The Sea and Englishness in the Middle Ages: Maritime Narratives, Identity and Culture

spine 23mm A 6 May 2010

Local and imperial, insular and expansive, both English yet British: geographically and culturally, the sea continues to shape changing models of Englishness. This volume traces the many literary origins of insular identity from local communities to the entire archipelago, laying open the continuities and disruptions in the sea’s relationship with English identity in a British context. Ranging from the beginnings of insular literature to Victorian medievalisms, the subjects treated include King Arthur’s struggle with muddy banks, the afterlife of Edgar’s forged charters, Old English homilies and narratives of migration, Welsh and English ideas about Chester, Anglo-Norman views of the sea in the Vie de St Edmund and Waldef, postConquest cartography, The Book of Margery Kempe, the works of the Irish Stopford Brooke, and the making of an Anglo-British identity in Victorian Britain. Sebastian Sobecki is Professor of Medieval English

Literature and Culture at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen.

Contributors: Catherine A. M. Clarke Alfred Hiatt Jonathan Hsy Chris Jones Kathy Lavezzo Fabienne Michelet Joanne Parker Winfried Rudolf Sebastian Sobecki David Wallace Judith Weiss

Cover: The British Isles, Ptolemy’s Cosmographia, 1467. National Library of Poland, MS BN BOZ 2/I, fol. 2v.

BOYDELL & BREWER Ltd YORK MEDIEVAL PRESS

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YORK MEDIEVAL PRESS

The Sea and Englishness in the Middle Ages: Maritime Narratives, Identity and Culture

The Sea and Englishness in the Middle Ages: Maritime Narratives, Identity and Culture Edited by Sebastian I. Sobecki

d. s. brewer

© Contributors 2011 All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under current legislation no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system, published, performed in public, adapted, broadcast, transmitted, recorded or reproduced in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the copyright owner

First published 2011 D. S. Brewer, Cambridge

ISBN 978-1-84384-276-7

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Contents List of Illustrations

vii

Acknowledgements

ix

Contributors

xi

Abbreviations

xii

1. Introduction: Edgar’s Archipelago – Sebastian I. Sobecki

1

2. The Spiritual Islescape of the Anglo-Saxons – Winfried Rudolf

31

3. Lost at Sea: Nautical Travels in the Old English Exodus, the Old English Andreas, and Accounts of the adventus Saxonum – Fabienne L. Michelet

59

4. Edges and Otherworlds: Imagining Tidal Spaces in Early Medieval Britain – Catherine A.M. Clarke

81

5. East Anglia and the Sea in the Narratives of the Vie de St Edmund and Waldef – Judith Weiss

103

6. The Sea and Border Crossings in the Alliterative Morte Arthure – Kathy Lavezzo

113

7. ‘From Hulle to Cartage’: Maps, England, and the Sea – Alfred Hiatt

133

8. Lingua Franca: Overseas Travel and Language Contact in The Book of Margery Kempe – Jonathan Hsy

159

9. ‘Birthplace for the Poetry of the Sea-ruling Nation’: Stopford Brooke and Old English – Chris Jones

179

10. Ruling the Waves: Saxons, Vikings, and the Sea in the Formation of an Anglo-British Identity in the Nineteenth Century – Joanne Parker

195

Afterword: Sea, Island, Mud – David Wallace

207

Bibliography

219

Index

249

Illustrations Figure 1: Frontispiece from John Selden, Mare clausum, trans. by Marchamont Nedham (London, 1652). Provided courtesy of the Daniel R. Coquillette Rare Book Room, Boston College Law Library.

6

Figure 2: British Library, MS Cotton Tiberius B.V. 1, f. 56v: the Cotton mappa mundi. Reproduced by permission of The British Library.

135

Figure 3: BL, MS Cotton Tiberius B.V. 1, f. 29r: zonal map. Reproduced by permission of The British Library.

137

Figure 4: BL, MS Cotton Faustina C. 1, f. 87v: Macrobius map. Reproduced by permission of The British Library.

138

Figure 5: Oxford, Bodley MS Auct. F. 2.20, f. 53v: Macrobius map. Reproduced by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.

140

Figure 6: The Hereford Mappa Mundi, detail: the British Isles and Augustus Caesar. Reproduced by permission of the Dean and Chapter of Hereford and the Hereford Mappa Mundi Trust.

143

Figure 7: College of Arms, MS Muniments 18/19: the Evesham map. Reproduced by permission of the College of Arms, London.

145

Figure 8: BL, MS Additional 25691: sea chart, atelier of Angelino Dulceti, 1339–50. Reproduced by permission of The British Library.

155

Disclaimer: Some images in the printed version of this book are not available for inclusion in the eBook. To view these images please refer to the printed version of this book.

Dla Nadii z Wysp

Acknowledgements A number of the ensuing chapters started out as contributions to two sessions on Englishness and the sea at the 15th International Medieval Congress, held in Leeds in the summer of 2008. My list of thanks must therefore begin with those who presented and chaired these sessions: Fabienne Michelet, Catherine Clarke, Jennifer Neville, Clare Lees, Jonathan Hsy, Kathy Lavezzo, and Alfred Hiatt. I would also like to thank the IMC Programming Committee for having welcomed the idea of joint sessions on this theme. But there might never have been a book had Caroline Palmer, Boydell and Brewer’s commissioning editor, not lent her enthusiastic support to this project at the time. Caroline has encouraged and shaped this initiative from the outset. I am also grateful to the anonymous reader of the proposal, from whose comments the book profited greatly, and to Rohais Haughton and Vanda Ham at Boydell and Brewer, who provided prompt and knowledgeable guidance during the production process. I would like to thank my contributors for having crafted such perceptive chapters. Their meticulous work has made editing this book a joy. I owe special thanks to David Wallace, who generously responded to my invitation and whose elegant Afterword has given this book a perspective it could not have otherwise obtained. Finally, I would like to thank my wife and my daughter for having put up with this book and its many demands.

Contributors Catherine Clarke is Senior Lecturer in English and Associate Director of the Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Research at Swansea University. Her research centres on earlier medieval literature and culture, with particular attention to questions of place, power, and identity and an emphasis on interdisciplinary approaches. Her publications include the monograph Literary Landscapes and the Idea of England, 700–1400 (Brewer, 2006), and she was director of the AHRC-funded Mapping Medieval Chester project. Alfred Hiatt is a Reader in Medieval English Literature at Queen Mary, University of London. His research interests centre on spatial representation and historical writing. He is the author of two books, The Making of Medieval Forgeries: False Documents in Fifteenth-Century England (British Library, 2004), and Terra Incognita: Mapping the Antipodes before 1600 (British Library, 2008). He is currently working on a monograph on medieval maps. Jonathan Hsy is an Assistant Professor of English at the George Washington University. His publications include essays on multilingual lyrics, sea travel, and Anglo-French literary and cultural exchange. He is completing a book on merchant culture and multilingual writing practices in late medieval London. Chris Jones is Senior Lecturer in English Poetry at the University of St Andrews. He works on medieval poetry (especially Old English) and its reception in the post-medieval world. His book Strange Likeness: The Use of Old English in Twentieth-Century Poetry (Oxford University Press, 2006) was shortlisted for the ESSE prize. His second book, Fossil Poetry: Anglo-Saxonism and Linguistic Nativism in the Nineteenth Century, is in preparation. Kathy Lavezzo teaches English at the University of Iowa. She is the editor of Imagining a Medieval English Nation (Minnesota University Press, 2004) and the author of Angels on the Edge of the World: Geography, Literature, and English Community, 1000–1534 (Cornell University Press, 2008). She has co-edited with Susie Phillips a special issue of Philological Quarterly on New Work on the Middle Ages (2008). She is currently working on a book on the function of buildings and urban space in English anti-Semitic writings from the Middle Ages and Renaissance.

Fabienne L. Michelet is an Associated Scholar at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto. She is the author of Creation, Migration, and Conquest: Imaginary Geography and Sense of Space in Old English Literature (Oxford University Press, 2006). Her work focuses on Old English literature, especially Old English poetry; cultural geography and questions of space and place; discourses of heroism and heroic agency. Joanne Parker is a lecturer in Victorian literature at the University of Exeter. Her work is focused on nineteenth-century historical literature and in particular on Victorian medievalism. Her monograph England’s Darling: The Victorian Cult of Alfred the Great was published by Manchester University Press (2007) and she has also published on the Victorian fascinations with Robin Hood, King Arthur, and prehistoric monuments. Winfried Rudolf is Darby Fellow in English at Lincoln College, Oxford. His main research interest concerns Anglo-Saxon manuscripts, the iconicity of the written sign in the Middle Ages, the prose–poetry interface in Old English and the materiality of Anglo-Saxon homiletic literature on which he has published widely. He is currently finishing a monograph on textual instability in Old English homilies and is editing a collection of essays on a fifteenth-century English prayerbook found in Vercelli (Italy). Sebastian I. Sobecki is Professor of Medieval English Literature and Culture at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen. He is interested in maritime, mercantile, and legal writing, and works on comparative medieval and early modern literature. His first book, The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Brewer), appeared in 2008. He is currently finishing his second monograph, Unwritten Verities: The Common Law, Reading, and Ideas of Englishness, 1460–1586 (Notre Dame University Press), and preparing the first volume of a new edition of Richard Hakluyt’s Principal Navigations (Oxford University Press). David Wallace has been Judith Rodin Professor of English, University of Pennsylvania, since 1996. His most recent books are Strong Women (Oxford University Press, 2011) and Premodern Places (Blackwell, 2004). Work for BBC Radio 3 includes documentary features on Bede, Margery Kempe, Malory, and John Leland; he is currently editing a literary history of Europe, 1348–1418, for Oxford University Press (www.english.upenn.edu/~dwallace/regeneration/). Judith Weiss is an Emeritus Fellow of Robinson College, Cambridge. Her interests lie mainly in the field of Anglo-Norman romance and historiography. Her publications include a parallel text and translation of Wace’s Roman de Brut (Exeter University Press, 1999, 2002) and a translation of and introduction to Boeve de Haumtone and Gui de Warewic (ACMRS, 2008).

Abbreviations ASE ASPR CCSL DNB EETS MED MGH NM PL

Anglo-Saxon England Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records: A Collective Edition, ed. by George Philip Krapp and Elliott van Kirk Dobbie, 6 vols (New York: Columbia University Press, 1931–53) Corpus Christianorum Series Latina (Turnhout, 1947–) Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed. by H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, online edn (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) www.oxforddnb.com Early English Text Society (various locations, 1864–) The Middle English Dictionary, ed. by Hans Kurath and Sherman M. Kuhn, 19 vols (Ann Arbor, MI, 1956-2001) Monumenta Germaniae Historica (various locations, 1826–) Neuphilologische Mitteilungen Patrologia Latina, ed. J.-R. Migne, 221 vols (Paris, 1844–64)

Introduction: Edgar’s Archipelago*

Sebastian I. Sobecki ‘Britain isn’t an entity, it’s an argument.’1 Initially voiced at a conference panel, David Baker’s assertion was not just a gut feeling worth publishing. How else, for instance, is one to interpret the peculiar pecking order governing British passports? Issued in no fewer than six classes, a British passport formalises one of the following ranks of belonging: British citizenship, British overseas citizenship, British overseas territories citizenship, British national (overseas), British protected person, and British subject.2 Connecting and separating these gradations is British nationality law, an intricate web of privileges and restrictions, which the Home Office openly acknowledges to be ‘complicated’.3 With six degrees of political affiliation to a British polity – some of which confer virtually no entitlements – how can Britain ever be objectively delimited as a viable ‘imagined community’ and Britishness hence defined as a national identity? Benedict Anderson perceives the nation-state as ‘an imagined political community’, one that is ‘imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign’.4 And he thinks of a nation-state as imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion.5

Anderson sets the bar too high for Britishness. Without a clear idea of what constitutes this communion, it is hard to see how all six classes of political Britons could share the same definition of what it is exactly that makes them come together. Communities, imagined and otherwise, need to know where they *

I am grateful to Alasdair MacDonald and David Wallace for their comments on this chapter. 1 David Baker and Willy Maley, ‘An Uncertain Union (A Dialogue)’, in Archipelagic Identities: Literature and Identity in the Atlantic Archipelago, 1550–1800, ed. Philip Schwyzer and Simon Mealor (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), pp. 8–21 (p. 10) 2 The Home Office’s UK Border Agency even lists defunct forms such as citizenship of the United Kingdom and colonies (CUKC) or British Dependent Territories citizenship: www. ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/britishcitizenship/aboutcitizenship [accessed 26 August 2010]. 3 www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/britishcitizenship/aboutcitizenship [accessed 26 August 2010]. 4 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006), p. 6. 5 Anderson, Imagined Communities, p. 6.

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end to give their constituents a firm sense of belonging. But the idea of Britain isn’t such a community. Instead, contrastive features such as vestigial Governors General, political devolution, short-changed Gurkha pensioners, and the seemingly unstoppable process of European integration stimulate enough variance to ensure that the boundaries of Britishness will remain arguable in the near future. Yet the drawing and redrawing of physical or political boundaries is an essential activity for communities. Such boundaries define interests as much as they set expectations. Whether they are drafted under the Hobbesian pretence of self-preservation or give voice to expansive ambition (or both), borders and boundaries grow lives of their own: they are productive beyond their own instrumentality; they determine their content by encompassing and bounding it. Boundaries help communities make sense of themselves. For that reason any form of identity finding relies on exclusion: identities are demarcated, delimited, defined. What has historically delimited and therefore defined insular Britons is the sea with its all-encircling boundary, the shoreline. Just as journeys of self-discovery traverse the surroundings of the self, so communities imagine their environment to understand themselves. Looking into requires one to be on the outside. Louis Althusser, in a celebrated reading of Brecht’s theatre, situates the crucial, radical moment of self-discovery in the encounter with the outside: ‘la conscience accède au réel, non par son développement interne mais par la découverte radicale de l’autre que soi’.6 As a marker of this environment and of the literature its dwellers have produced, the sea circumscribes insular identity as it delimits islands. And if the six classes of British nationality seem at first confusing, remarkably the sea continues to define them. It privileges the sense of insular Britishness that is conveyed by the first class of British nationality, British citizenship. (For ‘British citizenship’, read ‘of the archipelago’.) The remaining five classes all have ‘overseas’ as a distinguishing attribute, either as part of their classification label or embedded in the degree to which their insular rights are curtailed by overseas birth or residence. The sea separates inner from outer Britons. As if to remind its bearer of this division, the new design for the British passport, released on 25 August 2010, features the white cliffs of Dover – complete with tern, lighthouse, and the sea – on the biographical double-page.7 To adapt Baker’s assertion, then, Britain appears to be a maritime argument. For an island culture the moment of Althusser’s découverte radicale, of profound introspection, is therefore located in the repeated encounter with its maritime boundary. It is on the littorals and along the coasts of Britain that so many early narratives of English identity are generated. Cnut’s failed subjection of the sea in Henry of Huntingdon’s Historia Anglorum, Arthur’s transgression of ‘England’s 6 7

Louis Althusser, Pour Marx (Paris: Maspero, 1965), p. 144. Home Office press release for 25 August 2010 www.homeoffice.gov.uk/media-centre/ press-releases/new-uk-passport-unveiled [accessed 26 August 2010]. I am grateful to David Wallace for drawing my attention to the new passport design.



introduction: edgar’s archipelago

3

watery border’ in the Alliterative Morte Arthure, or the littoral struggles for collective survival in the Horn legend – all situate their defining moments near the sea.8 Geographically as well as ideologically, the British maritime environment in which narratives of Englishness were first negotiated and fixed is the theme of this collection. The idea behind this book was to encourage scholars working on pre- and post-Conquest literature to think about the relationship between the sea and the formation of a collective English identity. In this context, ‘the sea’ denotes Britain’s insular setting as much as it refers to the full range of maritime topoi available to insular writers, whereas ‘English’ is understood not just as a historical self-designation but a process that involves not one but many British communities. But this is not to say that the book’s scope is exclusively English: since many of the narratives in this volume situate Englishness in relation to Britishness, ideas of English identity frequently engage with many of the other inhabitants of the archipelago, the Welsh, the Scots, the Irish, and the Norse. This introductory chapter probes the humble beginnings of one such narrative, King Edgar’s legendary title to archipelagic dominion.9 I have chosen to focus on Edgar’s claim because its reception history aptly illustrates what I would call the ‘dynamic memory’ of a community, that is, the process of repeatedly adjusting the past to harmonise collective identity at a given moment.10 Since the sea circumscribes the ambits of insular identities from local communities to the entire archipelago, the various chapters in this collection show the many continuities and disruptions in the sea’s relationship with English identity over the longue durée. My main purpose, therefore, is to bring into conversation some of the ideological forces that maritime English topoi are prone to: they are often local and imperial, insular and expansive, English yet British. The second purpose is to justify the volume’s considerable chronological scope, ranging from pre-Conquest texts to Victorian medievalisms, by demonstrating how the rewriting and appropriation of a particular pre-modern maritime narrative inscribed an idea of Britain in the dynamic memory of Englishness. Worcester’s Memory On the evening of Friday 17 April 1663, Samuel Pepys paid a visit to the bookseller Robert Walton ‘to cause the title of [his] English Mare Clausum to be 8

See, in turn, the chapters by Catherine A. M. Clarke and Kathy Lavezzo as well as my The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008), pp. 100–13. 9 By ‘archipelagic’ I understand an island-studded sea as opposed to a group of islands. This is still the primary meaning of archipelago: ‘Any sea, or sheet of water, in which there are numerous islands; and transf. a group of islands’ (OED) and ‘1: An expanse of water with many scattered islands; 2: a group of islands’ (Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th edn (Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, 2003)). 10 Merriam-Webster defines ‘dynamic memory’ in this context as memory ‘requiring periodic refreshment of charge in order to retain data’ (Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary).

