[Sidenote: Alfred’s greatness.]
§ 66. ‘Alfred is one of the greatest figures in the history of the
world.’ These are not the words of any insular patriot, but of the great
German historian, Leopold von Ranke[459], who, if I may venture to
criticise so great a man, is almost too diplomatic and cosmopolitan in
his view of history, too little sensitive to purely national movements
and aspirations.
[Sidenote: State of England at his accession. Fresh invaders. Second
battle of Reading. Battle of Wilton.]
But, when Alfred ascended the throne in 871, the prospect was dark
enough; and we can well believe what Asser tells us, confirmed as it
seems to be by expressions of Alfred himself in the Boethius, that it was
only reluctantly that Alfred undertook the burden laid upon him[460].
The earlier writer embodied in Simeon of Durham says distinctly that
Alfred was elected by the chief men of the whole people[461]. Our primary
authorities tell us nothing of this[462]; and though their silence
is not conclusive[463], a formal election would probably be rendered
unnecessary by the arrangement already come to with reference to the
succession; while it certainly was no time for coronation festivities
or anything of that kind. Even before Æthelred’s death a new force of
wikings, ‘a summer army[464]’ as opposed to those who had wintered in
the land, invaded the country. Æthelred was interred at Wimborne, where,
in Asser’s words, ‘he awaits the coming of the Lord, and the first
resurrection with the just[465].’ Even while Alfred was busied with
his brother’s exequies, an engagement was being fought in his absence.
Ethelwerd alone tells us of this engagement[466]; and at one time I
supposed[467] that his account was merely a mistaken version of the
battle of Wilton, but I am now convinced that his account is distinct,
and that it is not improbable in itself. If I understand him rightly,
and he is never very easy to understand, the new force of wikings came
to Reading, where they were joined by the Danes who had wintered in the
country; and together they defeated an English force, which was in no
great numbers, owing to the absence of the king. If this is correct, we
have here one of the unnamed ‘folc-gefeoht’ of the Chronicle[468]. But
though Ethelwerd calls it a barren victory[469] for the Danes, it seems
to have opened to them the heart of Wessex, for the next engagement
was fought at Wilton, a month after Æthelred’s death, that is towards
the end of May, where another of those enigmatic contests took place,
in which the Danes are put to flight, and yet encamp upon the field of
battle. Possibly the Danes, whether in real or pretended flight, turned
upon their disorderly pursuers and defeated them. This seems to be
distinctly suggested by Asser’s narrative[470]. After this, peace was
made, probably by purchase, and a respite was well worth paying for. The
Danes had suffered scarcely less than the West Saxons[471], and for four
whole years they avoided Wessex. The question has been asked: Why did
not Burgred of Mercia come to the help of his brothers-in-law in their
hour of need, as they had come to help him three years before? Mr. Simcox
points out that here too the despised Ingulf[472] supplies the right
answer. Burgred was detained by an incursion of the Welsh, acting, no
doubt, in concert with the Danes.
[Sidenote: The Danes at London. Their exactions. They overrun Mercia.]
§ 67. After this peace, the Danes moved from Reading, which had remained
their head-quarters, to London, where they spent the winter of 871-2,
and forced the Mercians once more to purchase peace. Alfred seems to
have kept at any rate an army of observation in the neighbourhood. For
a later annal, speaking of the alms sent by Alfred to Rome and India
in 883[473], says that this was in fulfilment of a vow made ‘when they
encamped against the host at London. And through God’s mercy,’ adds the
pious Chronicler, ‘they fully obtained their prayer after that vow.’
Whether these last words refer to an actual defeat inflicted on the
Danes by Alfred, or only to his success in keeping them out of Wessex,
we cannot tell. In either case the notice illustrates very strikingly
the fragmentary nature of even our best authorities. The weight of
the exactions which Burgred had to impose to raise the ransom for the
Danes, is illustrated by a lease executed this very year (872) of lands
belonging to the see of Worcester, which was necessitated ‘owing to the
enormous tribute in the year when the heathen sat in London[474].’ The
next year the Danes moved northwards and wintered at Torksey, 872-3. The
next winter, 873-4, was spent at Repton, and in 874, after destroying
that mausoleum of the Mercian kings[475], they overran the whole of
Mercia, drove out Burgred, who withdrew to Rome to die; and set up in
his place for the present a puppet king in the person of ‘an unwise
king’s thane,’ as the Chronicle quaintly calls him, named Ceolwulf,
‘an Englishman by race, but a barbarian in cruelty[476].’ In 875 the
Danes divided their forces, and part went to the Tyne and part went to
Cambridge. The only event recorded in connexion with the history of
Wessex in this year is the defeat, by Alfred in person[477], as it would
seem, of a small fleet of seven wiking ships.
[Sidenote: The Danes in Wareham. They make a dash for Exeter. Destruction
of a Danish fleet. Mercia partitioned.]
§ 68. But in 876 the Cambridge division of the Danes managed to slip
past the Saxon ‘fyrd,’ and get into Wareham, the ancient importance of
which is still attested by the large quadrangular earthworks[478]. We do
not know what time of year this was; but apparently the Danes stayed
there till the following winter[479]; when Alfred found it expedient to
make peace with them, by purchase, according to Ethelwerd; the Danes
giving hostages, and swearing their most binding oaths on the sacred
temple-ring, ‘on which they would never swear before to any people.’
