Part 13

The Danes in England do not appear to have occupied themselves with any compositions that can be properly called historical; at all events all remains of such composition have disappeared. It is related of the contemporary Normans in France, that, down to the days of William the Conqueror, they devoted themselves more to war than to reading and writing. This, however, is not surprising, since even the Anglo-Saxon clergy in Alfred the Great’s time, according to that monarch’s own statement, were so ignorant and so unaccustomed to literary occupations, that exceedingly few of them could read the daily prayers in English, much less translate a Latin letter. Even if we should admit that the Danes in England, by reason of their earlier and more extended settlements there, had somewhat better opportunities for study than the Normans in Normandy, still there is not sufficient ground to suppose that they wrote any other chronicles than such dry annals as some few monks, and other learned men of that time, composed. The reason of this seems partly to have been because they preferred preserving the remembrance of important events in historical lays; and partly, because neither their national nor political development could proceed in a foreign land with such freedom from all admixture, and in such tranquillity, as to allow of more important historical works, and especially in their mother tongue, being produced among them.

In Iceland, on the contrary, where a great number of the most powerful and shrewdest of the heathens of Norway sought, after the year 870, a refuge against spiritual and political oppression, and where they founded a republic which retained its independence for centuries, the Scandinavian spirit obtained a free field. Not only did the old bardic lays, and the remembrance of the deeds of former times, continue to live among the Icelandic people, but new bards arose in numbers, who, spreading themselves over the whole north of Europe, returned “with their breasts full of Sagas.” There also speedily arose in Iceland, immediately after the Viking expeditions, and altogether independently of any external influence, an historical Saga literature in the old Scandinavian tongue, which, viewed by itself, is, from its simplicity and elevation, extremely remarkable, but which, when compared with the contemporary dry Latin monkish chronicles and annals in the rest of Europe, is truly astonishing. The Edda songs, the purely historical Sagas, the historical novels, and other peculiarly bold and original productions of the Icelandic literature, in an age when the European mind was singularly contracted, form, in the intellectual world, manifestations of the same thorough individual freedom, which stamped itself on the arms, endeavours, and whole life of the heathen Northman.

SECTION XII.

Ecclesiastical and Secular Aristocracy.

The supposition that the Danes in England devoted themselves to study both earlier, and to a greater extent, than the Normans in France, is not founded only on loose conjectures. The English chronicles of the earlier middle ages contain traces of the Danes having not unfrequently entered into the English Church, in which they sometimes obtained the highest preferment. On this point we still possess an important source of information, which has, besides, the advantage of being for the most part contemporary with the events and circumstances which it elucidates. This consists of a considerable quantity of letters and diplomas issued by kings, bishops, and other leading men in England, from about the year 600 to 1066. These documents, which have lately been collected and published by a gentleman celebrated for historical research, Mr. J. M. Kemble, (under the title of “Codex Diplomaticus Ævi Saxonici,” vol. i.-vi., London, 1839-1848, 8vo.) more especially regard the southern and midland parts of England, as unfortunately the greater part of the letters relating to the north of England are lost. Nevertheless, those that remain, taken in conjunction with the chronicles, afford valuable information, both respecting the Danish clergy in the south-east of England, and their diffusion throughout that country.

In the centre of the east coast of England, in Lincolnshire, and near the Wash, stood in the Anglo-Saxon times the large and famous convent of Croyland, or Crowland, dedicated to St. Guthlac. It was built upon an island, and so protected on the land side by the vast morasses which in those times covered the districts nearest the Wash, that it was a sort of natural fortress. According to the chronicles of the convent, compiled by one of the abbots in the eleventh century, it was governed, shortly after the year 800, by an abbot of the name of Sivard; in whose time there is also mentioned in the convent a priest (presbyter) named “Turstan,” and a monk “Eskil” (Askillus monachus). In the same ancient chronicle are also recorded several deeds of gift, which possibly, with regard to the rights conveyed to the convent, may have been forgeries of the times, but which, at all events, so far as regards the names of persons and places mentioned in them, must be perfectly correct and trustworthy; since incorrectness in these particulars would have easily led to the discovery of the intended frauds. These deeds mention, between the years 800 and 868, amongst the benefactors of the convent, three viscounts in Lincolnshire, “Thorold” (or Thurold), “Norman,” and “Sivard;” and also “Grymketil” and “Asketellus” (or Asketil), who was cook to the Mercian king Viglaf. Lastly there appear (particularly in the year 833) the following names of places:—Langtoft, Asuuiktoft, Gernthorp, Holbeck, Pyncebek, Laithorp, Badby, and Kyrkeby.