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changed, and the new title, dedicated to the King, to be put into it’ because he was ‘ashamed to have the other seen dedicate[d] to the Commonwealth’.11 Pepys’s ‘English Mare clausum’ is Marchamont Nedham’s 1652 translation of John Selden’s influential treatise on territorial waters, published in 1635.12 Selden’s treatise was originally written during the second decade of the seventeenth century as a rebuttal to Mare liberum, an eloquent defence of the doctrine of free seas composed by the Dutch polymath Hugo Grotius in 1609.13 It is telling that Pepys had singled out Selden’s book for his public display of adherence to the nouveau regime. At the time, Pepys was clerk of the acts at the Navy Board and he may have had a professional interest in ensuring the ideological homogeneity of his bookshelf.14 Clearly, Pepys derived some satisfaction from his sanitised copy, for only four days later he went to his office ‘where [he] first ruled with red Inke [his] English Mare clausum; which, with the new Orthodox title, makes it now very handsome’.15 Nedham’s 1652 translation, the work of one of Cromwell’s chief propagandists, was printed by ‘special command’ with a frontispiece that featured a triumphalist panegyric ode, in six stanzas, spoken by ‘Neptune to the Common-Wealth of England’.16 In the poem, Neptune encourages England to adopt an imperialist policy, grounded in its naval strength. For most of the poem the addressee is an apostrophised English state which has received its adjacent seas from King Edgar: What wealth or glorie may arise By the North-West discoveries is due unto thy care, Th’ adopting them with English names, The greatness of thy minde proclaim’s, and what thy actions are. 11

The Diary of Samuel Pepys: A New and Complete Transcription, ed. Robert Latham, William Matthews, and William A. Armstrong, 11 vols (London: Harper Collins, 2000), IV, 105. David Armitage, The Ideological Origins of the British Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) treats this event on pp. 120–1. 12 Pepys acquired his copy at St Paul’s Churchyard in 29 November 1661, and he has minuted its reading between that month and 8 January of the following year. The Diary of Samuel Pepys, II, 223, 226–7, and 235, and III, 6. 13 M. B. Vieira, ‘Mare liberum vs. Mare clausum: Grotius, Freitas, and Selden’s Debate on Dominion over the Seas’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 64 (2003), 361–77). Selden’s work almost went to print in 1618 before James had it withdrawn to appease Denmark (Richard Tuck, The Rights of War and Peace: Political Thought and the International Order from Grotius to Kant (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 119). 14 Charles Knighton, ‘Pepys, Samuel (1633–1703)’, in DNB. Pepys’s purchase of Mare clausum was connected to his intention of writing about the striking of the sail to further his career; The Diary of Samuel Pepys, II, 223. Presumably he was aware that Charles was trying to enforce the naval policy of the striking of the sail. 15 The Diary of Samuel Pepys, IV, 107. 16 The poem has had an illustrious afterlife, including its unacknowledged adaptation by Haydn in 1794 (Armitage, The Ideological Origins of the British Empire, p. 119). Pepys must have owned one of the two 1652 printings since the second printing, published in 1663, was sold with the ‘orthodox’ title page.



introduction: edgar’s archipelago

5

New Seas thou gain’st; & to the antient FOUR By Edgar left, thou addest many more. (ll. 19–24)17

This maritime England, then, built by Edgar, is spurred on to rule Britain and, by extension, conquer new dominions: What then should great Britannia pleas, But rule as Ladie o’re all seas, and thou as Queen of her For Sea-Dominion may as well bee gain’d By new acquests, as by descent maintain’d. (ll. 27–30)

Edgar’s alleged possession of the four seas becomes the foundation myth of maritime Englishness as well as the vindication for the Protectorate’s archipelagic empire. If the poem articulates a political vision, it is that of an English Britain rooted in Edgar’s reign and predestined for divinely sanctioned conquests. There existed two versions of the 1652 printing. Both included the poem and the title page, but one version also featured a double-frontispiece, showing the poem verso next to an allegory of Britannia recto (Figure 1). David Armitage describes this image as the first showing Britannia as a ruler of the waves.18 Its iconography makes it the companion piece to Neptune’s ode: Britannia is shown holding an English shield, and under her feet piles up the loot of her conquests, marked by the flags of subdued Scotland, Ireland, and Wales – next to cannons, a neck-guard, and the iconic capeline, or lobster-tail pot helmet brandished by the soldiers of Cromwell’s New Model Army.19 Next to each other on the ground, the crowns and sceptres of Scotland and Ireland (territories which were occupied by the Protectorate at the time) make her an empress. To mark the historical continuity of the Republic’s claim to the archipelago, Britannia is dressed in a Roman centurion’s armour and sandals as she sits on the insular rock of the English Commonwealth (Angliae respvb.), washed by the English sea. To her left, Neptune is seen addressing her, presumably in the words of the ode on the facing page: poem and allegory combine to perform a dramatic vignette. Crucially, this panegyric communicates to a wider public a turning point in English self-perception. Archipelagic dominion and possession of adjacent seas was no longer a personal prerogative of certain English monarchs but,

17

John Selden, Of the Dominion or Ownership of the Sea, trans. Marchamont Nedham (London: 1652), frontispiece. 18 Armitage, The Ideological Origins of the British Empire, p. 119. Since Britannia had appeared on Roman coins, Nedham can hardly be said to have ‘used the figure of Britannia for the first time’, as Edward Holberton states (Edward Holberton, Poetry and the Cromwellian Protectorate: Culture, Politics, and Institutions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 45). 19 The lobster-tail pot was also called zischagge (Stuart Asquith, New Model Army, 1645–60 (Oxford: Osprey, 1981), p. 13).

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Figure 1. Frontispiece from John Selden, Mare clausum, trans. by Marchamont Nedham (London, 1652).



introduction: edgar’s archipelago

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in a distant echo of an idea first mooted by the Libelle of Englyshe Polycye in 1436–8, an integral aspect of England itself.20 Equipped with Neptune’s ode and the triumphalist allegory of a demonstrably English Britannia, Nedham’s authoritative translation elevates Selden’s riposte to Grotius to the level of a national epic.21 In this epic, Edgar is assigned a leading role. The foundation on which Nedham’s panegyric and, by extension, much of Selden’s argument for territorial waters rests is Edgar’s claim to dominion over the entire archipelago, including the surrounding seas. His insular empire had an English centre, a maritime justification, and no fixed extent. As the earliest claim to the entire archipelago, Edgar’s fabled insular empire supplied a lasting teleology of Britishness as the maritime extent of English hegemonic desire. This legend, however, had a very practical beginning. It was the by-product of deliberate rewriting and forgery undertaken by two generations of monks in twelfth-century Worcester to make collective history subservient to their specific local needs. By removing successive layers of fabrication I hope to show how the assertive pursuit of local interests by a small yet reasonably privileged monastic community determined the shape of national policies for centuries to come. As the pan-British idea of Edgar’s ‘Albion’, their legacy was also the first political claim to the British Isles that was justified through reference to the sea.22 What this rewriting of Edgar will reveal is a set of local and pragmatic motivations for the synthesising narrative of Englishness that Lesley Johnson and Jocelyn Wogan-Browne believe to have been orchestrated at Worcester: [T]he post-Conquest Worcester Cathedral Priory does suggest a context in which an ambitious and innovative project to gather up the ancient past of England and recount it in a high style resonant of the past might be both conceived and achieved.23

Ambitious though this project may have been, Worcester’s monks were certainly innovative: the fabricated origins of Edgar’s maritime dominion point to the capricious yet significant role local interests played in the shaping of an English narrative of archipelagic rule. The enterprising Benedictines of Worcester had 20 The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye explicitly makes the sea not the just the king’s but ‘by

auctorite / Of cronicle that environ the see / Shulde bene oures subjecte unto the kynge’ (ll. 944–6). See Sobecki, The Sea and Medieval English Literature, pp. 151–2. 21 Subsequent incarnations of Britannia, such as the ‘Lord Lucas’s farthings’ minted after 1663, showed her sporting the Union Jack on her shield; Roger Mason, Scots and Britons: Scottish Political Thought and the Union of 1603 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 80. 22 The Nachleben of Edgar’s ‘Albion’ has been investigated by Julia Crick, ‘Edgar, Albion and Insular Dominion’, in Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations, ed. Donald Scragg (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2008), pp. 158–70. 23 Jocelyn Wogan-Browne and Lesley Johnson, ‘National, World, and Women’s History: Writers and Readers of English in Post-Conquest England’, in The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature, ed. David Wallace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 92–121 (p. 99).

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their own, functional reasons to append the sea to Edgar, but by so doing they generated a crucial precedent for vindicating the maritime expansion of future incarnations of the British Empire. Generations of English writers saw in Edgar (959–75) a maritime king par excellence. Edgar’s realm was thought to have covered all of Britain, its neighbouring islands including Ireland, as well as the intervening sea. In the late 1430s this enabled the writer of the jingoistic Libelle of Englyshe Polycye, a poem obsessed with a maritime definition of Englishness, to regard Edgar’s naval dominion as worthy of setting him on a par with impressive worthies, among them Cyrus the Great, Charlemagne, and Romulus: Of Englysshe kynges was none so commendáble To Englysshe men, ne lasse memoriáble Than Cirus was to Perse by puissaunce; And as grete Charlis was to them of Fraunce, And as to Romains was grete Romulus, So was to England this worthy Edgarus.24

In 1598, Richard Hakluyt, who also printed the Libelle of Englyshe Polycye, extols Edgar as ‘the true and soveraigne Monarch of all the British Ocean, environing any way his empire of Albion and Ireland, with the lesser Islands next adjacent’.25 When compiling his influential Mare clausum a century later, the jurist John Selden found in Edgar’s maritime rule one of the earliest precedents for countering Grotius’s doctrine of the freedom of the seas.26 The publication of Mare clausum in 1635 was a part of Charles I’s programme of exercising maritime supremacy. When in 1635 the Sovereign of the Seas, the king’s great ship, was launched, Charles had an effigy of Edgar placed on the ship’s beak.27 As late as 1888, authoritative publications could pronounce that the Danes of Ireland were friendly, and acknowledged the power if not the supremacy of the English king, for coins of Eadgar were minted at Dublin.28 24 The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye: A Poem on the Use of Sea-Power, 1436, ed. by George

Warner (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1926), ll. 867–81, p. 45.

25 Richard Hakluyt, The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the

English Nation, Hakluyt Society e.s. 1–12, 12 vols (Glasgow: MacLehose, 1903), I, 23.

26 I will discuss Selden’s use of Edgar’s claim more fully below. 27 Thomas W. Fulton, The Sovereignty of the Sea: A Historical Account of the Claims of

England to the Dominion of the British Seas (Edinburgh: Blackwood, 1911), pp. 28 and 326. For the sculptures, see Hendrik Busmann, Sovereign of the Seas: Die Skulpturen des britischen Königsschiffes von 1637 (Hamburg: Edition Convent, 2002). Cromwell continued Charles’s maritime pretensions: ‘When the Protectoral warship, the Naseby (also known as the Great Oliver) was launched, the effigy on its prow depicted Cromwell trampling Scottish, Irish, Dutch, French, Spanish, and English victims under his horse’s feet, in an image derived from the portrait of King Edgar on the sovereign’ (Armitage, The Ideological Origins of the British Empire, p. 120). 28 Dictionary of National Biography, ed. by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee, 22 vols (London: Smith Elder, 1908), XVI, 367.



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Even in the final years of Victoria’s reign there occasionally surfaced passionate attempts at championing Edgar’s archipelagic mastery against a growing mountain of evidence. In 1898, the historian William Henry Stevenson, in want of argumentative evidence, sought to adduce the distinction of an outside arbitrator: The distinguished Danish historian, Professor Steenstrup, after critically examining Mr Robertson’s arguments, comes to the conclusion that there is nothing to prove that the eight kings could not have met Edgar at Chester, and that, despite a few possible mistakes, we cannot deny the existence of these princes or Edgar’s supremacy over them.29

Though this measure may not have proven Stevenson’s interlocutor wrong, at the very least it shows how firm a place in the canon of Englishness Edgar continued to occupy by end of the nineteenth century. Edgar’s nonpareil reputation rested on a series of intricately connected documents, a number of which were either forged in the twelfth century or are believed to be of disputed authenticity. The most sweeping claims to the extent of Edgar’s maritime rule are made in the notorious Altitonantis charter of ‘964’, a twelfth-century forgery, and, somewhat more mutedly, in a highly irregular Malmesbury charter, allegedly granted by Edgar in 974.30 Both charters were frequently adduced to cement England’s and, later, the British empire’s claim to the entire archipelago and the British ocean. The spurious Altitonantis charter, named after the first word that appears in the document, is dated 28 December 964 but was most likely forged at Worcester in the early 1140s.31 The charter 29 W. H. Stevenson, ‘The Great Commendation to King Edgar in 973’, The English Historical

Review, 13 (1898), 505–07 (pp. 505–06). Stevenson’s attack was directed at Eben W. Robertson, Scotland under Her Early Kings, 2 vols (Edinburgh: Edmonston and Douglas, 1862). 30 P. H. Sawyer, Anglo-Saxon Charters: An Annotated List and Bibliography, Royal Historical Society guides and handbooks (London: Royal Historical Society, 1968), charter 731 (Altitonantis) and S 796/797, for the Malmesbury charter. (Sawyer numbers will be subsequently abbreviated by ‘S’ followed by digits.) In this context, Julia Barrow has discussed the forgery of Altitonantis as well as of a number of other documents: ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, in The Perception of the Past in Twelfth-Century Europe, ed. Paul Magdalino (London: Hambledon, 1992), pp. 53–74 and ‘The Chronology of Forgery Production at Worcester from c. 1000 to the Early Twelfth Century’, in St. Wulfstan and His World, ed. Julia Barrow and Nicholas Brooks (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), pp. 123–36. See also Antonia Gransden, ‘Cultural Transition at Worcester in the Anglo-Norman Period’, Medieval Art and Architecture at Worcester Cathedral: The British Archaeological Association Conference Proceedings for the Year 1975, 1 (Leeds: British Archaeological Association, 1978), pp. 1–14 (reprinted in Legends, Traditions, and History in Medieval England, ed. Antonia Gransden (London: Hambledon, 1992), pp. 107–23). Rewriting Old English in the Twelfth Century, ed. Mary Swan and Elaine M. Treharne (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) gives the wider context. The authenticity of S 796 has also been challenged, which I will discuss further below. 31 Patrick Wormald, ‘A Handlist of Anglo-Saxon Lawsuits’, ASE, 17 (1988), 247–81 (no 42); Eric John, Land Tenure in Early England: A Discussion of Some Problems (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1960), pp. 106–08; Simon Keynes, Facsimiles of Anglo-Saxon Char-

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purports to document the granting of land, the triple hundred of Oswaldslaw, by Edgar to the monks of Worcester priory, who had been installed there by Bishop Oswald.32 Opening the charter is a particularly pompous variation of Edgar’s imperial formula, only on this occasion it appends the ocean together with nearby insular realms to his ambit: Eadgarus Anglorum basileus omniumque regum insularum oceani que Brytanniam circumiacent cunctarumque nationum quae infra eam includuntur imperator et dominus. […] Mihi autem concessit propitia diuinitas cum Anglorum imperio omnia regna insularum oceani cum suis ferocissimis regibus usque Norregiam maximamque partem Hiberniae cum sua nobilissima ciuitate Dublina Anglorum regno subiugare.33 [Edgar ruler of the English and emperor and lord of all the kings of the islands of the ocean which surround Britain and of all the peoples who are included within it. […] Moreover the propitious Divinity conceded to me, together with the empire of the English, to subject to the kingdom of the English all the kingdoms of the islands of the ocean, with their most ferocious kings, as far as Norway and the greater part of Ireland, with its most noble city Dublin.]

