done by him to his Mother Queen Emma in banishing and spoiling her of her money and jewels against all right and justice and partly for his unjust invasion of the Crown of England but in truth as a just retaliation of his barbarous cruelty to Prince Alfred and his Normans For whose treacherous inhumane slaughter King Harde-Cnute deprived Alfred Bishop of Worcester of his Bishoprick whose hands were said to have been in Alfreds bloud And for which murder he likewise looked with an evil eye upon Earl Godwin compelling him to an Oath of Purgation touching the same Whereupon Godwin by his own Oath and the Oaths of most of the Nobles of the Realm his compurgators swore though most falsly That Prince Alfreds eyes were not put out nor he murdered as aforesaid by his Counsel or consent but what was done therein was only by the command of King Harold which he durst not resist Notwithstanding which Oath to purchase his peace with Harde-Cnute he presented him with a most rich and royal present to wit with a Ship whose stern was of gold with 80 Souldiers placed therein all uniformly and richly suited having on their heads gilt Burgonets on their armes bracelets of Gold on their bodies Habergeons Swords Battel-axes Targets and other arms after the Danish fashion all richly gilt with gilt bosses and darts in their hands Which Present though it pacified the Kings indignation yet it prevented not Gods avenging justice on him afterwards for Alfreds bloud thus partly avenged on Harolds carcasse which was cast into the Thames and mangled according to Hard-Cnutes command and lay floting on the water sundry dayes till a Fisherman in compassion took up his corps and buried it privately in St. Clements Danes CHAP. V. Containing a Brief Historicall Collection of all the Parliamentary Councils State-Assemblies Historicall Passages and Proceedings that concern the Fundamentall Liberties Priviledges Rights Properties Laws and Government of the Nation under the reign of King Edward the Confessor from the year of our Lord 1042. to 1066. wherein he died KING Harde-Cnute being sodainly taken out of this world without issue by divine Justice on the 6 day of June Anno 1042. thereupon the Earls and Barons of England immediately after his death assembled together in a Great Council about the election of a New King Wherein OMNES ANGLORUM MAGNATES ad invicum tractantes DE COMMVNI CONCILIO ET JURAMENTO STATUERUNT QUOD NUNQUAM TEMPORIBUS FUTURIS ALIQUIS DACUS SUPER EOS IN ANGLIA REGNARET hoc maxime pro contemptibus quos Angli à Danis saepiâ—… acceperunt c. as the Chronicle of Bromton others informe us All the Nobles of the English treating together decreed by common advice which they ratified with an oath THAT IN TIMES TO COME NEVER ANY DANE or person of the Danish blood SHOULD REIGN OR BE KING OVER THEM IN ENGLAND ANY MORE disclaiming all Danish subjection that especially for the contempts which the English had very often received from the Danes For if a Dane had met an Englishmen upon any bridge the Englishman must not be so hardy to move a foot but stand stâ—ll till the Dane was passed quite over it And moreover if the Englishmen had not bâ—wed down their heads to doe reverence to the Danes they should presently have undergone great punishments and stripes Whereupon King Harde-Cnute being dead the English rising up against them drove all the Danes being then without a King and Captaine out of the Realm of England who speedily quâ—tting the land never returned into it afterwards And here we may justly stand still a while and contemplate the admirable retaliating justice of God upon our Danish usurping Kings and their Posterity King Cnute as you heard before caused the temporizing English Bishops Nobles and Barons assembled in a Parliamentary Council against their oaths of allegiance to King Ethelred Edmund Ironside and their heirs no less then twice one after another to renounce cast off and abjure their regall Posterity to make them incapable of the Crowne of England and settle the inheritance of it upon him and his Danish blood Anno 1016. and 1017. And now in little more then twenty years after all the English Prelates and Nobles assembled in Council of their own accords by a solemn Decree and Oath abjure renounce and eternally disinherit all the Danish blood-royall of the Crown of England and restore the Saxon English royall line to that soveraignty which they had formerly disclaimed such are the vicissitudes of divine Justice and providence worthy our observation in these wheeling times wherein we live when no man knoweth what changes of like nature one day or year may bring forth The English putting their Decree for cashiering all the Danes in execution turned the mâ—â—t of all the Castles Forts Garrisons Cities Villages throughout England as well those of the Royall and Noble blood as the vulgar sort and forced them to depart the Realm as they had formerly banished the English Princes and Nobles Procâ—reâ— igitur Anglorum jam DACORUM DOMINIO LIBERATI The Nobles therefore of Engl. being thus freed from the Danes dominion for so much of God of his mercy and providence who is the maker of heirs thought good after the woâ—ull captivity of the English Nation to grant them some respite of deliverance in taking away the Danish Kings without any issue left behinde them who reigning here in England kept the English people in miserable subjection about the space of 28 years and from their first landing in the time of King Brictâ—icus wasted and vexed this land for the space of 255 years their Tyranny now coming to an end by the death of Harde Cnute they thereupon assembling together in a great Council with a generall consent elected Prince Edward surnamed the Confessor the youngest and onely surviving son of King Ethelred for their King who ANNUENTE CLERO ET POPULO LONDONIIS IN REGEM ELIGITUR as Mat. Westminster relates whereupon Edward being then in Normandy where he had long lived in exile being a man of a gentle and soft spirit more appliable to other mens counsels then able to trust his own naturally so averse from all war bloodshed that he wished rather to continue all his life long in a private exiled estate then by war or blood to aspire to the Crown the Lords sent messengers to him to come over and take peaceable possession of the Kingdome of England they having chosen him for their King advising him to bring with him as few Normans as he could and they would most faithfully establish him in the throne Edward though at first he much doubted what course to stear somewhat mistrusting the treachery and inconstancy of the fickle headed English yet at last upon the importunity of the messengers who informed him melius esse ut vivat gloriosus in Imperio quà m ignominiosus moriâ—ur in exilio JURE EI COMPETERE REGNUM aevo
A Seasonable VINDICATION OF The good old Fundamental RIGHTS and GOVERNMENTS of all English FREEMEN By William Prynne Esq a Bencher of Lincolnes Inne Jeremiah 22. and 18. They shall not lament for him saying Ah my Brother or Ah hi Glory He shall be buried with the burial of an Asse drawn and cast forth beyond the Gates of Jerusalem No man of his seed shall prosper sitting on the Throne of David and ruling any more in Judah LONDON Printed for Henry Broom at the sign of the Gun in Ivie Lane 1659. To the Ingenuous Unprejudiced READER I Here present thee with The Third part of a seasonable Legal and Historical Vindication of the good old Fundamental Liberties Franchises Rights Properties Laws Government of all English Freemen with A Chronological Collection of their Strenuous Defences by Wars and otherwise of all the Great Parliamentary Councils Synods chief Laws Charters and other Proceedings in them the great fatal Publick Revolutions Invasions Wars National Sinnes occasioning them and the exemplary Judgements of God upon Tyrants Oppressors Perjured persons Rebells Traytors Regicides Usurpers under our Saxon and Danish Kings since the year of Christ 600. till the Coronation of King William the Norman anno 1066. with some Short Observations of mine own here and there subjoined for the Readers benefit and instruction A work neither unseasonable for nor unsutable unserviceable to our present times worthy the serious perusal of all who profess themselvs trons of the Publique Fundamental Rights Liber-Paties Laws Properties Government of the English Nation or studious of our old Parliamentary Councils Acts Laws Charters Proceedings or of our English History From which intelligent wise Christian Readers by observing the Providences Judgements Proceedings of God towards our ancestors and others for their national personal crying bloody sins in former ages may probably conjecture what Tragical Judgements Events our whole Nation in general many transcendent Delinquents in particular have now just cause to fear and expect for their exorbitant iniquities equalling or exceeding any in those former ages unless their speedy real sincere repentance reformation and Gods infinite mercy ward them off True it is that the infallible certainty of future contingent judgements and events national or personal are known only to God himself who changeth the times seasons removeth Kings and setteth up Kings pulleth down one and setteth up another roots up pulls down destroyes builds plants Nations Kingdomes Cities Families Persons at his pleasure doing whatsoever pleaseth him both in heaven earth the Sea all deep places and amongst all the Inhabitants of the earth and none can stay his hands nor say unto him What dost thou Yet notwithstanding wise intelligent Christians by a serious trutination and comparing of the Judgements of God expresly threatned against and usually inflicted upon Nations or Persons for such and such transgressions in precedent generations may probably conjecture predict what severe exemplary punishments our late present transcendent wickednesses outragious crimes are like to draw down upon our impenitent secure perjured sinfull Nation and the hairy scalps of all those Grand Offenders who go on still in their exorbitant trespasses though they deem themselves advanced above the reach of any Powers or Tribunalls which may pull them down and execute justice on them answerable to their bloody crimes and violences there being an higher than the highest who is both able and resolved to execute vengeance on them in his due season as well as on all Notorious grand Offenders in former ages though never so many if their repentance prevent it not It was Davids profession to God though a victorious King General and Man of War My flesh trembleth for fear of thee and I am afraid of thy judgements O that this were the present temper of our secure Nation and all the sinners warriours and Grandees in it in this fearless stupid age wherein though we commit wickedness with both hands our tongues doings are against the Lord to provoke the eyes of his glory and we all proclaim our sins like Sodome and hide them not yet Gods judgements are far above out of our sight and we all say in our hearts like those secure Atheists mentioned in the Psalmist we shall never be moved we shall never be in adversity God hath forgotten he hideth his face he will never see nor require it Yea notwithstanding all Gods threats curses against his late severe punishments of our National personal sins We blesse our selves and say in our hearts we shall have peace though we walk in the imaginations of own hearts to add drunkennesse to thirst quite forgetting what follows thereupon The Lord will not spare such men but the anger of the Lord and his jealously shall smoke against them and all the curses that are written in his book shall lie upon them the Lord shall blot out their names from under heaven Let therefore the contemplation of the National Personal judgements of God upon our Ancestors here recorded for those crimes of wch we are now as deeply guilty as they were then awaken us from our present Lethargy lest we be sodainly destroyed and that without remedy and teach us all this Gospel lesson Rom. 11. 20 21. Be not high minded but fear for if God spared not the naturall branches heretofore or of late take heed lest he also spare not thee Rumor de Veteri faciet futura timeri The fourth Section of the third chapter which begins this third part should have been printed with the Second part as a branch thereof above two years since but that the Stationer then kept it back for fear it should swell that Part overbigg for his present Sale whereby the bulk of this Third Part is now augmented beyond its first intended proportion which all Readers may do well to binde up with the two former parts to which it hath special relation more particularly to the ten Propositions in the First Part to which the Proposition figures in the margin refer The most of that large tract of 450. years space I have here Chronologically run through was spent either â—n bloody intestine wars between our Saxon Kings themselves or the Welsh Britons warring upon and against each other or else in defensive Wars both by Land and Sea against the invading bloody plundering Danes Norwegians Scots Normans and other Foreign Nations During which Military seasons Religion Devotion Piety Law Iustice Parliamentary Councills Synods and just Government are usually cast aside and quite trampled under foot yet it is very observable for the perpetual honour of our Kingdome and Kings that as during the reign of our antient British Kings before the Saxon race here seated our Kingdome of Brittain produced Lucius the first Christian King Helena the first Christian Queen and Constantine the great her son the first Christian Emperour in the world who publickly imbraced professed countenanced propagated the faith and Gospel of
services Fiscal tributes except these three Expedition Building of Castle and Bridge The next in time is the Grant of Lotharius King of Kent Anno 679. of certain Lands in the Isle of Thannet to the Monastery of Raculph free from all secular services except these three Expedition Building of Bridge and Castle To which I might annex these ensuing Grants and Charters which I shall only name The Grant of King Egfrid and his Queen Etheldrida of Hestodesham to Bishop Wilfrid Anno 674. The Charter and Grant of Ceadwalla a foresaid and Kendritha his wife of 4 plough-plough-Lands to Archbishop Theodor and the Family of Christ-Church in Canterbury free from all secular services but those 3 forementioned An. 687. of Withrid King of Kent Anno. 694 of King Offa An. 774 of King Edmund An. 784. of King Kenewlfe An. 791 814 815 822. of King Wilof An. 829. of King Athulfus An. 832 833 834. of King Ethelstan An. 927 940. of King Edred An. 941 948 949. of King Egered An. 979 980. and of King Cnute An. Dom. 1016. To pretermit others of this kind All which Grants being for the most part only of their own private Lands gotten by Purchase or Conquest not of the Lands or Demesnes of their Crowns passed by their own Charters alone without any confirmation or assent of their Nobles in a Parliamentary Council not mentioned at all in them But no grants of any Lands Rents or Revenues of their Crowns to pious or other uses were then either valid in Law or obligatory to their successors without common consent and ratifications of their Nobles in Parliamentary Councils which for this reason is still mentioned in all their Charters and donations of such Lands and Rents to pious uses Neither could they exempt those Lands from any of these three forenamed publick charges for the common defence and benefit of their Realms by their own royal Charters alone unless ratified by the Nobles in their great Councils Whereupon in all these forecited Charters and other grants of Lands by particular persons ratified by these Kings they exempted them only from all secular services exceptis Expeditione Pontis Arcis constructione which they could not discharge them from but by special Grants in General Parliamentary Assemblies as subsequent Presidents will more fully demonstrate Theodor Archbishop of Canterbury Anno 685. held a Council at Twyford in the presence of Egfrid King or Northumberland who going in person to St. Cutbert when as he neither by Letters nor Messengers could be drawn out of his Iland Lindesfarne to the Synod brought him to it much against his will where by the command of all the Synod he was constrained to take upon him the Office of a Bishop Whereupon King Egfrid by the advice of Archbishop Theodor Bishop Trumwin totius Concilii and of the whole Council for the salvation of his and his successors souls by his Charter gave to St. Cutbert and all his successors the Village called Creic and 3 mile in circuit round about it together with the City called Lugabadia and 15 miles circuit round about it to have to him and his successors for the service of God for ever as freely and quietly as he himself enjoyed them and to dispose thereof at his pleasure which Charter the Arch-Bishop and Bishops present in the Conncil confirmed with their Subscriptions What other Councils and Synods were held under this Arch-Bishop Theodor at Hartford Clovesho Heathfield or Hatfeild and what Canons were made in them for the confirmation of the Christian faith the 5 first General Councils c. you may read at leisure in Gervasius Doroberniensis Matthew Parker and Godwin in his life where they are recorded and in Matthew Westminster An. 880. Chronicon Johannis Bromton Col. 741 756 799 780. Radul de Diceto Abbreviationes Chronic. Col. 441. Chronica Wil. Thorne col 1770 Henry Huntindon Historiarum lib. 3. p. 335 Spelmanni Concilia p. 152. Beda Ecclesiastieae Historiae l. 4. c. 5 17 18. Mr. Fox Acts and Monuments vol. 1. p. 160 161. To which I shall refer you About the year of Christ 692. Ina King of the West-Saxons who succeeded Ceadwalla by the exhortation and advice of Cenred his Father Hedda and Erkenwald his Bishops and of all his Aldermen or Senators and of all the Elders and Wisemen of his Realm in a great Assembly of the Servants of God for the salvation of his peoples souls and the common conservation of his Realm Enacted sundry Ecclesiastical and civil wholsom Laws that by them just judgements might be founded and established throughout his Dominions and that from thenceforth it might be lawfull for no Alderman Senator or other person living within his Realm to abolish these his Laws tending all to advance Piety Justice Peace and preserve his people from violence rapine oppression and all Punishments Taxes Fines but such only as were imposed ascertained by his Laws and Parliamentary Councils as you may read at large in the Laws themselves especially Lex 2 3 4 6 9 10 11 16 17 51 73 74. In the year 694 Withred King of Kent summoned Brithwald Archbishop of Canterbury Toby Bishop of Rochester with the other Abbots Abbesses Priests Deacons Dukes and Earls to a great Council at Beccanceld or Baccanceld as others write it where consulting all together concerning the State of the Churches of God within that Realm how they might establish and perpetuate to them to the end of the World those Lands and Revenues which their plous Kings and Ancestors had granted and appropriated to God and his Church as their perpetual inheritance without substraction or diminution They thereupon enacted decreed and in the name of God Almighty commanded that all their successours both Kings and Princes with allother Laymen whatsoever should not invade the Rights Lands or Dominions of the Churches which they then confirmed nor presume to violate the Privileges granted to them and specially by king Withreds Charter which they ratified in this Council with all their subscriptions wherein he and they exempted Churches from all secular services and Tributes but such as they should voluntarily and freely render without compulsion which should not be drawn into custom to their prejudice witnesâ—e this Clause of the Charter and exemption then confirmed ab omni debito vel pulsatione Regalium Tributorum nisi suâ spontanea voluntate ex largitate beneficiorum quid facere velint tamen hoc imposterum non servetur nec habeatur in malam consuetudinem The same King Withred in the Parliamentary Council of Berghamsteed Anno 697. by the advice and common consent of his Bishops and other Ecclesiastical Orders cum viris quibusdam militaribus enacted sundry Ecclesiastical and civil Laws to be added to the former Laws and customs of Kent the first whereof is this That the Church shall be free and enjoy her Judgements Rents and Pensions And
prisoner and slain by this Usurper at Tymmouth Upon occasion of which Insurrections and Wars I conceive this Council was most probably summoned Soon after this usurping Regicide Ethelred was slain himself even by those seditious Subjects who expelled and slew Osred to advance him to the Throne The common fate of bloody Usurpers especially in this kingdom of Northumberland as our Historians observe King Offa in the year 793. called a Provincial Parliamentary Council where Archbishop Humbert and his Suffragaâ—s with all the Primates and Nobles were present wherein he treated with thâ—m about founding the Monastery of St. Albane the first Martyr in the place where his Corps was found â—ndowing it with lands and Privileges Placuit omnibus Regis propositum Whereupon they concluded the King should go to Rome in person and procure from the Pope the Canonization of St. Albane and a Confirmation of Privileges to the Abbey he intended to build He repairing to Rome accordingly the Pope commending his Devotion gave him his full aâ—…ent both to found a Monastery and endow it with all such Privileges as he desired enjoyning him that returning to his Country ex Consilio Episcoporum Optimatum suorum by advice of his Bishops 〈…〉 he should confer to the Monastery of St. Albane what Possessions or Privileges he would which he 〈◊〉 grant or confirm to it by his special Charter first and afterwards he would confirm his original with his Privilege and Bull. The king hereupon receiving the Popes Benediction returned home and held two great Councils for the setliug of the Lands Privileges and Liberties of St. Albanes The one at Celcyth where were present 9 Kings 15 Bishops and 20 Dukes as John Stow relates in his Chronicle who all subscribed and ratified his Charter 〈◊〉 Lands and Privileges granted to St. Albane The other Council was held at Verolam which Matthew Westminster thus expresseth Congregato apud Verolamium Episcoporum Optimatum Concilio unanimi omnium consensu voluntate beato Albano Amplas contulit terras possessiones innumeras Quas multiplici Libertatum privilegio insignivit Monachorum vero conventum ex Domibus bene Religiosis ad Tumbam Martyris congregavit Abbatem eis Nomine Willegodum praefecit cui cum ipso Monasterio Jura Regalia concessit This king then reigning over 20 Shires at the same time by the unanimous assent of the Bishops and Nobles z gave out of all those Counties to the English School at Rome Peter-Pence in English called Romescot Yet he privileged the Church of St. Albane with so great Liberty that this Church alone should be quit of the Apostolical Custom and Tribute called Romescot when as neither the King nor Archbishop nor any Bishop Abbot or Prior or any other in the Realm was exempted frow this payment And likewise granted that the Church of St. Albane should faithfully collect the said Romescot from all the County of Hertford wherein the said Church is situated and receive the money collected to that Churches own use And that the Abbot thereof or a Monk constituted his Archdeacon under him should exercise Episcopal Authority over all the Priests Laymen within the possessions belonging to the Abbey and that he should make subjection to no Archbishop Bishop or Legate but only to the Pope himself So as that Church hath omnia jura Regalia and the Abbot thereof for the time being Pontificalia ornamenta And that by the great Charter of this king then made with the unanimous consent of all his Bishops and Nobles in this great Council What Lands he gave to the Monastery of St. Augustines and Christ-church in Canterbury and the Archbishops there you may read at large in the Chronicles of William Thorne col 1775. and Evidentiae Ecclesiae Christi Cantuariensis col 2203 2219. King Offa deceasing An. 797. his Son Egfrid so soon as he was settled in his Fathers kingdom imitating the pious footsteps of his Father devoutly conferred many Lands and possessions on the Church of St. Albanes and confirmed them by his Charter and Privilege with all those other Lands Privileges and Royal Liberties which his Father had conferred on the said Church to enjoy them in the freest manner Et ejus Donatio ut perpetuae firmitatis Robur obtineret juxta morem Romananae Ecclesiae omnium Episcoporum Comitum et Baronum totius imperii sui assembled in a general Council of the Realm Subscriptionem signum crucis apposuit Causing all his Bishops Earâ—s and Barons of his whole Realm to subscribe and ratifie his Charter and Donation with the sign of the Cross after the manner of the Roman Church That it might be of perpetual force and validity Moreover declining his Fathers covetousness in all things whatever he for the exaltation of his Kingdom had diminished out of the possessions of divers Monasteries he out of a pious devotion restored and confirmed with his Privilege or Charter to all who desired it This pious King Egfrid as our Historians observe and let others note it who gain their Kingdoms Powers Possessions by Bloodshed and Treason was taken away by sudden death on the 141 day after his Fathers decease which gave great cause of grief to all the people of his Realm not for his own sins which is not to be supposed but because his Father pro Regni sui confirmatione sanguinem â—…ffudit for the confirmation of his Kingdom shed much blood For he came to the Crown by the slaughter or King Bernred forementioned deposed and slain by him for his usurpation Tyranny and Mis-government then he invaded and â—â—ew with his own hand Alrick King of Kent routed his forces and reduced that kingdom under his own After this marching from South to North even beyond Humber he made Havock of all that stood in his way Whence returning in Triumph he set upon the West-Saxons and vanquished them forced their king Kenwolf to fly into Wales to the Britons for aid then entred into Wales routed their King Marmodius for breaking his Truce made a great slaughter of the Britons after ten years prosperous wars to conquer others returned victoriously into his own territories After his return thither to compleat his bloody Tragedies Ethelberâ— King of East-Angles coming upon solemn invitation to his Court in great state to marry his Daughter was there treacherously murdered by his Wife Quendreda's solicitation and practice with his privity and consent who caused a deep pit to be digged in his Bed chamber under his Chair of State or Bed into which he falling was there treacherously murdered and his head cut off by Gaymbertus who presented it all bloody to King Offa who to colour the business seeming to be sorrowfull for this murder shut himself up in his Chamber and there fasted 8 days space but then sending a great Army into the Kingdom of this murthered Prince seised on united it to his own Empire But Gods exemplary
vengeance pursued this hainous bloody Treachery notwithstanding all his feigned magnified Saintship and works of Charity and Piety for within one year after this bloody fact committed both Queendreda Offa and their Son Egfrid the only joy and pride of his Parents all died and his very kingdom it self was translated from the Mercians to the West-Saxons whom he â—…quered and oppressed O that all men of blood and unjust invaders of others Crowns Realms Possessions by war bloodshed and Treachery would seriously consider this President with all others of this nature both at home and abroad collected to their hands by Sir Walter Raughly in his excellent Preface before his famous History of the World About the year of Christ 797. Cynwolfe or Kenulph King of West-Saxons held a Council wherein he with his Bishops una cum caterva Satraparum and likewise with a great company of his Nobles there assembled writ a Letter to Lullus Bishop of Mentz touching some matters of Religion then in Debate In the year 798. the third of King Kenulph his reign there was a great Parliamentary Synod assemat Pinchamhalch wherein Eanbaldus or Embaldus Archbishop of Yorksate President with very many wise and great Men by whose Wisdom and Justice the Kingdom of Northumberland was then much advanced and renowned Who after they had debated many things concerning the benefit of holy Church and profit of all the Provinces of the People of Northumberland the observation of Easter and of Divine and secular Laws the increase of Gode service and the honours and necessities of the servants of God rehearsed and ratified the faith of the 5 first General Councils concerning the Trinity in brief and pithy expressions sit now to be revived in these times of Heresie and Blasphemy The same year there was another Great Council held at Bacanceld wherein Kenulph King of Mercians sate President Athelardus Archbishop of Canterbury 17 other Bishops sundry Abbots Arch-deacons and other fit persons being there likewise present Wherein by the command of Pope Leo it was decreed That from thenceforth no Laymen should exercise Dominion over the Lords Inheritance and Churches but that they should be governed by Holy Canons and the Rules of their first founders and possessors under pain of Excommunication and that Christ-church in Canterbury should be restored to its antient Metropolitan Jurisdiction Which all the Prelates and Abbots confirmed with their Subscriptions And this year this King consecrated the Church of Winchelcumbe endowing it with great gifts and possessions in a kind of Parliamentary Assembly of 13 Bishops and 10 Dukes where he manumitted and set free at the high Altar Edbert King of Kent surnamed Pren whom he had taken prisoner in Battel Moreover Eanbaldus Archbishop of York this year assembled a Synod at Finchale most likely for the assistance of Eardulfus King of Northumberland against Duke Wadus and other Conspirators who rose up against him whom he vanquished and utterly routed after a long and bloody battle at Bilingeho where many were slain on both sides which History Matthew Westminster couples with this Synod An. 798. King Kenulph in the year 799. By the consent of his Bishops and Priuces at the request of Athelardus Archbishop of Canterbury restored to Christ-Church in Canterbury four parcels of Land which king Offa had formerly taken from it and gave to his Servants free from all secular service and Regal Tribute ratifying this restitution by his Charter signed with the Cross that it might remain inviolable by their concurrent assent There was a Provincial Council held at Clovesho or Clyffe In the year of our Lord 800. by Kenulf king of Mercians Athelwerdus Archbishop of Canterbury and all the Bishops Dukes Abbots â—â—juscunque dignitatis viâ—os and men of all sorts of dignity where after some inquiry how the Catholique Faith was kept and Christian Religion practiced amongst them The Lands which king Offa and king Kenulph had forcibly taken away from Christ-Church with the Nunnery of Cotham and the Hides of Land called Burnam were Synodali Judicio by the Judgement of the Council restored to Christ-Church Et omnium voce Decretum est and It was decreed by the voice of all the Council upon sight of the Books and Deeds there produced before them by the Archbishop that it was just Cotham should be restored to Christ-Church being given to it by King Aethelbald by his Charter of which it had for a long time unjustly been spoiled notwithstanding the frequent complaints made by Archbishop Bregwin and Iambert in every of their Synods In hoc Concilio annuente ipso Rege Athelandus recuper avit dignitates possessiores quas Offa Rex Merciorum abstulerat Iamberto writes Gervasius After which the Archbishop in this Council made this Exchange with Cynedritha then Abbess of Cotham that she and her successors should enjoy all the Lands and Nunnery of Cotham in lieu whereof she should give to him one hundred and ten Hydes of Land in Kent lying in Fleot Tenaham and Creges together with all the writings thereto belonging which exchange was made before confirmed and attested by this Noble Synod that so no Controversie might arise between them their Heirs and Successors or King Offa ' s in future times concerning the same but that they might peaceably injoy them without interruption for ever And more over the Archbishop gave unto Cynedrytha the Monastery called Pretanege which king Egfrid gave to him his heirs Which proves the Gâ—eat Councils and Synods in that age to be Parliaments and that they judicially restored Lands â—â—justly taken away by Kings upon complaint examination anâ— due proof made thereof as well as inquired of errors and abuses in religion In this Councilâ—… conceive i was that Kenulph with his Bishops Dukes et omni sub nostra Ditione Dignatis gradu compiled and â—â—nâ— a Letter to Pope Leo the third promising obedience to his commands requesting that the ancient Canons might be observed and the Jurisdiction and Power of the See of Canterbury which King Offa and Pope Adrian had diminished and divided into two Provinces or Archbishopricks might be restored and united again thereto to avoid Scisms and craving the Popes answer to these their requests which he returned in a special Letter to the King restoring to Athelardus and his successors the Bishopricks substracted from his Province with the Metropolitan Jurisdiction over them as amply as before Hereupon in the year 802. or thereabouts there was another Parliamentary Council assembled at Clovesho wherein the Archbishoprick of Litchfield was dissolved the See of Canterbury restored to its former plenary Metropolitical Jurisdiction according to Pope Leo his Decree By the advice and Decree of the whole Council which commanded in the name of God That no Kings nor Bishops nor Princes neque ullius Tyrannicae potestatis Homines should diminish the honour of the Metropolitical See or presume to divide
the Church of Worcester This Bishop with 50 Mass Priests and 160 other Priests Deacons Monks and Abbots whose names are recorded in the Manuscript swore that this Lana and Monastery were impropriated to his possession and Church which Oath with all these fellow swearers hewas ordered to take at Westminster and did it accordingly after 30 nights respite Whereupon It was ordained and decreed by the Archbishop all the Council consenting with him that the Bishop should enjoy the Monastery Lands and Books to him and his Church and so that sute was ended and this Decree pronounced thereupon Quapropter si quis hunc agrum ab illâ Ecclesiâ in Ceastre nititur eveâ—lere contra Decreta sanctorum Canonum sciat se facere quia sancti Canones decernunt Quicquid Sancta Synodus universalis cum Catholico Archiepiscopo suo adjudicaverit nullo modo fractum vel irritum esse faciendum Haec autem gesta sunt Hi sunt Testes Connrmatores hujus rei quorum nomina hic infra notantur à die tertio Calend Novembrium Ego Beornulf Rex Merciorum hanc chartulam Synodalis decreti signo sanctae Christi Crucis consirmavi Then follows the Archbishops Subscription and confirmation in like words with the subscriptions of sundry Bishops Abbots Dakes and Nobles being 32 in number all ratifying this Decree An. 833. Egbert King of West-Saxons Athelwulfe his Son Witlasius king of Mercians both the Arcbbishops Abbots cum Proceribus majoribus totius Angliae with the greatest Nobles of all England were all assembled together at London in a National Parliamentaty Council pro consilio capiendo contra Danicos Piratas Littora Angliae assidne infestantes to take Counsel what to do against the Danish Pirates dayly infesting the Sea-Coasts of England In this Council the Charter of Witlasius king of Mercians to the Abbey of Croyland where he was hid and secured from his enemies was made and ratified wherein he granted them many rich gifts of Plate Gold Silver Land and the Privilege of a Sanctuary for all offenders flying to it for shelter which grant could not be valid without a Parliamentary confirmation for he being elected King omnium consensu after the slaughters of Bernulf and Ludican two invading Tyrants cut off in a short time qui contra fas purpuram in duerent regno vehementâ—t oppresâ—o totam militiam ejus quae quondam plurima extiterat victorio sissima sua imprudentia perdiderant as Ingulphus writes was enforced to hold his kingdom from Egbert king of West-Saxons under a Tribute And thereupon conferring divers Lands by his Charter to this Abbey for ever to be held of him his heirs and Successors Kings of Mercia in perpetual and pure Frankalmoigne quietae solutae ab omnibus oneribus secularibus exactionibus vectigalibus universis quocunque nomine censeantur That his grant might be sound and valid he was necessitated to have it consirmed in this Parliamentary Council by the consent of King Egbert and his Son and of all the Bishops Abbots et Proceribus Majoribus Angliae and the greater Nobles of England there present most of them subscribing and ratifying this Charter with the sign of the Cross and their names About the year of Grace 838. there was a Parliamentary Council held at Kingston in which Egbert king of the West-Saâ—ons and his Son Aethelwulfe Ceolâ—eth Archbishop of Canterbury with the rest of the Bishops and Nobles of England were present Amongst many things there acted and spoken Archbishop Ceolnoth shewed before the whole Council That the foresaid Kings Egbert and Aeâ—hel wulfe had given to Christchurch the Mannor called Malinges in Sudex free from all secular service and Regal Tributes excepting only these three Expedition building of Bridge and Castle which foresaid Mannor and Lands King Baldred gave to Christchurch Sed quia ille Rex cuneâ—is Principibus non placuit noluerunt donum ejus permanere râ—…m But because this King pleased not all his Nobles they would not that this his gift should continue firm To which Sir Henry Spelman adds this Marginal Note Rex non potuit distrahere patrimonium Regni sine assensu Procerum Wherefore the foresaid Kings in this Parliamentary Council with their Nobles assent at the request of the said Archbishop regranted and confirmed it to Christchurch with this Anathema annexed against the infringers of this grant If any shall presume to violate it on the behalf of God and of us Kings Bishops Abbots and all Christians let him be separated from God and bet his portion be with the Devil and his Angols Polydor Virgil records that King Athelwulfe in the year 847. going in pilgrimage to Rome repaired the English School there lately burned down and in imitation of King Ina made that part of his Kingdom which Egbert his Father had added Tributary towards it Legeque sancivit and enacted by a Law made in a Parliamentary Council that those who received 30 pence rent every year out of their possessions or had more houses should pay for those houses they inhabited every of them a penny a peece to the Pope for the maintenance of this School at the Feast of Peter and Paul or at least of St. Peters bonds which Law some writes he though falsely ascribr to his Son Alfred which act others refer to the years 855 or 857 and that more truly Abbot Ingulphus in his Hist of the Abby of Croyland records that Bertulf usurping the Crown by the treacherous murder of his Cosen St. Westan tantà ferebatur ad regnandum ambitione passing by the Abbey of â—royland most wickedly and violently took away all the Jewels Pâ—ate and ornaments of the Church which his Brother Withlasins and other Kings had given to it together with all the mony he could find in the Monastery and hiring Souldiers therewith against the Danes then wasting the Country about London he was vanquished and put to slight by the Paâ—ans Whereupon this King soon after holding a great Council at Benningdon An. 850. with the Prelates and Nobles of his whole Realm of Mercia there assembled about the Danes invasions how to raiâ—e â—orces and monies to resist them as is most probable by 〈◊〉 Historians Abbot Siward and the Monks of Croy land therein complained before them all by Askillus then fellow Monk of certain injuries malitiously doâ—e unto them by their Adversaries who lying in wat in the uttermost banks of their Rivers did seise upon their servants being such as fled thither for Sanctuary in case at any time they went out of their precincts never so little way either to fish or bring back their stragling Sheep Oxen or other Cattle as infringers of their Sanctuary and subjected them to the publick Laws to their condemnation and destruction to the great dammage of the Abbey by the loss of their service Of which complaint the King and all the Council being very sensible and
conservantibus salutem sempiternam in Domino nostro Jesu Christo Quoniam peccatis nostris exigentibus manum Domini super nos extensum quotidiè cum virgâ ferreâ cernimus cervicibus nostris imminere Necessarium nobis salubre arbitror piis sanctae matris ecclesiae precibus Eleemosynarumque liberis largitionibus iratum Dominum placatum reddere et dignis devotionibus ejus gratiam in nostris necessitatibus auxiliariam implorare Ideoque et ad petitionem strenui Comitis mihi meritoque dilectissimi concessi regio Chirographo meo Theodoro Abbati Croyland Tam donum dicti Comitis Algari quam dona aliorum fidelium praeterit orum ac praesentium c. And it concludes thus Istud Regium Chirographum meum Anno Incarnationis Domini nostri Jesu Christi 868. Calendis Augusti apud Snothingham coram fratribus amicis omni populo meo in obsidione Paganorum congregatis sanctae crucis munimine confirmavi Then follow the subscriptions and confirmations of Ceolnoth Archbishop of Canterbury 5 Bishops 3 Abbots Ethelred king of West-Saxons and Alfred his Brother Edmund kingof East-Angle 2 Dukes and twelve Earls who all ratified this Charter After which Charter confirmed this king Beorred renders special thanks to all his Army for their assistance against the Danes especially to the Bishops Abbots and other inferior Ecclesiastical Persons for their voluntary assistance of him in those wars against these Enemies norwithstanding his Fathers exemption of them by his Charter from all military expeditions and secular services thus recorded by Ingulphus and most worthy observation Ego Beorredus Rex Merciorum Intimo animi affectu totisque praecordiis gratias exolvo speciales omni exercitui meo maximè tamen Viris Ecclesiasticis Episcopis Abbatibus aliis etiam inferioribus status dignitatis Qui licèt piissimae memoriae Rex quondam Ethelwulfus pater meus per sacratissimam Chartam suam â—ab omni expeditione militari vos liberos reddiderit ab omni servitio saeculari penitus absolutos dignissâ—mâ tamen miseratione super oppressiones Christianae plebis Ecclesiarumque Monasteriorum destructiones luctuosas benignissimè compassi contra nefandissimos Paganos in exercitum domini prompti spontanei convenistis ut tanquam Martyres Christi cultus sanguine vestro augeatur barbarorum superstitiosa crudelitas effugetur From these last Passages it is apparent first That in those days our Saxon Kings made War and Peace by the advice and consent of their Nobles and Parliamentary great Councils 2ly That in cases of common invasion and danger by forein Enemies all the forces raised and ways and means to resist them were concluded on by advice and consent of these great Councils and not by the kings absolute power 3ly That all or most Church-men and their church-Church-lands in those days were absolutely freed and discharged from all military expeditions Contributions Aids and Assistance against Enemies by express Charters but only such as themselves voluntarily and freely contributed in cases of incumbent great Danger and Necessity without compulsion for which their kings rendred them special and hearty thanks acknowledging and confirming these their Immunities not violating them upon such Necessities as this Notable passage of Ingulphus attests together with that of Mat. West An. 867. Concerning Alstan Bishop of Sherborne a man of very great Power and Counsel in the Realm Contra Danos quoque qui tunc primò insulam infestabant Regis Aethelulfi saevitiam exacuit Ipse ex fisco pecuniam accipiens ipse excercitum componens Martiis felix eventibus contra hostes bella plurima constanter peregit receiving Mony out of the Kings Exchequer not the Peoples Purses or Conrributions to manage these Wars and not warring on his own expences 4ly That the Nobles Gentry and People of the Realm were the only standing Militia in that Age to defend it against forein Enemies in times of danger or actual invasion when they marched out of their own Counries against them voluntarily and freely adventuring their lives for defence of their King Country Religion Liberties Properties as they did at this siege of Nottingham and during all the long-lasting Danish Wars Invasions and Depredations both by Land and Sea 5ly That our Christian Kings Nobles and great Councils of those days in times of greatest danger Invasion and Wars held it most seasonable and necessary to confirm and enlarge the Churches Patrimony Liberties and Privileges thereby to stir up their Clergy-men more earnestly to assist them with their Prayers not to diminish invade or infringe them under pretext of Real inevitable necessary and danger the practice of late and present times Whereupon they granted and confirmed this forecited Charter in the very Armie during the siege of Notingham before all the Kings Princes Prelates Dukes Earls and people there present In the year 870. Inguar and Hubba with the rest of the Danes comming into Kesteven in Lincoln-shire wasting and slaying all the Country with fire and sword thereupon Earl Algarus Osgot Sheriff of Lincoln and all the Gentry and People in those parts with the Band of the Abby of Croyland under the Command of Tâ—… a Monk formerly a Souldier consisting of 200 stout men most of them Fugitives thither for Sanctuary uniting all their forces together in Kesteven on the Feast of St. Maurice fought with the Danes and slew 3 of their Kings with a great multitude of their forces That night the other Danish Kings dispersed abroad to pillage the Country with a great booty many captains coming to the tents of their routed Companions with a numerous Army were inraged with the slaughter of their Confederates in their absence Whereupon most of the English secretly fled away from the Earl and their Captains in the night through fear who early in the morning having heard divine Offices and receiving the Sacrament resolved not to retreat but manfully to fight with the Danes though not above 700 to their many thousands being most ready to die for the defence of the faith of Christ and of their Country Whereupon the Danes assailing them with great multitudes and fury they all standing and fighting close together valiantly susteined their assaults from morning till evening without giving ground Upon which the Danes to sever them purposely feigned a Flight and began to leave the Field Hereupon the English contrary to the commands of their Captains dissolving their Ranks and dispersing themselves to pursue the Danes they suddenly returned and slew most of the English who fought gallantly with them to the last gasp some few of them only escaping After which the Danes marching to the Abby of Croyland put the Abbot with all the Monks and Persons they there found one Child excepted to the Sword after they had extremely tortured them to discover where their Treasures were broke up all the Tombs pillaged and burnt the Abby with all the Edifices thereof leaving it a meer ruinous heap then
