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Pope's confirmation for the privileges of the rising minster of Saint Peter, and they returned laden with letters from Nicolas to that effect.1 Walter and Gisa obtained without difficulty the consecration which they sought; 2 but Ealdred was at first not only refused the pallium which he asked for, but was deprived, so far as a Pope could deprive an English Prelate, of all his preferments. The ground for this severity was, according to one account, the charge of simony; according to another, it would seem to have been an objection to an uncanonical translation or to the holding of two Bishopricks at once.1 At any rate, Ealdred retired in confusion. The whole party now prepared to return to England, but not in one body. Judith and the greater part of the company were sent first, and they reached England without any special adventure. But the Earl, and seemingly all the three Bishops, stayed behind to prosecute the cause of Ealdred. At last, thinking the matter hopeless, they also set out to return home. On their way they were attacked by robbers, seemingly the robber nobles of the country. The brigands seem to have been specially anxious to seize the person of the Earl of the Northumbrians. A noble youth named Gospatric' said that he was the Earl, and was carried off accordingly. But, after a while, the robbers, admiring his courage and appearance, not only set him free

was held in 1060, but the real date was April 13, 1059. See its Acts in Pertz, Legg. ii. Ap. 177; Milman, iii. 49. And cf. above, p. 449.

1 See what profess to be the letters in Cod. Dipl. iv. 183.

2 Gisa himself (Hist. Ep. Som. 16) fixes the day to April 15th.

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3 Vita Eadw. 411. Apostolicis et pontificalibus decretis examinantibus et omni synodo censente, a petitione suâ repulsus, non solum usum pallii non obtinuit, verum ab episcopatus gradu dejectus in hâc confusione recedere habuit."

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4 Will. Malms. Gest. Pont. 154. Gisonem et Walterum voti compotes reddidit, qui essent non usquequaque contemnendæ scientiæ et nullius notati ignominiâ simoniæ. Aldredum suâpte responsione culpabilem utrobique repertum omni honore severus exspoliavit." But, in his Life of Wulfstan (Ang. Sac. ii. 250), he says, "Nam nec ille Wigornensi præsulatui renunciare, nec Papa nisi cederet Eboracensi eum pallio insignire volebat." The Biographer (411) is not very clear, but he seems rather to make the translation the objection; "Perscrutatus ergo qualiter ad sacros accessisset ordines, eo

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gratuitu confitente inventus est a primo ordinationis suæ episcopio [episcopo in the printed text] ad aliud commigrâsse contra canones."

5 Vita Eadw. 412. "Quum caussâ Aldredi Episcopi Dux in Româ prehendinaret diutius, uxorem suam et omnem regiæ dignitatis suæ comitatum præmiserat cum suis majoris numeri hominibus, et hi processerant prospere."

• The Biographer, who first (411) calls them "latrones," afterwards (412) promotes them into "militares.”

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"Adolescens Gaius Patricius nomine (411). The same strange perversion of the name is made by Orderic (512 C). There can, I think, be no doubt that this Gospatric is the Earl of William's reign. The Biographer describes him as being "de ejusdem regis Ædwardi genere." The kinsmen both of Eadward and William are endless, but in this case we can really make out the kindred. Gospatric was the grandson of Eadward's half-sister; "Erat enim ex matre Algithâ, filiâ Uchtredi comitis, quam habuit ex Algivâ, filiâ Agelredi regis.' (Sim. Dun. X Scriptt. 205.) See vol. i. p.