Perhaps thinking of Charlemagne as a benchmark of regnal ambition, Edgar, as well as some of the other Anglo-Saxon rulers, had a penchant for imperial titles. To justify these, neighbouring lands were frequently claimed. In his authentic charters Edgar’s title frequently includes adjacent peoples (for example, S 691, 699, 756, 786, 788, 793, 812), irrespective of whether he calls himself basileus and/ or king of England or of the English region, Britain, or Albion.34 What is new about Altitonantis is that it extends Edgar’s reign beyond the island of Britain to span the British ocean. As if this were not sufficient, it explicitly mentions that Edgar ruled Dublin. At about the same time, the monks also forged King Stephen’s confirmation of Altitonantis.35 Julia Barrow sets the timeframe for Altitonantis and Stephen’s ters (Oxford: Published for the British Academy by Oxford University Press, 1991), supplementary vol. I, 11; Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’ (pp. 69–74, and p. 72 for the date of production); David Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings, AD 973: textus et dramatis personae’, Early Medieval Europe, 10 (2001), 49–79 (pp. 56–7); and Julia Crick, ‘The Art of the Unprinted: Transcription and English Antiquity in the Age of Print’, in The Uses of Script and Print, 1300–1700, ed. Julia Crick and Alexandra Walsham (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), pp. 116–34 (pp. 124–34). Only John regards the charter as authentic, though heavily interpolated. 32 Worcester cathedral underwent a process of monachisation during which secular priests were replaced by Benedictines, thereby making the bishop effectively abbot of the community (Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, pp. 53–4 and 62). 33 Text and translation from Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, p. 56. 34 On Edgar’s and later uses of Albion, see Crick, ‘Edgar, Albion and Insular Dominion’. 35 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, pp. 72–3, and Reginald Darlington, The Cartulary of Worcester Cathedral Priory, Pipe Roll Society n.s.



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forged confirmation between 1140 and 1154.36 According to Barrow, the central issue driving these Worcester forgeries was ‘the speed with which the community had been converted from a congregation of secular clergy to Benedictine monasticism’.37 Barrow argues that although William of Malmesbury and other reliable twelfth-century sources reported a gradual monachisation process, Worcester’s own historiography encouraged a sudden, rapid model to strengthen their claims to monasticism. This, she suggests, had been done to vindicate the expulsion of secular clerics by Bishop Oswald in favour of Benedictine monks. Consequently, Barrow pays particular attention to other Worcester documents that were forged or tampered with, including the so-called ‘1092’ synodal document (another forgery from the late 1140s to early 1150s).38 As Barrow sees it, the monks had two essential motives to concoct Altitonantis and Stephen’s confirmation: ‘the need to show continuity of property and traditions between the pre-and post-Conquest periods, and the need to stand up to a newly strengthened diocesan authority’.39 Attractive as this theory may be, it does not explain why Edgar’s regnal ambitions had to be enlarged by Altitonantis to include the ocean, nearby islands, and Dublin. If the monks of Worcester were claiming exemption from the control of secular clergy, why did they style Edgar ‘ruler of the English and emperor and lord of all the kings of the islands of the ocean which surround Britain’, expressly including Dublin and most of Ireland? Between 1140 and Stephen’s death in 1154, the immediate threat to Worcester’s monks was not internal church affairs, I should like to argue, but the ad-hoc creation of the earldom of Worcester as a result of Stephen’s campaign against Empress Matilda. During the years of the Anarchy, Worcester became a hub for Stephen’s operations in the west of the country. Because it served the king as a base from which to attack Ludlow in the north and Sudeley in the south, Worcester emerged as ‘an important centre of royal authority’ to contain ‘the Angevin advance in the west country’.40 That Worcester mattered strategically became clear when Robert of Gloucester sacked it in November 1139, less than a century after the city had been razed by Harthacnut’s Danish army. Worcester became the ideal location from which to curb Gloucester’s operations, and Stephen’s protégé, the Norman baron Waleran de Meulan (1104–66), proved just the man to do it. And so, the practical earldom 38 (London: Pipe Roll Society, 1968), pp. lxvii–lxviii (Darlington believes Stephen’s confirmation to be genuine). 36 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, p. 72. 37 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, p. 53. 38 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, p. 69, though Barrow adds that it may have been written slightly earlier, during Bishop Simon’s tenure (1131–48). 39 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, p. 73. 40 Edmund King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan, Earl of Worcester (1104–1166)’, in Tradition and Change: Essays in Honour of Marjorie Chibnall, ed. Diana E. Greenway, C. J. Holdsworth and Jane E. Sayers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 165–81 (p. 168).

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of Worcester was created by Stephen between May and November 1139.41 No sooner had Waleran become the first bearer of this title, than he was hot in pursuit of Gloucester, burning his residence at Tewkesbury early in 1140.42 The monks of Worcester quickly realised that the fault lines of the Anarchy were running through their city. They were also well informed about Stephen’s actions as John of Worcester’s Chronicon ex chronicis and William of Malmesbury’s related Gesta regum Anglorum confirm.43 With a new earldom having been established in response to a military campaign going badly, the monks of Worcester’s cathedral priory must have observed the creation of this new political entity with some degree of unease. And rightly so, for Waleran appears to have viewed his earldom as more than a temporary base of operations. He quickly developed a penchant for ecclesiastical lands and foundations. In 1140 he reached an agreement with Bishop Simon of Worcester about estates in the earldom: the purpose of this complex document was to set in writing once and for all what was Waleran’s and what was Simon’s.44 Having survived Gloucester’s siege and witnessed comprehensive territorial negotiations between Waleran and their bishop (and abbot) in less than a year, it would seem that the monks of Worcester had more pressing concerns than justifying their historical monachisation. The Spectre of Matilda However, this still does not account for Edgar’s inflated title as a maritime emperor and the presence of Dublin in the spurious charter. There is another, altogether more likely explanation. On close inspection, the monks stood to gain considerably from Waleran’s appointment. In a letter written at the time to William de Beauchamp, Waleran grants Worcester priory exemption from forest pleas at Tibberton. In this letter, he also outlines his policy for the earldom: ‘I concede and I pardon to the prior and the monks the king’s geld which I am entitled to, and all customs and services and forest rights which were once the king’s and are now mine in that township.’45 Waleran had more boons in store for his monks. There exist also two royal writs concerning the rights of Worcester priory, both in favour of the priory, that were addressed to him.46 Waleran’s interest in monastic communities culminated in his foundation of the Cister41 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 168. 42 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 168. 43 C. W. Hollister, ‘The Aristocracy’, in The Anarchy of King Stephen’s Reign, ed. Edmund

King (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 37–66 (p. 50). In all likelihood William of Malmesbury knew John as he had visited Worcester at least twice during a time when both were writing their respective chronicles. I will return to the close relationship between these chronicles below. 44 H. A. Cronne, ‘An Agreement Between Simon, Bishop of Worcester, and Waleran, Earl of Worcester’, Birmingham Historical Journal, 2 (1949), 201–07. 45 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 169. 46 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 169.



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cian abbey at Bordesley in Worcestershire.47 Even when his fortunes waned in the mid-1140s, the monks of Worcester priory still ‘felt it worth while to apply to him’.48 Certainly the documentary evidence suggests that the relationship between the monks and the new earl went off to an excellent start. So far, so good. But Waleran was Stephen’s creature, and after the king lost the Battle of Lincoln in February 1141, Stephen’s captivity ushered in Empress Matilda’s brief rule at the same time as it spelled the beginning of Waleran’s woes. Needless to say, Waleran’s position and his title to Worcester became highly precarious. More importantly for the monks, Waleran’s grants and exemptions attracted the attention of Matilda. The foundation of Bordesley, in particular, revealed that Waleran had assumed his regal rights in Worcester (‘which were once the king’s and are now mine’) too comprehensively. Waleran had foolishly founded Bordesley on royal demesne, that is, on land that belonged personally to the Crown, and this circumstance made the abbey vulnerable after Stephen had lost the Battle of Lincoln. Matilda, who did not approve of Waleran’s use of royal demesne – not least because Waleran was one of the pillars of Stephen’s rule – was a threat to the abbey. From this time dates a letter from Waleran to Bishop Simon, explaining the situation of Bordesley.49 Although this letter does not ask anything of Simon or his monks, having benefited on more than one occasion from Waleran’s actions, the monks at Worcester must have felt Matilda breathing down their necks. They knew that their embattled earl was fighting for his survival and could not offer them any protection. Waleran had found himself negotiating a re-founding of Bordesley on Matilda’s terms.50 This vulnerability of Waleran’s foundation charter must have extended to any document that bore the signature of the disgraced earl and that referred to his suspended earldom, including the privileges and exemptions of Worcester priory. This would certainly explain their attempts to forge documents showing not only recent royal authority but also the pre-Conquest continuity of their significant holding of Oswaldslaw. In this highly volatile climate, Matilda’s founding anew of Bordesley explains why the monks had to summon a super-sized Edgar – the source of the forged Altitonantis charter’s authority – as a king not only of the English but as one whose unquestioned rule reached overseas and had not been surpassed in its geographic extent. To secure their privileges from the scrutiny of the empress, Edgar’s own rank had to be boosted to that of her peer, an archipelagic emperor. 47 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 170. On Bordesley Abbey, see pp. 178–81, as well

as Marjorie Chibnall, ‘Normandy’, in The Anarchy of King Stephen’s Reign, ed. Edmund King (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 93–116 (pp. 112–13), and Chibnall, ‘The Charters of Empress Matilda’, in Law and Government in Medieval England and Normandy: Essays in Honour of Sir James Holt, ed. George Garnett and John Hudson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 276–98. 48 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 169. 49 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, pp. 170–1. 50 King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 171.

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Matilda styled herself imperially in most of her charters: Mathildis (or Matildis) imperatrix regis Anglorum (or Anglie) filia.51 Indeed, Matilda’s two Bordesley charters (Regesta Regum Anglo-Normannorum 115 and 116) open with her usual ‘M(atildis) imperatrix’ in contrast to Stephen’s almost diminutive ‘S(tephanus) rex Angl(orum)’.52 It did not cost the monks much to forge the confirmation of a recently deposed king, but what mattered was to state in one breath that Edgar was basileus, imperator, and dominus of ‘all the kings of the islands of the ocean which surround Britain’. With their abbot, Bishop Simon, looming large in every document pertaining to Bordesley, it is obvious that his monks were worried that their grants and concessions might be curtailed and Waleran’s 1140 division of assets with Simon nullified.53 And so, Matilda, unhappy with Waleran’s use of royal demesne lands in a part of the country in which these are scarce to begin with,54 re-founded Bordesley on her own terms, triggering Altitonantis and its forged confirmation by Stephen. A second reason why the empress might have wished to pay closer attention to the cathedral priory (and particularly to Oswaldslaw) in an area that had successfully resisted her allies was the trimoda necessitas that came with the lease of Oswaldslaw, that is, the obligation to provide military service, the building of bridges, and fortress work.55 One way or another, the monks of Worcester priory must have viewed as very real the possibility of being drawn into a ruinous conflict between powerful princes. Although these circumstances explain Edgar’s accolade of titles and the forging of Altitonantis as well as its confirmation by Stephen, some of the charter’s features still need explaining. To have Edgar exercise rule over Dublin and much of Ireland appears to have been a case of appeasement coupled with tactful one-upmanship on Matilda, not least because her allies enjoyed close contacts with Dublin. When Stephen was imprisoned by Mabel, the wife of Henry’s half-brother and Waleran’s local nemesis, Robert of Gloucester, the earl himself was held hostage by Stephen’s allies. When the latter threatened to send Robert to friendly Boulogne, Mabel retaliated with the threat of sending Stephen to 51 Chibnall, ‘The Charters of Empress Matilda’, p. 277. 52 Regesta Regum Anglo-Normannorum, 1066–1154, ed. H. A. Cronne and R. H. C. Davis

(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), pp. 42–3. Stephen’s original confirmation of Waleran’s foundation is item 114 on p. 42. 53 There is no reason to suppose an ideological rift between bishop and monastic community along the lines proposed by Barrow. Although the monks initially tried to secure a free election, there is evidence that Simon quickly established a very good rapport with his monks (D. L. Bethell, ‘English Black Monks and Episcopal Elections in the 1120s’, The English Historical Review, 84 (1969), 673–98 (p. 683)). 54 On Matilda’s refounding of Bordesley Abbey, see Chibnall, ‘The Charters of Empress Matilda’, pp. 283–4. 55 C. W. Hollister, Anglo-Saxon Military Institutions on the Eve of the Norman Conquest (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962), p. 82. See also Patrick Wormald, ‘Lordship and Justice in the Early English Kingdom: Oswaldslow Revisited’, in Property and Power in the Early Middle Ages, ed. Wendy Davies and Paul Fouracre (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 114–36 (pp. 116 and 123–4).



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Ireland, where ‘Diarmait [Mac Murchada] would have been expected to provide suitable accommodation’.56 Diarmait controlled Dublin intermittently from 1140 onwards,57 and Matilda’s son, Henry II, would justify his conquest of Ireland by coming to Diarmait’s aid. The threat made to Stephen would have made little sense without Dublin enjoying friendly relations with Matilda’s closest supporters. Making ‘the noblest of cities, Dublin’ and ‘most of Ireland’ subservient to Edgar (as it actually was at this time to Diarmait) may have been aimed at flattering Angevin influence in the British Isles.58 Many in England’s corridors of power – and in Worcester especially – were already under the impression that they wielded some form of supremacy in Ireland. For quite some time, the see of Canterbury had been witnessing occasional ecclesiastical submission by Dublin and was keen to see this bishopric toe an English line. Claire Downham notes that Dublin bishops were consecrated in Canterbury in 1096 and 1121.59 But the practice was started much earlier, in 1074, when Archbishop Lanfranc consecrated the Worcester monk Patrick bishop of Dublin.60 As the pretensions of Canterbury to ecclesiastical rule in Dublin and Ireland document, the position of Dublin in relation to England appeared far from clear cut to English writers in the first half of the twelfth century. Barrow follows Eric John in explaining the reference to Edgar’s subjugation of Dublin with an early twelfth-century letter sent around 1120 by another Worcester monk, Nicholas, to Eadmer of Canterbury, which ‘states that Edgar had subjugated the king of Dublin’.61 Although I have not been able to find any discussion of this, with the fact that the letter was sent to Eadmer, a trusted associate of Archbishop Anselm, only a year before another Dublin bishop was consecrated 56 Claire Downham, ‘Living on the Edge: Scandinavian Dublin in the Twelfth Century’,

in West over Sea: Studies in Scandinavian Sea-Borne Expansion and Settlement Before 1300: A Festschrift in Honour of Dr Barbara Crawford, ed. Beverley Ballin Smith, Simon Taylor, and Gareth Williams (Leiden and Boston, MA: Brill, 2007), pp. 33–52 (pp. 46–7). See also Benjamin Hudson, ‘William the Conqueror and Ireland’, Irish Historical Studies, 29 (1994), 145–58. 57 Downham, ‘Living on the Edge’, p. 46. 58 That appeasement was called for at this moment in time has been pointed out by Edmund King, who takes Waleran’s mention of Henry I’s soul (‘pro anima Henrici regis’) in his letter to Simon to be deference to Angevin sensitivities; King, ‘Waleran, Count of Meulan’, p. 170, and pp. 179–80 for the letter. 59 Downham, ‘Living on the Edge’, p. 46. 60 Letter of Lanfranc to Guthric, king of Dublin (29 August 1073–autumn 1074), printed and translated in The Letters of Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, ed. Helen Clover and Margaret Gibson (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), pp. 66–70. On Patrick, see Aubrey Gwynn, The Writings of Bishop Patrick, 1074–1084 (Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1955), pp. 6–7; John, Land Tenure in Early England: A Discussion of Some Problems, pp. 106–7; and Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, pp. 56–7. 61 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, p. 70. As additional evidence Barrow considers the fact that both Altitonantis and Nicholas’s letter use the same verb, subiugare, to describe Edgar’s control over Dublin.

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by Anselm may suggest that the monks of Worcester supplied supporting arguments for Cantuarian claims to authority over the see of Dublin. A further source of the impression – in Worcester and elsewhere – that Dublin was an English and possibly Edgarian possession was the persistence of Edgar’s coinage reform. Benjamin Hudson argues for a strategic alliance between Edgar and the Viking king of Dublin, Olaf Cuaran (died 981). The alliance and the strong trade links may not support the authenticity of Altitonantus (as Hudson claims) but they do indicate the extent to which Edgar’s claims over Dublin and parts of Ireland were still seen to be operative in the 1130s and 1140s.62 After all, intervening rulers, such as Cnut, had made good on this claim. The presence of Edgar’s coins even 150 years after his death is hardly a surprise since he had undertaken a reform of minting, issuing considerably more coins than many of his successors.63 Edgar completely reminted the current coinage and tripled the number of mints.64 In fact, Edgar’s system of mintage was still in place when John of Worcester and William of Malmesbury were writing.65 It only underwent modification in Stephen’s reign.66 At any rate, although coins of Edgar circulated and were in use in Dublin, there is also plenty of evidence for imitations of English coins being minted at Dublin after mintage started there around 997.67 Early Irish coins with English rulers were so frequent in the eleventh and twelfth centuries that not only John of Worcester but also early English numismatists could be fooled by Edgar’s claim. Particularly misleading in such cases was Altitonantis. In his An Essay on Medals, published in 1784, John Pinkerton asserts in a footnote that ‘Edgar, King of England, conquered all Ireland, as he 62 Benjamin T. Hudson, Viking Pirates and Christian Princes: Dynasty, Religion, and Empire in the North Atlantic (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 47–48. Hudson also discusses the proliferation of coins bearing Edgar’s effigy in Ireland in this context as coins that were minted in England and may have been forms of payment to secure Edgar’s share of the pact (p. 48). 63 Peter Spufford, Money and Its Use in Medieval Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 87 and 92. 64 Spufford, Money and Its Use in Medieval Europe, pp. 87 and 92. 65 M. A. S. Blackburn, ‘Coinage’, in The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England, ed. Michael Lapidge (Oxford: Blackwell, 1999), pp. 113–16 (p. 113). 66 On Edgar’s reform in the context of English minting, see Christopher Challis, A New History of the Royal Mint (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 32–52. 67 See Michael Dolley and Joan Ingold, ‘Viking-Age Coin Hoards from Ireland and Their Relevance to Anglo-Saxon Studies’, in Anglo-Saxon Coins: Studies Presented to F. M. Stenton, ed. Michael Dolley (London: Methuen, 1965), pp. 241–65. On the so-called Dublin-crux type of imitations of Anglo-Saxon coins, see Michael Dolley, ‘Some Irish Evidence for the Date of the Crux Coins of Aethelred II’, ASE, 2 (1973), 145–54, and P. F. Wallace, ‘The English Presence in Viking Dublin’, in Anglo-Saxon Monetary History: Essays in Memory of Michael Dolley, ed. Mark Blackburn (London: Leicester University Press, 1986), pp. 201–21: ‘When Dublin’s own mint was eventually established c. 997, it was English prototypes of Aethelred II which were copied by the Dublin moneyers. […] It soon became usual for new English issues to be copied in Dublin within a few months’ (p. 208).