his temporal Armes humbly prayed the Father Son and Holy Ghost to give him constancy in his passion Then the Danish Souldiers seising on him brought him from the Church before Hinguar by whose command he was tyed to a tree hard by cruelly whipped a long time then shot through with Darts wherewith his Body was stuck full after which being taken from the tree his Head was cut off from his Body with a bloody sword by the Barbarous Executioner appointed for that purpose and so he died a most glorious Martyr for his Kingdom Country Subjects and Religion to whose memory a famous Monastery was after built Of which William of Malmesbury de Gestis Regum l. 2. c. 13. p. 89. gives this Relation Quibus Artibus Edmundus ita sibi omnis Britanniae devinxit incolas ut beatum se in primis astruat qui Coenobium illius vel nummo vel valenti illustraret Ipsi quoque Reges aliorum Domini servos se illius gloriantur coronam ei regiam missitant magno si uri volunt redimentes commercio Exactores vectigalium qui alibi Bacchantur fas nefasque juxta metientes ibi supplices cira â—ssa um sancti Edmundi litigationes sistunt experti multorum paenam qui perseverandum putarunt which I wish our Tax-Exactors and Excisers would now remember Whiles the Danes were thus wasting the Kingdoms of Northumberland and the East-Saxons with Fier and Sword and martyring King Edmund Beorred king of Mercians was busied in warring against the Britains who infested the Western parts of his Realm But hearing the Danes had invaded the Eastern part of his Kingdom he came to London and gathering a great Army together matching with it through the Eastern quarters of his Realm he applyed the whole Isle of Ely to his Exchequor taking into his hands all the lands formerly belonging to the Monastery of Medehamsted lying between Stamford Huntindon and Wisebeck assigning the Lands more remote lying scattered through the Country to his Souldiers The like he did with the Lands of the Monastery of St. Pega of Rikirk retaining certain of them to himself and giving some of them to his Souldiers And the like did he with the Lands of all other Monasteries destroyed totally by the Danes whose Lands by Law escheated to the Crown and those Lords whose predecessors founded and endowed them by the slaughter and chasing away of all the Monks Nuns burning of the Monasteries whose Lands thereupon were resumed and confilcated to the Kings Exchequer Et cum caetera Monasteria per Danorum ferocitatem funditus destructa Regali fisco fuerant ascripta denuo et assumpta omnibus Monachis eoru 〈◊〉 necatis perditis seu penitus fugatis as Ingulphus informs us of the Reason yet many of the Monks of Croyland escaping the Danes fury and returning soon after thither again electing a new Abbot and repairing their Monastery by degrees as well as that exigency would permit thereupon they enjoyed the sight of the whole Abby and the Isle of Croyland with the self same Liberties and Privileges they had from the beginning aischardged from all secular services during all the time of this their desolation the Danish wars till the time of its restoration after that till Ingulphus time as he records Notwithstanding because many of the Monks were slain and the Abby burnt down demolished by the Danes King Reorred thereupon seised some of their lands into his own hands gave other of their Lands more remote from the Abby to his stipendiary Soldiers And although venerable Abbot Godric took very much paines frequently demanding restitution of them both from King Beorred his Souldiers and very often shewed the Charters of the Donors the confirmations of former Kings together with his own proper Charter to this Kings yet he received always nothing but empty words from him them whereupon he at last utterly despaired of their restitution Perceiving therefore the overmuch malice of the times et Militiam Regis Terrarum cupidissimam and the Kings Militia and Soldiers most covetous of Lands he resolved with himself in conclusion to passe by these Royal Donations Surdo Tempore in a deaf time being over-glad rejoycing that the Kings grace had granted the whole Island lying round about the Monastery unto it free and discharged from all Regal exactions much more specially to him then at that time which had not happened to many otheâ— Monasteries There departed therefore at that time from the Monastery of Croyland these possessions which never returned to this present day The Mannor of Spalding given to Earl Adelwulfe with all its appurtinances The Mannor of Deeping given to Langfer a Knight or Souldier and the Kings Baker with all its appurtenances The Mannor of Croxton given to Fernod a Knight or Souldier the Kings Ensign-bearer with all its appurtenances The Mannors of Kerketon and Kimerby in Lindesy with all their appurtenances given to Earl Turgot but Bukenhale and Halington then appropriated to the Exchequer were afterwards restored to the said Monastory by the Industry of Turketulus Abbot of Croyland and the gift of most pious King Edred the Restorer of them with 12 other Mannors named by Ingulf belonging to Croyland quas Rex Beorred us Fisco suo assumserat Which King Beorred had then assumed in his Exehequor After which K. Beorred passing with his Army into Lindesey Latissimas Terras Monisterio Bardney totally ruined by the Danes Dudum Pertinentes Fisco suo accepit remotas vero in diversis patriâ—s divisas jacentes Militibus suis dedit But mark the issue At last the Danes returning into Mercia Anno 874. wasting and spoiling all the Country with fire and sword and destroying all Churches and Monasteries King Beorred when he beheld all the Land of England in every corner thereof wasted with the slaughters and rapines of these Barbarians vel de victoriâ desperans vel tot laborum Labyrinthum fastidiens either despairing of victory or loathing the labyrinth of so many troubles left the Kingdom and went to Rome where he died few days after and was there buried in the English School and his Wife following after him died in her way to Rome Some write he was driven out of his kingdom by the Danes Here upon the Danes Anno 874. substituted in his place in the Realm of Mercia one Ceolwulfus a servant of King Beorreds an Eglishman by Nation sed Barbarus impietate but a Barbarian in impiety For he swore fealty and gave pledges to the Danes Quod tributa imposita eis fidelitèr persolveret that he would faithfully pay unto them the Tributes they imposed and that whensoever they would redemand the Kingdom committed to him He would resign it without any Resistance under pain of losing his Head Whereupon he as Ingulphus records going round about the Land paucos Rusticos relictos excoriavit Mercatores absorbuit Viduas Orphanos oppressit
Re Populi Rectum et jus publicum recitate et unum quodque placitum terminum habeat quando peragatur quod tunc recitabitur The first Chapter of the second part of his Laws intimates that they were made by his Wtse men assembled in a Parliamentary Council at Exeter witness the contents thereof Edwardus Rex admonuit Omnes Sapientes quando fuerunt Exoniae ut investigarent simul et quaererent quomodo pax eo rum melior esse possit quà m ante à fuit quia visumest ei quod hoc impletum sit aliter quam deceret et quam ante à praecepisset Inquisivit itaque qui ad emendationem velint redire et in societate permanere quâ ipse sit et amare quod amat et nolle quod nolit in Mari in Terrâ Hoc est tunc Ne Quisquam rectum difforceat alicui Siquis hoc faciat emendet sicut supra dictum est In his first Laws then either made or rehearsed prima vice 30 s. secundâ similitèr ad tertiam vicem 120 s. Regi The last Chapter being the VIII in Bromtons translation but the XI in the Saxon Coppy is this Volo ut omnis Praepositus habeat Gemotum an Hundred Court semper ad quatuor hebdomadas et efficiat ut omnis homo rectum habeat et omne placitum capiat terminum quando perveniat ad finem Siquis hoc excipiat emendet sicut antè dictum est King Edward deceasing Aethelstan his eldest Son designed by his Fathers Will to succeed him was elected King at Winchester in the year 924. Magno Optimatum consensu et omnium favore and soâ—emnly Crowned at Kingston only one Alfred and some factious ones opposed his election pretending he was illegitimate and born of a Concubine whereupon they would have set up his Brothet Edwin being legitimate and next heir as they pretended whom the Generality of the Nobles rejected nondum ad regnandum propter teneros Annos Idoneo Aethelstan after his Coronation knowing his Brother to be born in lawfull Matrimony and fearing Ne per ipsum quandoque Regni solio privaretur lest he should be some time or other deprived of his kingdom by him hated him extremely and at the sollicitation of some Parasites whereof his Cup-bearer was the chief to be rid of him and this his fear he caused young Edwin attended only with one Page to be put into an old broken Boat in the midst of the Sea without Sail Oare or Pilate that so his death might be imputed to the waves out off which Boat the young Prince in discontent cast himself head-long into the Sea or rather the Page threw him head-long over-board and so was he drowned But the Page recovering his body by rowing with his hands and feet brought it to Land where it was interred The King was hereat so troubed with a real or feigned contrition for this barbarous bloudy fact that he did seven years voluntary penance for this his fratricide and adjudged his Cup-bearer to a cruel death who gave him this ill advice and to pacifie his Brothers Ghost and his own Conscience built two new Monasteries at Middleton and Michelresse and there was scarce any old Monastery in England which he adorned not either with buildings or Ornaments or Books or Lands to expiate this his bloody crime In this king Aethelstans reign In the year 927. There were fiery Beams and Meteors seen throughout all the Northern parts of England soon after which Athelstan resolved utterly to extirpate the perfidious Nation of the Danes and treacherous Scots which had violated their Agreement made with his Father whereupon he marched with a great Army by Land and Navy by Sea into Northumberland and Scotland wasted and harrowed the Country without resistance forced Guithfrith King of Northumberland out of his kingdom uniting it to his own Realm vanquished and overcame Howel king of Wales Constantine king of Scots Anlafe the Dane and others in a set battel drove them out of their Realms and forced them to submit to him Who upon their submission knowing the chance of war to be variable and pitying the Cases of these down-cast Princes restor'd them presently to their former estates with this Princely Speech That it was more honour to make a King than to be a King yet these petty Kings Princes rebelling afterwards siding with Anlafe against him were all routed by Athelstane King Constantine of Scotland with five more of these Kings 12 Dukes and most of their Army slain in one battel principally by the valor of Turketulus and the Londoners An. 837 Whereupon the petty Kings of Wales contracted to pay him a yearly tribute of 20 pound weight of Gold and 300 of Silver and 25000 head of Cattel with a certain number of Hawks and Hounds which no King of England ever exacted or received from them before William of Malmeshury who exceeds in his praises writes that it was truly reported of him amongst the English Quod nemo Legalius vel literatius rempublicam administraverit That no king governed the Commonwealâ—h more legally or learnedly than he being as Ingulphus records guided and directed by Turketulus his Chancellour a man of great integrity honesty and piety of proâ—â—und judgement whose decrees upon debate were irrefragâ—ble This king Athelstan for the better administration of Justice enacted sundry excellent civil and ecclesiastical Laws recorded in Bromt. Lamb. Spelm. The first of these his Laws were made and enacted in the famous Council of Grately about the year 928 in which the king himself Wulfehelm Arch-bishop of Cante bâ—ry and the rest of the Bishops and all the Nobles and Wisemen which King Ethelstan could assemble were present who all ordained and confirmed these Laws in this great Counâ—il as the last Chapter there oâ— informs us in these words Totum hoc institutum est et confirmatum In magno Synodo apud Grateleyam câ—i Archiepiscopus Wolâ—â—nus â—eâ—… et omnes Optimates et Sapientes quos Adelstanus Rex potuit Congregare Oâ— Cum Optimates et Sapientes ab Aethelstano evocaâ—â— frequentissimi as another Copy renders it which proves that all the Members of this Council were summoned to it by this kings writ and not elected by the peoples suffrages And although the Archbishops Bishops and other Clergy men were the chief advisers of the Ecclesiastical Lâ—ws made in this Council as this Prologue to them attests Ego Aethelstanus Rex ex prudenti Ulfnelmae Archiepiscopi aliorumque Episcoporum et Servorum Dei consilio mando yet they were all enacted and confirmed by all the Nobles and Wisemen in the Council as the premises evidence In this Council the king commanded by his Laws all his Officers that they should demand and exact from his Subjects such things and duties only as they might justly and lawfully receive adding this memorable reason for it Nunquam enim erit populo bene consultum nec digne
est quod Episcopi et praepositi qui Londoniensi Curiae pertinent edixerunt jurejurando confirmaverunt in suo Fridgildo Comites villani in adjectione judiciorum quae apud Grateleyam Exoniam instituta sunt iterum apud Thundresfeldam Cap. 1. Et est imprimis haec non parcatur alicui latroni supra 12 Annos et supra 12 d. de quo verè fuerit inquisitum quod reus sit quin occidatur capiatur omne quod habet c. Cap 14. Nec tacendum est vel praetereundum si dominus noster vel praepositorum nostrorum aliquis ullum Augmentum excogitare possit ad nostrum Fridgildum ut hoc gratanter excipiamus sicut nobis omnibus convenit nostrum necesse sit in Deo confidimus et regni nostri Domino Cap. 15. Si totum hoc ita complere volumus res totius populi meliorabitur contra fures quam antea fuit si remissius egerimus de pace vadiis quae simul dedimus quam Rex nobis praecipit timere possumus vel magis scire quod fures isti regnabunt plus quam antè fecerunt si fidem teneamus et pacem sicut domino nostro placeat quia magnum opus est ut insistamus et peragamus quo◠ipse velit et si amplius praecipiat cum omni jocunditate et de votione parati sum us Cap. 17. Item quod Sapientes omnes dederunt vadium suum insimul Archiepiscopo apud Thundresfeldam quando Ealpheagus Scyb et Brithnodus Odonis filius veneruut ad Concilium ex ore Regis ut omnis praepositus vadium capiat in suo comitatu de pace servandâ sicut Adelstanus Rex apud Fefresham et quartâ vice apud Thundresfeldam coram Archiepiscopo et Episcopis et Sapientibus quas ipse Rex nominavit qui interfuerunt et judicia conservaverunt Quae in hoc Concilio fuerunt instituta c. Cap. 18. Item quod Adelstanus Rex praecepit Episcopis suis et praepositis omnibus in toto Regno suo ut pacem ita custodiant sicut recitavit et Sapientes sui Cap. 19. Item Rex dixit nunc iterum apud Thitlan◠birig Sapientibus suis et praecepit ostendi Atchiepiscopo et caeteris Episcopis quod ei miserabile videtur quod aliquis tà m juvenis occidatur vel protà m parvâ re sicut innotuit ei quod ubique fiebat dixit itaque Quod ei videbatur et eis cum quibus hoc egerat ne aliquis occidatur junior quam quindecim Annorum nisi se defendere velit vel aufugere et in manus ire velit ut tunc deducatur sic major sit minor qualiscunque sit si se dederit ponatur in Carcere sicut apud Greateleyam dictum est et per idem redimatur c. Praecepit Rex ne aliquis occidatur pro minori precio quam 12 d. nisi fugiat vel repugnet ne dubitetur tunc licet minus Si haec ita conservemus in Domino Deo confidimus quod pax nostra melior erit quam antea fuit As these passages demonstrate the proceedings of the Parliamenrary Councils in that Age unknown to most for which end I have transcribed them at large so they clearly prove that Theeves or Felons much lesse other English Freemen could not be imprisoned killed put to death fined or ransommed but by special Acts and Laws made in General Parliamentary Councils nor any Laws made enacted or altered in such Councils but by the Kings Royal Assent thereto who then frequently summoned them and all the Members ofthem by writ and nomination without the Peoples Election Henry de Knyghton de Eventibus Angliae l. 1. c. 5. and some other fabulous Authors relate that in the eighth year of King Aethelstans reign Olaus King of Denmark Golanus King of Norwey and the Duke of Normandy with 8 Dukes and 5 hundred thousand Souldiers arived in England bringing with them out of Africa A Giant called Colybrand the strongest and most famous at that time throughout the World Whereupon King Aethelstan hearing of their comming Congregavit Magnates assembled his Noblemen at Winchester to advice with them how they might resist the Enemies and fight with them in Battel Thar whiles king Aethelstan vacaret tali Coneilio et congregatione populi sui in Wintonia the foresaid kings came upon him with their Army and besieged him Cum Baronia sua with his Batons in that City for two years space Neither durst the English sight with them by reason of their multitude and Power In the mean time they made this Agteement that king Aethelstan should find out one Champion to fight a single Duel with Colybrand that in all future times the Realm of England should be held of the King of Denmark under a Tribute and if Colybrand were conquered by Aethelstans Champion rhen Olaus should forfeit and disclaim the Realm of England for him and his Heirs for ever and no King of Denmark should afterwards lay claim to the Realm of England nor yet molest it That the king in near one whole years space could not find out a Champion to encounter Colybrand whereupon he and his Nobles were very much troubled At last God by an Angel from Heaven directed the King to sind out Guy of Warwick comming thither as a Pilgrim who undertook to encounter Colybrand and after a sharp battel with him in the view of both kings and their Armies cut off one of his hands and after that his head By which Victory the whole Land of England enjoyed the unviolated privilege of rest and Liberty from the Danish king untill Cnute king of Denmark gained the Realm of England from Edmund Ironside But this Relation being contrary to the truth of History and the Stream of all our Historiographers I shall repute it meerly fabulous though I could not well omit it for that Relation it hath to this my Theame and precedent Propositions William of Malmesbury and others out of him record that Elfrid a Noble man who opposed Aethelstans Title to the Crown though in vain intended to have seized on him at Winchester and put out his eyes but his Treason being discovered before it came to the Accomplishment he was taken and sent to Rome to purge himself by Oath where before the Altar of St. Peter and Pope Iohn the 10th he abjured the fact and thereupon fell suddainly down dead to the Earth and being carried from before the Altar by his Servants to the English School he there died within three daies after Upon this the Pope sent to the king to advise what he should do with him and whether he should allow him burial with other Christian Corps The king hereupon assembling a Council of his Nobles to advise about it Optimates Regionis the Nobles of the Realm with a great Company of Elfrids kindred earnestly requested of the King with great humility that his body might
be committed to Christian Burial The King consenting to their Request acquainted the Pope therewith who granted him Christian Burial though unworthy Hereupon the Nobles adjudged all his Lands and Possessions great and small to the King who by their consent granted and confirmed them all to the Abby of Malmesbury by his Charter wherin he recites Sciant Sapientes regionis Nostrae non has praefatas terras me injustè Rapuisse Rapinamque Deo Dedicasse sed sic eas accepi Quemadmodum judicaverunt omnes Optimates Regni Anglorum Insuper et Apostolicus Papa Romanae Ecclesiae Johannes After which reciting the Treachery perjury and death of Elfred with his Condescention to his Nobles and friends request aforesaid he concludes thus Et sic Adjudicata est mihi tota possessio ejus in magnis et modicis Sed et haec Apicibus praenotamus literarum ne quamdin Christianitas regnat aboleatur unde mihi praefata possessio quam Deo et Sancto Petro dedi donatur nec Justius novi quam Deo et sancto Petro hanc possessionem dare qâ—i aemulum meum in conspecta omnium cadere fecerunt et mihi prosperitatem Regni largiti sunt To which Malmesbury subjoyns In his Verbis Regis sapientiam et piotatem ejus in Dei rebus suspicere par est Sapientiam eo quod animadverterat juvenis presertim non esse Dei Gratiosum de Rapinâ Holocaustum Pietatem eo quod Munus ultione divinâ collatum Deo potissimum non ingratus rependeret From whence I shall only observe that Elfrid being a Peer of the Realm dying perjured as asoresaid was adjudged to forfeir all his Lands for Treason after his death only by his Peers in a Parliamentary Council and that if the king had seized on them without their judgement it had been an unjust Rapine by his own Confession but being legally confiscaâ—ed to him by their Judgement it was no Rapine but Justice for him to seize and Piety to dispose of them at his pleasure to this Church What Churches and Monasteries he built and repaired throughout the Realm What Lands he restored to St. Augustines Church at Canterbury on the day of his Coronation by the Assent of his Bishops and Nobles though long detained from it and how he gave the Lands of Folcastan in Kent eâ—cheated by the Danes destruction of the Nunnery there to Christ-church in Canterbury you may read in the Marginal Authors William of Malmesbury informs us that Baldwin Earl of Flanders sent Embasâ—adour by Hugh King of France to King Ethelstan to demand his Sister for his Wife brought over with him divers rich presents and Reliques Amongst others the Sword of Constantine the Great the Lance of Charls the Great and one of the 4 Nails that pierced our Saviours body set in plates of Gold A piece of our Saviours Cross inclosed in a Christal Case c. all which he presented to the King and Lady cum in Conventu Procerum apud Abindonium proci postulata exhibuisset Which intimates that this King consulted with an assembly of his Nobles about his Sisters Marriage to the King of France as a mater of Parliamentary consideration Ingulphus Hist p. 876 877 878. records that Turketulus was his Chancellor and chief Counsellour who affected not Honors and Riches refused many Bishopricks offered him by the King Tanquam tendiculas Satanae ad animas everâ—endas and would never accept of any Bishishoprick all his life being Content only with his own Lands and Wages That all his Decrees were so just and legal that they remained irrevocable when once made That he was a great Souldier and fought most valiantly against the Danes and often gloried and said He was most happy in this that he had never murdered nor maimed any one Cum â—ugâ—… pro patria maximè contra Paganos licite quisque possit He esteeming the slaughter of such â—agan Enemies in defence ef his Country lawfull and no murther nor maim King Aeckelstan deceasing without iâ—ue his Brother Edmund succeeded him An. 940. who upon the false suggestions of some of his Souldiers and Courtiers dedeprived Dunstan whom he had made his Chancellour and one of his privy Conâ—cil yea ranked amongst the Royal Palaâ—ines and Princes of his Realm of all his dignities and Offices The very next day after being like to break his Neck as he rod a hunting over a sâ—eep Rock had not his horse miraculously stopped at the Rocks brink in his full carier he immediatly sent for Dunstan and to repair the injury done him rod presently to Glastonbury and made him Abbot thereof Presently after Anlaffe King of Norwey whom Aethelstan had driven out of the Kingdom of Northumberland came with a great Navy and Army to York being called in by the perfidious and rebellious Northumberlanders who instantly revolted to him and elected him for their King Whereupon he marching Southward with a puissant Army purposing to subjugate the Realm of England to himself King Edmund gathering his forces together encountred him and after a bloody battel fought a whole day between them at Leicester with great loss on both sides Odo Archbishop of Canterbury and Welstan Archbishop of York perceiving the danger on both parts and the Destruction of the Realm made this Agreement between them that Anlaffe should quietly enjoy the whole Northeast part of England lying North of Waâ—lingstreet and Edmund all the Southern part thereof during their joynt Lives and the Survivor of them enjoy the whole Realm after the others decease But Anlaffe soon after wasting the Church of St. Balter and burning Tivinagham with fire was presently seised on by Gods avenging Judgement and miserably ended his life About the year 940. Hoel Dha Prince of all Wales sent for six Laymen eminent for authority and knowledge out of every Kemut or hundred of his Realm and all the Archbishops Bishops Abbots Priors of his Realm dignified with a Pastoral staff who continuing all together in prayer fasting and consultation all the Lent did in this Welsh Paâ—liament make and enact many Civil and Ecclesiastical Laws which they divided into 3 parts and books for the better Government of the Realm and Church which you may read in Spelman In the 22 Law whereof they thus determine Tres autem sunt homines quorum â—ullus potest per Legem impignorare contra aliquod Iudicium Primus est Rex ubi non poterit secundum Legem in Liâ—e stare coram judice â—uo agendo vel respondendo per dignitatem naturalem vel per dignitatem terrae ut Optimas vel alius So that by the Laws of those times not only the Kings of England but even the petty Kings of Wales were by their very Natural and Royal Dignities exempted from all personall Tryals and Judgements against them in any Courts of Justice seeing they had no Peers to be tryed by In the year 940 Reingwald or Reginald the Dane comming
with a great Navy into Northumberland slew most of the best Inhabitants of that Realm or drove them out of it He likewise seized upon all the Lands of St. Cutbert and gave his Lands to two of his Souldiers one of them called Scula who afflicted the miserable Inhabitants with Grievous and intollerable Tributes whence even unto this day the Yorkshire-men as often at they are compelled to pay Tributum Regale A Royal Tribute endeavour to impose a pecuniary Mulct on the Land which this Scula possessed for the easing of themselves Scilicet Legem deputant quod Paganus per Tyrannidem fecerat qui non legitimo Regi Anglorum sed barbaro et aliegenae Et Regis Anglorum hosti militabat Nec tamen quamvis multum in hoc Laboraverint Pravam Consuetudinem huc usque Sancto Cuthberto resistente Introducere potuerunt writes Simeon Dunelmensis The other part of those Lands one Onlasbald seised upon who was much more cruel and oppressive to all men than Scula extraordinarily vexing the Bishop Congregation and People of Saint Cutbert and particularly seising upon the Land belonging to the Bishoprick Whereupon the Bishop oft endeavouring by perswasion to draw him to God and entreating him to lay aside the obstinate rigor of his mind and refrain himself from the unlawfull Invasion of the Churches Lands else if he contemned his admonitions God and St. Cutbert would severely avenge the Injuries done by him to them and others He with a diabolical mind contemning his admonitions and Threats swore by his Heathen Gods that he would from thenceforth be a more bitter Enemie towards St. Cuthbert and them all than ever he was before Whereupon the Bishop with all his Monks falling prostrare on the earth earnestly prayed to God and his holy Confestor to annul those proud Tyrants Threats who was then comming into the place where they were praying having one foot within the Door and the other without in which posture he stood there immovably fixed as if both his feet had been nayled being able neither to go out nor come in but standing immovable till being long thus tortured he there gave up his miserable soul in the place with which example all others being terrified would no further presâ—me by any means to invade the Land nor any thing else belonging of right to the Church Anno 941. the Rebellions o Northumberlanders preferring disloyalty before the Feaâ—ty which they owed unto Magnificent Edmund King of England elected Anlaff King of the Norwegiâ—ns for their King Son to the former Anlaff who perishing suddenly for his Sacrilege as aforesaidâ— he and Reginald the Son of Garthfrith after their Baptism breaking their faith and Agreement with King Edmund by invading his Dominions Edmund thereupon by force of Armes expelled them both out of the Realm of Northumberland and united it to his own kingdom and wrested Lincoln Nottingham Dorby Leicester and Stamford out of the hands oâ— the Usurping insolent oppresting Danes with all Mercia subduing and reducing the Monarchy of all England unto himself exâ—irpating all the Pagan Danes with their infidelity restoring Christianity to its Lustre and the English to their Possessions and Liberties The year following he wasted and subdued all Cumberland and pillaged the people of all their goods And because the people of that Country were perfidam legibus insolitam perfidious and unaccustomed to Laws so that he could not totally subdue and civilize them having harrowed it with his Army and put out the eyes of the two sons of Dummail King thereof he gave the Country to Malcolm King of Scots to be held of himself upon this Condition that he should assist him and defend the Northern parts of England by Land and Sea from the Incursions of invading Enemies This King Edmund after the Conquest and Expulsion of his Enemies by the advise of Dunston and his Chancellour Turketulus made good Lawes and ordinances Ecclesiastical and Civil for the Government of his Realm for which purpose about the year of our Lord 944 he assembled a Parliamentary Council of the Clergy Laity at London to consult and advise with them in the making of his Lawes Which the Proems to them thus expresâ—e Edmundus Rex ipso solenni Pascatis festo Frequentem Londini tam Ecclesiasticorum quam Laicorum Caetum celebravit as one version out of the Saxon Or Congregavit magnam Synodum Dei ordinis et saeculi as another translation renders it cui interfuit Odo et VVulstanus Archiepiscopi et alii plures Episcopi ut animorum suorum et eorum omnium qui eis curae sunt consuleretur saluti And this Proem of King Edmund himself thus seconds Ego Edmundus Rex omnibus qui in ditione ac potestate meâ sunt senibus juvenibus clarè signisico Me à scientissimis Regni mei in celebri Ecclesiasticorum quam Laicorum frequentiâ studiosè requisivisse quo tandem pacto Christiana proveheretur sides c. Or Mando praecipio omni populo Seniorum Juniorum qui in Regione measunt Ea quae Investigans Investigavi cum Sapientibus Clericis Laicis In this Council there were three parcels of Laws made the one meerly Ecclesiastical the other meerly Civil the third mixt of boâ—h And in this Council I conceive the Constitutions of Archbishop Odo were read and ratified The greatest parâ— of the Civil Laws there made were against Murder bloodshed fighting breach of Peace Thefâ— and Perjury In the last parcel of these Laws cap. 5. The King gives God and them thanks for assisting him in making these Laws in these words Maximas autem Deo vobis omnibus ago gratias Qui me auxilio vestro in hac pacis quam nunc ad profligandos sures sancivimus Lege adjuvistis ac vehementèr consido eo vos propensius Nobis in posterum opitulaturos quo hujus Decreti observatio magis videbitur necessaria About the same year 944. this King assembled another Parliamentary Council of his Bishops and Wisemen at Culinton where they enacted 7 other Laws Principally against Theeves together with an Oath of Allegiance to king Edmund thus prefaced Haec est Institutio quam Edmunds Rex Episcopi sui cum Sapientibus suis instituerunt apud Culintoniam de pace Juramento faciendo The two first of these Laws I shall transcribe as pertinent to my Theam Cap. 1. Imprimis ut omnes jurent in nomine Domini pro quo sanctum illud sanctum est fidelitatem Edmuudo Regi Sicut Homo debet esse fidelis Domino suo sine omni controversiâ seditione in manifesto in occulto in amando quod amabit Nolendo quod noluit et antequam Iuramentum hoc dabitur ut nemo concelet hoc in fratre vel proximo suo plus quam in extraneo Cap. 2. Vult etiam ut ubi sur pro certo cognoscetur Twelfhindi et Twifhindi that is meu of
periculum ducitâ—â— in itinere obvium habuerit potestatem habeat eripiendi eum ab imminen i periculo in toto Regno meo The old Charter begins thus In nomine Domini nostri Jesu Christi Quamvis Decreta Pontificum verba Sacerdotum inconvulsis ligaminibus velut fundamenta montium fixa sunt tamen plerumque tempestatibus turbinibus saecularium rerum Religio sanctae Ecclesiae maculis reproborum dissipatur ac â—…itur Iccirco profuâ—… succedentibus posteris esse decrevimus ut ea quae salubri Consilio et communi assensu definiuntur nostris literis roborata firmentur c. Hoc itaque Dunstano Doroberniensi at que Oswaldo Eboracensi Episcopo adhortantibus consentiente etiamer annuente Brithelmo Fontanensi Episcopo caeterisque Episcopis Abbatibus et Primatibus Ego Edgar divina dâ—â—poâ—…one Rex Anglorum c. And it concludes thus Acta est haec Privilegii â—aginâ— confirmata apud Londonium Communi Concilio omnium Primatum meorum Then follow the subscriptions of King Egar Alfgina his Mother Prince Edward Kinred King of Scots Mascusius the chief Admiral both the Archbishops 6 Bishops 8 Abbots 3 Dukes and other Officers Which Charter and Privileges at the Kings request were ratified by Pope John the 13 in a general Council at Rome Anno Dom. 971. by a special Bull that they might remain inviolable yet both the Abbey it self Lands Privileges are long since demolished dissipated annihilated such is the mutabiliunity of all sublunary things The self same year Anno 970. King Edgar by his Charter granted and confirmed sundry Lands and Privileges to the Monastery of Medeshamsted formerly demolished by the Danes which Bishop Aethelwold had repaired and named Burgh perpetually exempting it from all Episcopal jurisdiction yoak and exaction Quatenus nec Rex nec Comes nec Episcopus praeter Christianâ—â—atem attinentium Parochiarum nec vicecomes nec ulla alia major minorve persona ulla dominatione occupari praesumat excepta moderata expeditione Pontis Arcisve constructione VVhich Charter was ratified by the kings own subscription both the Archbishops sundry Bishops Abbots Dukes and other chief Officers and the sign of the Cross after each of their Names In the year 973. King Edgar after his seven years penance expired on the Feast of Pentecost in the 30th year of his age was solemnly Crowned and consecrated King and wore his Crown with great glory at Akemancester alias Bath both the Archbishops Dunstan and Oswald with all the rest of the Bishops of England ac Magnatibus universis and all the Nobles being there preâ—ent at his Coronation and received the accustomed Gifts usually given to the Nobles being at such inaugurations Soon after the same year this King with a very great Fleet and Army sayling round about the Northern parts of England came to Westchester where his eight tributary Kings or Vice-royes namely Kyneth king of Scots Malcome King of Cumberland Marcus king of Man and many other Ilands and the other 5 kings of Wales Dufnall Siferth Howel Iames and Iuchill met him as he had commanded them and swore alleâ—i nce to him in these words That they would be faithfull and assisting to him both by Land and Sea Which done he on a certain day entred with them into a Barge and placing them at the Oares himself took the Helm and steered the Barge very skilfully whiles they rowed it down the River of Dee from his Palace to the Monastery of St. John Bapist on the other side all his Dukes and Nobles following and accompanying him in other Barges where having made his Prayers they all rowed him thence back again in like pompe to his Royal Palace which when he had entred he said to his Nobles That any of his Successors might then say he was King of England when with so many Kings following and subject to him he should enjoy the Prerogative of the like pompe and power But Mr. Fox subjoyns In my mind this king had said much better God forbid that I should glory in any thing but in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ The year following An. 974. Certain Merchants comming from York arived in the Islle of Thanet in Kent where they were presently taken by the Ilanders and spoyled of all their goods which king Edgar being informed of was so far incensed against these Plunderers that he spoyled them of all their Goods and deprived some of them of their lives Which Huntingdon and Bromton thus record Rex Edgarus undecimo Anno Regni sui jussit praedari Insulam Tenet Quia jure Regalia spreverant non ut host is insaniens sed ut Rex malo mala puniens The same year as Malmesbury Ingulphus and others write king Edgar by his regal Charter caused the secular Priests to be removed out of the Monastery of Malmesbury and introducing Monks in their places restored to them the Lands and Possessions of the monastery which the secular Priests formerly enjoyed and had leased 〈◊〉 that upon a full hearing before the Wise-men Bishops others in his presence most likely in a Parliamentary Council as this clause in his Charter intimates Haec a praedictis accommodata Clericis a contensioso possessa est Edebnoto sed superstitiosa subtilique ejus disceptatione aSapientibns meis audita et conflictatione illius mendosa ab eisdem me praesente convicta Monasteriali a me reaâ— â—a est usui If the Council of Winchester hereafter cited Anno 975. was held in King Edgars life time as some affirm most probably this debate here mentioned touching these Lands was held in and before that Council and this Charter therein made and ratified with the subscriptions of the Kings Arch-bishops Bishops Abbots and Dukes thereto annexed according to the custome of that age Although King Edgar in his younger daies was subject to many Vices and committed some injurious Tyrannical Acts recorded by Malmesbury Fox Speed and others yet repenting of these his youthfull lustfull Vices he proved such a just and prudent King that our Historians of elder and later ages give these large Encomiums of his Justice Prudence Piety Vertues and politique Government worâ—hy perpetual memory and immitation So excellent was he in Justice So sharp was he in correction of Vices as well in his Magistrates Officers and other Subjects that never before his days was less felony by Robbers nor less extortion or Bribery by false Officers such as were wicked he kept under them that were Rebels he repulsed the godly he maintained and the just and modest he loved the learned and virtuous he encouraged He would suffer no man of what degree or quality soever he were to elude or violate his Laws without condigne punishment In his time there was neither any private Pilferer nor publike Theef but he that in stealing other mens Goods would venture and suffer as he was sure the loss of his own Goods and