The names of persons in the convent, and of places about it, here cited are all, perhaps, or at most with a single exception, of undoubted Danish or Scandinavian origin. They not only prove that, even long before the treaty between Alfred the Great and the Viking King Gudrum or Gorm, which in the year 879 secured to the Danes their conquests on the south-east coast of England, and therefore, more than one hundred and fifty years before Canute the Great’s time, the Danes really had such a footing round the Wash that they could give their villages Danish names, and were governed by their own chiefs; but they likewise indicate the remarkable fact, that at least a great number of these Danes must have been already Christians, since they had villages with churches (Kyrkeby) and gave landed property to a convent, in which we find both Danish monks (Eskil and Thurstan), and a Danish abbot (Sivard.) It was about the same time that the Jutland king, Harald Klag, was baptized, together with his whole suite, during a sojourn with the Emperor Ludvig, at Ingelheim, near Mayence, in the year 826. This christening of Danish men abroad, in Germany and England, was the beginning of the subsequent introduction of Christianity into the Scandinavian North.

The genuineness of the above-mentioned Scandinavian names is placed beyond all doubt by the circumstance that similar names appear in other documents connected with the history of Croyland at the same period, or the ninth century. In the year 867, swarms of Danish-Norwegian Vikings landed on the east coast of England, and the Christians who then lived there, whether Danes or Anglo-Saxons, as well as their churches and convents, suffered from the ferocity of these heathens. After a great battle in Lincolnshire, in which, however, the heathens lost three of their kings, whom they buried in a place afterwards called “Trekyngham” (the three kings’ home), they marched against Croyland. In vain did the Christians seek to arrest their progress. In a battle near the convent many of the Christians fell, and amongst them “Toli” or “Tule,” who had previously been a knight, but who had now entered the cloisters of Croyland. The Vikings stormed the convent, and committed a terrible massacre. Their king, “Oskytyl,” cut down the abbot before the altar; after which the convent was plundered and destroyed. The Danish Viking Jarl Sidroc, or Sigtryg, saved a boy called Turgar (Thorgeir) from this massacre, who afterwards escaped to the neighbouring convent of Ely, and gave an account, which is still preserved, of this terrible devastation. Meanwhile, however, the convent of Ely, as well as that of Medehamstede (Peterborough), was plundered and destroyed by the Vikings.

Amongst the monks then killed in Croyland, we may cite from the chronicle, the prior, Asker, and the friars Grimketulus (Grimketil) and Agamundus (Amund); and among the few saved, Sveinus or Svend:—names which, not less than Tule and Thorgeir, indicate a Danish origin. Men of Danish extraction continued in the following centuries to play a considerable part in the history of this and of the neighbouring convents. A Dane named “Thurstan” is said to have rebuilt that of Ely; and another man of Danish family, “Turketul” (Thorketil), certainly rebuilt Croyland. Thorketil, who (it is stated) was nearly related to the royal Saxon family, had previously distinguished himself both as a warrior and statesman. In the battle of Brunanborg he commanded the citizens of London who were in Athelstane’s army, and during a long series of years was chancellor to several kings. Subsequently, however, he took the vows of the convent, and governed Croyland with honour, as abbot, till his death in the year 975.

