names in old English history—was then King. Alfred had to fight the
invaders both on sea and land. In and about Exeter there were several
engagements, resulting in the Danes agreeing to leave Alfred’s
territories. Two years later they broke truce, made a sudden incursion
to Chippenham, and became for a time masters of the west country. This
is the time assigned to the neatherd-cottage negligence of Alfred, in
allowing the cakes to burn in baking, whilst sheltering amongst the wood
and morasses of Somersetshire. After a time he organised a sufficient
army to meet, fight with, and beat the Danes—they gave him oaths and
hostages against further disturbance, and their King Guthrum—thence
called Athelstan—with thirty of his chief followers were baptized. But
the Danes now held East Anglia, Northumbria, and large portions of Essex
and Mercia,—indeed more than one-half of what is now England. Alfred
being in peace during the latter years of his reign, devoted himself to
works of governmental utility, he made a digest of the laws, and saw
that justice was impartially administered; and he was the father of the
English navy. His mind was cultured with the best learning of the times,
and he made Anglo-Saxon translations of the Psalms, of Æsop’s Fables,
and of Bede’s Church History.
In the first year of the tenth century, Alfred’s son, Edward (styled the
Elder, so as not to confuse him with later Edwards), began a reign of
twenty-five years. He was a strong king; through all his reign he had
conflicts with the Danes, who had settled in the north and east of
England; always beating them, and then having to quell fresh
insurrections. And he made himself Over-King of the Scots and Welsh; so
he was the first Anglo-Saxon king who became lord of nearly all Britain.
Wessex, Kent, and Sussex he had inherited, Wales, Strathclyde, and
Scotland acknowledged him as Suzerain. His son, Athelstan, succeeded him
in 925; and the King of England now held such a high place among the
rulers of Western Europe, that several of his sisters married foreign
kings and princes. In 937 a great battle was fought in the North, when a
combination of Scots under Constantine, and Danes and Irish under Anlaf,
were defeated with much slaughter by Athelstan. It is called by the old
chroniclers the Battle of Brunanburg, but the locality is uncertain.
Constantine and Anlaf escaped; but Constantine’s son was killed, as,
says the old chronicler, were “five Danish Kings and seven Jarls.”
Athelstan died in 941. Two of his brothers, and one brother’s son
occupied the throne successively during the next eighteen years. Then,
in 959, Edgar, a grandson of Alfred, then only sixteen years of age, was
by the Witan made King. He was called _The Peaceable_; during his reign
of sixteen years, no foe, foreign or domestic, vexed the land.
Northumbria, extending as far north as the Forth, with Edwinsburh its
border fortress—garrisoned by Danes and Anglo-Saxons—having long been a
trouble to the Kings of Wessex, Edgar divided the earldom. He made
Oswulf Earl of the country beyond the Tees—including the present county
of Northumberland; and Osla, Earl of Deira, where the Danes had ruled,
with York for his chief town; but the Danes were allowed to live
peaceably under their own laws. And Edgar granted Lothian, containing
the counties of Linlithgow, Edinburgh, and Haddington, to Kenneth, King
of Scots, to be held under himself. And thus Lothian was ever after held
by the Scottish Kings, and its English speech became the official
language of Scotland. With Strathclyde, west of the Solway, under a
Scottish prince, the map of the Kingdom of Scotland was now broadly
traced out.
Edgar commuted the annual Welsh tribute to 300 wolves’ heads. He
appointed standard weights and measures, maintained an efficient fleet,
and was altogether a fine example of a man who—although of small stature
and mean presence—by vigour of mind and will, ruled ably and well in
rude times. He was really _Basileus_,—lord-paramount of all Britain.
After his coronation at Bath, which was not before he had reigned
thirteen years—he sailed with his fleet round the western coasts. Coming
to Chester, it is related that eight Kings, viz.: Kenneth of Scotland,
Malcolm of Cumberland, Maccus of the Western Isles, and five Welsh
princes did homage to him. They are said to have rowed him in a boat on
the Dee—he steering—from the palace of Chester to the minster of St.
John, where there was solemn service; and then they returned in like
manner.
But these halcyon days for England of peace and settled government ended
with Edgar. He died in 975, leaving two sons—Edward by a first wife—
Ethelred by a second. Edward succeeded, but reigned only four years,
being assassinated at the instigation of his step-mother, who desired
the crown for her son. Edward was in consequence styled _The Martyr_.