Realm and the hearts of the Subject to be withdrawn from and set against their Soveraign they thought it a sufficient occasion and advantage to forward their intendments and omitting no time arived on the Coasts of Kent and spoiled the Country as aforesaid About the year of our Lord 982. One Lefsi bought lands in the Isle of Ily of Adelwold Bishop of Winchester and not only denied to pay for them but likewise forcibly disseised the Bishop of 3. Manors Burch Undeles and Kateringes which the Bishop recovered by Judgement of the Earldermen and Thames in the WITENAGEMOTE Wittagemiot or Parliamentary Assembly of that age thus reported by the antient Book of Ely and by Mr. Selden out of it Edicitur placitum apud Londoniam quo cum Duces Principes Satrapae Rethores et Causidici ex omni parte confluxerant beatus Aedelwoldus praefatum Lefsium in jus protraxit et coram cunctis suam causam et injuriam ac rapinam quam ipse Leofsius intulerat sanctae Ecclesiae ex ordine patefecit Qua re benè ac apertè ab omnibus discussa omnes Deo et beato Aethelwaldo per judicium reddiderunt Burch et Undeles et Kateringes Judicaverunt etiam ut Leofsius Episcopo totum damnum suum suppleret et Mundam suam redderet de rapina verò Regis forisfacturam emendaret dato pretio genealogiae suae Post haec infra octavum diem convenerunt iterum ad Northamtune et congregata ibi tota Provincia sive Vicecomitatu coram cunctis iterum causam supradictam patefecerunt Qua patefacta ac declarata ut praejudicata erat apud Londoniam judicaverunt et isti apud Northamtune Quo facto omnis populus cum jurejurando in Christi Cruce reddiderunt Episcopo quae sua erant scilicet Burch et Undeles et Kateringes By which President it is apparent 1. That Parliamentary Councils in that age held Pleas and gave judgements of Disseisins and Titles of Lands 2. That they had Lawyers to assist them and plead such cases before them 3. That the Judgement given in the Great Council at London was confirmed recited and executed in the County-Court held at Northampton and possession of the Lands accordingly restored to the Bishop King Ethelred being incensed against the Bishop of Rochester Anno 983. as some or 986. as others compute it besieged the City of Rochester for a long space VVhereupon Archbishop Dunstan commanded him to give over the siege lest he should provoke St. Andrew Patron of that City against him The King notwithstanding continued his siege till he extorted one hundred pounds from the Bishop VVhereupon Dunstan admiring at his covetousness sent him this Message Because thou hast preferred silver before God Mony before an Apostle covetousness before me the evils which the Lord hath denounced shall violently come upon thee Upon which Matthew Westminster makes this observation Anno 986. Rex Anglorum Aethelredus qui prohibente beato Dunstano Centum libras ab Episcopo Roffensi extorserat pro pace brevissima pensionem 16 millium librarum persolvere compulsus est VVhich fell not out till the year 994. as himself and others record Malmesbury referrs it to the Tax of 10 thousand pounds paid by him to the Danes Anno 991. In this year 986. Alfric Duke of Mercians son of Duke Alfere was banished England crudeliter cruelly without just cause as Bromton recites which made him afterwards prove treacherous to the King he being one of those English quos nullis causis extantibus exhaeredabat Rex et affecto crimine opibus emungebat which Malmesbury taxeth him for His oppression and injustice being the chief causes of his miscarriage and expulsion by the Danes Anno 988. The Danes invading VVecedport thereupon Goda Earl of Devonshire Strenwild a most valiant Knight and many others in defence of their Native Country and Liberties fought with them and were slain by them And Anno 891. Brithnoth the most valiant Duke of the East English and his forces fought a set battle with the invading Danes who wasted Ipswich and the parts adjoyning In which battel an innumerable multitude were slain on both sides and this valiant Duke with many thousands of the English in defence of their Country against these Invaders After which by the Counsel of Syricius Arch-bishop of Canterbury Duke Aethelward Alfric and other Nobles assembled no doubt in a Parliamentary Council as Malmesbury his Duces et Proceres si quando in Concilium venissent pars hic 〈◊〉 illud elâ—… c. 〈◊〉 Henry de Knyghton his Proceres Regni si quando ad Concilium congregati c. import A Tribute of ten thousand pounds was given to the Danes that they might desist from their frequenr rapines and slaughters of men which they frequently exercised about the Sea-coasts pacemque firmam cum iis tenerent and might hold a firm peace with them Some of our Historians stile this Infaustum Concilium an unlucky Council Eadmerus gives this verdict of it Regis desidia circum circa innotuit Et ideo extevorum cupiditas opes Anglorum quam mortes affectans hac illac per mare terram invadere primo propinquas mari villas urbes deinde remotiores ac demum totam Provinciam miserabili depopulatione devastare Quibus cum ille nimio pavore perculsus non armis occurrere sed data pecunia pacem ab eis petere non erubuisset ipsi suscepto pretio in sua revertebantur ut numero suorum adaucto fortiores redirent ac praemia iteratae irruptionis multiplicata reciperent Unde modo decem millia modo sedecim millia modo viginti quatuor millia modo triginta millia librarum argenti consecuti sunt omnia illis largiente praefato Rege Edelredo et gravi exactione totum Regnum opprimente VVilliam of Malmesbury paâ—â—eth this censure on it and the unhappy consequence of it Danis omnes portus infestantibus levitate piratica ubique infestantibus dum nesciretur ubi eis occurrere debent decretum à Syriaco Archiepiepiscopo c. ut repellerentur argento qui non poterunt ferro Ita decem milliâ— librarum soluta cupiditatem Danorum explâ—â—ere Exemplum Infamiae et Viris indignnm libertatem pecunia redimere quam ab invicto animo nulla violentia possit excutere Et tunc quidem palisper ab incurâ—â—bus cestarunt mox ubi vires otio resumpserunt ad superiora reditum Tantus timor Anglos invaserat ut nihil de resistendo cogitarent Si qui antiquae gloriae memores obviare â—â—gna colligere tentassent hostium multitudine sociorum defectione destituebantur whereby they became Vassals and Tributaries to the insulting Danes Cujus Siricii consilio in gestis Regum dixi Ethelredum Regem animi libertatem Danis pretio â—endicasse Ut eoruâ— pacem argento redimerent quod ferro repellere posseâ—â—
nisi corde carâ—reâ— Unde Importabilis Tributi pensio imposita Angliae fortunas provincialium ad solum usque destruxit Henry Huntindon and the Chronicle of Bromton pass this verdict against and deduce this memorable observation from this Tribute Edelredi Regis Anno 13. Primo statuerunt Angli which intimates it to be 〈…〉 Parliamentary Council Concilio infausto Siricii Archiepiscopi quod ipsi censum Dacis persolverent quatenus à rapinis caede ceâ—â—arent â—…eis decem mille libras Hoc antem malum usque in hodiernum diem duravit et diu nisi Dei Pietas subveniat durabit Regibus namque nostris modo persolvimus ex consuetudine quod Dacis persolvebatur ex ineffabili terrore To which Bromton Ranulphus Censtrensis and Henry de Knyghton immediately subjoyn Dacis Tributum annuum solvunt Primo anno 10 milia librarum Secundo anno 16 millia librarum Tertio anno 20 millia librarum Quarto anno 24 millia Quinto anno 40. millia librarum dâ—nec tandem pecunâ—a deficiente iterum tenderent ad Rapinas Et tunc Noâ—… depraedaâ—es et Londoniam obsidenteâ— Coegerunt regem tributum dare Mat. Parker Archbishop of Cauterbury thus censures this ill advice of his Predecessor Siricius pacem Christianis ab infidelibus Dacis 10. librarum millibus redemit Ad ignominiam sane peneque perniciem totius Regni Mr. John Fox inâ—orms us That King Ethelred being glâ—d to grant the Danes great sums of money for peace gave himself to polling of his Subjects and disinheriting them of their possessions and caused them to redeem the same again with great sums of money For that he paid great Tributes to the Danes yearly which â—as called Danegelt Which Tribute so increased that from the first Tribute of 10000 l. it was brought at last in processe of 5. or 6. years to 40000 l. The which yearly Tribute until the coming of St. Edward and after was levied of the people of the Land Moreover for lack of Justice many Theeves Rioters and Bribers were in the land with much misery and mischief To which sorrow moreover was joyâ—ed hunger and penury besides a bloudy flux feavers mortality murrain amongst cattel c. amongst the Commons insomuch that every one of them was constrained to pick and steal from others So that what for the pillage of the Danes and what by inward Theeves and Bribers this Land was brought into great affliction Albeit the greatest cause of this affliction as it seemeth to me is not so much to be imputed to the King as to the dissention among the Lords themselves who dâ— not agrée one with another but when they assembled in Consultation together either they did draw divers wayes or if any thing were agreed upon any matter of peace between the parties soon it was broken again or else if any good thing were devised for the prejudice of the Enemy even the Danes were warned thereof by some of the same Council John Speed in his Hist of Great Britain relates That King Ethelred could not redress the evils occasioned by the prosperous Danes successes who lay in the land like unto Grashoppers his strengths being small and his Subjects affections lâ—ss Theâ—eforâ— calling to counsell the Statesmen and Peers demanded their Advics what was best to be done Some few of these profeâ—ed the King their assistance but more of them perswaded to a composition whereof Siricius Archbishop of Canterbury was chief and in fine ten thousand pounds paid to the Danes for their departure This golden mine once entred was more eagerly digged into by those still thirsting Danes who finding the branch so beneficial at first hoped the vein in following would prove farr more beneficial and therefore regardless of promise the next year prepared themselves again for England and with a great Fleet dâ—spâ—â—ched to Sea The News whereof struck such terror into the English hearts that despairing of hope they accounted themselves the Bondslaves of Misery and were enforced to compound a peace with them with the payment of 16000 pounds which they at last mounted to 40000 or 48000 pounds till it emptied the Land of all her coin the Kingdom of her Glory the Nobiâ—ity of their Courage the Commons of their Content and the Soveraign of his wonted Respect and Observation A pattern of our age and times Samuel Dâ—mel gives us this Censure of this first unworthy heavy Tax Ethelred in the end was fain seeing he could not prevail with the sword to assail them with money and bought a peace for 10000 pounds which God wot proved after a very dear penny-worth to the Commonwealth Shewing the seller thereof how much was in his power and the buyer at how bad a rate his necessity was to be served and yet not sure of his bargain longer than the Contractor would Who having found the benefit of this market raised the price therof almost every year And yet had not Ethelred what he paid for the land in one part or other being never free from spoil and invasion but rather were more oppressed both by the Dane and by this Taxation which was the first we find in our Annals laid upon the Kingdom and with heavy grievance raised in a poor distressed State continuing many Ages after the occasion was extinct And in the end though in anoâ—her 〈◊〉 became the usual Supplement in the Dangers of the Kingdom and the Occasions of Princes And hereby Ethelred enlarged the means and desires of the Enemy so that at length came Swaine King of Denmark and Anlafe King of Norwey in person as if likewise to receive him for committing outrage and were both returned with great summs And many years it was not ere Swaine returned again to raise new summs by new afflictions and tormenting here this poor turmoiled people more than ever receives a fee for bloudshed to the summ of 48000 l. Granted in the General Assembly of the States at London and a Peace or rather paction of servitude concluded From these passages of our Historians it is most evident 1. That this Tax of ten thousand pounds to the Danes was the very first we find imposed on the English Nation An. Domini 991 being never subject to any publike Civil Tax til then for ought appears by History 2. That this Tax was then imposed and after reimposed augmented on the Nation only by common advice grant and consent of the King Prelates and Nobles assembled in a publike and Parliamentary Council 3. That the original ground of granting it was base degenerous cowardise or unmanly fear and sluggishness both in the King Nobles and People and that by the very unlucky imprudent ill Council and advice of an Archprelate Siricius Archbishop of Canterbury being the ptinciple adviser of it 4ly That it was originally paid not to a lawfull Native Soveraign king for defence of the Nation but to a forein invading prevailing victorious Danish Enemy to
postea slammis tradita sunt Abbas cum majore parte conventus sui assumptis secum sacris reliquiis sanctarum Virginum Kineburgae Kineswithae ac Tibbae Thorniam adiit Prior autem cum nonnullis fratribus assumpto secum brachio sancti Oswaldi regis ad insulam de Hely aufugit Subprior vero cum 10. fratribus ad Croylandiam venit faelicitèr Illo anno ex frequentibus fluviis inundationes excreverunt et vicinas paludes circumque jacentes mariscos immeabiles reddebant Ideo totus mundus advenit populus infinitus affluxit Chorus et claustrum replebantur Monachis caetera Ecclesia sacerdotibus et clericis Abbatia tota laicis caemeteriumque nocte ac die sub tentoriis mulieribus et pueris fortiores quicunque inter eos ac juvenes in ulnis et alnetis ora fluminum observabant erantque tunc quotidie ut caetera onera taceantur 100 Monachi in mensa Super haec omnia per nuncium Rex Swanus Monasterio Croylandiae mille Marcas imposuit et â—ub poena combustionis totius Monasterii solutionem dictae pecuniae certo die apud Lincoln assignavit infraque tertium mensem post solutionem hujus pecuniae iterum pro victualibus suo exercitui providendis exactores nequissimi mille Marcas minis maximis extorquebant Ventilatum est tunc et ubique vulgatum crudele martyrium S. Elphegi Archiepiscopi Doroberniae qui quia summam pecuniâ— excessivam sibi impositam pro sua redemptione solvere detrectavit belluina Dacorum ferocitas eum acerbissimo tormento crudeliter interemit Omnes fera tempora flebant foelices qui quocunque modo in fata processerant Abbas Godricus maximè cui cura tanti populi incumbebat et quem Rex Ethelredus cumulos argenti habere existimabat Daniens vero Swanus sunsque totus exercitus ei tanquam Domino de manibus eorum refugientium juges insidias et minas semper maximas ingerebat Demum expensis internis et exactionibus externis totus thesaurus Domini Turketuli Abbatis distractus est horrea â—mborum Egelrâ—corum â—â—m lita sunt cum adhuc Regii exactores pro pecuniis quotidie irruerent Et eum tanquam patriae proditorem et Danorum provisorem regi in proximo cum dignis compedibus deducendum et suppliciis tradendum pro suis demeritis affirmarent Perculsus ergo venerabilis Pater Abbas Godricus dolore cordis intrinsecus pro tot minis terribilibus convocat totum suum conventum et nuncians nummos Monasterio deficere orat et exorat quatenus doceant et decernant in medio quid contra nequam seculum magis expediat faciendum Tandem longo tractatu placet haec sententia cunctis aliquem Ministrorum seu satellitum Edrici Ducis Merciorum conducere et cum pecuniae deficerenâ— terris et tenementis ad terminum vitae concedendis in suum defensorem contra imminentia pericula obligare Erat enim ille Edricus potentissimus post regem in terra et cum rege Ethelredo et cum Swano rege Danorum familiarissimus et postea cum Cnuto filio suo Conductus est ergo quidam maximus satellitum dicti Ducis Edrici nomine Normannus sanguine summe clarus filius videlicet Comitis Lefwini et Frater Leofrici nobilis Comitis Leicestriae dato sibi prout postulabat manerio de Badby ad terminum 100. annorum Ille dictum manerium acceptans tenere de Sancto Guthlaco per firmam in grano piperis per annum in festo S. Bartholomaei singulis annis persolvendo fideliter promittebat et se futurum procuratorem ac protectorem Monasterii contra omnes adversarios confecto inde chirographo obligabat Valuit illud Monasterio aliquanto tempore scilicet omnibus diebus vitae suae By which passages it is apparent what Taxes exactions predures the Monasteries and others suffered both from King Ethelred his Captains and Officers on the one side and from the Danes on the other side and how they were enforced to hire and bribe great Souldiers and Courtiers by leases and monies to protect them from utter ruine John Speed affirms That the Clergy as backward as any denied to King Ethelred their assistance pleading their exemptions from warr and privileges of the Church when the land lay bleeding and deploring for help and scandalized all his other proceedings for demanding their aydes But this passage of Abbot Ingulphus so near that age out of the Register Books of Croyland whereof he was Abbot not long after proves they paid great annual contributions to the King and his Officers which consumed all their money plate Jewels Chalices and the very shrines of their Saints notwithstanding all Charters and exemptions And as for the Laity William of Malmsbury Radulphus Cistrensis Mr. Fox and others write That King Ethelred had such a condition that he would lightly dis-inherit Englishmen of their lands and possessions and caused them to redeem the same with great sums of money and that he gave himself to polling of his Subjects and framed Trespasses for to gain their money and goods for that he paid great Tribute to the Danes yearly Whereby he lost the affections of the people who at last deserted him and submitted themselves to the Danish Invaders who usurped the Soveraign power and forced him out of England with his Queen and Children These Unrighteous Oppressions Dis-inherisons and Exactions of his were specially provided against by his Nobles Prelates and VVisemen in the Councils of Aenham and Habam forecited by special Laws and special excellent Prayers and Humiliations prescribed to be made to God to protect them from his judgements and the invading oppressing bloody Danes worthy perusal yet pretended necessities and VVar laid all those Laws asleep In the year of Christ 1013. the very next after the Englishmens dearest purchased Peace which the perfidious gold-thirsty Danes never really intended to observe King Swain by the secret instigation of Turkel the Dane whom King Ethelred unadvisedly hired to guard him with his Danish shiâ—s from forein Invasions who sent him this Message Angliam praeclaram esse patriam opimam sed Regem stertere illum Venere Vino que studentem nihil minus quà m bellum cogitare Quapropter odiosum suis ridiculum alienis Duces invidos Provinciales infirmos primo stridore Lituorum proelio cessuros arrived at Sandwich with a great Fleet and Army of Danes in the Moneth of July where resting themselves a few days he failed round the East part of England to the mouth of Humber and from thence into the River of Trent to Gainsborough where he quitted his ships intending to wasâ—e the Country Hereupon first of all Earl Uhtred the Northumbriaâ—s with those of Lindesey presently without delay and after them the Freelingers with all the people in the Northern parts of Watling street having no man to defend them yeelded themselves up to Swain without striking one stroke
after a bloudy and cruel encounter he put Cnute and his Army to slight and slew many of them Not long after they recruiting their forces both Armies meeting at Steorstan King Edmond resolving there to give Cnute battel placed the most expert and valiantest of his Souldiers in the front and the rest of the English who came flocking in to him he kept for a reserve in the rear Then calling upon every of them by name he exhorted and informed them That they now fought for their Country for their Children for their Wives for their Houses and Liberties inflaming the minds of his Souldiers with his excellent Speeches in this battel with the Enemy he exercised the Offices of a valiant Soldier and good General charging very couragiously But because that most persidious Duke Edric Almar and Algar and others of the great men who ought to have assisted him with the Inhabitants of Southampton VViltshire and innumetable other English joyned with the Danes the battel continued all day from morning to night with equal fortune till both sides being tired out and many of each party slain the night constrained them to march one from another But their bloud not being cold the next day they buckled together again with no less courage than before till at last in the very heat of the battel the most perfidious Duke Edric perceiving the Danes like to be totally routed and the English in great forwardness of victory cut off the head of a Souldier named Osmeranus very like to King Edmund both in hair and countenance and shaking his bloody sword with the half gasping head in his hand which he lifted up on high cryed out to the English Army O ye Dorsetshire men Devonshire men and other English flee and get away for your head is lost behold here is the head of your King Edmund which I hold in my hand therefore hasten hence with all speed and save your lives Which when the English heard and saw they were more affrighted with the atrocity of the thing than with the belief of the Speaker whereupon all the more unconstant of the Army were ready to fly away But Edmond having present notice of this treacherous stratagem and seeing his men ready to give over the fighr hasted where he might be best seen and posting from rank to rank encouraged them to fight like Englishmen who thereupon resuming their courage charged the Danes more fiercely than before and bending their force against the Traytor had shot him to death but that he retreated presently to the Enemy the English reviving and manfully continuing the battel again till the darkness of the night caused both Armies voluntarily to retreat from each other into their Tents When much of the night was spent Cnute commanded his men in great silence to break up their Camp and marched to his Ships and soon after whiles King Edmond was recruiting his Army in West-Sex besieged London again whereupon Edmond marching to London with a select company of Souldiers chased Cnute and his Army to their ships removed the siege and entred the City in manner of Triumph Cnute and Edric perceiving the valour and good success of Edmond conspired together to overcome him by Treason whom they could not vanquish by Armes for which end Edric before King Edmonds march to London as some or soon after as others relate feignedly revolted from Cnute and submitted himself again to Edmond as his natural Lord and renewing his peace with him fraudently swore that he would continue faithfull to him only that he might betray him Edmond two days after he had chased the Danes from the siege of London pursuing his victory passed over the Thames at Brentford where though many of the English were drowned in passing over the River through their carelesness yet he there fought with the Danes the fourth or tather fifth time routed them and won the field After which Edmond by the advice of Edric marched again into West-Sex to raise a more numerous Army to supply those who were drowned and slain in this last battel Upon which advantage the Danes again returned to the siege at London invironing and fiercely assaulting it on every side but being valiantly repulsed by the Citizens they retired from thence to their ships and sailed into the River of Arewe where leaping out of their ships they went about pillaging in Mercia killing all they met and burning the Villages returning to their ships with a great booty Another company of their foot sailing up the River of Meadway pillaged Kent their Horse marching thither by Land to meet them doing the like wasting all places with fire and sword King Edmond having in the mean time raised a strong Army out of all England passed over with them again at Brentford to fight the Danes and giving them battel near Oteford routed the whole Danish Army not able to endure his fierce charge and pursued them as far as Ilesford slaying many thousands of them in the pursute and had he followed the pursute futther it was conceived that day had put an end to the war and Danes for ever But perfidious Duke Edric by his most wicked Counsel the worst ever given in England caused him to give over the chace Whereupon the flying Danes escaped into the Isle of Shepy Edmond returning into VVest-Sex to observe Cnutes motion he thereupon transported his forces into Kent who began to plunder and wast Mercia far worse than ever they had done before VVhereupon King Edmond marching with his Army against them gave them battel the sixt time at Esesdune or Assendune now Ashdune in Essex where after a long and bloody fight with equall valour and great loss on both sides King Edmond seeing the Danes to fight more valiantly than ever before leaving his place which usually was between the Dragon and Standard ran into the very front of the battel and breaking in like thunder upon the Enemy brake their ranks pierced into the very midst of them and made way for others to follow him forcing the Danes to give back VVhich the ever traiterous Edric perceiving fled with the whole Squadron of Souldiers which he commanded unto Cnute as was formerly agreed between them whereupon the Danes becoming the stronger made an extraordinary slaughter of the English as Matthew VVestminster and his followers story Henry Huntindon relates That Edric seeing the Danes going to ruine cryed out to the English Army Fly O Englishmen fly Englishmen for Edmond is dead being not seen in his wonted place and crying out thus he and his Brigade first began the flight whereupon the whole Army of the English following them fled likewise VVigorniensis informs us that King Edmond before this battel riding about to every Company admonished and commanded them that being mindfull of their pristine valour and victory they should defend themselves and the Realm from the avarice of the Danes being now to fight with those they had formerly conquered That perfidious Duke Edric seeing the
ad mortem deducatur Sed justitia pacificans pro necessitate populi exquiratur ne pro levi re opus manuum Dei sui ipsius pretium quod profundè redemit desperet Lex 26. Praecipimus nè Christiani passim in exilio vendantur vel in Gentilitatem nè forte pereant animae quas propria vita sua mercatus est Dominus noster Ihesus Christus Lex 31. Omnis Injustitia deinceps opprimatur Burgbotam Brigbotam Scipforthunga Frothunga qui Navigii vel expeditionis sonant apparatum sedulo procuremus cum necesse fuerit ad commune regni nostri commodum Et perquiramus simul modis oâ—… quo modo praecipuum possit consilium ad profectum populi obtineri rectaque Christianitas propensius erigi quicquid injustum est solertius enâ—rvari Lex 34. Si quis deinceps Vnlage i. e. non legem erigat vel injustum judicium judicet pro laesione vel aliqua pecuniae susceptione sit erga Regem CXX s. reus in Anglorum laga nisi cum juramento audeat inveritare quod rectins nescivit judicare dignitatem suae legalitatis semper amittat si non eam redimat erga Regem sicut ei permittetur In Denelaga Lathslithes reus sit si non juret quod melius nescivit Lex 36. Qui aliquem accusare praesumat unde pecunia vel commodo pejor sit denique mendacium pernoscatur linguam suam perdat vel Weregildo redimatur Lex 37. Nemo Regem requiret de Justitia facienda dum ei rectum offertur in Hundredo suo requiratur Hundredum secundum Witam sicut justum est Lex 38. Et habeatur in anno ter Burgimotus Scyremotus bis nisi saepius sit necesse Et inter sit Episcopus et Aldermannus et doceant ibi Deirectum et seculi Lex 59. Non est in aliquo tempore concessa INJUSTITIA et tamen Injustitia est festis diebus et sanctificatis locis propensius interdicta Semperque sicui homo potentior est vel majoris ordinis sic debet solertius pro Deo et seculo quod justum est emendaâ—e Et ideo gratam emendationem sedulo per quiramus de Scripturis Sanctis et seâ— cularem juxta legem seculi Lex 83. Si quis de morte Regis vel Domini sui quoquo modo traectaverit vitae suae reus sit â—t omnium quae habebit nisi triplici judicio se purget Lex 91. Si quis Burgbotam vel Brigbotam 1. burgi vel pontis refectionem vel Firdfare 1. in exercitum ire supersedeat emendet hoc erga Regem C. xx s. in Anglorum laga in Denelaga sicut Lex stetit antea vel ita se adlegiet nominentur ei 14. et acquirat ex eis 11. Lex 96. Haec est alleviatio quam omni populo meo praevidere volo in quibus nimis omnino fuerant aggravati Praecipio Praepositis meis omnibus ut in proprio meo lucrentur et inde mihi serviant Et nemo cogatur ad firmae adjutorium aliquid dare nisi sponte sua velit Et si quis aliquem inde gravabit Werae suae reus sit erga Rogem Lex 97. Si quis ex hac vita decedat sine distributione rerum suarum vel per incustodiam vel per mortem improvisam non usurpet dominus ejus de pecunia nisi quantum ad justam Relevationem pertinet quae Anglicè vocatur Hereget sed sit secundnm dictionem ejus ipsa pecunia recte divisa uxori pueris et propinquis unicuique secundum modum qui ad eum pertinet Et sint Relevationes it à minutae sicut modus est Comitis sicut ad eum pertinet hoc est octo equi quatuor sellati quatuor insellati et galeae quatuor et loricae quatuor cum octo lanceis et totidem scutis et gladii quatuor et CC. marcae auri Postea Thayni regis qui ei proximus sit quatuor equi duo sellati et duo insellati et duo gladii et quatuor lanceae et totidem scuta et galea cum lorica sua et 50. marcae auri Et mediocris Thayni equus cum apparatu suo et arma sua vel suum Halsfang in Westsaxia in Mircenis ij l. in Estanglia ij l. Et si notus sit Regi equi duo unus cum sella et alius sine sella et unus gladius et duae lanceae et totidem scuta et 50 marcae auri Et qui minus potest det duas libras Lex 104. Et qui fugiat à Domino vel socio suo pro timiditate in Expeditione navali vel terrestri per dat omne quod suum est et suam ipsius vitam et manus mittat Dominus ad terram quam ei antea dederat Et si terram haereditariam habeat ipsa in manum regis transeat Lex 105. Et qui in bello ante Dominum suum ceciderit sit hoc in terra sit alibi sint relevatitones condonatae et habeant haeredes ejus terram sicut et pecuniam suam et rectâ— dividant inter se Lex 107. Et volo ut omnis homo pacem habeat eundo ad Gemotum vel rediens de Gemoto id est placito nisi sit fur probatus Lex 110. Qui leges istas apostabit quas Rex modo nobis omnibus indulsit sit Dacus sit Anglus Werae suae reus sit erga regem Et si secundo faciat reddat bis Weram suam Si quis addat tertio reus sit omnium quae habebit In the rest of his Lawes all corporal and pecuniary penalties and fines for all sorts of Offences and Crimes are reduced to a certainty and none left arbitrary and by Lex 104 105. it is evident that the Military Laws as wel as the Civil Ecclesiastical were made in and by advice and direction of the Great Councils The Chronicle of Bromton informs us that King Cnute per Chartam suam à se et haeredibus suis dedit quà m cito post in Parliamento suo apud Wintoniam when and where those Laws were made coram omnibus Regni sui Magnatibus confirmavit gave and confirmed the Manors of Hornyng Ludham and Netershede to the Monastery of Cowholm in Northfolke And that one Maynard riding towards this Parliamentary Council brake his neck who had so incensed the King against Wulfric and the Monks of this Monastery that he threatned to put them to death What lands and privileges he gave by his Charters to St. Cuthberts Church in Durham Christs-Church in Canterbury and other Monasteries the t Marginal Authors will inform us About the year 1034. King Cnute having obtained the Soveraign Dominion of England Scotland Norwey a great part of Sweden and of all Denmarke principally by the Sword through the flattery of his followers who stiled him a King of all Kings most mighty
then to mary his daughter Godith to Edward the younger Brother and to make him King as being of a more milde and simple disposition apt to be ruled by him Hereupon Godwin went to Southampton to meet with the two Brothers at their landing It fell out that the Messengers sent into Normandy found only Alfred there Edward being then gone into Hungarie to speak with his Cosen Edward the Outlaw Ironsides son When Alfred heard these Messengers tydings he thanked God and in all hast sped him to England ariving at Southampton with some of his Mothers kinred and many of his fellow-Souldiers of like age who were Normans Whereupon Godwin intimated to the Nobles of England That Alfred had brought over too great a company of Normans with him and had likewise promised the lands of the Englishmen to them and therefore it would not be safe to instirpate such a valiant and crafty Nation amongst them That these ought to undergoe exemplary punishment lest others by reason of their alliance to the King should presume to intrude themselves amongst the English And then posting to Southampton welcomed and received Alfred with much joy pretending to conduct him safe to London where the Barons waited for to make him King and expected his comming and so they passed forth together towards London But when they came to Guild-down Godwin said to Alfred Look round about thee on thy right hand and left and behold what a kingdom shall be subjugated to thy Dominion Upon which Alfred giving thanks to God presently promised that if it happened hâ— should be crowned King He would constitute such Laws as should be pleasing and acceptable both to God and Man Which words were no sooner uttered but the Traytor Godwin commanded all his men to apprehend Alfred and to slay all the Normans that came with him in his company and after that to carry Alfred into the Isle of Ely and there to put out both his eys and to pull out his bowels which they accordingly executed as aforesaid And so died this innocent Alfred right heir to the Crown through the Treason of wicked Godwin When the Lords of England heard thereof and how Alfred that should have been their King was put to death through the false Treason of Godwin against their wills tâ—…ey were wonderfull â—orrow â—ll and wroth and swore before God and Man that he should die a worser Death than did Edric which destroyed his Lord Edmond Ironside and would immediately have put him to death but that the Traytor fled and escaped into Denmark and there continued 4. yeares and more and lost all his Lands Rents Goods and Chattels in England confiscated in the mean time for this his Treason These Historians though they somewhat vary in the time and occasion of Prince Alfreds death yet they all agree in the substance of his and of his Norman Souldiers and Campanions treacherous barbarous murders by the joynt or separate treacherie of Earl Godwin and his son Harold Which how fatal it proved to them both by Gods avenging Justice you shall hear in its due place and what divine vengeance it drew at last on the whole English Nation religious and judicious Mr. John Fox informes us in these words This cruel fact of Godwin and his men against the innocent Normans whether it came of himself or of the Kings setting on seemeth to me to be the cause why the justice of God did shortly after avenge the quarrel of these Normans in conquering and subduing the English Nationâ—… by William the Conquerour and the Normans which came with him For so just and right it was that as the Normans coming with a natural English Prince were murdered of English men so afterwards the Englishmen should be slain and conquered by the Normans coming with a forein King being none of their natural Country After the banishment of Queen Emma out of and murder of Prince Alfred in England Harde-Cnute delaying the time in Denmark and deferring his coming into England thereupon Harold formerly King only of the Mercians and Northumbrians that he might reign over all England in the year 1037. A Principibns et omni Populo Rex eligitnr was elected King by all the Nobles and People Harde Cnutus verò quia in Denmarchia mansâ—rat et ad Anglian ut rogabatur venire distulit penitus abjicitur as Florentius Wigorniensis Simeon Dunelmensis Hoveden Bromton Radulphus de Diceto and others inform us After which King Harold degenerating from Cnute his Father in all things took no care at all either of military or civil affairs nor of his own Courtly honour doing only his own will and contrary to his royal estate going more willingly on foot of which he was so swift that he was named Harefoot than riding on Horseback In his dayes there were rendred and paid to 16 Ships from every Port not In-land Towns 8. marks of Silver as in the time of his Father as Henry Huntindon records to which John Speed subjoynes This Dane seeing his hazards prevented sought to secure himself and with 16 Ships of the Danish Fleet kept the Seas which continued ever in a readiness and wafted from port to port to the maintenance whereof he charged the English with great payments to their no little grudge and reviling whereby he lost the love of his Subjects before it had taken root in their hearts Neither held he long those disloyal courses for that his speedy death did cut off the infamy of a longer life he dying at Oxford where he was elected King without wife or children to survive his person or revive his name when he had reigned only 4. years and as many moneths Anno 1040. Upon the death of Harold Proceres tam Anglorum quam Danorum in unum concordantes sententiam the Nobles both of the English and Danes aâ—â—embling together in a Parliamentary Council and concording in one opinion sent Embassadours to Harde-Cnute then at Bruges in Flanders visiting Queen Emma his Mother where he had made great preparation of ships and land forces to recover the Crown of England which belonged to him both by birth and compact from his brother Harold beseeching him to make hast into England and to take possession of the Crown thereof Whereupon he immediately consenting to the Counsel of the Nobles came speedily into England with 60 as some or 40 ships as others write furnished with Danish Souldiers and Mariners where he was received with great joy elected King both by the English and Danes and solemnty crowned at London by â—lnothus Archbishop of Canterbury Soon after he commanded Alfric Arch-bishop of Yorke Earl Godwin and others to digg up the interred corps of his brother King Harold out of his grave in London and his head to be cut off by the hangman and then both head and corps to be thrown into the Common sink and after that into the Thames And that partly in revenge of the injuries
transfert regna mutat imperia propter peccata populi regnare facit hypocritam Peccatum peccaâ—it populus tuus Domino tradidit eos in manus Gentium dominati sunt etiam qui oderunt eos Sed non obliviscitur misereri Deus nec continebit in ira sua milericordias suas Erit enim cum dormis cum patribus tuis sepultus in senectute bona visitabit Dominus populuÌ„ suuÌ„ faciet redemtionem plebis suae Eliget enim sibi viruÌ„ secundum cor suum qui faciet omnes voluntates suâ—s qui me opitulante regnuÌ„ adeptus Anglorum Danico furori finem imponet Erit enim acceptus Deo gratus hominibus amabilis civibus terribilis hostibus utilis ecclesiae Qui cum praescriptum terminuÌ„ regnandi in justitia pace compleverit laudabilem vitam sancto fine concludet Quae omnia in beato Edwardo completa râ—i exitus comprobavit Expergefactus Pontifex rursus ad preces lacrimasque convertitur licet faelicitatem suae gentis non esset ipse visurus de malorum tamen fine câ—rtus effectus gratiâ—s agens Deo plurimum graâ—nlabatur Factus igitur animaequior populis poenitentiam praedicabat quibus Dâ—us misericordiam non defuturam constantissime pollâ—… From these passages whether reaâ—â— as man as fictitiâ—us as some repute them I shall onely observe these reall Truths 1. That in King Ethelreds reign great Parliamentary Councils were usually assembled to consult of the weighty affairs state if not succession of the Realm of England 2. That godly men in all ages have been deeply affected with the misery exile disinheriting and extirpation of the Royal Issue and Posterity by invading forreign usurpers and with the oppressions of their native countrey under their usâ— ped power and have poured forth frequent and fervent prayers unto God in secret for their restitution and relief 3. That the Nobility Clergy and people of England have ever had a propense naturall inclination and affection to the true royall Blood and Posterity of the Nation though forcibly constrained to abjure and renounce them for a season by prevailing Intruders electing them for their Kings and preferring them before all others upon the very next opportunity to vindicate their rights and liberties and rejecting the usurpers and their race 4 That though the Kings of England were usually reputed hereditary yet in truth they were for the most part actually elected by the Prelates and Nobles in parliamentary Councils and appointed by the generality of the Clergy and people and had oaths of allegiance given to them by their subjects 5. That God doth many times beyond all probability and expectation restore disinherited Princes to their Crowns of which they have been forcibly deprived after many years dispossession and without any wars or effusion of blood even by the Nobles and peoples own voluntary choice and act without their seeking as he did here restore Prince Edward after 25 years interruption and Aurelius Ambrosius long before to the British Crown to omit all others 6. That Crowns invaded ravished by force of armes and bloodshed are seldome long or peaceably enjoyed by the usurpers themselves or their posterity that of Curtius being an experimentall truth Non est diuturna possessio in quam gladio inducimur All which we find experimentally verified in this History of King Edward his election and restitution to the Crown of England worthy our special observation King Edw. coming to the Crown was not onely very charitable to the poor humble mercifull and just towards all men but also PLURES LEGES BONAS IN ANGLIA STATUIT quae pro majore parte adhuc in regno tenerentur Whereupon about the year 1043 as the Chronecle of Brompton William Caxton in his Chronicle and Mr. Selden inform us Earl Godwin a sugitive in Denmark for the murther of prince Alfred hearing of his piety and mercy resolved to return into England humbly to implore his mercy and grace that he might have his lands again that were confiscated having provided all things for his voyage he put to sea and arrived in England and then posted to London UBI REX ET OMNES MAGNATES AD PARLIAMENTUM TUM FUERUNT Where the King and all the Nobles were then at a parliament here he beseeched intreated his friends kindred who were the greatest Lords of the land after the King that they would study to procure to him the Kings Grace and friendship who having thereupon taken deliberate counsel among themselves led him with them before the King to seek his Grace But so soon as the King saw him he presently appealed him of TREASON of the death of Alfred his brother and using these words unto him said THOU TRAITOUR GODVVIN I THEE APPEAL FOR THE DEATH OF ALFRED MY BROTHER WHOM THOU HAST TRAITEROUSLY SLAIN To whom Godwin excusing himself answered My Lord and King saving your Reverenoâ— and Grace Peace Lordship I never betrayed nor yet slew your Brother unde super hoc pono me IN CONSIDERATIONE CURIAE VESTRAE whence I put my self upon the consideration and judgement of your Court concerning this matter Then said the King KARISSIMI DOMINI COMITES ET BARONES TERRAE c. Most dear Lords Earls and Barons of the land who are my Liege men now here assembled you have heard both my appeale and Godwins answer Volo quod inter Nos in ista appellatione RECTUM JUDICIUM DECERNATIS ET DEBITAM JUSTITIAM FACIATIS I will that between us in this appeale you award right Judgement and do due Justice COMITIBUS VERO ET BARONIBUS SUPER HOC AD INVICEM TRACTANTIBUS Hereupon the Earls and Barons debating upon this businesse among themselves some among them were different in their opinions from others in doing just judgement herein For some said that Godwin was never obliged to the King so Bromton to Alfred writes Caxton by homage service or fealty and therefore HE WAS NOT HIS TRAITOUR and that he had not slain Alfred with his own hands But others said Quod Comes nec Baro nec aliquis Regi subditus BELLUM CONTRA REGEM IN APPELLATIONE SUA DE LEGE POTEST VADIARE That neither the Earl nor any Baron nor any Subject to the King could by the Law wage Battel against the King in his Appeal but ought wholy to but himself in his mercy and to offer him competent amends Then Leofric Earl of Chester or Coventry as Caxton a good man towards God and the world spake and said The Earl Godwin after the King is a man of the best parentage of all England and he cannot deny but that BY HIS COUNCEL Alfred the Kings Brother was slain wherefore I award as touching my part that himself and his son and every of us DUODECIM COMITES the twelve Earls who are his friends and kinsmen should go humbly before the King laden with as much gold and silver as every of us can
