Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Complete

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“Is it astonishing,” asked the people (referring to Edward’s preference of the Normans), “that the author and support of Edward’s reign should be indignant at seeing new men from a foreign nation raised above him, and yet never does he utter one harsh word to the man whom he himself created king?”—HAZLITT’s THIERRY, vol. i. p. 126.

This is the English account (versus the Norman). There can be little doubt that it is the true one.

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Henry of Huntingdon, etc.

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Henry of Huntingdon; Bromt. Chron., etc.

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Hoveden.

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The origin of the word leach (physician), which has puzzled some inquirers, is from lids or leac, a body. Leich is the old Saxon word for surgeon.

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Sharon Turner, vol. i. p. 472.

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Fosbrooke.

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Aegir, the Scandinavian god of the ocean. Not one of the Aser, or Asas (the celestial race), but sprung from the giants. Ran or Rana, his wife, a more malignant character, who caused shipwrecks, and drew to herself, by a net, all that fell into the sea. The offspring of this marriage were nine daughters, who became the Billows, the Currents, and the Storms.

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Frilla, the Danish word for a lady who, often with the wife’s consent, was added to the domestic circle by the husband. The word is here used by Hilda in a general sense of reproach. Both marriage and concubinage were common amongst the Anglo-Saxon priesthood, despite the unheeded canons; and so, indeed, they were with the French clergy.

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Hilda, not only as a heathen, but as a Dane, would be no favourer of monks; they were unknown in Denmark at that time, and the Danes held them in odium.—Ord Vital., lib. vii.

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Chron. Knyghton.

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Weyd-month. Meadow month, June.

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Cumen-hus. Tavern.

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Fitzstephen.

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William of Malmesbury speaks with just indignation of the Anglo-Saxon custom of selling female servants, either to public prostitution, or foreign slavery.

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It will be remembered that Algar governed Wessex, which principality included Kent, during the year of Godwin’s outlawry.

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Trulofa, from which comes our popular corruption “true lover’s knot;” a vetere Danico trulofa, i.e., fidem do, to pledge faith.—HICKE’s Thesaur.

“A knot, among the ancient northern nations, seems to have been the emblem of love, faith, and friendship.”—BRANDE’s Pop. Antiq.

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The Saxon Chronicle contradicts itself as to Algar’s outlawry, stating in one passage that he was outlawed without any kind of guilt, and in another that he was outlawed as swike, or traitor, and that he made a confession of it before all the men there gathered. His treason, however, seems naturally occasioned by his close connection with Gryffyth, and proved by his share in that King’s rebellion. Some of our historians have unfairly assumed that his outlawry was at Harold’s instigation. Of this there is not only no proof, but one of the best authorities among the chroniclers says just the contrary—that Harold did all he could to intercede for him; and it is certain that he was fairly tried and condemned by the Witan, and afterwards restored by the concurrent articles of agreement between Harold and Leofric. Harold’s policy with his own countrymen stands out very markedly prominent in the annals of the time; it was invariably that of conciliation.

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Saxon Chron., verbatim.

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Hume.

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“The chaste who blameless keep unsullied fame, Transcend all other worth, all other praise. The Spirit, high enthroned, has made their hearts His sacred temple.”

SHARON TURNER’s Translation of Aldhelm, vol. iii. p. 366. It is curious to see how, even in Latin, the poet preserves the alliterations that characterised the Saxon muse.

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Slightly altered from Aldhelm.

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It is impossible to form any just view of the state of parties, and the position of Harold in the later portions of this work, unless the reader will bear constantly in mind the fact that, from the earliest period, minors were set aside as a matter of course, by the Saxon customs. Henry observes that, in the whole history of the Heptarchy, there is but one example of a minority, and that a short and unfortunate one; so, in the later times, the great Alfred takes the throne, to the exclusion of the infant son of his elder brother. Only under very peculiar circumstances, backed, as in the case of Edmund Ironsides, by precocious talents and manhood on the part of the minor, were there exceptions to the general laws of succession. The same rule obtained with the earldoms; the fame, power, and popularity of Siward could not transmit his Northumbrian earldom to his infant son Waltheof, so gloomily renowned in a subsequent reign.

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