Ethelred was named _The Unready_. He was weak, cowardly, and thoroughly
bad; his long reign of thirty-eight years, was one duration of
wretchedness and confusion. He had hardly begun to reign when the
foreign Danes began to be troublesome, and this time it was a farther
stage of invasion: they meant not plunder or partial settlement, but
conquest!
In the first quarter of this tenth century, the Northmen had taken
possession of a large district on the north of France. Their leader,
Rolf Ganger, became a Christian—or at least was baptized as such,—
married the daughter of Charles the Simple, King of the West Franks, and
was, as Duke of Normandy, confirmed in his possessions—a territory on
either side of the Seine, with Rouen for its capital. And after this,
the Danes and other Northmen, in their expeditions against England, had
assistance from their kinsfolk in Normandy.
Ethelred tried first to bribe the Danes to leave him in peace; and for
the money for this purpose he levied the first direct tax imposed upon
the English nation. It was called Dane-gild, and amounted to twelve
pence on each hide of land, excepting lands held by the clergy. But the
idea was a vain one, for whilst the tax was vexatious, the pirate-ships
still swarmed along the English shores. In 1001, the Danes, under King
Sweyn, attacked Exeter, but were repulsed by the citizens. Then—beating
an English army—they ravaged Devon, Dorset, Hants., and the Isle of
Wight; loading their ships with the spoils. Next year Ethelred gave them
money; but finding this of no use, he devised the mad and wicked scheme
of ordering a general massacre of the Danes residing in England. On St.
Bryce’s Day this massacre, to a large extent, took place; it included
aged persons, women, and children. Gunhild, a sister of Sweyn’s, was one
of the victims. Burning for revenge, Sweyn again invaded England. Exeter
he now took and plundered, and again marched eastwards through the
southern shires. He was generally successful, for there was treason and
incompetency amongst the English leaders; and the unpopularity of
Ethelred was a down-drag on the English cause. Year after year, Sweyn’s
fleets appeared on the fated coasts, and the Danes marched farther and
farther inwards. Through East Anglia they went into the heart of
England, burning Oxford and Northampton.
In August, 1013, Sweyn sailed up the Humber and Trent to Gainsborough.
Here he had submission made to him of the Earl of Northumbria, and of
the towns of Leicester, Lincoln, Nottingham, Stamford, and Derby. He
then marched to Bath, where the western Thanes submitted to him, and
then London submitted. Ethelred and his queen fled to Normandy, Emma,
the Queen, being the Duke’s sister, and Danish Sweyn was virtually King
of England. But he did not long enjoy his conquest; early in 1014 he
died at Gainsborough.
Canute, the son of Sweyn, was a man of strong will, and he had already
achieved warrior renown: but he had a severe struggle before he secured
his father’s conquests. First, after Sweyn’s death, the Witan, after
extorting promises that he would now govern rightly, recalled King
Ethelred. Receiving better support, and his son Edmund, named Ironside,
being an able commander, he defeated Canute, who had to take to his
ships. Then Ethelred died, and Canute returned. There was much
fighting,—London being twice unsuccessfully assaulted by the Danes,—and
then the rival princes, Edmund and Canute, had a conference on a little
island in the Severn. They agreed to a division of the kingdom,—the
Saxon district to be south,—and the Danish district to be north of the
Thames. A few weeks after the treaty, Edmund died, and although he left
a young son Edward, Canute became sole monarch. For twenty-four years,—
1017 to 1041,—England was under Danish rule. Canute married Emma, the
widow of King Ethelred, and he further tried to win over his English
subjects by sending home all Danish soldiers, except a bodyguard of 3000
men. Besides England, he ruled over the three Scandinavian kingdoms in
the north, and is said to have exacted homage from Malcolm, King of
Scotland, and his two under-kings. He was the first Danish King who
professed Christianity. He introduced the faith into Denmark, and
himself made a pilgrimage to Rome. He reigned nineteen years, dying in
1036.
After Canute’s death, the Witan divided England into two portions. The
counties north of the Thames, including London, were assigned to Harold,
a son of Canute by his first wife; and the district south of the river
to Hardicanute, his son by Emma. Harold died in 1039, and Hardicanute
became sole King. He died two years later, and before he was buried, his
half-brother Edward, the son of Ethelred and Emma, and thus a descendant
of Alfred, was chosen King.