of Thanet into Flanders to Earle Baldwin with much treasure but his other two sonnes Harold and Leofric sailed by Bristol into Ireland Moreover the King put away his Queen Editha for her Father Godwins sake thrust her into the Abbie of Warwel or Redwel without worship with one maid only to attend her committing her to the custody of the Abbess his own sister taking away all her substance without leaving her so much as one penny ne scilicet omnibus suis parentibus patriam suspirantibus sola sterteret in pluma Harolds Earldom and County wâ—a bestowed on Algarus who ruled it nobly and he with good will resigned it up to Harold upon his returne These things being done William Duke of Normandy came to visit the King with a great multitude of Normans and Souldiers whom King Edward honorably received and magnificently entertained for a season carrying him about to all his royal Castles and Cities and at last sent back into Normandy with many and great presents bestowed on him and his followers De successione autem Regni spes adhuc aut mentio nulla facta inter eos fuit writes Iugulphus King Edward In Parliamento Pleno having in Plain or sull Parliament as Radulphus Cestrensis Knighton de eventibus Angliae l. 1. c. 10. Trevisa and others relate thus banished and outlawed Godwin and his sons in which in condition as some write they continued two ful years Thereupon in the year 1052. Harold and Leofric by way of reveng coming out of Ireland with such ships and forces as they could there raise pillaged the western parts of England infesting the shores with continual robberies carrying away rich booties and slaying such as resisted them Then marching from Severn into the confines of Somsetshire and Dorsetshire they plundered many Towns and Villages in those parts against whom a great multitude assembled out of these two Counties making head were incountred and routed by Harold many of their chief Officers and others being slain After which they returning to their ships with great booties sailed round about by the shore to Plimonth Upon this King Edward speedily sent forth forty ships well victualed and furnished with choice Souldiers commanding them to watch for and resist the coming and landing of Earle Godwin who without their privity coming with a few ships undescerned out of Flanders practised pyracy and pillaged the sea-coasts of Kent and Sussex and at last came to the Isle of Weight where his two sonnes Harold and Leofric joyning their ships and Forces with his they studiously plotted how they might aveng themselves upon King Edward by sea Griffin King of VVales in the mean time by their instigation de populating Herefordshire by land slaying many of the Countrey people who resisted him On the Kings part there were about sixty ships assembled together to oppose Harold riding at anchor the Admirals of which Navy were the Earls Odo and Ralph the Kings kinsmen neither was the King himself sloathfull in this necessity lying all night on shipboard and diligently observing the excursions of these Pyrates executing that by sage counsel which by reason of age he could not act with his hand When both Navies were drawn near together and ready to grapple with and encounter each other a thick fogge and cloud sodainly arising blinded the eyes of these furiou persons and restrained the wretched audacity of these mortals so that they could not encounter each other Godwin with his companions being forced by the winds to returne from whence they came After which Godwin and his sonnes by secret messengers drew unto their party an innumerable company of the inhabitants of Kent Essex Sussex and Surry and all the Mariners of Hastings with many Souldiers and having drawn together a very great Army out of those parts who all promised with one voice To live and dye with Godwin forbearing all plunder and depopulation after they met together taking only victuals for their Army when occasion and necessity required and alluring all they could to their party they marched with their forces first to Sandwich Which the King hearing of being then at London speedily sent messengers to all who had not revolted from him to come with all speed to his assistance who delaying overlong came not at the time appointed In the mean while Godwin comes up the Thames with his Navy and Army toward London and pitched his Tents in Southwark near the City King Edward who was then at London had assembled a great company of armed men together and no small Navy to pursue Godwin and his sonnes both by Sea and Land But because very few with the King or Godwin had courage to fight with each other and the English whose sonnes Nephews Kinsmen and Friends were with Godwin and Harold refused to fight against their own parents kinred of the Kings party thereupon some wise men on both parts diligently endeavored to make a firme peace and reconciliation between the King and Godwin and commanded the Armies and Navies to forbear fighting Godwin being aged and potent both with his favour and tongue to bow the mindes of his auditors very well purged himself from all the things objected against him The next morning Rex habens cum Primartbus suis Concilio the King taking Counsel with his Nobles restored Godwin and all his sonnes except Swane who went on Pilgrimage barefoot to Jerusalem to expiate the murder of Beorne together with the Queen his daughter to their former honours Godwin giving his Sonne VVolnoth and Hake the Son of Swane his hostages to the King for his keeping of the peace and future loyaltie to him whom the King immediatly sent into Normandy to be kept there A concord and peace being thus made and ratified the King and Nobles omni populo bonas Leges rectam justitiam promiserunt promised good Laws and right Justiceto all the people then they banished Robert arch-bishop oâ— Canterbury William Bishop of London Vlfe Bishop of Dorchester and all the other Normans who incensed and gave the King evill counsel against Earle Godwin and the English and had invented unjust laws and pronounced unjust judgements against them permitting only some few Normans nominated in our Historians whom the King loved more than the rest and who had been faithfull to him and all the people to remain in England Not long after VVilliam Bishop of London was for his goodnesse recalled and restored to his Bishoprick but Stigand was made Archbishop of Canterbury in the place of Robert and Osburne and Hugh two Normans by birth leaving their Castles here went to the King of Scots who entertained them and so the land was freed from these forreign incendiaries Normannos omnes ignominâ notatos prolata Sententia in Robertum Archiepis ejusque complices quod statum regni conturbarant animum Kegis in provinciales agitantes Upon this sentence denounced Robert and others of them presently fled the Realme of their own accord
his See from Ramesberg to the Monastery of Malmsbury sed Rege jnxta Consilium Procerum id nolente he thereupon resigned his Bishoprick went beyond the Seas and took upon him the habit of a Monk but repenting of his rashness he returned into England three years after and held the Bishopricks of Salisbury and Sherborne united together till the 9th year of King William the Conqueror In the year 1057. Prince Edward son of Edmond Ironside came out of Hungary where he had long lived an Exile into England being sent for thence by his Unkle King Edward who had decreed to make him heir to the Crown after himself but he died at London soon after his return leaving onely Edgar Athelin his son very young and two daughters Margaret and Christiana under the Kings custody and tuition This same year Earl Leofric at the request of his devout Noble Countess Godina freed the City of Coventry from a most grievous dishonest servitude and heavy Tribute wherewith he had formerly oppressed the Citizens being very much offended with them which though frequently importuned by her he would remit upon no other condition but this That his Lady Godina should ride naked through the street of the City from the one end of the market to the other when the people were there assembled Which she to obtain their Liberties from this Servitude and Tribute performed covering her self so with her long fair hair that she was seen and discerned by no body Whereupon the Earl her husband by his Charter exempted the Citizens of Coventry for ever from many payments which he formerly imposed and exacted from them the wisdom of which Earl much benefited the King and people whiles he lived t Algarus his son succeeding him in the Earldom of Mercia in the year 1058. was banished the second time by Kiag Edward but by the assistance of Griffin King of Wales and help of the Norwey fleet which beyond expectation came to assist him he suddenly recovered his Earldom again by force of which he conceived himself unjustly deprived against Law Griffin King of Wales having contrary to his former league and agreement invaded infested England slain the Bishop of Hereford burnt the City harrowed the Country and twice assisted Earl Algarus against King Edward thereupon Anno 1063. Duke Harold by King Edwards command marched hostilely into Wales with his forces to infest Griffin who having notice of his comming took Ship and hardly escaped his hands Hereupon Harold raised a greater Army and likewise provided Ships and furniture after this his brother Tosti and he joyning their forces together by the Kings command began to depopulate Wales and invaded it both by Sea and Land whereupon the Welshmen compelled by necessity gave them Hostages and promised That they would thenceforth pay aTribute to K. Edward as their Soveraign and banish their King Griffin whom they expelled accordingly that year and An. 1064. they out off their King Griffins head and sent it unto Harold who presently transmitted it to K. Edward whereupon the King made Griffins Brothers Blethagent and Redwallo Kings over the Welshmen to whom he gave that land who sware Fealty to King Edward and Harold et ad imperium illorum mari terraque se fore paratos ac omnia quae prius de terra illa Regibus anterioribus fuâ—rant pensa obedienter se pensuros responderunt as Wigorniensis Hoveden Simeon Dunelmensis and others record their Oath The next year Tosti Earl of Northumberland moved with envy against his Brother Harold in the Kings own presence at Winsore took Harold by the hair as he was drinking wine to the King and violently struck the Cup out of his hand using him most dishonourably all the Kings Houshold admiring at it Upon which Harold provoked to revenge taking Tosti between his arms and lifting him up on high threw and dashed him violently against the pavement At which sight the Souldiers round about ran in on all sides and parting the began fray perforce between these Brothers and stout Warriers severed them one from the other But the King upon this predicted that the destruction of these two Brothers was now near at hand and that their deadly fâ—ud was not long to be deferred For all the sons of the Traytor Earl Godwin were so ungracious covetous oppressive and so extremely unjust that if they had seen any fair Mannor or Mansion place they would procure the owner thereof to be slain in the night withall his posterity and kinred that so they might get possession thereof for themselves Who notwithstanding which their soft and honied speeches although they were but swords did so circumvent the over-credulous simplicity of King Edward that after many enormous wickednesses committed by them he made them Regni Iusticiarios Regni Rectores Dispositores both Justices Rulers and Disposers of the kingdom and likewise Generals and Admirals of his forces both by Land and Sea The many acts of Injustice committed by the sway of power and passion by Earl Godwin and his sons proportionate greatness and the Kings weakness did much blacken that bright time of Peace and made a good man not by acting but induring ill held to be a bad King Tosti after this contest and quarrel with his brother Harold departing in a rage from the Kings Court and comming to the City of Hereford where his Brother Harold had provided a great intertainment for the King slew and cut all his Servants in pieces and put either a legg arm or some other member of their bodies thus mangled into every vessel of wine meade bear and other sorts of liquors he there found wherin they lay steeping stopping up the Vessels again Which done he sent word to the King that when he came to his Farm at Hereford he should find his flesh well powdered and that he would provide him sweetmeats The King being informed of this his barbarous villany and scoff commanded that he should be banished for this detestable wickedness which he abhorred Soon after Tosti departing into Northumberland about the 5. of October divers Gentlemen and others of that Country assembling together came with about 200. armed men to York where Tosti then resided both to revenge the execrable murder of some Noble Northumberlanders servants to Gospatric whom Queen Egitha in the cause of her brother Tosti had commanded treacherously to be slain on the 4th day of the precedent Christmass and of Gamel the son of Orue and Ulfe son of Delfin whom Tosti the year before had commanded to be treacherously murdered in his chamber at York under pretext of making a Peace with them necnon pro immanitate Tributi quod de tota Northimbria injuste acceperat as also for the excesliveness of the Tribute which he had unjustly received out of all Northumberland without their common consent and grant These chasing the Earl himself out of the Country pro contuitu Ducatus
battel in a tumultuous manner were routed by them many of them being slain in the field and the rest inforced to fly into York for shelter which the Enemies besieging was presently surrendred up to them and hostages delivered them after the slaughter of many Citizens Nobles and Clergy-men Upon this King Harold recollecting his disbanded Army and Navy marched with all speed towards York against the Danes Norwegeans and his brother Tosti but coming to Hamford Bridge one valiant Dane with his Battle Axe slew 40 of his men and made good the Bridge against the whole Army for a long space till at last some going under the Bridge in a Boat slew him with a spear Both Armies joyning battel after a long and bloudy fight Harfager and Tosti with may other of Note were slain their whole Army routed all their Ships taken with the loss of many of the bravest English Souldiers and 20 of their Ships only permitted to depart into Denmark with their wounded men and Olaus Harfagers Son who to save his life took an Oath never from thenceforth to attempt any hostility or invasion against the English This victory Abbot Ailred a ascribes to the merits of Edward the Confessor who promised to be the Captain and Protector of the English Nation against those Enemies who invaded the Realm contrary to right and Law and promised them the victory over them But Harold ascribing it to his own valour instead of rewarding his Souldiers with the spoils of the vanquished enemies as the price of their bloud out of a base unworthy a varice converted all the spoils and booty to his own private use giving no part of them to any other Wherewith many of the Nobles and common Souldiers were so incensed that detesting the covetousness of their Prince they unanimously departed from his service and refused to march with him against the Normans This triumphant victory so puffed up Harold that he thought himself secure in the Throne beyond the fear or reach of any adversity and instead of a King became a TYRANT Whilst Harold with all his Land and Sea forces were thus busied in the North of England Duke VVilliam in August assembled all his Land Army and Navy consisting of 900 ships at the Port of S. Valerie to invade England in the South then wholly destitute of all Guards by Land and Navy by Sea to resist his landing And to satissie his Souldiers and all others of the justice of his undertaking he alleged these three causes thereof which Henry de Knyghton devides into four The first was to revenge the cruel murther of his Cousin Prince Alfred King Edmunds brother and of the Normans who came with him to assist him to recover the Crown of England to which he was right heir whom Godwin and his Sons had shamefully dishonoured treacherously betrayed and barbarously murdered which fact he ascribed principally to Harold The second was because Godwin and his Sons by their cunning had injuriously banished Robert Arch-bishop of Canterbury Earl Odo and all the French and Normans out of England which wrong he would revenge on Harold as done principally by his means and labour The third and chief ground was because Harold falling headlong into perjury had without any right usurped the Crown and Realm of England which of due belonged unto him both by right of Kinred to and gift by King Edward his Nephew and by Harolds own solemn Oath and promise made to him in Normandy to preserve the Kingdom for his use after King Edwards death without children according to King Edwards command While Duke William with his ships and Army lay many days together at S. Valerie expecting a fair gale for England the winds being cross many of the common souldiers there lying in Tents thus muttered one to another That the man was mad who would by force invade and make another mans Country and Realm his own That God did fight against them in withdrawing the winds That his Father attempted the same thing in the same manner and was hindered and inhibited therein That it was fatal to his family that aspiring to things above their power they should find God opposite to them These speeches bruted abroad which might enfeeble the strength and abate the courage even of valiant men The Duke thereupon taking Counsel with his Senators caused the Corps of St. Valerie to be brought forth to procure a wind presently a prosperous gale filling their sayles the Duke himself first took ship and launched forth and all the rest after him then casting Anchor till the Fleeâ— came round about him they all sailing with a gentle course landed at Hastings and Pevemsy The Duke stepping forth of the ship upon the shore one of his feet slipped so that he fell down into the mud one of his hands being filled with sand whch he interpreted as an ill omen and sinister event But one of his Souldiers who stood next him lifting him up from his fall whiles he held the mud in his hand changed this event into a better interpretation saying Most happy Duke thou already possessest England and plowest it up Behold the land is in thy hand Lift up thy self with good hope thou sha't be King of England ere long No sooner was the Army landed m but the King strictly charged them to forbear plundering and take no booties seeing they ought to spare the things that should be his own nor to wrong any of their persons who should ere long become his Subjects Richard Vestegan records out of a French Historian that Duke VVilliam the same day he landed in England caused divers of his chief Officers and Friends to dine with him and chancing at dinner to talk of an Astrologer who by the conjunction of the Planets had assured him at St. Valerie That Harold should never withstand him but submit himself unto him and yeeld him faith and homage willed now that the said Astrologer should be brought unto him whom he had caused to be imbarqued for that voyage But it was told him that the Ship wherein the said Astrologer sailed was cast away at Sea and he drowned in it Where unto the Duke replyed That man was not wise who had more regard to the good or â—ll fortune of another than unto his own I am now thanks be to God come over I know not how the rest will succeed How false this Star-gazers prediction proved the sequel will manifest Duke VVilliam after his arrival rested quietly 15. days without acting any thing as if he minded nothing less than war After which to cut off all occasion or hopes of return from his Souldiets he fired all his ships or as some write drew them all a shore and intrenched them as others erecting only a Castle on the shore for a retiring place for his Souldiers if need were From Pevensy he marched to Hastings where he built another Fort. Henry de Knyghton records that the first
and thee to Gods tuition and benediction Lincolns Inne December 6. 1655. WILLIAM PRYNNE A Seasonable Legal and Historical Vindication of the good old Fundamental Liberties Rights and Laws of England Chapter 3. Section 4. Comprehending a brief Collection of all the most observable Parliamentary Councils Synods Conventions Publique Contests Debates Wars Historical Proceedings Passages Records relating to the fundamental Liberties Franchises Rights Customs and Government of the People under our English Saxon Kings from the year of our Lord 600 till the death of King Edmund Ironside and reign of Cnute the Danish King Anno Dom. 1017. with some brief Observations on and from the same IN the former Section I have presented you with a general brief Account of our first English Saxon Christian Kings limited Power and Prerogative being obliged to govern their English-Saxon Subjects not arbitrarily but justly according to their known Laws and totally disabled to alter repeal any old or enact any nâ—w Laws to impose any publique Taxes Tallages Imposts Customs whatsoever on their people upon any real or pretended necessity to make any War Peace or to alienate the Lands or ancient Revenues of their Crowns to any pious publique or private uses whatsoever without the common consent of their Nobles and Wisemen in general Parliamentary Councils together with a Summary of the Laws of Ethelbert the first Christian Saxon King wholly pretermitting the Names Acts Kingdoms of our first Pagan Saxon Usurpers rather than lawfull Kings who though many and great in their generations were very speedily brought to nothing their Kingdoms begun erected by blood conquest and meer power of the Sword standing not long unshaken by civil wars among themselves each King envying his equals greatness and seeking to inlarge his own Dominions upon the next In which Combustions few or none of them came to the Grave in due time but were either slain in war or treacherously murdered in Peace or expelled their Realms by or forced to resign their Crowns to others after all their former prosperous successes and reigns wholly spent in Wars Troubles Seditions Rebellions Rapines affording nothing worthy memory for their peoples good the Kingdoms settlement or imitation of Posterity Whence Henry Huntindon in the close of the 2 Book of his Histories p. 320 hath this Observation concerning them very seasonable for our present times Vide igitur Lector perpende quanta Nomina quam cito ad nihilum devenerint Attende quaeso stude cum nihil hic duret ut adjuiras tibi regnum substantiamillam quae non deficiet Nomen illud honorem qui non pertransibit monimentum illud claritatem quae nullis saeculis veterascet Hoc praemeditare summae prudentiae est acquirere summae caliditatis adipisci summae faelicitaâ—is I shall now in this Section proceed in my intended Chonological Method to their next succeeding Christian Saxon Kings reigns in England till the reign of King Cnute the Dane Anno Domini 1017. It is recorded of Aethelbert the first Christian Saxon King of Kent that keeping the Feast of our Saviours Nativity at Canterbury with his Queen Ead bald his Son Arch-Bishop Augustine and the Nobles of the Land he there held a Parliamentary Council with them on the 5. of January in the year of our Lord 605. Which Thomas Sprot thus expresseth in the Language of his age rather than of that Convocato ibidem communi Concilio tam Cleri quam Populi die quinto Januarii he did then and there Omnium singulorum approbatione consensu as he relates or cum consensu Venerabilis Archiepiscopi Augustini Ac Principum meorum cum Aedbaldi filii mei aliorumque Nobilium optimatum meorum Consilio as his Charters recite give grant and confirm to the Church of St. Peter and Paul in Canterbury for ever sundry Lands pretious Utensils Privileges and Immunities by his Charters made and ratified in this Council In which it is most probable he likewise made those Judicial Decrees and Laws with the advice of his Wise men for the benefit of his people in his own Country Saxon Language Which our venerable Beda William of Malmesbury Huntindon Bromton and others mention only in the general and Bishop Enulph hath registred to posterity in his famous manuscript intituled Textus Roffensis of which I have given you some account before Section 3. p. 50 51 52. on which you may reflect In the year of Christ 627 Paulinus perswading Edwin King of Northumberland to become a Christian to avod eternal torments and to be made a partaker of the Kongdom of Heaven The King answered That he was both willing and ought to receive the faith which he taught but he ought first to confer with his Friends Princes and Counsellors concerning it that so if they concurred in judgement with him they might all be baptized together Assembling therefore his Wisemen and advising with them he demanded severally of them all What that Doctrine which they never heard of till then and that new worship of God which was preached by Paulinus seemed to them To whom Coyfi the chief of the Priests presently answered Do thou consider O King what that Religion is which is now preached to us I profess unto thee that which I have most certainly learned that the Religion we have hitherto imbraced hath no virtue at all in it whereupon it remains that if those new things which are now preached unto us shall appear to thee upon examination to be better and stronger than our Religion let us hasten to embrace them without any delay To whose wise perswasions and words Another of the Kings Nobles giving his Assent spake something concerning the brevity and incertainty of this life and of their ignorance and incertainty of that life which is to come concluding That if this new Doctrine brought any thing to them more certain than that they formerly imbraced it ought to be deservedly followed The rest of the Elders and Kings Counsellors prosecuting the like things by Divine admoniâ—ion Coyfi added that he desired to hear Paulinus preaching concerning God more diligently than before which when he had done by the Kings command he cryed out having heard his preaching I heretofore understood that what we worshipped was nothing because by how much the more diligently I sought the truth in that worship the less I found it But now I openly professe that in this preaching the truth shines forth which is able to give unto us the gifts of eternal life salvation and happiness Whereupon O King I advise thee that the Temples and Altars we have consecrated without any fruit or benefit we should now presently execrate and burn Upon this without more debate the King openly gave his assent to the preaching of Paulinus renouncing Idolatry confessed that he did imbrace the faith of Christ. And when the King demanded of Coysi his Priest who ought first to prophane and
destroy the Altars Temples of the Idols with the rails and bounds wherewith they were inclosed He answered I who have worshipped them through foolishness And presently renouncing his Superstition he demanded Arms and an Horse of the King which by their old Law Priests might not use which being granted him he mounted the Horse with a Sword and Lance in his Hand and riding to the Idols thus armed the people deeming him to be mad prophaned the Temple and commanded his Companions to destroy and burn it with the Idols and all the Hedges about it which they did Whereupon the King with his Nobles and very many of the people embraced the Christian Religion and were baptized by Paulinus in the Church of St. Peter at York which the King there speedily commanded to be built of Wood and afterwards enlarged ordaining Paulinus Bishop of that place who converted baptized him and his people as Beda and others more largely record the History From which memorable president we may observe these particulars 1. That the King himself could not then alter the established Laws or received Religion of this Realm though false nor introduce new Laws or set up the true Religion without the concurrent Assent of his Nobles and Wisemen in a general Parliamentary Council 2. That the Princes Chief Priests Nobles and Aeldermen of the Realm were the Parliament Members in that Age. 3. That every one of them in these Councils had freedom of Vote and Debate and gave their voices severally for the bringing in of Christianity and destruction of Idolatry William of Malmesbury gives this Character of this Kings Government after he became a Christan and of the vicissitude of humane affairs worthy our present observation he being suddenly slain in battle together with his Son after all his former conquests and felicity Nullus tunc Praedo Publicus nullus latro domesticus insidiator conjugalis pudoris procul Expilator alienae Haereditatis exul Magnum id in ejus laudibus nostrâ aetate splendidum Itaque Imperii sui ad eos limites incrementa perducta sunt ut Justitia Pax libentèr in mutuos amplexus concurrerent osculorum gratiam grata vicissitudine libantes faeliciter tunc Anglorum Respublica procedere potuisset nisi mors immatura temporalis beatitudinis Noverca turpi fortunae ludo virum abstulisâ—et Patriae Aetatis enim 48. Regni 17. Rebellantibus Regulis quos sub jugum miferat Ceadwalla Britonum Penda Merciorum cum Filio interemptus miserabile varietatis humanae fuit exemplum nulli prudentiâ inferior qui nè Christianam fidem nisi diligentissimè inspectat â ratione voluit suscipere susceptaeque nihil existimare comparabile Anno 673 Theodor Archbishop of Canterbury held a great Council at Hertford presentibus Episcopis Angliae ac Regibus Magnatibus universis the Bishops of England and Kings to wit King Lotharius and Easwine and all the Nobles being present at it In this Council they made ten Canons or Laws which they all subscribed and ratified with their hands the 7th whereof was That a Synod or Parliamentary Assembly should be assembled twice or because divers causes hindred Placuit omnibus in commune they all agreed in common that in the Calends of August in a place called Cloveshoon a Synod should be congregated at least once every year The rest of them you may peruse in the marginal Authors at leisure being meerly Ecclesiastical and not so pertinent to my Discourse Ceadwalla King of the West-Saxons In the year of our Lord 680. granted to Bishop Wilfrid certain Lands with their appurtenances called Pagaliam cum consensu devotâ confirmatione omnium Optimatum meorum with the consent and devout confirmation of all his Nobles assembled in a Parliamentary Council the grant of his Crown Lands to him being not valid to bind his Successours without his Nobles concurrent confirmation William of Malmesbury writes of him That though before his conversion unto Christianity he addicted himself to wars and to plunder and spoil his neighbouring Kings yet he conscientiously dedicated the tenth of all his spoils to God Inter haec arduum memoratâ— est quantum etiam ante Baptismum inservierit pietati ut omnes manubias quas jure praedatorio in suos usus transcripserat Deo Decimaret In quo etsi approbamus affectum improbamus exemplum juxta illud Qui offert sacrificium de substantia Pauperis quasi qui immolat silium in conspectu patris If all the Plundering warring Saints of this Age would imitate his example in giving the Tenths of all their spoils and plunders to God his Ministers instead of spoiling them of their Tithes and antient Church-Revenues men would deem them as good Saints as this plundering conquering Saxon King of whom it is likewise storied that before he turned Christian intending to invade the Isle of Wight and unite it to his Kingdom he vowed to give the 4th part of the Iland and Prey to Christ if he should vanquish it Whereupon he conquering the Isle slew the Natives in it being Pagans with a Tragical slaughter and in performance of his vow gave to Bishop Wilfrid and his Clerks for their maintenance and encouragement the possession of 300 I-Hides of Land being the fourth part thereof When our new Conquerours shall be so bountifull in bestowing the fourth or but the tenth part of all the pretended conquered Lands they have gotten on Christs Church and Ministers instead of invading and purchasing the Churches antient Lands Glebes Tithes and Inheritance they may demerit the Name and praise of Saints as well as Ceadwalla who before he came to the Crown as he was unjustly banished from his Country through the envy of others only for his vertues and worthiness which first caused him to take up armes and invade the South-Saxons two of whose Kings he slew successively in the field after which he twice invaded and afflicted Kent with grievous wars taking advantage of their civil discords wherein he shed abundance of Christian blood So when he had reigned but two years space after all his victories out of meer devotion he voluntarily left his Crown Kingdom Conquests and went in Pilgrimage to Rome where he was baptized to bewail and expiate the guilt of all his former wars bloodshed plunders rapines perplexing his Conscience and there died The first Charter and grant I find extant of any Lands given to the Church after those of Ethelbert King of Kent forecited is that of King Eadbaldus his Son and successour Anno Dom. 616 who being by Gods mercy through the admonition of Archbishop Lawrence converted from the pravity of his life for the Salvation of his soul and hope of a future reward gave to Christ-Church in Canterbury and to the family serving God in that Church his Lands called Edesham with the Fields Woods Pastures and all things thereunto of right appertaining free from all secular
Anno Dom. 700. this king Withred unâ cum consensu Principum meorum together with the consent of his Nobles and Bishops who subscribed their names to his Charter granted to the Churches of God in Kenâ—… that they should be perpetually freed ab omni exactione publica tributi atque dispendio vel laestone à praesenti aie tempore c. From all publick exaction of Tribute and from all dammage and harm rendring to him his posterity such honour and obedience as they had yeelded to the Kings his antecessors under whom Justice and Liberty was kept towards them About the year of our Lord 678. Wilfrid Arch-bishop of York being in a Council unjustly deprived of his Bishoprick by Theodor Archbishop of Canterbury who envied the greatness of his Wealth Power and Diocess which he would and did against Wilfrids will in that Council divide into 〈…〉 more Bishopricks was after that time exiled the Realm through the malice of Egfrid king of Nortbumberland and Emburga his Queen whom he would have perswaded to become a Nun and desert her Husband as some Authors write and others deny in his favour without any just and lawfull cause and after that about the year 692. being again deprived of his Bishoprick and right by the Judgement and sentence of another Council held under Aldrid kingâ— of Northumberland and Bertuald Archbishop of Canterbury he thereupon made two successive appeals to Rome against their two unjust sentences as he conceived them The first to Pope Agatho and a Council of 150 Bishops held under him who decreed he should be restored to his Bishoprick and make such Bishops under him by advice of a Council to be heldâ— by him as he should deem meet with which decree against his first sentence he returning from Rome to king Egfrid to whom he delivered it sealed with the Popes Seal the king upon sight and reading thereof in the presence of some of his Bishops tantùm à reverentiâ Romanae sedis absuit was so far from obeying this Decree of the Roman See that he spoiled Wilfrid of all his Goods and possessions and committed him prisoner to a barbarous and cruel Governour who thrust him into a dark dungeon for many days and after that committed him to another more cruel Gaoler than he called Tumber who endeavoured to put him into Fetters by the Kings command which he could no ways fasten upon his Legs but they presently fell off again through a Miracle Whereupon wickedness giving â—…lace to Religion he was loosed from his Bonds detainâ—ed in free custody and afterwards released but not restored After which about the year 693 he appealed again to Pope John against the proceedings of the second Council which refused to re-admit him to his Archbishoprick unless he would submit to the decrees of Archbishop Theodore and Brithwald his successor which he refused to do unless they were such as were consonant to the decrees of the holy Canons which he conceived theirs not to be because they would order him to condemn himself without any Crime objected to him Upon which appeal this Pope with his Bishops pronounced Wilfrid free from all Crime and ordered him to return to his Aâ—chbishoprick writing Letters to Ethelred King of Mercians and Alfrid King of Northumberland to restore him thereunto Alfrid receiving the Popes Letters by Wilfrids Messengers altogether refused to obey the Popes commands in this Case saying Quod esset contra rationem homini jam bis à toto Anglorum Concilio damnato propter quaelibet Apostolica scripta communicare That it was against reason to communicate with a man already twice condemned by the whole Council of the English Nation for any writings of the Pope so little were the Popes authoritie and decrees then regarded in England contradicting the kings and English Councils proceedings neither would he restore him all his life After his death Edulfe usurping the Crown by Tyranny Wilfrid repaired to him to restore him to his Archbishoprick upon this account of the Popes Letters Whereupon he was so inraged with him for it though formerly his great friend that he presently commanded him to depart the Realm forthwith unless he would be spâ—led of all his goods and cast out of it with disgrace But this Usuper being deprived both of his Realm Crown and Life in little more than 3 Months space and Osred son of king Alfrid being restored to the Crown by the Nobles as right heir thereunto at last Wilfrid was re-invested in his Bishoprick by the decree of a Council held under him in Northumberland at a place called Nidden Anno 705. not so much in obedience to the Popes command as king Alfrids attested by Elfleda his Sister then Abbess of Streneshash witness these words of Berfride Ego jussionibus Papae obediendum censeo praeserâ—im cum eorum robori accedat Regis nostri Jussio nostrae necessitatis sponsio c. Puer in Regem levatus host is abactus Tyrannus extinctus est igitur Regiae voluntatis ut Episcopus Wilfridus revestiatur Upon which he was accordingly restored whereupon all the Bishops embraced him and reconciled themselves to him This Bishop Wilfrid procured to the Church of Hagustald which he founded and was Bishop thereof many privileges and that for one miles circuit round about none should be arrested going or coming but injoy inviolable peace Quod institutum authoritate privilegiis Romanae sedis Apostolicorum Archiepiscoporum Episcoporum Regum Principum tam Scotiae quam Angliae confirmatum est Quod si aliquis temerarius infringere audebit magnae pecuniae damno obnoxius erit perpetuo Anathematis gladio ab ecclesiâ seperabitur as Richard Prior of Hagustald records Anno Domini 708 Egwin Bishop of Worcester procured king Kenred and Offa by their Charters to grant and confirm many Lands and Privileges to the Abbey of Evesham which Pope Constantine likewise ratified by his subscription at Rome as well as these kings in the presence of many Archbishops Bishops Princes and Nobles of divers Provinces who commended and approved their Charters and Liberality In pursuance whereof Pope Constantine writ a Letter to Brithwald Archbishop of Canterbury to summon Concilium totius Angliae a Council of all England to wit of the Kings Bishops Religious persons of Holy Orders Optimatesque Regni cum proceribus suis with the Nobles and great men of the Realm who being all assembled together in the name of the Lord The Archbishop should in their presence read the Charters of these Kings and the Popes confirmation of them that they might be confirmed by the favour and assent of the Clergy and the people and consecrated with their Benediction Whereupon king Kenred and Offa after their return from Rome assembled a General Council in a place called Alne where both the Archbishops Brithwald and Wilfrid with the rest of the Bishops Nobles and these two Kings were
present wherein Donationes omnes confirmatae sunt all these their Donations and Charters were confirmed and likewise in another Synod at London An. 712. A most pregnant evidence that these kings Charters and Donations though ratified by the Pope himself were not valid nor obligatory to their successors or people without their common consent to and confirmation of them in a general Parliamentary Council of the Prelates Nobles Clergy and Laity even by the Popes and these kings own confessions and practice in that age In the year of our Lord 716. Ethelbald king of Mercians by his Charter gave to God the blessed Virgin Saint Bartholomew Kenulphus the whole Isle of Croyland to build a Monastery and confirmed it to them for ever free from all Rent and secular services inde Chartam suam in praesentia Episcoporum Procerumque Regni sui securam statuit all his Bishops and Nobles of his Realm assenting to and ratifying this Charter of his both with the subscriptions of their names and sign of the Cross as well as the King that so it might be firm and irrevocable being his demesne Lands which Charter is at large recorded in the History of Ingulphus About the year of Christ 720. some fabulously write that king Ina took Guala daughter of Cadwallader last king of the Britons to wife with whom he received Wales and Cornwal and the blessed Crown of Britain Whereupon all the English that then were took them wives of the Britons race and all the Britons took them wives of the illustrious blood of the English and Saxons which was done Per commune Concilium et assensum omnium Episcoporum ac Principum Procerum Comitum et omnium Sapientum Seniorum et populorum totius Regni aâ—… General Parliamentary Council Et per praeceptum Regis Inae whereby they became one Nation and People Afâ—er which they all called that the Realm of England which before was called the Realm of Britain and they all ever after stood together united in one for common profit of the Crown of the Realm and with â—…nimous consent most fiercely fought against the Danes and Norwegians and waged most cruel wars with them for the preservation of their Country Lands and Liberties An. 705. King Ina by his Royal Charter granted and confirmed many Lands to the Abbey of Glastonbury endowing that Abbey and the Lands thereto belonging with many large and great Privileges exempting them from all Episcopal Jurisdiction and from all regal exactions and services which are accustomed to be excepted and reserved to wit from Expedition and building and repairing of Castles or Bridges from which they should inviolably remain free and exempted and from all the promulgations and perturbations of Arch-Bishops and Bishops which privileges were formerly granted and confirmed by the ancient Charters of his Predecessors Kâ—…s Kâ—…n â—…alla and Baldred This Charter of his was made and ratified by the consent and subscription not only of king Ina himself but also of Queen Edelburâ—a king Baldrâ—d Adelard the Queens Brother consentientibus etiam omnibus Britanniae Regibus Archiepiscopis Episcopis Ducibus atque Abbatibus all the Kings Archbishops Bishops Dukes and Abbots of Britain consenting likewise thereunto many of which subscribed their names unto it being assembled in a Parliamentary Council for that end King Ina In the year 727. travelling to Rome built there a school for the English to be instructed in the faith granting towards the maintenance of the English Scholars there a penny out of every house within â—his Realm called Romescot or Peter pence to be paid towards it every year All which Things and Tax That they might continue firm for perpetuity Stat 〈◊〉 esâ—generaâ—â— decreâ—o c. were confirmed by a general decree of a Parliamentary Council of his Realm then held for that purpose of which before more largely In the year of our Lord 742. There was a Great Parliamentary Council held at Clovesho or Clysfe where Ethelbald King of Mercia sate President with Cuthbert Archbishop of Canterbury the rest of the Bishops sitting together with them diligently examined things necessary concerning Religion and studiously searched out of the ancient Creeds and institutions of the holy Fathers how things were ordered according to the rule of equity in the beginning of the Churches birth in England whiles they were inquiring after these things and the antient privileges of the Church at last there came to their hands the Liberty and Privileges which King Withred had granted to the Churches in Kent which being read before all by King Ethelbalds command they were all very well pleased therewith and said unanimously That there could not be found any so noble and so prudent a Decree as this formerly made touching Ecclesiastical Discipline and therefore Hoc ab omnibus firmari sanxerunt decreed that it should be confirmed by them all Whereupon King Ethelbald for the salvation of his soul and stability of his kingdome confirmed and subscribed with his own munificent hand That the Liberty Honour Authority and security of Christe Church in all things should be denied by no person but that it should be free from all secular services with all the lands pertaining thereunto except Expedition and building of Bridge and Castle And like as the said King Withred himself ordained those privileges should be observed by him and his so he and this Council commanded they shall continue irrefragably and immutably in all things And if any of our Successors Kings Bishops or Princes shall attempt to infringe this wholsom Decree let him render an account to Almighty God in that terrible day But if any Earl Priests Clerk Deacon or Monk shall resist this Decree let him be deprived of his degree and sequestred from the participation of the body blood of the Lord and alienated from the kingdom of God unless he shall amend with due satisfaction what he hath unjustly done through the evil of Pride Anno 747. There was another Parliamentary Council held at Clovesho or Clyffe under king Ethelbald where the king himself with Cuthbeâ—t Archbishop of Canterbury eleven other Bishops cum Principibus et Ducibus with the Princes and Dukes were present In this Council were some Ecclesiastical Laws and Canons made the last whereof was for Prayers to be publikely made for Kings and Princes incessantly that the People might live a Godly and peaceable life under their pious protection In this Council king Ethelbald renewed and enlarged his former Grant of Privileges to the Churches recited at large in the Marginal Authors the sum whereof is this Plerumque contingere solet pro incertâ futurotum temporum vicissitudine ut ea quae prius multorum fidelium personarum testimonio consilioque roborata fuissent ut fraudulenter per contumaciam plurimorum machinament is simulationis sine ullâ consideratione rationis periculose dissipata essent nisi auctoritate Literarum
