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Some Latin poems as evidence for the reign of Athelstan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Michael Lapidge
Michael Lapidge
Affiliation:
Clare Hall, Cambridge
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Extract

Like his illustrious grandfather, Alfred, King Athelstan (924–39) combined a distinguished and successful career as soldier and statesman with more overtly intellectual pursuits. He restored monasteries, established new bishoprics and was an extremely generous benefactor of churches throughout England. William of Malmesbury reports a view allegedly shared by his twelfth-century contemporaries, that ‘no one more just or more learned ever governed the kingdom’. William's assessment has been endorsed by modern historians. Stenton, for example, wrote of Athelstan that ‘in character and cast of mind he is the one West Saxon king who will bear comparison with Alfred’. As in the case of Alfred, we are moderately well informed concerning Athelstan's military exploits and political achievements from early chronicles. But whereas we also have sound evidence for the literary enterprise of Alfred's reign both in the pages of Asser and in the surviving Old English translations which were executed under Alfred's sponsorship, we have no comparable evidence for the reign of Athelstan. Here the contemporary evidence is limited to a couple of Latin letters addressed to the king, a series of royal diplomas issued in his name and a miscellany of (largely incomprehensible) Latin verse. In face of this pitiful collection of contemporary evidence scholars have seized upon a poem quoted at some length by William of Malmesbury, have declared it a near-contemporary document and have used it to fill the void in the historical record – without ever having examined the poem's credentials to authenticity and antiquity with care. I propose to examine the miscellaneous Latin verse contemporary with Athelstan's reign presently; but since the poem quoted by William of Malmesbury has loomed so large in previous discussions of the reign, it may serve as an appropriate point of departure.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anglo-Saxon England , Volume 9 , December 1980 , pp. 61 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1980

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References

1 The best assessment of Athelstan's intellectual attainments is still that of Robinson, J. A., The Times of St Dunstan (Oxford, 1923), pp. 25–80.Google Scholar

2 De Gestis Regum Anglorum, ed. W. Stubbs, 2 vols., Rolls Ser. (London, 1887–1889Google Scholar; hereafter GR) 1, 144.

3 Stenton, F. M., Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd ed. (Oxford, 1971), p. 356.Google Scholar

4 A letter by Radbod of Dol to Athelstan, preserved only by William, of Malmesbury, (De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum, ed. Hamilton, N. E. S. A., RS (London, 1872Google Scholar; hereafter GP), pp. 399–400; trans. Whitelock, D., English Historical Documents c. 500–1042 (London, 1955Google Scholar; hereafter EHD), pp. 821–2), and a letter to Athelstan asking protection for a Breton monk travelling in England, ptd Stubbs, W., Memorials of St Dunstan, RS (London, 1874), pp. 381–2Google Scholar (note that Stubbs's, reading Britannia circa marina (p. 381Google Scholar) is an error for MS Britannia citra marina = ‘Brittany’).

5 Athelstan's charters await systematic investigation, but there are some suggestive preliminary remarks by D. A. Bullough, ‘The Educational Tradition in England from Alfred to Ælfric: Teaching utriusque linguae’, La scuola nell'occidente latino dell'alto medioeveo, Settimane di studio del Centro italiano di studi sull'alto medioevo 19 (Spoleto, 1972), 453–94, at 466–78.Google Scholar

6 More poetic evidence from the reign of Athelstan may yet come to light. A library catalogue from Glastonbury of 1247 lists the following item: ‘Epistolae Alqvini, Albini & Karoli, & bella Etheltani regis…’ (Iobannis Glastoniensis Chronica siue Historia de Rebus Glastoniensibus, ed. T. Hearne, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1726) 11, 438Google Scholar). What these were – and indeed whether they were in poetic form – we have no way of knowing, but note that they are bella in the plural. I do not discuss here the metrical martyrology in the so-called ‘Athelstan Psalter’, BL Cotton Galba A. xviii (ed. Hampson, R. T., Medii Aevi Kalendarium, 2 vols. (London, 1841) 1, 397–420Google Scholar; see Bullough, ‘The Educational Tradition’, pp. 462–3), since there is no evidence that it belongs to the reign of Athelstan rather than – more probably – to that of Edward the Elder.

7 GR 1, 145–6 and 151–2. The poem is listed in D. Schaller and Könsgen, E., Initia carminum Latinorum saeculo undecimo antiquiorum (Göttingen, 1977Google Scholar; no. 14120, where it is dated ‘inc. saec. x’). Two lines of the poem are quoted in the twelfth-century Chronicon Rameseiensis (ed. W. D. Macray, RS (London, 1886), p. 14Google Scholar), but these derive almost certainly from William of Malmesbury.

8 EHD, p. 277.

9 Anglo-Saxon England, p. 339, n.2; cf., among others, Gransden, A., Historical Writing in England c. 550 to c. 1307 (London, 1974), pp. 53–4Google Scholar, and Nelson, J. L., ‘The Problem of King Alfred's Royal Anointing’, JEH 18 (1967), 145–63, at 163.Google Scholar

10 So Whitelock, , EHD, p. 277Google Scholar, and Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, p. 319Google Scholar, n. 1, as well as Loomis, L. H. (‘The Holy Relics of Charlemagne and King Athelstan: the Lances of Longinus and St Mauricius’, Speculum 25 (1950), 437–56CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 437–9), who recites a litany of authorities for this early dating.

11 The work in question is the Rhetorica ad Herennium (a work no longer attributed to Cicero), where, at 4.15, the author discusses a style which he calls sufflata, ‘bombastic’ – suffulta in William's text is a simple corruption – and which is characterized by excessive use of neologisms, archaisms and loan-words such as grecisms: ‘cum aut nouis aut priscis uerbis aut duriter aliunde translatis aut grauioribus quam res postulat aliquid dicitur’. On William's extensive knowledge of Cicero's writings, see Thomson, R. M., ‘The Reading of William of Malmesbury’, RB 85 (1975), 362–402, at 373–7.Google Scholar

12 GR 1, 144.

13 GP, p. 22 (Frithegod), and GR 1, 1–3 (Æthelweard).

14 The manuscript was written in north-eastern France in the third quarter of the ninth century (see below, n. 51), was in England by the early tenth, and by the thirteenth century was at Bury St Edmunds (a Bury ex-libris is entered on fol. 1), but its English whereabouts before it arrived at Bury are unknown.

15 Bishop, T. A. M., ‘An Early Example of Insular-Caroline’, Trans. of the Cambridge Bibliographical Soc. 4 (1968), 396–400.Google Scholar

16 William, , GP, pp. 407–8Google Scholar. On Dunstan's literary activity at Malmesbury, see my note ‘St Dunstan's Latin Poetry’, Anglia 98 (1980), 101–6.Google Scholar

17 ‘The Hermeneutic Style in Tenth-Century Anglo-Latin Literature’, ASE 4 (1975), 67–111.Google Scholar

18 E.g., his hexameters ‘sollicitudinibus uehementibus exagitaris’ (Panegyr. Aviti 536), ‘innumerabilium primordia philosophorum’ (Epithal. Polemio et Araneolae 43) and ‘Hellespontiacis circumclamata procellis’ (Panegyr. Anthemii 507); there are many more.

19 Rodulfi Tortarii Carmina, ed. M. B. Ogle and D. M. Schullian, Papers and Monographs of the American Acad. in Rome 8 (Rome, 1933), 373Google Scholar (= Passio B. Mauri 11.101).

