Thomas Andrew Archer

“ Wilfrid on his journey to and from Rome was kindly received by Dalphinus, the archbishop of Lyons, who offered to make the young Englishman his heir and to give him his daughter in marriage. ‘But at that time,’ Eddius continues, ‘an evilly-disposed queen, Baldhild by name, persecuted the church of God. As the most wicked Jezebel of old, who slew God's prophets, so she bade slay ten bishops, of whom this Dalphinus was one.’ Bathilda seems to have given orders for him to be brought to the court, and to have had him slain on the way. ”

“ The extreme unpopularity of Queen Eleanor is reflected in nearly all the contemporary annalists. Nor were these unfortunate relations confined to her subjects alone. In 1252 her arrogant conduct provoked her patient husband into an exclamation against feminine pride. Despite the affection which her eldest son, Edward, seems to have constantly shown for her, she is said by one chronicler to have been the cause of the quarrel between him and his father in 1260. Even her affection for her kinsmen is no justification for her waste of English treasure on their behalf. ”

“ These two seem to have given great offence to unprejudiced hearers by the system they adopted; for, without bringing forward passages from the writings of Bishop Gilbert, they proposed to swear that they had heard heretical opinions fall from his lips; and people were astonished that men of position, so well exercised in the true methods of argument (‘viros magnos et in ratione disserendi exercitatos’) should offer an oath for a proof. This Adam de Parvo-Ponte, then, was a canon of Paris in 1147, and considered an adept in the science of dialectics. ”

“ Duncan succeeded in expatriating his uncle and establishing himself in his stead; but the young king found his followers unpopular with the very Scots who had made him king. These rose up in a body, cut off the strangers almost to a man, and only consented to retain Duncan as their king on condition of his taking an oath to introduce no more English or Normans into the country. ”

“ To quote Fuller's words, we may in 'this Robert Bacon behold the senior of all the Bacons which, like tributary streams, have disembogued themselves with all the credit of their actions into Roger Bacon, who in process of time hath monopolised the honour of all his sirname-sakes,' and the chief task of his biographer is to assign to him those actions which seem to be his due. ”

“ This Adalbert was patron saint of Egmont, where his faithful worshipper, Theodoric I, count of Holland (c. 922) , erected a shrine for his relics. At the bidding of Egbert, archbishop of Treves and grandson of Theodoric I, who believed himself to have been cured of a fever by this saint's intercession, certain ‘monachi Mediolacenses’ (Metloch, near Saarbrück, in the diocese of Treves) drew up in the tenth century a life of Adalbert. This life, together with another account written by a monk at Egmont in the twelfth century, is our chief authority on this subject. ”

“ He allowed no plundering among his followers, but countenanced the deposition of the great men of the city, and the tempprary institution of what a contemporary ndon chronicler calls a ‘commune’ of the ‘homines minuti.’ Henry at once came south with his army, rescued the legate, apparently by water, but, being unable to effect an entrance within the walls, encamped at Stratford. ”

“ Gilbert de Clare was the most powerful English noble of his day. Besides his immense estates in Wales and Ireland, he possessed lands in twenty-two English counties (Escheat Rolls, i. 131) . In his early years he appears to have been very fickle in his political attachments, and want of loyalty to his leaders was strikingly exemplified in his conduct towards Simon de Montfort and Prince Edward. There was something chivalrous, however, in his attitude towards the disinherited barons, and in his care to secure the safety of his adherents among the London citizens. ”

“ On the death of Richard Kellaw, bishop of Durham, in 1316, the king, the queen, the Earl of Lancaster, and the Earl of Hereford had each his own candidate for the vacant office. As the day of election came on, the church was filled with the above-mentioned nobles and their followers, as well as with the retainers of Louis de Beaumont and of his brother Henry. Threats passed freely to slay the elected bishop if the monks should dare to choose one of their own number. ”

“ Louis de Beaumont was present on this occasion, and it cannot be doubted that a man of his high birth and courage had much to do with the decision there arrived at — to render aid against the Scotch invasions, but to hold political matters over till the next parliament. Louis does not seem to have been a very vigorous protector of his palatinate against the Scotch, though this was one of the pleas on which Edward II urged the pope to appoint him; and we have a letter from that king reproaching the bishop for being by no means a 'stone wall' against the enemy. ”

“ BATE, JOHN (d. 1429) , theologian and philosopher, was, according to Leland's account, born west of the Severn (inter Transabrinos) , but seems to have been brought up in the Carmelite monastery at York, where his progress in learning was so great that he was despatched to complete his studies at Oxford. Philosophy and theology seem to have divided his attention, and on asking his master's degree in both these subjects he proceeded to add to his reputation by authorship. He was acknowledged to be an authority in his own university, and the news of his acquirements soon spread abroad. ”