it in any particle whatsoever under pain of an Anathema Maranatha which Decree the Archbishop wirh 12 other Bishops subscribed and ratified with the sign of the Cross as they formerly did in the Council of Bechanceld An. 798. And in this Council divers controversies concerning the Lands Limits and Jurisdictions of other Bishops Bishopricks were likewise decided and setled as you may therein â—ead at large Eadburga Daughter to King Offa married Briâ—hric King of the West-Saxons proud of her parentage and match she grew so ambitions â—…solent and Tyrannical that she became odâ—ous not only to all the Prelates Nobles and Courtiers but to the people lâ—kewise For being incited with malice and tyranny she usually accused and execrated to the King all the Nobles of the Realm Ordinaries Bishops and Religious persons and so overcame him by her flatteries that those whom she began to accuse ant vitâ aâ—t Regno privaret she would either deprive of Life or banish them the Realm and if she could not obtain this from the King against them she accustomed to destroy them privily with poison At last An. 802. She preparing poison to destroy a rich and noble Favourite of the Kings whom he extraordinarily lov'd so as she could not banish or destroy him by her false accusations the King casually drinking of the Poison contrary to her intention as well as his Favourite they were both therewith suddenly poisoned and destroyed Wherewith this wicked woman being terrified sled with all her invaluable Treasures beyond the Seas to Charles the Great who for her Lasciviousness in making choice of his Son for her Husband before himself though much inamoured with her transcendent beauty thrust her into a Monastery where soon after she abusing her body by uncleaness in lying with a lewd man was expelled thence forced to beg her bread and ended her days in extreme misery A just judgement of God both upon a Tyrannical Queen and unrighteous King seduced to banish and condemn his Nobles and Subjects unjustly by her solicitations For this her most hainous crime the West-Saxons ordained a Law to the Grand prejudice of all their succeeding Queens That none of them should have either Title Majesty or place of Royalty or Queen Non enim West-Saxones Reginam vel juxta Regem sedere vel Reginae appellatione insigniti pariuntur propter malitiram Badburga quae virâ—m suum Brithicum veneno perdidit juxta Regem sedens omnes Regni Nobiles accusare solebat quos accusare non potuit potu eos venenifero necare consuevit Itaque pro Reginae maleficio omnes conjuraverunt quod nunquam se regnare permitterent qui in praedictis culpabilis inveniretur as William of Malmesbury Asserius Menevensis Matthew Westminster Florentius Wigorniensis and others out of them relate There was a Parliamentary Synod or Council held at Celichuh in the year 816. at which not only Wulfred Archbishop of Canterbury with all his Suffragan Bishops but likewise Kenulf king of Mercians with his Princes Dukes and Nobles and sundry Abbots Priests Deacons and other sacred Orders were present wherein they enacted 11 Constitutions the 6th whereof was this in substance That the Judgements and Decrees of Bishops made in Synods should not be infringed but remain firm and irrefragable being ratified with the sign of the holy Cross by the Kings and Nobles Subscriptions unless perchance the King or Princes deemed the subscriptions of their Antecessors of no force and feared not to reform or cease from this error which shall rest and bring a Curse on them and their heirs The 7th That no Bishops Abbots or Abbesses shall alienate or part with the Lands writings and evidences of their Churches and Monasteries which they are intrusted to keep nisi rationabilis cansa poposcit adjuvari contra invasionem samis Depraedationem Exercitus ad Libertatem obtinendam which causes they reputed reasonable In the year of our Lord 822. there was a Parliamentary Council assembled at Clovesho wherein Beornulph King of Mercians sate President at which Wulfred Arch-bishop of Canterbury with the rest of the Bishops Abbots omniumque dignitatum Optimatibus Ecclesiasticarum scilicet saecularium personarum were present debating things both concerning the benefit and regulation of the Church and defence and safety of the Realm the proper subjects of our present English Parliaments as these words import Utilitatem necessitatem Ecclesiarum Monasterialisque vitae Regulam et observantiam stabilitatem quoque Regni pertractanteâ— In this Parliamentary Council the Proceedings in 3 precedent Councils touching the Complaints of the Archbishops of Canterbury of the Injuries done unto them in taking away the Lands of the Church by their Kings and Officers with the proceedings thereupon are at large recited which I shall here transcribe because generally unknown to most and best discovering the proceedings of our antient Parliamentary Councils in Cases of this nature of any Council I have met with in that Age and those which next proceeded or succeeded it All the said persons in the said Council sitting down quietly together it was inquired by them quomodo quis cum Justitia sit tractatus seu quis injustè sit spoliatus In what manner any one had been handled with justice or if any one had been unjustly spoiled Whereupon amids other things there acted and spoken it was shewed That Archbishop Wulfred by the mis-information and enmity and violence and avarice of king Kenulph had suffered many injuries and was most unjustly deprived of his just dominations as well by those things which were done unto him amongst us here in England as by those things which were brought against him to the See Apostolick by the procurement of the foresaid King Kenulph by which accusations and discords not only the fore-named Archbishop but also the whole English Nation for almost six years space was deprived of its primordial authority and of the Ministry of sacred Baptism Above all these things the said king Kenulph at a certain time with his Council coming to the City of London appointed a day with great indignation wherein the Archbishop should come unto him whither when he came the King commanded that relinquishing all his goods he should speedily depart out of England without hopes of returning any more neither by the command of our Lord the Pope neither by the intreaties of the Emperour nor of any other person unless he would consent to his will in demising to him a farm of 300 Hides of Land called Leogeneâ—ham and moreover would give to the said King one hundred and twenty pounds in money This reconciliation the said Wulfred refusing long contradicted and when the friends of the man of God and Nobles of the King who loved him very much perceived the rapacity and violence of the King they importuned the Arch-bishop that he would consent to the Kings will upon this condition that the King should relinquish the
difference which he had raised between the Pope and Archbishop by his Messengers and should restore to the said Father all the power and dignity which belonged to the said Primates See according to the authority which his Predecessors most amply enjoyed in former time But if the King could not do this that he should then restore the mony and Land which he exacted of the Arohbishop to him again Upon this condition therefore the said reverend Father gave his assent But nothing of the aforesaid condition was performed For three whole years after the said agreement he remained deprived of the power which his predecessors and himself had before that difference over Suthmenstre as well in pasture mony vestments as obedience which belonged to the Metrapolitical See But after the death of King Kenulf when Beornulf reigned the said Archbishop Wulfred invited Abbess Kenedrytha Heir and Daughter of King Kenulf to the foresaid Council whither when she came the Archbishop complained in the audience of all the Council of the injuries and troubles offered and done to him and to Christs Church by her Father and required reparation from her if it were Just Then all the Council found it to be Justice et hoc unanimi consensu Decrevit and Decreed it by a unanimous consent That all those things which her Father had taken away from the Archbishop she ought justly to restore unto him and to give him so much again for reparation And moreover should restore all the use or profit the foresaid Father had lost in so long a space which she humbly promised to do It seemed good therefore to king Beornulf with his Wisemen for friendship sake most diligently to make a reconciliation and amends for the said Lands between the heirs of King Kenulf and the Archbishop and because this pleased the king and he humbly intreated it out of Love and Friendship to the King the Archbishop consented thereto for the heirs of the said king Kenulf often desired to have the said Father to be their Patron and intercessor And they intreated him with humble devotion that for a full reconciliation he would receive in four places one hundred Hides of Land to wit Herges and Herfording Land Wamdelâ—a and Gedding Then the Archbishop for the love of God and the amiable friendship of Beornulf consented to this accord upon this condition that the foresaid Abbess should deliver to the said Archbishop the foresaid Lands of one hundred Hides with the Books which the English call Landbor and with the same liberty which he had before for a perpetual inherâ—nace Whereupon king Beornulf with the testimony of the whole Council proclaimed it to be altogether free But this Agreement was not all this time ratified because after these things the promise remained unfulfilled for 12 Moneths for three Hides or tenements of the foresaid Lands were detained and the Books of 47 tenements to wit the Book of Bockland the Book of Wambelea and also the Book of Herfocdingland But in the year following she the said Ahbess desired a Conference with the foresaid Archbishop who at that time was in the Country of the Wicii at a place called Ostaveshlen where he held a Council where when she had found the man of God she confessed her folly in delaying her former agreement upon which the Archbishop with great sweetness shewed that he was altogether free from the foresaid agreement and that of her part there were many things wanting which she ought to have restored but she being brought before the Councilâ— greatly blushing humbly promised that she would restore all those things that were wanting and with a willing mind restored to the Archbishop the Books of certain Lands which before she had not promised with the Lands adjudged to him as Sir Henry Spelmans Margent supplies the defect in the same Council She likewise added thereto a farm of 4 tenements in Hevgam for his favour likewise She gave to the Archbishop 30 Hide land or tenements in Cumbe with a Book of the said Lands that a firm and stable friendship and accord might remain between all the heirs of King Kenulf and the Archbishop To all which things the Arch-bishop gave his consent upon this Condition that the names of the afore said Lands should be rased quite out of the Ancient Privileges which belong to Wincelcumbe lest in after times some controversie should be raised De hoc quod Synodali authoritate decretum est et signo crucis firmatum concerning this which was ended by authority of the Council and confirmed with the sign of the Ctoss By this and the precedent Councils of Clovesho it is apdarent first That the Injustice Rapine and oppression of our Saxon Kings themselves was then examined and redressed in and by our Parliamentary Councils 2ly That Tittles to Lands Jurisdictions Privileges unjustly taken from the Church and other men by our kings or other great persons and complaints touching the same were usually heard determined and redressed in the great Parliamentary Councils of that Age upon complaints made thereof and that to and before the whole Council not to any private Committees not then in use 3ly That restitution reparations and damages in such Cases were usually awarded in such Parliamentary Councils not only against the Kings Parties that did the wrong but likewise against their heirs as here against AbbessCenedritha Daugher and heir to king Kenulph After the decease ofher father the Tort Feasor 4ly That the same cause and complaint was revived continued ended in succeeding that rested undecided and unrecompenseâ— in former Councils 5ly That Agreements Exchanges and Judgements given upon Complaints in Parliamentary Councils were conclusive and final to the Parties and their Heirs 6ly That Injuries done by the power of our Kings or great Men in one Parliamentary Council as in dividing the Archbishoprick of Canterbury c. were examined redressed by another subsequent Council 7ly That Parliamentary Councils in that Age were very frequently held atleast once or twice a year if not interrupted by wars and that usually at Clovesho according to the Decree of the Council of Heartford under Archbishop Theodor That the Bishops once a year should assemble together in a Council at Clovesho as Gervasius Doroberniensis records there being 4 Councils there and elsewhere held in King Beornulfs 4 years reign I find m another Council held at Clovesho in the year 824 the 3. of the Calends of November under Beornulf King of Mercians and Wulfred Archbishop of Canterbury where this King which all his Bishops and Abbots and all the Princes Nobles and many most wise men were assembled together Amongst other businesses debated therein there was a sure between Heabere Bishop of Worcester and the Nuns of Berclea concerning the inheritance of Aethelfrick Son of Aethelmund to wit the Monasterie called West-Burgh the Lands whereof with the Books the Bishop then had as Aethelfrick had before commanded that they should be restored to
desirous to provide for the peace and quiet of the Abbey and to declare and enlarge their Privileges The King thereupon commanded Radbott Sheriff of Lincoln and the rest of his Officers in those parts to go round about describe and set forth the bounds of their Isle of Croylan and of the Marishes thereunto belonging and faithfully and clearly to demonstrate them to him and his Council wherever they should be the last day of Easter next ensuing Who fulfilling his command openly presented an exact description of their Boundaries to the King and his Council which bounds are recited at large in Ingulphus keeping their Easter at Kingsbury Anno 851. Whereupon the king in this Parliamentary Council at Kingsbury in Hebdomada Paschae pro Regni negotiis congregati In Recompensationem tamen aliquam pecuniae direptae to make some kind of Recompence of the Mony he had formerly taken from the Abbey by the Common Council of his whole Realm by his Charter made and ratified in this Council wherein he makes this recital touching this money as if they had freely â—ent it to him in his necessities though the Historian relates he took it away by forâ—… Gratias Debitas â—â—obis omnibus dignissimè redâ—o pro pecuniâ quâ me peâ—…os dudum praetereuntem in me à maximâ indigen 〈…〉 contra Paganorum violentiam gratissimo liberalissimo animo defovistis granted unto them That the bounds of their Sanctuary and liberties should extend 20 foot in breadth beyond the farthest banks of their grounds compassing their Iland And 20 foot from the water it self where ever their fugitive servants should ascend to draw their nets or do their other necessary businesses and that this Sanctuary for fugitives should extend to all the Marishes where they had Common for their Cattle and that if their Cattel through tempest theft or other misfortune strayed beyond these limits into the fields adjoyning their fugitive servants might pursue and fetch them back thence without any seisure or danger sub mutilatione membri magis dilecti si quis istud privilegium meum in aliquo temerè violaret After which he confirmed all the Lands and privileges formerly granted to this Abbey by Kings Earls or other persons particularly recited in this Charter which was made granted by the common consent sent and advice of this whole Parl. Council of the Bishops and Nobles of the Realm as these Clauses in the Charter abundantly attest Cum communi concilio totius Regni mei concedo Consentientibus omnibus Praelatis Proceribus meis concedo cum communi Concilio gratuitoque consensu omnium Magnatum Regni mei concedo complacuit unanimiter mihi ac universo Concilio vestra omnia loca mei authoritate Regii Chirograpi confirmare Unanimo consensu totius presentis Concilii hic apud Kingsbury Anno incarnationis Christi Dom. 855. feria sexta in hebdomada Paschae pro Regni negotiis congregati istud meum Regium Chirographum sanctae crucis signo stabiliter immutabiliter confirmavi After which the Archbishop of Canterbury with other Bishops 3 Abbots 2 Dukes 3 Earls with Oslat Ambassadour of King Ethelwulf and his Sons in their Names and the Name of the West-Saxons subscribed and ratified this Charter affixing the sign of the Cross and their names thereto as you may read at large in Ingulphus That this Parliamentary Council and the former at Beningdon were principally summoned for the defence of the Realm against the invading Danes who then incessantly molested it and that this was the chief of those Regni negotiis for which they were assembled is evident by this publick prayer of the Kings then subscribed under this Charter Ego Bertulphus Rex Merciorum palam omnibus Praelatis Proceribus Regni mei divinam deprecor Majestatem quatenus per â—intercessionem sanctishmi Confessoris sui sancti Guthlaci omniumque sanctorum suorum dimittat mihi omni populo meo peccata nostra sicut per aperta miracula sua dignatus est misericordiam suam sic super Paganos hostes suos dare nobis dignetur omni certamine victoriam post praesentis vitae fragilem cursum in consortio sanctorum suorum gloriam sempiternam Amen After which Ingulphus subjoyns this Monkish miracle relating the order of the proceedings in this Council the sole end for which I cite it God wrought in this Council to the honour of his most holy Confessor Guthlac a most famous miracle whereby the devotion of the whole Land now more lukewarm than ordinary to goe in pilgrimage to Croyland might thenceforth become more frequent and by all ways through all Countiâ—s might dayly be revived for whereas a certain disease like to a Palsie this year afflicted all England the Nerves of Men Women and Children being smitten with a sudden and excessive cold their veins swelling and growing harder the which no remedy of cloathes could prevent and especially the Arms and hands of men being made useless and altogether withred in which disease like a fore-running most certain Messenger thereof an intollerable pain pre-occupated the Member so growing ill It hapned in this Council that many as well of the greater as lesser ranck were sick of this Malady cum regni negotia proponerentur and when as the businesses of the Realm were to be proposed Lord Celnoth Archbishop of Canterbury who was vexed with this disease openly counselled Divina negotia deberi primitus proponi sic humana negotia Christi suffragante gratia finem prosperum posse â—ortiri Assentientibus universis c. That Divine businesses ought first of all to be proposed and so humane business through the suffrage of Christs grace might obtain a prosperous end All assenting thereunto when Lord Siward then Abbot of Croyland was inquired for because in Councils and Synods for his great eloquence and holy Religion he had been as it were a divine interpreter for many years and the most gratious Expositor and Promotor of innumerable businesses of the whole Clergy who by reason of his great old age was not present but by Frier Askillus his fellow Monk he excused his absence with a most humble Letter by the burden of his long old age King Bertulph himself remembring the former complaint of the Church of Croyland openly related before the Council the Injuries frequently done to the Lord Abbot Siward and to his Monastery of Croyland by the foolish fury of their Adversaries and commanded that Remedy should be provided and Decreed by common advice When as therefore this business was in agitation amongst them Petitio Domini Siwardi the first Petition I meet with of this Nature to and in our Parliamentary Councils and the Petition of the Lord Abbâ—t Siward concerning the same delivered by the foresaid Frier Askillus had run from hand to hand of the Prelates and Nobles of the whole Council and one advised one thing another another Lord
Ceolnoth Archbishop of Canterbury cried out with a loud voice that he was healed of his disease and perfectly recovered by the merits of the most holy Confessor of Christ most blessed Guthlac whose businesses were then handling in their hands likewise many other most potent men in the said Council cryed out as well Prelates as Nobles that they had been sick of that disease but now by Gods Grace and the merits of most holy Guthlac they felt no pain in any of their Members through the said malady And all of them presently bound their Consciences with a most strict vow to visit the most sacred Tomb of most holy Guthlac at Croyland with devout pilgrimage so soon as they could Wherefore our Lord King Bertulf commanded the Bishop of London who was then accounted the best Notary and most eloquent speaker who being moreover touched with the same disease now predicated with greatest joy that he was healed to take the Privileges of Croyland into his hands and that he should insist to honour his Physicitian S. Guthlac with his hand writing prout consilium slatueret as the Council should ordain which also was done Therefore in the Subscriptions of the Kings Charter afore-mentioned the Archbishop of Canterbury Coolnoth confesseth himfelf whole and sound St. Swithin Bishop of Winchester rejoyceth concerning the Lords Miracles Alstan Bishop of Sherburn and Orkenwald of Lichenfeld give thanks for the successes of the Church and Rethunus Bishop of Leicester professeth himself a Servant to St. Guthlac so long as he lived Uuniversique Concilii Optimates And all the Nobles of the Council with a most ardent affection yeelded obedience to the Kings benevolent affection towards St. Guthlac In all things From all which precedent passages in these two Councils it is apparent First That the Parliamentary Councils of that Age consisted only of the King spiritual and temporal Lords and Peers without any Knights of Shires or Burgesses of which we find no mention in this or any other former or succeeding Councils in the Saxons times though sometimes Wise-men of inferior quality both of the Clergie and Laity were particularly summoned to them without any popular election by the Kings special direction for their advice 2ly That all Divine and Ecclesiastical matters touching God Religion and the Church and all affairs of the Realm of publique concernment relating to war or peace were debated consulted of setled in Parliamentary Councils 3ly That the businesses of God and the Church were there in usually first debated and setled before the affairs of the kingdom of which they ought to have precedency 4ly That all private grievances injuries and oppressions done by the King his Officers or other private persons to the Church or other men were usually complained of and redressed in Parliamentary Councils by the advice and judgement of the King and Peers and that either upon the parties Petition setting forth his grievances or a relation made thereof by the King or some other Prelate or Nobleman before the whole Council 5ly That what could not be redressed in one great Council was in the next succeeding Council revived and redressed according to the merits of the cause 6ly That no Peer nor Member of the great Council might absent himself in those times but upon just and lawfull excuse which he ought humbly to signifie to the King and Council by a special Messenger and Letter as Abbot Siward did here 7ly That all Members of the Council had free liberty of Debate and Vote in all businesses complained of or proposed to them and a negative as well as an affirmative voice 8ly That all businesses then were propounded and debated before all the Council and resolved by them all not in private Committees 9ly That our Kings in those days in Cases of necessity could not lawfully seise their subjects monies and plate against their wills to raise Soldiers to resist invading forein Enemies but only borrow them by their free consents and held themselves bound to restore or recompence the monies lent or taken by them in such exigencies with thankfull acknowledgement 10. That our Kings in that age could not grant away their Crown lands create or in large Sanctuaries or exempt any Abbies from Taxes and publique payments or impose any publique Taxes on their Subjects but by Charters or grants made and ratified in and by their great Councils Anno 854. King Aethelulf gave the tenth part of his Realm to God and his Saints free from all secular services exactions and Tributes by this Charter made and confirmed by the advice and free assent of all the Bishops and Nobles throughout the Realm then assembled in a Great Council to oppose the invading plundering Danes Regnante in perpetnum domino nostro Jesu Christo in nostris temporibus bellorum incendia direptiones opum nostrarum vastantium crudelissimas hostium barbarorum paganorumque gentium multiplices tribulationes affligentium usque ad internecionem cernimus tempota incumbere periculosa Quamobrem ego Aethelulfus Rex Occidentaliâ—m Saxonum cum Consilio Episcoporum ac Principum meorum Consilium salubre arque uniforme reme iâ—m â—…avi ut aliquam portionem Terrae meae Deo beatae Mariae omnibus sanctis Iure perpetuo possidendam concedam Decimam scilicet partem terrae meae 〈…〉 et libera ab omnibus servitiis secularibus nec non Regalibus Tributis Majoribus et Minoribus seu Taxationibus quae nos 〈…〉 appeâ—…amus Sitque omnium rerum libera pro remissione apimarum preccarorum meorum â—…erviendâ—m soli Deo sine expeditione et pontis constructione arcis munitione ut â—o diligentius â—…o nobis preces ad Deum â—â—e cessatione funâ—anâ— quo eorum servitutem in aliquo levigamus The Copies in our Historians vary in some expressions and in the dare of this Charter some placing it in Anno 855. others Anno 865. This Charter as Ingulphus records was made at Winchester Novemb. 3. Anno. 855. praesentibus subscribentibus Archiepiscopis Angliae universis nec non Burredo Merciae Edmundi East-Anglorum rege Abbatum Abbatissarum Ducum Comitum Procerumque totius terrae aliorumque fidelium infinita multitudine Dignitates vero sua nomina subscripserunt After which for a greater Confirmation the King offered the Written Charter up to God upon the Altar of St. Peter where the Bishops received it and after sent it into all their Diocesses to be published and hereupon the Bishops of Sherburne and Winchester with the Abbots and religious persons on whom the said benefits were bestowed decreed That on every Wednesday in every Church all the Friers and Nuns should sing 50 Psalms and every Priest 2 Masses one for the King and an other for his Captains It is observable first That the Parliamentary Council wherein this Charter was made and ratified by common consent and this exemption and tenth granted was principally called to resist the invading plundering Danes 2ly
That this King and Council in those times of Invasion and necessity were so far from 〈…〉 away the Lands and Tithes of the Church for 〈…〉 of the Realm or from imposing new unusual 〈…〉 and Contributions on the Clergy for thaâ— end thaâ— they granted them more Lands and Tithes than formerly and exempted them from all former ordinary Taxes and Contributions that they might more cheerfully and frequently pour forth prayers to God for them as the best means of defence and security against these forein inâ—ading enemies Mr. Selden recites another Charter of this King of the same year different from it in month and place out of the Chartularies of Abbington Abbey to the same effect made by Parliamentary consent of that time per consilium sâ—â—ubre cum Episcopis Comâ—â—bus ac cunctis Optimatibus mois which Charter is subscribed by this King and his two Sons with some Bishops and Abbots ratified with their signs of the Cross and this annexed curse Si quis vero minuere vel mutare nostram donationem praesumpserit noscat se ante tribunal Christi redditurum rationem nisi prius satisfactione omendaverit usual in such Charters After which this King going to Rome carried Alfred his youngest Son thither with him whom he most loved to be educated by Pope Leo where continuing a year he caused him to be crowned King by the Pope and returning into his Country married Judith the King of France his Daughter bringing Alfred and her with him into England In the Kings absence in forein parts Alstan Bishop of Sherburne Eandulfe Earl of Somerset and certain other Nobles making a Conspiracie with Ethelbald the Kings eldest Son concluded he should never be received into the Kingdom upon his return from Rome for two Causes One for that he had caused his youngest son Alfred to be crowned King as Rome excluding thereby as it were his eldest Son and others from the Right of the Kingdom Another for that contemning all the women of England he had married thâ— Daughter of the King of France an alien et contra morem et Statuta Regum West-Saxonum â—nd against the use and Statutes of the Kings of the West-Saxons called Judith the King of France his Daughter whom he lately â—spoused Queen and caused her to sit by his side at the Table as he easted For the West-Saxons permitted not the Kings Wife to sit by the King at the Table nor yet to be called Queen but the Kings Wife Which Infamy arose â—â—om Eadburga Daughter of King Offa Queen of the same Natâ—on who destroyed her Husband King Brithrâ—…c with poison and sitting by the King was wont to accuse all the Nobles of the Realm to him who thereupon deprived them of life or banished them the Realm whom she câ—uld not accuse she used to kill wâ—th poison Therefore for this mis-doing of the Queen they all conjured and swore that they would never permit a King to reign over them who should be guilty in the premises Wâ—…e eupon King Aethelulfe returning peaceably â—rom Rome his Son Aethelbald with his Complices attempted to bring their conceived wickedness to effect in excluding him from his own Realm and Crown But Almighty God would not permit it for lest peradventure a more than civil war should arise between the Father and the Son the Conspiracie of all the Bishops and Nobles ceased though the King Clemency who divided the Kingdom of the West-Saxons formerly undivided with his Son so that the East paâ—t of the Realm should go to his Son Ethelbald and the West-part remain to the Father And when tota Regni Nobiliras all the Nobility of the Realm and the whole Nation of the West-Saxers would have fought for the King thrust his Son Etheibald from the right of the Kingdom and 〈…〉 him and â—is Complices out of the Realm qui tantum facinus perpetrare ausi sunt Regem à regno â—…epeâ—â—erent which Wigorniensis Anno 855. â—il Facinus et inauditum omnibus saeculis ante infortunium if the Father would have permitted them to do it He out of the nobleness of his mind satisfied his Sons desire so that where the Father ought to have reigned by the just judgement of God there the obstinate and wicked Son reigned This King Aethelulfe before the death of Egbert his father was ordained Bishop of Winchester but his Father dying he was made King by the Prelates Nobles and People much against his will cum non esset alius de Regio genere qui regnare debuisset because there was none other of the Royal Race who ought to reign Haeredibus aliis deficientibus postmodum necessitate compulsus gubernacula Regm in se suscepit as Bromton and others expresse it At his death Anno 857. he did by his will lest his Sons should fall out between themselves after his decease give the kingdom of Kent with Sussex and Essex to Ethelbert his second son and left the kingdom of the West-Saxons to his eldest son Aethelbald then he devised certain sums of Money to his Daughter Kindred Nobles and a constant annuity for ever for meat drink and cloths to one poor man or pilgrim out of every 10 Hides of his Land 300 marks of mony to be sent yearly to Rome to be spent there in Oyl for Lamps Almes which sums I never find paid by his Successors as he prescribed by his Will and Charter too because not confirmed by his great Parliamentary Councils of Prelates and Nobles as his forcited Charter and Peter-pence likewise granted by him were upon this occasion âs some record that he being in Rome and seeing there out lawed men doing penance in bonds of Iron purchased of the Pope that Englishmen after that time should never onâ— of their Country do penance in Bonds About the year of our Lord 867. Osbrith King of Northumberland as Bromton records residing at York as he returned from hunting went into the house of one of his Nobles called Bruern Bocard to eat who was then gone to the Sea-coasts to defend it the Ports against Theeves and Pirates as he was accustomed His Lady being extraordinarily beautifull entertained him very honorably at dinner The K. enamored with her beauty after dinner taking her by the hand leads her into her Chamber saying he would speak with her in private and there violently ravished her against her will which done he presently returned to York but the Lady abode at her house weeping and lamenting the deeds of the King whereby she lost her former colour and beauty Her Husband returning and finding her in this sad condition inquired the cause thereof where with she fully acquainting him he thereupon cheered her up with comsortable words saying that he would not love her the lesse for it since her weakness was unable to resist the Kings power and vowed by Gods assistance speedily to avenge himself her of the King for this indignity
Where upon being a Noble and very potent man of great Parentage he called all his kinsmen and the chief Nobles of his Familie to him with all speed and acquainted them with this dishonour done to him by the king saying he would by all means be avenged thereof and by their Counsel and Consent they went all together to York to the king who when he saw Bruern called him courteously to him But he guarded with his kinred and friends presently defying the King resigned up to him his Homage Fealty Lands and what ever he held of him saying that he would never hold any thing of him hereafter as of his Lord And so without more words or greater stay instantly departed and taking leave of his friends went speedily into Denmark and complained to Codrinus king thereof of the Indignity done by King Osbrith to him and his Lady imploring his aid and assistance speedily to revenge it he being extracted out of his Royal blood The king and Danes hereupon being exceeding glad that they had this inducing cause to invade England presently gathered together a great Atmy to revenge this Injury done to Bruern being of his Blood appointing his two Brothers Inguar and Hubba most valiant Souldiers to be their Generals who providing Ships and other Necessaries transported an innumerable Army into England and landed them in the Nothern parts This being the true Cause why the Danes at this time invaded England in this manner In the mean time the Parents Kindred and Friends of Bruern expelled and rejected King Osbrith for this Injury done to him and his Lady refusing to hold their Lands of or to obey him any longer as their Soveraign and advanced one Ella to be King though none of the Royal bloud Our other Historians who mention not this fact of Osbrith and occasion of these Danes arival to revenge it write that the Danes upon their Landing marched to the City of York wasting all the Country before them with fire and Sword unto Tinmouth At that time they write by the Devilsinstinct there was a very great discord raised between the Northumberlanders Sicut semper populo qui odium incurrerit evenire solet For the Northumberlanders at that time had expelled their lawfull King Osbrith out of the Realm and advanced one Ella a Tyrant not of the Royal bloud to the Regal Soveraignty of the Kingdom By reason of which division the Danes taking York ran up and down the Country filling all places with bloud and Grief wasting and burning all the Churches and Monasteries far and near leaving nothing standing but the Walls and ruines of them pillaging depopulating and laying waste the whole Country In which great necessity and distress the Northumberlanders reconciling their two Kings Osbrith and Ella one to another gathered a great Army together against the Danes which their two Kings and eight Earls marched with to York where after a long fight with various success both the said Kings with most of the Northumberlanders were all stain April 11. Anno 867. The City of York consumea with fire and the whole Kingdom made tributarie to the Danes Simeon Dunelmensis relates that both these kings had violently sacrilegiously taken away certain Lands from S. Cuthberts Church in Durham for Osbrit had by a sacrilegious attempt taken away Wircewood and Tillemouth and Ella Billingham Heclif and Wigeclif Creca from S. Cuthbert tandem cum maximâ parte suorum ambo praefati Reges occubuerunt Injurias quas Ecclesiae sancti Cuthberti aliquando irrogaverant vitâ privati regno persolverunt Which the Author of the History of St. Cuthbert observes and records more largely as a punishment of their sacrilegious Rapine The Danes hereupon made Egbert king of Northumberland as a Tributary and Viceroy under them Sic Northumbria bellieo jure obtenta barbaro rum dominium multo post tempore pro conscientiâ libertatis Ingemuit writes Malmesbury de Gestis Regum Angliae l. 2. c. 3. p. 42. These rebellious Northumberlanders about 7 years after uno conspirantes consilio expelled Egbert the Realm by unanimous consent together with Archbishop Wilfer making one Richius King in his Place the Danes both then and long after possessing and wasting their Country and slaughtering them with fire and sword as the Marginal Historians record more than any other parts of the Iland by a just divine punishment for their manifold Treasons Seditions Factions Rebellions against and Murders of their Soveraigns In the year 868. a great Army of these victorious plundering Danes marched out of the Kingdome of Northumberland to Nottingham which they took and there wintered Whereupon Beorred or Brithred King of Mercians omnesque esusdem gentis Optimates and all the Nobles of that Nation assembled together Where the King Consilium habuit cum suis Comitibus comilitonibus omni populo nbi subjecto Qualitèr inimicos bellicâ virtute exuperaret sive de Regno expelleret held a Council with his Earls and fellow Souldiers and all the people subject to him how he might vanquish these Enemies with military power or drive them out of the Realm By whose advice he sent Messengers to Ethelred King of the West-Saxons and to his Brother Elfrid humbly requesting them that they would assist and joyn with him against the Danish Army which they easily condescening to gathered a very great Army together out of all parts and joyning all together with Beorred and his forces marched to Nottingham unanimously with a a resolution to give the Danes battel who sheltering themselves under the works of the Castle and Town refused to fight with them whereupon they besieged them in the Town but being unable to break the Walls they concluded a Peace at last with the Danes upon condition that they should relinquish the Town and march back again into Northumberland which they did where their Army continued the whole year following in about York debacchans insaniens occidens perdens perplurimos viros mulieres Abbot Ingulphus records that during the siege of Nottingham King Beorred as he stiles him at the request of Earl Algar the younger who was very gracious with him and the other Kings causâ suae nobilis militiae granted a Charter of Confirmation not only of all the Lands Advowsons Possessions which this Earl with other particular persons and Kings had given to the Abby of Croyland but likewise of all their former Privileges confirming all their Ilands Marishes Churohes Chapels Mannors Mansions Cottages Woods Lands Meadows therein specified to God and Saint Guthla◠for ever Libera Soluta emancipata ab omni onere terreno servitio seculari in Eleemofynam aeternam perpetuo possidendam Which Charter hath this memorable exordium expressing the motives inducing this King to grant it Beorredus largiente Dei gratiâ Rex Merciorum omnibus provinciis populis earum universam Merciam inhabitantibus fidem Catholicam
marching on laying all the Country waste before them with fire and Sword sparing neither person age nor sex they cast down burnt destroyed and levelled to the Ground the goodly Monasteries of Bradney Peterborough Huntingdon Ely with sundry others murthering as well all the Monks as Nuns therein which their merciless Swords after they had first polluted them To avoid whose barbarous rape Ebba Abbess of Coldingham and her Nuns by her example and perswasion cut off their upper Lips and Noses to deform themselves to their lascivious eyes which bloody Spectacle preserved their Chastity from their Lust but not their Monasterie or bodies from their Cruelty they burning them and their Nunnery to Ashes After which the same year Inguar and Hubba marched against St. Edmund who in the year 855. was chosen King of the East-Saxons Ab omnibus Regionis illius magnatibus et populis by all the Nobles and People of that Realm being sprung from the antient Royal blood of the Saxons and compelled to take the Government on him much against his will being then but 13 years old and consecrated King by Bishop Humbert in the Royal Town called Bury The reason of their malice to this King as some of our Historians write was this that he was maliciously accused to have murthered the ir Father Lothbroc driven by a sudden storm in a small boat into England as he was hawking at Fowl by this Kings Faulkoner who having murthered himself out of meer malice was by judgement of the Knights and Lawyers banished the Realm and put alone into Lothbrocs Boat without Oare or Sails for murthering him and so sent to Sea being driven in it into Denmark to excuse himself he maliciouslie accused the King of this Murther to these his Sons Who thereupon invaded England with an Army to revenge their Fathers death And the Reason why they at this time so extraordinarily prevailed and over-run the Land was the Civil Discords Wars and Emulations amongst the Saxon kings who either out of Malice or Ambition to advance their own Dominion or base unworthy fears would rather induce these common Enemies to over-run them than assist one another against them which William of Malmesburie thus expresseth Meminerit interea lector quod interim Reges Merciorum et Northanimbrorum captata occasione adventus Danorum quorum bellis Ethelredus insudabat a servitio West-Saxonum respirantes dominationem suam penè asseruerant Ardebant ergo cunctae saevis popularibus provinciae unusquisque Regum inimicos magis in suis sedibus sustinere quam compatriotis Laborantibus opem porrigere curabat Ita dum malâ—it â—â—vindicare quam praevenire injuriam socordiâ suâ exanguem reddiderunt Patriam Dani sine obstaculo succressere dum et provincialibus timor incresce ret et proxima quaeque victoria per additamentum Captivorum instrumentum sequentis fieret c. Northanimbri jamdudum civilibus dissentionibus fluctuantes adventante hoste correxerunt discordiam Itaque Osbirthum Regem quem expulerant in solium reformantes magnosque moliti paratus obviam procedunt sed facilè pulsi infra Urbem Eboracum se includunt quâ mox à victoribus succensâ cum laxos crines â—ffusior flamma produceret tota depascens maenia ipsi quoque conflagratâ— patriam ossibus texêre suis Mercii non semel obtriti obsidatu miserias suas levaverunt At vero Ethelredus multis laboribus infractus obiit Orientalium Anglorum pagi cum urbibus et vicis à praedonibus possessi Rex corum sanctus Edmundus ab eisdem interemptust Anno Dominicae Incarnationis 870. 12 Calendas Decembris temporaneae mortis compendio regnum emit aeternum The manner of King Edmunds Martyrdom Historians thus relate An. 870. Hinguar King of the Danes invading King Edmunds Realm with a great Power sent a Messenger to King Edmund to demand the half of his Treasure and Wealth and that he should hold his Realm under him threatning otherwise to waste his Kingdom and extirpate him and his People Sed nimis fraudulentèr Hinguar the sauros exigebat qui Clementissimi Regis caput potius quam pecunias sitiebat writes Matthew Westminster Where upon Bishop Humbert advising him to fly from the Danes who approached with their forces towards him to save his life The King wished Would to God that I might preserve the lives of my Subjects for whom I desire to lay down my life for this is my chiefest wish that I may not survive my faithfull Subjects and most dear friends which this Cruel Pirate hath the evishly slain neither will I stain my glory by flâ—ght who never yet sustained the reproaches of Waâ—re The Heavenly King also is my Witness that no fear of the Barbarians shall separate me from the Love of Christ whether living or dead Then turning to the Messenger of Hinguar he said Thou art worthy to suffer the punishment of death being wet with the blood of my people But imitating the example of my Christ If it should so happen I am not afraid willingly to die for them Return therefore speedily to thy Master and carry my answers to him Although thou takest away my Treasures and riches which the Divine Clemency hath given me by thy power yet thou shalt never subject me to thy infidelity for it is an honest thing to defend perpetual liberty together with purity of Religion for wâ—… also if there be need we think it not unprofitable to die Therfore as thy proud cruelty hath begun after the servants slaughter cut thou the Kings throat because the King of Kings seeing these things will translate me into Heaven there to reign eternally The Messenger departing the King commanded his Souldiers to run to their Arms affirming that it was a worrhy thing to fight both for their Faith and Country est they should prove deserters of their Realm and betrayers of the people And being incouraged by Bishop Humbert his Nobles and fellow Souldiers he marched against the Enemy and near Thedford fought a bloody battel with the Danes from morning to night the place being all dyed red with the blood of the slain At which grievous sight King Edmund was much grieved not only for the great slaughter of his own Souldiers fighting for their Country native liberty the faith of Jesus Christ so already Crouned with Martyrdome But likewise for the death of the Barbarous Infidels sent down to Hell in great numbers which he overmuch lamented After which battel retiring to Hegelsdun with his forces that were left he immutably resolved in his mind never to sight battel wâ—th the Enemies more saying only this that it was necessary that he alone should die for the People and not the whole Nation perish Soon after Hinguars Army being recruted by the access of Hubba to him with ten thousand men he marched to Hegelsdun and surrounded it that none might escape thence Whereupon King Edmund flying to the Church and casting down
