The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle | Page 5

obliged to have recourse to the Saxon Annals, or to Venerable
Bede, to supply the absence of those two great lights of history -- Chronology and
Topography.
The next historian worth notice here is Nennius, who is supposed to have flourished in
the seventh century: but the work ascribed to him is so full of interpolations and
corruptions, introduced by his transcribers, and particularly by a simpleton who is called
Samuel, or his master Beulanus, or both, who appear to have lived in the ninth century,
that it is difficult to say how much of this motley production is original and authentic. Be
that as it may, the writer of the copy printed by Gale bears ample testimony to the "Saxon
Chronicle", and says expressly, that he compiled his history partly from the records of the
Scots and Saxons (8). At the end is a confused but very curious appendix, containing that
very genealogy, with some brief notices of Saxon affairs, which the fastidiousness of
Beulanus, or of his amanuensis, the aforesaid Samuel, would not allow him to transcribe.
This writer, although he professes to be the first historiographer (9) of the Britons, has
sometimes repeated the very words of Gildas (10); whose name is even prefixed to some
copies of the work. It is a puerile composition, without judgment, selection, or method
(11); filled with legendary tales of Trojan antiquity, of magical delusion, and of the
miraculous exploits of St. Germain and St. Patrick: not to mention those of the valiant
Arthur, who is said to have felled to the ground in one day, single-handed, eight hundred
and forty Saxons! It is remarkable, that this taste for the marvelous, which does not seem
to be adapted to the sober sense of Englishmen, was afterwards revived in all its glory by
Geoffrey of Monmouth in the Norman age of credulity and romance.
We come now to a more cheering prospect; and behold a steady light reflected on the
"Saxon Chronicle" by the "Ecclesiastical History" of Bede; a writer who, without the
intervention of any legendary tale, truly deserves the title of Venerable (12). With a store
of classical learning not very common in that age, and with a simplicity of language
seldom found in monastic Latinity, he has moulded into something like a regular form the
scattered fragments of Roman, British, Scottish, and Saxon history. His work, indeed. is
professedly ecclesiastical; but, when we consider the prominent station which the Church
had at this time assumed in England, we need not be surprised if we find therein the same
intermixture of civil, military, and ecclesiastical affairs, which forms so remarkable a
feature in the "Saxon Chronicle". Hence Gibson concludes, that many passages of the
latter description were derived from the work of Bede (13). He thinks the same of the
description of Britain, the notices of the Roman emperors, and the detail of the first
arrival of the Saxons. But, it may be observed, those passages to which he alludes are not
to be found in the earlier MSS. The description of Britain, which forms the introduction,
and refers us to a period antecedent to the invasion of Julius Caesar; appears only in three
copies of the "Chronicle"; two of which are of so late a date as the Norman Conquest, and
both derived from the same source. Whatever relates to the succession of the Roman
emperors was so universally known, that it must be considered as common property: and

so short was the interval between the departure of the Romans and the arrival of the
Saxons, that the latter must have preserved amongst them sufficient memorials and
traditions to connect their own history with that of their predecessors. Like all rude
nations, they were particularly attentive to genealogies; and these, together with the
succession of their kings, their battles, and their conquests, must be derived originally
from the Saxons themselves. and not from Gildas, or Nennius, or Bede (14). Gibson
himself was so convinced of this, that he afterwards attributes to the "Saxon Chronicle"
all the knowledge we have of those early times (15). Moreover, we might ask, if our
whole dependence had been centered in Bede, what would have become of us after his
death? (16) Malmsbury indeed asserts, with some degree of vanity, that you will not
easily find a Latin historian of English affairs between Bede and himself (17); and in the
fulness of self-complacency professes his determination, "to season with Roman salt the
barbarisms of his native tongue!" He affects great contempt for Ethelwerd, whose work
will be considered hereafter; and he well knew how unacceptable any praise of the
"Saxon Annals" would be to the Normans, with whom he was connected (18). He thinks
it necessary to give his reasons, on one occasion, for inserting