Yet in spite of this, the negotiations were only a blind on the part
of the Danes, and under cover of them they took to their horses, and
slipped away by night to Exeter. This seems to have been early in 877.
Alfred failed to overtake them before they reached Exeter, and he did not
venture to attack them behind their fortifications[480]. But he sat down
and blockaded them by land, and, if a later account may be trusted[481],
his ships watched the mouth of the Exe. Meanwhile a wiking fleet of 120
sail was making its way west about from East Anglia, no doubt with the
view of throwing supplies and reinforcements into Exeter. But off the
coast of Swanage they were caught in a violent storm, and in Gaimar’s
uncomplimentary language, who rather exaggerates the number of the fleet,
‘140 ships went to the devils[482].’ But for the wreck of these 120 ships
the issue of the campaign, perhaps even of the whole war, might have been
very different[483]. The motto on a Dutch medal struck to commemorate the
ruin of the Armada in 1588 would apply here also: ‘Flauit et dissipati
sunt[484].’ ‘Thou didst blow with thy wind, the sea covered them: they
sank as lead in the mighty waters[485].’ And so the Danes in Exeter were
fain to submit, and swore mighty oaths, which for once they kept, and
withdrew to Mercia, which they now partitioned, dividing part of it among
themselves, and restoring the remainder to their puppet Ceolwulf. This
partition is of some prospective importance as being probably the origin
of the distinction between English and Danish Mercia[486].
[Sidenote: The campaign of 878. Battle of Ethandun. Submission of the
Danes. Defeat of the Danes in North Devon. The Danes retire to East
Anglia.]
§ 69. Of the sudden swoop of the Danes on Chippenham in January, 878,
and Alfred’s retirement to Athelney I have said enough above[487]. It
was at Easter, March 23, 878, that Alfred and his little band reared
the fort on Athelney. Some seven weeks later, that is to say, about the
middle of May, he moved out of it to Brixton Deverill near Warminster.
The date of this movement must have been carefully fixed, and widely
made known by Alfred’s messengers beforehand. For here he was joined at
once by the levies of Somerset, Wilts., and part of Hampshire, ‘and they
were fain of him,’ says the Chronicler, in words the more expressive for
their extreme simplicity. How effectually the preliminary arrangements
had been made, is shown by the fact that the very next day Alfred was
able to continue his forward movement to Leigh near Westbury, and the
next day to Edington[488]. Here a general engagement was fought with the
whole Danish army under Guthrum, which had moved out of Chippenham. The
result was a complete victory for Alfred: ‘he put them to flight, and
rode after them to their fort, and sat down before it for a fortnight,
and then the host (_here_) gave him leading hostages and swore mighty
oaths that they would quit his realm. And they further promised that
their king should receive baptism. And so it was performed, and three
weeks later [that is, about the end of the first week in June] the king
Guthrum, with twenty-nine of those that were worthiest in the host, came
to him at Aller near Athelney; and the king received him at baptism,
and his chrism-loosing was at Wedmore; and he was twelve nights with
the king, and he honoured him much, and feed his followers.’ The ‘fort’
to which Alfred pursued his flying foes was, I think, the Danish lines
at Chippenham; and though high authorities, including Professor Earle,
take a different view[489], I am glad to see that I am supported by our
military historian, Professor Oman[490]. The submission of the Danes
would be furthered by a great disaster which befell another body of
them earlier in the year. A wiking fleet, which had wintered in South
Wales[491], crossed to the opposite coast of Devon; probably intending,
after ravaging the southern coast of the Bristol Channel, as they had
already ravaged the northern coast, to effect a junction with the Danes
at Chippenham. The men of Devon, under their ealdorman Odda, took refuge
in a rude fort[492], probably Kenny Castle near Appledore. The Danes,
under Ubba, the brother of Halfdene and Ingwar[493], expected an easy
victory, but the English, sallying out unexpectedly at early dawn, put
their foes to rout, slaying over 800 of them, and driving the rest to
their ships[494]. The mystic Raven Banner fell into the hands of the
victors. After the ceremony at Wedmore the Danes retired, in accordance
with their promise, to Cirencester[495], and the next year, 879, they
withdrew altogether to East Anglia; while a body of wikings, which had
gathered at Fulham, crossed to the Continent. It would seem that, whether
by formal compact or no[496], not only Wessex and its dependencies but
English Mercia west of Watling Street was cleared of the invader.
[Sidenote: Results of the battle of Ethandun.]
§ 70. I have said elsewhere that Alfred holds in real history the place
which romance assigns to Arthur[497]; and certainly, after this mid-May
victory of Alfred at Edington, his followers might well have sung the
song which our late Laureate places in the mouths of Arthur’s men[498]:—
‘Blow trumpet, for the world is white with May;
Blow trumpet, the long night hath roll’d away!
Blow thro’ the living world—“Let the King reign.”
‘Blow, for our Sun is mighty in his May!
Blow, for our Sun is mightier day by day!
Clang battleaxe, and clash brand! Let the King reign.
‘The King will follow Christ; and we the King
In whom high God hath breathed a secret thing.
Fall battleaxe, and flash brand! Let the King reign.’
[Sidenote: Loss and gain. The gain outweighs the loss.]