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NICOLAS YIELDS TO THE THREATS OF TOSTIG. 305

without ransom, but restored to him all that they had taken from him.1 The rest returned to the presence of the Pope, with nothing but the clothes on their backs.2 Tostig seems now to have mingled threats and entreaties. One account describes the Pope as touched with the desolate condition of the whole party, and as therefore yielding the more readily to Tostig's petition in favour of Ealdred.3 Another version makes the Earl take a higher tone. If the Pope and his authority were so little cared for in his own neighbourhood, who could be expected to care for his excommunications in distant countries? He was fierce enough towards suppliants, but he seemed unable to do anything against his own rebels. Let him at once cause the property to be restored, which had most likely been seized with his own connivance. If Englishmen underwent such treatment almost under the walls of Rome, the King of the English would certainly withdraw all tribute and payment of every kind from the Roman See. He, Earl Tostig, would take care that the King and his people should know the truth in all its fulness. This account carries more of the stamp of truth with it than the other more courtly version. At any rate, whether the voice of Tostig was the voice of entreaty or the voice of threatening, to his voice the Pope at last yielded. Ealdred was restored to his Archbishoprick and invested with the pallium, on the single condition of his resigning the see of Worcester.5 The losses which the Earl and the Bishops had undergone at the hands of the robbers were made good to them out of the Papal treasury, and they set forth again on their journey homeward. They must have come back through France, as Burhhard died on the way at Rheims. He was there buried in the churchyard of the lately hallowed Abbey of Saint Remigius," a house which his father Ælfgar enriched for his sake. Ealdred, Tostig, and the rest came back, honoured and rejoicing, to England.

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1 "Suis propriis rebus donatus," says the traheret, se non defuturum rerum veritati Biographer, 412.

2 Will. Malms. Gest. Pont. 154. "Ita differenti effectu quum regrederentur [he conceives Gisa and Walter to have been of the party], una pariter ærumna omnes involvit ; nam prædonibus irruentibus, præter simplices vestes exspoliatis omnibus, ad nummum valens corporibus tamen illæsis Romam refugere."

3 Vita Eadw. 412. "Confuse ergo et miserabiliter reversis Romana pietas indoluit, veritusque Dominus Papa maxime clarissimi Ducis petitionem," &c.

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4 Will. Malms. Gest. Pont. 154. turum ut hæc Rex Anglorum audiens tributum Sancti Petri merito Nicolao subVOL. II.

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exaggerendæ. Hoc minarum fulmine Romani territi Papam flexerunt." This follows a good hearty English denunciation, of which I have given the substance in the text. To the same effect in the Life of Wulfstan, ii. 250.

5 Such is William of Malmesbury's account. The Biographer, in his rhetoric, leaves out the condition.

6 Vita Eadw. 412. "Ducem consolatus est caritativâ allocutione, allatis insuper magis xeniis ex beati Petri largitate."

7 See above, p. 73. A large part of the church consecrated in 1049 still remains, and Burhhard's name is still remembered. 8 See Appendix II.

But in this, as in so many other cases, we see the evil effects which followed on this passion for pilgrimages, at least among Kings and Earls and other rulers of men. It was with a true wisdom that the Witan of England had hindered the intended pilgrimage of Eadward.1 None but the great Cnut could leave his realm without danger and could keep distant nations in subjection by the mere terror of his name. We have seen what evils were undoubtedly brought upon Normandy by the pilgrimage of Robert; we have seen what lesser evils were probably brought upon England by the pilgrimage of Harold. So now the absence of her Earl, even on so pious a work, brought no good to Northumberland. No doubt the times must have seemed specially secure both at home and abroad, when two of the great Earls of England could venture to leave the Kingdom at the same time, and when Northumberland could be deprived of the care at once of her temporal and of her spiritual chief. Her only dangerous neighbour was bound to Tostig by the closest of artificial ties. But so tempting an opportunity for a raid overcame any scruples which either gratitude or the tie of sworn brotherhood might have suggested to the mind of Malcolm. The King of Scots entered Northumberland (1061); he cruelly ravaged the country, and did not even show reverence to Saint Cuthberht by sparing his holy isle of Lindisfarn.2 We have no further details. Whether Tostig took any sort of vengeance for this seemingly quite unprovoked injury is by no means clear. A dark allusion of one writer may or may not imply that Tostig on his return revenged the raid of Malcolm and drove him to submit and give hostages. Otherwise we hear nothing more of Scottish affairs during the remaining years of the reign of Eadward.

