condition of the People--Norman Costumes--Condition of Learning and the Arts--Refinement of the Normans--The Bayeux Tapestry.
Few subjects in mediæval art have led to so much controversy as that of English architecture; one party of writers claiming for it a place as a distinct and separate style, and another totally denying its very existence.
It was usual for writers on architecture before Rickman's time to denominate all buildings in which the semicircular arch or the zigzag moulding prevailed as "Saxon," no matter how highly finished or how richly carved they might be; and, consequently, all our fine Norman churches are in their works described as Saxon.
When this designation was proved to be incorrect, a reaction took place, and some of our writers went so far as to deny the existence of any building of a date anterior to the Conquest. It was argued by these writers that the English built with wood only, and that, consequently, all their erections had long since perished. But though it is true there is evidence to show that the usual material for building was wood, and that it was sometimes overlaid with lead and other metals, yet we find, on the other hand, in the works of early writers, indubitable proofs to show that stone was also used, particularly in rebuilding the churches and monasteries which had been destroyed by the Danes. Alfred set aside a sixth part of his income for this purpose, and we are told by Asser that "he built the houses majestic and good, beyond all the precedents of his ancestors, by his new mechanical contrivances."
It was first pointed out by Rickman that there were a number of churches in different parts of the kingdom which could be proved to be of very early date, while they did not agree in character either with the Roman remains, or with the earliest of the Norman churches; and that, in some instances, early Norman work had been built upon portions of these early buildings, thus affording conclusive evidence that these edifices must be of a prior date to that of the earliest Norman buildings.
Strong confirmatory evidence is also offered when we find it stated, in a contemporary manuscript, that a church was built on a certain spot by some well-known ecclesiastic at a given time, and still find standing on this spot a building, or portions of a building, of a style which cannot be referred to that of any subsequent period. We are justified in considering this the building so mentioned; and when we find all these buildings agreeing in certain general features, we are also justified in considering these as constituting the style of the period.
Of this documentary evidence, the following are examples. The venerable Bede, mentions the building of a monastery at Jarrow by Benedict Biscop in 681, and we now find standing on the spot a church, of which the chancel is of the rudest construction, and evidently of earlier date than the tower, which, from its style, cannot be much subsequent to the Conquest, and in which portions of the earlier building are built into the walls. The east window is of later date, but the side windows of the church (now blocked up) are of the rudest possible construction--round-headed, with the heads formed of a single stone. These are undoubtedly the work of Benedict.
The church of Monkwearmouth is also mentioned by Bede as having been built by the same Benedict, in 676. This church still stands, and bears indubitable proofs of its early date. The windows are divided by balusters, and have other features peculiar to the period.
A convent existed at Repton, in Derbyshire, in the seventh century, and was destroyed by the Danes in 875. The church was afterwards rebuilt, and such portions as had not perished were built into the new erection, and they may still be distinguished by the peculiarities of their style. The original crypt under the church still remains in a tolerably perfect state, and is a very remarkable specimen of the style.
Curious crypts of this date also exist under the Cathedral of Ripon, and at Hexham. The latter is particularly interesting, from its having been constructed of materials taken from the Roman road, which passes within a short distance of the place, and Roman inscribed slabs have been used in forming its roof.
In the Old English MSS. in the British Museum and the library of Salisbury Cathedral, and particularly in the paraphrase of Cædmon, in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, buildings of stone are distinctly shown in the illuminations, and these buildings exhibit "the long and short work" and other distinctive features of existing remains. This, therefore, may be taken as conclusive evidence that these buildings are of English origin.
The characteristics of this style are as follow:--
TOWERS.--These are without buttresses, generally of the same dimensions from the foundation to the top, but sometimes diminishing by stages. They are usually built of rubble, the stones being very irregular in size, with quoins at the angles, which are formed of long stones set perpendicularly, and shorter ones laid horizontally alternately with them. This is termed "long and short work". They are sometimes divided into stages, and the surface is intersected by upright projecting ribs of stone, as if the builder had before him for a model a tower constructed of timber and plaster, and had endeavoured to imitate this in stone. The finest example which we have of this kind of ornament is the tower of Earl's Barton Church, Northamptonshire; other examples also occur at Barton-on-Humber, and at Barnack.
These towers seem always to have been coated with plaster between the ribs of stone, and this gives them a still more timber-like appearance.
Some towers have not this ornament, and are quite plain. The kind of masonry called "herringbone" is frequently used, and Roman bricks taken from the ruins of earlier buildings are of frequent occurrence.
The upper portion of these Saxon towers has been destroyed, and replaced by later parapets; so that it is not easy to say in what manner they terminated. But the very remarkable tower of Sompting, in Sussex, offers a valuable solution of the difficulty. In this tower each side terminates in an acutely pointed gable, from which the roof is carried up, and, meeting in a point, forms a sort of short square spire, such as we still see in some of the churches in Germany. All these towers are without staircases, the different storeys being only to be reached by ladders. The circular or newel stair turret seems not to have been introduced till the twelfth century.