‘The long night has rolled away.’—‘Yea, even like as a dream when one
awaketh, so shalt Thou make their image to vanish.’—Every historian
is agreed that this is the turning-point in the history, not only of
England, but of Western Europe. ‘Wessex was saved; and in saving Wessex,
Alfred saved England; and in saving England, he saved Western Europe from
becoming a heathen Scandinavian power[499].’ In recognising the Danish
occupation of East Anglia, Eastern Mercia, and Northumbria, Alfred was
hardly making a cession, for they had never been his to cede; he was at
most giving up a shadowy overlordship which neither he, nor his brothers,
nor, probably, even his father had ever exercised. The only district
which was in strictness ceded was Essex; and it was a heavy loss that
London remained for some years longer a Danish city. But the gains far
outweighed the losses; and we can but ask in wonder what were the causes
of so great a change. Some light is gained when we have realised that
Alfred at Athelney was not burning cakes, but organising victory. Then,
too, he had good helpers. We have seen what Odda did in Devonshire; and
Ethelwerd lays stress on the co-operation of Æthelnoth, the ealdorman of
Somerset, in the dark days of Athelney[500]. There is nothing like work
in common for a great cause, in face of great difficulties, for cementing
friendship[501], and perhaps it is to these days that Werferth of
Worcester looks back when in one of his charters he speaks of Æthelnoth
as ‘the friend of us all[502].’
[Sidenote: Mobility of the Danes.]
§ 71. Another and very important point is this. The chief difficulties
of our forefathers under Alfred, as of us, their descendants, in South
Africa at the present day, arose from the extreme mobility of the
enemy[503], and the way in which they used the horses which they brought
with them or captured[504], not indeed for fighting (that was never
either the Danish or the Saxon mode of warfare), but for dashing from
point to point, and eluding[505] and surprising the enemy. They were, in
modern phrase, mounted infantry. It would seem as if the English were
learning to copy them in this. You may have noticed that in the extract
from the Chronicle which I read just now, describing the sequel of the
battle of Edington, it is said that Alfred ‘_rode_ after the enemy to
their fort.’ The only other occasion up to this campaign[506], where any
such phrase is used of an English force, is in the preceding year, where
the Chronicler describes the brave but ineffectual dash which Alfred
made to try and intercept the treacherous Danes before they got into
Exeter[507].
[Sidenote: Alfred’s personal influence.]
But after all, the greatest of all human causes of success (though it is
not merely human) is contained in those words of the Chronicler already
quoted, ‘they were fain of him.’ The personality of Alfred was beginning
to tell, and to rally to itself all that was worthiest in the nation. It
has been compared, not unaptly, to the resurrection of France under Joan
of Arc[508].
[Sidenote: Comparative peace. Revolt of the East Anglian Danes.]
§ 72. For the next few years Alfred had comparative peace, the Danes
being mostly occupied on the Continent. There was a small, but
successful, naval engagement in 881 or 882[509], and in 884[510] a body
of the enemy landed in Kent and laid siege to Rochester, throwing up
their usual fortifications round their own positions. But the besieged
defended themselves successfully till Alfred came with the fyrd, and
the besiegers were in their turn besieged, and withdrew, possibly by
agreement, to the Continent once more, leaving their prisoners, and the
horses which they had brought with them from over seas, in Alfred’s
hands[511]. The appearance of their kinsmen in Kent seems to have been
too much for the loyalty of the Danes in East Anglia. ‘They broke
the peace with King Alfred[512].’ Alfred at once sent his fleet from
Kent[513], where it had no doubt been supporting his operations at
Rochester, across the broad estuary of the Thames, and at the mouth of
the Stour, between Essex and Suffolk, the English defeated and captured a
fleet of sixteen sail; but on their way back were met by a superior fleet
of East Anglian Danes, and defeated in their turn. It will be remembered
that it is in reference to this defeat that the earlier writer in Simeon
of Durham gives us the wonderful story based on the corrupt reading in
Asser of ‘dormiret’ for ‘domum iret[514].’
[Sidenote: Alfred wins London.]
§ 73. The next stage in the liberation of England was a very important
one, being nothing less than the acquisition of London by Alfred. This
is placed by the Chronicle in 886. But we have seen that the Chronicle
is here in advance by a year of the true chronology; the true date is
therefore probably 885. It is clear that Alfred did not gain this great
success without the use of force[515]; and I am inclined to see in this
the culmination of the measures which he took to chastise the East
Anglian Danes for their breach of the peace in the preceding year[516].
It is with this that we must associate the document known as Alfred and
Guthrum’s peace[517], often wrongly confused with the settlement of 878.
By this treaty the boundaries of 878 were materially modified in Alfred’s
favour. They now ran up the Thames to the mouth of the Lea, up the Lea
to its source, thence to Bedford, and so up the Ouse to Watling Street.
By this, not only London, but a considerable district east of Watling
Street was made over to Alfred. The Danes had paid heavily for their
momentary treachery. But again it illustrates the fragmentary nature of
our sources, that we hear nothing of the military operations which must
have led up to this success.
[Sidenote: Effect of this on Alfred’s position. Alfred, the second
founder of London.]
It had an immense effect upon Alfred’s position, and made him more
clearly than ever the head of the nation. ‘There submitted to him the
whole Angle-kin that was not in subjection to the Danes.’ The city was
restored and fortified, and committed to the care of Alfred’s son-in-law,
Æthelred, whom soon after 878[518] he had made ealdorman of the part of
Mercia which fell to him by the settlement of that year. Once, in 851,
under Berhtwulf, the Danes had captured London; they had occupied it in
872 under Burgred; it had fallen to their share at the division of Mercia
in 877. But never again, after Alfred’s restoration of it, was it ever
forcibly captured by them or by any other foreign host. Alfred is rightly
called the second founder of London[519].
