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the existence of distinct annals in Northumbria and Mercia, and to help on the progress of national unity by reflecting everywhere the same national consciousness.

When his work on Bæda was finished, Ælfred, it is thought, began his translation of the Consolation of Bothius; and it is not improbable that the metrical translation of the Metra of Boethius was also from his hand. From philosophy and this effort at poetry he turned to give to his people a book on practical theology. As far as we know, the translation of the Pastoral Rule of Pope Gregory was his last work, and of all his translations it was the most carefully done. It is only as we follow the king in the manifold activity of his life that we understand his almost passionate desire for that "stillness" which was essential to his work. But it was only by short spaces that the land was "still," and once more Ælfred's work of peace was to be broken off by a renewal of the old struggle.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Plummer, Life and Times of Alfred the Great. Pauli, Life of King Alfred, an old but still useful work. Conybeare, Alfred in the Chroniclers, especially valuable for the source material collected. Stevenson, Asser's Life of King Alfred, a critical edition of this famous work. Bowker (editor), Alfred the Great (1899). Ramsay, Foundations of England, Vol. I, chap. xv, a dry but reliable account. Hodgkin, A Political History of England to 1066, chap. xvii.

CHAPTER V

THE REIGN OF CNUT

THOUGH Alfred's successors wrested from the Danes the English territory which had been lost, they were not able to establish a stable and permanent government strong enough to resist all attacks on national independence. Toward the close of the tenth. century the Danes began to harry and invade the land in their old fashion. For a time they were bought off with heavy grants of money, but they were bent on conquest. In 1016 Edmund Ironside, badly supported by his own followers, was forced to share his kingdom with the Danish leader Cnut, and, as the English king died in the same year, the latter was able to make himself master of the country.

§ 1. Accession of Cnut and Settlement of his Kingdom1

Immediately after the death of Eadmund, his powerful vassal, Cnut, summoned the bishops, ealdormen, thanes, and all the chief men of England to a great assembly at London. On their appearance before him, as if distrustful of his own memory, he desired those who were witnesses of what had passed between him and Eadmund, when they agreed to divide the kingdom, to declare what had been said regarding the brothers and sons of the latter; whether in the case of his surviving Eadmund, the throne should devolve on him or on them. The base and selfish courtiers immediately declared on oath that Eadmund, neither in his lifetime nor when at the point of death, had ever designed any portion of his kingdom for his brothers; but that Cnut, according to the known will of Eadmund, should aid and support his children until they were of age to assume the reins of govern

ment.

1

Lappenberg, A History of England under the Anglo-Saxon Kings, Vol. II, pp. 196 ff.

This declaration of the exclusion of the brothers was, at a time when the pretensions of minors to the throne were seldom regarded, all that Cnut required in order to be acknowledged king of all England. With few exceptions, the persons assembled swore to choose him for their king, humbly to obey him, and to pay tribute to his army; and, having received his pledge given with his naked hand, and the oaths of the Danish chiefs, they treated with contempt the brothers and sons of Eadmund and declared them unworthy ever to ascend the throne. Of these the clito Eadwig, the highly revered brother of Eadmund, was pronounced worthy of banishment; but Cnut, who naturally feared him as a rival above all his brothers, lost no time in deliberating with Eadric as to the readiest means of destroying him. Eadric hereupon introduced to Cnut, as a fitting instrument, a certain nobleman named Ethelweard, to whom a great reward was offered for the head of the prince, but who, while expressing his readiness, had no intention to perpetrate the deed. The prince, therefore, for that time, escaped with life.

After a short interval, in the beginning of the following year, the election of Cnut took place at London, to which the vassals from the remotest parts were summoned. Having entered into the customary engagements with the nobles and people, and exchanged oaths of lasting friendship and oblivion of all former enmities, he ordained a new division of the kingdom. From the few ealdormen, whose names have been transmitted to us, it would seem that, even in the last years of Æthelred, the division of the country into a number of small provinces had been thought disadvantageous; but Cnut went further in the work of reform by dividing England into four parts only. Of these he reserved Wessex for his own immediate government, Eadric retained Mercia, East Anglia was assigned to Thorkell, who had espoused Eadgyth, the widow of the ealdorman Ulfcytel; Northumbria was bestowed on Eric, the former jarl of Norway.