“ FITZSTEPHEN, WILLIAM (d. 1190?) , the biographer of Becket, styles himself the archbishop's ‘concivis.’ He was in the closest connection with Becket for ten years or more, as his ‘clericus et convictor.’ When Becket became chancellor, he appointed Fitzstephen to be ‘dictator in cancelleria ejus.’ Later William became subdeacon in his chapel, and was entrusted with the duty of perusing letters and petitions. ”

“ Nor did he ape the usual pride of bishops in those days. ‘The primate of all England,’ says his biographer, ‘did not blush to take off his own shoes or to bear the cross from chapel to study with his own hands.’ But that which most impressed the imagination of his own generation was his absolute purity. ”

“ Fearing lest Bathilda should take vengeance for her friend's murder, they now consented to her retirement; and she, having first taken counsel with the priests, pardoned the offenders.
From this time the queen's life seems to have been spent in works of piety. In the nunnery of Chelles she submitted to the rule of that Bertila whom she had herself made abbess. Nor did the lowhest offices of the household or the kitchen shock her. Sometimes, however, she would revisit the outside world. ”

“ The author of the ‘De Tripartito’ claims the ‘Liber de ordine,’ &c., and the author of the ‘De Triplici genere,’ &c. claims the ‘De Tripartito.’ One Adam, therefore, wrote the three treatises. And the ‘De Tripartito’ is full of hints which enable us to fix the author's era with certainty, and his country with a fair amount of probability. In part ii. c. 6 we read that the sixth age of the world dates from the coming of Christ, ‘of which age 1180 years are now past.’ The same date will suit the lists of popes and kings. ”

“ At last, feeling that death was upon him, and pitying the older members of his flock whose weak limbs could hardly bear the toils of a journey to his secluded cell, he gave orders to be carried from the valley to a place of easier access. ”

“ A graceful tribute is then paid to the honour of a man from whom John had learnt not only to recognise the true but to discard the false. In another passage Adam is coupled with Abelard as one of the typical teachers of the age; and later (iv. 3) is condemned for displaying in his ‘Ars Disserendi’ an over-subtlety and verbiage which friends might perhaps attribute to keenness of intellect, but enemies would certainly ascribe to folly and vanity. Here Adam appears as an expounder of Aristotle, who, though darkening his authority by ‘intricacy of words,’ is yet worthy of much praise. ”

“ Pits has committed several egregious mistakes in his account of this writer, making him die in 1310, four years before the battle of Bannockburn, which he celebrates in verse; and Bale's vaguer language leaves the impression that he too was labouring under a similar error. On the whole, it seems hard to escape from the conclusion that Robert Baston's biographers have made him present in Scotland on two occasions instead of one, and have confounded the siege of Stirling under Edward I with the siege of the same castle that, under Edward II, resulted in the battle of Bannockburn. ”

“ Next morning the city was in open revolt. Louis had to leave early (April 19) , and Galdric at once began to levy for his own use the contribution each citizen had made to the ‘commune.’ In spite of warnings from Anselm, he continued to enforce the impost, till on the following Thursday the burgesses, raising the cry of ‘Commune,’ burst into the bishop's court. Galdric fled to the cellars beneath the cathedral. ”

“ His life for the next six years seems to have been divided between Paris and Oxford. Though he refused to take deacon's or priest's orders, he was constant in his attendance at early mass. He even built a little chapel in the Oxford parish where he lived, and induced his pupils to imitate his own example in the matter of punctual attendance (Vita Bertr.; Ep. Oxon.) His austerity towards himself was balanced by extreme tenderness towards others. ”

“ The name of Christian's new abbot, according to Mauritus à Prato, who here becomes Ghiselbert's authority, was Adam, or Edan, from the neighbouring foundation of Soulseat near Stranraer, and is identified with our writer. In the Præmonstratensian abbey of St. Michael at Antwerp Ghiselbert found another life of Adam which described him as being born of noble parents in Anglo-Scotia, and a contemporary of the ‘first fathers of the Præmonstratensian order.’ But the amount of truth that underlies these vague statements is very hard to appreciate at its exact value. ”

“ John the redoubtable, than whom no poet was more learned’ (Earls of Kildare, p. 28) . At one time or another he must have had under his control no inconsiderable part of Ireland. The fact that he was never justiciar seems to point to some distrust as to his perfect trustworthiness, and his power is shown by his equality in the quarrel with the great house of Ulster, which latterly seems to have been willing to secure peace by mutual marriages. ”

