The History of the Norman Conquest of England: The reign of Eadward the Confessor. 1868

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Clarendon Press, 1873

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Page 113 - At last he found his death-wound in an inglorious quarreT, in the personal commission of cruelties which aroused the indignation of his own age; and the mighty King and Conqueror, forsaken by his servants and children, had to owe his funeral rites to the voluntary charity of a loyal vassal, and within the walls of his own minster he could not find an undisputed grave. Such was William the Great, a title which, in the...
Page 351 - He is a full believer in Eadward's miraculous power, but he again (ii. 222) lets us see that there were two opinions on the subject. Some people affirmed that Eadward cured the evil, not by virtue of his holiness, but by virtue of his royal descent ; " Nostro tempore quidam falsam insumunt operam, qui asseverant istius morbi curationem non ex sanctitate, sed ex regalis prosapiae haereditate fluxisse.
Page 106 - Washington ; he look on his work as being any the less trustworthy on account of its poetical shape. But of course, whenever he departs from contemporary authority, and merely sets down floating traditions nearly a hundred years after the latest events which he records, his statements need to be very carefully weighed.
Page 268 - Billingsley, and for the restoration of ^Elfgar to his earldom. All that we know of the good old Earl of the Mercians leads us to look on him as a man who was quite capable of sacrificing the interests and passions of himself or his family to the general welfare of his country. § 3. From Harold's first Campaign against Grvffydd to the Deaths of Leofric and Ralph.
Page 157 - ... vadimonium sumere. Quod si ab aliquo fieri contigisset contra hoc decretum publicum : aut de vita componeret, aut a christianorum consortio expulsus patria pelleretur. Hoc insuper placuit universis, veluti vulgo dicitur, ut treuga domini vocaretur.
Page 113 - It is hardly superstitious to point out, alike with ancient and with modern authorities, that the New Forest became a spot fatal to William's house, and that, after the death of Waltheof, his old prosperity forsook him. Nothing indeed- occurred to loosen his hold on England ; but his last years were spent in bickerings with his unworthy son, and in a petty border warfare, in which the Conqueror had, for the first time, to undergo defeat. At last he found his deathwound in an inglorious quarrel, in...
Page 362 - ... inclinabat assensum." Of the charges of sacrilege brought against Godwine and Harold I shall speak in the next Note ; but this may be the best place to quote an entry in Domesday, which seems to charge Harold with defrauding the King. At p. 32 we read of lands in Surrey, " Heraldus tenuit de Rege E. Antequam Heraldus habuisset, defendebat se pro xxvii hidis ; postquam habuit pro xvi hidis ad libitum Heraldi. Homines de hundreda numquam audierunt nee viderunt brevem ex parte Regis qui ad tantum...
Page 420 - THE only writer who puts on anything like a tone of censure with regard either to Harold's conduct at Porlock or to Godwine's plundering along the south coast, is William of Malmesbury, and he does not draw the proper distinction between the doings of father and son. His words (ii. 199) are, " Exsulum quisque, de loco suo egressi, Britanicum mare circumvagari, littora piraticis latrociniis infestare, de cognati populi opibus preedai eaeimias conjecture.
Page 403 - Scaccario (ap. Madox, Exchequer, p. 27). In all these passages (except perhaps in that of Bromton, who calls it " tallagium datum Danis") the Danegeld is described as a tax levied, not to buy off Danes, but to hire mercenaries, whether Danes or others, to resist them. Thus in the " Laws of Eadward" the description given is as follows ; " Denegeldi redditio propter piratas primitus statuta est.
Page 108 - William passed to one who shared largely in his mere intellectual gifts, but who had no fellowship in the greater and nobler elements of his character. To appreciate William the Conqueror we have but to cast our glance onwards to William the Red. We shall then understand how men writhing under the scorpions of the son might well look back with regret to the whips of the father. We can understand how, under his godless rule, men might feel kindly towards the memory of one who never wholly cast away...

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