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The Last Two Saxon Kings of England.
A notable personage, Earl Godwin, was the chief influence in this
reversion to the old race. Who was Earl Godwin? In 1020, Canute, having
come to trust his English subjects, and wishing to mix the two nations
in the administration of affairs, created Godwin Earl of the West
Saxons. He was an able administrator, an eloquent speaker, of high
courage, and these qualities generally exerted for the freedom and
independence of his country; and he came to have the greatest personal
influence of any man in England. Little is known with certainty of his
birth, but he married Gytha, the sister of Ulf, a Danish Earl, who had
married a sister of Canute, and whose son, Sweyne, became after the
death of Hardicanute, King of Denmark. Godwin had several children, all
of whom occupy conspicuous places in the history of this eleventh
century; the second son, Harold, being the last of the Saxon Kings of
England.
Earl Godwin became the King’s chief minister, and the King married his
daughter Edith. The King lived an ascetical, monkish life, and they had
no children. Edward had been born in England, but on the deposition of
his father Ethelred, his mother Emma took him to the court of her
brother Robert, Duke of Normandy; and he had lived there through the
reigns of Canute and Harold, coming back to England with Hardicanute. He
was thus thoroughly Norman-French in his speech and his manners,—very
fond of his young cousin, Duke William, and he now gathered French
people about him, and promoted them to office and estate. The French
language and fashions prevailed at Edward’s court; and in this language
lawyers began to write deeds, and the clergy to preach sermons. These
foreign modes, so different from the English, gave great displeasure to
the old nobles; and Earl Godwin—although three of his sons had been
advanced to earldoms—rebelled against the King’s authority. After some
fighting, the Earl’s army deserted him at Dover, and he had to seek
refuge in Flanders. His daughter, the queen, was deprived of her lands,
and sent to a nunnery of which the King’s sister was abbess.
At the outbreak of the revolt, Edward asked aid from William; the aid
was not required, but William, then twenty-three years of age, came,
with a retinue of knights to his cousin’s court. They were hospitably
entertained, and it is said that the King promised to bequeath his crown
to William.
Things did not go on well during Godwin’s absence, so when, in 1052, he
and his sons appeared with a fleet in the Channel, there was an under-
current of mutiny in the King’s ships under their French commanders.
“Should Englishmen fight with and slay Englishmen, that outlandish folks
might profit thereby?” So the King had to take Godwin back into his
honours and estates: but he died next year, leaving to Harold his
titles, and his place as foremost man in England.
And now the dangers of a disputed succession loomed over England. The
Witan advised Edward to send for Edward, the son of Edmund Ironside,
then an exile in Hungary. Edward came with his family—a son Edgar, and
three daughters: but he died shortly after his arrival. About this time
Harold was shipwrecked on the Norman coast; William kept him prisoner
for some time, and under circumstances of fraud and chicanery, an oath
was extorted from him to favour William’s pretensions to the English
throne. Edward died on 5th January, 1046, at the age of 65. He was
buried next day in Westminster Abbey, which he had built. There, in the
centre of the magnificent pile, is his shrine, for, about a century
after his death, he was canonised, and awarded the title of _Confessor_.
And now, who was to be chosen King of England? For a choice had to be
made. Edgar the Atheling was quite young, and was hardly English—having
been born and brought up in a foreign land; so, in these unsettled
times, he was not thought of. The Witan were obliged to do what had
never previously been done in English history, and has never been done
since (except partially, in the case of calling William of Orange to
reign jointly with his wife Mary),—to choose a King not of the blood
royal.
But it was not a difficult choice. Amongst the nobles of England, one
man, Harold, stood foremost, both in strength of position and in
personal qualifications. He had now for years been the chief
administrator—a born ruler of men—energetic yet prudent—valiant without
ferocity; and he had been the later recommendation of Edward as his
successor. So, on the very day of Edward’s burial, Harold was crowned in
the same Abbey, King of England.
Harold’s troubles began almost from the day of his coronation. William
sent demands for the crown; Edward had promised it to him, the King’s
nearest of kin, and Harold had sworn over concealed relics, to help him
to it. It was replied that the crown was not disposable by Edward; all
he could do was to recommend a successor to the Witan; and this he had
done in favour of Harold: Edward’s kinship to William was on the
maternal side, not on that of the blood-royal of England: and as to
Harold’s oath, it was extorted by force and fraud, and was entirely
_nil_ in that it pledged Harold to do what he had no right to do,—the
diversion of the crown from the will of the English people. William
stormed and threatened, and, in building ships and organising troops,
made active preparations for the invasion of England.