“ Avarice, according to the popular impression, was the leading characteristic of his mind. Matthew Paris does not hesitate to accuse him of selling his daughter into marriage like any common ‘usurer;’ and Simon de Montfort charged him more than once with the most wanton deceit. ”

“ Leo X, who succeeded Julius II in the papacy, had promoted the Bishop of Moray to St. Andrews (by 27 Jan. 1514) , then vacant by the death of Alexander Stewart, James IV's son, who was slain at Flodden (No. 4682, Leslie, p. 95) . His election to this see was contested by Gavin Douglas [q. v.] and John Hepburn. It was generally believed that Forman was supported by the new regent, the Duke of Albany, whom, however, the bishop did not accompany to Scotland. In March 1515 the bishop was at Lyons, and about 3 June he left Bruges for Scotland. ”

“ Baconthorpe was a man of extremely small stature, a very Zacchæus, as Pits phrases it, whose body could never have supported the weight of the huge volumes his intellect produced without being crushed to death. ”

“ He appears to have died in the castle of Glasgow on Christmas eve 1446 (Short Chronicle of Scotland, quoted in Gordon) . There does not seem to be any valid foundation for Spotiswood's charge that Cameron was of a cruel and covetous disposition; and still less is any credit to be attached to the legend of terror with which the story of his death has been embellished (Buchanan) . ”

“ In 1235 Maurice and Richard led an army to ravage Connaught, but turned aside to attack Donnchadh O'Briain, prince of Munster. Felim was driven off to O'Domhnaill, while Maurice the justiciar was mustering the spoil at Ardcarna, launching his fleet on the eastern Atlantic, and storming the rock of Loch Cé. The expedition closed when Felim made peace with the justiciar, and was granted the five 'king's cantreds.' Next year Maurice banished Felim again, and supplanted him by his cousin, Brian O'Conor. A great victory at Druimraithe restored Felim to the throne ”

“ Hence it would appear that Sir Thomas de la More had drawn up a French account of at least the reign of Edward II, of which Geoffrey Baker availed himself in his longer chronicle. Sir Thomas's original work has wholly disappeared. In the early years of Queen Elizabeth manuscript copies of what purported to be a Latin translation of Sir Thomas's ‘Life and Death of Edward II’ were in circulation, and Camden printed a version of that work in the ‘Vita et Mors Edwardi II,’ published in his ‘Anglica Scripta’ (1603) . ”

“ Careless in the matters of food and drink, raiment, or personal comfort, he had the art to appear the servant rather than the lord of his followers, to whom he showed himself liberal and gentle. Though a man of undoubted spirit, he always tempered his valour with prudence, and, 'though he had much of the knight about him, he had still more of the captain. ”

“ It is curious to find the earl once more supporting the claims of Walter Hervey, who had been elected mayor of London by the 'communitas,' against those of Philip le Tayllur, the candidate appointed by the city magnates. Here he seems again to be advocating the cause of the weaker citizens, as he had done in 1267, and so helping to sustain a popular movement, which appears to have originated in the times of Simon de Montfort. ”

“ FISHACRE, FISSAKRE, FISHAKLE, or FIZACRE, RICHARD de (d. 1248) , Dominican divine, is said to have been a native of Devonshire (Fuller, i. 442, iii. 20) . Trivet styles him 'natus Oxonia,' where, however, other manuscripts read Exonia (p. 230) . Bale makes him study 'the scurrilities of the Sophists' at Oxford and Paris; but the whole story of the latter visit is probably nothing more than the expansion of a very dubious suggestion in Leland's 'Commentaries ' (Bale, p. 294; Leland, ii. 275) . Like Robert Bacon [q. v.] , Fishacre in his old age became a Dominican ”

“ To form any compound number, hooks are added to both sides; as, for example, 55, which thus takes the shape of a cross, and is ‘the worthiest of all these figures,’ according to Matthew Paris. Leland assures us that Basingstoke, on his return home, did much to encourage the rising generation to study Greek; and we know from Matthew Paris that he translated a Greek grammar into Latin, to which he gave the name of ‘Donatus Græcorum.’ He likewise wrote a book on the parts of speech, and another work, ‘which he got from the Athenians,’ in which the order of the Gospel events is set forth. ”

“ ELEANOR of Provence (d. 1291) , queen of England and wife of Henry III, was the daughter of Raymond Berenger IV, count of Provence, and his wife Beatrix, sister of Amadeus III of Savoy. Both her father and her mother figure among the Provençal poets, and Eleanor herself is reported to have composed an heroic poem while yet a child, in her native language. ”