[Sidenote: Peace.]
Once more, for a few years, Alfred had peace. In 889 or 890 his old
enemy and god-son, Guthrum-Athelstan of East Anglia, died. How far he
had really become a Christian we cannot tell. In spite of his baptism
Ethelwerd uncharitably dismisses him below: ‘he breathed out his soul
to Orcus[520].’ But for the present the Danes of East Anglia made no
movement.
[Sidenote: The final storm.]
§ 74. In 892 the final storm burst on England; but the result was only
to show the strength of the system which Alfred had built up during the
years of peace[521]. The splendid annals 893-7 (892-6 according to the
true chronology), in which, as has been said, we seem to hear the very
voice of Alfred himself[522], and beside which, as the same authority
declares[523], ‘every other piece of prose not in these Chronicles
merely, but throughout the whole range of extant Saxon literature, must
assume a secondary rank,’ give us some insight into the reforms which
Alfred had effected.
[Sidenote: Military reforms; (1) the _fyrd_ divided.]
(1) To counteract the standing weakness of citizen-armies, which made
them liable to melt away at the critical moment, when their short
term of service was expired, he divided the fyrd into two divisions,
which were to relieve one another at fixed intervals, ‘so that always
half were at home, and half on service.’ This measure is particularly
interesting, as it may have been suggested to Alfred by his studies in
Orosius, where a similar institution is attributed to the Amazons, and in
Alfred’s translation is described in language very similar to that of the
Chronicle[524].
[Sidenote: (2) Fortifications.]
(2) Besides the two alternating divisions of the fyrd, the Chronicle
enumerates ‘the men who were bound to keep the burgs[525].’ If the Danes
had taught the Saxons the importance of mobility when in movement, they
had no less surely taught them the importance of fortifications when
stationary. In the first place the towns were encouraged to fortify
themselves—we have a very interesting document, unfortunately without
date, which tells how Æthelred of Mercia, and his wife, Æthelflæd, lady
of the Mercians, ‘bade work the burg at Worcester for the protection
of all the people[526]’; while in 898 there was a formal conference at
Chelsea between Alfred, Æthelred, Æthelflæd, and Archbishop Plegmund on
the fortifications of London[527]. But besides this, fortified camps were
erected at strategic points. The important document known as the burghal
hidage[528], which is only a very little later than Alfred’s reign,
seems to show that certain districts were appurtenant to these burgs,
while ‘the men who were bound to keep the burgs’ would possibly hold
their lands by a tenure analogous to that known under the feudal system
as ‘castle-guard.’ Asser also insists strongly on the importance which
Alfred attached to the construction of ‘castella’ or ‘arces’ (= burgs);
though he also shows that Alfred had considerable difficulty in getting
his subjects to adopt this novel mode of defence[529]. It would seem then
that, in creating the famous lines of forts by which Edward and Æthelflæd
secured the country which they won from the Danes, they were but carrying
out the policy of their father[530].
[Sidenote: (3) Number of thanes increased.]
(3) It seems to have been part of Alfred’s military policy to increase
considerably the number of thanes, by conferring the privileges, and
enforcing the obligations of thanehood on all owners of five hides of
land, an estate analogous to the later knight’s fee. This would give the
king a nucleus of highly equipped troops, whom he could moreover call out
on his own authority, without going through the form of consulting the
Witan[531]. It can hardly be a mere accident that, whereas in the records
of Alfred’s reign, the only mention of king’s thanes hitherto has been
in connexion with the minor military operations of the great ‘year of
battles,’ 871, in the annals 894-7 they are mentioned no less than six
times.
[Sidenote: (4) Greater mobility.]
(4) These annals also furnish abundant evidence of that increased
mobility of the English forces which we have already noticed. They also
show
[Sidenote: (5) Fortified positions carried.]
(5) That the English had learned not only to make fortifications, but to
storm them[532]. After this preamble we return to the history of Alfred’s
last contest.
[Sidenote: Battle of the Dyle. Renewed invasion of England by the Danes.
A concerted attempt to conquer England. Danish plan of campaign. Battle
of Farnham.]