religiosos omnes tanquam conscios thesanrorum innumeris torment is afflixit plucked off the Skins of the few Countrymen that were left swallowed up the Merchants oppressed the Widows and Orphans and afflicted all Religious Persons as conscious of hidden Treasures with innumerable torments whence amongst very many evils he did Impoposing a Tribute of a thousand pounds upon Godric the venerable Abbot of Croyland and his miserable Freers he almost undid the Monastery of Croyland For no man after that by reason of the overmuch Poverty of the place would come to conversion Yea Abbot Godric being unable to sustain his professed Monks dispersed many of the Monks amongst their Parents and other Friends of the Monastery through all the Country very few remaining with him in the Monastery and protracting their life in greatest want Then all the Chalices of the said Monastery except 3. and all the silver Vessels besides the Crucible of King Withlasius and other Jewels very precious being changed into Mony or sold for Mony were scarce able to satisfie the unsatiable covetousness of Ceolwulfe the Vice-roy who at last by his Lords the Danes most just in this after all his Rapines and Oppressions of the People by unjust Taxes and imposts was deposed and stripped naked of all his ill-gotten Treasure even to his very Privities and so ended his life most miserably And the Kingdom also of the Mercians at this very time King Alfred prevailing against the Danes was united to the Kingdom of the West-Saxons and remained so united ever after when it had continued a Kingdom from the first year of Penda the first King thereof to the last times of this miserable Viceroy Ceolwulph about 230 years Of which Kingdom William of Malmesbury thus concludes Ita Principatus Merciorum qui per tumidam gentilis viri insaniam subitó effloruit tunc per miseram semiviri ignaviam omninó emarcuit Anno Dom. 875. though Speed post-dotes its period in the year 886. Whence it is observable that unjust Rapines Taxes Oppressions speedily suddenly destroy both Kings and Kingdoms The next year following Anno 876. Halden king of the Danes seising upon the seditious kingdom of Northumberland sibi eam suisque Ministris distribuit illamque ab exercitu suo coli fecit auobus Annis totally dispossessing the seditious murtherous Northumberlanders thereof who but a little before had expelled both their King and Archbishop out of their Realm This Halden and his Souldiers miserably wasted and destroyed the Churches of God in those parts for which the wrath of God suddenly fâ—â—ll upon Halden who was not only struck with madnesse of mind but with such a most loathsome disease in his body which much tormented him that the intollerable stink thereof made him so odious loathsome to his whole Army that being contemned and cast out by them all he fled away from Tine only with three Ships and soon after perished with all his Plundering Sacrilegious Followers The Danes elected Guthred king in his stead possessing this seditious Realm of Northumberland till dispossessed of it by king Edmund An. 944. who then annexed it to his kingdom Our Noble Saxon King Alfred the first anointed king of England as glorious for his most excellent Laws transcendent Justice and civil Government as for his Martial Exploits Victories and for his incomparable Piety and extraordinary bounty to the Clergy and Learned men comming to the Crown Anno Dom. 871 in the years 873 874 and sundry years following by common consent of his Wise men commanded long Ships and Gallies to be built throughout the Realm and furnished with Mariners to guard the Se as and encounter the Danish Ships and Pirates which then infested and wasted the Realm from time to time whose forces he often encountred as well by Sea as by Land with various success At last having obtained the Monarchy of all England and received their Homages and Oaths of Fealty to him he appointed special Guardians to guard the Seas and Sea-costs in all places Whereby he very much freed the Land from the Danes devastations Abour the year 887. even in the midst of his wars when Laws use to be silent he compiled a body of Ecclesiastical and Canon Laws out of the sacred Scriptures and the Laws which his pious predecessors Ina Offa and Ethelbert had religiously made and observed antiquating some of them retaining reforming others of them and adding some new Laws of his own by the advice and counsel of his wisemen of the most prudent of his Subjects the observation of which Laws was enjoyned by the consent of them all Wherein certain fines and penalties were prescribed for most particular offences which might not be altered or exceeded Amongst other Laws as Andrew Horn and others record this King and his Wisemen ordained That a Parliament twice every year and oftner in time of Peace should be called together at London that therein they might make Laws and Ordinances to keep the People of God from sin that they might live in peace and receive right and Justice by certain customs and Holy Judgements and not be ruled in an arbitrary manner but by stable known Laws And it was then agreed that the King should have the Soveraignty of all the Land unto the midst of the Sea invironing the Land as belonging of Right to the Soveraign Jurisdiction of the Crown This King by appointing Hundreds and Tithings throughout the Realm with Constables and Tithing men who were to take sureties or pledges for the good behaviour of all within their Jurisdictions or else the hundred to answer all offences injuries therein committed both to the party and king caused such a general peace throughout the Realm and such security from Robbers and plunderers even in those times of war That he would hang up golden bracelers in the High-ways and none durst touch them and a Gâ—ri might have travelled safely laden with Gold from one end of the Realm to the other without any violence Matthew Westminster and Florence of Worcester record That he spent a great part of his time in Compositione legum Quibus Milvorum Rapacitatem Reprimeretur simplex â—ndeâ—â—um devotio â—irmaretur And amongst many other memorable acts of his Justice as he frequently examined the Judgements and Proceedings of his Judges and Justices severely checking them when they gave any illegal Judgement against Law and Right meerly out of Ignorance of which they were to purge themselves by Oath that they could judge no better so he severely punished them when they thus offended out of Corruption Partiality and Malice Andrew Horn in his Mirrour of Justices records That he hanged up no less than 44 of his Judges and Justices in one year as Murtherers and Capital Offenders princicipally for their false Judgements in condemning and executing sundry of his people against Law without any lawfull tryal by their Peeres or Verdict and Iudgement by
600 or 200 s. Land by the year consocientur et exuperent eum vivum vel mortuum alterutrum quod potâ—runt et qui aliquem eorum infaidiabit qui in câ quaestione suerint fit inimicus Regis et omnium Amicorum ipsius Et si quis adire negaverit et coadjuvare nolit emendat Regi cxx s vel secundum hoc pernegat quod nescivit et hundredo xxx s. From whence it is apparent That all Oaths of Allegance and Laws against Theeves and other Malefactors were then made and enacted in Parliamentary Council s assembled for that purpose and all fines for offences imposed and reduced to a certainty only by Parliament And by the last parcel of King Edmunds Laws in Bromton it seems the manner of contracting Marriage was then prescribed and setled by a Parliamentary Council This King Edmund as he gave and restored by his Charters to Christ-Church and St. Augustines in Canterbury several Lands unjustly taken away from them by his Predecessors free from all secular services except expedition and building of Bridge and Castle and ratified the Laws and Privileges of St. Cutberts Church at Durham by consent of his Bishops and Nobles So likewise Anno 944. he graâ—ted by his Charter written in golden Characters â—â—dry large Liberties together with the Mannor of Glâ—stâ—â—bury to the Abbey of Glustonbury Consiâ—io et coâ—sen 〈◊〉 Opâ—imatum meorum then assembled in a Paliamentary Council at London ratifying the Privileges grantâ—d to the Monastery by King Edmund his Father Eâ—frid â—…twine Ina and Cuthred et nè quisquam mortalâ—… seu Episcopus vel Dux aut Princeps aut quilibet ministrorum eorum audeat eam omnino intrare causa placitandi vel capiendi vel quidquam faciendi quod contrarium fore possit inibi Deo Servientibus Dei indictone prohibuit In the year 945. this King Edmund gave many Lands and Privileges tothe Monastery of St. Edmundsbury by his Charters quam subscriptione Episcorum Comitum et Baronum piâ devotione roboravit most probably in the Parliamentary Council of London at Culington where they were all assembled King Edmund in the year 946. celebrating with great Solemnity the Feast of St. Augustine which the English accustomed to celebrate every year at Canterbury as some or at Pulcherkirke now at Puckel-Church in Glostershire as others or Michelesberith as Matthew Westminster stiles it as he was sitting at Dinner in the Hall amidst his Nobles and Courtiers espyed a notable Thief called Leoff whom he formerly banished for his theft stand in the Hall Whereupon he not enduring his sight commanded his Butler to thrust that Thief presently out of the Palace who refusing to depart upon the Kings Command and resisting the Butler the King therupon in a rage rising suddenly from the Table took the Thief by the Hair and threw him to the Ground whereupon the Traitor feeling himself hurt and the King lying upon him presently drew out his Knife which he carried secretly about him ript up the Kings bowels and slew him with it which the Knights and Souldiers perceiving rushed all upon the Thief and with their Swords and Knives chopped all his flesh and bones into small pieces Some â—istorians write that he slew some of the Kings followers likewise and wounded more of them and so escaped in the midst of the Tumult Sicque clarum regalis Convivii principium nebulosus rerum Gestarum exitus terminavit Communi ergo decretum Concilio It was thereupon decreed by a Common Council that his Body should be interred in Glastonbury Abby Abbot Ethelred gives this Encomium of him Erat autem pauis Edwardi in omnibus imitabitor homo simplex rectus et timens Deum et usque ad finem vitae suae permanens in innocentiâ suâ Edred his Brother succeeded him the same year in the Throne and was crowned King at Kingston by Odo Archbishop of Canterbury Edwin and Edgar King Edmunds Sons being put by because of their Infancy quiaâ—tepugnante legitimâ aetate patri succedere non valebant as Matthew Westminster renders the reason No sooner was he crowned but entring into Northumberland with a great army he subdued the rebellious Northumberlanders who refused to bear the yoak of his government reducing them all under his obedience Wherupon Wulstan Arcbbishop of York and all the Nobles of the Northumberlanders swore fealty to King Edred which they did not long observe After which King Edred entred with Banners displayed into Scotland whereupon the Scots strucken with a fear without any resistance or war swore homage and fealty to him as to their true Lord as well as the Northumberlanders which Oath they soon violated For no sooner was Edred returned with his Army into the Southern parts but Anlaff who was chased out of Northumberland returning thither again with a great Fleet was joyfully received by the Northumberlanders and restored by them to the Throne of the Kingdom which he kept by force near four years But in the fourth year the Northumberlanders using their accustomed treachery and disloyalty châ—sed away their King Anlaff and received Hire or Eâ—icus son of Harald for their king who held the kingdom but a short time for the People of the Country not long enduring any king as they haâ— lightly received Hire for their king so in the third year of his Reign they as lightly rejected him and calling king Edred to them of their own accord received him again for their Soveraign and set him in the Throne as Humindon records But Malmesbuty Roger Hoâ—eden and others relate That king Edred Anno 948 was soincensed with the Northumberlanders for their treachery towards him in chusing Hirc for their king against their Oath of Allegiance sworn to him that he wasted all Norshumberland with fire and sword and famine et penè ex hominibus delevit But some of the Northumberlanders in his return from thence sallying out of York with their forces cut off some of the Rear of his Army ar Cesterford wherwith king Edred was so enraged that he resolved presently to return et totam illam terram penitus desere and ututterly to destroy all that Country Which the Northumberlanders hearing they were so terrified that they rejected their new King Hirc and received Edred for their Soveraign satisfying the King with Honors and the Damages and Wrongs they had done unto him with Gifts and no small Sums of Mony These treacherous Rebellious Northumberlanders after Edred and Hirc had no particular King at all to rule over them but only Dukes whose names and successions with their Treachery towards and Rebellions against them you may read at leisure in Roger Hoveden who subjoyns the History of them immediately to this relation This King Edred about the year 951. close imprisoned Wulstan Archbishop of York in Withaubrig and suspended him from his Archbishoprick near a whole year for certain causes of which he had been
frequently accused to him but especially for countenancing and harbouring the rebellious perjured Northumberlanders and the Danes a Heathen people who not only sought to destroy his Native Country but also to root out Christian Religion for which he deserved a thousand deaths and exciting them both against his Soveraign King Edred contrary to their Oath and for killing the Citizens of Thetford in a tumultuous manner in revenge of the death of Abbot Adelm whom they had causelesly murdered Norwithstanding all which about a year after he was enlarged and restored to his Bishoprick Malmesbury and Abbot Ethelred record of king Edred that he made his Palace altogether a School of Virtues obeying Dunstans Counsels in all things et Justissimis Legibus subditos Regens and governed his Subjects by most just Laws I read only of one Great Parliamentary Council held under King Edred and that was at London in the year 948. in the Feast of the Virgin Maries Nativity Cui Universi Magnates Regni per Regium edictum Summoniti tà m Archiepiscopi Episcopi Abbates quam Caeteri totius Regni Proceres Optimates Londini convenissent ad tractandum de negotiis publicis totius Regni as Ingulphus and others record In which Parliamentary Council when all the publike affairs were finished which as it seems concerned the making and carrying on of that war against the Rebellious Treacherous Northumberlanders who brake their faith with King Edred and set up a King of the Danish race as aforesaid the King in the presence and by the consent of them all restored granted and re-confirmed by his Charter dictated by Abbot Turketulus hererofore his Chancellour all the Lands and Liberties formerly granted by Kings and others to the Abbey of Croyland with sundry Mannors then given to it by Turketulus himself wherein amongst other Liberties he granted to the Monks quodsint quieti soluti ab omni Scotto Geldo auxiliis Vicecomitum Hydagio ab Secta in Schiris Wapuntakis Hundredis Thrichingis omnibus omnibus aliis curis saeculi oneribus universis This Charter was subscribed and ratified with the sign of the Cross by all the Archbishops Bishops Abbots aâ—d Nobles who gave both their Counsels and Assents thereto as their subscriptiens testifie that so it might be firm and perpetual In the beginning of which Charter this King to shew that he held his Crown only from and under God thus stiles himself Ego Edredus Rex terrenus sub imperiali potentia Regis saeculorum aeternâ—que Principis Magnae Britanniae gerens Imperium c. About the year of Christ 950 Nogui a Welsh King being overmuch incensed with one Arcoit wasted his Lands and with too much fury violated the Sanctuary to which he fled Whereupon Pater Bishop of Landaffe assembled all the Clerks of his Diocess in a Synod to punish this Sacrilege and breach of Sanctuary Which the King hearing of desired pardon of the Bishop and whole Synod for these offences in the Church of Mainnon restoring all the things of the Church he had taken away with satisfaction and effusion of Tears Whereupon to obtain pardon and absolution for the penance they enjoyned him he gave the parish of Guidcon with all the Lands Liberties and Commons appertaining there unto to God and the Bishops of Landaffe for ever to be held in Frankalmoighne Some five years after Anno 955. Ily a Deacon slaying one Merduter and flying into a Church for Sanctuary there upon his kinsfolk and some of king Nogui his family forcibly entring into the Church flew Ili before the Altar sprinkling his blood both upon the Altar and Walls of the Church Whereupon Pater Bishop of Landaffe assembled a Synod of all the Priests Deacons and Ecclesiastical persons within his Diocess to excommunicate the Delinquents which King Nogui and his Nobles hearing of fearing the Malediction of the Church the weight whereof they durst not undergoe sent for the Bishop and upon consultation by advice of the Doctors of both sides delivered up the Murderers into the Bishops hands who sent them to the Monastery of St. Teliavi where they were kept 6 Moneths in Iron Chains After which they were excommunicated Synodo quoque Judicante definitum est unusquisque eorum suum agrum suamque totam substantiam insuper pretium animae suae id est septem Libras Argenti redderet Ecclesiae quam maculaverat determinantibus omnibus Divino Judicio c. The Bishop rising up in the midst of them holding the Gospel in his hand said to Nogui lay thy hand upon this Gospel Whereupon Nogui laying his hand upon it said Sit haec terra cum incolis suis in sempiterna consecratione Deo c. Patri Episcopo omnibus Episcopis Landaviae Libera ab omni Laicali servitio nisi tantum in oratione quotidianâ in perpetuo It seems the petty Welsh Kings and their Courtiers were all subject in those dayes to the Censures and excommunications of their Synods for their Sacrilege and other unrighteous Actions infringing the Churches Liberties That their Synods had a Judiciary Power and that they could not convey Lands to the Church but by the Consent and Judgement of their Synods which attested and ratified the same as you may read in Spelman Who likewise informs us of another Welsh Synod held at Landaffe about the year 988. wherein Arithmail Son of Nogui King of Guenti slaying his Brother Elised was for this execrable Fratricide excommunicated by Gucan Bishop of Landaffe and all the Synod who thereupon submitting to the penance therein enjoyned him gave certain Lands for ever in Frankalmoighne to God and all the Bishops of Landaffe to purchase his absolution King Edred deceasing to the great grief of all his Sub ects his Nephew Edwin formerly put by the Crown for his Nonage was thereupon though young crowned King at Kingston by Archbishop Odo An. 955. but in the second year of his reign 957. the Mercians and Northumberians wholly cast off their obedience to him and conspiring alltogether by unanimous consent rejecting him from being their King elected his Brother Edgar for their Sovereign Lord Deo dictante annuente populo VVhereupon the kingdom was divided between them by the bounds of the River of Thames VVhat was the true Cause of this deposition and rejection of Edwin is very doubtfull William of Malmesbury Hovedeu Matthew Westminster Dunelmensis Bromton Henry de Knighton Abbot Ethelred Hygden Florence of Worcester and most of our old Historians being Monks and over-much devoted to their Arch-Patron Dunstan record That the true Causes thereof were First His ill lascivious Life and Incontinency with Alfgiva his Concubine as they write and near kinsâ—oman from whom Archbishop Odo divorced him and likewise with sundry other Concubines which he entertained in his Court whom Odo excommunicated and banished thence 2. His Indiscret and Tyrannical Gvernment contrary to his Laws 1. In slighting depressing and
quod contra nostrum deliquit decretum The same year King Edgar by his regal Charter recorded at large by Abbot Ingulphus confirmed all the Lands and Privileges of the Abby of Croyland formerly granteâ— and confirmed to them by King Edred and his Nobles in the presence of both the Archbishops 〈…〉 Bishops anâ—… Nobles assembled in a Council at London who raâ—… it wiâ—h their â—ubâ—câ—ipâ—ions the â—â—gn of the Cross and a solemn excommunication denounced by the two Archbishops and three Bishops more in Pauls Church London in the presence of King Edgar hiâ— Prelates and Nobles in Octavis Pentecostes against all Infringers of this Chaâ—ter and of their Liberties About the year 967 as some or 969. as others compute King Edgar in a Great Senate or Council by advise of his Wisemen enacted divers civil Ecclesiastical Laws and Canons for the Government of the Stâ—… Church thus prefaced Leges quas â—or hoc est Institutum quod Edgarns Rex freqenti Senatu Consilio Sapientum snorum 〈…〉 gloriam 〈…〉 ornâ—… et Reipublicae utilitatem sancivit or constituit The 7 and 8 of his secular Lawâ— in the Latâ—… â—â—r 1 2 3. in the Saxon Copy I shall only transcribe Hoc est institutio secularis quam volo per omnia â—eneâ—i Voloâ— omnis homo sit dignus juris publiet 〈…〉 quicunque â—it et eiâ— justa judicia judicentur Et â—it in emendationibus remâ—… vemaâ—is apud Deum Et apud seculum tolerabiâ—is Et nemo requiret Regem pro aliqua causa niâ—i domi negatur ei omne dignum recti vel rectum impetrare non possit Et de nulla emendabili re foris faciat homo plusquam Weram suam agreeable to our Kings Coronation oath and Magna Charta Et judex qui injustum judicium judicabit alicui det Regi Cxx s. nisi jurare audeat quod â—ectius judicare nescivit Et qui aliquem injuste superdicere praesumat Unde vita vel commodo pejor sit linguae suae reus erit c. Anno 969. there was a general Council assembled at London by king Edgar at the instigation of Pope Iohn and Archbishop Dunstan wherein as I conceive the King made that elegant Oration against the vicious lives of the Clergy thus expressing his own duty and supremacy over all Persons and causes both Civill and Ecclesiastical Justum proinde est ut qui omnia subjecit sub pedibus nostriâ— subjiciamus illi et Nos et animas nostraâ— et ut hi quos nobis subdidit ejus subdantur Legibus non segniter elaboremus Et meae quidem inâ—ereâ—… Laicos cum aequitatis fure tractare inter virum et proximum suum justum judicium facere punire sacrilegos rebelles supprimere eripere â—…opem de manusortiorum ejus egenum et paâ—perem à deripientibus eum Sed et meae â—ollicitudinis est Ecclesiarum Ministris c. et necessaria procurare et paci eorum et quieti consulere De quorum omnium moribus ad Noâ— spectat examen si vivunt continenter si honeste se habent ad eosqui foris sunt si in divinis officiis solliciti si in Docendo populo assidui si victu sobrii si moderati habitu si in judiciis sunt discreti c. Ego Constantini vos Petri gladium habetis in manibus jungamus dextras gladium gladio copuâ—emus ut ejiciantur â—extra castra leprosi ut purgeâ—ur sanctuarium Domini et ministrâ—nt in Templo silii Levi c. After which directing his speech to Dunstan Aethelwald and Oswald he concludes thus Vobis istud committo negotium â—t Episcopali censura et authoritate Regia turpiter viventes de Ecclesiis ejiciantur ordinatè viventes introducantur Herupon there was a Decree made in this General Council That all Canons Priests Deacons and Sub-Deacons should live chastly that is put away their lawfull Wives vow chastity and become Monks or relinquish the Churches they then held The execution whereof was committed to Oswald and Ethelwald Who thereupon compelled the Clergy in Worcester Winchester and other Churches to become Monks renuentes verò ab omni beneficio spoliarunt depriving those who refused of all their Benefices and putting Monks into them qui novo quidem splendore vniversam Insulam illustrarunt as our Monkish Writers record or rather novo foetore contaminarunt as others write John Bromton informs us that after the slaughter of the Nuns of Ely by Inguar and Hubba the secular Priests enjoyed that Monaâ—â—erâ— one hundred years space whom King Edgar de Concilio beati Dunstani Archiepiscopi dicti Ethelwardi aâ— mâ—gnatum Regni in the forementioned General Council expulit fugavit for their dishonest conversation Bishop Oswald having ejected the married secular Priests out of his Church at Worcester and introduced Monks in their places did this year 969. as I conjecture from the premises not 964. as Sir Henry Spelman computes it â—â—ocure King Edgar by the Counsel and assent of his Princes Nobles and Bishops most probably in the forementioned General Council or that of London next ensuing to ratifie this their ejection and confirm the Church of Worcester with all the lands goods ecclesiastical secular things thereto belonging to the Monks of that Church for ever free from all secular services and exactions hard or easie and from all fiscal duties great and small known or unknown as well of the King or Prince as of their Officers exceptis Arcis Pontis extructione et expeditione edntra hoâ—stem And that by the special Charter called Oswald Law subscribed by the King Queen both the Archbishops and 3 Dukes King Edgar Anno 970. or 971. in the 12 â—ear of his reign held another Parliamentary Council at London where himself his Mother Alfgina Prince Edward his Son Kined King of Scots Mascusius his Admiral both the Ahchbishops with the rest of the Bishops and all the Nobles and great men of the Realm were present By his Charters made in and ratified by this Council this King granted and confirmed many and very magnificent Privileges to the Monastery of Glastonbury communi Episcoporum Abbatum Principuâ—â—que concilio et generali assensu Pontificum Abbatum Optimatumque suorum exempting the Monastery and Monks thereof not only from all Episcopal Jurisdiction but likewise all their Lands from all Tributes and Exchequer businesses for ever Granting them Socam Sacam c. Toll Teame Italibere et quiete sicut ego habeo in regno meo Eandem quoque Libertatem Potestatem quam ego in Curia mea habeo tam in demittendo quam in puniendo in quibuslibet omnino negotiis Abbas Monachi praefati Monasterii in Curia sua habeant And which is a Privilege beyond all president Si autem Abbas vel quilibet Monachus loci illius latronem qui ad suspendium vel quodlibet mortis
indumentorum designaretur Hac igitur providentia cum Legatoriis ad Ducem Normannorum missis Rex Anglorum suae petitionis concessionem obtinuisset Statutâ— tempore tanto digno ministerio ad Dominam suam recipiendam et adducendam Proceres Anglorum mittuntur in Normanniam quae longo et digno regibus apparatu dirigentur in Angliam Thus Henry Archdeacon of Huntindon Radulphus Cistrensis Bromton and others out of them vrite of this Norman maâ—ch as the ground-work of translating the Goverment in succeeding times from the Saxons to the Normans for the Saxons sinnes forenamed This same year the Danish Fleet sailing into Normandy and pillaging it King Ethelred hearing of it marched with a great Army into Cumberland and the Northern parrs which had revolted to the Danes and where their greatest Colony was where he vanquished the Danes in a great battel and wasted pillaged most of all the Country Which done he commanded his Navy to sail round about the North parts of Wales and to meet him at an appointed place which by reason of cross winds they could not doe yet they wasted and took the Isle of Man which success somewhat raised and encouraged the dejected spirits of the English and encreased the Kings reputation with them In the years 1001. The Danish Fleet returning from Normandy entred the river of Ex and besieged Exceter which the Citizens manfully defending repulsed them with great loss from their walls Wherewith they being extremely enraged marched through all Devonshire burning the villages wasting the fields and slaying the people without distinction of age or sex after their usual manner Whereupon the inhabitants of Devon Somerset and Dorsetshires uniting their forces in a Body in a Place called Penho gave them battel but being overpowred by the multitude of the Danes who farr exceeded them both in number and military skill they were forced to slie and many of them slain The Danes there upon getting their horses harrowed Devonshire farr worse than before and returned with a great booty to their ships Whence steering their conrse to the Isle of Wight they preyed sometimes upon it sometimes upon Hampshire other times upon Dorsetshire no man resisting them Destroying the men with the sword and the Villages and Towns with fire in such sort ut cum illis nec classica manus navali nec pedestris exercitus certare audeat praello terrestri for which cause the King and People were overwhelmed with unspeakable grief and sadness In this sad perplexity King Ethelred Anno 1002. Habito consilio cum regni sui Primatibus as Florentius Wigorniensis Simeon Dunelmensis Radulphus de Dicetâ— Roger Hoveden and others express it or Consilio Primatum suorum as Mat. Westminster and his followers relate it By the Counsel of the Nobles of his realm assembled together for this purpose at London reputed it beneficial for him and his people to make an Agreement with the Danes and to give them a Stipend and Pacifying Tribute that so they might cease from their mischiefs For which end Duke Leofsi was sent to the Danes who coming to them importuned them that they would accept of a Stipend and Tribute They gladly embracing his Embassy condescended to his request and determined how much Tribute should be paid them for to keep the peace Whereupon soon after A Tribute of 24000 pounds was paid them pro bono Pacis for the good of Peace In this Assembly and Council as I conjecture King Ethelred informed his COUNSELLERS who instructed him both in divine and humane things with the sloathfulness negligence and vicious lives of the Secular Priests throughout England and by their advice thought meet to thrust them out and put Monks in their places to pour forth prayers and praises to God for him and his people in a due manner Whereupon he confirmed by his Charter the ejection of the Secular Priests out of Christs-Church in Canterbury and the introduction of Monks in their places and ratified all the lands and privileges formerly granted them exempting the Monastery and Lands thereof from all Secular services except Expeditione Pontium operatione et Arcium reparatione Beseeching and conjuring all his lawfull Successors Kings Bishops Earls and people that they should not be Ecclesiae Christi Praedones sed sitis Patrimonii Christi defensores seduli ut vita et gaudio aeternis cum omnibus Dei sanctis in aeternum fruaâ—… Which Charter was ratified by the Subscriptions of the King Archbishop Bishops Abbots and of several Aeldermen Nobles and Officers and the sign of the Cross This year Duke Leofsi slaying Esric a Nobleman the Kings chief Provost was judicially banished the Realm by the King for this offence After this Peace made with the Danes Anno 1002. Emma ariving in England received both the Diadem and name of a Queen whereupon King Ethelred puffed up with pride seeing he could not drive out the Danes by force of arms contrived how to murder and destroy them all in one day by Treachery at unawares either by the sword or by fire because they endeavoured to deprive him and his Nobles both of their Lives and the Realm and to subject all England to their own Dominion The occasion time and manner of whose sudden universal Massacre is thus related by Mat. Westminster An. 1012. though acted An. 1002. as all accord and by Mr. Fox and others Huna General of King Ethelreds Militia a valiant warlike man who had taken upon him the managing of the affairs of the Realm under the King observing the insolency of the Danes who now after the peace made with them did so proudly Lord it through all England that they presumed to ravish the wives and daughters of Noblemen and every where to expose them to scorn by strength caused the English husbandmen to soyl and sow their land and doe all vile labor belonging to the House whiles they would sit idely at home holding their wives daughters and servants at their pleasure and when the husbandmen came home they should scarcely have of their own as his servants had So that the Dane had all at his will and fill faring of the best when the owner scarcely had his fill of the worst Thus the common people being of them opprested were in such fear and dread that not only they were constrained to suffer them in their Doings but also glad to please them and called every one of them in the House where they had rule LORD DANE c. Hereupon Huna goeth to the King much perplexed and makes a lamentable complaint to him concerning these things Upon which the King being not a little moved by the Counsel of the same Huna sent Letters or Commissions unto all the coasts of the Realm commanding all and every of the Nation that on one day after to wit on the Feast of St. Brice the Bishop all the Danes throughout England should be put to death by a secret Massacre
vel per incuriam vel negligentiam corruperit et tamen recuperabilis sit Is navis corruptelam vel fracturam ejusdem per solidam prius recuperet Regique deinde ea quae pro ejusdem munitionis fractura â—â—bimet pertinet ritè persolvat Cap. 24. De Militiam detractante Si quis de Profectione militari cui Rex intererit sine licentia se substraxerit in detrimentum currat omnium fortunarum These three last Lawes most clearly demonstrate that the Militia and Military affairs of this age with all their Provisions of Arms Ships for defence of the Realm by Land and Sea against the invading Danes and other Enemies with their Military Laws and all other apurtenances thereto belonging were ordered and setled in their General Councils by common consent Cap. 26. Si quis vitae Regis insidiabitur sui ipsius vitae dispendio et quas habet rebus omnibus poenas luito Sin negaverit et purgatione qua licuerit expetierit solemniori eam faciat juramento vel Ordalio triplici juxta legem Anglorum et in Danorum lege prout ipsa statuit Cap. 27. Si quis Christi legibus sive Regis se nefariè opposuerit capitis plectitor aestimatione vel mulctâ aliâ pro delicti qualitate Et si is contrarius rebellare armis nititur et sic occiditur inultus jac eat Cap. 29. Scrutari oportet diligentius unumquemque modis omnibus quonam pacto illud ante omnia efferatur Consilium quod populo habeat utilissimum et ut recta Christi reâ—gioâ—…xime provehatur injustumque quodlibet funditus extirpetur Haec enim in rem fuerint totius patriae ut injustitia conculcetur et Institia coram Deo et hominibus diligatur Cap. 32. Ut quisquis fuerit potentior in hoc seculo vel per scelera evectus in altiorem gradum ita gravius emendabit peccata sua et pro singulis malefactis poenas luet graviores Haec itaque Legalia Statuta vel Decreta in Nostro Conventu Synodali à Rege nostro magnopere edicta tuncti tunc temporis Optimates se observaturos fideliter spondebant The Invasions and Oppressions of the Danes excited both the King his Prelates and Nobles in this Great General Council not only to provide for their necessary defence against them by Land and Sea but likewise to enact good Laws for the advancement of Gods worship and service the good Government of the Republickâ— the advancement of Justice and Righteousnesse the suppression of all Oppressions Injustice wickedness and preservation of the Just Rights and Liberties both of the Church and People as the most effectual means to unite and preserve them against the Common Enemy and to remove Gods wrath and judgements from them as the other Statutes and Decrees of this Council more fully resolve which you may peruse at leisure About the same year as I conjecture or not long after King Ethelred having some breathing time from wars by his Peace concluded with the perfidious Danes held three other great Parliamentary Councils the first at VVoodstock the second at Venetyngum the third at Haba wherein He and his Wise-men made and published many excellent Civil and Ecclesiastical Laws for the Good Government Peace VVelfare and happiness of his People recorded at large in Bromton Lambard and Spelman where you may read them I shall insert only 3 of them made at Venetingum VVanâ—ige as some take it Cap. 4. Habeantur placita in singulis VVapentakis ut exeant seniores 12 Thayni Praepositus cum eis jurent super sanctuarium quod eis dabitur in manus Quod neminem innocentem velint accusare vel noxium concelare Cap. 23. Ad Bilynggesgate si advenisset una navicula unus obolus Thelonii dabatur si major habet siglas 1 d. si adveniat Ceol vel ulcus ibi jaceat 4 d. ad Thelonium dentur De navi plena lignorum unum lignum ad Theloneum detur In ebdomada panum Theloneum detur 3 diebus die Dominica die Martis die Jovis Qui ad Pontem ventat cum Bato ubi piscis inest unus ob dabatur in Theloueum de majori Nave 1. d. Homines de Rothomago qui veniebant cum vino vel craspisce Flandrenses Pontrienses Normannia Francia monstrabant res suas extolneabant Hogge Leodium Nivella qui per terras ibant ostentionem dabant et Theoloneum Et homines Imperatoris qui veniebant cum navibus suis bonarum legum digni tenebantur sicut nos emere in suas naves Et non licebat eis aliquod Forcheapum facere burhmannis dare Theoloneum suum Et in sancto natali Domini duos Grisingos panâ—os unum Brunum 10 libras Piperis cirotecas 5 hominum et duos cabillinos colennos aceto plâ—nos totidem in Pasca de Dosseris cum Gallinis una Gallina Thelon de uno Dosseto cum Ovis 5 Ova Theolon Si veniat ad Mercatum mongestre Sinere qui mangonant in Caseo Butiro 14 diebus ante Natale Domine 1. d. 7 diebus post Natale Domini Unam alium denarium ad Theloneum Cap. 24. Si Portireu vel Tungravia vel alius Praepositus compellat aliquem quod Theolon supertenuerit homo respondeat quod nullum Theloneum concelaverit quod juste debuit juret hoc se sâ—xto sit quietus Si appellet quod Theolonium dederit inveniat cui dedit qu etus sit Sâ—tunc hominem invenire non posset cui dedit reddat ipsum Theloneum et persolvat 5 l. Regi Si Cacepollum advocet quod â—i Theoloneum dedit ille neget perneget ad dei ud cium et in nulla alia lada These-are the first Laws to my remembrance wherein there is any mention of Toll Tribute or Custom paid by any Natives or Foreiners for goods or merchandise imported or sold or any forfeitures or penalty imposed for concealing or non-payment thereof which it seems were imposed about this time by common consent in a Parliamentary Council for the better maintenance of the Navy and defence of the Realm against the Danes the end for which I cite them The King having thus in the Great Councils of Aenham and Wantige by consent of his Nobles and Wise-men provided a Navy to be annually set out for the defence of the Realm in pursuance thereof the self-same year as our Historians joyntly attest commanded one ship to be built and furnished out of every 310 Hides or Ploughlands and a Buckler Helmet out of every 9 Ploughlands throughout his Realm The ships being accordingly provided the King victualled and placed chosen Souldiers in them and assembled them all together to the port of Sandwich that they might defend the Coasts of the kingdom from the irruptions of Foreiners An. 1009. Puppes praedictae congregatae sunt apud Sandwic viri optime armati