WINDOWS.--These are either round-headed or triangular-headed, and are frequently surrounded by a sort of framework of projecting stone. They are usually--but not always--deeply recessed on the outside as well as in the inside, the narrowest part of the window being in the centre of the wall. When the window is of two lights, it is divided by a small baluster or shaft, set in the middle of the wall; this supports an impost, which is generally one stone reaching through the entire thickness of the wall. Sometimes the heads of both single and double-light windows, instead of being arched, are made of two straight stones, meeting at the point, and forming a triangular head. The single lights are often little more than mere openings in the wall, frequently without ornament of any kind, the whole window being cut out of a single stone, as at Caversfield, and the jambs are often inclined, making the opening wider at the bottom than at the top. Ornament is seldom attempted, but at Deerhurst the shaft and jambs are adorned with a rude kind of fluting, and the imposts are cut into a series of simple square-edged mouldings. Roman bricks are sometimes used both for the jambs and for turning the arch, as at Brixworth. All these varieties of windows are very characteristic, and are not to be found in the later styles.
DOORWAYS.--These, like the windows, are either round or triangular-headed. The arches are generally turned of plain stones, without any moulding or ornament whatever--sometimes simple, and sometimes recessed; but the projecting framework of plain stone is not unfrequent, as may be seen at Earl's Barton, Stanton Lacy, &c. The imposts are as a rule plain, but sometimes ornamented with a series of singular mouldings, usually square-edged and plain, as at Barnack, or with a kind of fluting, as at Earl's Barton. At Sompting it is ornamented with a kind of scroll-work, though sculpture is seldom attempted. A cross is sometimes introduced above the door, as at Stanton Lacy, and it is remarkable that whenever the cross is used it is of the Greek form--that is, with the limbs of equal length in contradistinction to the Latin type, in which the lower member is the longest. The triangular heads of the doorways are formed either by two stones placed diagonally, and resting one upon the other, or partly by horizontal stones cut obliquely. Both these varieties may be seen at Barnack. Doorways are also sometimes built of tiles, taken from Roman buildings, as at Brixworth.
MOULDINGS AND SCULPTURES.--There are very few mouldings belonging to this style, the strings and other members being mostly square-edged and plain, though, as at Dunham Magna, they are sometimes alternately notched on the edges. The capitals and bases of the shafts and balusters, which divide the windows, are moulded chiefly with round and square moulding. The sculptures are few, and very rude, as at St. Benet's, Cambridge, where two lions are sculptured at the spring of the tower arch.
CAPITALS.--The abacus seems in all cases to be a plain, square-edged, flat member, without chamfer (in which it differs from the Norman). The bell of the capital is either globular, as at Jarrow, or moulded, as before mentioned, or cut into a rude imitation of foliage, or of the Corinthian volute, as at Sompting.
It is curious to observe the evident imitation of Roman work in these capitals. The beautiful capital of the Corinthian order appears to have attracted the attention of the rude English workman, and his first attempt at sculpture seems to have been to copy it. Its delicate and complicated foliage was too difficult for his hand, but he could make an imitation of its more prominent feature, the volute. This partiality for the volute was continued in the next century, through the early and late Norman, until, in the transition to the Early English, it produced those magnificent capitals of which we have a few examples in England, and so many on the Continent.
It must not be expected that all these peculiarities will be found in one building; but wherever any of them occur, there is reasonable presumption that the building is of early date and deserving of further investigation.
Illustrations drawn from ancient calendars are among the best documents one can consult for obtaining a knowledge of former manners and customs. The twelve designs which follow, and which may conveniently serve as an introduction to an account of English customs, are taken from an Anglo-Saxon calendar composed some time before the Norman Conquest, and preserved in the Cottonian Library. Some explanatory notes are added.
Anglo-Saxon Calendar.
JANUARY.--The heathen English called this month "Wolf-monath," because the wolves were then most ravenous. It was also called "Aefter-Yula," that is, After-Christmas. In the woodcut, four oxen are laboriously drawing the plough. At that time they did not use horses for field labour; and oxen are employed, even at the present day, in some localities.
FEBRUARY.--Here they are cutting down trees for firewood. The English called February "Sprout-kele." Kele meant "kelewurt," and was most extensively used at this time for making broth. The well-known custom of making pancakes on Shrove Tuesday is a remnant of an old superstition, and certainly one of the most pleasing that has come down to us.
MARCH was dedicated by the English to the goddess Rhoeda, and hence called "Rhede-monath." It was called also "Illyd-monath," or the stormy-month. In the woodcut they are digging, hoeing, and sowing with much ardour. After the introduction of Christianity, March was held in great reverence, as the month in which Lent began.
APRIL was "Oster-monath" because the wind generally blew from the east during this month. The woodcut appears to represent three thegns celebrating a feast by quaffing ale from their drinking-horns. On the right is an armed guard with a long spear, and on the left are two servitors. The bench on which the three worthy thegns are seated is adorned with two sculptures of formidable-looking animals. The use of chairs or sofas was then entirely unknown. They called the benches placed in the festal halls "mede benc," or "eale benc"--mead or ale benches.
MAY was called "Trimilki," because then they began to milk the kine three times in the day. In this woodcut shepherds are watching over the ewes and lambs. May-day was the great rural festival of the English, and was celebrated with pomp and rejoicing. This festival will soon be numbered amongst the things that were.
JUNE.--To June different names were given: "Weyd-monath," according to some, "because then the cattle began to weyd"--that is, feed in the meadows, which at that time were usually marshes. According to others, it was called "Midsummer month." This was the time of the year at which the English commenced their long voyages, and they are represented in the woodcut in the act of cutting down and dressing trees, in order to fit out their ships.
JULY was called by the English "Heu-monath," or foliage-month; also "Hey-monath," or hay-month, being the month in which they mowed and made hay, in which operations they are represented in the woodcut as being engaged. They also called it "Lida-aftera." meaning the second lida, or second month after the sun's descent.