§ 75. On November 1, 891[533], Arnulf, king of the Eastern Franks, had
defeated the Northmen in a brilliant engagement on the Dyle, which
freed the interior of Germany for ever from these foes. This, and the
famine which prevailed on the Continent in 892 in consequence of an
exceptionally severe winter, disgusted them with their continental
quarters; and in the autumn of 892[534] a fleet of 250 sail put forth
from Boulogne, and entered the mouth of the then navigable river
Lymne, drew their ships four miles up the river, and, after capturing
an unfinished[535] fort, entrenched themselves at Appledore. Shortly
after, a smaller detachment of eighty ships under Hæsten sailed into
the estuary of the Thames, entered the Swale, and fortified itself at
Milton. In view of these new encampments on English soil, Alfred, early
in 893 (894), exacted oaths from the Northumbrian and East Anglian Danes,
with hostages in addition from the latter, that they would take no part
with the invaders. This is the first time that we have had mention of
any dealings of Alfred with the Northumbrian Danes, and it shows what
new possibilities were opening before him; while, on the other side, the
important part which, in spite of their oaths, the Northumbrian and East
Anglian Danes took in the following struggle, and the fact that the new
invaders brought their wives and children with them, prove that this was
no mere predatory raid, but a deliberate and concerted attempt to conquer
England. Alfred with his fyrd took up a position between the two Danish
camps, so as to watch them both. Numerous small skirmishes took place,
but no general engagement. Meanwhile Alfred was negotiating with the
smaller body of Danes at Milton; whom he may have thought to detach by
making a separate agreement with them. Hæsten entered into negotiations,
and even allowed his two sons to be baptised, Alfred himself and Æthelred
of Mercia acting as sponsors. But on the part of Hæsten the negotiations
were only a blind; if indeed they had not been originally proposed
by him with this object. While they were in progress, he ordered the
Danes at Appledore to send their ships round to Benfleet in Essex, and
themselves to break out in force, and marching through Surrey, Hampshire,
and Berkshire, cross the upper Thames, and then, turning eastwards,
regain their ships at Benfleet, to which he himself now crossed, threw
up a fortification, and occupied himself with harrying the districts,
which had been ceded to Alfred by the settlement of 885 (886). This plan
was put into execution. But though the Danes at Appledore succeeded
in breaking out, they were pursued by the fyrd under Alfred’s eldest
son Edward[536], which overtook them (or, in the Chronicler’s words,
‘_rode_ before them’), compelled them to fight a general engagement at
Farnham, in which the Danes were defeated, and driven in confusion across
the Thames, and up the Hertfordshire Colne, where they took refuge in
an island called Thorney[537], which the fyrd proceeded to blockade.
Unfortunately at this crisis the term of service of Edward’s division of
the fyrd expired, and their provisions being exhausted they were forced
to raise the blockade.
[Sidenote: The Danes in the west.]
Alfred was on his way to relieve them with the other division of the
fyrd, when he heard[538] that two fleets of Northumbrian and East Anglian
Danes were operating in the west, the larger one of 100 ships besieging
Exeter, the smaller one of forty ships besieging an unnamed fort on the
coast of North Devon. Alfred at once hurried westward, detaching however
a small force under Edward to watch the Danes at Thorney. Alfred was
ultimately[539] successful in raising the siege of Exeter; the fate of
the North Devon fort is not recorded.
[Sidenote: Edward reduces the Danes in Thorney. Capture of Benfleet.]
Meanwhile Edward, reinforced by Æthelred from London, renewed the
blockade of Thorney, the Danes having been unable to avail themselves
of his temporary absence, owing to the fact that their chief had been
wounded in the battle of Farnham. They had accordingly to submit and
give hostages, and were then allowed to march off. Edward and Æthelred
returned to London, and collecting reinforcements there and from the
west, marched to Benfleet, which they found garrisoned by their former
antagonists from Thorney; Hæsten himself with his division being away
plundering. The fort was carried, the garrison put to flight, all the
women, and children, and plunder captured; Hæsten’s own wife and sons
were among the captives, though either now or later Alfred chivalrously
restored them, because of the relationship which baptism had created
between them. The ships were burned or broken up, or carried off to
London and Rochester. It was as complete a victory as could well be
imagined.
[Sidenote: The Danes make a dash across England. They are driven
northwards, defeated at Buttington, and retire to Shoebury. They winter
at Chester, and retire to Essex.]
§ 76. The defeated Danes fell back on Shoebury, where they were joined by
Hæsten, and threw up another fortification. They then set out to march
up the Thames, being joined by large reinforcements from Northumbria
and East Anglia. The object of this move was probably to co-operate
with their friends in Devonshire against Alfred’s force. If so, it was
frustrated. The three great ealdormen, Æthelred of Mercia, Æthelnoth of
Somerset, and Æthelhelm of Wilts., ‘with the thanes who were at home at
the forts,’ raised a levy, the extent of which, as Professor Earle has
remarked[540], seems to astonish the Chronicler himself, ‘from every
burg east of Parret, west and east of Selwood, north of Thames, west of
Severn, with some of the North Welsh’; the co-operation of these last
being especially noteworthy. In view of these gathering forces the Danes
were obliged to head off northwards up the Severn valley, being finally
overtaken at Buttington, and blockaded on both sides of the river. The
locality of this place has been much disputed; some authorities placing
it at Buttington Tump, at the junction of the Wye with the Severn,
others identifying it with Buttington on the borders of Shropshire and
Montgomeryshire. Contrary to my former opinion, I am now inclined to take
the latter view; not because of Sir James Ramsay’s objection that the
Severn is too wide to be blockaded at Buttington Tump, for on that theory
the river on which the Danes were blockaded would be the Wye; but because
the phrase of the Chronicler that the Danes marched ‘up along Severn,’
just as they had marched ‘up along Thames,’ seems to imply that they
followed the Severn valley northwards; whereas to reach Buttington Tump
they would have had to cross the Severn and turn south; and moreover,
in that case, their fleets in Devonshire would probably have made some
attempt to relieve them. However this may be, the English blockaded
them for ‘many weeks,’ until they were starved out, their horses having
all died of hunger or been eaten. They then made a desperate attempt to
break through the English lines on the eastern side of the river, but
were defeated with loss; those who escaped returning to Shoebury; then,
leaving their ships, their women, and their booty in East Anglia, and
drawing in large reinforcements from East Anglia and Northumbria, they
made a sudden dash across England, marching ‘without stopping[541] day
or night,’ till they reached the ruined Roman walls of Chester, where
they fortified themselves for the winter. The fyrd failed to cut them
off before they reached Chester, and the approach of winter and the
heavy work already done probably prevented them from attempting another
blockade; they therefore contented themselves with destroying everything
in the neighbourhood from which the Danes could gather sustenance, and
retired. Not since the great year of battles in 871 had there been such a
bustling year in England, and what a different result!
