f III LIBRARY OF WELLES LEY COLLEGE PURCHASED FROM LIBRARY FUNDS BOHN'S ANTIQUARIAN LIBRARY THE ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE G. BELL AND SONS, LTD. LONDON : PORTUGAL ST., KINGSWAY CAMBRIDGE : DEIGHTON, BELL AND CO. NEW YORK : THE MACMILLAN CO. BOMBAY : A. H. WHEELER AND CO. ^^ boc l«en • tfiit Vtfion t»U5««d |nib» TAf C01T1AJ1 I'tiJ^iUi oj: •pcttntAU 'imb lAir5u fayri o(^ c^otib hc|t be ^djbm* ytit^tnuijoti cAft^tun ^if^ -jt vtUoJJ'^^tf t)p<t coy jtS jWnr«j^t <of pjlcumtii. J»' t^1>ir ^i^<m Jnf Uni^ nopj><m yM|i^ **! ]^)?<m^Hdf n^ hon b|itct»f. lya t^ <qi cyc^on • Atw ^a. ^syhrnT b«om Abcr ^In3tat|iotib«o^» don pf^ («r'p:anitm.<mJ>a.3C|uib kync em 44 (m|?A.pp he<Uf«i« pn bcot^<m |^ Uii5t 4\inv ^iCl 5e yaz of^ ^be|iiit<in on b^inxene ^^ j^ Un M ^Cf4ttm5<el3e«)bon'^ yepiCDiid liqiiito^a |iw^t^ ct5Ttm ynrcfiu^cc^iyiCyc qu{tr |^ .wemicb^at tiili yi0max\tL\cAyt^tnii^hvmh^him^ (Vniu/f^A'. Ox 6^H-/ FACSIMILE OP THE FIRST PAGE OP THE LAUD MS. PROM THOBPE'S EDITION. (Scale « of the original.) THE ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE EDITED, FROM THE TRANSLATION IN MONUMENTA HISTORICA BRITANNICA AND OTHER VERSIONS, BY IHE LATE J. A. GILES D C.L. NEW EDITION LONDON G. BELL AND SONS, LTD. 1914 111^ \_ReprinUd from Sieve ot^jpe 'plaUs.'] J?/V PREFACE The work which is commonly known as the Saxo!i or Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is a chronological record of important events, chiefly relating to the English race, from the earliest period of the Christian era to the XII. century. It is of a composite character, and has been preserved to the present day in the form of six more or less complete ancient MSS., some of which appear to be independent of each other though traceable to some common original, whilst others are apparently more nearly related by obvious similarities. Four of these are in the British Museum, one in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and another in the library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. In addition to these, there is, in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin, a copy made in 1563—4, by William Lambard, of a MS. which now exists only in the shape of three disfigured leaves. It is one of the Cottonian MSS. in the British Museum, some of which were damaged or destroyed by a fire in Little Dean's Yard, Westminster, in the year 1731. Before its destruction this MS. was printed by Abraham Wheloc in 1633-4; and it is evident that, as far as it goes, it is a copy of the Cambridge MS. These seven MSS., including the — vi PHEFACE. one which is represented by the Dublin copy and Wheloc'ff printed edition, have been distinguished as follows ; Ending at 1. At Cambridge .... 1070 A 2. In the British Museum . 977 B 3. 1066 „ ;, „ . G 4. „ „ , . 1079 D 5. „ Bodleian Library (imperfect) 1154 E b. „ British Museum (imperfect) 1058 P . (The Dublin MS. copy ) ^ ^ ^qq^ ^ ^^^ ^y (Wheloc's printed copy 3 MS. A (CCCG 173) is part of the bequest of Archbishop Parker (died 1575) to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and is now generally known as the Parker MS. It is written in many different hands, but as the entries down to 891 are all in one script, consistent with that date, it is not unreasonable to assume that this copy dates from the days of Alfred the Great, to whom the initiation of this national chronicle is without doubt to be ascribed. 1 1 is also obvious from the entries that it was written at his royal city of Winchester, though it was at a later date supplemented by contemporary scribes at Canterbury. There are, moreover, many interpolations by later hands, and notes by Joscelin, Archbishop Parker's secretary. It i-5 generally regarded as the standard text. IMS. B, in the British Museum (Cott. Tib. A vi.) is all * In Mr. Charles Plummer's edition of " Two Sason Chronicles parallel" the text of G is indicated by the letter A as being a copy \jL the Cambridge MS., which he distinguishes by the symbol K. To his introduction to those parallel texts K and E (Clarendon Press, 18'J9) every student who requires an exhaustive description, audlysis and comparison of all the existing texts in referred. PREFACE. vii in one hand, and is supposed to have been copied about the year 1000, which is not remote from the year 977, at which it ends. The chronicle from which it was directly or indirectly copied was associated with the monastery of Abingdon. MS. C, in the British Museum (Cott. Tib. B i.), is also connected with the same monastery, and has been called the Abingdon Chronicle. It is written