AUGUST was by the English called "Arn-monath," or "Barn-monath," meaning harvest-month. The instruments which appear in the woodcut do not seem to differ much from those used at the present day. To the left appears a man sounding a horn, with a spear in his right hand. Whether he is superintending the labourers, or is one of a hunting party entering the field, it is hard to decide. The sheaves are being lifted by a fork into a cart, or wagon, of tolerably good construction.
SEPTEMBER was called "Gerst-monath"--barley-month; so named from the liquor called "beerlegh" made in that month, and hence "barley." The subject of the woodcut is a boar-hunt.
OCTOBER was called the "Cold-monath," or "Wyn-monath"--wine-month. The vine was extensively cultivated in England in olden times. The woodcut represents a hawking scene.
NOVEMBER was called "Wint-monath," or wind-month, as this was the season of the year when the cold storms commenced, which were generally considered to last till March. It was the custom to light great fires in the open air in honour of the gods, and as a means of driving away evil spirits. The men are here seen approaching one of these fires to warm themselves.
DECEMBER was called "Aerra Geola," because the sun then "turns his glorious course;" and after the introduction of Christianity, "Heilig-monath," or holy-month. December was, among the English, above all things, a month of festivity. Before the introduction of Christianity, Christmas was the feast of Thor, and the wassail bowl circulated as briskly in honour of the heathen god as it has done since at the Christian festival. The figures in the woodcut are engaged in threshing the corn, winnowing it with a fan, and carrying it away.
The foregoing designs afford, probably, as good an idea as can now be obtained of the occupations and amusements of our English forefathers, and of their daily life in time of peace.
The monasteries were the schools of the Middle Ages, in which all secular knowledge, as well as religious doctrine, was cultivated. Previous to the invention of printing, books were transcribed with great pains and labour. Not only was the mere task of copying a book by hand a work of considerable time, but the illuminations or embellishments with which the more valuable manuscripts were adorned, were executed with a degree of care and finish demanding infinite skill and industry. The annexed engravings are copied with scrupulous fidelity from various MSS. still extant, and serve to show some of the different kinds of writing which are found in those documents. Many of the MSS. also contain on each page paintings representing scenes either connected with the narrative in the text or otherwise. Sometimes they are ornamented with portraits of saints, kings, or other great men. These figures, as well as the other ornamental portions of the work, are brilliantly coloured, and are often represented on a gold ground.
The parchment used was of various kinds; that which was the finest and whitest being employed for the most valuable manuscripts. For gilding upon parchment, our ancestors employed both gold powder and leaf gold, which was fixed upon a white embossment, generally supposed to be a calcareous preparation. The subjects of the paintings were taken from sacred or profane history, but the artist invariably represented the costume and customs of his own time, and to these illuminations we owe most of the knowledge we possess of those customs. The English displayed proficiency in this branch of painting at an early period; and though it is not easy to trace the rise and progress of the art, there is evidence of its flourishing condition from the eighth to the eleventh centuries, in the numerous manuscripts of that date, which fortunately still remain both in England and in the collections on the Continent.
Previous to the introduction of Christianity, the English possessed no literature worthy of the name. It is not, however, to be supposed that the people were destitute of intellectual power; for when our forefathers began to apply themselves to the pursuit of knowledge, the progress of literature was remarkably rapid. Within one hundred years after the light of knowledge dawned upon the English, Bede appeared, with other men, whose abilities and teaching exerted a marked influence upon the spread of English learning.
The English scholars, though defective in actual knowledge, had just conceptions of the objects of philosophy. Alcuin defines it to be the study of natural things, and the knowledge of divine and human affairs. All the subjects comprised by Alcuin in physics are arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. That larger field of science to which we now give the name of physics had not yet been discovered, nor had chemistry, mineralogy, and the other analogous sciences.
A fair idea of the condition of mental and moral science previous to the Norman conquest, may be obtained from an extant dialogue between Alcuin and Pepin, the son of Charles the Great. Some of the questions, with the answers, are subjoined:--
"What is life?--The gladness of the blessed; the sorrow of the wretched; the expectation of death.
"What is death?--The inevitable event; the uncertain pilgrimage; the tears of the living; the confirmation of our testament; the thief of man.
"What is sleep?--The image of death.
"What is man's liberty?--Innocence.
"What is the brain?--The preserver of the memory.
"What is the sun?--The splendour of the world; the beauty of heaven; the honour of day; the distributor of the hours.
"What is the moon?--The eye of night; the giver of dew; the prophetess of the weather.
"What is rain?--The earth's conception; the mother of corn.
"What is the earth?--The nurse of the living; the store-house of life; the devourer of all things.
"What is the sea?--The path of audacity; the divider of regions; the fountain of showers.
"What is a ship?--A wandering house; a perpetual inn; a traveller without footsteps.
"What makes bitter things sweet?--Hunger.
"What makes men never weary?--Gain.
"What gives sleep to the watching?--Hope.
"Who is he that will rise higher if you take away his head?--Look in your bed, and you will find him there."