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asserts himself in the charter of Oswaldslaw [Altitonantis], dated at Gloucester, 964.’68 An even more sober numismatist, James Simon, made the same blunder. Here, Altitonantis, though admittedly ‘a trick of the Monks’, is made to explain Irish coins depicting Aethelred: How these coins of Ethelred of England happened to be struck in Dublin, seems surprising; and to account for it, we must have recourse to his father king Edgar’s charter, mentioned by Ware and Flaherty, though looked upon by others as spurious, and a trick of the Monks. […] ‘About this time Edgar, king of England subdued a great part of Ireland, and particularly the city of Dublin, as appears by his charter of Oswald’s law for depriving married priests, and introducing monks, dated at Gloucester, in the year 966.69

Simon elaborates further: If, as it appears from this charter, Edgar conquered the kingdom and city of Dublin, and a great part of Ireland, he did, one may reasonably suppose, lay some kind of tribute on the vanquished princes of this island, and obliged them to strike in his name effigies, and that of his successors, the money to be paid to him and them for the said tribute.70

Simon then cheerfully develops his tribute theory, which has been repeated by others.71 Some even went so far as suggesting that Altitonantis was a charter granting rights to Dublin. The 16 January 1847 issue of Hogg’s Weekly Instructor, printed by the Edinburgh publisher James Hogg, demonstrates that early journalism was not second rate when it comes to being liberal with its source material: ‘In 964, Edgar conferred a charter on the city, in which he denominates it “the most noble city of Dyvelin”; and Ethelred his successor had a mint there, a coin of which, still extant, intimates that it was struck at Dyvelin.’72 Incidentally, this is also the tenor of the entry for ‘Edgar’ in the Dictionary of National Biography of 1888, quoted at the beginning of this chapter. The end of Waleran’s short-lived but generous tenure as earl of Worcester and Matilda’s subsequent re-founding of Bordesley presented the monks of Worcester with the pressing danger that the empress might reopen and redefine their privileges and rights. This threat required a sophisticated and manypronged approach for the forged charter and Stephen’s spurious confirmation: the invocation of the royal authority of Stephen, which in turn, confirmed the authority of an earlier king whose own authority over the entire archipelago was, like Matilda’s elsewhere, imperial and extended as far as Ireland. 68 John Pinkerton, An Essay on Medals (London: Dodsley, 1784), p. 195. 69 James Simon, An Essay Towards a Historical Account of Irish Coins (Dublin: Powell, 1749),

p. 8. 70 Simon, An Essay Towards a Historical Account of Irish Coins, p. 8. 71 See, for instance Rogers Ruding, Annals of the Coinage of Britain and Its Dependencies, 3 vols (London: Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, and Jones, 1840), I, 360–1. 72 Hogg’s Weekly Instructor, 16 January 1847, p. 329.

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The Bishop’s Ship This leaves the sea to be explained in Altitonantis. The creation of Edgar’s maritime reputation happened to be a local Worcester product the monks could utilise. At the time, Edgar’s naval prowess was mainly associated with two traditions: the alleged subjection of between six and eight insular kings on the River Dee near Chester shortly after his coronation on 11 May 973 and the substantial size of his legendary fleet. As if by some bizarre coincidence, both of these traditions appear to be traceable to activity at Worcester’s cathedral priory in the early twelfth century. Pre-Conquest sources, primarily the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, have been instrumental in providing post-Conquest writers with the outline of the royal submission to Edgar’s insular overlordship at Chester. In its Northern recension (versions D, E, and F), the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle describes the wellknown submission of six insular kings shortly after Edgar’s coronation: sona æfter þam se cyning gelædde ealle his scipfyrde to Leiceastre, 7 þær him comon ongean .vi. cyningas, 7 ealle wið hine getreowsodon þæt hi woldon efenwyrhtan beon on sæ and on lande.73 7

[And immediately after that the king took his whole fleet to Chester, and there six kings came to him, and all gave him pledges that they would be his allies (lit. fellow workers) on sea and on land.]

David Thornton lists a number of other pre-Conquest sources for elements of this submission at Chester, most of which have either been produced by Ælfric, the eleventh-century abbot of Eynsham, such as the ‘Life of St Swithun’ and the epilogue to his work on the Book of Judges, or can be linked with him directly or indirectly. This second group contains the probably spurious ‘Ely’ charter and the two poems in praise of Edgar in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that are attributed to Ælfric’s correspondent Wulfstan, archbishop of York and bishop of Worcester (d. 1023).74 It was at Worcester, probably in the 1090s that the D version of the AngloSaxon Chronicle was produced.75 In the 1120s and 1130s, again at Worcester, the Chronicon ex chronicis, a Latin commentary, started by Florence and continued 73 The passage cited here is taken from the D version, the fullest version of the northern

recension, which also includes versions E and F. The translation is Thornton’s, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, p. 50. 74 Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, pp. 51–4. Texts produced independently of Ælfric include Byrhtferth of Ramsey’s Vita S. Oswaldi, the anonymous Vita S. Dunstani, the C text of the Annales Cambriae, as well as Welsh translations of this chronicle (pp. 53–4). On the poems about Edgar, see Jayne Carroll, ‘Engla Waldend, Rex Admirabilis: Poetic Representations of King Edgar’, The Review of English Studies, 58 (2007), 113–32. 75 Cyril Hart, ‘William Malet and His Family’, in Anglo-Norman Studies XIX: Proceedings of the Battle Conference 1996, ed. Christopher Harper-Bill (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1997), pp.



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by John, supplemented the D version.76 Although the ‘commendation’ of these kings to Edgar became the basis for subsequent elaborations of his imperial claim to Britain and its various inhabitants,77 Thornton has shown that many of the details of this event, especially the idea that the submission had occurred on the River Dee aboard a ship that was rowed by Edgar’s sub-kings, were most likely provided by the Chronicon ex chronicis of John of Worcester: A comparison of texts suggests that the whole rowing incident may have been an embellishment, perhaps by John of Worcester, partly inspired by the naval character of the submission and partly by the wording of one Anglo-Saxon account.78

Why did John turn the submission on the River Dee into this spectacular rowing incident, with Edgar as helmsman, which the Libelle of Englyshe Polyce and later texts would come to celebrate?79 Altitonantis states that the triple hundred of Oswaldslaw, given by Edgar to Bishop Oswald, was shaped to form a ship-soke (‘quod Anglice dicitur Scypfylleð oþþe scypsocne’) in memory of Oswald.80 In line with the ship-soke system, which supplied the Anglo-Saxon navy, Oswald had to provide a ship for the king’s navy. According to Scandinavian custom, a ship-soke was a district obliged to supply ships.81 The ship-soke system, by which three hundreds were required to provide a ship with 60 men, is first mentioned under Henry I but it may have been instituted by Edgar himself.82 Edgar envisaged bishops, above all else, to supply his navy.83 Worcester’s monks, therefore, 123–64 (p. 124). On Worcester’s shaping influence on early post-Conquest historiography, see Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’. 76 The work has been edited by The Chronicle of John of Worcester, ed. Patrick McGurk, 3 vols (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998). Most readers accept John’s authorship of most if not all of the chronicle, though this view is not shared by everyone (see, for instance, Hart, ‘William Malet and His Family’, p. 124, n. 5). 77 For a discussion of the earliest treatments of this event, see Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, passim. 78 Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, p. 74. The afterlife of this episode fed the imagination of national histories: Stephen Matthews, ‘King Edgar and the Dee: The Ceremony of 973 in Popular History Writing’, Northern History, 46 (2009), 61–74. On the River Dee as a tidal and cultural borderland, see Catherine A. M. Clarke’s chapter in this volume. 79 For the Libelle’s account, which the writer celebrates as a ‘rowynge’, see The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye, ll. 960–75, p. 49. 80 Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’, p. 70. 81 Hollister, Anglo-Saxon Military Institutions, p. 113. 82 The Anglo-Saxons, ed. James Campbell, Eric John, Patrick Wormald, and P. V. Addyman (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1991), pp. 172–3. 83 The Anglo-Saxons, p. 173. See also Mary F. Giandrea, Episcopal Culture in Late AngloSaxon England (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2007), pp. 186–7. On bishops under Edgar and ship-sokes, see Eric John, ‘War and Society in the Tenth Century: The Maldon Campaign’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 27 (1977), 173–95 (pp. 180–1). Barrow states that there is no evidence for ship-sokes before 1008, probably thinking of Aethelred II’s fifth code, but in a letter from the beginning of the eleventh century Bishop Aethelric of Sherborne mentions a number of ship-sokes held by other bishops and he complains that he does not receive ship-scot from all of his hides unlike his predecessors (Florence E. Harmer, Anglo-

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were required to provide ships in the memory of Oswald. Their contribution to Edgar’s navy would have been an important aspect of the priory’s history, not least because Edgar was ‘the patron and hero of English Benedictines from the tenth century onwards’.84 In addition, some of his genuine charters refer to him as ‘steersman’.85 Worcester’s monks had good reason to remember Edgar as a naval king, and his frequent circumnavigation of Britain and mastery of sea was therefore also a part of their own collective identity as a monastic community founded and shaped by Oswald. There is evidence that the ship-soke of Oswaldslaw was not a hollow clause. As Frederic Maitland had already noted, in the time of Edward the Confessor the bishop of Worcester had a ship, filled with people from Oswaldslaw and commanded by a certain Eadric, the steersman of the bishop’s ship: ‘Edricus qui fuit, stermannus navis episcopi et ductor exercitus eiusdem episcopi ad servitium regis’ [‘one of whom was Eadric, steersman of the bishop’s ship in the time of King Edward, and leader likewise of the bishop’s army for the king’s service’].86 The bishop’s ship was evidently the ship which was the contribution owed by the ship-soke of Oswaldslaw.87 But John of Worcester does not leave it at the River Dee account. He also extols Edgar’s naval prowess, claiming that he maintained a sizeable fleet that could circumnavigate the British Isles in defence of the archipelago. It is tempting to view Oswaldslaw ships as forming part of these patrols that may have travelled as far as Ireland.88 John attributes to Edgar a fleet of 3600 ships which were assembled every year after Easter, 1200 on the east coast, 1200 on the west, and 1200 on the north, so that the king could circumnavigate the island (clockwise) each summer, in a show of force ‘for the defence of his kingdom against foreigners and to train himself and his men in military exercises’.89 Saxon Writs (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1952), pp. 266–70). For further evidence of early episcopal ship-sokes, see Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages (London: Leicester University Press, 1995), p. 129. See also Peter Rex, Edgar: King of the English, 959–75 (Stroud: Tempus, 2007), p. 80. 84 Julia Barrow, ‘Chester’s Earliest Regatta? Edgar’s Dee-Rowing Revisited’, Early Medieval Europe, 10 (2001), 81–93 (p. 89). Barrow discusses the changes to the Dee event in the context of Worcester writing. 85 Barrow, ‘Chester’s Earliest Regatta?’, p. 92. 86 F. W. Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond: Three Essays in the Early History of England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1907), p. 308, n. 2. The translation is from Henry Adams, Essays in Anglo-Saxon Law (Boston, MA: Little and Brown, 1876), pp. 378–9. See also Rex, Edgar, p. 80. On ship-sokes, see Hollister, Anglo-Saxon Military Institutions, pp. 112–15, and Ann Williams, Æthelred the Unready: The Ill-Counselled King (London: Hambledon, 2003), p. 81. 87 Hollister, Anglo-Saxon Military Institutions, p. 112. 88 At the time, ships also sailed from Worcester directly to Ireland (Brendan Smith, Britain and Ireland, 900–1300: Insular Responses to Medieval European Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), p. 57). 89 The Chronicle of John of Worcester, II, 424–7. See also Ann Williams, ‘Edgar (943/4–975)’, in DNB, and Matthew Strickland, ‘Military Technology, and Conquest: The Anomaly of Anglo-Saxon England’, in Anglo-Norman Studies XIX, pp. 353–82 (p. 376). On p. 375 Strick-



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John of Worcester provided his fellow monks with Edgar as a maritime king who had held Ireland, Dublin, and the sea, and who had ruled the entire archipelago peacefully. In his discussion of Edgar’s submission of neighbouring kingdoms, Thornton observes that the inclusion of Scandinavian and Irish rulers in this particular tradition was not a pre-Conquest development, but can be traced to John of Worcester: This was clearly assumed to be the case by the post-Conquest writers (to the extent of regarding Dublin as within Edgar’s power), and John of Worcester’s Maccus plurimarum rex insularum must fall into that category.90

When looking for a historical foundation of the portrayal of Edgar as a maritime, pan-British king, the monks did not have to look any farther than their own library and to their chief chronicler, John, who may still have been alive or at least in living memory in early 1141.91 Their homegrown yet nationally renowned historiographical tradition provided them with all they required for the forgery of Altitonantis. John wrote his Chronicon ex chronicis in the 1120s and 1130s, but he paid particular attention to the movements of Stephen and Waleran in Worcester between 1139 and 1140. John enlarges the River Dee event by naming the individual kings and adding the detail of rowing. This passage ‘was not the inspiration of Edgar himself but of a later writer, either John or an earlier Worcester scholar’.92 John himself, in turn, had other Worcester-linked texts to rely on, texts that maintained the cathedral priory’s naval stake in Edgar’s sea empire. As David Thornton and Michael Lapidge have shown, the Chronicon was influenced by Byrhtferth’s life of St Oswald, where Edgar is not only feared by ‘the chieftains and rulers of this island [insularum principes et tiranni]’ but also by ‘the kings of many foreign peoples [reges plurimarum gentium]’.93 With the ship-soke of Oswaldslaw having provided Worcester priory’s genuine naval contribution to the English fleet in memory of Oswald, it is only natural that the Vita S. Oswaldi, composed at the turn of tenth and eleventh centuries, would sow the seed for an inflated Edgar who ruled the whole archipelago. land also notes that the ‘sub-kings’ swore to support Edgar by land by sea (as did the Welsh). For the idea that John was informed about Edgar’s navy, see Sashi Jayakumar, ‘Some Reflections on the “Foreign Policies” of Edgar “The Peaceable”’, in The Haskins Society Journal 2001: Studies in Medieval History, ed. S. Morillo (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2001), pp. 17–38 (pp. 28–9). 90 Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, p. 71. 91 The Chronicon ends in 1140, which does not mean that he had passed away immediately: ‘the date of [ John of Worcester’s] final writing here was presumably in or after 1140’, The Chronicle of John of Worcester, III, p. xvi. 92 Thornton, ‘Edgar and the Eight Kings’, p. 64. 93 For the parallels between Byrhtferth’s Vita sancti Oswaldi and John of Worcester’s chronicle, see Michael Lapidge, ‘Byrhferth and Oswald’, in St. Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence, ed. Nicholas Brooks and Catherine Cubitt (London: Leicester University Press, 1996), pp. 64–83. For the passage, see Byrhtferth of Ramsey: The Lives of St. Oswald and St. Ecgwine, ed. Michael Lapidge (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. 74–5.

