Benjamin Thorpe

“ Is the Chronicle, in succeeding ages, to be regarded as a contemporaneous narrative of events? Generally speaking, I am inclined to answer in the affirmative, although it certainly is not free from interpolations of later date. Such interpolations are, however, chiefly prevalent in manuscript Domitian A. VIII., and the Laudian manuscript. As an instance of such interpolation, may be noticed the entry A.D. 876, in the manuscript first mentioned, where it is said, that Rodla (Rolf, Rollo) [7] penetrated into Normandy, and reigned fifty years. ”

“ In this edition of the Saxon Chronicle, the texts of the several manuscripts are printed entire; a plan which, at first sight, may appear objectionable, on the score of the great mass of repetition it necessarily occasions of matter not only substantially but frequently verbatim and even literatim identical. ”

“ From the beginning of the Chronicle to the death of Beda (A.D. 734) , we are enabled to form a judgment as to the sources whence much of its matter is derived; but from that date until the time of Ælfred (or about a hundred and fifty years) , we know not from what materials the narrative was compiled. Tradition, which in those days must have been in much greater request than it is now, no doubt contributed its share ”

“ An edition to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, down to the date of the Norman conquest, is included in the 'Monumenta Historica Britannica' published in the year 1848, in folio, by Royal authority. This edition, with an English translation, is by the late eminent Anglo-Saxon scholar, Mr. Richard Price, and is, as far as it extends, in every respect greatly superior to any of the preceding ones. ”

“ This volume was supposed to have been entirely destroyed, but a considerable portion of Beda's Ecclesiastical History (No. 1.) , and three damaged leaves of the Saxon Chronicle, in a hand apparently of the eleventh century (No. 2.) , beginning A.D. 837 (823) , and ending A.D. 871, have lately been recovered. This Manuscript formed the basis of Wheloc's edition, and a comparison of his text with such portions of the leaves as are readily legible, seems to show that he transcribed it very carefully. A transcript by Lambard, apparently from this copy, is among Usher's collections at Dublin. ”

“ It is much mutilated from A.D. 261 to A.D. 693, but part of the hiatus has been filled up by Josceline from other copies; it is also mutilated at the end. To A.D. 806, it has much in common with Manuscripts E. and F. It sometimes enlarges the text, not only by fuller extracts from Beda, but by the addition of many events relating especially to Mercia and Northumbria, which would seem to imply the existence of a distinct Chronicle, at least during the greater part of the eighth century; and it probably also agreed with Manuscript E., in that portion which is now lost in that copy. ”

“ From the above, however, we can only form the probable conjecture, that the writer, after his withdrawal from court, joined the brotherhood in the abbey of Peterborough. ↑ The Corpus Christi manuscript.—It is the opinion of Dr. Lappenberg (England under the A. S. Kings, Introd. p. xxxix.) , and, after him, of the author of the Preface to the 'Monumenta Historica Britannica' (p. 75) , that this manuscript is in the dialect of Mercia; an opinion which, if well founded, would prove that the belief in Ælfred's participation in the work is wholly groundless. ”

“ A remarkable case of what would be pronounced an interpolation, did it not appear in no less than five of the six manuscripts, occurs under the year 755, under which date, an event, the murder of Cynewulf, is recorded, which did not occur until 784, when it is again, and rightly, mentioned. ”

“ In addition to Wheloc's text, Gibson used the Bodleian Manuscript, Laud. 636, and copies of the Cottonian, Tiberius A. vi. and Domitian A. viii. Besides giving a new Latin version of his text, greatly enlarged, he added a preface, notes, and indexes, glossarial and chronological."
"The latest edition was published at London in 1823, in quarto, by the Reverend James Ingram, B.D., afterwards President of Trinity College, Oxford. Dr. Ingram collated all the known manuscripts, among which were two in the Cottonian collection (viz., Tiber. B. i. and Tiber. B. iv.) not employed by Gibson ”