A Source Book of Mediaeval History Part 23

[Sidenote: Learning in the days before the Danish invasions]

When I thought of all this I remembered also how I saw the country before it had been all ravaged and burned; how the churches throughout the whole of England stood filled with treasures and books. There was also a great mult.i.tude of G.o.d's servants, but they had very little knowledge of books, for they could not understand anything in them because they were not written in their own language.[285] When I remembered all this I wondered extremely that the good and wise men who were formerly all over England and had learned perfectly all the books, did not wish to translate them into their own language. But again I soon answered myself and said: "Their own desire for learning was so great that they did not suppose that men would ever become so indifferent and that learning would ever so decay; and they wished, moreover, that wisdom in this land might increase with our knowledge of languages." Then I remembered how the law was first known in Hebrew and when the Greeks had learned it how they translated the whole of it into their own tongue,[286] and all other books besides. And again the Romans, when they had learned it, translated the whole of it into their own language.[287] And also all other Christian nations translated a part of it into their languages.

[Sidenote: Plan to translate Latin books into English]

Therefore it seems better to me, if you agree, for us also to translate some of the books which are most needful for all men to know into the language which we can all understand. It shall be your duty to see to it, as can easily be done if we have tranquility enough,[288] that all the free-born youth now in England, who are rich enough to be able to devote themselves to it, be set to learn as long as they are not fit for any other occupation, until they are well able to read English writing. And let those afterwards be taught more in the Latin language who are to continue learning and be promoted to a higher rank.

[Sidenote: The translation of Pope Gregory's Pastoral Care]

When I remembered how the knowledge of Latin had decayed through England, and yet that many could read English writing, I began, among other various and manifold troubles of this kingdom, to translate into English the book which is called in Latin _Pastoralis_, and in English _The Shepherd's Book_, sometimes word for word, and sometimes according to the sense, as I had learned it from Plegmund, my archbishop, and a.s.ser, my bishop, and Grimbald, my ma.s.s-priest, and John, my ma.s.s-priest. And when I had learned it, as I could best understand it and most clearly interpret it, I translated it into English.

I will send a copy of this book to every bishopric in my kingdom, and on each copy there shall be a clasp worth fifty mancuses.[289]

And I command in G.o.d's name that no man take the clasp from the book, or the book from the minster.[290] It is uncertain how long there may be such learned bishops as, thanks be to G.o.d, there now are almost everywhere; therefore, I wish these copies always to remain in their places, unless the bishop desires to take them with him, or they be loaned out anywhere, or any one wishes to make a copy of them.

32. Alfred's Laws

Here are a few characteristic laws included by Alfred in the code which he drew up on the basis of old customs and the laws of some of the earlier Saxon kings. On the nature of the law of the early Germanic peoples, see p. 59.

Source--Text in Benjamin Thorpe, _The Ancient Laws and Inst.i.tutes of England_ (London, 1840), pp. 20-44 _pa.s.sim_.

If any one smite his neighbor with a stone, or with his fist, and he nevertheless can go out with a staff, let him get him a physician and do his work as long as he himself cannot.

If an ox gore a man or a woman, so that they die, let it be stoned, and let not its flesh be eaten. The owner shall not be liable if the ox were wont to push with its horns for two or three days before, and he knew it not; but if he knew it, and would not shut it in, and it then shall have slain a man or a woman, let it be stoned; and let the master be slain, or the person killed be paid for, as the "witan"[291] shall decree to be right.

Injure ye not the widows and the stepchildren, nor hurt them anywhere; for if ye do otherwise they will cry unto me and I will hear them, and I will slay you with my sword; and I will cause that your own wives shall be widows, and your children shall be stepchildren.

If a man strike out another's eye, let him pay sixty shillings, and six shillings, and six pennies, and a third part of a penny, as 'bot.'[292] If it remain in the head, and he cannot see anything with it, let one-third of the 'bot' be remitted.

[Sidenote: Penalties for various crimes of violence]

If a man strike out another's tooth in the front of his head, let him make 'bot' for it with eight shillings; if it be the canine tooth, let four shillings be paid as 'bot.' A man's grinder is worth fifteen shillings.

If the shooting finger be struck off, the 'bot' is fifteen shillings; for its nail it is four shillings.

If a man maim another's hand outwardly, let twenty shillings be paid him as 'bot,' if he can be healed; if it half fly off, then shall forty shillings be paid as 'bot.'

FOOTNOTES:

[257] That is, Ethelred I., whom Alfred succeeded.

[258] Wiltshire, on the southern coast, west of the Isle of Wight.

[259] The same as the modern city of the name.

[260] Mercia was one of the seven old Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. It lay east of Wales.