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John’s version of the River Dee episode and most of his other Edgarian descriptions circulated in William of Malmesbury’s Gesta regum Anglorum.94 William completed this chronicle in 1120, and he later expanded it to include events up to 1127. The links between William and the monastic community at Worcester were strong, since he ‘demonstrably exchanged material with [Worcester’s] house-chronicler John, and knew Priors Nicholas and Warin, as well as other monks’.95 He visited Worcester to consult material between 1116 and 1124, and again between 1124 and 1142,96 at which stage he must have seen John of Worcester’s account of the rowing incident, which he also borrowed for his Gesta regum Anglorum, probably during his first visit. The nature of William’s visits was extensive, and his most recent editors believe that ‘he drew on the rich stores of ancient books and documents’ during his stays at Worcester.97 William’s Vita Wulfstani is prefaced by a letter to Warin, prior of Worcester. In this letter William apologises for the long delay in completing the work, the composition of which had been ‘ordered’ by Warin. Since it is unlikely that William would have accepted an ‘order’ (iussus) from Warin before he was prior, and, given the delay of which William speaks, it is probable that the Vita Wulfstani was written a few years after Warin’s term had begun (1124) but certainly before it had come to an end in 1142.98 In between, William visited Worcester for a second time, and we know that John was busily writing his chronicle during this period. And there was much both writers had in common, since Malmesbury and Worcester had lived through parallel histories: as part of the Benedictine reform, both had their main centres of worship rededicated from Peter to Mary in the tenth century.99 Although they differ slightly in their use of Edgar, they both were Benedictine apologists and heaped praise on Edgar primarily because he had championed their monastic cause.100

94 The analogous treatment of Edgar by John and William is discussed by Thornton, ‘Edgar

and the Eight Kings’, pp. 57ff. A more nuanced account of their textual relationship is offered by Barrow, ‘Chester’s Earliest Regatta?’, pp. 90–3. 95 Saints’ Lives: Lives of SS. Wulfstan, Dunstan, Patrick, Benignus and Indract, ed. ���������� M. Winterbottom and R. M. Thomson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), p. xiv. 96 Rodney M. Thomson, William of Malmesbury (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2003), pp. 73–4. 97 Saints’ Lives, p. xiv. 98 Saints’ Lives, pp. 8–10. 99 See Mary Clayton, The Cult of the Virgin Mary in Anglo-Saxon England, Cambridge Studies in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 133–4, for the Marian dedication of Malmesbury. William says that this happened under Aelfric in the tenth century (William of Malmesbury, Gesta Pontificum Anglorum: The History of the English Bishops, ed. Michael Winterbottom and Rodney M. Thomson, 2 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007), II, 330). In the case of Worcester, a church dedicated to the Virgin Mary had been built by Oswald in the churchyard of the existing church, St Peter’s, which was gradually taken over. Barrow, ‘How the Twelfth-Century Monks of Worcester Perceived Their Past’ gives the various accounts of this process. 100 Barrow, ‘Chester’s Earliest Regatta?’, pp. 90–2.



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The only other early text that makes a comparable claim to Edgar’s maritime rule is the Malmesbury charter, S 796. The charter is best known for its appearance in William’s Gesta regum Anglorum. Its text expresses Edgar’s claim to the entire archipelago’s overlordship: Ego Edgarus totius Albionis basileus, necnon maritimorum seu insulanorum regum circumhabitantium (adeo ut nullus progenitorum meorum) subiectione largiflua Dei gratia suppetente sullimatus, quid imperii mei potissimum Regi regum Domino darem, tanti memo honoris sollertius sepe tractaui. [I Edgar, monarch of all Albion, who by the subjection of neighbouring kings of coasts and islands am raised higher than were any of my forbears, thanks to the grace of God that supports me in such generous measure, have often considered with care what portions of my realm I could for preference give to our Lord the King of kings in memory of this great honour.]101

William uses the same charter in his Gesta Pontificum Anglorum (completed around 1125).102 What connects S 796 and Altitonantis is the extent to which Edgar’s realm stretches beyond Britain and absorbs surrounding islands and the ocean. Whereas Altitonantis is explicit in its inclusion of the ocean by virtue of claiming rule over its islands [‘insularum oceani que Brytanniam circumiacent’], S 796 annexes the sea that is appended to insular realms claimed by Edgar [‘maritimorum seu insulanorum regum circumhabitantium’]. As such, S 796 and Altitonantis have been recognised by early twentieth-century jurisprudents as documenting the first English claim to territorial waters.103 Since William’s descriptions of Edgar tend to parallel those by John and since S 796 is the only charter associated with Edgar that articulates a maritime and archipelagic remit, it is not unreasonable to suspect William’s involvement in modifying the charter if it was indeed altered or forged. Whether S 796 is a forgery cannot be ascertained, but most editors regard it as ‘doubtful’ or ‘highly unusual’.104 Susan Kelly, the most recent editor of this charter, calls it ‘odd’ and 101 William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum: The History of the English Kings,

ed. Michael Winterbottom, Rodney M. Thomson, and R. A. B. Mynors, 2 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999), I, 248–9. 102 William of Malmesbury, Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, I, 604–05. 103 Fulton, The Sovereignty of the Sea, p. 27: ‘the assumption being that he also exercised sovereignty over the intervening and surrounding seas’. Fulton adds that the claim to territorial waters is made more fully in Altitonantis. 104 The Heads of Religious Houses: England and Wales, ed. David Knowles, Christopher N. L. Brooke, Vera C. M. London, and David M. Smith, 3 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972), I, 231 find it ‘doubtful’. Susan Kelly, Charters of Malmesbury Abbey, Anglo-Saxon Charters, 11 (Oxford: Published for the British Academy by Oxford University Press, 2005), regards S 796, no. 30 in Kelly’s list, as problematic and of doubtful authenticity, though it may be an ‘unconventional but genuine diploma’ (pp. 62–3, 231–6). Kelly dismisses the variant S 797 as ‘not more than a botched version’ of the text given in William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Regum Anglorum (p. 234).

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believes ‘that there is nothing similar in the Malmesbury archive’.105 Kelly casts additional suspicion on this document by suggesting that it may show signs of having been tampered with at Malmesbury.106 Her concluding comments couch the charter’s authenticity in the most fragile terms: [S 796] is a very odd document, but there may be grounds for accepting it as an unconventional but authentic diploma of Edgar, drawn up by a scribe who was not accustomed to writing royal diplomas.

But there are other problems. Kelly uses the text found in the charter collection that was copied into the abbey’s cartularies and into a further manuscript. The readings given by William, however, are superior to those in the alleged original, and she admits the possibility of William having corrected ‘the errors in an imperfect original’.107 Kelly also notes that the charter shows, though not in an expected way, the influence of the ‘alliterative style’ of composing charters, a style traced to Coleman of Worcester. William praises Coleman in his letter to Prior Warin, calling him ‘your monk’.108 He especially singles out Coleman’s writing style.109 Since no writings of Coleman’s have been identified except for his hand in a few Worcester manuscripts, it would appear that William grounds his praise in having read some of the charters Coleman had produced. Ultimately, however, it cannot be proved beyond doubt that S 796 is authentic or that it had been tampered with by William, but given the pan-British and maritime extent of Edgar’s realm in the Malmesbury and the (forged) Worcester charters, William may very well be the link connecting these two documents. There would have been a motive, too. A clue is provided by the pancarta of Edward the Confessor (S 1038; Kelly 30), confirming all of Malmesbury abbey’s holdings, including Crudwell, from S 796. There is good reason to believe that this document is a forgery produced by the monks in response to the encroachments of Bishop Roger of Salisbury, who had been meddling in their affairs between 1125 and 1139.110 If this was the case, then S 796 and its variant S 797, 105 Kelly, Charters of Malmesbury Abbey, p. 236. 106 Kelly adds that the charter contains a verbal echo of a passage from no. 29 (Kelly’s

numbering) which was probably altered by a Malmesbury forger (Kelly, Charters of Malmesbury Abbey, pp. 235–6). 107 Kelly, Charters of Malmesbury Abbey, p. 234. 108 Saints’ Lives, pp. 8–10. 109 Saints’ Lives, pp. 8–10. 110 Kelly, Charters of Malmesbury Abbey, pp. 37–8 and 62–4, where S 1038 is described as ‘problematic’ and ‘evidently forged or revised’ in the twelfth century. On the whole, Kelly regards the entire Malmesbury archive as ‘a collection of ancient documents, some of which were over the centuries “improved”, partly rewritten, and used to create fabrications which were more useful to the community’ (p. 64). William, too, would have had reason to look to Edgar for authority: ‘It is well known that tenth-century English kings had their imperial credentials proclaimed in the rhetoric of their royal diplomas and that twelfth-century writers, proponents of Englishness like William of Malmesbury, knew and exploited this’ (Crick, ‘Edgar, Albion and Insular Dominion’, p. 170).



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both of which confirm the restitution by Edgar of estates previously lost, may have been prepared as part of the campaign to protect the monastery from Roger’s visitations. Since the forging of S 1038 and, perhaps, of S 796, would have occurred between 1125 and 1139, that is, during William’s active years, it is difficult to believe that the community would have looked any further than their house-chronicler, who was intimately acquainted with the history of their foundation and who had regular access to the archives at Worcester and at other monasteries. Edgar, Lord of the Four Seas If the focus on Englishness has been lost in the minute dealings and affairs of twelfth-century Worcester and Malmesbury, then this only goes to show to what extent occasional, local, and pragmatic interests control the historical formation of constructs such as national identity. A sense of Englishness that is tied to the sea is therefore not so much the product of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century apologists as it is a result of the accrual of myths, forgeries, and the rewriting of archives from the twelfth to the nineteenth century. In the final part of this chapter, I shall chart how the pragmatically justified twelfth-century Benedictine version of a maritime Edgar informed and participated in early English and imperial fictions of Britain. Altitonantis, S 796, and the Worcester/Malmesbury accounts of Edgar’s prowess at sea continued to influence, at first very much independently, the course of England’s maritime expansion. One of the first works to recognise Edgar’s relevance in this domain is the fourteenth-century proto-mercantilist Libelle of Englyshe Polycye (henceforth Libelle). As if to illustrate how later medieval and early modern writers were mining earlier chronicles for suitable material, the Libelle introduces its celebration of Edgar by acknowledging an older source: ... to be holde thorowgh Cristianyte Master and lorde environ of the see, For all lyvinge men suche a prince to drede, Of suche a regne to be aferde indede. Thus prove I well that it was thus of olde, Whiche by a cronicle anone shalbe tolde, Ryght curiouse (but I woll interprete Hit into Englishe as I did it gete) Of kynge Edgare, oo the moste merveyllouse (ll. 860–8)111

The Libelle’s account of Edgar is, as Warner has pointed out, taken from Aelred of Rievaulx’s Genealogia regum Anglorum, who took the information from John

111 The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye, pp. 44–5.

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of Worcester, perhaps via Roger Howden or the Melrose chronicle.112 The Libelle is mainly interested in Edgar’s control of the sea and in the submission of his neighbouring rulers. Thus, the poem gives John’s number for the size of Edgar’s fleet (‘[f ]ull thre thousande and sex hundred’, (l. 918)) and exploits the nautical sense of John’s ‘gubernauit’ when it portrays Edgar sitting in the ship rowed by the eight kings as their ‘sterisman’.113 The most significant stages of the subsequent political exploitation of Edgar are as follows. In the second edition of his Principal Navigations (1598), Richard Hakluyt printed most of Altitonantis and included the entire Libelle, besides commenting on the various sizes given for Edgar’s fleet.114 He may have come across the latter in John Dee’s General and Rare Memorials Pertayning to the Perfect Arte of Navigation (1577) (pp. 57–60), since he includes an account by Dee already in the first edition of the Principal Navigations, published in 1589.115 Next, Edward Coke printed Altitonantis in 1604, John Selden commented on S 796 in his Titles of Honor in 1614, and included parts of Altitonantis in Analecton Anglobritannicon, published in 1615.116 But it is only in Selden’s Mare clausum – printed in 1635, though written before 1618 – that the various strands of Edgar’s archipelagic ambitions are brought together for the first time. Selden opens his account of Edgar in book 2, chapter 10, where he discusses Edgar’s circumnavi-

112 The Libelle of Englyshe Polycy, p. 95. Warner mentions Howden, though Melrose could

also have been used by Aelred. It is also possible that the writer of the Libelle obtained the River Dee account from John of Oxenedes, who copies the description of the rowing verbatim from Aelred, but the Genealogia provides a more consistent source throughout. 113 The Chronicle of John of Worcester, II, 424, and The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye, ll. 972–3 (p. 50 for the Latin commentary). 114 The chronicle tradition continued to be fascinated by Edgar’s fleet, including John Stow’s Summary of English Chronicles (1565), William Harrison’s Description of Britain (1577), and William Warner’s Albion’s England (1586) (Torsten Reimer, ‘Before Britannia Ruled the Waves: Die Konstruktion einer maritimen Nation’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, 2006), pp. 38 and 42–3). To this can be added many more, including John Rastell’s unusual The Pastyme of People from 1530. 115 In 1597 Dee wrote an epistolary tract on the sea at the request of Edward Dyer (Thallatokratia Brettaniki), which incorporates praise for Edgar. See Armitage, The Ideological Origins of the British Empire, p. 106; Glynn Parry, ‘John Dee and the Elizabethan British Empire in Its European Context’, The Historical Journal, 49 (2006), 643–75 (pp. 661 and 674–5); and William Sherman, John Dee: The Politics of Reading and Writing in the English Renaissance (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 1995), pp. 192–200. 116 Coke’s and Selden’s use of Altitonantis has been discussed by Crick, ‘The Art of the Unprinted’, but the chapter must be read with great caution. Crick overlooks Selden’s first use of the charter in his Analecton Anglobritannicon (1615), misidentifies his 1614 use of S 767 as Altitonantis, and confuses therefore the sequence of influence between Coke and Selden. It was actually Coke, in his posthumous Institutes, who took a wrong reference from Selden.



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gation of Britain, the size of his fleet, and the River Dee episode.117 In book 2, chapter 12, Selden cites S 796 and Altitonantis.118 Nevertheless, the apotheosis of Edgar as ruler over the archipelago would only be accomplished by Nedham’s panegyric, where the conquest of the four seas is explicitly assigned to Edgar. So authoritative was Nedham’s translation of Selden that for the less discerning the panegyric became tantamount to weighty historical evidence. The ‘cock-brained’ Edward Waterhouse, if we are to believe his acquaintance Anthony Wood, tried to borrow its lustre for his patchwork legal compendium Fortescutus Illustratus (1663).119 Not only does Waterhouse cite Nedham’s lines referring to Edgar as prima facie proof in what is a slapdash abstract of Selden’s exposition, but he conflates them with a Stuart tag line: ‘King Edgar, who is said, Quatuor Maria vindicare’.120 Selden comments on the four-part division of the British ocean in book 2, chapter 1, pp. 119ff, and he prints a map dividing the seas surrounding Britain into four parts on p. 122, but he does not state explicitly that Edgar attached the four seas to England.121 This is only found on Nedham’s frontispiece. Waterhouse must have been thinking of Neptune’s ode and of the motto famously claimed by Charles I for his flagship, The Sovereign of the Seas. Thomas Heywood, in his description of the king’s ship published in 1637, writes that, although he himself has not seen it, the king claims for himself the motto Ego ab Edgaro quatuor maria vindico, which is engraved on his ship.122 By the mid-seventeenth century, the legal phrase infra quatuor maria 117 John Selden, Mare clausum (London: 1635), pp. 165, 166 for Edgar’s circumnavigation, p.

168 for a discussion of the size of his fleet, and pp. 165–6 for the River Dee episode.

118 Selden’s quotes a fragment from S 796 on p. 177 and gives an extract from Altitonantis on

p. 178.

119 See Andrew Sharp, ‘Edward Waterhouse’s View of Social Change in Seventeenth-Cen-

tury England’, Past and Present, 62 (1974), 27–46, p. 27 for Wood’s characterisation of Waterhouse. Wood, however, is notorious for character assassination, and he once described John Aubrey as a ‘shiftless person, roving and magotie-headed, and sometimes little better than crased’ ( John Dougill, Oxford in English Literature: The Making, and Undoing, of ‘The English Athens’ (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1998), pp. 50–1). 120 Edward Waterhouse, Fortescutus Illustratus or a Commentary on That Nervous Treatise, De Laudibus Legum Angliae (London: 1663), p. 408. 121 Edgar’s dominion over parts of the seas is noted on pp. 166 and 178. For a relatively recent discussion of the four seas as a legal concept (that surprisingly does not mention John Dee or John Selden), see Albert Kiralfy, ‘The Riddle of the Four Seas: A Correspondence’, The Journal of Legal History, 10 (1989), 380–8. Travers Twiss drew attention to the legal doctrine of the four seas in an early article, ‘Criminal Jurisdiction of the Admiralty of England: The Case of the Franconia’, Law Magazine and Review, 2 (1876), 145–77 (pp. 161ff ). The best treatment of the subject remains Fulton, The Sovereignty of the Sea, pp. 17–18. 122 Alan Young, His Majesty’s Royal Ship: A Critical Edition of Thomas Heywood’s ‘A True Description of His Majesties Royall Ship’ (New York: AMS Press, 1990), p. 22. For the idea of the entire Sovereign of the Seas as an allegory of the Edgarian tradition, see Michael Bath, ‘Review of His Majesty’s Royal Ship: A Critical Edition of Thomas Heywood’s A True Description of His Majesties Royall Ship, ed. by Alan R. Young’, Review of English Studies, 43 (1992), 555–7.