less than 900 Religious persons and above 8000 others in this manner as some of our Historians relate Mr. Lambard in his Perambulation of Kent computeth that ther were massacred 43 thousand and two hundred persons in this Decimation there being only 4 Monks and 4800 Lay-people saved alive The Archbishop Alfege they took prisoner bound in chains buffeted grievously wounded and then carried to their Fleet where they kept him prisoner 7 Moneths At last they propounded to him that if he would enjoy his life and liberty he should pay them 3000 pounds for his ransom which he refusing to do Week after Week prohibiting any others to give them any thing for his ransom they were so inraged with him that bringing him forth publikely to their Council at Greenwich they struck him down to the ground with their battel Axes Stones and the Bones and Heads of Oxen and at last one Thrum whom he had confitmed but the day before moved with an impious piety cleft his head with an Axe and so martyred him The Londoners hearing of it purchased his dead corps with a great sum of money and honourably interred it But above 2000 of these bloody Villains were in short time after destroyed with grievous diseases VVhiles these things were acted by the Danes in Kent Anno 1012. perfidious Duke Edric et omnes cujuscunque Ordinis et Dignitatis Primates Congregati and all the Nobles of every Order and Dignity assembled together at the City of London continuing there til they had levied and paid to the Danes a Tibute of forty as some or forty eight thousand pounds as others write upon this condition That all the Danes within the Realm should have every where a peaceable habitation with the English and that there should be as it were one Heart and one Soul of both people as Matthew Westminster Daniel and some others record the Agreement Which Accord being ratified on both sides with Pledges and Oaths as Matthew Westminster and others relate King Swain as some Historians write though others mention not his being here in person but only by his Commanders returned into his own Land and so the rage of the Danish persecution ceased for a short space Upon this agreement 45 of the Danish ships under the command of Turkill the Danish General submitted themselves to King Ethelred promising That they would defend England against strangers and forein invasions upon this condition that the English should find them victuals and cloaths Henry Huntindon censures this accord with the Danes as made overlate Tunc vero Rex nimis serò pacem fecit cum Dacorum exercitu dans eis 8000 misprinted for 48000 librarum nunquam enim tempore oportuno pax fiâ—bat donec nimia contritione terra langueret To what extremities King Ethelred was put to raise this and the other forementioned Tributes to the Dâ—â—nes and to pay his own Captains besides and how much the Monasteries were taxed oppressed exhausted of all their moneys plate wealth by the King his Officers and the Danes during these wars by force and menaces this memorable passage of Abbot Ingulphus will best inform us not mentioned by any other Historians which I purposely reserved as properest for this place In tempore itaque Domini Osketuli Abbatis Croylandiae cum sic Dani totam terram inquietarent indigenae â—e Villis Vicis ad Civitates Castella plurimi ad paludes et lacum loca invia refugientes Danorum transitum et discursum pro anima praecavebant Coeperunt tunc omnia terrae Monasteria a Rege Ethelredo et Ducibus ejus ac Ministris Gravissimis exactionibus subjici et ad satisfaciendum Danicis Tributis pro immensis pecuniarum summis sibi impositis supra modum affligi Et direptis thesauris ac monasteriorum tam sacris calicibus quam alâ—â—s jocalibus etiam sanctorum Scrinia jubent ab exactoribus spoliari Venerabilis ergo pater dominus Osketulus Abbas Croilandiae 400. marcas pro talibus Tributis variis vicibus exolverat et tandem 12. annis in officio pastorali sanctè ac strenuè consummatis mortis sacrae compendio Regias exactiones universosque seculi timores cum carnis depositione finalitèr exuebat 12. Cal. Novemb. Anno scil Domini 1005. Cui successit ad Abbatis officium Venerabilis Pater Abbas Godricus electus et effectus Abbas in diebus angustiae tribulationis et miseriae laboriosissimeque rexit Monasterium 14. annis sub praedicto rege Ethelredo Hujus Abbatis tempore cum Dani totius terrae ferè obtinerent dominium et tà m per Ethelredum regem et ejus Duces Edricum Alf â—cum Godwinum et alios 〈◊〉 importabiles Impositiones pro Danorum tributis persolvendis ac aliae Exactiones gravissimae ad eorundem Ducum expensas plurimas restaurandas quam per Analafum et Swanum ac eorum exerciâ—us depraedationes despoliationes et destructiones assidue fierent saepe multa Monasteria de omni Denario emuncta sunt Non tamen exacâ—…râ—…s ultimum quadrantem se extorsisse credere voluerunt Ita hinc religiosi quo magis premebantur magis putabantur habentes magis putabantur abundantes Hinc venerabilis Pater Abbas Godricus solvit primo Anno Regi Ethelredo 200 marcas Ducesque sui pro suis expensis similiter ducentas marcas extorquebant praeter minores sumptus qui quotidie Regis ministris irruentibus continue fiebant Secundo tertio ac quarto anno similiter actum est Tertio enim anno pro Triremibus per omnes portus Fabricandis et Navali Militia cum victualibus et aliis necessariis exhibenda Ducentae Librae exactae sunt Quarto etiam anno cum Turketulus Danicus Comes cum fortissima classe appllcâ—isset Procentum Libris missuâ— et ad solutionem per exactores crudelissimos commissum est Di currentesque Dani tunc per provincias omnia mobilia diripientes immobilia cremantes Draiton Kotenham et Hoketon maneria Croylandiae cum toto Comitatu Cantabrigiae direpta ignibus tradiderunt Sed haec nuntia sunt malorum Quippe cum quolibet anno sequente quater centum Marcae Regiis exactionibus et Ducum suornm sumptibus communiter solverent rex Swanus veniens cum classe recenti exercitu ferocissimo tunc omnia depopulatur Irruens enim de Lindesia vicos cremat rusticos eviscerat religiosos omnes variis torment is necat tunc Baston et Langtoft flammis donat Is erat annus Domini 1008. Tunc monasterium Sanctae Pegae omniaque sua contigua maneria scilicet Slinton Northumburtham Makesey Etton Badington Bernake omnia una vice combusta tota familia caesa vel in captivitatem ducta Abbas cum toto comitatu nocte fugiens et navigio in Croylandiam veniens salvatus est Similiter Monasterium Burgi villaeque vicinae ac maneria sua Ege Thorp Walton Witherington Paston Dodifthorp et Castre prius omnia direpta
the name of the English Nation brought almost to the last period for we are overcome not by weapons and hostile warr but by Treason and domestick falshood our Navy betrayed into the Danes hands our battel weakned by the revolt of our Captains our designs betrayed to them by our own Counsellers and they also inforcing composition of dishonourable Peace I my self disesteemed and in scorn termed Ethelred the unready Your valour and loyalty betrayed by your own Leaders and all our poverty yearly augmented by the payment of their Danegelt which how to redress God only knoweth and we are to seek For if we pay money for peace and that confirmed by Oath these Enemies soon break it as a people that neither regard God nor man contrary to equity and the Laws of War and of Nations and so fâ—r off is all hope of better success as we have cause to fear the losse of our kingdom you the extinction of the English Nations revenue Therefore seeing our enemies are at hand and their hands at our throats let us by fore-sight and counsel save our own lives or else by courage sheath our swords in their bowels either of which I am willing to enter into to secure our Estate and Nation from an irrecoverable Ruine After which Speech he and his Army retreated and gave way to the prevailing Enemy Swain herepon setling all things according to his own will when as he knew that no man durst resist him commanded himself to be called King of England Dum non fuit alius qui pro sure regni decertare vel se regem confiteri ausus fuisset as Matt. Westminster and others write Such a strange fear and stupidity was then fallen upon Ethelred and the whole English Nation After this Ethelred privily departed from London to Hampton and from thence to the Isle of Weight as afore said where advising with the Abbots and Bishops there assembled in Council what course was best to steer he spake thus unto them the History whereof I shall fully relate in William of Malmesbury his words Ibi Abbates et Episcopos Qui nec in tali necessitate Dominum suum deserendum putarent in hanc convenit sententiam Viderent quam in angusto res essent suae et suorum se perfidia Ducum avito extorrem solâ—o et opis egentem alienae in cujus manu aliorum â—olebat salus pendere quondam Monarcham et Potentem modo miserum et exulem dolendum sibi hanc commutationem quia facilius toleres oâ—es non habuisse quam habitas amisisse Pudendam Anglis eo magis quod deserti Ducis exemplum processurum sit in orbem terrarum Iâ—os amore sui sine sumptibus voluntariam subeuntes sugam domos et facultates suas praedonibus exposuisse in arcto esse victum omnibus vestitum deesse pluribus probare se fidem illorum sed non reperire salutem adeo jam subjugata terra observari littora ut nusquam sine periculo sit exitus Quapropter considerent in medium quid censerent faciendum Si maneant plus a Civibus cavendum quam ab Hostibus forsitan enim crucibus suis novi domini gratiam mercarentur et cer◠è occidi ab hoste titulatur fortunae prodi a Cive addicetur Ignaviae Si ad exteras gentes fugiâ—ne gloriae fore dispendium si ad notas metuendum ne cum fortuna colerent animum Plaerosque enim probos et illustres viros hac occasione caesos experiendum tamen sortem et tentandum pectus Richardi Ducis Normannorum qui si Sororem et Nepotes non ingrato animo susceperit se quoque non aspernanter protecturum Vadabitur enim mihi meam salutem conjugi et liberis impensus favor Quod si ille adversum pedem contulerit non deerit mihi animus planè non deerit hic gloriosè occumbere quà m illic ignominiosè vivere Hereupon he sends Emma his Queen and her children in the moneth of August into Normandy accompanied with the Bishop of Durham and Abbot of Burgh where they are joyfully received by Duke Richard who invites Ethelred himself to honour his Court with his presence who thereupon in January following passeth over into Normandy and there solaceth his miseries with the curteous entertainment he there found King Swane in the mean time provokes invaded England with ruines and slaughters playes the absolute Tyrant commands Provisions to be abundantly provided for his Army and Navy et Tributum fere importabile solvi praecepit and likewise commanded an insupportable Tribute to be paid And the like in all things Earl Turkell the Dane commanded to be paid to his Navy lying at Greenwich hired by King Ethelred to defend the English from Foreiners yet both of them as often as they pleased preyed upon and pillaged the Country besides first polling the inhabitants of their goods and then banishing them Provincialium substantiae prius abreptae mox proscriptiones factae In this sad oppressed condition under their New Soveraign to whom they had submitted themselves both Nobles and people knew not what to doâ—… Haesitabatur totis urbibus quid fieret si pararetur rebellio assertorem non haberent si eligeretur subjectio placido rectore carerent Ita privatae et publicae opes ad naves cum obsidibus deportabantur Quo evidenter apparet Swanum naturalem et legitimum non esse Dominum sed atrocissimum Tyrannum as Malmesbury Matthew Westminster and others record But God who is propitious to people in their greatest extremities suffered not England to lye long fluctuating in so many calamities For this barbarous Tyrant Swâ—ne after innumerable evils and cruelties perpetrated in England and elsewhere added this to the heap of his further damnation that he Exacted a great Tribute out of the Town of St. Edmondsbury Anno 1014. which none ever before presumed to doe since it was given to the Church wherein the body of the precious Martyr St. Edmond lieth intombed all the lands thereof being exempted from Tributes Beginning to vex the possessions of the Church and threatning to burn the Town and destroy all the Monks unless they speedily paid him the Tribute he exacted and using reproachfull speeches against St. Edmond as having no holiness in him he was suddenly struck dead and ended his life on the Feast of the Purification of the blessed Virgin Anno 1014. Our Monkish Historians record That on the Evening of the day whereon he held a general Court at Geâ—gnosburgh â—eiterating his menaces against the Town and ready to put them in execution for not paying the Tribute demanded he saw St. Edmond comming alone armed against him whiles he was invironed in the midst of his Danish Troops whereupon he presently cried out with great affright and a lowd voice Help O fellow Souldiers help behold St. Edmond comes to slay me and whiles he was thus speaking being grievously wounded with a spear by the
Saint he fell off from his horse and continued in great torment till night and so ended his life with a miserable death Swane being deâ—d the whole Navy and Nation of the Danes Elected and made â—…te his son their King and Lord 〈…〉 Majores Natu totius Angliae The Nobles and Senators of all England liking nothing â—eâ—s than bondages especially under such new tyrannizing forein Intrâ—… thinking it now or never the time to shake ofâ— their new yoak pronounced their Natural Lord to be dearer to them than any Foreiner Si regalius se quam consuâ—verat ageret Whereupon with unanimous consent and great joy and speed they sent messengers â—…o Normandy to Ethelred to inform him Nullum eo libentius se in Regem recepturos si ipse vel rectius gubernare vel mitius eos tractare vellet quam prius tractaverat and to hasten his return unto them Who thereupon presently sent over his son Edward qui fidem Principum favoremque vulgi praesens specularetur who together with his Embassadors assured both the Nobles and Commons of the English Nation That he would for time to come be their mild and devout Lord consent to their wills in all things acquiesce in their Counsels and if he had offended in any kinde he would reform it according as they should think fit and with a ready mind pardon whatsoever had been contemptuously or disgracefully spoken or acted by them against him or his if they would all unanimously receive him again as their King into the Kingdom To which they all gave a favourable and satisfactory answer Whereupon a plenary reconciliation was ratified between them on both sides both by words and compact Moreover The Nobles unanimously and fréely agreed and voted That they would never more admit a Danish King into England to reign over them These things concluded King Ethelred speedily returns into England where he was honourably and joyfully received by the English And that he might seem to cast off his former sloathfulness he hastned to raise an Army against Cnute who remaining with his Navy in Lindesey made an agreement with the inhabitants exacting men and horses from them that he might surprise Ethelred at unawares and threatning grievously to punish all such as revolted from him But Cnute being taken in his own craft Ethelred marching thither with a strong army before he was provided to receive him fled from thence with his Hostages Army and Navy to Sandwich whereupon Ethelred depopulated all Lindesey wasting the Country with fire and sword slaying all the Inhabitants as Traitors to him and their Native Country Cnute by way of revenge humano et divino Jure contempto in insontes grassatus cuts off the hands and ears and â—â—its the Noses of all the most Noble and beautiful Hostages throughout England given to his father and so dismissing them sailed into Denmark to settle his affairs and augment his sorces resolving to return the year following After his departure King Ethelred this very year Super haec omnia mala Classi quae apud Greenwic â—acuiâ— Tributum quod erat 30. millia librarum pendi mandavit to wit to the Fleet under Turkell the Dane who instead of defending did but help to pillage and oppress the English Huntindon writes it was but 21 thousand pounds and Bromton avers that it was Cnute not Ethelred who commanded it to be paid to his Navy Soon after which the Sea rising higher than it was accustomed drowned an innumerable Company of Villages people and cartel After Cnutes departure King Ethelred summoned a Parliamentary Council at Oxford Anno 1015 both of the Danes and English Malmsbury expressly stiles it MAGNUM CONCILIUM Wigorniensis Hoveden Sim. Dunelmensis MAGNUM PLACITUM Matthew Westminster and others MAGNUM COLLOQUIUM our later English Historians a Great Council and Parliament The King by the ill advise of that Arch Traytor Duke Edric at this Great Council commanded some Nobles of the Danes to be sodenly and secretly slain quasi de Regia proditione notatos ac persidiae apud se insimulatos the chiefest of them were Sygeforth and Morcar whom Edric treacherously invited to his chamber and there making them drunk caused his armed guards there placed secretly to murder them which they did Hereupon their Servants endeavouring to revenge their Lords deaths being digniores et potentiores ex Seovengensibus they were repulsed with arms and forced to slye into the Tower of St. Frideswides Church for safety whence when they could not be forcibly expelled they were all there burnt together The King presently seised upon their lands and goods the chief cause of their murder as some conceived and sent the relict of Sygeforth a very Noble beautifull and vertuous Lady prisoner to Malmsbury whither Edmond the Kings base Son as some affirm posted without his fathers privity and being enamored with her beauty first carnally abused then afterward maried her and by her advice forcibly invaded and seised upon the Lands of her husband and Morcar which were very great and the Earldom of Northumberland which his father denied him upon his request Whereupon all the Inhabitants of that County readily submitted to him Whiles these things were acting d Cnute having setled his affairs in Denmark and made a League with his neighbour Kings recruired his Army and Navy and returned into England with a resolution either to win it or to lose his life in the attempt Ariving first at Sandwich and sailing thence to the West he pillaged Dorsetshire Somersetshire and Wiltshire filling all places with slaughters and plunders King Ethelred lying then sick at Cosham his son Edmond Ironside and Duke Edric raised an Army against Cnute but when both their forces were united to fight him the old persidious Traytor Edric endeavoured by all means to betray Edmond to the Danes or treacherously to slay him which being discovered to Edmond thereupon they severed their forces from each other and gave place to the Enemies without giving them battel Not long after Edric inticing to him 40 of the Kings ships furnished with Danish Mariners and Souldiers openly revolted and went with them to Cnute subjecting himself to his dominion as his Soveraign by whose example all West-Sex submitted to him as their Kiâ—g delivering him hostages for their fidelity resigning up all their arms to him and providing both horse and arms for his Danish Army The Mercians offred themselves alone to resist the Danes but through the Kings sloathfulness the business of war received delay and the enemies proceeded in their rapines without opposition In the year 1016. King Cnute and treacherous Duke Edric came with 200 sail of ships into the river of Thames whence they marched by land with a great Army of horse and foot and invaded Mercia in an hostile manner burning all the Towns and Villages and slaying all the men they met with in Warwickshire and other places whereupon King Ethelred as
Soveraign and the like who had under his subjection Dominion not only the People and Land but the Sea likewise also by reason of his Great Dominions was so much elevated with pride of heart that he once commanded the royal Throne of his Empire to be placed on the Sea shore near the water as the Sea was flowing in upon it and then stepping up into his Throne sitting in it he spake thus to the Sea in an imperious manner as if he were absolute Sovereign of it Tu meae ditionis es c. Thou art under my Dominion and part of my Empire and the land on which I fit is mine neither is there any one in it who dares resist my command without punishment Therefore I now command thee that thou ascend and come not up upon my land nor yet presume to wet my royal robes nor the feet or Members of thy Soveraign But the Sea notwithstanding this Inhibition ascending after its accustomed manner and nature and no wayes obeying his commands wet both his feet legs and royal Robes without any revernce Whereupon the King leaping hastily out of his Throne almost over-late and retiring from the waves used these words Lâ—t all the Inhabitants of the world know that the power of Kings is but. vain and frivolous and that no man is worthy the name of a King but he alone to whose beck both Heaven Earth and the Sea obey by everlasting Laws Henry de Knyghton superaddes thereto as part of his Speech which most others omit I am a Wretch and a Captive able to do nothing possessing nothing without his gift I commend I recommend my self to him and let him be the Gardian of debility Amen After which King Cnute never wore his Crown upon his head but put it upon the head of the Crucifix at Winchester as most accord to the praise of the great King thereby giving a great example of humility to Kings and Conquerors who in the height of all their power can not command the Sea or least wave not to flow or wash them Henry de Knyghton conceives this to be before his pilgrimage to Rome others expresly record it was after his return from thence whose computation I here follow and therefore place it in this year In the year of our Lord 1035. King Cnute a little before his death made this partition of his kingdoms amongst his Sons Swane his son by Q. Algiva or as some affirm of a Priests wife suborned by Algiva as her own he made King of Norwey his Son Harde-Cnute by Queen Emma he caused to be crowned King of Denmark as Wigorniensis Hoveden and others write yet some gainsay it that he made his Son Harold King of England and soon after died at Shaftesbury November 12. 1035. and was buried at Winchester Immediatly after his decease the Nobles met at Oxford about the election of a new King which our Historians thus express Convenerunt apud Oxoniam ad Colloquium as Mat. Westm or Placitum magnum as Huntindon and others stile it Proceres Regni Vt de novo Rege creando tractarent ibidem All the Nobles of the Realm assembled in a great Parliamentary Council or Court at Oxford that they might consult about the electiction of a New King which they would not have done had Harold been made King of England before by Cnute in his life time Leofric Earl of Chester and the rest of the Nobles on the Northside of the Thames with all the Danish Princes and Londoners who by conversing with the Danes amongst them were corrupted with their vices and addicted to their party elected Harold Son of Cnute by his Concubine Algiva whom some aver to be the son of a Tayler for their King But Godwin Earl of Kent with the Princes of the Western part of England contradicting them would rather have elected Harde-Cnute son of Cnute by Queen Emma or one of the Sons of King Ethelred and Emma then in Normandy After great strife and debate between the Nobles about the Election because Harold was there personally present but Harde-Cnute then in Denmark and Alfred and Edward in Normandy Harolds party prevailed against Earl Godwins qui tandem vi numero minor cessit violentiae Whereupon Harold was presently crowned King at Oxford by Elnothus Archbishop of Canterbury though at first he was very unwilling to perform that service For it is reported of him that he having the regal Scepter and Crown in his custody refused with an Oath to consecrate any other for King so long as Queen Emma her children were living for said she Cnute committed them to my trust and assurance and to them will I give my faith and allegiance This Scepter and Crown therefore I here lay down upon the Altar neither do I deny nor deliver them to you but I require by the Apostolick Authority all Bishops that none of them presume to take the same away neither that they consecrate him King therewith as for your self if you dare you may usurp that which I have committed to God on this Table Notwithstanding this great thunderclap being allayed with the showers of Golden promises of his just good and religious government intended though present experience manifested the contrary he was crowned by him Anno Anno. 1035. Henry Huntindon and others write That they elected him King only to keep the kingdom for his Brother Harde-Cnute then in Denmark Harold and the Nobles of West-Sex who opposed his election upon advice taken resolved that Qneen Emma wife of the deceased King should keep West-Sex and Winchester for the use of her Son Harde Cnute and that Earl Godwin should be their Captain in military affairs Roger Hoveden and others record That Harold being elected King by the consent of the major part of the Nobles of England obtained the royal dignity and began to reign quia justus haeres because he was a lawfull heir yet he reigned noâ— so powerfully as Cnute quia justior haeres expectabatur Harde Cnutus because a juster heir Harde Cnute was expected By reason of this disagreement amongst the Nobles to please both parties the kingdom of England was therupon divided by Lot Harold enjoying the Northern part thereof and Harde-Cnutes friends retaining the Southern part of it for his use No sooner was Harold crowned King but to secure himself the better in his Throne he presently posted to Winchester with his forces where tyrannically and forcibly taking away all the Treasures and goods which Cnute had left to Queen Emma his Mother-in-law he banished her out of England into Flanders some write she was thus banished by the secret Counsel and treachery of Earl Godwin whom she had made General of her forces for her preservation who proved unconstant and a Traytor to her and her children where in this her distresse she was honourably entertained by Earl Baldwin In the year 1036. Alfred eldest Son of King Ethelred comming over to claim his
carry between his arms offering that to him for his trespasse and submissively deprecating that he would pardon all his rancour and ill-will to the Earle and receiving his homage and fealâ—y he would restore and redeliver his lands intirely to him Vnto which award THEY ALL ACCORDING they all laded themselves with treasure in the manner aforesaid and going to the King declared unto him the order and manner of their JUDGEMENT or AVVARD QUORUM CONSIDERATIONI REX CONTRADICERE NOLENS QUICQUID JUDICAVERANT PER OMNIA RATIFICAVIT The King not willing to contradict them in any thing they had judged ratified the same in all things An agreement therefore being made between them in this manner the Earl presently regained all his lands The generality of our Historians as Bromton confesseth deny that Godwin ever fled into Denmark or left England for the murder of Alfred they generally affirming that he purged himself thereof though falsly CORAM PROCERIBUS before the Nobles in the reign of Harde-Cnute swearing with his compurgators that he never consented to his death NISI REGIA VI COACTUS but through compulsion by royall violence Recording likewise that after the death of King Harde-Cnute Prince Edward was called out of Normandy and elected King principally by the help and counsel of Earle Godwin himself who as Malmesbury and others write perswaded him to accept the Crown and precontracted with him before he came into England Paciscatur ergo sibi amicitiam solidam filiis honores integros filiae matrimonium brevi futurum ut se Regem videat qui nunc vitae naufragus exul spei alterius opem implorat Utrinque fide data quicquid petebatur sacramento firmavit If there were then any such Parliament as this then held at London and such proceedings in it concerning Godwin it was most probably in the year 1043. as I here place it And from these memorable proceedings in it we may observe 1. That there is mention onely of the King Earls and Barons present in this Parliament as members of it not of any Knights of shires Citizens or Burgesses elected by the people of which there is not one syllable 2. That the Earls and Barons in Parliament were the onely Judges in that age in Parliament between the King and his Nobles subjects both in criminal and other causes there decided 3. That Peers in that age were onely tryed and judged by their Peers for treason and capitall offences 4. That appeals of Treason were then tryed in Parliament and the Earls and Barons the sole Judges of them and of what offences were Treason and what not 5. That the Bishops and Clergy in that age bad no votes in matters of Treason and capitall offences 6. That the Judgement of Parliament then rested properly in the Earls and Barons not the King and that their judgement was not repealable by but obligatory to the King himself 7. That no Subject could then by law wage battel against the King in an Appeal 8. That the murther of Prince Alfred then heir to the Crown in the time of Harold an actuall King by usurpation without any good title by his command was reputed a treasonable offence in Earl Godwin for which he forfeited his lands and was forced to purchase his pardon and lands restitution with a great fine and summe to the King 9. That though the Author of the Chronicle of Bromton Caxton out of him stile this Assembly PARLIAMENTUM a Parliament not a COUNCIL yet it is onely according to the style of the age wherein he writ being in the reign of King Edward the third as Mr. Selden proves not according to the dialect of the age wherein it was held to which the term Parliamentum was a meer stranger and CONCILIUM MAGNUM c. the usual name expressing such Assemblies King Edward Anno 1643. immediately after his Coronation came suddenly from Glocâ—ster to Winchester attended with Earl Godwin Siward and Leofric and by their advice forcibly took from his Mother Queen Emma all her gold silver jewels and precious stones and whatever rich things else she possessed commanding onely necessaries to be administred to her there The cause of which unjust act some affirm to be Godwins malice towards her others affirm it to be her unnaturalnesse to King Ethelred her first husband and her own sons by him Alfred and Edward In loving and marrying Cnute their enemy and supplanter when living and applauding him when dead more then Ethelred In advancing Harde-Cnute her son by him to the Crown and endeavouring to deprive Alfred Edward thereof In refusing to give any thing toward Prince Edw his maintenance whiles in exile and distresse although he oft requested her to supply his necessities In having some hand in the murther of Prince Alfred and endeavouring to poyson King Edward himself as the Chronicle of Bromton relates After which by the instigation of Robert Archbishop of Canterbury a Norman born he againe spoiled her of all she had and shut her up prisoner in the Abbâ—y of Werwel upon suspition of incontinency with Alwin Bishop of Winchester from which false imputation she purged her self and the Bishop by passing barefoot over nine red hot ploughshares without any harm Whereupon the King craved mercy and pardon from her for the infamy and injury done unto her for which he was disciplined and whipped by his Mother and all the Bishops there present Anno 1044. There was GENERALE CONCILIUM CELEBRATUN a General Council held at London wherein Wolmar was elected Abbot of Evesham And this year King Edward DE COMMUNI CONCILIO PROCERUM SUORUM as Bromton and others write most likely when assembled in the Council at London married Edith daughter of Earl Godwin in patrocinium regni sui he being the most potent man in all the Realm there being in her breast a magazine of all liberall vertues And this same year most probable by this same Councils Edict Gunilda a noble Matron King Crute's sâ—sters daughter with her two sons Hemming and Thurkell were banished out of England into Flanders from whence after a little stay they departed into Denmark King Edward in the year 1045. assembled together to the port of Sandwich a very numerous and strong Navy against Magnus King of Norway purposing to invade Engl. But Swane King of Denmark then warring upon him hindered his voyage for England The next year 1046. Osgodus Clapa was banished out of England Swane King of Denmark Anno 1047. sent Ambassadours to King Edward desiring him to send a Navy to him against Magnus King of Norway Hereupon Earl Godwin counselled the King to send him at least fifty ships furnished with souldiers Sed quia Leofrico comiti ET OMNI POPULO id non videbatur consilium CAETERI PROCERES DISSUASERUNT nullum ei mittere voluit But because that Council seemed not good to Earl Leofric and all the people and the rest of the Nobles
defended in his absence till his returne from Rome Upon which the Nobles after serious consultation considering the great inconveniences and perils that might befall the kingdome by his absence being but newly setled and the manifold dangers that might happen to him in so long a journey and what new troubles and mishaps might befall the Realm if he should miscarry in the way having no issue would by no meanes permit him to undertake this pilgrimage but disswaded him from it and by common consent at last agreed to send solemn Ambassadours from the King and them to the Pope to represent the incenveniences and perils that might befall the Realm by his absence from it and thereupon to procure a dispensation from this his vow and pilgrimage Which the Ambassadours accordingly representing the Pope thereupon dispensed with the Kings vow upon this condition and firme injunction that the King should distribute to the poore all the expences he had provided for his journey and should either build a new or repaire an old Monastery in honour of S. Peter the Prince of the Apostles and endow it with sufficient revenues to maintain the Monks confirming by his Apostolicall Authority all the lands or revenues which the King or any other should conferre upon that Monastery and whatever priviledges he would think fit to grant thereunto pertaining to the honour of God and denouncing an eternall malediction against the infringers of them The Ambassadours returning with this dispensation St. Peter revealed to one Vlsin a Monk and Anchorite that his will was that the place called Westminster then lying ruinous should be restored which vision when he had related to the King and his Council REX TOTIUS REGNI CONSILIO The King by the advice of the whole Realme assembled in a parliamentary council rebuilt the foresaid place and endowed and enlarged it with very ample possessions rents and liberties The passages of this story being very memorable and pertinent to my discourse I shall present you with them at large in the words of Abbot Ailred who thus records them Succedentibus prosperis Rex beatus nequaquam sui sponsionis est oblitus nec in die bonorum immemor fuit malorum Sed cogitans recogitans quanta sibi fecerit Dominus qui ditavit egenum sublimavit humilem inglorium coronavit parat reddere vota quae distrinxerunt labia ejus Parat sumptus separat donaria VOCATISQUE TOTIUS REGNI PRIMATIBUS habuit cum eis hujusmodi vel DE STATU REGNI vel DE SUA PEREGRINATIONE SERMONEM Benedictus Deus qui magnificavit misericerdiam suam facere nobiscum qui visitavit in virga iniquitates nostras in verberibus peccata nostra pietatem suam non amovit à nobis Ecce quomodo deposuit potentes exaltavit humiles quomodo esurienâ—es implevit bonis divites dimisit inanes Per mâ— Reges regnant ait ipse principes justa discernunt Non excidit â nobis quomodo intrantibus in haereditatem nostram barbaris facti sumus opprobrium vicinis nostris subsannatio illusio hiis qui in circuitu nostro sunt Aliis nam que interfectis aliis fugatis aliis jugo ignominiosae servitutis oppressis ferè nihil honoris nihil gloriae generl nostro reliquerunt Tandem defuncto Patre meo patribus peremptis actis in exilium Nâ—potibus cum hostibus nostris in omnibus fortuna faveret mihi profectò nihil spei superesse videbatur Ego verò contra spem in spem credens Domini misericordiae me totum dedens peregrinationem meam ad sanctorum Apostolorum limina vovi deinceps divinae me protectioni dispositionique commisi Ille autem respexit in orationem meaÌ„ non sprevit precem meam abstulit obprobrium meum restituit me in regnuÌ„ Patris mei insuper cumulavit divitiis auxiâ— gloriâ donis coelestibus illustravit SINE SANGUINE REâ—ELLES SUBâ—GIT hostes subvertit omnia nostra amabili quadam composuit pace Absit absit ut tot â—antis ejus beneficiis inveniamur ingrati quin potius de manu inimicorum nostrorum liberati serviamus illi in justitia veritate Faci amusque quod ait Propheta Vovete reddite Domino Deo vestro DECERNITE ER GO ME CUM QUO MODO ME PEREGRINANTE REGNUM SUBSISTAT ANGLORUM QUA LEGE QUA PACE QUO JUDICE OMNIA DISPONANTUR QUIS CUI PRAEFERATUR REGIONI QUIS CASTRA QUIS URBES QUIS PRIVATA QUIS PUBLICA NEGOTIA PROCURET Erit enim unus omnibus Custos PROTECTOR DEUS pacem quam dedit ipse servabit nobiscum proficiscens vobiscum remanens qui vos custodiat me reduca Ad hanc vocem tota illa multitudo contremuit interiorem produnt lachrymis suspiriisque dolorem Jam jamque manus Danica timebatur quam ejus meritis evaserant jamjamque deletum iri totam patriam formidabant Erupit sermo in populum ecce clamor ecce tumultus quasi jam saevirent incendia plena lacrimis insula videbatur Videres pauperes nunc manus extendere ad coeâ—um nunc rursus in terram ruere quasi morituros fame si Rex discederet de sepuâ—tura tantum tumulo cogitare Tunc OMNES IN COMMUNE VOCIFERANTES IN REGEM se non deserendos se non exponendos gladiis patriam hostibus non prodendam nec demittenduÌ„ paces obsiaeÌ„ quem Deo dante receperant nec pro uno ut putabatur bono tot ADMITTENDA PERICULA ALLEGABANT IMPERANT PONTIFICES ROGANT PROCERES PLEBS EXTOR QUET ut si non omittenduÌ„ iter istud censuerit CENSEAT VEL DIEFERENDUM Tunc ille tot lacrimis tot vocibus tot precibus se urgeri sentiens diu inter pietatem desiderium fluctuabat quia voto supersedere periculosum tantorum precibus fletibusque non cedere inhumanum arbitrabatur Tandem quod aptius esset Deo scire desiderans peregrinationem non quidem dimittendam sed differendam interim consultius aestimabat donec Apostolicae auctoritatis consilio voluntate consulta ex ejus sententia aut votum redimeret aut impleret His auditis tanta fuit omnibus divitibus pauperibusque laetitia ut Edwardum suum rursus sibi redditum rursus revocatum exilio aestimarent Agit unusquisque pro gradu suo pro officio suo pro facultate sua ut regem dilationis non toedeat aliis orationes elemosinas aliis suam etiam pro eo peregrinationem nonnullis promittentibus Dirigendi mox ad sedem apostolicam ELIGUNTUR LEGATI Archiepiscopus Eâ—oracensis Aelredus Episcopus Wintoniensis Hermannus Abbates praeterea duo spectatae religionis cum pluribus aliis tam clericis quam laicis Parantur interim necessaria sucseptoque à rege mandato ad urbeÌ„ proficiscuntur Credendum Dei actum providentiâ ut regii responsales congregatam ibi SYNODUM MAXIMAM reperirent in qua praesidente beatae
recordationis Papa Leone de negotiis ecclesiasticis tractabatur Gaudet in eorum adventu illa sanctorum praeclara societas quasi sibi missum de caelo solatium tantorum Patrum praesentiam susceperunt magnum Dei munus judicantes quod à finibus terrae tales viri tali tempore tali conventui occurrissent Igitur patre beatissimo praecipiente nuncii causam pro qua venerant dicturi proceduÌ„t in mediuÌ„ patribus qui assidebant praebentibus cum summa devotione silentium Exponunt desiderium regis ET REGNI PERICULUM dispendium pacis clamorem pauperum lacrimas orphanorum OBDUCTAM ETIAM NECDUM RECENTIS PLAGAE CICATRICEM ASSEREBANT QUAE DANICA RABIE ANGLIS INFLICTA SI REX DECEDERET ACRIOR TIMEBATUR Silentibus nunciis sonuit in ore omnium gratiarum actio vox laudis Praedicatur circa Deum Regis circa Regem plebis devotio Mirantur mansuetudinem David prudentiam joseph divitias Solomonis in tali principe convenisse Tandem summo Pontifice dictante sententiam OMNES IN COMMUNE DECERNUNT PRO PACE REGNI PRO UTILITATE ECCLESIAE pro necessitate pauperum quiete monasteriorum Regem auctoritate Dei beati Petri PRAESENTIS ETIAM SACRATISSIMAE SYNODI à voti hujus vinculo solempniter absolvendum expensas paratas itineri pauperibus erogandas in voti recompensatione construenduÌ„ in Honorê beati Petri regiis copiis monasterium vel aliquod destructum à barbaris reparandum Exhinc legatarii oblatis muneribus quae sanctorum Ecclesiis Rex sanctus direxerat accepta benedictione Pontificis cum literis apostolicis laeti repatriant transvectique in insulam IN CONSPECTU CONCILII QUOD PROPTER HOC IPSUM REGIA POTESTAS COEGERAT epistolam tradiderunt Leo Episcopus servus servorum Dei dilecto filio Edwardo Anglorum Regi salutem apostolicam benedictionem Quoniam voluntatem tuam laudabilem Deo gratam agnovimus gratias agimus â—i per quem reges regnant principes justa odecernunt Sed quia prope est Dominus in omni loco omnibus invocantibus eum in veritate sancti Apostoli cum suo caepite conjuncti unus spiritus sunt pias preces aequaliter audiunt Eâ— QUI A CONSTAT PERICLITARI REGIONEM ANGLICANAM EX TUA DISCESSIONE QUI FRAENO JUSTITIAE TUAE SEDITIOSOS Ejus MOTUS COHIBES Ex auctoritate Dei sanctorum Apostolorum SANCTAE SYNODI absolvimus te à peccato illius voti pro quo Dei offensam times ab omnibus negligentiis iniquitatibus tuis ea nimirum potestate usi quam Dominus in beato Petro concessit nobis dicens Quaecunque solveritis super terram soluta erant in coelis Deinde praecipimus tibi sub nomine sanctae obedientiae poenitentiae ut expensas quas ad iter istud paravaras pauperibus eroges coenobium MonachoruÌ„ in honore sancti Petri apostoloruÌ„ principis aut novum construas aut vetustum augeas â—mendes sufficientiaÌ„ victualium fratribus de tuis redditibus constituas quatenus dum illi assidue inibi Deum laudaverint sanctis angeatur gloria tibi indulgentia Cui loco quicquid contulsris vel collatum est vel conferetur ut ratum sit apostolica authoritate praecipimus ut semper habitatio Monachorum sit nulli laiâ—ae personae nisi regi subdatur Et quaecunque privilegia ibi constituere volueris ad honorem Dei pertinentia concedimus robustissima auctoritate confirmamus infractores eorum aeterna maledictione dampnamus After which Abbot Ailred at large relates the vision of the Anchorite in Worcester-shire and S. Peters command to him therein to eminent King Edward in discharge of his vow to repaire and endow the Abbey of Westminster which he signified in a letter sent by him to the King delivered and read in the Council the very same day the Popes letter was read Ea igitur die loco â—odeÌ„ IN EODEM CONCILIO quo legati redeuntes ab urbâ— apostolicum retulere mandatum epistola etiam viri Dei regi praesentata profertur in medium Lectoque sancti Papae Leonis rescripto loco sequenti beati senis apices recitantur c. Tunc rex laetus alacer ut ei fuerat constitutum pecuniam quam in peregrinationis suae solatium procuraverat disper sit dedit pauperibus operique injuncto intendens animum thesauros â—ffudit When he had fully rebuilt and finished this Monastery he sent Aeldred Archb. of York Guiso Bishop of Wells and Walter Bish of Herefoâ—d again to Rome to Pope Nicholas with a Letter and Peter pence and royall presents desiring his absolution from his former vow and confirmation of the liberties and priviledges of the Abby of Westminster and the lands conferred on it who thereupon granted to this Abbey Vt amplius in perpetuum regiae constitutionis consecrationis locus sit atque reposâ—…orium regalium insignium habitatio perpetua monachorum qui nulli omnino personae nisi regi subdantur habeant que potestatem secundum regulam sancti Benedicti per successores eligere idoneos Abbates c. Absolving and exempting the Abby from all episcopal service exaction Dominion Jurisdictior ratifying all their lands and liberties dâ—nouncing a perpetuall Anathema against the invaders diminishers dispersers or sellers of them with Judas the Traytor Closing his Bull and letter thus Vobis vero posteris vestris regibus committimus ADVOCATIONEM â—uiti nem ejusdem loci OMNIUM TOTIUS ANGLIAE ECCLESIARUM ut vice nostra CUM CONCILIO EPISCOPORUM ET ABBATUM CONSTITUAS UBIQUE QUAE JUSTA SUNT Scientes per hoc vos recepturos dignam mercedem abeo cujus regnum imperium non desinâ—t nec mâ—nuâ—tur in seculum The Kings and Popes letters are at large recorded by Ailred who addes Lectis igitur Aâ—ostolicae majestatis apicibus exultavit in gaudio Rex beatissimus omnique solicitudine quam ex voti obligatione contraâ—erat exuitur CUNCTAQUE REGNI NEGOTIA DUCIBUS PROCERIBUS QUE COMMITTENS totum se divinis mancipabat oâ—s quiu K. Edw after these two Embassâ—ies to Rome by three severall Charters wherein he recites these Embassies the Popes letters in answer to them and the vision aforesaid CUM TOTIUS REGNI ELECTIONE CUM CONSILIO ET DECRETO ARCHIEPIS COPORUM EPIS COPORUM COMITUM ALIORUMQUE MEORUM OPTIMATUM PROSPICIENS assembled in a great parliamentary Council for that purpose granted and confirmed sundry lands and priviledges to this Abby of Westm which all the Prelates confirmed not onely with their subscriptions and the sign of the crosse but likewise with a solemn excommunication In the first of which Charters there is this memorable recital agreeing with Abbot Ailreds relation Edwardus Dei gratia Anglorum Rex c. Scire vos volo quoniam tempore avorum meorum patrisque mei multa gravia bellorum pericula afflixerunt gentem