The following account, taken from William of Malmesbury, of the social condition of the English people at the time of the Conquest, indicates a decline of literature and the arts at that period. The picture may probably be overdrawn, but the main facts are correct. "In process of time, the desire after literature and religion had decayed, for several years before the arrival of the Normans. The clergy, contented with a very slight degree of learning, could scarcely stammer out the words of the sacraments, and a person who understood grammar was an object of wonder and astonishment. The nobility were given up to luxury and wantonness. The commonalty, left unprotected, became a prey to the most powerful, who amassed fortunes, either by seizing on their property or by selling their persons into foreign countries; although it be an innate quality of this people to be more inclined to revelling than to the accumulation of wealth. Drinking was a universal practice, in which they passed entire nights, as well as days. They consumed their substance in mean and despicable houses, unlike the Normans and French, who, in noble and splendid mansions, lived with frugality."
Music was cultivated by our ancestors from a very remote period. Among the English the music on which most attention was bestowed was that employed in the services of religion. Singing in churches is said to have been introduced into England in the fourth century.
Among the northern nations the Scalds were at once the poets and musicians. Like the bards of the Britons, they celebrated the deeds of the great and brave in heroic poems, which were sung to the sounds of the lyre or the harp. After the conquest of Britain by the English, these minstrels remained in high favour among the people, and were received with respect and veneration in the courts of kings and the halls of the nobles. In the English language they were known by two appellations, the one equivalent to the English word gleemen, or merry-makers, and the other harpers, derived from the instrument on which they usually played.
The gleemen were jugglers and pantomimists, as well as minstrels, and they were accustomed to associate themselves in companies, and amuse the spectators with feats of strength and agility, dancing, and sleight-of-hand tricks.
Among the minstrels who came into England with William the Conqueror was one named Taillefer, of whom it is related that he was present at the battle of Hastings, and took his place at the head of the Norman army, inspiriting the soldiers by his songs. Before the battle commenced he advanced on horseback towards the English lines, and casting his spear three times into the air, he caught it each time by the iron head and threw it among his enemies, one of whom he wounded. He then drew his sword and threw it into the air, catching it, as he had done the spear, with such dexterity, that the English who saw him believed that he was gifted with the power of enchantment.
The term minstrel, or, in Norman-French, ministraulx, came into use in England soon after the Conquest, at which time it is believed that the class of minstrels and jesters grew much more numerous. The general language of France in the ninth century was the langue d'Oc, which closely resembled the dialects of the Catalonian. The language of the north, or langue d'Oil, varied but little from it. At this period the flowing accents of the southern tongue were wedded to music by minstrels, who were called troubadours in the southern provinces, and trouveres in the north.
These poets became known throughout Europe for their songs of love and war, in which they celebrated the beauty of women and the achievements of the brave. The minstrels enjoyed many privileges, and travelled from place to place, in time of war as well as of peace, in perfect safety. Their persons were held sacred, and they were received wherever they went with the warmest welcome and hospitality.
In England the professors of the minstrel's art were of various classes, which were distinguished by the several names of singers, relaters of heroic actions, jesters, balancers, jugglers, and story-tellers. At this period every great baron kept a jester as a part of his household establishment.
The word jester, in its original sense, did not necessarily mean joker, or buffoon, but teller of tales, which might be of a kind to excite either laughter or pity. The jesters, however, were usually employed at feasts and in the hours of conviviality, and they found the tales of merriment so much more popular at such times, that it is probable the more serious part of their vocation fell into disuse. In later times the jesters and japers became mere merry-andrews, whose business it was to excite mirth by jokes and ludicrous gesticulations.
In olden times the number of musical instruments was considerable, but their names were still more numerous, because they were derived from the form and character of instruments which varied according to the caprice of the maker or the musician. Each nation had its peculiar instruments of music, and as these were described in each language by names appropriate to their qualities, the same instrument was frequently known by many names, while the same names sometimes applied to several instruments. The Romans, after their conquests, were in the habit of carrying back with them the music and the instruments which they found among the conquered nations, and thus it happened that, at a certain epoch, all the musical instruments of the known world were collected in the capital of the empire. At the fall of Rome, many of these fell into disuse and were forgotten; they were no longer needed to celebrate the festivals of pagan deities, or to add gaiety to the ovations to the emperors in the capitol. A letter of St. Jerome to Dardanus (de diversis generibus musicorum instrumentorum) gives an account of those instruments which remained in existence in the fifth century. St. Jerome enumerates the organ, various kinds of trumpets, the cithara, in the form of a Greek delta ([Greek: D]), with twenty-four strings; the psalterium, a small harp of a square form, with ten strings; the tympanum, or hand-drum, and several others.
These seem to have been almost the only musical instruments in use in the fifth century. A nomenclature of a similar kind appears in the ninth century, in a manuscript life of Charles the Great, by Aymeric de Peyra,[1] from which we find the number of instruments to have been nearly doubled in the course of four centuries, and their forms during this period had continually varied.
The flute is the most ancient of all instruments of music, and in the Middle Ages was found in many varieties. Among these was the double flute of the classic form, having two stems. The stem held in the left hand (sinistra) was for the high notes, and that held in the right hand (dextra) for the low notes. The two stems were sometimes held together, sometimes separate.
About the year 951, there was made for the church at Winchester an organ which, in size and construction, surpassed any that had hitherto been seen. This organ was divided into two parts, each having its bellows, its key-board, and its player; twelve bellows above and fourteen below were set in motion by sixty-six strong men, and the wind was passed along forty valves into four hundred pipes, arranged in groups of ten, and to each of these groups corresponded one of the twenty-four keys of each key-board. In spite of the great size of this organ, we can hardly believe that its sound was heard over the whole town (undique per urbem), as we are told by a contemporary poet.