“ The wide range of his inquiries is proved by the titles of his works, which, besides the ordinary theological and logical topics of the age, embrace treatises on astronomy or astrology, on the pontifical canons, on generation, the movement of animals, and innumerable other subjects. At Paris he seems to have first displayed that marked adherence to the doctrines of Averroes which gained him the title of 'Princeps Averroistarum.' But M. Renan is explicit in his statement that Baconthorpe does not so much maintain all the tenets of Averroes as strive to palliate their heterodoxy. ”

“ BARTHOLOMEW, Saint (d. 1193) , was a Northumbrian hermit of some celebrity, who flourished in the twelfth century. His life was most probably written by Galfrid, the author of the biography of St. Godric, and a monk of Bartholomew's own monastery of St. Mary at Durham. In any case, it professes to be written in the lifetime of the saint's contemporaries. According to this life, Bartholomew was born at Witeb or Whitby. ”

“ After having received the priesthood, Carthach was once more brought before the king, whom he blessed, and to whose descendants he promised long rule in Kerry, ‘all which things,’ says his biographer (Vita, ii. 379) , ‘are being fulfilled according to that prophecy.’ From his cell in Kell-Tulach, ‘between the Mainne and Mount Mysis,’ Carthach set out for North Ireland, the home of his race, and spent a year with Comgall at his great monastery of Bangor (in co. Down) , on leaving which place he acted as bishop in Kerry. ”

“ The prefaces to the later redactions of the 'Scotichronicon' are our only authority for Fordun's life. He only once intimates his name by an acrostic (Fordun, p. 3; Scotichron. i. 3) . The important manuscript of the 'Scotichronicon' in the British Museum (Royal Library, 13 EX) , commonly known as the 'Black Book of Paisley' (a fifteenth-century manuscript) , calls John de Fordun 'capellanus ecclesiæ Aberdonensis,' while the 'prologue' to the 'Scotichronicon' styles him 'dominus Joannes Fordoun, presbyter' (Skene, pref. p. xvii; Murray, pp. 2, 15) . ”

“ CLARE, GILBERT de, seventh Earl of Clare, fifth Earl of Hertford, and sixth Earl of Gloucester (d. 1230) , was the son of Richard, sixth earl of Clare and Hertford (d. 1217?) , by his wife Amicia, one of the three coheiresses of William, earl of Gloucester. On the death of his mother and the failure of issue to her two sisters, Mabel and Isabella (the divorced wife of King John, afterwards married to Geoffrey de Mandevil and Hubert de Burgh) , he succeeded to the vast Gloucester estates apparently in the year 1217 (Annals of Margam, p. 33) . ”

“ Alexander III, who was accustomed to call him and the bishop of Worcester the two candlesticks of the English church, in 1169 gave him, in concert with the archbishop of Rouen, the power of absolving the excommunicated bishops. ”

“ This volume is a history of Rome from the earliest periods, and consists, like its author's previous works, of quotations from Cicero so woven together as to make a continuous whole. It appears to be a mere torso of a larger work, in which the same method was to have been employed for illustrating ‘the moral and physical science of the Romans’ from the writings of Seneca and Pliny. Warton has suggested that it was from Bellenden's ‘De Tribus Luminibus’ that Middleton conceived the idea of writing Cicero's history in his own words. ”

“ About Easter the archbishop was negotiating a peace with Llewellyn of Wales.
Meanwhile the earl marshal had been enticed into Wales and slain in the king's name, if not with the king's consent. Edmund took up this matter also. At Gloucester he induced Henry to accept the homage of the dead noble's brother and heir, Gilbert (28 May) , and on Whitsunday at Worcester he had the letters by which Earl Richard had been inveigled to his fate read before the king and the whole assembly of bishops and barons. ”

“ The feud was at its height by April 1294, and William de Vescy accused John Fitzthomas of felony. John accused the justiciar of saying that the great lords of Ireland need care very little for a king like Edward, who was ‘the most perverse and dastard knight in his realm.’ William denied the charge, and offered wager of battle. From Ireland the case was transferred to Westminster, and a day appointed for the combat. ”

“ He was educated at Oxford, where he was first the pupil and afterwards the friend and fellow-lecturer of Edmund Rich, of whose life he afterwards wrote at least one account. Like Rich and so many other of his contemporaries he passed with his bosom friend, Richard Fishaker, to study at Paris, and is said always — even when in later life once more resident at Oxford — to have kept up a constant communication with the confraternity of learning there. ”

“ But, since Aristotle, till the thirteenth century, was known to Western Europe only as a logician (Bass Mullinger, History of Cambridge University) , it is perhaps best to assign this commentator to the century in which his sole existing manuscript was written. Wadding reckons him as a Franciscan, and professes to have seen four other treatises upon Aristotle written by this Adam, besides the one above mentioned, which he had never come across. ”