20 Abrahams, P., Les Oeuvres poétiques de Baudri de Bourgucil (Paris, 1926), p. 294Google Scholar (= ccxvi.826); the line is possibly modelled on Sidonius, , Panegyr. Maiorani 184Google Scholar (‘Bellerophonteis insultaturus opimis’).

21 Migne, Patrologia Latina 155, col. 980.

22 Munari, F., Marci Valerii Bucolica, 2nd ed. (Florence, 1970), p.4Google Scholar; see Munari's extensive discussion of this metrical technique, pp. xxxix–xlii.

23 GR 1, 152. The line appears to be a conflation of Sidonius, , Epithal. Polemio et Araneolae 43Google Scholar (‘innumerabilium primordia philosophorum’) and Vergil, , Aen. 11.614Google Scholar. I am unaware of any sound evidence that the poetry of Sidonius was read in Anglo-Saxon England; cf. Ogilvy, J. D. A., Books Known to the English 597–1066 (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), p. 243.Google Scholar

24 See Meyer, W., ‘Die Arten der gereimten Hexameter’, Gesammelte Abhandlungen zur mittellateinische Rythmik, 3 vols. (Berlin, 1905–1936) 1, 79–98Google Scholar, and Norberg, D., Introduction à l'étude de la versification latine médiévale (Stockholm, 1958), pp. 65–9Google Scholar. The examples from the Athelstan poem are taken from GR 1, 151 and 146 respectively.

25 Ed. Strecker, K., Die Tegernseer Briefsammlung (Froumund), Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Epist. Sel. 3 (Berlin, 1925), 17.Google Scholar

26 Strecker, K., ‘Studien zu karolingischen Dichtern V: Leoninische Hexameter und Pentameter im 9. Jahrhundert’, Neues Archiv 44 (1922), 213–51.Google Scholar

27 Ed.Scott, A. B., Hildeberti Cenomannensis Episcopi Carmina Minora (Leipzig, 1969), p. 44Google Scholar; cf. the tail-rhyme in annos/tyrannos in the Athelstan poem as quoted above, p. 66.

28 Manitius, M., Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters, 3 vols. (Munich, 1911–1931) 11, 841.Google Scholar

29 PL 171, col. 1593; note that the leonine rhyme nomen/omen is also employed by the author of the Athelstan poem as quoted above, p. 66.

30 PL 171, col. 1675.

31 Abrahams, , Les Oeuvres poétiques de Baudri de Bourgueil, e.g. pp. 58–60, 67, 106 and 128–9Google Scholar; on his visit to Worcester, see p. 360.

32 Ed.Wright, T., Anglo-Latin Satirical Poets and Epigrammatists of the Twelfth Century, 2 vols., RS (London, 1872) 11, 201–7Google Scholar; on Gualo, see Manitius, , Geschichte 111, 943.Google Scholar

33 Ibid. 11, 243 (Serlo's poems are ptd pp. 233–58).

34 Ed. Boehmer, H., Libelli de Lite, MGH 111 (Hanover, 1897), 708–10.Google Scholar

35 P L 155, cols. 941–94.

36 Ed. Liebermann, F., ‘Raginald von Canterbury’, Neues Archiv 13 (1888), 519–56Google Scholar; the lines quoted are from Poem I (p. 531); cf. also nos. XI (pp. 538–9 ) and XIII (p. 540).

37 Ed. L. R. Lind, Univ. of Illinois Stud. in Lang. and Lit. 27.3–4 (1942); cf. Lind's brief remarks, ‘Reginald of Canterbury and the Rhyming Hexameter’, Neophilologus 25 (1940), 273–5.Google Scholar

38 Regrettably there is no adequate survey of twelfth- and thirteenth-century Anglo-Latin poetry, and much of the finest poetry from this period (e.g. that of Laurence of Durham) remains unpublished.

39 Ed. Wright, , Anglo-Latin Satirical Poets 11, 163–74.Google Scholar

40 Mozley, J. H., ‘The Unprinted Poems of Nigel Wireker’, Speculum 7 (1932), 398–423.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

41 The pronunciation of Anglo-Latin must be largely a matter of conjecture; nevertheless one might compare our modern English pronunciation of sign, borrowed into Middle English (cf. ME signe, sygne) from OFr signe, with our pronunciation of signature, borrowed directly from medieval Latin signature. The same phenomenon is observable in the pairs deign (from OFr degnier) and dignity (from Latin dignitas) or reign and regnal. It is likely a priori that this difference observable in modern English pronunciation would have obtained between Anglo-Saxon and Old French pronunciation of Latin - gn-.

42 See William's detailed account of Athelstan's benefactions to Malmesbury, , GP, pp. 397–403Google Scholar. After discussing Athelstan, William adds a six-line epitaph in honour of the king (GP, pp. 397–8). Since he does not state that he has seen the epitaph anywhere, the strong presumption must be that he composed it himself (the same may be suspected of the six-line epitaph he gives of Aldhelm, , GP, p. 382Google Scholar). What is interesting is that one line of the Athelstan epitaph probably composed by William – ‘Hic iacet orbis honor, patriae dolor, orbita recti’ – unmistakably echoes a line in the Athelstan poem under discussion (‘…patriae decus, orbita recti’), which suggests that there was a close relationship between William and the author of the Athelstan poem.

43 There were close intellectual contacts between Worcester and Malmesbury at this period: William was probably a personal acquaintance of John of Worcester and had visited Worcester at least once (see William's, remarks in his Vita Wulfstani, ed. Camden, R. R. Darlington 3rd ser. 11 (London, 1926), ix and 54Google Scholar, as well as discussion by Thomson, ‘The Reading of William of Malmesbury’, pp. 393–4, and my remarks, ‘Some Remnants of Bede's Lost Liber Epigrammatum’, EHR 90 (1975), 798–820, at 820).Google Scholar

44 See Thomson, ‘The Reading of William of Malmesbury’, pp. 390–2, and ‘Addenda et Corrigenda’, RB 86 (1976), 327–35, at 331.Google Scholar

45 I find very attractive the suggestion by Thomson (‘Th e Reading of William of Malmesbury’, p. 393) that Faricius was William's teacher at Malmesbury.

46 GP, p. 192.

47 Ibid. pp. 192–3.

48 This identity is accepted by Knowles, D., Brooke, C. N. L. and London, V., The Heads of Religious Houses, England and Wales, 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1972), p. 55Google Scholar. He is presumably the same Peter to whom William addressed a long letter (ptd GR 1, cxliii-cxlvi) concerning John Scotus Eriugena.

49 Over a century ago Freeman put the case exactly: ‘William of Malmesbury evidently worked out the life of Æthelstan with unusual care, seemingly from lost sources’ (Freeman, E. A., The Norman Conquest, 5 vols. (Oxford, 1870–1876) 1, 60Google Scholar, n. 1). One possible ‘lost source’ may be the ‘bella Etheltani regis’ which were listed as a possession of the Glastonbury library in 1247 (see above, n. 6); it is worth recalling that William of Malmesbury spent some five years at Glastonbury, and may have seen there this copy of the ‘bella Etheltani regis’.

50 The poem is listed in Schaller and Könsgen, Initia carminum (no. 989). It has been printed by Macray, W., Catalogi Codicum Manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae v.2 (Oxford, 1878Google Scholar), col. 352; James, M. R., On the Abbey of St Edmund at Bury (Cambridge, 1895), p. 45Google Scholar (an extremely inaccurate transcript); the Benedictines of Bouveret, , Colophons de manuscrits occidentaux des origines aux XVIe siècle, Spicilegii Friburgensis Subsidia 2 (Fribourg, 1965), 181Google Scholar (= no. 1456); and Robinson, , The Times of St Dunstan, p. 69Google Scholar, n. 2.