[Sidenote: They fortify themselves on the Lea, but are out-manœuvred.]
§ 77. The measures taken by the English proved effective, for early
in the next year, 894 (895), want of provisions forced the Danes to
evacuate Chester, and withdraw into Wales, whence they retired to Mersea
in Essex; ‘marching through Northumbria and East Anglia, so as the fyrd
might not reach them[542]’; words which give eloquent testimony to the
changed state of things. At Mersea they were joined by the fleet from
Exeter, which had been beaten off with heavy loss in an attempt which
they had made on Chichester. At the end of this year and the beginning
of the next, 895 (896), the Danes drew their ships up the Thames and Lea
to a spot twenty miles above London, and there fortified themselves. An
attempt by the garrison of London with other forces to storm the Danish
lines failed; and so during harvest Alfred encamped in the neighbourhood
to protect the inhabitants of the district, while they were reaping their
corn. One day as he was riding up the river, he noticed a spot where it
seemed to him possible, by constructing obstacles on either side of the
stream, to prevent the Danish ships from getting out[543]. He at once
proceeded to put his plan into execution, but he had hardly begun when
the Danes realised that they were out-manœuvred, and abandoning their
ships once more struck off for the upper waters of the Severn. The fyrd
pursued, but here again no attempt was made to blockade them, and the
Danes wintered at Bridgenorth.
[Sidenote: Break-up of the Danish host.]
The next summer, 896 (897), the Danish host broke up, ‘some to East
Anglia, some to Northumbria. Those who had no property [in England] got
them ships and fared south over sea to the Seine.’ The long campaign was
over. ‘And through God’s mercy,’ says the Chronicler once more, ‘the
[Danish] host had not wholly ruined the Angle-kin, but they were much
more ruined in those three years with murrain of men and cattle, and with
the loss of many of the most excellent king’s thanes who passed away in
those three years.’
[Sidenote: Alfred’s new ships. Not a great success. Alfred’s claim to be
the founder of the English navy doubtful. Earlier naval engagement.]
§ 78. The only thing that remained to be done was to suppress the
predatory raids of Northumbrian and East Anglian ships on the south
coasts of Wessex. With this object Alfred turned the constructive ability
which he undoubtedly possessed to the building of a new type of ship,
just as Caesar did when he invaded Britain[544]. They were much larger
in all their measurements than the wiking vessels, built neither on
Frisian nor Danish lines, but according to the king’s own ideas. To tell
the honest truth, they do not seem to have been a great success. In an
engagement between nine of the new ships and six wiking vessels in the
neighbourhood of the Isle of Wight all the English ships got aground,
‘very uncomfortably,’ as the Chronicler quaintly says, six on one side
of the strait and three on the other. Moreover at the end of the same
annal it is recorded: ‘and the same summer perished no less than twenty
ships on the South Coast, crews and all’; so that the new ships do not
seem to have been very capable of weathering a storm. We have noticed
earlier naval operations of Alfred in the years 875, 877, 881 (882), 884
(885). I am, however, inclined to think that both Alfred’s claims to be
called the founder of the English navy, and also the previous disuse of
the sea by the Saxons have been somewhat exaggerated. The mention of
Frisians as fighting on the English side[545] in the naval engagement
just referred to, shows indeed that Alfred was glad to avail himself
of these skilled mariners, who had probably come over to England in
consequence of the wiking settlements in Frisia[546], just as the Danish
descent on Wessex, in 878, drove many West Saxons to take refuge on the
Continent. And Asser expressly mentions Frisians among those who settled
under Alfred’s rule[547]. There was certainly a naval engagement in 851,
under Æthelwulf[548], in which the English were victorious, if not yet
earlier in 833 and 840[549]. Still it is no doubt true that there was
no fleet capable of safeguarding the English coasts. The silence of the
Chronicle as to any later attacks may indicate that this was effected
in Alfred’s later years. Unhappily, for the last four years of Alfred’s
reign the Chronicle is silent as to almost everything. So the argument is
at best precarious. The stress laid on the description of Alfred’s new
ships shows that he saw in this the necessary completion of his work for
the defence of England; but did it really require such an immense amount
of genius to discern that, as the invaders came by sea, it was desirable
to stop them, if possible, before they got to land?
[Sidenote: The problems of peace.]
§ 79. We are constantly being told that ‘Peace hath her victories not
less renowned than war.’ But the victories of peace are worthy of double
renown when they have to be won, as in Alfred’s case, from the ashes
left by an exhausting war. For, as Alfred says himself, ‘throughout all
England everything was harried and burnt[550].’
The most needful of the works of peace is, as men have often learnt
by bitter experience, to be prepared for war. Not only the works of
peace, but peace itself, are impossible except under the guarantee of
an adequate military and naval force. We have said enough already of
Alfred’s efforts to reorganise his kingdom on this side.
[Sidenote: Civil reorganisation. The shire system. Legislation not very
important in early times.]
