Charles Plummer

“ And though it would be wrong to call Bede a critical historian in the modern sense of the words, he shows a very unusual conscientiousness in collecting his information from the best available sources, and in distinguishing between what he believed to be fact, and what he regarded only as rumour or tradition. Other historical works of Bede are the History of the Abbots (of Wearmouth and Jarrow) , and the lives of Cuthbert in verse and prose. The History of the Abbots and the prose life of Cuthbert were based on earlier works which still survive. ”

“ At the end of this year and early in 895 (896) the Danes drew their ships up the Thames and Lea and fortified themselves twenty miles above London. A direct attack on the Danish lines failed, but later in the year Alfred saw a means of obstructing the river so as to prevent the egress of the Danish ships. The Danes realized that they were out-manœuvred. They struck off north-westwards and wintered at Bridgenorth. The next year, 896 (897) , they abandoned the struggle. Some retired to Northumbria, some to East Anglia; those who had no connexions in England withdrew to the continent. ”

“ After the final dispersal of the Danish invaders Alfred turned his attention to the increase of the navy, and ships were built according to the king’s own designs, partly to repress the ravages of the Northumbrian and East Anglian Danes on the coasts of Wessex, partly to prevent the landing of fresh hordes. ”

“ Alfred had been on his way to relieve his son at Thorney when he heard that the Northumbrian and East Anglian Danes were besieging Exeter and an unnamed fort on the coast of North Devon. Alfred at once hurried westwards and raised the siege of Exeter; the fate of the other place is not recorded. ”

“ Of Bæda, commonly called “the Venerable Bede,” almost all that we know is contained in the short autobiographical notice which he has appended to his Ecclesiastical History:—“Thus much concerning the ecclesiastical history of Britain, and especially of the race of the English, I, Baeda, a servant of Christ and priest of the monastery of the blessed apostles St Peter and St Paul, which is at Wearmouth and at Jarrow, have with the Lord’s help composed, so far as I could gather it, either from ancient documents, or from the tradition of the elders, or from my own knowledge. ”

“ The Danes on their side moved out of Chippenham, and the two armies met at Edington in Wiltshire. The result was a decisive victory for Alfred. The Danes submitted. Guthrum, the Danish king, and twenty-nine of his chief men accepted baptism. By the next year (879) not only Wessex, but Mercia, west of Watling Street, was cleared of the invader. ”

“ As a little boy he would take his place among the pupils of the monastic school, though he would soon pass to the ranks of the teachers, and the fact that he was ordained deacon at nineteen, below the canonical age, shows that he was regarded as remarkable both for learning and goodness. ”

“ It is in the Boethius that the oft-quoted sentence occurs: “My will was to live worthily as long as I lived, and after my life to leave to them that should come after, my memory in good works.” The book has come down to us in two MSS. only. ”

“ Of books iii. and iv. only, there is a learned edition by Professors Mayor and Lumby of Cambridge (3rd ed., 1881) . A cheap and handy edition of the text alone is that by A. Holder (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1882, &c.) . The best-known modern English translation is that by the Rev. L. Gidley (1870) . Of the minor historical works a good edition was edited by Rev. J. Stevenson for the Eng. Hist. Soc. in 1841; and a translation by the same hand was included in Church Historians of England, vol. i., part ii. (1853) . See also Plummer’s edition, pp. cxxxii-cxlii. (C. Pl.) ”

“ Gehle, Disputatio . . . de Bedae vita et Scriptis (Leiden, 1838) , is still useful. Dr William Bright’s Chapters of Early English Church History (3rd ed., Clarendon Press, 1897) is indispensable. See also Ker, Dark Ages, pp. 141 ff. Of the collected works of Bede the most convenient edition is that by Dr Giles in twelve volumes (8vo., 1843–1844) , which includes translations of the Historical Works. The Continental folio editions (Basel, 1563; Cologne, 1612 and 1688) contain many works which cannot by any possibility be Bede’s. The edition of Migne, Patrologia Latina (1862 ff.) ”