51 Latin Script and Letters A.D. 400–900: Festschrift presented to Ludwig Bieler, ed. J. J. O'Meara and B. Naumann (Leiden, 1976), p. 211Google Scholar; see also the remarks of Bishop, T. A. M. (English Caroline Minuscule (Oxford, 1971), p. 2Google Scholar), who describes the script as ‘continental minuscule of s. xin.,, and Ker, N. R. (Catalogue of Manuscripts containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford, 1957), p. 427Google Scholar), who describes it as a ‘continental hand, s. ix/x’.

52 See Bishop's discussion of the Anglo-Caroline annotations on 36v (Early Caroline Minuscule, p. 2) and his more detailed treatment of the same subject, ‘An Early Example of Insular-Caroline’, pp. 396–400. The Old English glosses are ptd Napier, A. S., Old English Glosses (Oxford, 1900), nos. 17, 21 and 24.Google Scholar

53 MS augustae.

54 The Times of St Dunstan, p. 69, n. 2.

55 Goetz, G., Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum, 7 vols. (Leipzig, 1888–1923) v, 397Google Scholar. The glossary in question is that called the ‘First Amplonian’ or ‘Erfurt I’, which was probably compiled in England in the last part of the seventh century (see Pheifer, J. D., Old English Glosses in the Epinal–Erfurt Glossary (Oxford, 1974), pp. xxv–xxviii and lxxxix–xciGoogle Scholar). The sole surviving manuscript was written at Cologne c. 800 and never left Germany.

56 Goetz, , Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum v, 375.Google Scholar

57 Two other (less serious) candidates may be mentioned: Athelstan son of King Æthelwulf, who was Alfred's elder brother and who became sub-king of Kent, Sussex, Surrey and Essex from 839 to c. 851 (see the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle 839 and 851), and Guthrum, the ruler of the Eastern Danelaw, who adopted the English name Athelstan when he was baptized by Alfred and who died in 890 (ASC 890; see Smyth, A. P., Scandinavian Kings in the British Isles, 850–880 (Oxford, 1977), p. 254Google Scholar). Of neither of these shadowy Athelstans could it be said that he was ‘abundantly endowed with the holy eminence of learning’. The possibility of an unknown Athelstan who never became king cannot be entirely ruled out.

58 Sawyer, P. H., Anglo-Saxon Charters: an Annotated List and Bibliography (London, 1968Google Scholar; hereafter S), 416 (ed. W. de G., Birch, Cartularium Saxonicum, 3 vols. (London, 1885–1893Google Scholar; hereafter BCS), 677), 421 (BCS 694), 425 (BCS 702), 447 (BCS 741) and 449 (BCS 734).

59 For purposes of the present argument 1 omit discussion of the Scandinavian languages, even though in Old Norse sources of a much later period the English king's name was customarily spelled Aðalsteinn (e.g. Egils saga Skalla-Grimssonar, ed. S. Nordal, Islenzk Fornrit 2 (Reykjavik, 1933), 127–35Google Scholar and passim). For the period in question the possibility of a Norseman literate in Latin (and with a smattering of Greek) is not worth entertaining.

60 The evidence for names in Adal- is collected by Förstemann, E., Altdeutsches Namenbuch I: Personennamen (Bonn, 1900Google Scholar), cols. 158–82 (see also Kaufmann, H., Altdeutsche Personennamen: Ergänzungsband (Munich, 1968), pp. 42–3Google Scholar), and for the area of Francia, by Morlet, M.-T., Les Noms de personne sur le territoire de l'ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe siècle I: les noms issus du germanique continental (Paris, 1968), pp. 15–18Google Scholar. See also general discussion by Bach, A., Deutsche Namenkunde I: Die deutschen Personennamen, 2 vols., 2nd ed. (Heidelberg, 1952–1953) 1, 222Google Scholar, and Kaufmann, H., Untersuchungen zu altdeutschen Rufnamen (Munich, 1965), pp. 89–90, 210 and 286.Google Scholar

61 The abundant material collected by Förstemann and Morlet would need to be painstakingly analysed with respect to questions such as: where did the person named in a document originate? where did the author of the document originate and where was he active? where did the manuscript(s) of the document originate? A reader who will attempt to answer these questions for even one of the thousands of entries in Förstemann will gain some notion of the magnitude of the task.

62 See Wagner, A., Über die deutschen Namen der ältesten Freisinger Urkunden (Erlangen, 1876Google Scholar); Schatz, J., ‘Die Sprache der Namen des ältesten Salzburger Verbrüderungsbuch’, ZDA 43 (1899), 1–45Google Scholar, esp. 6; Ilg, J., ‘Die ältesten Namen der Mondseer Codex’, ZDA 46 (1902), 285–301Google Scholar, esp. 294–5; and Schröter, E., ‘Die Sprache der deutschen Namen des bischöflichen Traditionsbuches von Passau’, BGDSL 62 (1938), 161–285Google Scholar, esp. 207.

63 The principal sources for the study of Alemannic forms are the confraternity lists of St Gallen and Reichenau, ed. Piper, P., Libri Confraternitatum, MGH (Berlin, 1884), esp. pp. 401–6Google Scholar; see also Baesecke, G., ‘Das althochdeutsche von Reichenau nach den Namen seiner Mönchslisten’, BGDSL 52 (1928), 92–148, at 108 and 138.Google Scholar

64 See Karg-Gasterstädt, E. and Frings, T., Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch (Berlin, 1968Google Scholar–), s.v. ‘adal’, and Schade, O., Altdeutsches Wörterbuch, 2nd ed. (Halle, 1872–82Google Scholar), s.v. ‘adal’ and ‘edil’.

65 To take one example from Fulda, in the heart of the Rhineland: in lieu of the normal form Adalung a scribe has written Edilung in a charter of 808 (ed. Dronke, E. F. J., Codex Diplomaticus Fuldensis (1850; repr. Aalen, 1962), no. 245)Google Scholar. There are numerous examples of similar changes in Libri Confraternitatum, ed. Piper, Index, s.v. ‘Edelung’, ‘Edilinc’, ‘Adilung’ etc. - all variants of the name Adalung.

66 See Gamillscheg, E., Romania Germanica III: Die Burgunder (Berlin, 1936), pp. 101–2.Google Scholar

67 See Jubainville, H. d'Arbois de, ‘Fragments d'un dictionnaire des noms propres francs de personne …’, Études sur la langue des Francs à l'époque mérovingienne (Paris, 1900), pp. 1–104Google Scholar, esp. 4 -6 on names in Adal-, and Longnon, A., ‘Les Noms propres de personne au temps de Charlemagne’, Polyptyque de l'abbaye de Saint-German-des-Prés, 2 vols. (Paris, 1895) 1, 254–382Google Scholar, esp. 277.