Much too would be needed in the way of civil reorganisation, especially
in the non-West-Saxon districts which had been won from the Danes. And
this fact is probably the basis of the legend which makes Alfred the
inventor of shires, hundreds, and tithings[551]. Indeed, in the districts
which previously had formed part of Mercia, it is probable that the
shire system was introduced for the first time, either now or a little
later. For, as Mr. Taylor has pointed out[552], whereas every existing
shire division south of the Thames is mentioned in the oldest MS. of the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle before the first change of hand at the year 892,
there is no mention of any Mercian shire in any MS. of the Chronicle
prior to 1000. Legislation too would be required, though we must always
remember that legislation, as we understand it, played a very small part
in Anglo-Saxon times. The idea of a code or body of statutes covering all
departments of civil life was quite foreign to their notions, and every
attempt to explain the existing Anglo-Saxon laws on any such hypothesis
must be a failure. Into the details of Alfred’s laws I do not propose
to enter. To do so with any profit would require more space than I can
afford, and a minuter knowledge of the earlier and later laws than I can
pretend to. Indeed, I must confess that the study of the Anglo-Saxon laws
often reduces me to a state of mental chaos. I may know, as a rule, the
meaning of individual words; I can construe, though not invariably, the
separate sentences. But what it all comes to is often a total mystery.
The reason (apart from my own shortcomings) is to be sought in the
fact alluded to above, that a very small part of Anglo-Saxon life and
institutions is to be found in the laws, which imply a whole body of
unwritten custom, of which only the most salient changes are registered
in the laws. And as this body of unwritten custom is, to a large extent,
beyond our reach, it is not surprising that the written law, to which it
was the key, should often be obscure.
[Sidenote: Alfred’s laws probably passed late in his reign.]
§ 80. The date of Alfred’s laws is unfortunately nowhere given. But it
must be comparatively late in his reign. The introduction consists, as is
well known, largely of passages taken from the Old and New Testaments,
translated from the Vulgate with a degree of skill and freedom, which
seems to imply some practice in the work of translation and adaptation,
which, as we shall see, Alfred probably did not begin at any rate before
the year 887[553]. We may therefore conjecture that the enactment of
these laws should be placed either just before, or just after the last
great struggle with the Danes, 892-6; for William of Malmesbury’s
statement that while, as a rule, ‘inter arma silent leges,’ Alfred
carried on his legislation amid the din of war[554], need not be taken
for more than the rhetorical flourish which it evidently is.
[Sidenote: Points of interest connected with them.]
One or two points in the preface and in the laws may just be briefly
noted. In the former there is an interesting mistranslation of the fifth
commandment, the feminine relative in the last clause: ‘which the Lord
thy God giveth thee,’ being taken to refer not to land (terra) but to
mother (matrem); ‘honour thy father and thy mother whom the Lord gave
thee[555].’ Was it the thankful thought of his own noble mother Osburh
which prompted this mistake?
The insertion among the causes which excuse the non-return of a deposit,
of the case of its having been captured by the enemy[556], throws light
on the circumstances of the time, as does the provision of one of the
laws that, for certain offences, the punishment is doubled when the
‘fyrd’ is out[557]. Characteristic too of the times is the fact that
treason against the lord is ‘boot-less[558],’ i.e. incapable of being
atoned for by money-payment, and the provision against harbouring the
king’s fugitives[559]. Nor is it surprising that Alfred the truth-teller
should be specially severe against falsehood; if any man commits
folk-leasing, i.e. public slander, he is to suffer no lighter punishment
than the loss of the offending member[560].
At the end of the Apostolic letter, which Alfred translates from Acts
xv, is found a version of the golden rule in its negative form, ‘that
which ye would not that other men should do to you, do not ye to other
men[561].’ This is not, as is often alleged[562], an insertion made by
Alfred from the Sermon on the Mount[563], but is an addition to the text
of Acts, found in some Greek and Old Latin MSS., from the latter of which
it passed into some MSS. of the Vulgate[564]. Most characteristic of
Alfred’s thought is the comment: ‘by this one law any one may know how he
ought to judge another; he needs no other law book.’
[Sidenote: Alfred’s administration of justice.]
§ 81. Asser gives a striking picture[565], which there is no reason to
distrust, of the pains which Alfred took to secure a good administration
of justice, and especially to ‘see that such as are in need and necessity
have right.’ From this point of view we can understand Alfred’s recasting
the precept of Exodus xxiii. 3: ‘pauperis quoque non misereberis in
iudicio,’ ‘neither shalt thou favour a poor man in his cause’ (R.V.). The
warning that justice is no more to be wrested in favour of the poor, than
of the rich, is one not unneeded now. But undue favouring of the poor was
a remote danger in Alfred’s day, when, as Asser says, the poor had few
helpers, or none, besides the king[566]. And so Alfred puts the precept
in a general form: ‘Judge thou very equally, judge not one judgement for
the rich, and another for the poor[567].’ And it would seem from Asser’s
account that he kept a control on the local administration of justice,
not only by constantly hearing appeals himself, but also by a system of
special envoys analogous to the Carolingian ‘missi dominici,’ and to the
later ‘justices in eyre[568].’
[Sidenote: Alfred’s accessibility to suitors.]