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It always marks a season of comparative quiet when our attention is chiefly occupied by ecclesiastical affairs. During four whole years Malcolm's raid into Northumberland is the only political or military event which we have to record. We now enter on the last year (1062) of this time of quiet. In the year following the pilgrimage of Tostig, Ealdred having at last resigned the see of Worcester, a successor had to be chosen. England was at that moment blessed or cursed with visitors of a kind who, to say the least, did not in those days often reach her shores, namely Legates from the Roman See. Pope Nicolas died soon after the visit of Ealdred and Tostig, and was succeeded by Alexander the Second, a name afterwards to become only too well known in English history. By commission from this Pontiff, Ermen

1 See above, p. 75.

2 Sim. Dun. Gest. Regg. 1061. "Interim Rex Scottorum Malcolmus sui conjuncti fratris, scilicet Comitis Tostii, comitatum ferociter depopulatus est, violatâ

pace sancti Cuthberti in Lindisfarnensi insulâ." Compare 1096, and De Obs. Dun. 157. Hinde.

See the passage of the Biographer quoted in Appendix EE.

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VACANCY OF THE SEE OF WORCESTER.

307 frid, Bishop of Sitten, with a nameless colleague, came to England early in the year. It is clear that their errand was in some way connected with the appointment to the see of Worcester, besides any other matters with which they may have been charged for the enlightenment of the King's private conscience or for the forwarding of his foundation at Westminster.1 Possibly their personal presence was thought necessary in order to ensure the surrender by Ealdred of a Bishoprick to which he clave with special affection.2 At any rate it was Ealdred who received the Legates, who conducted them on their journey through a great part of England, and who at last quartered them at Worcester, under the care of Wulfstan, the holy Prior of that church. There they were to remain through Lent, waiting for the Easter Gemót, in which the King and his Witan were to decide on all the matters which had brought them to England. With regard to the succession to his see of Worcester, Ealdred was for a while doubtful between two candidates. One was Ethelwig, now Abbot of Evesham, who had so long acted as his deputy in the administration of the Hwiccian diocese.5 This Prelate is described as a man of noble birth and of consummate prudence in all matters human, perhaps in matters divine also. One part at least of his character was not belied by his actions. We shall find that he lived in high favour equally under Eadward, Harold, and William, and died in full possession of his Abbey eleven years after the Conquest. He was not unnaturally anxious to succeed to the full possession of a see which he had so long administered, and with whose affairs he must have been thoroughly conversant. Ealdred himself doubted for a while whether the see would be more safely entrusted to the worldly wisdom of Ethelwig or to the simple piety of Wulfstan the Prior. Wulfstan,

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1 Vita Wlst. 250. Ealdred is to resign Worcester, and a good successor is to be chosen; " Hujus igitur conditionis arbitros, et quædam alia ecclesiastica negotia in Angliâ expedituros, Cardinales adductos Archiepiscopus Regi exhibuit." Florence (1062) calls them " legatos sedis apostolicæ. . . Armenfredum scilicet, Sedunensem Episcopum, et alium, qui a Domino Papâ Alexandro pro responsis ecclesiasticis ad Regem Anglorum Eadwardum missi . . . Wigorniæ.. degebant." I quote the fuller Life by William of Malmesbury as "Vita Wlstani," and the shorter one by Heming by name.

2 Vita Wlst. 250. "Adeo illum amor Wigornia devinxerat."

3 Florence mentions their sojourn at Worcester, and their admiration of Wulf

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stan; the Life makes them actually his guests.

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4 Fl. Wig. Exspectantes responsum

suæ legationis usque ad curiam regalem proximi Pascha." So the Life, but less clearly.