68 See Heyne, M., Altniederdeutsche Eigennamen aus dem neunten bis elften Jahrhundert (Halle, 1867Google Scholar), and Althof, H., Grammatik altsächsischer Eigennamen in westfäliscben Urkunden des 9. bis 11. Jahrhundert (Paderborn, 1879), esp. pp. 17–22Google Scholar, as well as the more recent comprehensive study by Schlaug, W., Die altsächsische Personennamen vor dem Jahre 1100, Lunder germanistische Forschungen 34 (Lund, 1962), 47–52Google Scholar

69 Cf. Schlaug, , Die altsächsische Personennamen, pp. 19–24.Google Scholar

70 Historiae 11.16 (ed. G. Waitz, MGH Script. Rer. Germ. 51 (Hanover, 1877), 47).Google Scholar

71 Radbod's letter is preserved by William, of Malmesbury, (GP, pp. 399–400Google Scholar; also ptd BCS no. 643). William claims to have found the letter in a shrine at Milton Abbas; there is thus some presumption that what he found was the original and hence that the spelling of the king's name was indeed Radbod's.

72 See Folcwin's, statement in his Gesta Abbatum S. Bertini, ed. Holder-Egger, O., MGH, Script. 13 (Hanover, 1881), 627Google Scholar. After the treaty of Verdun in 843 the kingdom of Hlotar was bounded by the Rhine on the east (including some small territories on the lower right bank) and the Scheld on the west, and included Frisia. Folcwin's parents could thus have been speakers of Old Frisian or even possibly of Old Saxon (on the linguistic boundaries of Old Saxon see Gallée, J. H., Altsächsische Grammatik (Halle, 1910), p. 2).Google Scholar

73 Ed. Holder-Egger, p. 629. The text of Folcwin's Gesta Abbatum S. Bertini is based on an eighteenth-century transcript of an original now lost which, in the opinion of Mabillon, was Folcwin's autograph; the spellings therefore are likely to be Folcwin's. Note that his spelling Adalstenus preserves exactly the Old Saxon forms aðal and stên.

74 Such an examination might well have important bearing on Anglo-Saxon diplomatic studies. For example, there is a charter recording a grant of land by King Athelstan to St Augustine's, Canterbury, which purports to be issued on the day of that king's coronation (S 394 = BCS 641). The form of the charter is anomalous and the names of the English witnesses are so badly mutilated that the charter has been dismissed as spurious on these grounds alone. The king's name, however, is spelled Adalstan and it is at least a possibility that the charter was drafted by a continental scribe resident in England, perhaps an Old Saxon, given Athelstan's connection with the Old Saxon royal house (see below, p. 93); this seems to me a more probable explanation than that the scribe was copying from dictation, as Robinson, J. A. suggested (The Saxon Bishops of Wells, Brit. Acad. Supplemental Papers 4 (London, 1918), 31–2).Google Scholar

75 Searle, W. G., Onomasticon Anglo-Saxonicum (Cambridge, 1897Google Scholar), records two persons named Iohannes (s.v.) at this time; but in fact Searle's ‘Iohannes, Wiltshire c. 896’ is simply John the Old Saxon in another context (see below, n. 86).

76 Asser's Life of King Alfred, ed. W. H. Stevenson, rev. D. Whitelock (Oxford, 1959), p. 81Google Scholar (§94): ‘Iohannem presbyterum et monachum, scilicet Eald-Saxonum genere.’

77 The only previous discussion of any length is found embedded in Stevenson's, commentary to his Asser's Life of King Alfred, at pp. 311–12 and 335–6.Google Scholar

78 Ibid. p. 63 (§78). The scepticism of Bately, J. M. (‘Grimbald of St Bertin's’, MÆ 35 (1966), 1–10Google Scholar), to the effect that ‘there is not a shred of evidence for the identification’ of John mentioned here in §78 with John the Old Saxon mentioned in §94, strikes me as excessive and unnecessary. It seems to me that Asser would scarcely have introduced two colleagues of Alfred named John without taking some pains to distinguish them.

79 Ed. Sweet, H., King Alfred's West-Saxon Version of Gregory's Pastoral Care, EETS o.s. 45 and 50 (London, 1871), 7.Google Scholar

80 Ed. Blake, E. O., Liber Eliensis, Camden 3rd ser. 92 (London, 1962), 54Google Scholar. See the remarks by Grierson, P. (‘Grimbald of St Benin's’, EHR 55 (1940), 529–61, at 552CrossRefGoogle Scholar, n. 2) on the probable genuineness of this late report.

81 It is often stated that John came from Korvey on the Weser in Saxony via Corbie (e.g. Delisle, L., Le Cabinet des manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Nationale 11 (Paris, 1874), 104Google Scholar, and Priebsch, R., The Heliand Manuscript (Oxford, 1925), p. 38Google Scholar), but this statement is merely based on a conjecture of Jean Mabillon: ‘quo ex monasterio locoue Galliae accersitus sit, non liquet. Mihi ueri simile uidetur, eum in Corbeiae coenobio degisse, ubi ueterum Saxonum, recens ad fidem conuersorum, plurimi liberi in religione Christiana, litteris ac monasticis institutis erudiebantur’ (Annales Ordinis S. Benedicti, 6 vols. (Paris, 1703–1739) 111, 243Google Scholar). In fact there is not a scrap of evidence to support the conjecture, since the name ‘Iohannes’ occurs nowhere among the ‘Nomina fratrum Novae Corbeiae’ [ = Korvey], a fairly full list spanning the years 882–1146 (ed. P., Jaffé, Monumenta Corbeiensia, Bibliotheca Rerum Germanicarum 1 (Berlin, 1864), 66–72, at 67–8Google Scholar; see also Gysseling, M., ‘Altdeutsches in Nordfranzösischen Bibliotheken’, Scriptorium 2 (1948), 59–62).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

82 The name Iohannes is not widely attested in continental sources at this time; see Morlet, M.-T., Les Noms de personne sur le territoire de l'ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe siècle II: les noms latins ou transmis par le latin (Paris, 1972), pp. 65–6Google Scholar. Two occurrences of the name merit consideration, one from Trier, the other from Gorze (both on the Moselle in central Rhineland): Beyer, H., Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der jetz die preussischen Regierungsbezirke Coblenz und Trier bildenden mittelrheinischen Territorien (Coblenz, 1860Google Scholar), no. 98 (861 × 884), and d'Herbomez, A., Cartulaire de l'abbaye de Gorze (Paris, 1898), no. 64 (868)Google Scholar. Recall, however, that the more famous Iohannes Scotus Eriugena was active at this time in an area not far west of the Rhineland.

83 The date of Grimbald's arrival has been established by P. Grierson (‘Grimbald of St Bertin's’, pp. 544–7). Whether or not John arrived in England at the same time as Grimbald, he must have been in England several years at least before Asser broke off writing his life of Alfred in 893.

84 Asser's Life of King Alfred, p. 81 (§94): ‘cum nec adhuc tantum numeram, quantum uellet, haberet, comparauit etiam quamplurimos eiusdem gentis Gallicae’.

85 Ibid. pp. 81–5 (§§94–7).

86 S 372 (BCS 613). There are several other contemporary charters witnessed by Iohannes, but these have less serious claims to authenticity. S 348 (BCS 567) possibly has a genuine base, as do S 364 (BCS588) and 374 (BCS 604). S 349 (BCS 571) and 373 (BCS 612) are certainly spurious (cf. Stevenson, , Asser's Life of King Alfred, p. 312Google Scholar, n. 2). I am grateful to Nicholas Brooks and Simon Keynes for advice on these matters.