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had become a synonym for England.123 Under the Stuarts, however, the Four Seas were being elevated from a legal doctrine to a political pledge: in 1617 the phrase marked James’s entry in Ben Jonson’s court masque Vision of Delight (ll. 179–80).124 Restoration propaganda successfully combined the royal claim to the four seas with the Protectorate’s iconography. Quatuor maria vindico became the motto carried by farthings after that time, popularly called ‘Lord Lucas’s farthings’ after his scathing attack on the king’s fiscal policies.125 Following Britannia’s appearance on a Protectorate medal of 1654 (presumably part of the same campaign as Nedham’s translation of Mare clausum), coins minted after 1665 showed Britannia holding a Union Jack before she was re-introduced as a maritime figure on a 1667 medal.126 At this stage, the Edgarian claim had literally become common currency. So common, that the luckless antiquarian Silas Taylor could not find a buyer for his copy of Altitonantis during his lifetime, which led John Aubrey to comment in the late seventeenth century that Taylor’s copy had ‘wrapped herrings by this time’.127 Aubrey’s remark proved ominous for the diminishing interest in Edgar over the next century. By the early nineteenth century Edgar’s maritime reputation could no longer serve as a stepping stone. This is brought out by the reception of Elizabeth Appleton’s novel Edgar: A National Tale (1816), which an American reviewer scathingly called ‘one of those silly rhapsodies with which loyal enthusiasm has so often gorged the public of Great Britain’.128 Appleton’s monumental narrative shows how the various streams of a maritime Edgar – his imperial claim, his unrivalled fleet, and his sense of archipelagic identity – was no longer an expression of Englishness but had been naturalised as British. In Appleton’s novel, London is a proto-imperial city, inspired by Dryden’s ‘Empress of the Northern Clime’: Welcome! proud city, that rearest thy magnificent head among the clouds, encircled as thou art for leagues by the stately river which presses in its bosom the superb forests of the mighty Ocean. London! proud mistress of our generous empire, we hail thee!129 123 Edward Coke, The First Part of the Institutes of the Laws of England, ed. Charles Butler

and Francis Hargrave (London: Clarke, Pheney, and Brooke, 1823), p. 156.

124 John Creaser, ‘“The Present Aid of This Occasion”: The Setting of Comus’, in The Court

Masque, ed. David Lindley (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1984), pp. 111–34 (pp. 128–9). 125 William W. Carlile, The Evolution of Modern Money (London: Macmillan, 1901), pp. 146–7. Apparently modern scholarship has forgotten about this episode. 126 Mason, Scots and Britons, p. 80. Mason appears to be unaware of Nedham’s allegory since he states that ‘it was the 1667 medal which first depicted Britannia seated on the sea-shore, holding a spear and shield, and watching the navy’ (p. 80). 127 John Aubrey, Brief Lives, ed. Richard Barber (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1982), p. 300. 128 Anonymous, ‘Review of Edgar: A National Tale by Elizabeth Appleton’, The Analectic Magazine and Naval Chronicle, 8 (1816), 300–06 (p. 300). 129 Elizabeth Appleton, Edgar: A National Tale, 3 vols (London: Henry Colburn, 1816), I, 133.



introduction: edgar’s archipelago

29

At Edgar’s service is ‘the British fleet that will waft thee to glory in life or death for thy country’ (p. 101) and, more importantly, he exemplifies not English but British fidelity: The fine stature of Edgar expanded as he replied: ‘Little know you, sir, British fidelity, if thus lightly you can bid me desert my friend in his anguish – in his peril – in his extremity. Never; my lord, I am your captive.’130

Appleton’s successful Private Education or A Practical Plan for the Studies of Young Ladies, originally published in 1815 but just entering its second edition, justified the publication of the three-volume Edgar, to which the promotional tag ‘author of Private Education, &’ appended to Appleton’s name on the frontispiece testifies. At the time Appleton had apparently been consulted about the education of Princess Charlotte, the prince regent’s only child.131 Edgar: A National Tale, which is dedicated to the princess, may have been Appleton’s pitch for this prestigious role. Perhaps somewhat unwisely she chose the waning star of Edgar for her ambitious project. The Ends of the Archipelago Alfred may have become the Anglo-Saxon ruler of choice for nineteenth-century Britons, but Edgar’s legendary archipelagic and maritime dominion remained a force to be reckoned with in debates about the extent of imperial jurisdiction.132 When the captain of a Royal Navy ship had to defend himself against charges of falsely imprisoning a sailor off the coast of New Zealand in 1834, the side of the attorney general for New South Wales argued that [b]y the law of England the King of England is Lord of the four seas and his power over the ocean has extended from time to time by the growth of the Navy and the maritime ascendancy of Great Britain.133

Clearly, it was impossible to state where the four seas ended and the ocean began. What this echo of Nedham’s imperial vision demonstrates is that the archipelago of the four seas had indeed become a moving frontier of Englishness. And just how potent a concept Edgar’s archipelago was at the frontier of the British Empire is shown by the dispute that would result in the Declaration of Independence. Addressing the inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay in April 1775 under his nom de plume Novanglus, John Adams conducted a legal war of words against the idea that the American colonies should be appended to Great 130 131 132 133

Appleton, Edgar: A National Tale, I, 218. E. H. Chalus, ‘Appleton, Elizabeth (c.1790–1849)’, in DNB. Joanne Parker’s chapter in this volume explores Victorian representations of Alfred. Lewis v. Lambert, in James Dowling, Select Cases (Archives Office of New South Wales), IV 2/3463, p. 96.

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Britain. His case in point was Ireland, which, he argued, had been annexed by the Crown though not by the country of England. But to free himself from what he perceived to be the clutches of a remote empire, he first had to tackle Edward Coke’s formidable legal apparatus and then take up the challenge posed by the forged Altitonantis charter. Adams cites Coke on Altitonantis before he argues that ‘America is not parcel of the realm, state, kingdom, government, empire, or land of England, or Great Britain, in any sense, which can make it subject universally to the supreme legislature of that island.’134 Adams appears to take Altitonantis and Edgar’s rule over Ireland for granted. Since America, unlike Ireland, had never been conquered by England, so his argument runs, its attachment to England must be even looser than that of Ireland. For Adams the judicial case for American independence starts with assailing the earliest precedent of an English overseas conquest, and that was provided by the definition of Edgar’s archipelago in a forged Worcester charter. Just how deep a chord Adams’s argument had struck is shown by Ezra Pound’s freezing of this moment in Canto 67, one of his ‘John Adams’ cantos. Pound appears to ridicule the forged nature of Altitonantis by misspelling ‘Edgarus’ as ‘Edgardus’ and prefacing his quotation by the equally misspelled allusion to Poynings’ law, suggesting that Edgar’s claim to rule over Ireland justified historical English hegemonic desire: ‘(Poyning’s) edgardus anglorum basileus’.135 Edgar’s archipelago had become associated with an idea of Britain that started with England and extended as far as the sea could reach. To prove to his fellow colonists that their identity was not British and that America was not part of an English-ruled archipelago, John Adams had to demonstrate that the sea which Worcester’s ingenious monks had associated with Edgar did not wash against Massachusetts Bay.

134 John Adams, The Works of John Adams (Boston, MA: Little and Brown, 1851), IV, 160–1

and 163, respectively.

135 Ezra Pound, The Cantos of Ezra Pound (New York: New Directions, 1975), p. 389. Henry

VII’s Lord Deputy in Ireland was called Edward Poynings not Poyning. Poynings’ Law was an Act of the Parliament of Ireland that placed it under the authority of the Parliament of England. The capitalisation is Pound’s.

The Spiritual Islescape of the Anglo-Saxons

Winfried Rudolf The British islescape wields an undeniable power in shaping the collective identities of all peoples which have inhabited this part of the world. For the AngloSaxons, the ‘insular mentality’ was rooted in a myth of arrival at the island and the subsequent conquest of this confined territory. In the continuous perception of the littoral landscape they could further construct and perpetuate this specific mindset. Their word for island (OE ealond/igland), a compound combining water (ea) and land (land/lond), must have resounded in their minds with a semantic delay to which present-day users of the word are almost deaf.1 Unlike many peoples on the European continent Anglo-Saxons could, for large parts of their territory, perceive a clear geographical frontier in the coast and thus foster a particular notion of the independence of the land mass they inhabited. Through the unchanging natural border they could view the island as an eternally stable territory, but – for the same reason – they were also prone to develop fears of invasion of the familiar home ground.2 This sense of limited space and its implementation in the Anglo-Saxon collective memory could not be more emphatically expressed than by the attempts to define exact territorial measures in the famous opening sentences of Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica or the Peterborough Chronicle.3 1

The term denoting ‘land entirely surrounded by water’. Other minor layers of meaning are discussed by Charles D. Wright, ‘“Insulae Gentium”: Biblical Influence on Old English Poetic Vocabulary’, in Magister Regis: Studies in Honor of Robert Earl Kaske, ed. Arthur Groos with Emerson Brown et al. (New York: Fordham University Press, 1986), pp. 9–21. He holds that the extended senses ‘land by the water’ and ‘land partly surrounded by water’ in Old English are semantic loans from the Biblical Latin (p. 21). 2 See Jennifer Neville, Representations of the Natural World in Old English Poetry, Cambridge Studies in Anglo-Saxon England, 27 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), p. 88 and Fabienne Michelet, Creation, Migration, and Conquest: Imaginary Geography and Sense of Space in Old English Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 23–4. 3 Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), pp. 14–5 (henceforth HEGA) and The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: A Collaborative Edition, 7: MS E, ed. Susan Irvine (Cambridge: Brewer, 2004), p. 3 (henceforth E-Chronicle). These accounts are also concerned with the co-existence of other tribes and languages within the same insular boundaries, but it seems that the hermetic island-world as a dominant frame of reference outweighs the tribal factor in the initial stages of these literary attempts to shape Anglo-Saxon identity. This may arguably find further manifestation in the well-known term ‘bretwalda’, which could underscore the idea of ‘Britain’ as a unifying principle.

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Their perimeters largely defined by the sea, but also by the strong belief that they would inhabit a marginal realm of the world, Anglo-Saxons could begin to transform given or inherited social, historical, and spiritual realities or create fresh mental maps, the constructions of which were triggered and guided by an involvement with the geographical realities that surrounded them. 4 One important mental response to the geographical insulation on a naturally limited body of land may have been an intensified focus on the self: on the one hand on the physicality of the confined island ‘body’,5 on the other on the human body inhabiting it as an entity that could be perceived as equally finite. It is in the special awareness of visible demarcations that island life can cause a stronger identification between man and land, a stronger sense of belonging and attachment than felt towards territories arbitrarily demarcated by porous borders. Land that is visibly insulated can be perceived and related to more easily in its entirety as a geographical unit or centre within a maritime ‘desert’. In the same way the body provides the only valid point of orientation for agoraphobic human minds when experiencing a horror vacui in empty landscapes.6 In Gillian Beer’s terms we are, as yet unborn, already surrounded by wetness in the womb, though still attached to a lifeline, and finally become islands through birth.7 Thinking our own self to be lost in a deserted empty void, we can thus conceive ourselves mentally and socially as insular in certain situations.8 Human language betrays the psychology of such corporeal identification of landscape in coinages such as headland or tongue of land, an outlying islet becoming a spit. In view of the vastness of the sea this sense of belonging through the body conditions the mind and soul to nourish specific desires and notions of arrival at and departure from the island territory. Being on the island can mean to be

4

For a definition of mental maps see Michelet, Creation, Migration, and Conquest, pp. 8–12 and 21–34. I largely agree with her definition of a mental map as ‘an imaginary picture of the world made up of representations of the immediate environment’, which ‘entails an awareness of the place one occupies in this world picture’ (p. 9). 5 For a groundbreaking study on the human body as cosmic symbol and its literary use, see Leonard Barkan, Nature’s Work of Art. The Human Body as Image of the World (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1975). A striking identification between island and body is made by Drayton in his Poly-Olbion (see Barbara C. Ewell, ‘Drayton’s Poly-Olbion: England’s Body Immortalized’, Studies in Philology, 75 (1978), 297–315). 6 On those mental mechanisms of bringing order into spatial chaos, see Paul Zumthor, La Mesure de Monde: Représentation de l’Espace au Moyen Âge (Paris: Seuil, 1993), p. 91. 7 See her ‘The Island and the Aeroplane: The Case of Virginia Woolf ’, in Nation and Narration, ed. Homi K. Bhabha (London: Routledge, 1990), 265–90 (p. 271). 8 Similar to Judas in the Navigacio Sancti Brendani or the poetic voices in Wulf and Eadwacer (‘Wulf is on iege, ic on oþerre’) (cf. Acta Sancta Brendani: Original Latin Documents connected with the Life of Saint Brendan, ed. by Patrick F. Moran (Dublin: Kelly, 1872), pp. 120–5; The Exeter Book, ed. George P. Krapp and Elliot V. K. Dobbie, ASPR, 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), p. 180, line 4. Cited by line-number in this edition in the following for Soul and Body II, The Wanderer, The Seafarer and Riddle 7).



the spiritual islescape of the anglo-saxons

33

at peace with the self, but can equally create a feeling of imprisonment.9 Departure can become an expression of freedom, a (sometimes addictive) projection of hope and fascination into something new, but likewise it can bring about notions of loneliness, pain or war. All this surfaces in the language and literature of the Anglo-Saxons. In Old English a sailor is frequently referred to as scipliðend (mostly outside the genre of poetry), the verb liðian carrying not only the sense of ‘to sail’ but also meaning ‘to depart’, ‘to separate oneself from somebody/something’, in certain contexts even ‘to suffer (loss)’ (cf. OHG lídan, ModHG leiden).10 This sense of suffering and separation from kin(g) and country seems crucial to the Anglo-Saxon nautical experience. Its meaning is much more in line with the lugubrious tone of the exiled voices in The Wanderer or The Seafarer than with Beowulf ’s swimming escapades. Likewise, there is an equally deep desire of the soul to break out and leave the island of the body in order to find an absolute answer to the question of those borders lying beyond or beneath the sea, which the mere vista of the horizon above the waterline denies. In this chapter, I shall turn to Anglo-Saxon religious writing, and specifically (but not exclusively) to Old English homilies. My topic will be the study of some known and less known maritime motifs in Old English pastoral addresses, which will be analysed for their constructive impact on a specific spiritual islescape of the Anglo-Saxons. Examining these texts I am first guided by the assumption that Old English homilies were likely to find representative audiences comprising people of all ranks.11 The number of surviving manuscripts suggests that homilies enjoyed a wider reception than certain other works of Old English literature, which is to belittle neither these other texts’ importance nor their potential influence on the formation of insular identity.12 Second, I further presuppose on account of their transmission that these homilies were preached repeatedly for centuries and were only effective and worthy to be copied if their contents appealed to the hearts and minds of their changing audiences. Only by touching the cognitive patterns of the Anglo-Saxon mentality could the Christian message entwine with it and thus become an inseparable part of that people’s mental geography which would help to define their identity. Finally, the origins and 9 The soul in the OE poem Soul & Body II complains in this vein: ‘No ic þe of meahte, flæsce bifiongen’ (ll. 30b–31a). 10 See An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, ed. J. Bosworth and enlarged T. N. Toller (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1898), entry for ‘liðian’. Bosworth and Toller trace this last meaning in the phrase Beam sceal leafum liðan (Maxims I). 11 On different types of homiliaries and varying audiences see, for example, M. Clayton, ‘Homiliaries and Preaching in Anglo-Saxon England’, Peritia, 4 (1985), 207–42 (p. 213–16) and M. Mc. Gatch, ‘The Unknowable Audience of the Blickling Homilies’, ASE, 18 (1989), 99–115. 12 More than 1200 versions of Old English homilies survive in 85 manuscripts according to Hildegard L. C. Tristram, Early Insular Preaching: Verbal Artistry and Method of Composition, Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse, Sitzungsberichte, 623, Veröffentlichungen der Keltischen Kommission, 11 (Vienna: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1995), p. 3.