It is, indeed, very striking to observe how many abbots of Danish origin governed the convent of Croyland from the ninth to the twelfth century. Sivard and Thorketil have been already mentioned. Thorketil was succeeded by two of his relations, both named Egelrik; and after the death of the last of these in 992, followed an abbot with the pure Danish or Scandinavian name of “Oscytel.” This Asketil had long been prior of Croyland before he became its abbot, which he continued to be till his death in the year 1005. To what extent Asketil’s immediate successors were Danes is at least very uncertain, as they have Anglo-Saxon names. During the invasions of the Danish kings, however, the convent was at times suspected of being in league with the Danes. Canute the Great is said to have presented a chalice, and his son Hardicanute his coronation mantle, to Croyland. Other Danes also made similar gifts to that convent. In the year 1053 it again had an abbot with the Danish name of Ulfketil (Wulketulus); and, what is very significant, after the Norman conquest, the swampy districts round it became places of refuge for the Danes and Anglo-Saxons who had in vain fought the last battle for freedom against the victorious and advancing Norman conquerors. One of the chief leaders in this battle was the Jarl Valthiof, a son of the far-famed Danish Jarl, Sivard Digre (_Eng._ Sivard the Stout) of Northumberland. Valthiof, it is expressly stated, was one of Croyland’s best benefactors and protectors. Subsequently he made his peace with William, but was at last executed by that monarch’s directions, and immediately buried at Winchester. Nevertheless the abbot Ulfketil, together with his monks, obtained permission to convey Valthiof’s body to Croyland, where many miracles were soon performed at the shrine of the innocent and murdered martyr of freedom. Exasperated probably by this, as well as by the refuge which their opponents found in and about Croyland, the Normans inflicted many calamities on it, and at length deposed the abbot Ulfketil. He was succeeded by an Englishman with the Scandinavian name of “Ingulf,” to whom we are indebted for having indited the ancient chronicles of the convent.

The close connection of Croyland with the Danes, as well as its Danish monks and abbots, was a natural consequence of the convent’s being situated in Lincolnshire, a part of England which was pretty nearly the earliest and most numerously occupied by them. Satisfactory reasons certainly exist even to justify us in calling this convent peculiarly a Danish one. In consequence of its size and importance, it is highly probable that it was one of the principal places whence the Danish settlers in England derived their civilization. In this manner Croyland answers in England to the convent of Bec in Normandy (from the Danish Bæk, a small rivulet), founded by the Northmen, and afterwards very celebrated; which also seems to have been one of the most important nurseries for the diffusion of a higher Christian and intellectual cultivation among the Scandinavian colonists in Normandy.

The very remarkable evidence which the history of Croyland affords of the Christianity of the Danes in England so early as the ninth century, is, however, by no means solitary. Before the treaty concluded between Gorm (Gudrum) and Alfred in the year 879, the former had already been converted, and received at his baptism the name of Athelstane. In a somewhat later treaty concluded by the same King Gorm with Alfred’s successor Edward, it is assumed that there must long have been Christians among the Danes settled in East Anglia, and that they had at all events allowed the ecclesiastical institutions to exist unmolested among them. In the year 890 there was in Northumberland a king called Guthred (Gutfred, Godfred?), a son of the Danish king Hardicanute, of whom it is stated that he extended the bishopric of Durham, and conferred on it considerable rights and privileges, which even at the present day distinguish that see above all others in England. The coins of Danish-Norwegian kings minted in the north of England in the ninth and first half of the tenth century (as mentioned at p. 49), also indicate an early conversion to Christianity; as they show both the cross, and frequently also parts of the Christian legend: “Dominus, dominus, omnipotens rex mirabilia fecit;” or, “The Lord, the Lord, the Almighty King, hath performed wonderful things.”