87 GR 1, 132 (William gives a variant version of the same epitaph GP, p. 394). Regrettably, William himself ventured to identify ‘Iohannes sophista’ as the famous ninth-century Irish scholar Iohannes Scotus Eriugena, thereby laying the seed for a good deal of scholarly nonsense about the retirement of the great John Scotus to Malmesbury after a long career at the court of Charles the Bald. The nonsense has been disposed of by Cappuyns, M., Jean Scot Erigène, sa vie, son oeuvre, sa pensée (Louvain and Paris, 1933), pp. 252–60.Google Scholar

88 Ed. Liebermann, F., Die Heiligen Englands (Hanover, 1889), p. 18Google Scholar; see discussion of the compilation and date of this document by Rollason, D. W. (‘Lists of Saints’ Resting-Places in Anglo-Saxon England’, ASE 7 (1978), 61–93, at 61–8 and 87–93).Google Scholar

89 It is worth recalling that the two young sons of Æthelweard (Alfred's youngest son) were buried at Malmesbury and that Athelstan himself was subsequently buried there; in other words Malmesbury was in some sense a royal mausoleum. John the Old Saxon, who had been a royal chaplain to Alfred, could fittingly have been buried there as well.

90 Two of the Saxon Chronicles Parallel, ed. C. Plummer and J. Earle, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1892–1899) 1, 64Google Scholar; the same event is recorded by Asser, (Asser's Life of King Alfred, p. 7Google Scholar (§8)).

91 See John, E., Orbis Britanniae and other Studies (Leicester, 1966), pp. 37–42Google Scholar, and Nelson, ‘The Problem of Alfred's Anointing’.

92 The papal letter has been dismissed as a forgery by Nelson, ‘The Problem of Alfred's Anointing’. In certain respects Dr Nelson's arguments are persuasive, but I fail to understand how on her account knowledge of the anointing incident was transmitted from England to Rome, given the extremely limited circulation of both Asser's text and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.

93 MGH, Epist. 5.2 (Berlin, 1899), 602: ‘et quasi spiritalem filium consulatus cingulo honore uestimentisque, ut mos est Romanis consulibus decorauimus’; cf. Whitelock, , EHD, p. 810.Google Scholar

94 GR 1, 145. Stevenson, (Asser's Life of King Alfred, p. 184Google Scholar, n. 4) states that William's source for this information was an ‘old Latin poem celebrating the deeds of Athelstan’, but William himself makes no such statement. On the date and reliability of the ‘old Latin poem’, see above, pp. 62–71.

95 A similar ceremony of giving arms involving Duke William and Harold is depicted on the Bayeux Tapestry; see Stenton, F. et al. , The Bayeux Tapestry: a Comprehansive Survey, 2nd ed. (London, 1965), p. 179Google Scholar and pl. 27. On the French (and Norman) knighting ceremony, see Luyn, P. van, ‘Les milites dans la France du XIe siècle’, Le Moyen Âge 77 (1971), 5–51 and 193–238Google Scholar, esp. 217–20 and 237–8, as well as the earlier study by Guilhiermoz, P., Essai sur l'origine de la noblesse en France au moyen âge (Paris, 1902), pp. 374–9 and 436–49Google Scholar; on the giving of the cingulum militiae, see esp. pp. 447–9.

96 Alfred's intention was apparently to ensure the succession of his own line through to the second generation (i.e. Edward the Elder's children), since at the time of Alfred's death Æthelwold, son of King Æthelred I (Alfred's brother), was a claimant to the throne. Why Alfred designated Athelstan in particular is not clear (did he do the same for Athelstan's elder brother Ælfweard, who in fact was the first to accede to the throne on Edward's death in 924, only to die shortly thereafter?). Presumably Athelstan was pleased to interpret the earlier ceremony (whatever its original intention) retrospectively as a designation of his right to the throne once he had indeed secured it.

97 Asser's Life of King Alfred, pp. 184–5.

98 On the meaning of ‘consul’ in Anglo-Saxon contexts, see the remarks of Hunter, M., ‘Germanic and Roman Antiquity and the Sense of the Past in Anglo-Saxon England’, ASE 3 (1974), 29–50, at 39 and 47–8.Google Scholar

99 GR 1, 145; William's source for this information is not known.

100 Bern, Burgerbibliothek, 671, 74v; see Lindsay, W. M., Early Welsh Script (Oxford, 1912), pp. 10–12Google Scholar, and Homburger, O., Die illustrierten Handschriften der Burgerbibliothek Bern (Bern, 1962), pp. 31–2Google Scholar. The main text (the four gospels) is written in an insular cursive script of s. ix(i) and apparently originated in an unidentified centre in the Celtic area of Britain (Lindsay assigned it provisionally to Cornwall). The acrostics were added in a blank space at the end of the main text in an Anglo-Saxon square minuscule hand of the very beginning of the tenth century (facsimile, Lindsay, Early Welsh Script, pl. v). This script resembles other specimens of Anglo-Saxon square minuscule written at Winchester in the early years of the tenth century, as Parkes, M. B. suggests (‘The Palaeography of the Parker Manuscript of the Chronicle, Laws and Sedulius, and Historiography at Winchester in the Late Ninth and Tenth Centuries’, ASE 5 (1976), 149–71, at 157Google Scholar, n. 1); on other early examples of square minuscule, see Bishop, T. A. M., ‘An Early Example of the Square Minuscule’, Trans. of the Cambridge Bibliographical Soc. 4 (1966), 246–52Google Scholar. The manuscript subsequently passed to Great Bedwyn, Wiltshire (one of Alfred's estates), where four documents in Old English were added (see Meritt, H., ‘Old English Entries in a Manuscript at Berne’, JEGP 33 (1934), 344–51).Google Scholar

101 Hagen, H., Carmina Medii Aevi (Bern, 1877), p. 11Google Scholar; Strecker, K., Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini, MGH iv.2 (Berlin, 1896), 1078Google Scholar; Stevenson, , Asser's Life of King Alfred, p. 307Google Scholar; and Lindsay, , Early Welsh Script, pp. 10–11.Google Scholar

102 The difficulties of this poem may stem from the fact that it was awaiting revision which it never received (as is suggested by the incomplete form of the right-hand acrostic legend). The translation is intended only as a guide to the main points of difficulty (notably in the last three lines). There are three unusual spellings in the poem: for erce in line 2 read arce, for faede in line 3 read foede (adv.) and for flagrantice in line 4 read flagrantique. Lindsay, (Early Welsh Script, p. 10Google Scholar) would read negasti for necasti in line 6, although necasti makes acceptable sense.

103 This poem is less difficult than its predecessor. In lines 2–4 the acrostic legend is achieved by reversing the sequence of letters in the final word; in line 5 the letters of talenta are merely jumbled. There are three examples of insular orthography (i/e): discendant, competa and dulcidine. For fletas in line 3 read flectas.

104 The poem is listed in Schaller, and Könsgen, , Initia carminum (no. 2143Google Scholar). It has been printed by Wright, T. and Halliwell, J. O., Reliquiae Antiquae, 2 vols. (London, 1841–1843) 11, 179Google Scholar (where it is described as a ‘song on Athelstan's victory over the Danes at Brunanburh’); Méril, E. du, Poésies populaires latines antérieures au Xlle siècle (Paris, 1843), pp. 270–1Google Scholar; Stubbs, , Memorials of St Dunstan, p. xiiiGoogle Scholar, n. 1; and Birch, , BCS 655Google Scholar; each of these editions is based solely on the text in Nero A. ii. Attention was first drawn to the variant version in Durham A. II. 17, pt 1, by Turner, C. H., ‘Iter Dunelmense: Durham Bible MSS’, JTS 10 (1908–1909), 529–44Google Scholar, where the poem is ptd on p. 537. The poem has been discussed by Becker, P. A., ‘Vom Kurzlied zum Epos’, Zeitschrift für französische Sprache und Literatur 63 (1940), 299–341, at 338–40Google Scholar (repr. Becker, , Zur romanischen Literaturgeschichte (Munich, 1967), pp. 217–19Google Scholar). Becker's work is marred by many serious errors (Athelstan is identified as Athelstan ‘Half-King’, for example) and has little interest for students of Anglo-Saxon history.