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character of the spiritual motifs analysed may indicate the special insular milieu out of which they emerged or in which they were adapted, thus explaining why the Anglo-Saxons showed a predilection for them.13 In carrying out a study of homiletic literature, we must briefly recall the intellectual core on which these texts constantly draw and which they interpret. The Mediterranean origins of Christianity ensure that the Bible, its spiritual exegesis, and its catechetical use in both canonical and non-canonical literature, abound in maritime themes. The best-known of these (for example, Noah and the Flood or Exodus) have been comprehensively discussed with regard to their relevance for the formation of Anglo-Saxon myth and identity and will be deliberately excluded from this chapter.14 What the undoubted popularity of the typological tradition reveals, however, is the Anglo-Saxon’s deep awareness of the sensus spiritualis hidden not just in religious texts and images, but in creation in general, which embraces the geographical, political, and cultural realities of their time. This awareness emerged out of the well-known desire for a sound world-order, where every sign and every thing not only had its rightful place, but was therefore considered to be divinely vested with deeper spiritual meanings.15 As for the orator in general, it must thus have been in the Anglo-Saxon preacher’s best rhetorical interest to employ exactly those signs which the audience’s natural environment contained in order to construct and maintain a spiritually meaningful world-edifice in the minds of the faithful. Taking these observations as a basis, my examinations shall now gauge the spiritual significance of selected maritime motifs concerning the island, the coast, and the sea (roughly arranged in this order), conjecturing about the Anglo-Saxons’ tropological and eschatological perspectives on this triad. The World-Island Four Old English exhortatory homilies for the second Sunday after Epiphany (or other varying occasions) contain an intriguing preaching topic, which Fred Robinson first titled The Devil’s Account of the Next World.16 This short episode, 13 To avoid the often committed fault of cultivating or creating historical stereotypes, I shall

not claim any of my findings to be generally representative of the entire Anglo-Saxon culture. When I speak of the Anglo-Saxons henceforth, I therefore assume the reader’s sensitivity to the obvious limits that the use of such terminology inevitably entails. I am aware that some of my observations may reflect especially the mindset of educated Anglo-Saxons, but they may have become popular ideas through the dissemination of homilies. 14 See, for example, Nicholas Howe, Migration and Mythmaking in Anglo-Saxon England (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989), pp. 71–107 and Daniel Anlezark, The Myth of the Flood in Anglo-Saxon England (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006). 15 A fundamental discussion on the spiritual sense is provided by Friedrich Ohly, Sensus Spiritualis: Studies in Medieval Significs and the Philology of Culture, ed. Samuel P. Jaffe and trans. Kenneth J. Northcott (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 2005), pp. 1–30. 16 Fred C. Robinson, ‘The Devil’s Account of the Next World: An Anecdote from Old English Homiletic Literature’, NM, 73 (1972), 362–71. The varying occasions are suggested by



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35

which assembles a number of images of great elocutive power, is one of the most emphatic and picturesque examples of Old English homiletic literature and enjoyed wide circulation in changing manuscript contexts from the tenth to the late twelfth centuries.17 In the story, a hermit catches a devil whom he then forces to reveal the nature of the heavenly joys and the pains of hell. However, before giving away the information demanded from him, the devil confronts the hermit with a panoramic view of the earthly realm. In MS Bodleian Library, Bodley 340 this reads as follows: Sægeð hit éac on bócum þæt sum deofles gast sæde anum ancran ealle helle ger[yne]. 7 þara sawla tintrega 7 he \sæde/ þæt eall þés middaneard nære þe mare dryges landes ofer þone micclan garsegc. þe man ænne prican aprycce on anum brede. 7 nis þés middaneard swilce se seofoða dæl ofer þone micclan garsecg. we mid micclum or mætnyssum ealle þas eorðan útan ýmb ligeð. 7 lytel dæl is under heofonum dryges landes þæt hit ne sy mid garsecge ofer urnen; (MS Bodley 340, fol. 39r)18 [It also says in books that a certain devilish spirit told an anchorite all the mystery of hell and the torments of souls. And he was saying that all this earth would be no more of dry land beside the great Ocean than a point pricked on a board, and this earth is not but as the seventh part over the great Ocean which with great immensity encircles all this earth on the outside. And there is little portion of dry land under the heaven that it is not covered over with the Ocean.]19

The vista of the dry land in a vast ocean being no more than a pointed dot in a board echoes a number of ancient accounts in which a view of the world typically precedes the visitation of otherworldly spheres. In both the apocryphal Testament of Abraham and II Enoch the protagonists are carried up to the ether of the first heaven and are granted a view of an ocean much bigger than the earthly one.20 The classical idea of this oceanus dissociabilis as a giant river separating this world from the heavenly and hellish regions is also used in the Apocalypse of Baruch, but the key text which obviously disseminated this concept to the AngloSaxons was the Visio Sancti Pauli.21 In its longer versions, Paul is able to cross the enormously vast oceanus and enters heaven. Looking back from his exposed the rubric in MS Bodley 340 Dominica II post Theophania et quando uolueris (fol. 35v). 17 At least eight versions of the Devil’s Account of varying length and contents survive in eight different manuscripts (see Robinson, ‘Devil’s Account’, p. 362). 18 This transcript from MS Bodley 340 supplements the text from a missing folio in the Vercelli Book. An edition is available in The Vercelli Homilies and Related Texts, ed. D. G. Scragg, EETS o.s., 300 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), no. IX, p. 174, lines 144–50 (henceforth Vercelli Homilies). 19 The translation follows Charles D. Wright, The Irish Tradition in Old English Literature, Cambridge Studies in Anglo-Saxon England, 6 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 179, with slight alterations of my own. 20 Wright, Irish Tradition, p. 180. 21 Wright, Irish Tradition, p. 181.

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point he notes that the world seemed like a nothingness to him (‘erat quasi nihil in conspectu meo’).22 Such comparisons of the earth to either the wide regions of the oceanus or to heaven were also familiar to the Anglo-Saxons from a variety of accounts rooted in the philosophical and astronomical traditions. In Macrobius’s commentary on the Sominum Scipionis, for example, the earth makes up no more than a point (‘punctum’).23 Boethius too is instructed by means of the same comparison by Lady Philosophy, who underpins it by claiming that in comparison to heaven the earth was only a point (‘ad caeli spatium puncti’) but had, in fact, no size at all (‘nihil spatii prorsus habere’).24 Notably, the fairly independent Old English translation of the passage employs the matching comparison of a pin-prick in a wide board, but also that of a boss of a shield (‘swilce an lytlu price on bradum brede oðþe rondbeag on scelde’).25 The humbling didactic purpose of these examples can hardly be overlooked: the world in its vanity is reduced to a trivial nothingness, a discovery which is as fundamental to the transfigured Troilus (‘litel spot’) or the frightened poet in Chaucer’s House of Fame (‘a prikke’) as it was to Neil Armstrong (‘pea’) standing on the moon.26 The other key element of the Devil’s Account marks the seven-part division of the world. Charles Wright crucially notes that in this episode – in contrast to the aforementioned analogues – the devil does not compare the earth (including the terrestrial ocean) to the universe as a whole, but the portion of the dry land to the immensity of the oceanus surrounding it.27 He further argues convincingly that the idea of a seven-part division of the world reached the Anglo-Saxons through the apocryphal IV Ezra, which appears to be a common influence on the Irish commentaries on Genesis.28 Significantly, in IV Ezra, however, the earthly waters rather than the lands are drawn together in one place and make up for only the seventh part of the earth.29 Wright considers the reversal of this 22 Apocrypha Anecdota [First Series]: A Collection of Thirteen Apocryphal Books and Fragments, ed. M. R. James, Texts and Studies, 2.3 (Cambridge: Cambridge Press, 1893), p. 15. 23 Ambrosii Theodosii Macrobii Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis, ed. James Willis (Leipzig: Teubner, 1963), p. 66. 24 Boethius, De consolatione Philosophiae, ed. L. Bieler, CCSL, 94 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1984), bk. II, pr. 7 (p. 32). 25 The Old English Boethius, ed. Malcolm Godden and Susan Irvine, 2 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), I, 278, B18.17–18. 26 The Riverside Chaucer, ed. Larry D. Benson, 3rd edn (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987), V.1815 (p. 584) and III.905–7 (p. 359). Neil Armstrong as quoted in ‘Space: The Greening of the Astronauts’, Time, US edition, 11 December 1972, p. 43: ‘It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.’ Interestingly he was standing in the Sea of Tranquillity. 27 The Irish Tradition, p. 185. 28 The Irish Tradition, p. 186. 29 The Fourth Book of Ezra, ed. R. L. Bensly, Texts and Studies, 3.2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1895), IV Ezra VI.42 (p. 23).



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motif in the Devil’s Account as the logical consequence of combining the boardmotif with the seven-part division of the world.30 Here the earth (including the low waters running over the dry lands) is understood as surrounded by a mighty ocean, the term ‘garsecg’ denoting the vast waters ‘under heofonum’ which must be six times the size of the earth. This creative fusion of sea images had already been carried out in some of the early Irish commentaries on Genesis and it attests to a well-established tradition of variation and synthesis of maritime topics among peoples in the British Isles and Ireland.31 The concept of the world being mainly land, as in IV Ezra, is indeed similar to what learned Anglo-Saxons would have found in their books. If they wanted to take a holistic view of the world they could have turned to traditional T-O maps, similar to those surviving in CCCC 265 (a fragment) and St John’s College, Oxford 17.32 These maps indeed presented Africa, Asia and Europe as a more or less concentrated land mass, with a circular O-frame often labelled as ‘Oceanus’ and the Mediterranean Sea, the rivers Don and Nile separating the continents in a T-shape. Looking at such a circular map they would have agreed with the cosmological comparisons designed by the translator of the Old English Boethius or by Boniface, who (quite progressively) described the world as being of the shape of a ball in a letter to Eadburga.33 One crucial innovation in the Devil’s Account, however, lies in the change from such a terrestrial ‘geographical’ view to the earth-diminishing transcendental vista. This outlook measures the huge proportions of the Oceanus reaching towards the realms beyond (this is what the homilist means with ‘under heofonum’), proportions which, for the sake of their size, were of course impractical to depict on a medieval world map drawn on precious parchment. To downsize the world to a point in this mass of water seems not only a logical consequence of the thematic fusion described above, but also a pushing to the fore of an image of the world as a singular entity, surrounded by immense aquatic insulation – literally a single ‘world-island’.34 It is not difficult to imagine how this mental image of an insignificantly small world-island in a gigantic ocean might have tallied with the Anglo30 The Irish Tradition, p. 186. 31 Bernhard Bischoff, ‘Wendepunkte in der Geschichte der lateinischen Exegese im Früh-

mittelalter’, Sacris Erudiri, 6 (1964), 189–279, repr. in his Mittelalterliche Studien: ausgewählte Aufsätze zur Schriftkunde und zur Literaturgeschichte, 3 vols (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1966–81), I, 206–73 (esp. pp. 210–25). 32 Electronic images of these maps are available at and [both accessed 29 March 2010]. 33 Edited in Kenneth Sisam, Studies in the History of Old English Literature (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1953), pp. 212–24 (pp. 213–14). 34 The joint conglomerate of the three ‘old’ continents was famously described as the ‘worldisland’ in the hugely influential work of H. J. Mackinder, Democratic Ideals and Reality, with a new introduction by Stephen V. Mladineo (Washington, DC: National Defence University Press, 1942), p. 45. My use of the term here is entirely free of any geopolitical connotations.

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Saxons’ perception of their real habitat. The pinpoint size of the world shifts the focus of the mind from the diversity of the landmass(es) to the measureless surrounding waters, so that looking at the sea from any littoral point literally evokes the impression of standing on the edge of the world. At the same time the island, as a hermetic territory, becomes a metonym for the inhabitable world as a whole, a realm filled with all imaginable earthly sin, surrounded by an even more dangerous and uncrossable ocean. In a first step, therefore, this mental map creates a holistic sense of the secular by moving the marginal English island realm into its tropological centre. On the eschatological level, this shift also serves to promote the other dominant idea of this excerpt from the Devil’s Account – the insignificance and inevitable transience of the world, as expressed by its almost negligible size. The point in the board is so tiny, as to be almost non-existent. Nonetheless, a pinprick remains something physically substantial unless it was not engraved in a solid, but in a soft surface. Such is suggested by an intriguing modification to the board-image made by some later correctors of the Devil’s Account, such as the one revising homily Napier XXX: And he sæde, þæt eal þes middaneard nære þe mare driges landes ofer þone mycelan garsecg. þonne man ænne prican apricce on ánum brádum \wæx/brede. (Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 113, fol. 75v)

Added here in an interlinear insertion, but later copied in two other postConquest versions, the plain board in which the world is marked by a point is conspicuously changed into a wax tablet.35 The milieu of monastic learning that may well have inspired this alteration can be vividly imagined, as wax tablets were the notepads of the medieval classroom. Although the textual supplementation of wæx may appear insignificant, the enhancement of the spiritual sense through this slight alteration is astonishing: the world is not just scratched into a board, but inscribed as it were, into a customary writing surface. The image recalls the beginning of the gospel of John in that the word physically shapes and creates – the word becomes the world. In medieval writing practice, a single point could be entered into the wax with a stylus or even a fingertip, reminding audiences of the digitus dei with which God writes and illustrates his creation like a book and fills it with spiritual significations (‘quasi liber et pictura’, as Alain de Lille puts it a century after the Conquest).36 Quite decisively, however, the user of a wax tablet can turn the board into a tabula rasa at any time, and it is this very possibility of erasure that turns the tablet-motif into a powerful eschatological image here. It would remind audiences not only of the fleetingness of words, but also of the end of the world at which the world-island, a seemingly 35 These versions are contained in Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 115 and CCCC,

MS 303.

36 Alain de Lille, De Incarnatione Christi Rhythmus Perelegans, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 210 (Paris:

Migne, 1855) col. 0579A.



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stable and eternal territory without shifting or porous borders, would be wiped away. Not surprisingly, then, the homilist of Bazire/Cross homily II peppers his address with Psalm 97:5 to picture his vision of Doomsday on which mountains will melt like wax (‘duna myltað swa weax deð on fyre’).37 This eminent image of land being liquidised at the end of time works analogously to the shift of focus from the physically solid state of the body to the liquid state of the soul in the afterlife, an image to which I will return shortly. The Sinner at the Coast Images memorable in their design and spectacular in detail, lend great rhetorical power to medieval preaching. To inscribe Christian doctrine with lasting effect into the conscience of their audiences, preachers favoured the use of picturesque and vibrant motifs, often wrapped in dramatic language. Thomas Bradwardine vigorously expresses this need for what I would call the ‘dynamic image’ when he states with regard to affective memorisation of rhetorical pictures: Their quality truly should be wondrous and intense, because such things are impressed in memory more deeply and are better retained. However, such things are for the most part not average but extremes, as the most beautiful or ugly, joyous or sad, worthy of respect or something ridiculous for mocking, a thing of great dignity or vileness, or wounded with greatly opened wounds with a remarkably lively flowing of blood, or in another way made extremely ugly, strange of clothing and all bizarre of equipment, the color also very brilliant and intense, such as intense, fiery red, and the whole color strongly altering in appearance. The whole image also should have some other detail or movement, that thus more effectively than through what is routine or rest, they may be commended to memory.38

Centuries earlier, it seems, Anglo-Saxon preachers already excelled in this aesthetic strategy in their attempts to express the ineffable tortures of hell to a degree which could stand any comparison with Pater Arnall’s notorious sermon in James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Evoking a bizarre image to illustrate the infernal pain, the homilist of the exhortatory Vercelli homily IX turns to his audience: forþan gif hwylc mann bið on helle ane niht. þonne bið him leofre gif he þanon mot. þæt he hangie .VII. þusend wintra on þam lengestan treowe ufeweardum þe ofer sæ stænd[\t/:::] 7 on þam hehstan sæclife. 7 syn þa fet gebundene to þam hehstan telgan. 7 þæt heafod hangige ofdunrihte 7 þa fet uprihte. 7 him sige þæt blod ut þurh þone muð. 7 hine þonne gesece ælc þæra yfela þe æfre on helle sy 7 hine ælc yð gesece mid þam hehstan þe seo sæ forð bringð. 7 þeah hine ælc tor

37 Eleven Old English Rogationtide Homilies, ed. Joyce Bazire and James E. Cross, King’s College London Medieval Studies (Exeter: Short Run Press, 1989), no. 11, p. 142, line 64. 38 As translated in M. Carruthers, The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature, 10 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 282.

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gesece þe on eallu clyfum syndon. þonne wile he eall þis [:::] þrowian wiððan þe he næfre eft helle ne gesece. (MS Bodley 340, fol. 38v)39 [For if any man were in hell for a single night, thereafter it would be more agreeable to him, if he could escape from there, that he should hang for seven thousand years atop the tallest tree that stands over the sea, on the highest seacliff. And (his) feet be bound to the highest branch, and the head would hang upside down and the feet upright, and the blood trickle out through the mouth, and every evil that ever was in hell would then afflict him, and every wave with the highest the sea brings forth and every rock from every cliff beset him, still he will endure all this provided that he never again seek out hell.]40

Depictions of hanging sinners are a traditional element of the description of either hell or hellish places. This form of torture, it seems, was particularly suited to the representation of the imprisonment and incessant suffering of the lost soul, finding multifarious expressions in world literature.41 An inexhaustive catalogue of works proves that the motif of the hanged man, like the horrific method of torture itself, experienced persistent popularity and variation since early antiquity. With regard to our Old English example it is most likely that the composer of Vercelli IX incorporated this passage from a homily contained in the St-Père de Chartres collection, which in turn may have been inspired by one of the long redactions of the Visio Sancti Pauli.42 In addition, a number of analogues exist in Irish literature; the closest will be revisited at the end of this section. Independently, sinners hung by their feet also occur in a description of hell’s tortures in Tristram homily III.43 Hanging by those parts of the body which committed the sin reached a particular popularity in the Middle Ages, both in reality and fiction: thieves hang 39 See note 29. Vercelli Homilies, no. IX, p. 170, lines 122–30. 40 Translation as in Wright, The Irish Tradition, p. 114, with slight alterations of my own. 41 The illustrious list of works drawing on this theme includes Plato’s Gorgias, the Acts

of Thomas, the Apocalypses of Elijah, Peter and Mary, the Visio Sancti Pauli, Dante’s Inferno, The Arabian Nights and Chinese hell narratives to name but a few. A good overview of the tradition is provided by Georges Minois, Histoire de l’enfer (Paris: PUF, 1994), further references are to the translation by Peter Dinzelbacher, Hölle: Kleine Kulturgeschichte der Unterwelt (Freiburg: Herder, 2000), esp. chapters III–VI. See further Martha Himmelfarb, Tours of Hell: An Apocalyptic Form in Jewish and Christian Literature (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983). I supplement here only the less familiar The New Arabian Nights: Selected Tales, not included by Gall and Orlane, ed. and trans. W. F. Kirby (Philadelphia, PA: J. B. Lippincott, 1883), p. 207. Charles D. Orzech, ‘Mechanisms of Violent Retribution in Chinese Hell Narratives’, Contagion: Journal of Violence, Mimesis and Culture, 1 (1994), 111–26 (p. 119). 42 Cambridge Pembroke College MS 25: A Carolingian Sermonary used by Anglo-Saxon Preachers, ed. James E. Cross, King’s College London Medieval Studies (Exeter: Short Run Press, 1987), no. 41, p. 192, lines 52–4. The connection is suggested by Wright, Irish Tradition, p. 115. 43 See Hildegard L. C. Tristram, ‘Vier altenglische Predigten aus der heterodoxen Tradition’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Freiburg, 1970), no. 3, p. 168, line 156.



