which himself caused to be built, and hallowed in God's and Olave's name." Tostig, Harold's brother, succeeds to the government of Northumbria.

A witenagemot is summoned at London, in Mid-Lent, at which Elfgar is outlawed, "well-nigh without guilt." Elfgar hires a fleet in Ireland, and with the help of Griffin, king of South Wales, defeats Ralf the earl1, and burns Hereford, Oct. 24.

Harold marches against them, and having fortified Hereford, peace is made. "And then they inlawed Elfgar the earl, and gave him all that before had been taken from him; and the fleet went to Chester, and there awaited their pay, which Elfgar had promised them."

A.D. 1056. Leofgar, the mass-priest (chaplain) of Harold, is appointed bishop of Hereford. "He forsook his chrism and his rood, his ghostly weapons, and took to his spear and to his sword, after his bishophood; and so went to the field against Griffin, the Welsh king; and there was he slain, and his priests with him, and Elfnoth the shire-reeve, and many good men with them; and the others fled away; this was eight days before Midsummer," (June 17.)

"It is difficult to tell the distress, and the marching all, and the camping, and the travail and destruction of men, and also of horses, which all the English army en

"Without any kind of guilt," according to another MS., whilst a third says, "It was cast upon him that he was a traitor to the king, and to all the people of the land. And he made a confession of it before all the men who were there gathered; though the word escaped him unintentionally."

e

The husband of his daughter Githa, who afterwards married Harold.

The son of Goda, the king's sister, and commander of the Norman mercenaries. He died the following year.

dured, until Leofric the earl came thither, and Harold the earl, and Bishop Aldred [of Worcester], and made a reconciliation there between them; so that Griffin swore oaths that he would be to King Edward a faithful and unbetraying under-king."

A.D. 1057. "Edward the atheling, King Edmund's son, came hither to land, and soon after died; and his body is buried within St. Paul's minster at London 8.”

"In the same year died Leofric the earl, on the second of the calends of October, [Sept. 30]; he was very wise for God, and also for the world, which was a blessing to all this nation. He lies at Coventry; and his son Elfgar succeeded to his government."

A.D. 1058. Elfgar is again outlawed, but soon' reinstated, "with violence," by the aid of Griffin of North Wales.

"And this year came a fleet from Norway; it is longsome to tell how all these matters went."

The sees of Wilton and Sherborne united.

Bishop Aldred, of Worcester, having built the minster at Gloucester, goes to Jerusalem, by way of Hungary, "with such splendour as none other had displayed before him, and himself there devoted to God; and a worthy gift he also offered to our Lord's tomb, that was a golden chalice of five marks of very wonderful

work."

Although Palestine had fallen into the hands of the Mohammedans early in the seventh century, it was not until about the close of the tenth that any serious diffi

One MS. of the Saxon Chronicle has a poetical lament for him, manifestly written after the Norman invasion.

culty was opposed to the pilgrimages which, at least as early as the time of Constantine (A.D. 313—337), it had become usual to make to the scenes sanctified by the presence and sufferings of the Redeemer. The caliph Hakem, who ruled Egypt and Syria, in the year 1009 forbade the resort of pilgrims, and destroyed the church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem; but this persecution ceased with his death, and, warned by the outrages they had suffered, the pilgrims now generally travelled in bodies able and willing to defend themselves if assailed. Such, probably, was the case with the Bishop Aldred and his company, as it certainly was a few years after (A.D. 1064) with the archbishop of Mentz, who, accompanied by three bishops and 7,000 men, proceeded to the Holy City, and on the way sustained a siege in a deserted castle until relieved for a sum of money by a Saracen emir. These armed pilgrims were the pre-. cursors of the vast hosts which, before the close of the century, established the Christian kingdom of Jerusalem.

A.D. 1061. Tostig and his wife1 make a journey to Rome.

A.D. 1063. Harold and Tostig invade Wales, both by sea and land.

The country is subdued, Griffin is killed by his own people, Aug. 5, and his head sent to Harold, who brings it to the king.

Blethgent and Rigwatla, Griffin's brothers, swear fealty to the king, and are allowed to govern the land.

h Judith, daughter of Baldwin IV. of Flanders: Tostig was con sequently brother-in-law of William of Normandy.

L

A.D. 1065. The Welsh, under Caradoc, son of Griffin, destroy a fort at Portskeweth, (Porth Iscoed, near Chepstow,) which Harold had erected, Aug. 24.

The people of Northumbria rise against Tostig's government, outlaw him, and kill his house-carles, and seize his treasures, in October. They choose Morcar, son of Elfgar, for their earl.

Morcar, being joined by his brother Edwin and many Britons, marches south as far as Northampton. Harold being sent against them, "they laid an errand upon him to King Edward, and also sent messengers with him, and begged that they might have Morcar for their earlk. And the king granted it, and sent Harold again to them at Northampton, on the eve of St. Simon's and St. Jude's mass, (Oct. 27); and he made known the same to them, and delivered a pledge thereof unto them, and he there renewed Canute's law'. And the northern men did much harm about Northampton the while that he went on their errand, inasmuch as they slew men, and burned houses and corn, and took all the cattle which they might come at, that was many thousand; and many hundred men they took and led north with them; so that that shire, and the other shires which there are nigh, were for many years the worse.'

22

i Tostig was then at Britford, in Wiltshire, with the king. k Harold is often blamed, as if he had acted in an unfriendly way by Tostig, but the following testimony from the Cottonian MS. of the Saxon Chronicle is strongly in his favour: "There was a great gemot at Oxford; and there was Harold the earl, and would work a reconciliation if he might, but he could not; but all Tostig's earldom him unanimously forsook and outlawed, and all who with him lawlessness upreared, because he robbed God first, and all those bereaved over whom he had power of life and land.'

1 See p. 156.

Tostig, with his wife, "and all those who would what he would," retires to Flanders, to Earl Baldwin.

66

'King Edward came to Westminster at midwinter, (Christmas,) and there caused to be hallowed the minster which himself had built to the glory of God and of St. Peter, and of all God's saints; and the church-hallowing was on Childermass-day," (Dec. 28.)

A.D. 1066. King Edward dies, Jan. 5; he is buried at Westminster the next day, "within the newly hallowed church."

HAROLD II.

HAROLD, the son of Godwin, immediately succeeded Edward, either chosen by a general assembly, or, as is with less probability asserted, named by him on his death-bed; the claims of Edgar Atheling being in either case passed over; but though at once hallowed king, "he with little quiet abode therein, the while that he wielded the realm." His brief reign of "forty weeks and one day" saw two formidable invasions of the country, and three great battles, the last of which swept away the Saxon rule, which, though undergoing many

m

Perhaps both statements are true, as one MS. of the Saxon Chronicle says, "Harold the earl succeeded to the kingdom of England, even as the king had granted it to him, and men also had him chosen thereto." The Heimskringla, or Chronicle of the Kings of Norway, in the saga of Harold Hardrada, gives this account of Harold's accession: "It is said that when the king was approaching his last hour, Harold and a few others were with him. Harold first leant down over the king, and then said, 'I take you all to witness that the king has now given me the kingdom, and all the realm of England,' and then the king was taken dead out of bed. The same day there was a meeting of the chiefs, at which there was some talk of choosing a king, and then Harold brought forward his witnesses that King Edward had given him the kingdom on his dying day."