About the year 940, Christianity must, on the whole, have had a firm footing among the Northumbrian Danes. It would otherwise be inexplicable how, in the wars which Edmund waged at that time with the Danish king Anlaf, or Olaf, in Northumberland, even the Archbishop of York, “Wulfstan,” should have sided with the Danes against the Anglo-Saxons. Wulfstan subsequently, in the year 943, negotiated a peace between Olaf and Edmund, whereby the latter ceded the country east of Watlinga-Stræt to Olaf. In this treaty a great man, of Danish extraction, took part on the Anglo-Saxon side; namely, Odo, Archbishop of Canterbury, whose father was a Dane who had fought in the host of the Vikings against Alfred the Great. One might almost be led to believe that Wulfstan himself was of Danish origin, and that his name was only the Anglo-Saxon form of the Scandinavian “Ulfsteen.” For under King Edmund’s successor, Edred, we again find the Archbishop, together with his clergy, paying homage to the Danish king’s son, Erik (son of Harald Blaatand?), although he had shortly before, in common with the Northumbrians, taken an oath of fidelity to the Anglo-Saxon king. After the murder of Erik, King Edred caused the Archbishop to be deposed and thrown into prison; but afterwards gave him the bishopric of Dorchester, though far removed from the Danish possessions.

Another argument in favour of the Danish extraction of Bishop Wulfstan (or Ulfsteen) is, that several of his successors in the archbishopric were undoubtedly Danish; which shows that in those days such men were chiefly elevated to that dignity, as, through their common descent and kinsmanship, possessed an influence over the Danish population in Northumberland; where, also, there was doubtless a great body of Danish clergy. Contemporary with Abbot Thorketil, a certain “Oscetel,” or Osketil, is also named as churchwarden (circeværd) in the King’s letters-patent in the year 949; probably the same Osketil who, between the years 955 and 970, constantly signed the King’s letters as Archbishop of York. As Odo, the Danish Archbishop of Canterbury, lived long after Osketil had become Archbishop of York, we are thus presented, half a century before the reign of Canute the Great, with the singular spectacle of the two chief ecclesiastics of England, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, being both of Danish extraction. Oscytel’s successor in the archiepiscopal see of York was also a Danish man, although he bore the Anglo-Saxon name of Oswald. He was both nearly related to Oscytel (his “nepos”), and, moreover, a brother’s son of Archbishop Odo; consequently descended in a direct line from the Danish Viking, Odo’s father. This Archbishop Oswald published some laws for the Northumbrian clergy which are still extant, and in which, according to Danish custom, fines are computed in _marks_ and _öre_; whilst in the rest of England they were reckoned in pounds and shillings.

As these facts lead us to suppose that, at that time, a great part of the inferior clergy in England must have been of Danish extraction, and particularly in Danish North and East England; it thus becomes still clearer that the English priests or missionaries, with Scandinavian names—as, for instance, Eskild, Grimkild, and Sigurd—who went over to Scandinavia in the tenth century for the purpose of converting the heathens, were, as their names show, of Danish origin, and undoubtedly natives of the Danish part of England. Sprung from Scandinavian families, which, though settled in a foreign land, could scarcely have so soon forgotten their mother tongue, or the customs which they had inherited, they could enter with greater safety than other priests on their dangerous proselytizing travels in the heathen North; where, also, from their familiarity with the Scandinavian language, they were manifestly best suited successfully to prepare the entrance of Christianity.

The rapid accession of the Danes to the highest ecclesiastical offices in England must satisfactorily convince every impartial person how carefully we should discriminate between the Danish or Scandinavian Vikings, who, only for a certain period, robbed and plundered, and the Danish colonists, who, from the beginning of the ninth century were settled down—particularly in the east and north of England—as peaceful Christian citizens; and whose sons soon became sufficiently accomplished and respected to fill the highest places among the already powerful ecclesiastical aristocracy of England. Nor should it be forgotten, that the Danes in England, who, though fewer in number than the natives, yet aimed at the supreme authority, were early obliged to apply themselves to study, and to permit their sons to enter the clerical order; for, the greater the influence they could acquire among the clergy, who at that time held a very large share of power, the stronger and more secure would their position become in the land of their adoption.