Harold set about preparations for the defence of his kingdom. He spent
the summer in the south, getting ready a fleet and army. He had to wait
too long for William; provisions falling short in the beginning of
September, he had to disband the most of his troops. And meantime
another foe, and this one of his own house, was intriguing against him—
his brother Tostig. Harold had given Tostig the earldom of
Northumberland; but he reigned so badly that the people rose and
expelled him,—Harold sanctioning the expulsion. Tostig now went to
Harold Hardrada, the King of Norway, and induced him to invade England.
A fleet was sent up the Humber; York was captured, and there Harold
Hardrada was proclaimed King. But English Harold—hastily getting an army
together, met the invaders at Stamford Bridge; and there, on September
25th, a fierce battle was fought,—ending in victory for England; the
Norwegian King and the traitorous Tostig both being slain.
But in meeting the Norwegian invasion, the Anglo-Saxons lost England.
Four days later, William, with a banner consecrated by the Pope, landed
near Pevensey in Sussex. Harold was seated at a banquet in York when the
evil news reached him. And now, the last in a life of turmoil, Harold
began his march through England; collecting on his way what troops he
could, he reached the hill Senlac, nine miles from Hastings, on the 13th
of October. Here he marshalled his army—nearly all on foot—and next day
the Normans attacked him. It was a well-contested fight; but discipline
and knighthood prevailed. The setting sun witnessed a routed English
army, its leader slain, and the Norman William, conqueror of England.
* * * * *
The eleventh century, so momentous in English history, was also an
important one in the history of Scotland. The Norse energy and ability
to rule shewed itself in the Earls of Orkney, who dominated the
Hebrides, and Ross, Moray, Sutherland, and Caithness. About 1010, Earl
Sigurd married the daughter of King Malcolm II. In 1014, Sigurd went
over to Ireland, to aid the Danish kings there against Brian Boru. In a
battle at Clontarf, the Danes were defeated—Sigurd being slain—and the
Celtic dynasty was restored. Sigurd’s territories were divided amongst
two sons by a former marriage, and an infant son, Thurfinn, by Malcolm’s
daughter; to the last was assigned the earldom of Caithness. In 1018—
taking advantage of the distracted state of England in this, the first
year of Canute’s reign—Malcolm invaded upper Northumbria; by a victory
at Carham, near Coldstream on the Tweed, the Lothians were brought more
under his rule. But after Canute’s return from his pilgrimage to Rome,
he invaded Scotland, and received the submission of Malcolm and two
under-kings, Mælbæthe and Jehmarc.
Malcolm II. was succeeded by his grandson Duncan,—a daughter’s son by a
secular abbot of Dunkeld. Duncan’s right was disputed by his cousin
Thurfirm, who was now Earl of Orkney. Duncan went north to check the
advance of his kinsman, and was defeated near the Pentland Firth. But an
invasion of Danes under King Sweyn on the coast of Fife, and which was
probably made in aid of Thurfirm, was defeated by Macbeth, an able
general of Duncan’s, and who, it is said, was also a grandson of
Malcolm’s, by another daughter. Duncan was _probably_—as in
Shakespeare’s great drama—killed by Macbeth. Certainly, to the exclusion
of Duncan’s two sons, Malcolm and Donaldbane, Macbeth seized the crown.
He reigned seventeen years—1040 to 1057—being contemporary with the
Confessor,—a glowing description of whom, posing as a saint with
miraculous powers of healing, occurs in Shakespeare’s play. When, on the
return of Earl Godwin from exile, there was a general exodus of the
Normans, whom Edward had placed in high positions, many of them went to
Scotland, and were well received by Macbeth. He appears historically, in
spite of our great poet’s portraiture of him, to have been an able
monarch; and he might be said to represent Celtic supremacy in Scotland,
as against the tendency to subvert it by Anglo-Saxon alliances. Duncan
had married the daughter of Siward, Earl of Northumbria, and Macbeth had
to resist the attacks of Siward on behalf of his grandson Malcolm.
Malcolm spent his boyhood in Cumbria, and his youth at the court of the
Confessor. He appealed to Edward for help to gain his father’s throne,
and by an English army under Siward, and Macduff, the powerful Thane of
Fife, and Tostig, the son of Earl Godwin, Macbeth was overthrown and
slain.