The syrinx, which was, in fact, the Pandean pipe, was composed usually of seven tubes of unequal length, forming a straight line at the top for the mouth of the player.
Trumpets were much in use among the English, and were employed in the chase and in the tourney, as well as in sounding the charge in battle. They were also used at feasts, public assemblies, and as signals by which one man could communicate with another at a distance beyond the reach of the voice.
The lyre, which was the principal stringed instrument of the Greeks and the Romans, preserved its primitive form until the tenth century. The number of cords varied from three to eight. The lyre of the North--which was unquestionably the origin of the violin, and which already presented the shape of that instrument--had a bridge in the middle of the sound-board.
The psalterium, which must not be confounded with the psalterion of the thirteenth century, was a little portable harp, played either with one or both hands. After the fifth century its shape varied, and was sometimes square or triangular, and sometimes round. In the tenth century the psalterium gave place to the cithara, a name by which various stringed instruments had at first been vaguely described.
The English harp was at first only a triangular cithara, but that of the ninth century appears to have differed little from the modern instrument of that name, and the simplicity and elegance of its form had arrived nearly at perfection. The English gleemen usually sang to the harp, and this instrument was also in common use among persons who did not follow the profession of minstrels. Bede tells us that, as early as the seventh century, it was customary at convivial meetings to hand a harp from one person to another; and that every one present played upon it in turn, singing a song to the music. This may be presumed to have been the case when the professional harper, whose business it was to amuse the company, was not present.
Games and exercises of strength and agility were common among the Anglo-Saxons. St. Cuthbert is stated by Bede to have excelled in running, wrestling, and other athletic sports. Feats of juggling were performed by the gleemen, who were the most important characters in the festivals and other popular gatherings. Some of the gleemen seem to have performed tricks, gambols, and feats of all kinds, while others were harpers, or bards, and ballad-singers.
The in-door sports were various, and suitable to different ranks. The games of chess and backgammon were both known, or at least games very similar to them. Backgammon is said to have been invented in the tenth century.
The English and other German nations, as well as the Normans, were strongly attached to the sports of the field. At an early period we find that hunting was considered a necessary part of the education of every man of gentle blood. Alfred the Great, before he was twelve years of age, is represented to have "excelled in all the branches of that most noble art, to which he applied with incessant labour." We are told also that Edward the Confessor, though unlike his illustrious ancestor in most respects, delighted to follow a pack of hounds.
Hawking was a recreation in high favour among the nobles of the Middle Ages, and was practised also by the clergy and by ladies. In the Bayeux tapestry Harold is represented with his hounds by his side, and a hawk in his hand, when brought before William of Normandy. Such a mode of travelling was common among the noblemen of this period. Persons of high rank rarely appeared without their hawks, and sometimes even carried them into battle. These birds were considered as the symbols of nobility, and a man who gave up his hawk was regarded as disgraced and dishonoured. The birds were trained and tended with the greatest care. To prevent them from seeing, their heads were covered with a little cap fastened behind with straps, and adorned with a plume. The falcons of princes and great nobles were known by these plumes, being of the feathers of the bird of paradise. Thus armed, the birds were carried to the chase in a cage, and when it rained were covered with an umbrella, similar to that represented in the illustration.
When the falcon became accustomed to his master, it was necessary to familiarise him to the noise of dogs and men; and to prevent the risk of his flying away, he was trained by means of the lure, which was an imitation of a bird. On the lure was placed a small piece of warm flesh of fowl, and the falcon was taught to come and eat at the voice of the falconer. A cord was attached to the bird's leg, and the person holding the cord retired to some paces' distance, while another lifted the bird's cap, and set him at liberty. The falconer then called the bird, showing the lure.
These details, with the accompanying engravings, are taken from the "Livre du Roy Modus," the most ancient of all the works on Hawking.
The tournament, which was the principal amusement of the Norman nobility at the time of the Conquest, was not introduced into England until the reign of Stephen. Various military exercises were, however, in existence, among which was the quintain. A staff, from which a shield was hung, was fixed in the ground, and the performer, on horseback, rode full tilt at the mark, endeavouring to strike the shield with his lance. Sometimes the quintain was the figure of a Turk or Saracen, which was placed on a pivot in such a manner that, if the horseman failed to strike it in the face, he received a severe blow from the other end of the quintain, which turned round with great velocity.
Some military sports are described by Strutt as peculiar to the young men of London in the twelfth century. At this period, also, he tells us that it was common for the young men and maidens of the city to meet for dancing and merry-making after the labours of the day, and that the city damsels played on the citherns, and kept up the dance by the light of the moon (usque imminente lunâ).
Many other sports were also common at this period, among which may be noticed sword and buckler play, and various games of ball.
The leisure hours of the English women were spent in spinning, or in similar employments; and the lady of the house did not disdain to be among her maids, encouraging and assisting them in their duties. Strutt relates the following account, given by Ingulphus, of Edith, queen to Edward the Confessor:--"I have often seen her," he says, "while I was yet a boy, when my father was at the king's palace; and as I came from school, when I have met her, she would examine me in my learning, and from grammar she would proceed to logic (which she also understood), concluding with me in the most subtle argument; then causing one of her attendant maids to present me with three or four pieces of money, I was dismissed, being sent to the larder, where I was sure to get some eatables." The simplicity of manners here described soon disappeared when the throne of England was occupied by the Norman king.