[261] This marked a radical departure in methods of fighting the invaders. On the continent, and hitherto in England, there had been no effort to prevent the enemy from getting into the country they proposed to plunder. Alfred's creation of a navy was one of his wisest acts. Although the English had by this time grown comparatively unaccustomed to seafaring life they contrived to win their first naval encounter with the enemy.

[262] In Dorsetshire.

[263] Athelney was in Somersetshire, northeast of Exeter, in the marshes at the junction of the Tone and the Parret.

[264] The modern Brixton Deverill, in Wiltshire, near Warminster.

[265] In Wiltshire, a little east of Westbury. In January the Danes had removed from Exeter to Chippenham. Edington (or Ethandune) was eight miles from the camp at the latter place. The Danes were first defeated in an open battle at Edington, and then forced to surrender after a fourteen days' siege at Chippenham.

[266] This so-called "Peace of Alfred and Guthrum" in 878 provided only for the acceptance of Christianity by the Danish leader. It is sometimes known as the treaty of Chippenham and is not to be confused with the treaty of Wedmore, of a few weeks later, by which Alfred and Guthrum divided the English country between them. The text of this second treaty will be found in Lee's _Source-Book of English History_ (pp. 98-99), though the introductory statement there given is somewhat misleading. This a.s.signment of the Danelaw to Guthrum's people may well be compared with the yielding of Normandy to Rollo by Charles the Simple in 911 [see p. 172].

[267] Ethelwerd was Alfred's fifth living child.

[268] This was, of course, not a school in the modern sense of the word. All that is meant is simply that young Ethelwerd, along with sons of n.o.bles and non-n.o.bles, received instruction from the learned men at the court. It had been customary before Alfred's day for the young princes and sons of n.o.bles to receive training at the court, but not in letters.

[269] This was Edward the Elder who succeeded Alfred as king and reigned from 901 to 925. He was Alfred's eldest son.

[270] aelfthryth was Alfred's fourth child. She became the wife of Baldwin II. of Flanders.

[271] Among other labors in behalf of learning, Alfred made a collection of the ancient epics and lyrics of the Saxon people.

Unfortunately, except in the case of the epic Beowulf, only fragments of these have survived. Beowulf was, so far as we know, the earliest of the Saxon poems, having originated before the migration to Britain, though it was probably put in its present form by a Christian monk of the eighth century.

[272] Armorica was the name applied in Alfred's time to the region southward from the mouth of the Seine to Brittany.

[273] There is a good deal of independent evidence that Alfred was peculiarly hospitable to foreigners. He delighted in learning from them about their peoples and experiences.

[274] The word in the original is _ministeriales_. It is not Saxon but Franco-Latin and is an instance of the Frankish element in a.s.ser's vocabulary. Here, as among the Franks, the _ministeriales_ were the officials of second-rate importance surrounding the king, the highest being known as the _ministri_.

[275] This comparison of the gathering of learning to the operations of a bee in collecting honey is very common among cla.s.sical writers and also among those of the Carolingian renaissance. It occurs in Lucretius, Seneca, Macrobius, Alcuin, and the poet Candidus.

[276] Plegmund became archbishop of Canterbury in 890, but it is probable that he was with Alfred some time before his election to the primacy.

[277] This Ethelstan was probably the person of that name who was consecrated bishop of Ramsbury in 909.

[278] From another doc.u.ment it appears that Werwulf was a friend of Bishop Werfrith in Mercia before either took up residence at Alfred's court.

[279] In Chap. 104 of a.s.ser's biography the _capellani_ are described as supplying the king with candles, by whose burning he measured time.

The word _capella.n.u.s_ is of pure Frankish origin and was originally applied to the clerks (_clerici capellani_) who were charged with the custody of the cope (_cappa_) of St. Martin, which was kept in the _capella_. From this the term _capella_ came to mean a room especially devoted to religious uses, that is, a chapel. It was used in this sense as early as 829 in Frankland. Whether by _capella.n.u.s_ a.s.ser meant mere clerks, or veritable "chaplains" in the later sense, cannot be known, though his usage was probably the latter.

[280] Chapter 87 of a.s.ser informs us that Alfred mastered the art of reading in the year 887.

[281] Grimbald came from the Flemish monastery of St. Bertin at St.

Omer. He was recommended to Alfred by Fulco, archbishop of Rheims, who had once been abbot of St. Bertin. We do not know in what year Grimbald went to England, though there is some evidence that it was not far from 887.

[282] John the Old Saxon is mentioned by Alfred as his ma.s.s-priest. It is probable that he came from the abbey of Corbei on the upper Weser.

Not much is known about the man, but if he was as learned as a.s.ser says he was, he must have been a welcome addition to Alfred's group of scholars particularly as the language which he used was very similar to that of the West Saxons in England.

[283] That is, south of the Humber.