5 See above, pp. 248, 292, 437.

6 Vita Wlst. 251. "Maxima quantum ad sæculum prudentiæ, quantum ad religionem non minima." But the Evesham historian (p. 87) calls him "honestis moribus valde probatum, tam generis nobilitate quam divinâ lege ac sæculari prudentiâ plurimum valentem."

7 Hist. Evesh, pp. 88, 89.

8 Vita Wlst. 251. "Quamvis Æthelwius sollicite anniteretur partibus."

9 Ib. " Aldredus, pro pacto quod fecerat Apostolico, nonnullo tempore fluctaverat

the friend of Harold, was now about fifty years of age.1 He was the son of Æthelstan, a Thegn of Warwickshire, and his wife Wulfgifu, and he must have been born among the horrors of the later years of Æthelred. Brought up, not as a monk, but as a lay student, in the Abbey of Peterborough, he made great proficiency in the learning of the time under a master whose name Ervenius seems to imply a foreign origin.3 His parents, as they grew old, took monastic vows by mutual consent, but Wulfstan for some while lived as a layman, distinguished for his success in bodily exercises as well as for his virtuous and pious demeanour. His chastity especially was preserved unsullied under unusually severe trials.* At last, when he still could not have been above twenty-six years old," he received ordination as a presbyter at the hands of Brihtheah, Bishop of Worcester. This was somewhat against his own will, as he shrank from the responsibilities of the priesthood. The friendly Prelate vainly pressed on him a good secular living in the neighbourhood of the city. But the determination of Wulfstan was fixed, and Brihtheah had soon to admit him as a monk of the cathedral monastery, where, after a while, he was promoted by Ealdred to the rank of Prior. Here he distinguished himself by every monastic perfection; he was eminent as a preacher, and it is still more interesting to read of his habit of going through the country to baptize the children of the poor, to whom-so our monastic informants tell us—the greedy secular clergy refused the first sacrament except on payment of a fee. The virtues of Wulfstan

animo; utrum ad episcopatum eligeret Ethelwii perspicacem industriam in sæculo, an Wlstani simplicem religionem in Deo. Erant enim illi viri Wigornensis dioecesis diverso respectu præstantissimi."

1 Flor. Wig. 1062. plus quinquagesimo."

"Anno ætatis suæ

2 Æthelstan in the Life, Eatstan according to Florence.

Vita Wlst. 244. Ervenius was a skilful illuminator, and wrote a Sacramentary for King Cnut and a Psalter for the Lady Emma. Cnut (249) gave both the books to the Emperor Conrad; his son Henry the Third gave them to Ealdred, who brought them back from Köln and gave them to Wulfstan. Emma had another Psalter whose adventures in Normandy we have already come across. See above, p. 153.

The story is given at length in the Life, p. 245.

5 Brihtheah was Bishop from 1033 to 1038 (Chron. Wig. 1033, Ab. 1038). This fixes the date of Wulfstan's ordination and

profession.

Brihtheah was one of the embassy which took Gunhild to Germany (Heming, Cart. 267). He had a brother Ethelwig, who enlarged the presbytery of Saint Peter's Church in Worcester (Ib. 342). 6 Vita Wlst. 246. "Obtulit ei plusquam semel Antistes ecclesiam suburbanam, cujus opulenti reditus ad quotidianam stipem satis superque sufficerent."

7 Ib. 247. "Præpositus, ut tunc, Prior, ut nunc dicitur, monachorum constitutus." "Prior et pater congregationis," says Florence, adding "ab Aldredo episcopo ponitur." It will be remembered that in a cathedral monastery the Bishop was Abbot; the Prior therefore was the immediate head of the society.

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8 Vita Wist. 248. 'Jam enim venalitas ex infernalibus umbris emerserat, ut nec illud gratis presbyteri præberent infantibus sacramentum, si non infarcirent parentes marsupium." Adam of Bremen (iv. 30) brings the same charge against the Norwegian and Danish clergy; but he allows

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