Malcolm III., named Canmore—“big-head”—reigned thirty-five years, 1058
to 1093. The Norman victory at Hastings brought to the Scottish court,
then at Dunfermline, a number of English refugees—these were a leaven of
higher culture and refinement amongst the rude thanes and chieftains,
and tended to further the advance of civilization, of letters and the
arts of life, throughout the northern kingdom. And numbers of Normans
also came and took service under Malcolm—and thus it came about that not
only in England, but in Scotland also, most of the noble families have
in them a strain of Norman blood.
Amongst the refugees were Edgar Atheling and his sisters, grand-children
of Edmund Ironside. Malcolm married Margaret, the eldest sister; she was
a noble woman, learned, pious, and charitable, doted upon by her
husband, and ever influencing his fierce nature for good. Thus connected
by birth with the heir of the old race of English Kings, Malcolm invaded
Northumberland on behalf of Edgar; but William was too strong for him,
and in turn invaded Scotland. William marched as far north as Abernethy,
where he forced Malcolm to do him homage. William never really
subjugated Northumbria north of the Tyne, but built Newcastle as a
border fortress. After the death of William in 1087, Malcolm made other
invasions of Northumbria, and to consolidate the possession of Lothian,
he removed the seat of government to Edinburgh. In 1093, he made a
desperate attempt to gain the counties of Northumberland and Cumberland;
but, whilst besieging the border fortress of Alnwick, he was attacked,
defeated, and killed by a Norman army.
The marriage of Henry, the youngest son of the Conqueror, with Matilda,
daughter of Malcolm, and niece of Edgar Atheling, united the Norman and
the older English royal lines. Henry’s son William was, in 1120, drowned
in “The White Ship,” and his only other child, Maud, was thus the
rightful heir to the throne. But the proud Norman barons had not been
used to female rule; so, after Henry’s death, in 1135, Stephen, a son of
the Conqueror’s daughter Adela, was made King.
David I., youngest son of Malcolm Canmore, succeeding his two elder
brothers, was at this time King of Scotland, and he took up the cause of
his niece Maud. In 1138 he invaded Northumberland, penetrating into
Yorkshire. At Northallerton he was met and defeated in a battle called
“Of the Standard.” It is said that he was gaining the day, when an
English soldier cut off the head of one of the slain, placed it on a
spear, and called out that it was the head of the King of Scots, thus
causing a panic in the Scottish army which the King, riding amongst it
without his helmet, vainly tried to overcome. After peace, David was
allowed to retain Northumberland and Durham, excepting the fortresses of
Newcastle and Bamborough. He was so good a king that after his death, in
1153, he was canonised.
David was succeeded by his twelve years old grandson, Malcolm. He was,
from his gentle disposition, called _The Maiden_. He was greatly
attached to the English King, Henry II., accompanying him to France as a
volunteer in his army. Malcolm’s Scottish subjects were afraid of the
influence of the older sovereign. Homage rendered by the Scottish kings
for their possessions in England, was always liable to be construed into
national homage; and it was notified that Malcolm had gone beyond mere
homage, and had absolutely resigned these possessions. So Malcolm had a
strong message from Scotland, asking him to return; this he did, was
again in favour with his people, but died in 1165, being then only
twenty-four years old.
He was succeeded by his brother William. He was called _The Lion_
because he used as his armorial bearing a red lion—_rampant_—that is in
heraldry, standing upon its hind legs; and this has ever since been the
heraldric cognizance of Scottish royalty. In 1174, for the recovery of
his ancestral possessions in Northumberland, William invaded England.
One day riding in a mist with a slender retinue, he came upon a body of
four hundred English horse. At first he thought that this was a portion
of his own army; seeing his mistake he fought boldly, but was
overpowered and made prisoner. He was taken to Northampton and conducted
into King Henry’s presence, with his feet tied together under his
horse’s belly. Now Henry had just been to Canterbury doing penance at
the tomb of the murdered Thomas à Becket; he had walked barefoot through
the city, prostrated himself on the pavement before the shrine, passed
the whole night in the church, and in the morning had himself scourged
by the priests with knotted cords. And now, as a token that his penance
had reconciled him to heaven, and obtained the saint’s forgiveness, here
was his enemy, the King of Scots, delivered into his hands.