105 ‘A Latin Poem Addressed to King Athelstan’, EHR 26 (1911), 482–7Google Scholar. Stevenson's edition is repr. Gaselee, S., The Oxford Book of Medieval Latin Verse (Oxford, 1928), p. 61.Google Scholar

106 Ed. E., Dümmler, Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini, MGH 1 (Berlin, 1881), 399–400Google Scholar. The poem was composed shortly before 810; concerning the identity of this ‘Irish exile’ nothing certain is known.

107 ‘A Latin Poem’, p. 487.

108 See Lowe, E. A., Codices Latini Antiquiores 11, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 1972), no. 149Google Scholar. On the date and origin of the manuscript, see the remarks of Brown, T. J., ‘Northumbria and the Book of Kells’, ASE 1 (1972), 219–46, at 225–9Google Scholar. A facsimile edition of this important Northumbrian manuscript is being prepared by T. J. Brown and C. D. Verey for EEMF.

109 See Robinson, , The Times of St Dunstan, pp. 51–5Google Scholar, as well as Barker, E. E., ‘Two Lost Documents of King Athelstan’, ASE 6 (1977), 137–43.Google Scholar

110 Ptd Wormald, F., English Kalendars before A.D. 1100, Henry Bradshaw Soc. 72 (London, 1934), 30–41Google Scholar, and Gasquet, F. A. and Bishop, E., The Bosworth Psalter (London, 1908), pp. 165–71.Google Scholar

111 The prayer is ptd BCS 656. It is commonly referred to as ‘Athelstan's Prayer’ (cf. Robinson, , The Times of St Dunstan, p. 68Google Scholar), but – although the prayer is copied by the hand that copied the Athelstan poem – there is no apparent link between it and the poem and no justification for regarding the prayer as Athelstan's.

112 This prayer book is discussed at length by Bishop, E. (Liturgica Historica (Oxford, 1918), pp. 384–91Google Scholar). See also Banks, R. A., ‘Some Anglo-Saxon Prayers from British Museum MS Cotton Galba A. xiv’, N&Q 210 (1965), 207–13.Google Scholar

113 Bishop, , Liturgica Historica, p. 390.Google Scholar

114 Catalogue of Manuscripts containing Anglo-Saxon, p. 200. As Ker points out (p. 201), the hand which copied Nero A. ii, 10v–12v, also copied the collect for St Æthelwold in Galba A. xiv, 125r. Other identifications of hands writing in both manuscripts proposed by Ker (p. 201) seem to me less certain; in particular it is worth noting that the proposed identity of the hand which copied Nero A. ii, 13v, with that which wrote Galba A. xiv, 54r, is not relevant to the problem, since fol. 13 of Nero A. ii is not part of the quire of 10 which comprises fols. 3–12 of the Nero manuscript.

115 The date of fols. 3–12 of Nero A. ii can be determined with some accuracy from entries in the calendar. The calendar must post-date 988, since it has the obit of Dunstan against 19 May (note that the Dunstan entry is in the main hand and is not a later entry as is suggested by Rose-Troup; see below, n. 118). Also the feast of Edward King and Martyr is noted against 18 March, which could indicate that the calendar post-dates 1008, for in that year the witan decreed that the feast of St Edward was to be observed on 18 March (see Liebermann, F., Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, 3 vols. (Halle, 1903–1916) 1, 240Google Scholar, and discussion by Korhammer, M. (‘The Origin of the Bosworth Psalter’, ASE 2 (1973), 173–87, at 175Google Scholar)). However, as Miss Fell notes, the witan's promulgation may simply have been intended to regularize a situation already existing at places such as Shaftesbury and the New Minster, Winchester (Fell, C. E., Edward King and Martyr (Leeds, 1971), p. xxiGoogle Scholar). Finally, the scribe who copied the Athelstan poem also copied a collect for St Æthelwold into Galba A. xiv, and such a collect presumably post-dates the translation of Æthelwold in 996. In other words a date early in the eleventh century would best suit both the script and the calendar of Nero A. ii, fols. 3–12.

116 The Bosworth Psalter, p. 152; cf. Robinson, , The Times of St Dunstan, pp. 67–8Google Scholar. Wormald (English Kalendars before A.D. 1100) assigns it simply to Wessex. Wormald prints four Winchester calendars (BL Cotton Titus D. xxvii, 3r–8v; BL Cotton Vitellius E. xviii, 2r–7v; BL Arundel 60, 2r–7v; and Cambridge, Trinity College R. 15. 32 (945), pp. 15–26); there is not a single entry for Gildas, Petroc or Winnoc in any of these calendars.

117 The calendar records the feast of one Æthelmod confessor against 12 January; possibly this is the Æthelmod who was bishop of Sherborne, 772–81, an otherwise totally obscure figure. It is interesting to note that (this same?) Æthelmod is remembered in the litany in Galba A. xiv – conceivably another link between the two manuscripts.

118 Rose-Troup, F., ‘The Ancient Monastery of St Mary and St Peter at Exeter, 680–1050’, Trans. of the Devonshire Assoc. 63 (1931), 179–220Google Scholar. Rose-Troup claims Nero A. ii as an Exeter book without offering any explanation.

119 Bishop (The Bosworth Psalter, p. 153) categorically rejects Cornwall as the place of origin of Nero A. ii but offers no explanation.

120 Against 27 May, 31 July, 30 September and 3 November. Of course all these entries do not refer to the same St Germanus: that of 27 May is probably Germanus bishop of Paris (ob. 576), normally commemorated on 28 May, and that of 31 July is Germanus of Auxerre. The other two entries – 30 September and 3 November – are not found in other calendars, which may suggest that this calendar reflects the observance of a local cult.

121 On the Cornish cult of St Petroc, see Doble, G. H., The Saints of Cornwall iv (Oxford, 1965), 132–66Google Scholar; Grosjean, P., ‘Vies et miracles de S. Petroc’, AB 74 (1956), 131–88Google Scholar; and Stonor, J., ‘St Petroc's Cell on Bodmin Moor’, Downside Rev. 66 (1947–8), 64–74Google Scholar. It is worth noting that St Petroc's feast in Nero A. ii is marked against 23 May (as it is in the Bosworth Psalter), whereas 4 June was the date which subsequently became universally established as his feast. Once again the unusual date may point to a local cult.

122 St Neot is twice commemorated in the calendar: on 31 July (the universally established feast) and again on 20 October (a date which does not seem to occur in any other pre-Conquest English calendar). On St Neot's Cornish origin and his subsequent translation to Huntingdonshire, see Stevenson, , Asser's Life of King Alfred, pp. 296–8.Google Scholar

123 In other words I cannot agree with N. R. Ker (as cited above, n. 114) that fols. 3–12 of Nero A. ii are a detached quire from Galba A. xiv, in spite of the fact that they share one scribe. There are other difficulties in assuming that Nero A. ii, fols. 3–12, and Galba A. xiv were originally one: why, for example, does each manuscript contain a copy of the so-called ‘Athelstan prayer’ (Nero A. ii, 1 iv; Galba A. xiv, 3r)? If the manuscripts were ever one, such duplication would have been unnecessary. In such cases the difficulties posed by the common scribe may best be resolved by supposing that he was active in more than one scriptorium, or else that Nero A. ii was written at Winchester (Nunnaminster) for St Germans or wherever.