After having had, at least, three archbishops of Danish family during the tenth century, it is not surprising that in the following one the English clergy had lost a great deal of their horror for the Danes, and were so willing to do homage to the Danish conqueror, Canute the Great, in preference to any prince of Anglo-Saxon descent. Nor did Canute betray their confidence. He conformed to their manners, and built churches and convents, whilst his followers imitated his example. Under such a state of things the English clergy must have become still more mixed with Danes. In Canute’s time the royal letters are signed by the abbots “Oscytel” (1020-1023) and “Siuuard” (in Abingdon, Berkshire); as also by “Grimkytel,” bishop in Essex; and under Hardicanute, by “Sivard” and “Grimkytel” as well as by the _diaconus_ Thurkil. Even long after the fall of the Danish power, as, for instance, in Edward the Confessor’s time, we still meet with many high dignitaries of the church, with Scandinavian names; such as the abbots Sivard, Sihtric, Uvi or Ove, abbot of St. Edmundsbury, in East Anglia, and Brand; who was also abbot of a convent on the east coast, namely Peterborough, close to Croyland. We further have Sitric, chaplain to the Bishop of Dorchester, and lastly the Kentish bishop, Siward. William the Conqueror’s Doomsday Book likewise mentions several such Danish clergymen; for instance, in the old Danish city of Lincoln, the priests “Siuuard” and Aldene or Haldan. In St. Edmundsbury there was still later (1157) a Danish abbot named Hugo.

The secular nobility, or chiefs, were closely connected with the high church dignitaries of that time. The royal letters before mentioned also show, that whilst the Danes succeeded in placing men of their own race amongst the highest clergy in England, they likewise procured admittance into the ranks of the nobility, and even into the suite that surrounded the Anglo-Saxon kings themselves. This happened not only from the Danish chiefs frequently entering the service of the Anglo-Saxon kings, and often marrying among the Anglo-Saxon aristocracy; but still more from the circumstance, that certain districts became in time so strongly occupied by the Danes, as to fall under Danish chieftains; and consequently the Anglo-Saxon kings, inasmuch as they held dominion over such districts, were compelled to take these chiefs into their court and councils. History informs us that the Danish kings Halvdan and Gudrum divided the districts they had conquered in Northumbria and East Anglia among their followers, and thus formed there, at an early period, a resident and wealthy Danish aristocracy.

It has been before shown that, so early as the ninth century, Lincolnshire had had at least three Shire-greves (Sheriffs), or earls of the shire, of Danish or Scandinavian extraction; viz., Thurold, Norman, and Sivard. In the ninth century, indeed, as well as in the first part of the tenth, the Danish possessions in England were almost entirely independent of the Anglo-Saxon kings. It was at this period that the Danish-Norwegian kings in the districts north-east of Watlinga-Stræt minted, as independent sovereigns, the many coins before described. There could not, consequently, have then existed in the courts of the Anglo-Saxon monarchs so many Danish chiefs, or vassals, as when those monarchs subsequently began to acquire dominion over the previously more independent Danish kingdoms. Thus, among the regular followers of King Athelstane (925-941), who subdued the Danish kingdoms in England, we find, even before his successful expeditions into the North, not a few Danish-Norwegian chiefs, who signed diplomas in conjunction with him, and particularly during the years 929 to 931; namely, besides the Thane “Syeweard” (his minister), the Jarls Urm, Gudrum, Healden or Halfdene, Inhwær (Ingvard), Rengwald, Hadder, Haward, Scule, and Gunner. This may, perhaps, partly confirm the statement of the chronicles, that Athelstane availed himself of Danish warriors to suppress rebellion in his kingdom. It is expressly stated that, at the battle of Brunanborg (treated of at p. 34), there were Scandinavian warriors in his army; and, among the rest, two Iceland brothers, namely, Thorolf, who fell in the battle, and the bard, or scald, Egil Skallegrimsen, who stayed for some time with King Athelstane, by whom he was presented with rich gifts for his lays. It is by no means improbable that Egil entertained, with his songs, the Scandinavian chiefs then at King Athelstane’s court.

Between the years 940 and 960, several of the above-named Jarls, as Gunner, Scule, Haldan, and Urm, together with Grim and the chiefs, or ministers, Thurkytel and Thurmod, continued to sign the Anglo-Saxon letters-patent, in conjunction with their countrymen or relatives, the Abbot Thurcytel, and Oscytel, Archbishop of York. At this time the Latin title “dux” varies alternately with the Scandinavian title of Jarl, which the Anglo-Saxons called “Eorl.”