The English appear to have been exceedingly fond of dress. Ladies of rank wore necklaces, bracelets, and rings, set with precious stones. Mantles, kirtles, and gowns were also in general use; and rouge was not unknown to them.
In the men this taste for finery degenerated into effeminacy. They wore golden collars, and not unfrequently precious stones round the neck; and the wealthy wore costly bracelets and rings. They had silk, linen, and woollen garments. Silk, from its costliness, was used only by the wealthy. The fashion of their garments of course varied. They had large mantles, which were ornamented with gold and gems; close coats or tunics, girded with a belt, which Strutt represents as having been put on over the head like a shirt. Many Englishmen are not aware that the smockfrock of the husbandmen of our own day is a pure piece of old-English costume; and if it were well made, tightened with a broad belt, and worn by a man of good carriage, it would form a much handsomer dress than the unmeaning stiff-cut coats of our time. Socks and stockings, and other covering for the legs, are mentioned by English writers.
The articles of costume were of great variety. A taste for gorgeous finery appears in the dress of the male sex. We read of a king's coronation garment being made of silk woven with gold flowers; and of a cloak studded with gold and gems. The dress of the soldiers and civilians usually consisted of a close coat or tunic, reaching only to the knee, and a short cloak over the left shoulder, which buckled on the right. This cloak was often trimmed with an edging of gold. The kings and nobles also commonly wore a dress very similar to this, only richer and more elegant. In the paintings of the MSS. the women are usually represented in a long loose robe, reaching to the ground, and with loose sleeves, the latter sometimes hanging a yard in length. Upon the head is a hood or veil, which falls down before, and is gathered into folds round the neck and breast. The robe is often ornamented with broad borders of different colours.
Both men and women wore shoes, or rather slippers; the legs of the men being covered half way up with a kind of bandage wound round, or else a straight stocking reaching above the knee. Up to the period of the Conquest, the taste for gold ornaments had increased; and massive bracelets for the arms and neck, rings for the fingers, and chains of gold were common. Among the nobility circlets of gold set with jewels were worn on the head; and belts and girdles were much admired, and were often richly ornamented.
From the paintings of some of the English MSS. a knowledge may be gathered of their customs at table. In the engraving of "The English Dinner Party" given on page 101, the table is of an oval form, and covered with a cloth. Upon it, besides a knife and spoon, there are a bowl with a fish, two other dishes, and some loaves of bread. At each end of the table are two attendants upon their knees, with a dish in one hand, and in the other a spit holding a piece of meat, which they are presenting to the guests. In other drawings of the MSS. the table is of a different form; ladies are shown as present, and the two sexes are arranged apparently without any precise order.
Cups of gold and silver were used, and also of bone and wood. Horns were much in vogue at table. A curiously carved horn of the Old English times is still preserved in York Cathedral. Glass vessels were little known in this country previous to the Norman Conquest. A disciple of Bede applied to Lullus in France, to know if there was any man in that neighbourhood, who could make glass vessels well; "for," said he, "we are ignorant and helpless in this art."
Of the furniture in use among the English little information has come down to us. Mention may, however, be made of hangings to be suspended on the walls of rooms, and adorned with figures of golden birds in needlework. The love of gaudy colours which prevailed at that day was apparent in the furniture as well as in the dresses of the people; and the hangings and curtains were stained with purple and various other colours. Among the benches and chairs in use, some are represented as having animals' heads at the extremities.
Candles have probably been in use from a period of high antiquity, and were certainly known in the tenth century. The English word for candlestick--candelsticca--seems to denote that the earlier candlesticks were made of wood. At this period the candle was not placed in a socket, as at present, but fixed on a long spike.
We find mention made of a curtain, sheets, and other clothes appertaining. A pillow of straw is also mentioned. Bear-skins were sometimes used as a part of bed furniture.
The English seem to have practised great personal cleanliness. The use of warm baths was common, for mention is made of a nun, who, as an act of voluntary penance, washed in them only on festivals. It was also enjoined by the canons as a charitable duty to give to the poor meal, fire, fodder, bathing, bed and clothes.
At the time of the Conquest the condition of the people in France and Normandy differed little from what it was in our own country, though superior refinement reigned at the courts. The nobles and higher ecclesiastics, all who possessed wealth, or who were in a position to seize it by force, inhabited their castles and country houses, where they collected about them whatever the age could afford of objects of luxury and elegance. Solitude and discouragement reigned around their dwellings. Industry and the arts languished obscurely in the towns, and commerce, restrained in its developments, was often conducted in secrecy and danger. The merchant was compelled to travel with his goods from the castle of one baron to that of another, and, living without a fixed residence or depôt for them, he could by this means escape the exactions of the nobles, who, in fact, were to some extent dependent upon his services. Frequently the baron would cause some of his serfs to learn the mechanical arts, so that the several labours of the carpenter, the armourer, the tailor, &c., might be available at once when required.
From an early period the Franks of noble race wore long hair and beards, and the custom of Christian priests was the same until the third and fourth centuries. In the time of Charles the Great the costume was still simple. The Franks piqued themselves upon their elegance; of which an example may be found in the journey of Rigonda, daughter of Childeric, to visit the king of the Spanish Goths, to whom she was betrothed. "Rigonda, daughter of Childeric, arrived at Tours with her treasures. Seeing that she had reached the frontier of the Goths, she began to retard her march, and so much the more because those about her said it was necessary for her to stop in that neighbourhood, because they were fatigued with the journey; their clothes were dirty, their shoes worn out, and the harness of their horses and chariots in a bad condition. They insisted that it was necessary, first, to place these things in good order, so as to continue the journey, and appear with elegance before their lady's future husband, lest, if they arrived badly equipped among the Goths, they should be laughed at."[2]
The Normans, who arrived with their short dresses and coats of mail, adopted the costume of the Franks, which they followed in all its phases; and in the following century they began to introduce the fashions of the Continent into England. At the time of the Conquest, however, the custom generally prevailed among the Normans of shaving not only the beard, but the back of the head, as appears from the figures in the Bayeux tapestry.