in several hands, but from the regularity of its pages it seems to have been transcribed as a whole. It has many annotations of the XVI. century. A peculiarity of both B and C, showing a close connexion, is that they interpolate bodily a number of annals (from 902 to 924) dealing mainly with the deeds of ^thelfled, a Lady of the Mercians, generally designated as the Mercian Register. MS. D, in the British Museum (Cott. Tib. B iv.) is written in several hands, and brings the chronicle down to 1079, but a considerable portion, comprising the years 262 to 693, is missing. The lacuna has been filled by insertions made by Joscelin from monastic records in other versions of the Chronicle. The original MS., though by seven or eight different hands, was all compiled in the latter half of the XI. century, with the exception of one late entry of 1130.* It agrees mostly with MS. C. MS. E, in the Bodleian Library (Laud Misc. 636), was formerly in the possession of Archbishop Laud. It extends to the year 1154, though the last leaf is missing. The greater part of it, to 1121, is apparently in one hand, but the latest entries are probably contemporary with the * This date, in the LIS., is 1080. Mr. Plummer has pointed out that MLXXX. has been erroneously written for MCXXX. viii PPwEFACE. events described. Owing to the numerous entries relating to Peterborough, it evidently came into the possession of that monastery. Its pedigree, as traceable from the original chronicle, diverges more than any other from that of MS. A, with which it has therefore a considerable com- plementary importance, for which reason Messrs. Earle and Plummer made these two texts the groundwork of their editions. MS. F, in the British Museum (Cott. Dom. A viii.), extends to 1058, but is mutilated at the end. It is a compilation from other transcripts, and has little original value, its most remarkable feature being that it is bi-lingual, each entry being written in Latin as well as English. MS. G, the few remains of which are in the British Museum (Cott. Otho B xi), is now only known by the Dublin copy and by Wheloc's printed version. It is practically a copy of A. The minute and exhaustive investigation of the subject by Mr. Plummer, from whom some of these particulars are derived, has proved that the original chronicle estab- lished by Alfred the Great, or any direct copy of it, is no longer extant. MSS. A, B and C, which are practically identical to the year 892, doubtless represent its substance to that date, but it will be noticed by the student that in all of these, from the middle of the eighth century to the middle of the ninth, the events are misdated by two or three years. This has arisen from the fact that a date left blank in the original copy has occasionally been inadvertently filled by the transcriber with the next entry, and so caused a general ante-dating of the succeeding PREFACE. ix annals. Bufc the later portions of MSS. A, C, D and E may all be regarded as contemporary chronicles, and not open to suspicion on chronological grounds. A complete analytical edition in modern English, with corrected dates, is still, and must perhaps remain, a desideratum. The first printed edition of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was that by Abraham Wheelock, or Wheloc, Professor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge. His text was compiled from MS. G (not then destroyed), with additions from A, and was accompanied by a Latin translation. Forty-nine years later a more complete edition, with a Latin translation, was published by Edmund Gibson, of Queen's College, Oxford, afterwards Bishop of London. The first translation into modern English, based on Gibson's version, was made by Miss Anna Gurney, and privately printed at Norwich in 1819. It was a work of great ability, but its publication was prevented by the appearance in 1823 of a text and English translation by Dr. James Ingram, President of Trinity College, Oxford, who had the advantage of his predecessors in collating al! the extant MSS. The following translation by Dr. Giles appeared in 1847. It was based on the materials prepared under the superintendence of Henry Petrie, formerly Keeper of the Records in the Tower. Dr. Giles also acknowledged his obligations to Miss Gurney 's translation, which he used to complete the chronicle, and to Dr. Ingram's account of the various MSS. Mr. Petrie's materials were, in the meantime, used in the compilation of the first volume of Monumenta Historica Britannica, which was published in 1848, and gives a composite text and X PREFACE.