124 See S 422–3 (BCS 695–6).

125 Athelstan refounded the church at Exeter at some point during the 930s. Several charters, none of them genuine, record grants of land by Athelstan to the church of SS Mary and Peter at Exeter: S 386, 387, 389 and 433 (BCS 724, 726, 723 and 721); see Chaplais, P., ‘The Authenticity of the Royal Anglo-Saxon Diplomas of Exeter’, Bull. of the Inst. of Hist. Research 39 (1966), 1–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Athelstan also donated approximately one third of his vast collection of relics to Exeter; see the list printed from the Leofric Missal (Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 579) by Warren, F. E., The Leofric Missal (Oxford, 1883), pp. 3–5Google Scholar, and a variant list printed in Dugdale's, WilliamMonasticon Anglicanum (2 vols. (London, 1655–1661) 11, 528Google Scholar) from another of Leofric's manuscripts, Oxford, Bodleian Library, Auct. D. 2. 16, 8r.

126 On Conan and St Germans, see O'Donovan, M. A., ‘An Interim Revision of Episcopal Dates for the Province of Canterbury, 850–950: Part I’, ASE 1 (1972), 23–44, at 35–6.Google Scholar

127 This version ends here, though there is room for the scribe to have written more if he had wished to do so.

128 Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini I, 399–400.

129 The rhythm of the poem is discussed briefly by Norberg, (Introduction à l'étude de la versification latine médiévale, p. 111Google Scholar); Norberg's statement that ‘the final cadence in verse of this sort is always is not true of these Athelstan verses, which usually have cadences in In Norberg's system of notation, these Athelstan verses can be described as 7pp + 7pp.

130 The orthography of the two scribes is appalling. Here, however, the spelling of dirige for dirige in D has some phonetic basis, since -ie clearly represents the palatalization of intervocalic -g- in late West Saxon; cf. armieros for armigeros in C, line 8.

131 Because ‘palace’, the usual rendering of palatium, has connotations which are inappropriate in an Anglo-Saxon context, I have preferred OE burh.

132 The poet apparently preferred the highly unusual (and possibly unique) form Bryttanium in lieu of the more usual Britannia (the necessary rhyme here with exercitum obviates an emendation to totam Britanniam).

133 Stevenson emended dixit to dic, ut on the authority – so he thought – of lines 7–8 of the poem by ‘Hibernicus exul’: ‘dic, ut Caesar Karolus…sit sanus, sit longeuus, sit felix uictoria’ (Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini 1, 400). He did not realize that the reading dic, ut printed by Dümmler was itself an emendation by Martène of the reading in the unique manuscript (Rome, Vatican Library, Reg. Lat. 2078), dixit cesar. Stevenson's theory that the poem is addressed from an overseas poet to Athelstan is in effect based on this emendation, and it will not stand. Stanza 6 unmistakably declares that the epistolary verses are from Athelstan, not to him.

134 The subjects of the wish sint sani, sint longeui are either Athelstan and Peter, or else the king's family and retainers at the burh.

135 If, as Stevenson thought, the poem was addressed to Athelstan, the information conveyed by stanza 3 – uiuit rex Æthelstanus – would be otiose, and he was therefore obliged to emend uiuit to uiuat.

136 The cliton or ‘prince’ in question is Eadwine, who witnessed S 1417 (BCS 648) as ‘Eaduuine cliton’ (see discussion of this charter, below, p. 92) and who was drowned at sea in 933 (ASC 933 E; see discussion Earle, and Plummer, , Two Chronicles 11, 137–8).Google Scholar

137 Principally ASC 926 and 927 D (the so-called ‘Mercian Register’), and William, of Malmesbury, , GR 1, 142 arid 146–7Google Scholar. See discussion Earle, and Plummer, , Two Chronicles 11, 135–6Google Scholar; Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, pp. 339–41Google Scholar; and, recently, Smyth, A. P., Scandinavian York and Dublin, 2 vols. (Dublin, 1975–1980) 11.Google Scholar

138 ASC 925 D.

139 From about this time the designation ‘Rex tot. Brit.’ appears on Athelstan's coinage; see Blunt, C. E., ‘The Coinage of Athelstan, 924–939: a Survey’, BNJ 42 (1974), 56.Google Scholar

140 ASC 926 D. Æt Eamotum has been variously located. The Old English name means ‘at the meeting of the waters’. William, of Malmesbury, (GR 1, 147Google Scholar) states that the meeting took place ‘ad locum qui Dacor uocatur’, but the source of his information is not known; possibly he was influenced by Bede, who notes that there was a monastery iuxta amnem Dacore (Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford, 1969), p. 446Google Scholar (iv. 32(30])). Dacor is usually identified with Dacre (3 miles south-west of Penrith, Cumbria); remains of some pre-Conquest stonework found in the present-day churchyard suggest that Dacre was indeed the site of Bede's monastery. In any case William is followed by Ekwall, E. (The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names, 4th ed. (Oxford, 1960), p. 155Google Scholar), who suggests that ‘the meeting of the brook from Dacre and the Eamont is probably referred to’. I doubt that this identification can be correct. First, there is no meeting of waters near present-day Dacre (and the brook which trickles through the town is scarcely a significant landmark). Second, I see no reason why an English king would have chosen a site deep in a remote Lakeland valley for so important a meeting. In my view a more pressing case may be made for nearby Brougham Castle (2 miles south-east of Penrith) which stands at the spectacular confluence of the rivers Eamont and Lowther and which had been a site of strategic importance since Roman times. A large Roman fort (Brocavum) was erected on this site and this fort must have been substantially preserved in late Anglo-Saxon times, since Henry II re-used its bricks in building the keep which stands there today. The Roman fort was situated on the junction of roads to Carlisle and across the Pennines and it guarded the important bridge across the Eamont. In other words Brougham Castle was a site of prime strategic importance at an important meeting of waters, located at the very boundary of Athelstan's kingdom, and I suggest that here, rather than in a remote valley to the west, was the site of the Chronicle's at Eamotum.

141 Stevenson, ‘A Latin Poem’, p. 486.

142 S 1417 (BC5 648). The charter is preserved in a contemporary copy and may be regarded as authentic, at least as far as the claims of the present argument are concerned. It is interesting that this charter witnessed by Peter is also the only surviving charter to be witnessed by Eadwine cliton, the title by which he is designated in Peter's poem, and also that the charter and the poem are the earliest witnesses to the word cliton in English records; see Dumville, David N., ‘The Ætheling: a Study in Anglo-Saxon Constitutional History’, ASE 8 (1979), 1–35.Google Scholar

143 To judge by names in the witness-list to this charter there were some foreigners among the familia of New Minster. Gundlaf is not an English name and is perhaps a spelling of OHG Gundleip (see Forssner, T., Continental–Germanic Personal Names in England in Old and Middle English Times (Uppsala, 1916), pp. 133–4Google Scholar) or possibly even OHG Gundulf or Gundalab. Walter is also probably a continental name, as the Old English equivalent Wealdhere was rare in the tenth century (see Ibid. pp. 243–4). Similarly the name Hildewine could conceivably be English but is more likely to be an English spelling of a continental form Hilduin.