In the tenth and eleventh centuries the costume of the higher classes usually consisted of a long tunic, confined by a girdle, over which was a large cloak. The soldiers wore a short coat of mail over a tunic, which descended to the knees; their arms comprised the long-bow, the crossbow, the sword, lance, buckler, and gisarme. The gisarme is said to be the weapon called the brown bill by Chaucer. It was in general use in the twelfth century, and was retained as late as the battle of Flodden.
The costume of the women of Normandy consisted of a simple head-dress, with long robes girded about the waist. In paintings of this period the hair is seldom seen, but the manner in which it was worn appears to have varied. Sometimes it is represented as gathered tightly about the head, and sometimes it descends in long plaits upon the shoulders. Princesses and ladies of rank wore a robe of ermine, or a tunic either with or without sleeves; a veil was also added, which covered the head, and descended in folds over the bosom.
After the death of Charles the Great literature and the arts in France experienced a gradual decline until the tenth century, when a new and remarkable impetus was given to learning by the Moors in Spain. English learning, which had flourished during the reigns of Alfred and his immediate successors, began rapidly to decay during the stormy period of the Danish invasions; and from the time of the accession of Canute to that of the Norman Conquest little or no revival of letters appears to have taken place. During the period which intervened between these two events the country enjoyed a considerable degree of repose, and it can hardly be doubted that some of the schools and religious houses were re-established; but the long period of peace was marked by the growth of indolence and sensuality among the people, rather than by the spread of education.
William the Conqueror, says a modern writer, "patronised and loved letters. He filled the bishoprics and abbacies of England with the most learned of his countrymen, who had been educated at the University of Paris, at that time the most flourishing school in Europe. Many of the Norman prelates preferred in England by the Conqueror were polite scholars. Godfrey, Prior of St. Swithin's, at Winchester, a native of Cambray, was an elegant Latin epigrammatist, and wrote with the smartness and ease of Martial; a circumstance which, by the way, shows that the literature of the monks at this period was of a more liberal cast than that which we commonly annex to their character and profession."
William founded the abbeys of Battle and Selby, with other religious houses, and endowed them with ample revenues. Many of his nobles were incited by his example to the erection of monasteries upon their estates. These institutions, which afforded leisure and protection to men of letters, acted as powerful incentives to the pursuit of learning, and promoted in no small degree the interest of literature.
The art of the sculptor had made little progress in Europe previous to the tenth century. Two centuries later, the Burgundian school was in its zenith, and enriched the churches and monasteries of France with many admirable specimens of sculpture. Bernard II., Abbé of Montier-Saint-Jean, in rebuilding the door of his church, caused it to be adorned with representations of the Saviour and the twelve apostles; and in other instances the arts were applied to decorate the religious houses, or the graves of the illustrious dead.
In Normandy we find at this period the names of several sculptors celebrated for their works. Among these was Otho, the sculptor of the tomb of William the Conqueror, in 1087, and other monuments of a similar kind; Azo, builder of the cathedral of Sens, and of several others. The masons and sculptors of Normandy formed at this epoch an important corporation.
At the beginning of the twelfth century, when the Normans became securely established in their conquests, they displayed the utmost activity in the erection of magnificent buildings both in England and Normandy. According to William of Malmesbury,[3] churches rose up in every village, and monasteries in the towns and cities, built in a style unknown before. "You might behold ancient buildings restored upon their sites throughout the country, so that each wealthy man considered that day as lost to him, on which he neglected to perform some magnificent action."
The Anglo-Norman barons who engaged in these works obtained from their own country and from France the assistance of the best architects and sculptors. William of Sens, one of these artists, reconstructed the cathedral of Canterbury in 1176; and other foreign artists were employed to restore the abbeys of Croyland, of York, of Monkwearmouth, and others.
While it is evident that results highly favourable to the progress of literature and the arts in this country were produced by the Norman conquest, there is also every reason to believe that the tendency to sensuality, which was so strong among the English people, experienced a salutary check from the introduction of Norman manners. The foreign invasion entailed immediate sufferings upon the conquered race, but its results were favourable to the progress of civilisation, and tended in no small degree to the advance of the nation in power and greatness.
The Normans are understood to have introduced into England many elegancies and refinements in the habits of common life and the customs of the table. It has been already stated that the English were a people of gross appetite, who were accustomed to spend many hours of the day at feasts. The Normans, on the other hand, appear, on their arrival in England, to have distinguished themselves by the moderation and refinement of their mode of living. Among the dainties held in the highest esteem by the Normans were the peacock and the crane. The boar's head was considered a regal dish, and it was brought in at great feasts in a kind of procession, preceded by musicians.
It would appear that the improvements thus introduced were rather moral than material, as we find no mention made of new articles of furniture or other conveniences as having appeared at the time of the Conquest. Our information on this subject, is, however, scanty, and it is probable that the improvement of taste and increased wealth were soon manifested in the application of the useful and decorative arts to the conveniences of domestic life.