without expecting any actual violence to banish and expell them From all these memorable Historical passages as we may observe the great unconstancy vicissitude and changes of earthly Princes favours worldly honours preferments and popular favour with the great inconveniencies of admitting or advancing forreigners to any places of trust or power under the King or Court so we may likewise conclude that by the Law of that Age. 1. That no Englâ—sh man ought to be condemned executed imprisoned or put to death upon any great mans bare suggestion no not by the Kings own speciall command which if given ought to be disobeyed in such cases but only by and after a Legall hearing tryall and conviction of the offence 2. That the Kings of England were then sworn and obliged to govern their people by good just and wholesome Laws and Customes not by their arbitrary pleasures powers or commands 3. That the Parliamentary Councels and Nobles in that age were very carefull to defend and maintain the Liberties Rights good Laws and Customs of the people and to prevent and abolish all unjust Laws and Encroachments repugnant to them 4. That Parliamentary Councels were then frequently summoned by the King upon all publique emergent occasions and differences and to make war and peace either at home or in forreign parts 5. That the Parliamentary Councels of that time consisted of the Earles Barons Nobles and Praelates of the Realme duly summoned to them without any mention of Knights or Burgesses elected and sent to them by the people of which there are no presidents in this Kings reign Enough to prove Modus Tenendi Parliamentum supposed to be made and observed in this age a meere cheating imposture of later daies as in truth it is 6. That all delinquents of what quality soever justly or unjustly accused ought to appear and justify themselves before the King and his Nobles in their Parliamentary Councels without armed Guards forces Tergiversation or resistance upon due suÌ„mons to appear before them by the Laws of that time 7. That Kings and great mens coming to Parliamentary Councels with Armies strong armed Guards and holding them with power or under Armies is inconsistent with their Liberty Priviledges and are an occasion of civill wars disturbances much mischief to the Nation as then they proved 8. That English Peers then were and ought to be tried banished judged by their Peers both in Parliamentary Councels and other Courts 9. That no English Peer or Freeman could then be lawfully and judically banished the Realme but in and by sentence and judgement of a Parliamentary Councel for some contempt or offence demeriting such a punishment 10. That Peers and great men obstinately refusing to submit themselves to the triall and judgement of Parliamentary Councels or to appear in them or the Kings Courts to justify themselves without hostages fist given for their securiy may justly be sentenced and banished by our Parliaments for such contempts and affronts to justice 11. That the subjects were bound to ayd and assist their Kings as wel against Traitors Rebels Pyrates as against forreign enemies under our Saxon Kings 12. That forreigners are usually the greatest occasioners and fomenters of civil wars That such Incendiaries deserve justly to be banished the Nation And that civill wars between King and subjects English and English and their shedding of one anothers blood in such wars was then deemed most unnatural odious execrable by all prudent means and councels to be timely and carefully prevented and not to be begun or undertaken but by good advice and common consent in great Parliamentary Councels upon weighty urgent inevitable necessities 13. That the abolishing of ill and enacting of good Laws the removing of ill Counsellors and Instruments about Kings ordering matters of war and defence by Land and Sea and setling of peace were the antient proper works businesses imployments of our Saxon Parliaments 14. That the English Freemen have been always apt forwards cordially to joyn with such Nobles and Great men who are most cordial and active to defend their just Liberties Laws Rights against foreiners and others who invade them Soon after the forementioned agreement between the King and Godwin King Edward according to his forementioned promises to make good Laws for all his people out of all the former British and Saxon Laws by Order of his Wisemen compiled an universal common Law for all the people throughout the whole Realm which were called King Edwards Laws being so just and equal and so securing the profit and wealth of all estates that the people long after as Mr Fox and others record did rebel against their Lords and Rulers to have the same Laws again when suspended or taken from them or dis-used and prescribed this Oath to William the Conquerour himself and every of our Kings since to be solemnly taken at the time of his Coronation for the further ratification and better inviolable observation of these Laws and perpetuating them to all posterity SIR will you grant and keep and by your Dath confirm to the people of England the Laws and Customs granted to them by antient Kings of England rightfull men and devout towards God namely the Laws and Customs and Franchises granted to the Clergy and to the Peopie by the glorious King Edward to your power To which the King must answer I will doe it before he be anointed or crowned King Now because these Laws of King Edward made by his Wisemens Counsel and advice as this Clause Sapientes caeperunt super hos habere consilium et constituerunt in the Chapter De illis qui has Leges despexerent implyes are so famous and fundamental most of our Common old Laws being founded on or resulting from them I shall give you this brief account of them out of our Historians as most pertinent to my subject matter and usefull for those of my profession to be informed of being generally not so well versed in Antiquity History and Records as were to be wished for the honour and lustre of their honourable publike calling pretermiting the grosse Forgery and Imposture of Modus tenendi Parliamentum so much cryed up by Sir Edward Cooke for its Antiquity and Authority as made and observed in Edward the Confessors reign when as it is a meer counterfeit Treatise and Spurious Antiquity scarce antienter than King Richard the 2. as I have proved in my Levellers levelled and Mr. Selden manifests in his Titles of honour pars 2. p. 713 738 to 745 yea it s own mentioning the Bishop of Carlisle which Bishoprick was not erected til the year 1132 or 1134. the Mayors of London which had no Mayor til the year 1208 and of other Cities with Knights and Burgesses usual wages all instituted long after the Conquerours reign the not mentioning of this Modus in any of our Records Histories or judicious Antiquaries and its difference from all the Modes and Forms of Parliaments and
Church and Clergy from all Invasion injury violence disturbance and specially enact That not only all Clerks and Clergy men but all other persons shall enjoy the peace of God and the Church free from all assaults arrests and other disturbances whatsoever both on Lords-days Solemn Festivals and other times of publike Church meetings eundo subsistendo redeundo both in going to continuing at and returning from the Church and publike duties of Gods worship or to Synods and Chapters to which they are either summoned or where they have any business requiring their personal presence wherewith the Statute of 8 H. 6. c. 1. concurs as to the later clause Therefore all Quakers Anabaptists and others who disturb affront and revile assault or abuse our Ministers or their people as many now doe in going to or returning from the Church or whiles they continue in it as well before or after as during Divine Service Sermons or Sacraments there administred may and ought by the Common Law of England confirmed both by Confessor and Conquerour in their Parliamentary Councils to be duly punished as Breakers of the Peace by all our Kings Justices and Ministers of publike Iustice being ratified by Magna Charta c. 1 and the Coronation Oaths of all our Kings which all our Judges and Justices are bound to observe To keep to God and holy Church to the Clergy and to the People Peace and Concord entirely according to their power especially during the publike worship of God in the Church and in going to tarrying at and returning from the duties which they owe unto him both as his Creatures and Servants And to grant keep and confirm the Laws Customs and Franchises granted by the glorious King Edward 3. That they prescribe the due payment of Tithes to God and his Ministers as well personal as praedial under Ecclesiastical and temporal penalties being granted and consented unto a Rege et Baronibus et Populo 4. That the Causes and pleas of the Church ought first to be heard ended in Courts and Councils before any other Iustitia enim est ut Deus ubique praecaeteris honoretur 5. That they thus define Danegild Danegaldi redditio propter Piratas primitus Statuta est Patriam enim infestantes vastationi ejus pro posse suo insistebant Ad eorum quidem insolentiam reprimendam Statutum est Danegaldum annuatim reddi scilicet duodecim denarios de unaquaque Hida totius Patriae ad conducendos eos qui Piratarum eruptioni Resistendo obviarent To which Hoveden Knyghton Lambard and others subjoyn De hoc quoque Danegaldo omnis ecclesia libera est quieta omnis terra quae in proprio dominico Ecclesiae erat ubicunque jacebar nihil prorsus in tali redemptione persolvens quia magis in Ecclesiae confidebant orationibus quam in armorum defensionibus usque tempora Willielmi junioris qui Ruffus vocabatur donec eodem a Baronibus Angliae auxilium requirente ad Normanniam requirendam retinendam de Roberto suo fratre cognomine Cortehose Ierusalem proficiscente Concessum esi ei non Lege sancitum neque confirmatum sed hac necessitatis causa ex unaquaque hida sibi dari quatuor solidos Ecclesia non excepta Dum vero collectio census fieret proclamabat Ecclesia suam reposcens libertatem sed nil profecit By which it is apparent 1. That this grievous Tax of Danegeld was first granted and appointed by a publike Law in a Parliamentary Council to hire men to resist the eruption of the Pyrates and Enemies That it amounted but to 12 d. a year upon every Ploughland That the Church and Demesne Lands of the Church where ever they lay were exempted from it till William Rufus his time who first exacted it from the Clergy upon a pretended necessity and raised it from 12 d. to 4 s. a Ploughland by grant of the Barons without any Law to enact or confirm it for fear of drawing it into consequence 6ly That these Laws thus describe the Duty and Office of a King The King because he is the Vicar of the highest King is constituted for this end that he may rule the earthly kingdom and the Lords people and above all things that he may reverence his holy Church and defend it from injuries pluck away evildoers from it and utterly to destroy and disperse them Which unless he shall doe the name of a King agreeth not unto him the Prophet Pope John witnessing Nomen Regis perdit qui quod Regis est non faciat he loseth the name of a King who dischargeth not the duty of a King Pepin and Charls his Son being not yet Kings but Princes under the French King hearing this definitive Sentence as well truly as prudently pronounced concerning the name of a King by William the bastard King of England foolishly writ to Pope John demanding this question of him Whether the Kings of France ought so to continue being content only with the name of a King Who answered That it is convenient to call them Kings who do watch over defend and govern the Church of God and his people imitating King David the Psalmograph saying He shall not dwell in my House which worketh pride c. After which it followeth in Mr. Fox and some others but not in Hoveden and Knyghton Moreover the King by his right and by his Office ought to defend and conserve fully and wholly in all ampleness without diminution all the Lands Honours Dignities Rights and Liberties of the Crown of his Kingdom And further to reduce into their pristine state all such things as have been dispersed wasted and lost which appertain to his kingdom Also the whole and universal Land with all Ilands about the same in Norwey and Denmark be appertaining to the Crown of his kingdom and be of the appurtenances and dignity of the King making one Monarchy and one Kingdom which sometimes was called the Kingdom of Britain and now the Kingdom of England such bounds and limits as is abovesaid be appointed and limited to the name of this kingdom A King above all things ought to fear God to love and observe his commandements and cause them to be observed through his whole kingdom He ought also to keep cherish maintain and govern the holy Church within his kingdom with all integrity and Liberty according to the constitution of his ancestors and predecessors and to defend the same against all Enemies so that God above all things be honoured and ever before his eyes He ought also to set up Good Laws and Customs such as be wholesom and approved Such as be otherwise to repeal them and thrust them out of his kingdom Item he ought to doe Iudgement and Iustice in his kingdom by the counsel of his Realm All these things ought a King in his own person to do taking his Oath upon the Evangelist swearing in the presence of the whole State of
the Realm as well of the Temporalty as of the Spiritualty before he be crowned of the Archbishops and Bishops Three Servants the King ought to have under his feet as Vassals Fleshly Lust Avarice and Greedy desire whom if he keep under as his Seruants and Slaves he shall reign well and honourably in his Kingdom All things are to be done with good advisement and premeditation and that properly belongeth to a King For hasty rashness bringeth all things to ruine according to the saying of the Gospel Every kingdom divided in it self shall be desolate c. A clear evidence that our Saxon Kings had no arbitrary nor tyrannical power to condemn banish imprison oppresse or Tax their Subjects in any kinde against their Laws Liberties Properties And thus much touching King Edwards Laws Qui ob vitae integritatem Regnandi Iustitiam clementiam Legumque sive à se latarum sive ex veteribus sumptarum Equitatem inter Sanctos relatus est as Matthew Parker records of him In the year of Christ 1053. as many or 1054. as others compute it that old perjured Traytor Earl Godwin came to a most soddein shamefull exemplary death by divine justice which the marginal Historians thus relate and Abbot Ailred thus prefaceth Inserendum arbitror quomodo Godwinum proditionum suarum donatum stipendiis divini judicii ultrix ira consumpserit detest andique facinoris quod in Regem fratremque ejus cōmiserat populo spectante ipsam quam meruerat poenam exolverat This Godwin being the Kings Father-in-law abusing his simplicity multa in regno contra jus et fas pro potestate faciebat did many things in the Realm against Law and right by his power and often attempted to incline the Kings minde to his Injustice At last his subtilty proceeded so farr that by fraud deceit and circumvention he banished out of the land almost all the Kings kinred and friends whom he had either brought with him or called out of Normandy as well Bishops as Clerks and Laymen of other dignities believing that all things would succeed according to his desires if the King deprived of all his friends should make use only of his Counsels But Edward dissembling all things in regard of time place and out of religion addicted himself wholly to divine duties sometimes predicting That divine Justice would at some time or other revenge so great malice of the Earl and telling Godwin himself so much Whereupon on a certain day when the King was celebrating the Feast of Easter at Winchester as most or at Windsor as some or Hodiam as others relate which feast was famous among the people the King sitting at his royal Table at dinner the Kings Cup-bearer Harold Godwins own Son as some record bringing the Kings cup filled with Wine towards the Table striking one of his feet very hard against a stumbling block on the pavement fell almost to the ground but his other foot going straight on recovered him again and set him upright so that he had no harm nor shed any of the wine Upon which many discoursing touching this event and rejoycing that one foot helped the other Earl Godwin who customarily sate next to the King at Table being his Father-in-law laughing thereat said by way of merriment Here a brother helped a brother as some or So is a Brother helping to a Brother and one assisting another in necessity as others report his words To whom the King upon this occasion ironically answering said Thus my Brother Alfred might have assisted me had it not been for Godwins Treachery who would not permit him Which Speech of the Kings Godwin taking over-grievously was sore afraid and with a very pale and sad countenance replied I know O King I know it hath been often reported to thee that I have sought to betray thee and that thou O King dost as yet accuse and suspect me concerning the death of thy Brother Alfred neither yet doest thou think that those are to be discredited who call me either his or thy Traytor or betrayer But let thy God who is true and just and knoweth all secrets judge between us and let him never suffer this piece of bread I now hold in my hand to pass down my throat without choaking me if I be guilty of any Treason at all against thee or had ever so much as a thought to betray thee Or if I be guilty of thy Brothers death or if ever thy brother by me or my counsel was nearer to death or remoter from life And so may I safely swallow down this morsel of bread in my hand as I am guiltlesse of these facts When he had thus spoken the King blessed the piece of bread whereupon Godwin putting it into his mouth swallowed it down to the midst of his throat where it stuck so fast that he could neither get it down nor cast it up by any means till through the cooperation of divine vengeance he was so choaked with it that his breath was quite stopped his eyes turned upside down his arms grew stiff being conscious to himself of what he thus abjured and so he fell down dead under the Table Deus autem justus et verax audivit vocem Proditoris et mox eodem pane strangulatus mortem praegustavit aeternam writes Radulphus de Diceto The King seeing him pale and dead and that divine judgement and vengeance had thus passed upon him said to those who stood by Dragg out of this dog this Traytor and bury him in the high way for he is unworthy of Christian burial Whereupon his Sonnes there present beholding this Spectacle drew him from under the Table into a Bedchamber ubi debitum proditoris sortitus est sinem and immediately after they buried him privily in the old Monastery at Winchester without honour or solemnity Abbot Ingulphus thus briefly relates the story of this his death Anno Domini 1053. cum Godwinus Comes in mensa Regis de nece sui fratris impeteretur ille post multa Sacramenta tandem per buccellam deglutiendam abjuravit buccella gustata continuo suffocatus interiit As this judgement of God upon Earl Godwin for murdering Prince Alfred right heir to the Crown and the Normans who accompanied him 17 years after the fact was most exemplary so Gods justice upon his posterity is remarkable which to omit their forementioned exiles troubles are thus epitomized by Will. Malmsb. Godwin in his younger years had the Sister of Cnute for his wife on whom he begat a Son who having passed the first years of his childhood whiles he was riding on a horse given to him by his Grandfather in a proud childish bravado giving him the spurr and rains the horse carried him into the swift stream of the River of Thames where he was drowned His Mother also was slain with the stroke of a thunderbolt receiving the punishment of her cruelty who was reported to buy whole droves of slaves
courteous regard who returned home without reply vel veris vel veresimilibus argumentis perstricti Some of our Historians record That the Dukes Messengers upon their second Embassy admonishing him how religiously he had bound himself by Oath and that perjured persons should be sure to find perdition from Gods hands and reproachfull shame with men waived all other demands of the Crown and insisted only upon this That Harold should marry his Daughter which he had espoused according to his promise else he should certainly know he would by force of Armes challenge the succession of the Kingdom promised to him But this seems improbable because our other Historians conclude that his espoused Daughter was deadbefore this Embassie and Williams preparations and future Messages claiming the Crown resolve the contrary Abbot Ingulphus flourishing at that time gives us this sum of their Negotiation and Harolds answer thereunto Willielmus autem Comes Normanniae Legatos mittit foedera facta dicit pacta patefecit promissa petit aliquod justum medium confici requirit At Rex Haroldus Legatos vix auscultat foedera fracta negat pacta recusat promissa excusat omnia justa media oblata sufflat subsannat Cumque haec intermedia quotidie agerentur ac solum nunciorum cursus ac recursus tota aestate sine fructu consumerarentur The Embassadours returned empty bringing only Harolds unsatisfactory and scornfull Answers with them Wherewith Duke William being much inraged cast about how to recover that by right of armes which he could not gain by Treaty providing Ships Souldiers Mariners and all things necessary for an invasive war making choice of the tallest skilfullest and goodliest Souldiers he could select and of such Captains and Commanders as both in the Army and elsewhere seemed all of them to be rather Kings than Nobles And to set the better colour upon his pretended enterprise he sent to Pope Alexander acquainting him with the justice of his cause and the war he had undertaken his Embassadours setting them forth with all the strength of eloquence which Harold neglected to doe either through sloathfullness or diffidence of his Title or for fear William who strictly watched at Ports should intercept his Messengers The Pope having weighed the Title of both parties sent a consecrated Banner to William as an Omen of his right to the kingdom and good success taken in the enterprise Which having received Conventum magnum Procerum apud Lislibonam fecit super negotium singulorum sententias scissitatus Duke William called a Great Council of Nobles at Lillebon demanding every one of their opinions concerning this business Cumque omnes ejus voluntatem plausibus excipientes magnificis promissis animassent Commeatum Navium omnibus pro quantitate possessionum indixit Henry Huntindon Hygden Radulphus de Diceto Speed Daniel and others relate That the Lords of Normandie in this great Parliamentary Assembly taking Counsel amongst themselves what was best to be done in this expedition VVilliam Fitz-Osbert counselled to leave and forsake the war both for scarcity of fighting men and by reason of the strength valour fierceness and cruelty of the Enemies Whereof the other Lords being glad put their answer into his mouth resolving they would all consent to what he should say Who comming before the King said That he and all his men were ready and devoted to assist him in that enterprise and so were all the other Lords Whereupon all the Nobles of Normandy being thus unexpectedly surprized and bound by his words and promise provided themselves for the expedition In this Assembly of the Norman States a subsidy being propounded as the sinews to carry on this great undertaking it was answered That a former war with the French had impoverished much of their wealth That if new wars were now raised and therein their substance spent to gain other parts it would be there so missed as it would hardly be sufficient to defend their own That they thought it more safe for him to hold what he had than with hazard of their own to invade the territories of others That though the war intended were just yet it was not necessary but exceeding dangerous Besides by their allegiance they were not bound to military services in forein parts and therefore no payments could be assessed upon them Whereupon the wealthiest of all the people were sent for by the Duke and severally one by one conferred with shewing them his right and hopes of England where preferments lay even for the meanest of them only money was the want which they might spare neither should that be given but lent upon a plentifull increase With which words he drew them so on that they strove who should give most and by this means he gathered such a masse of money as was sufficient to defray the war Besides Fitz Osburne promised to furnish 40 ships at his own charge the Bishop of Bayon 40 the Bishop of Mauâ— 30. and so others accordingly beyond their abilities And divers neighbour Princes upon promises of fair possessions in England assisted him both with Ships and Souldiers On the other side Harold to prevent his and the Danes invasions who likewise laid Title to the Crown provided ships and forces to oppose them both by Sea and Land and repairing to the Port of Sandwich appointed his Navy to meet him there which being there assembled he sailed with it to the Isle of VVight and there watched the coming of VVilliam into England with his Army all the Summer and Autumn placing likewise his Land forces of Foot in fitting places about the Sea coasts But at last the victuals of the Navy and land Army being spent they both returned home about the Feast of St. Mary Soon after Divine Providence to make the easier and speedier way for Harolds overthrow stirred up his own Brother Tosti the banished Earl of Northumberland to recover his Earldom and avenge himself of Harold who exiled him some think by Duke VVilliams advice they marrying two Sisters who coming with 60 some write 40 ships out of Flanders forced Taxes and Tribute out of the Isle of VVight took booties and Mariners to serve in his Navy on the Sea coasts of Kent whence he hoising sail fell foul on Lincolnshire where Morcar and Edwin Earls of Chester and Yorkeshire incountring him with their forces by Land and Harolds Navy by Sea with some loss of their men routed and drove him from thence into Scotland Where after some stay Harold Harfager King of Denmark after his conquest of the Orcades by Tosti his solicitation came into the River of Tine with 300. others write 500 ships where they both united their forces intending to subdue and conquer England then landing their Souldiers in Northumberland they wasted and spoiled the Country where ever they came Whereupon Earl Morcar and Earl Edwin with the inhabitants of the Country raised all the forces they could against them and giving them
though he gains the possession by force This is evident by the forecited words of Mathew Paris and this passage of Henry de Knyghton not extant in Hygden out of whom he seems to tanscribe it Et sic quia Normannus Iure haereditatis tenuit Normanniae Ducatum ideo Dux Regnum vero Angliae mero Conquestu in respect of actual possession et clameo subscripto in respect of Title by claim by gift from King Edward Ideo Rex which claim and Title being backed by the unanimous election of the Prelates Clergy Nobility People and right heir to the Crown himself who all submitted and sware homage fealty and allegiance to him as their lawfull King infallibly demonstrate him to be no Conquerour in respect of Title in a strict legal military sense even in the judgement of those antient and modern Historians who give him that Title but only in regard of Harold and his party and the actual possession which he got by conquest And in this sense alone is that Distick in the Chronicle of Bromton to be understood Dux Normannorum Willielmus vi validorum Rex est Anglorum Bello Conquestor eorum 6ly Our Great Antiquary Richard Vestegan in his Restitutions of decayed Antiquities learned Mr. John Selden in his Review of the Hist of Tithes p. 482 483. Sir John Hayward in the life of King VVilliam the first Mr. Nathaniel Bacon in his first part of his Historical Discourse of the uniformity of the Government of England chap. 44 45 46 55 56. to omit others most fully prove and assert That the entry of William the first into the royal Government of England neither was nor properly could be by Conquest but by Title and by the free election of the Nobles Clergy and People That although the several Titles he Pretended were perhaps if curiously examined not sufficient to give him a true legal Title and Right to the Crown of England à parte ante because not agreed unto and confirmed by the general consent of the Nobles Kingdom and Nation in a Parliamentary Great Council but only by the King and some particular Prelates and Nobles out of Parliament as Harold in his answers alleged yet being ratified exparte post both by the subsequent consent agreement submission election Oath homage and fealty of all the people Nobles Clergy by their legal free crowning of him at first by Edgar Atheling his own submission sealty and resignation of his royal right and Title thereby unto him and ratified by succeeding Parliamentary Councils it became an indubitable Right and Title both in Law and Justice to him and his Posterity against all others who could lay no legaller Title thereunto he continuing confirming all the antient fundamental Laws Liberties Customs and Government of the English Nation without any alteration both by Oaths and Edicts I shal therefore conclude this point with the words of Shard a learned Lawyer in King Edward the third his reign who when the Kings Counsel in a Quo Warranto against the Abbot of Peterborough would have made a Charter of king Edgar void because they alleged all Franchises were devolved to the Crown by the Conquest replyed thereto The Conquerour came not at all to put any who had lawfull possession out of their rights but to dispossess those who by their wrong had seised upon any land in dis-inherison of the King and his Crown And with the words of our judicious Historian Sa. Daniel concerning this king VVilliam Neither did he ever claim any power by conquest but as a regular Prince submitted himself to the orders of the Kingdom desiring to have his Testamentary Title howsoever weak to make good his succession rather than his sword And though the stile of Conqueror by the slattery of the time was after given him he shewed by all the course of his Government he assumed it not introducing none of those Alâ—erations which followed by violence but by a mild gathering upon the disposition of the State and the occasions offered and that by way of reformation And although Sir Hen. VVotton gives this verdict of them VVe do commonly and justly stile him the Conquerour For he made a general conquest of 〈…〉 Kingdom and People either by Composition or Armes c. Yet he addes He was Crowned on Christmas day 1066. at which time he would fain have compounded a Civil Title of I know not what Alliance or Adoption or rather Donation from Edward the Confessor As if hereditarie kingdoms did pass like Newyears gifts The truth is he was the heir of his Sword Yet from these pretences howsoever there sprang this good That he was thereby in a sorting aged to cast his Government into a middle or mixed nature as it were between a lawfull successor and an Invader though generally as all new Empires do savour much of their beginning it had more of the Violent than of the Legal If any domineering Souldiers or others upon this false surmise of Duke VVilliams right to the Crown and Realm of England by meer conquest shall henceforth presume to claim and exercise a meer arbitrary absolute tyrannical and despotical power over our English Nation Laws Liberties Parliaments Estates Persons as over a meer conquered Nation against all Commissions Trusts Oaths Engagements Declarations and the rules both of Law and War it self being raised waged commissioned only to defend and preserve us from conquest by the opposite party Let them know that they are far greater worser Enemies to their own Native Country than this Norman Duke or any of our former British Saxon Danish Norman or English Kings who never claimed the Crown by meer conquest in any age but only by some real or pretended Title of Inheritance or at least by a free and general election both of the Nobility Clergy and people as this King William did From the former Historical Passages concerning Harold Tosti Duke William and the Kentishmen I shall deduce these legal Observations 1. That no Tax Subsidie or Imposition whatsoever could in that age be imposed on the English or Norman Subjects by their Kings or Dukes but by their common consent in their Parliamentary Councils where they were denied when inconvenient to the publike as well as granted when convenient 2. That no English or Norman Subjects were then obliged to aid and assist their Soveraigns with their persons arms estates or subsidies granted in any foreign invasive war but only left free to contribute what private assistance they thought fit in such cases 3. That no publike wars in that age were ever undertaken but by common advice and consent in great Parliamentary Councils 4. That the Kings of England in that age however they came to the Crown by right or wrong held it both their bounden duty interest safety to defend and preserve the Laws Rights Liberties of the Church and people to enact and maintain good Laws and abolish all evill Laws Rapines Exactions Tributes
Anglorum ipsos tam â suis quà m ab extraneis concitata adeo ut penè periclitata sit HAEREDITARIA REGUM SUCCESSIO magnumque interstitium inter fratrem meum Edmundum qui patri meo mortuo successit meque habitum sit invadentibus regnum Swegeno Cnutho filio ejus Regibus Danorum ac filiis ipsius Cnuthi Haroldo Harde-Cnutho à quibus alter meus frater Alfredus crudeliter est occisus solusque sicut Joas occisionem Otholiae sic ego crudelitatem eorum evasi Tandem respectu misericordiae DEI POST PLURES ANNOS EGO EDWARDUS AD PATERNUM SOLUM REACCESSI ET EO POTITUS SINE ULLO BELLORUM LABORE sicut amabilis Deo Solomon tantâ pace rerum opulentiâ abundavi ut nullus antecedentium regum similis mei fuerit in gloria divitiis Sed gratia Dei non me ut assolet ex opulentia superbia contemptus invasit immo coepi cogitare cujus dono auxilio ad regni culmen evasi quoniam dei est regnum cui vult dare illud quia mundus transit concupiscentia ejus qui autem totum se subdit Deo feliciter regnat perpetualiter dives est itaque deliberavi me ire ad lumina subliminum Apostolorum Petri Paulâ— ibi gratias agere pro collatis beneficiis King Edward in the year 1051. released the English From the heavy tribute or Danegeld which Florentius Wigorniensis and Simeon Dunelmensis thus expresse Rex Edvardus Absolvit Anglos A gravi vectigali 38. anno ex quo pater ejus Rex Athelredus Danicos solidarios solvi mandavit c. quod eis pater suus propter Danicos solidarios imposuerat as Brompton renders it in another place Roger de Hunedon Annalium pars 1. p. 441. Rodolphus de Diceto Abbreviatione Chronicorum col 145. use the same words Ailredus Abbas Rievallis de vita miraculis Edwardi Confessoris Col. 383. thus relates it Insuper Tributum illud gravissimum quod tempore patris sui primo classi Danicae pendebatur Postmodum vero fisco regio Annis singulis inferebatur regia liberalitate remisit et ab onere hoc importabili in perpetuum Angliam absolvit Vnde sancto huic regi non inconvenienter aptatur quod scriptum est Beatus vir qui inventus sine macula qui post aurum non abiit nec speravit in pecuniae the sauris Post aurum non abiit quod potius dispersit nec speravit in the sauris quos in Dei opere non tam minuit quam consumpsit Matthew Westminster records it in these words Anno gratiae 1051. Rex Edwardus A vectigali gravissimo Anglos absolvit quod patre vivente Danicis stipendiariis Triginto octo millia librarum solvi consuevit Henry de Knighton De eventibus Angliae l. 1. c. 9. fol. 233. 1 and Higden in his Polychronicon lib. 6. c. 24. f. 254. thus relate it Rex Edvardus absolvit Anglos a Gravi Tributo quod paâ—ur ejus Ethelredus Danicis solidariis solvi fecerat jam per 40. annos duraverat which Fabian in his Cronicle part 8. c. 210. p. 282. Graston in his Cronicle p. 170. Speed in his History p. 410. Holinshead and others thus expresse This King Enward discharged English men of the great and most heavy Tribute called Danegeld which his Father Ethelred had made them pay to the Souldiers of Denmark and had then dured 40. years So that after that day it was no more gathered Abbot Iuguphus Historiae pag. 897. thus records it more at large Eodem etiam Anno 1051. cum terra non daret solitâ fertilitate fructus suos sed fames plurimos habitatores devoraret in tantum ut bladuum carentia panis inopia multa hominum millia morierentur miserecordiâ motus super populum piâ—ssimus Rex Edwardus Tributum gravistmum quod Danigelo dicebatur omni Angliae in perpetuum relaxavit Ferunt quidam regem sanctissimum cum dictum DANIGELD cublcularii sui collectum in regis cameram infudissent ad videndum tanti Thesauri cumulum ipsum adduxissent ad primum aspectum exhorrnisse protestantem Se daemonem super acervum pecuniae saltantem nimio gaudio exultantem prospexisse unde pristinis possessoribus jussit statim reddere de tam fera exactione ne jota unum voluit retinere quin in perpetuum remisit anno scilicet 38. ex que tempore Regis Ethelredi patris sui Suanus Rex Danorum suo exercitui illud solvi singulis annis imperavit This History of the Devils dancing upon this Mony is thus more fully related by Roger de Honeden Annalinm pars prior pag. 447. Item de eodem Rege Edvardo quadam die contigit quod cum praedistus Rex Anglorum Edwardus Regninâ comite Haraldo deducentibus aerarium suum intravit ut pecuniam videret magnam quam Regina Comes Haraldus Rege ipso nesciente colligissent ad opus Regis soilicet per singulos comitatus totius Angliae de unaquaque hida terrae quatuor denarios ut Rex inde contra natale Domini pannos emeret ad opus militum servientium suorum cumque Rex intrasset aerarium suum comitantibus Regâ—â—a Comite Haraldo videt diabolum sedentem inter Denarios illos ait illi Rex quid hic facis cui daemon respondit custodio hic pecuniam meam dixit Rex conjuro te per Patrem Filium Spiritum sanctum ut indices mihi Quamobrem pecunia ista tua est respondens dixit ei daemon Quia injuste accquisita est de substantia pauperum Illi autem qui illum conmitabantur stabant stupefacti audientes quidem illos loquentes neminem autem videntes praeter solum Regem ait illis Rex Reddite denarios istos illis a quibus capti sunt fecerunt sicut praecepit illis Rex which is likewise remembred by Capgrave Surius Ribadeniera and others in the life of King Edward the Confessor From all which relations compared together it is apparent First That Dangeld was a great most heavy and intolerable Tribute first imposed in King Ethelreds reign to pay the Danish Navy and Souldiers then invading Englana to keep them from plundering and spoiling the people 2. That King Swane the invading and usurping Dane after he had gotten the power of this Realm imposed it annualy on the English and made it any early Tribute to pay his Army 3. That the Danish succeding Kings continued and made it a kind of annual revenue to cloath and pay their Souldiers and Marriners for sundry years together 4. That it was yearly paid unto the Kings Exchequer and reduced to a certainty to wit four pence a year out of every Hide or plough land thorowout England or else twelve pence or two shilings a year as the laws of Edward the Confessor the black
Book of the Exchequor and Sir Henry Spelman in his Glossary Title Danegold affirms 5. That King Edwards Officers after the Danish Kings expired reignes did collect it of the English Subjects without his privitie to cloath and pay his Souldiers and followers 6. That he out of mercy piety conscience and justice to his people not only restored it to them when collected and brought into his Exchequer without retaining one farthing of it but likewise for ever released it to them so that it was no more collected during his reign 7. That Taxes unjustly leavied upon the poor oppressed people are very pleasing and acceptable to the devill himself who claimes the money so collected for his own and that the Collectors and exacters of such Taxes though for the payment of Armies and Souldiers are really but the devils agents and instruments who will one day pay them their deserved wages 8. That heavy oppressions and taxes though for pretended publike necessities continued for many years together ought not onely to be eternally remitted but restored when collected by all conscientious pious righteous mercifull Saintlike Kings and Governours 9. That illegall heavy Taxes imposed by or for invading Usurpers if once submitted to and not strongly opposed by the generality of the people wil soon be claymed leavied as a customary early legall revennue both by the imposâ—rs and their successors and hardly be laid down and discontinued again for the peoples ease 10. That this tax of Danegeld amounting but to thirty eight or fourty thousand pounds in one whole year was in truth an heavy and intolerable burden and grievous oppression to the whole Nation fit to be abolished and released especially in times of dearth and scarcity Therefore certainly our late illegal taxes without authority of a free and legall Parliament amounting to 120. 90. or 60. 1000 li. monthly when lowest besids Excises Customes Imposts amounting to twice as much more must certainly be far more grievous intollerable to the Nation and so not onely to be remitted abandoned excluded but accounted for and restored to our exhausted oppressed Nation by all those Governours who pretend themselves saints of the highest forme and men ruling in the fear of God against whom this St. Edward the Confessor will rise up in judgement if they imitate not his just and Saintlike president therein All which considerations I recommend to their own and their Collecters Excisers sadest considerations to meditate seriously upon for the peoples ease William of Malmsburies records of this King Edward that he was in exactionibus vectigalium parcus quippe qui exactores execraretur Till we may be able really to record the like of our new Governours and Princes over us we shall never be either a free a peaceable or happy people not they worthy of the name of Saints or Confessors in any English Annals or Kalenders He addes That King Edward with the touch of his hand did miraculously cure sundry persons of the luxuriant humours and swellings about the neck commonly called the Kings Evill which cure in after ages some falsly ascribed non ex sanctitate sed ex regalis prosapiae haereditate â—â—uxisse not to have issued from his sanctâ—tie but from his hereditary royall bloud If his sanctity in releasing and restoring the formentioned insupportable Tributes of Danegeld shall now cure the hereditary Kings and our new Republiques long continued evill and malady of intolerable Tributes Contributions and Excises in this Age we shall register it to posterity for as great a miracle as his first care of the evill Kings only by his touching of it with his royall sacred hand King Edward about the year 1047. calling out of Normandy certain Normans qui olim pauculis beneficiis inopiam Exulis suppleverant who had there releived and supplied his want during his exil to reward them for their benefits advanced them to places of extraordinary honour and trust about him amongst others he promoted Robert Gemeticensis a monk to the Bishoprick of London then to the Arch-bishoprick of Canterbury William to be his Chaplain first and afterwards Bishop of London and another to the Bishoprick of Dorchester which Jugulphus thus expresseth Rex autem Edwardus natus in Anglia sed Nutritus in Normania diutissime immoratus penè in Gallicum transierat adducens attrahens de NormaÌ„nia plurimos quos variis dignitatibus promotos in immensum exaltabat Praecipuus inter eos erat Robertus Monachus c. Caepit ergò totâ terrâ sub rege sub aliis Normannis introductis Anglicos ritus diminui FrancoruÌ„ mores in multis imitari Gallicum idioma omnes Magnates in suis curiis tanquam magnum gentilitium loqui Chartas Chyrographa sua more Francium confici propriam consuetudinem in his in aliis multis erubescere Thereupon Earle Godwin and his Sons being men of high spirits auctores tutores regni Edvardi were very angry and discontented quod novos homines advenas sibi preferri viderent because they saw these new upstarts and strangers preferred before them yet they never uttered a high word against the King whom they had once advanced Upon this occasion Anno 1051 there arose great discords between the English and these Normans quod Angli aspernantèr ferant superiorem Normani nequeant pati parem Henry Huntingdon records That these Normnans accused Godwin and Swaine and Harold his Sonnes to the King that they went about to betray him wherupon the King calling them into question for it they refused to appear without hostages for their safety upon which the King banished them But William of Malmsbury Roger de Hoveden Matthew Westminster Florentius Wigorniensis Simeon Dunelmensis Bromton Hygden Henry de Knighton Fabram Graston Holmshed Speed and the General Stream of our Historians relating the businesse more fully make this the originall cause of the difference between them and of the Exile of Godwin and his Sons Eustace Earle of Boloyn who had wedded King Edwards Sister ariving at Dover in the moneth of September 1051. one of his Knights seeking lodging unjustly slew one of the Townsmen whereupon the Townsmen slew him The Earle and his followers being enraged thereat slew divers men and women of the Town and trode their children under their own horses feet The Burgesses upon this assembling togetherto resist them after a feirce Encounter put the Earle and his followers to flight slew eighteen or twenty of them in the pursute and wounded many more so that the Earle escaped only with one of his followers to the King then at Glocester where he grievously incensed the King against the Englishmen by reason of this tumult which he and his followers occasioned Whereupon Earle Godwin being much incensed at the slaughter of his men in the Burrowgh of Dover he and his sons assembled a great Armie out of all the Towns and Countries subject to them The King sending for Godwin to