144 Anglo-Saxon England, p. 354; Stenton, however, gives no evidence for this assertion.

145 The manuscript is fully described by Thompson, E. M. (Catalogue of Ancient Manuscripts in the British Museum. Part II: Latin (London, 1884), pp. 35–7Google Scholar). See also Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 239–40Google Scholar; Robinson, , The Times of St Dunstan, pp. 59–60Google Scholar; and Bishop, , Liturgica Historica, p. 141Google Scholar, n. 1.

146 Turner, Sharon, The History of the Ango-Saxons, 7th ed., 3 vols. (London, 1852) 11, 176Google Scholar; Turner's conjecture is repeated Thompson, , Catalogue of Ancient Manuscripts, p. 36.Google Scholar

147 The first element of the name Mihthild is OE miht (cf. OS and OHG maht). The form Mihthild is not attested in continental sources; there the name is invariably spelled Mahthilt or Mahthild (see Förstemann, Altdeutsches Namenbuch I: Personennamen, cols. 1083–4). Furthermore the name is invariably spelled Mahthild in the two Latin lives written in Saxony to commemorate this queen: Vita Mahthildis reginae antiquior, ed. R. Koepke, MGH, Script. 10 (Hanover, 1852), 573–82Google Scholar, and Vita Mahthildis reginae, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH, Script. 4 (Hanover, 1841), 282–302Google Scholar; both lives date from the late tenth and early eleventh centuries. Similarly in continental sources the king's name is invariably spelled Otto, the form Odda being unattested, whereas in English sources the name Odda is very common (see Birch, W. de G., Index Saxonicus: an Index to all the Names of Persons in the Cartularium Saxonicum (London, 1899), p. 102Google Scholar), but the form Otto never occurs. There can thus be no doubt that the names were added by an English scribe.

148 BL Harley 6018, 6r: ‘sacer hic regibus Angliae codex, quippe qui olim eo tacto, cum regio diademate cingerentur, iuramentum solemne praestare soliti’.

149 Cf. the epigram composed by Leland to be inscribed in another of Athelstan's books:

Ethelstanus erat nostrae pars maxima curae

cuius nota mihi bibliotheca fuit.

illo sublato, sexcentos amplius annos

puluere delitui squallidus atque situ:

donec me pietas Magni reuocauit ad auras

Henrici, digno restituitque loco.

Leland found the manuscript at Bath and presented it to Henry, VIII (Commentarii de scriptoribus Britannicis, ed. Hall, A., 2 vols. (Oxford, 1709) 1, 159–60)Google Scholar; the manuscript survives as BL Cotton Claudius B. v.

150 Ptd BCS 711; see further the discussion by Chaplais, P. (‘The Anglo-Saxon Chancery’, Prisca Munimenta, ed. Ranger, F. (London, 1973), pp. 43–62, at 46–7Google Scholar). Chaplais observes that the handwriting of this prose dedication is that of a scribe who wrote five royal charters over the period 944 to 949 and argues that the scribe was active at Winchester (hence by implication that Tiberius A. ii passed through Winchester?); but it is more reasonable to regard the author as a royal scribe active at various points of the king's itinerary, as Dr Keynes suggests to me. If this was the case, there is no obstacle to assuming that both the prose and the poetic dedication were added at Christ Church, Canterbury.

151 After it came into Cotton's possession the manuscript was considerably mutilated. A number of folios containing Anglo-Saxon charters were excised and bound separately; these are preserved in Cotton Claudius A. iii and Faustina B. vi (see Ker, , Catalogue, pp. 239–40Google Scholar, and his more detailed discussion, Brit. Museum Quarterly 12 (1938), 130Google Scholar). Since fol. 15 is now mounted separately, its original position in the manuscript is impossible to determine.

152 Cf. Chaplais (‘The Anglo-Saxon Chancery’, p. 46), who observes that the hand of the poem ‘proves beyond doubt that the writer was of foreign origin, like the scribe of the main part of the book’. Note, however, that the hand of the poem is not that of the main text (the gospels), nor is it that of the English royal scribe who copied the above-mentioned prose dedication.

153 In the margin of the folio containing the poem the name Eawyn has been entered in a hand different from that which copied the poem. Whether the name has any connection with the poem cannot be determined and Eawyn cannot otherwise be identified.

154 The poem is listed in Schaller, and Könsgen, , Initia carminum (no. 14294)Google Scholar. It has been printed previously by Dümmler, E. (Neues Archiv 10 (1884), 343–4Google Scholar) and in BCS (710).

155 Tiberius A. ii is a richly illuminated manuscript and presumably the gemmigeris locis are the lavishly decorated miniatures in it (less probably in context, the phrase could refer to a jewel-studded binding). The notion that Athelstan himself was responsible for the decoration is either a conceit by the poet or else indicates that the poet was unaware of the manuscript's continental origin.

156 The use of auxit is problematical, since auxit cannot (normally) control an accusative infinitive construction, as it apparently does here (hoc…ornarier; ora is accusative of respect). Perhaps auxit is a scribal error for a verb such as iussit; if so, the scribe was evidently not the poet.

157 See my remarks on Anglo-Latin poetic diction, ‘Three Latin Poems from Æthelwold's School at Winchester’, ASE 1 (1972), 85–137, at 86–9.Google Scholar

158 Possibly it may be dated more narrowly to the last two years of his life: lines 5–6, with their reference to the bellicose king who conquered other reges feroces by grinding down their proud necks, would best seem to describe Athelstan's overwhelming defeat of Olaf and the kings of Scotland and Strathclyde at the Battle of Brunanburb in 937. For a full discussion of the circumstances, date and location of this battle, see The Battle of Brunanburb, ed. A. Campbell (London, 1938), pp. 43–80.Google Scholar

159 Cf. Stenton, , Anglo-Saxon England, p. 444Google Scholar. One may possibly add the scribe (or draftsman) of S 394 (BCS 641), whose orthography suggested a continental, possibly Saxon, origin (see above, n. 74), as well as the members of the New Minster familia who witnessed S 1417 (BCS 648) and who were probably of continental origin (see above, n. 143).

160 I am aware that new evidence for John the Old Saxon's literary activity in England may raise anew the question of the provenance both of the Old Saxon poem Genesis (at least part of which we know was translated into Old English poetry (Genesis B) probably by the early tenth century) and of BL Cotton Caligula A. vii, a tenth-century manuscript of the Old Saxon poem Heliand; I intend to return to this question on another occasion.

161 Cf. my remarks in ‘The Hermeneutic Style in Tenth-Century Anglo-Latin Literature’, ASE 4 (1975), 67–111, at 73–6.Google Scholar

162 I have examined the continental background to the hermeneutic style in England (without reference to Saxon, John the Old) in ‘L'Influence stylistique de la poésie de Jean Scot’, Jean Scot Erigène et l'bistoire de la philosophie, Colloques internationaux du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique 561 (Paris, 1977), 441–52.Google Scholar

163 Bullough, D. A., ‘The Continental Background of the Reform’, Tenth-Century Studies. Essays in Commemoration of the Millennium of the Council of Winchester and ‘Regularis Concordia’, ed. Parsons, D. (London and Chichester, 1975), pp. 20–36, at p. 20.Google Scholar

164 I am extremely grateful to several friends for incisive criticism and constructive comment: Nicholas Brooks, Julian Brown, David Dumville and Simon Keynes.