Of Alfred’s accessibility as the fountain of justice a very pleasant
picture is given in a document addressed to Edward the Elder detailing
the progress of a suit which had come before his father Alfred: ‘we went
in to the king and told him how we proposed to settle the matter, and
the king stood and washed his hands at Wardour within the bower, and
when he had finished, he asked us[569],’ and so forth. It reminds us of
the sketch which Josephus gives of Philip, tetrarch of Ituraea, almost
the only amiable member of the odious Herod family; how he would stroll
through his little state, with a chariot following him on which was
his curule chair, and if any of his subjects approached him with their
causes, he would at once have the chair brought forward, and sit and give
his judgement there and then[570]. It reminds us still more of the great
Charles, of whom Einhard relates: ‘When he was putting on his shoes or
dressing, he would not only admit his friends, but also, if the Count of
the Palace reported that there was some suit which could not be settled
without his command, he would have the parties brought in at once, and,
as if sitting in his tribunal, would hear the matter, and give his
decision[571].’ The satisfaction given by Alfred’s decisions appears not
only from Asser’s panegyric, but also from the document already cited,
where the writer continues: ‘And, sire, if every judgement which King
Alfred gave is to be upset, when shall we come to any conclusion?’
[Sidenote: Alfred’s laws drawn mainly from earlier sources. Action of the
Witenagemót under Alfred.]
§ 82. The last section of the Preface to the Laws which tells how Alfred
gathered these laws from older sources, and rejected others, with the
advice of his Witan, not daring to add to them many of his own, which
might not be suitable to after ages[572], has been often quoted as
an illustration of Alfred’s wise conservatism. It is also the best
illustration that we have of the action of the Witenagemót in his reign.
Others may be found in the charters, but charters, as we have seen[573],
are not numerous. The most interesting illustration is to be found in
Alfred’s will, which shows how anxious Alfred was not to bring any undue
influence to bear upon his councillors. The will tells us how in a
Witenagemót at Long Dean[574] the provisions of Æthelwulf’s will and the
agreements made between Alfred and his brothers were recited, in order
that the Witan might judge whether Alfred’s proposed disposition of his
property was in harmony with these: ‘Then prayed I them all for my love,
and gave them my pledge, that I would never bear any grudge against any
for what they might conscientiously decide, and that none for love or
fear of me should hesitate to declare the law of the case[575].’ The
Chronicle does not mention a single meeting of the Witan; and though
it would be wrong to argue from this silence, for the same is true of
many other reigns, yet it is probable that the circumstances of the
time, combined with Alfred’s character and ability, would tend to throw
more power into the hands of the king, and to reduce proportionally the
importance of the Witenagemót[576].
[Sidenote: Obscurity of ecclesiastical history under Alfred. Alfred’s
relation to the Church.]
§ 83. Of synods or special ecclesiastical legislation I can find no
trace under Alfred. More than one bishop’s see became temporarily
or permanently extinct owing to the ravages of the Danes[577]. The
monasteries ‘once filled,’ as Alfred says, ‘with treasures and
books[578]’ were favourite objects of attack. In the Preface to the
Cura Pastoralis Alfred thanks God for ‘the learned bishops which we now
have’; but, with the exception of the two archbishops of Canterbury,
Æthelred and Plegmund, Werferth of Worcester, and Asser, it is hard to
say anything about any of them. It is the same with the abbots. Thorne,
the historian of St. Augustine’s, Canterbury, gives a list of abbots
about this time, but he can say nothing as to any of them[579]. Beyond
the broad fact of the ruin caused by the ravages of the Danes, the whole
history of the Church under Alfred is most obscure[580]. This does not
mean that there is any truth in Ailred of Rievaulx’ myth[581] that Alfred
regained it as a king’s chief dignity to have no power in the Churches
of Christ. What little evidence there is points distinctly the other
way[582]. There is a curious letter of Pope John VIII to Archbishop
Æthelred[583] in which he says: ‘We admonish you to set yourself as a
wall for the house of God not only against the king, but also against
all who are minded to act perversely.’ There seems some ground for Sir
John Spelman’s remark: ‘The life and ways of Alfred were not perfectly
pleasing to the Fathers of Rome[584].’ A letter, from Archbishop Fulk
of Rheims to Æthelred’s successor, Plegmund[585], shows that clerical
and episcopal marriages were common in England at that time; and there
are traces of something like hereditary succession to ecclesiastical
lands[586]. There is no evidence that Alfred attempted to alter this
state of things; there is some evidence that he disapproved it. In the
Soliloquies of St. Augustine, the Anglo-Saxon translation of which[587]
is almost certainly by Alfred[588], there is a passage in which Augustine
declares that he has no desire to marry. This, which in the original
is purely personal to Augustine, is by the translator extended to all
clergy: ‘I say however that it is better for priests not to marry than to
marry[589].’
[Sidenote: Decline of monasticism.]
Alfred made some attempt to revive the monastic life in England. He built
a monastery for men at Athelney[590], no doubt as a thank-offering for
the deliverance there begun, and a convent for women at Shaftesbury[591];
he also made arrangements, though he did not live to carry them out,
for founding the New Minster at Winchester[592]. But he had but small
success. The taste for the monastic life had almost been extinguished
among men in England; and of the two contradictory causes which Asser
suggests[593] for this fact, viz. the Danish ravages, and the too great
riches of the English, which caused them to despise the monastic life,
there can be no doubt that the former is nearer the truth. Alfred had
accordingly to fill his monasteries with foreign monks. The result was
not always satisfactory, if there is any truth in Asser’s story[594]
how two of these foreign monks at Athelney tried to murder their abbot,
John the Old Saxon. Besides his own foundations, Alfred was a liberal
contributor to other monasteries, not only in England, but also in
Ireland and on the Continent[595]. Yet there is no monastic halo round
the head of Alfred, like that which adorns his great-grandson Edgar.