History of the English People, Volume I - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216

The Project Gutenberg eBook, History of the English People, Volume I (of 8), by John Richard Green This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net Title: History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 Author: John Richard Green Release Date: November 9, 2005 [eBook #17037] Most recently updated: May 20, 2008 Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 ***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE, VOLUME I (OF 8)*** E-text prepared by Paul Murray and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) Note: The index for the entire 8 volume set of History of the English People was located at the end of Volume VIII. For ease in accessibility, it has been removed and produced as a separate volume (http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/25533). HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE VOLUME I BY JOHN RICHARD GREEN, M.A. HONORARY FELLOW OF JESUS COLLEGE, OXFORD EARLY ENGLAND, 449-1071 FOREIGN KINGS, 1071-1204 THE CHARTER, 1204-1216 First Edition, Demy 8vo, November 1877; Reprinted December 1877, 1881, 1885, 1890. Eversley Edition, 1895. London MacMillan and Co. and New York 1895 I Dedicate this Book TO TWO DEAR FRIENDS MY MASTERS IN THE STUDY OF ENGLISH HISTORY EDWARD AUGUSTUS FREEMAN AND WILLIAM STUBBS CONTENTS VOLUME I BOOK I CHAPTER I CHAPTER II CHAPTER III CHAPTER IV EARLY ENGLAND AUTHORITIES FOR BOOK I THE ENGLISH CONQUEST OF BRITAIN THE ENGLISH KINGDOMS WESSEX AND THE NORTHMEN FEUDALISM AND THE MONARCHY 449-1071 449-1071 449-577 577-796 796-947 954-1071 BOOK II CHAPTER I CHAPTER II CHAPTER III CHAPTER IV ENGLAND UNDER FOREIGN KINGS 1071-1204 AUTHORITIES FOR BOOK II THE CONQUEROR THE NORMAN KINGS HENRY THE SECOND THE ANGEVIN KINGS 1071-1204 1071-1085 1085-1154 1154-1189 1189-1204 BOOK III CHAPTER I THE CHARTER AUTHORITIES FOR BOOK III JOHN 1204-1307 1204-1307 1204-1216 LIST OF MAPS Britain and the English Conquest The English Kingdoms in A.D. 600 England and the Danelaw The Dominions of the Angevins Ireland just before the English Invasion VOLUME I BOOK I EARLY ENGLAND 449-1071 1-003] AUTHORITIES FOR BOOK I 449-1071 For the conquest of Britain by the English our authorities are scant and imperfect. The only extant British account is the "Epistola" of Gildas, a work written probably about A.D. 560. The style of Gildas is diffuse and inflated, but his book is of great value in the light it throws on the state of the island at that time, and above all as the one record of the conquest which we have from the side of the conquered. The English conquerors, on the other hand, have left jottings of their conquest of Kent, Sussex, and Wessex in the curious annals which form the opening of the compilation now known as the "English" or "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle," annals which are undoubtedly historic, though with a slight mythical intermixture. For the history of the English conquest of mid-Britain or the Eastern Coast we possess no written materials from either side; and a fragment of the Annals of Northumbria embodied in the later compilation ("Historia Britonum") which bears the name of Nennius alone throws light on the conquest of the North. From these inadequate materials however Dr. Guest has succeeded by a wonderful combination of historical and archæological knowledge in constructing a narrative of the conquest of Southern and South-Western Britain which must serve as the starting-point for all future enquirers. 1-004] This narrative, so far as it goes, has served as the basis of the account given in my text; and I can only trust that it may soon be embodied in some more accessible form than that of a series of papers in the Transactions of the Archæological Institute. In a like way, though Kemble's "Saxons in England" and Sir F. Palgrave's "History of the English Commonwealth" (if read with caution) contain much that is worth notice, our knowledge of the primitive constitution of the English people and the changes introduced into it since their settlement in Britain must be mainly drawn from the "Constitutional History" of Professor Stubbs. Bæda's "Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum," a work of which I have spoken in my text, is the primary authority for the history of the Northumbrian overlordship which followed the Conquest. It is by copious insertions from Bæda that the meagre regnal and episcopal annals of the West Saxons have been brought to the shape in which they at present appear in the part of the English Chronicle which concerns this period. The life of Wilfrid by Eddi, with those of Cuthbert by an anonymous contemporary and by Bæda himself, throws great light on the religious and intellectual condition of the North at the time of its supremacy. But with the fall of Northumbria we pass into a period of historical dearth. A few incidents of Mercian history are preserved among the meagre annals of Wessex in the English Chronicle: but for the most part we are thrown upon later writers, especially Henry of Huntingdon and William of Malmesbury, who, though authors of the twelfth century, had access to older materials which are now lost. A little may be gleaned from biographies such as that of Guthlac of Crowland; but the letters of Boniface and Alcwine, which have been edited by Jaffé in his series of "Monumenta Germanica," form the most valuable contemporary materials for this period. From the rise of Wessex our history rests mainly on the English Chronicle. The earlier part of this work, as we have said, is a compilation, and consists of (1) Annals of the Conquest of South Britain, and (2) Short Notices of the Kings and Bishops of 1-005] Wessex expanded by copious insertions from Bæda, and after the end of his work by brief additions from some northern sources. These materials may have been thrown together into their present form in Ælfred's time as a preface to the far fuller annals which begin with the reign of Æthelwulf, and which widen into a great contemporary history when they reach that of Ælfred himself. After Ælfred's day the Chronicle varies much in value. Through the reign of Eadward the Elder it is copious, and a Mercian Chronicle is imbedded in it: it then dies down into a series of scant and jejune entries, broken however with grand battle-songs, till the reign of Æthelred when its fulness returns. Outside the Chronicle we encounter a great and valuable mass of historical material for the age of Ælfred and his successors. The life of Ælfred which bears the name of Asser, puzzling as it is in some ways, is probably really Asser's work, and certainly of contemporary authority. The Latin rendering of the English Chronicle which bears