A most faithful and valuable record of costumes and manners at the time of the Conquest is to be found in the remarkable work known as the Bayeux Tapestry, which tradition has, probably with justice, ascribed to Matilda, the wife of the Conqueror.
The Bayeux tapestry is a chronicle of the conquest of England by the Normans, opening with the mission of Harold to Duke William, and terminating with the battle of Hastings. The designs, which were probably the work of an Italian artist, are represented in worsted work, the colours of which, notwithstanding the great age of the tapestry, are still bright and distinct. The tapestry was placed at an early period in a side chapel of the cathedral of Bayeux, where it was regarded with veneration by the people. During the consulate of Napoleon, the ancient relic was removed from Bayeux to Paris, where it remained for several months, and was visited by the First Consul himself. At the present time the tapestry is preserved in the library of the town of Bayeux, and is exposed to view in glass cases.
This remarkable monument of skill and industry originally formed one piece; and, according to a learned authority,[4] measures two hundred and twenty-seven feet in length, by about twenty inches in breadth. The groundwork of it is a strip of rather fine linen cloth, which, through age, has assumed the tinge of brown holland. The stitches consist of lines of coloured worsted laid side by side, and bound down at intervals by cross fastenings. The colours chiefly used are dark and light blue, red, pink, yellow, buff, and dark and light green.
The central portion of the tapestry is occupied with the delineation of the narrative, and there is also an ornamental border at the top and bottom of the field, which contains figures of birds and beasts. Many of these are of fantastic shapes, and are, probably, meant to represent the dragons, griffins, and other fabulous creatures which are so often referred to in the romances of that period.
The two upper lines of the engraving of the tapestry on page 105 are consecutive. They have been chosen for illustration as affording a favourable view of the character of the design. The story is taken up at the part where Harold, after swearing fealty to William of Normandy on the relics of the saints, returns to England, and presents himself to King Edward. The first words which occur over the figures at the top of the page are, "Anglicam terram." The complete sentence, the former part of which is omitted in the engraving, reads thus:--"Hic Harold dux reversus est Anglicam terram" ("Here the Lord Harold returned to England"). The horsemen of Harold's train are represented on their way to the court; "Et venit ad Edwardum regem" ("And came to Edward the king"). Farther on we see Edward seated on his throne, and Harold receiving audience and communicating the ill success of his adventure.
The tapestry proceeds to depict Harold's unfortunate descent upon the Norman coast, his capture by Guy of Ponthieu, his release by William the Conqueror, the expedition into Brittany, and the ceremony of the fateful oath. "Hic Willelmus venit Bagias ubi Haroldus sacramentum fecit" ("Here William comes to Bayeux, where Harold takes an oath") is all the information we have on this most important event.
Worn down by anxiety, and by the anticipation of evils which he foresaw, but was unable to prevent, Edward the Confessor soon afterwards died, and was buried at Westminster, in the church which he had himself built in a new and costly style of architecture. The tapestry shows us the church of St. Peter, at Westminster, and the funeral procession of the king. It will be observed that the church, which was built in the Early Norman style, is provided at one end with a weathercock, which a workman is represented in the act of putting up. "By this," says the authority already quoted, "the designer of the tapestry means to show that the work was but just completed, when the interment of the Confessor took place. A hand appears over the western end of the church to denote the finger of Providence, and to indicate that it was the will of God that the remains of the deceased king should be deposited in that building." The arrangements of the funeral procession are simple--a boy appears at each side of the bier ringing bells, and various attendants and priests are following. The words written above are: "Hic portatur corpus Edwardi regis ad ecclesiam sancti Petri Apostoli" ("Here the body of King Edward is carried to the church of St. Peter the Apostle").
Then the artist represents to us the election of Harold; the appearance of the comet at Eastertide which filled men's mind with fear, and the anger of Duke William when he heard of the choice of the English. Then follows a series of most spirited representations of the Norman preparations; the working men felling trees, preparing planks, and dragging the ships to the shore. Presently the great armament is observed in full sail across the Channel, and a little farther on the horses disembark. Then comes a series of tableaux representing the movements of William and his comrades until Harold comes southwards. "Hic milites exierunt de Hestengâ et venerunt ad prelium contra Haroldum regem" ("Here the soldiers have departed from Hastings and march to battle against Harold the king").
The engraving on this page is taken from another portion of the tapestry, and represents the battle of Hastings. The thick of the combat is here delineated, according to the inscription, "Hic ceciderunt simul Angli et Franci in prelio" ("Here at the same time English and French fell in the battle"). Horses and men are tumbling about in the agonies of death. The mailed coats and pointed helmets of the Normans are easily distinguished from the English costume. Farther on we find a party of English posted on the hill, who are making a desperate stand against the enemy with their lances. At a time when the fortune of the day seemed turning against the Normans, Odo of Bayeux galloped among the soldiers, and restored their drooping courage. He is represented in the tapestry with a staff, probably a badge of authority, and the inscription above is: "Hic Odo episcopus, tenens baculum, confortat pueros" ("Here Bishop Odo, holding a staff, encourages the soldiers").
The last figure in the engraving is that of the Duke of Normandy, who is represented at the head of his troops waving his sword. The inscription runs: "Hic est Dux Wilhelm" ("This is Duke William").
The tapestry itself goes on to delineate other details of the battle, describes the place where Harold fell, and ends with the flight of the English before the conquering troops of Normandy.