§ 2. Cnut and his Rivals

A series of measures was next adopted for the security of Cnut against the members of the legitimate royal family. The ætheling Eadwig, against whom a decree of banishment had already been pronounced by the Witan at London, was declared an outlaw, as well as another Eadwig, probably a relation of the royal house, who, for reasons with which we are unacquainted, was

called the "king of the churls or peasants." The two sons of Eadmund, Eadward and Eadmund, the eldest scarcely two years old, were sent by Cnut to his half-brother Olaf, king of Sweden, who, it seems, would neither take charge of guests who might one day involve him in difficulties, nor, yielding to the wishes and, as it is said, secret requests of Cnut, cause them to be murdered. The children were, therefore, sent to Stephen, king of Hungary, the brother-in-law, by his wife Gisela, of the German king and emperor, Henry the Second, who, as well as Stephen, was distinguished by the title of "Saint."

Cnut had now removed his most dangerous enemies from England. Olaf of Norway (if the poetic sagas of Snorre have any historic foundations), who, after the death of Eadmund, afforded succor to his brothers, had been beaten back, and over the rest of the north the power of Cnut was supreme, either directly or through his relations. The chief danger threatened him from Normandy, where Elfgifu-Emma, the widow of Ethelred, and her two sons were residing with her brother Richard the Second, surnamed the Good. After so many deeds of violence, the policy of the Northern conqueror excites our astonishment, which prompted him to offer his hand to the widow of the Anglo-Saxon king, and, without consideration for his and her elder children, to promise the succession to those they might have in common. By the end of July this marriage was completed, one consequence of which seems to have been, besides a closer alliance with Duke Richard, the adoption of some milder measures, as we find that Eadwig, "the king of the churls," made his peace with the king

But Cnut could not consider himself secure while surrounded by so many powerful Anglo-Saxons, and in the same year he caused Eadwig the ætheling to be murdered. Eadric of Mercia also, who had so greatly facilitated his attainment to the throne of England, but was an object of hatred both to the Danes and Saxons, met with the fate he so richly merited. During the Christmas festival an altercation arose between Cnut and Eadric, when the latter, with the view apparently of obtaining some further rewards, exclaimed, "It was for you that I deserted Eadmund, and from fidelity to you I afterwards destroyed him." "Then you deserve death," answered the irritated monarch, "for treason against God and against me; for having slain your rightful sovereign and my sworn brother." Hereupon he summoned to his presence the jarl Eric, who was at hand, and who, on a word from his master, raised his battle-axe and felled the traitor to the earth.

His body being cast over the city wall, was there left unburied. At the same time, on mere suspicion, he caused to be slain Northman, the son of Leofwine the ealdorman, one of the chief of Eadric's adherents; Æthelweard, the son of Æthelmær the Great, and Brihtric, the son of Elfheah. Northman's possessions were inherited by his brother Leofric, who long enjoyed the favor of Cnut. One motive for the destruction of so many Anglo-Saxons may have been the necessity of rewarding the Danish warriors. with lands, and thereby fixing them in England. On the other hand, all those Anglo-Saxons who, by treason or weakness, had contributed to the overthrow of the old dynasty, were with great rigor banished by Cnut from his presence, and even from the kingdom, as useless and dangerous. A heavy Danegeld of seventytwo thousand pounds which was imposed on the English, besides ten thousand five hundred pounds, to be paid by the citizens of London alone, closed the hostile measures of the new sovereign against England, where during the whole remaining part of his reign we meet only with one trace of disturbance caused by the natives. After the above-mentioned oppressive tax was paid, Cnut sent his fleet of about fifty ships back to Denmark.

83. Cnut as Ruler

A remarkable change in the government of Cnut is at this time observable: we perceive him, if not a ruler to be compared with Charles the Great, yet a conqueror who was not hated, and under whom the people were probably happier than they had latterly been under their native sovereigns. The stern warrior appears from this time as a provident and wise ruler, capable of valuing and promoting and profiting by all the blessings of peace. The legal state of the country was settled in a great witenagemot at Oxford, and the legislation as it had been in the days of King Eadgar adopted as the model. The laws of Eadgar had shown particular regard to the Danes dwelling in England, while in those of Æthelred, as far as we are acquainted with them, similar provisions do not appear; they may even have contained enactments by which the customary laws of that nation were infringed. Cnut, moreover, devoted the greatest attention to the administration of the laws, and in pursuance of this object frequently journeyed through his English states from one boundary to another, attended by his counsellors and scribes. As a result of these iudicial labors may be regarded the numerous laws enacted

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