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by their hands, liars by their tongues, etc. Strappado by the feet or legs, though less obvious, is connected with fornication in the Apocalypse of Peter, but the Bodley homilist is remarkably silent on any specific transgression of the hanged man here. Instead, he creates a picture within which time and space, torture and pain are exaggerated for doctrinal purposes.44 First, the seven-thousand-year duration of the punishment may not be accidental. Some Anglo-Saxon calculations on the Ages of the World (for example, those promoted in Solomon and Saturn and Ælfric’s Catholic Homilies) count 6158 years from the creation to the birth of Christ.45 Adding up the time until the tenth century AD – a possible date of composition of the hanging sinner motif as preserved in our homily – the figure would roughly match the full age of the world. This would push the inexpressibility to extremes, as nothing older than creation itself could be plausibly imagined by those Anglo-Saxons believing the words of the scriptures. Second, there is the spectacular height of the sinner’s place of torment at the topmost branch of the longest tree on top of the highest sea cliff. The hyperbole was probably chosen to address the depth of hell, which the homilist has just depicted as twice as deep as the distance from earth to heaven in the preceding sentence (‘7 emne swa mycel swa fram heofenes hrofe is to þysse eorðan, þonne is leornod on halgum bocum þæt sio hel sie swylc twa deop’).46 Wright notes that within the variety of source materials it is only in the Visio Pauli that sinners hang from the branches of trees; these trees, however, are fiery and do not stand on cliff tops.47 Yet, Blickling homily XVI picks up this scene, transfers it into a maritime landscape and makes St Paul a spectator of the hanged in a cliff-top locus horribilis at the edge of the world: Swa Sanctus Paulus wæs geseonde on norðanweardne þisne middangeard, þær ealle wætero niðergewitað, 7 he þær geseah ofer ðæm wætere sumne harne stan. 7 wæron norð of ðæm stane awexene swiðe hrimige bearwas, 7 ðær wæron þystrogenipo, 7 under þæm stane wæs niccra eardung 7 wearga. 7 he geseah þæt on ðæm clife hangodan on ðæm isigean bearwum manige swearte saula be heora handum gebundne. 7 þa fynd þara on nicra onlicnesse heora gripende wæron, swa swa grædig wulf. 7 þæt wæter wæs sweart under þæm clife neoðan. 7 betuh þæm clife on ðæm wætre wæron swylce twelf mila. 7 ðonne ða twigo forburston þonne gewitan þa saula niðer þa þe on ðæm twigum hangodan, 7 him onfengon ða nicras. Ðis ðonne wæron ða saula þa ðe her on worlde mid unrihte gefyrenode wæron, 7 ðæs noldan geswican ær heora lifes ende.48

44 Minois, Hölle, pp. 61–2. 45 See Hildegard L. C. Tristram, Sex aetates mundi: Die Weltzeitalter bei den Angelsachsen

und Iren, Anglistische Forschungen, 165 (Heidelberg: Winter, 1985), p. 49.

46 Vercelli Homilies, no. IX, p. 170, lines 114–15. 47 The Irish Tradition, p. 120. 48 The Blickling Homilies of the Tenth Century, ed. and trans. R. Morris, EETS o.s., 73

(London: Trübner, 1880), no. XVI, pp. 208–11.

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[So St Paul was looking at the northern [part of ] this world, where all waters flow down, and there he saw over the water a grey rock, and to the north, grown exceedingly out of the rock, were frosty groves, and in that place were mists and darkness, and under the rock was the abode of water-monsters and wolves. And he saw that on the cliff many black souls were hanging on the icy groves, bound by their hands; and the (hellish) enemies of those (black souls), in the likeness of water-monsters, were taking hold of them even as a greedy wolf (would do); and the water was black under the cliff from beneath. And between the cliff and the water were such (black souls) for twelve miles, and when the boughs broke, then the souls that were hanging on the boughs went down and the water-monsters took them.]49

The verbal echoes with Grendel’s mere in Beowulf are unmistakeable, a parallel with Blickling XVI much discussed by scholars in the past.50 The water beneath the cliff is a hellish place from which fiendish creatures crawl up to torture the souls of sinners hanging on branches, although they hang by their hands here. Geographically, Paul’s vision is set in the North, the hostile region at the edge of the world where all rivers flow into the all-encompassing world-river Oceanus and where, according to I Enoch, the gates of hell are located.51 The North is also that part of the world which the Anglo-Saxons knew they were inhabiting, if we believe the Cotton Map or the seminal world-map in St John’s College MS 17.52 The latter charts England on the very edge in the frame that marks the circular ocean; Ireland and Thule are even placed outside this regularised border of the world. England’s relatively marginal position is verified by a tradition of continental sources and finds its etymological explanation in Gregory the Great and Widukind of Corvey, who both derive the island’s location in a corner of the sea (‘quia illa insula in angulo quodam maris sita est’) from the name of the AngloSaxons.53 While some later vernacular sources seem to move Britain towards an imaginary centre, Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica, as a chief canonical source, leaves no doubt about a peripheral locus of the island.54 Further evidence for this self-perception could be taken from the often neglected fact that a considerable population of Anglo-Saxons returned to the continent throughout the sixth and seventh centuries where they were offered settlements in Thuringia by the 49 Translation after Kemp Malone, ‘Grendel and his Abode’, in Studia Philologica et Litteraria

in Honorem L. Spitzer, ed. A. G. Hatcher and K. L. Selig (Berne: Francke, 1958), 297–308 (pp. 304–05) with slight alterations. 50 Richard Morris was the first to draw attention to it (The Blickling Homilies, pp. vi–ii). 51 I Enoch, XVII.6–8. 52 An image of the Cotton Map can be found in Michelet, Creation, Migration and Conquest, p. 155, and in Alfred Hiatt’s chapter in this volume. 53 Die Sachsengeschichte des Widukind von Korvei, ed. H.-E. Lohmann and Paul Hirsch, 5th edn, Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum (Hanover: Hahnsche Buchhandlung, 1935), p. 10. 54 See Matthias Werner, ‘Iren und Angelsachsen in Mitteldeutschland: Zur vorbonifatianischen Mission in Hessen und Thüringen’, in Die Iren und Europa im früheren Mittelalter, ed. Heinz Löwe (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1982), pp. 239–329. See also Kathy Lavezzo, Angels on the Edge of the World: Geography, Literature, and English Community, 1000–1534 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2006) and Sobecki, The Sea, p. 10.



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Merovingian kings.55 No matter how far from the finis terrae some Anglo-Saxons imagined their island to be located, we have good reason to assume that it could be spiritually imagined in the vicinity or on the threshold of the infernal realm as described in Blickling XVI. Again, as in the case of the isolation of the worldisland, geographical realities may have reinforced this view. The distance of twelve miles between cliff and water, which echoes the extreme height we encounter in the Bodley homily, is truly remarkable. To stare into a remotely similar (and surely no less impressive) abyss Anglo-Saxons would have had to stand at the edge of the white cliffs of Dover (106 m) or Beachy Head (162 m) (the Irish at the Aillte an Mhothair (214 m)), as landlocked areas would not offer equally extreme landscape formations. It seems possible that such breathtaking geographical extremes would inspire and reinscribe those lasting rhetorical images that communicated the ineffable to the island people. The lasting success of the mental image of the hanging sinner may thus be explained by the matching geographical types that the eternal landscape provided. It may have ensured that the motif remained part of the homily while other thematic sections of the Devil’s Account (such as a hell-hound with one-hundred heads) were dropped in the course of its reuse.56 Even if there is no close textual connection between Blickling XVI and the Bodley homily, in both texts the motif has an unmistakeable eschatological tone. The water below represents an image of hell; the Bodley homily, however, employs a more naturalised landscape for the torture scene, which creates an interesting interim state that resembles an acquatic purgatio. The sea, though roaring, is not explicitly presented as a dark home of water-monsters and wolves. What the hanging sinner would experience is, rather generally, all imaginable hell-tortures (‘hine þonne gesece ælc þæra yfela þe æfre on helle sy’). This sentence appears somewhat contradictory to the general idea of inexpressibility: if it is all hellish pains that already afflict the sinner hanging from a sea-cliff for seven-thousand years, how would he not want to be in hell for one night only? Understandably, then, a later version of the motif in the mid-eleventh-century manuscript Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 115 and its contemporary reviser found fault with this passage, altering it to read: 7 hine þær \ge/sece elc þara yfla þe \he/ æfre on eorþan fram [:::]\secgean gehyrde/ 7 hine þonne \eall/ þa sæyþa ‘nyþan’ cnyson 7 beaten þe heo mid hire brogan forþbringæþ. þonne wile he þis eall lustlice geþafian. (MS Hatton 115, fol. 143v)57

55 This historical evidence is often suppressed or neglected in scholarship at the expense of

linear literary myths of origin and conquest which are occasionally declared absolute.

56 See the missing parallels to Vercelli homily IX, pp. 182–4, lines 215–20 and the omission

marks surrounding the hell-hound passage in MS Bodley 340, fol. 40r.

57 For an edited text, see Vercelli Homilies, p. 171, lines 95–7.

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[… and if he was afflicted there by all evils that he ever heard tell about on earth and all the sea-waves that it (the sea) brings forth with its terror would trouble and beat him from below, then he will gladly suffer all this.]

Stating that the sinner is troubled by only those tortures that he was told about on earth, the homilist leaves the actual hellish tortures in the realm of the unknown. However, that both the immeasurable depth of the chasm and the destructive power of the sea are suggestive enough of the infernal pain is immediately clear; the waves surge monstrously high and toss against land and man, cliff and sinner, in perpetuity. Free of additional references to damnation, this incessant, repetitive crashing and beating of the waves works well on the tropological level, too: bound in this world, the sinner is constantly exposed to and afflicted by temptations to sin, as he looks down at the hostile, surging sea, a dynamic metaphor of hell actively reaching out for the soul. Body and land being unified in the image, ceaseless littoral erosion can be perceived as a spiritual reminder of age and temptation gnawing the body. This shift towards an earthly perspective is reached through the emphasis on the solitary state of the sinner, which, as Wright notes, stands in contrast to the collective infernal hanging portrayed in the Visio Pauli and Blickling XVI.58 An additional, terrifying effect on Anglo-Saxon audiences may have been achieved by the image’s resemblance to actual methods of torture of the time. The form of hanging described here was (and unfortunately still is in too many parts of the world) a customary torture that, if not used for interrogation or deterrence, would lead to a slow death. Medieval victims were frequently beaten during the hanging and more often than not the procedure included phases of immersion, during which the body was plunged headfirst into water or other, less pleasant liquids.59 As an image of transgression punished, the vividly dynamic picture of the hanging man also calls to mind the question of primordial sin. As if gazing into a gaping hell-monster’s mouth with the beating waves snatching, the sinner is denied a view of heaven by the fact of hanging upside down. This perspective creates a freeze-frame representation of the act of falling, inevitably linking the image with Lucifer’s expulsion from heaven and recalling the well-known illustrations of this scene from Anglo-Saxon manuscripts.60 If such illustrations were in any way convincing, the hanging sinner would not only persuasively articulate the inexpressible, but also prompt the audience to explore their moral conscience and ponder their own potential damnation in an eschatological sense: while 58 The Irish Tradition, p. 136. 59 During the later Middle Ages this horrible torture later became known as ‘The Jewish

Execution’, because it was mostly applied to Jews, possibly as a deadly mock-baptism in answer to the refusal of the same sacrament by those punished (see Maria R. Boers, ‘Jews in the Criminal-Justice System of Early Modern Germany’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 30 (1999), 407–35 (p. 430)). 60 See especially Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Junius 11, pp. 3 and 16.



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corrupt mankind is ‘hanging’ in this worldly life it is in permanent view of the impending doom below it, into which it can irreversibly plunge in the afterlife. In the first of the two illustrations showing the falling angels in the Junius manuscript, Satan is bound to the opening of the hell-mouth, engulfed in blazing flames. Although the chained fallen angel, like many souls in Old English homilies,61 is burning in fire here, such an analogue would not necessarily have incurred a complete contradiction to the sea image for Anglo-Saxons. The maritime setting and the traditional picture of infernal fire, though elementary opposites, combine in a portrayal of the flaming sea as hell in a sermon in Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Junius 85/86, which was possibly derived from the Apocalypse of Peter: And þær biþ fyren mere swilce oðru sæ and þæt is swiþe ormæte deopnes ðæs grundes and eal yfel ongemænged on ðam grunde and þær nænig god ætiewed biþ on ðam grunde and þam biþ seo eorðe gode ofergyten and þæt beoð þa earman tintrego and hie ðær woniegað a worulda woruld.62 [There is a fiery mere, like another sea, and the ground of it is quite immeasurably deep. And all evil gathers on that ground and nothing good shows itself on that ground and there the good of the earth is forgotten. And that is the punishment of the damned; and they dwell there in all eternity.]

Again, it is hard not to hear an echo of Grendel’s mere with its ‘fyr on flode’ in these lines.63 Similar to the landscape in Blickling homily XVI, it remains to be discussed if the fire image influenced Beowulf or was inspired by the poem, but with the epic as a textual contemporary the homilies create a particularly insular vision of hell in these examples. The entrance to the infernal regions is not found in some dark terrestrial cave, in a mountain or forest, but in a coastal landscape. This psychological setting seems natural to the Anglo-Saxons to the extent that even a stock-in-trade element of infernal depictions such as hellfire, despite the obvious elementary contradiction, can be reconciled with the sea. All damned creatures dwell in the deep, surrounded by monsters and devilish deceivers like the whale, who lures careless seafarers into ruin by pretending to be an island. All things damned and doomed ultimately fall or are plunged into the sea, like Jonah (who is allowed to return) or the dead dragon in Beowulf (who is not).64 The motif of the hanging sinner thus promotes the tropological message of man being bound to sinful earth just as much as it reminds Christians of 61 Ancient Laws and Institutes of England, 2 vols, ed. Benjamin Thorpe, Great Britain Public

Records Commission, 28 (London: Public Records Office, 1840), II, 394.

62 Two Apocrypha in Old English Homilies, ed. ������������������������������������������ R. Willard, Beiträge zur englischen Philo-

logie, 30 (Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1935; repr. 1967), pp. 39–57, lines 398–404. 63 Klaeber’s Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburg, ed. R. D. Fulk, Robert E. Bjork, and John D. Niles, 4th edn (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2008), line 1366a (henceforth referred to by line as Beowulf). 64 Beowulf, lines 3131b–33.

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possible post mortem punishment of the soul before doomsday. While this state may resemble a temporary liberation from hell tortures in a primordial form of what later becomes purgatory, the travel of the sinful soul across the sea to the shores of salvation is inevitably denied. In the closest Irish analogue to the hanging sinner motif contained in the Leabhar Breac, Cairpre Crom, a bishop of Clonmacnois, liberates the soul of Mael Sechnaill mac Maele Ruanaig, king of Tara, from hell through his prayers. Asked by the bishop about its state the soul of Mael Sechnaill answers: The soul whose punishment is least Which is in the regions of the oceans, It would not be a small comfort to its limb If it should come out of hell. On top of the hard, bare tree with fierceness, Above the dangerous cliff of the green sea, It would sleep there without want In the rough night of windy snow.65

The Sea, the Body and the Soul Without doubt, the sea served as a major plane of projection for the AngloSaxons’ ideas of their earthly and transcendental existence. On a moral level, one view of the world was that of a journey away from a safe homeland (and this homeland may well have been perceived as a kind of paradise), into a realm of temptation and evil. Out on the sea of life, man is exposed to tempests and hardships, as this sea is a vacillating territory, a terra tremanda.66 This direct exegetical correspondence between the sea and the vicissitudes of secular existence in general resonates throughout European homiletic literature, such as Haymo’s commentary on Isaiah (‘Mare significat hunc mundum’), but also in the less familiar homiliary of Angers (‘Mare istum saeculum demonstrat’).67 Both works were available in England at least as early as the mid-tenth century. The idea surfaces as early as Boniface for whom leaving the island equalled a spiritual departure from morally safer soil. He reports on the state of success of the conversion of the Germanic tribes to Archbishop Nothelm of Canterbury in 735 AD, praying that: 65 Translation as given by Wright, The Irish Tradition, p. 139. 66 Bede, De temporum ratione, ed. C. W. Jones, CCSL 123B (Turnhout: Brepols, 1977), ch.

XXVIIII, partly available in an Old English translation (see Ælfric’s De temporibus anni, ed. H. Henel, EETS o.s., 213 (London: Oxford University Press, 1942), VIII.15). 67 Haymonis Halberstatensis Episcopi Commentariorum in Isaiam, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 116 (Paris: Migne, 1852), col. 0972D. The full Angers text remains unedited. For an edition of the earliest known fragment, see Winfried Rudolf, ‘The Homiliary of Angers in Tenth-Century England’, ASE, 39 (2011), 163–92 (henceforth ‘Angers’). An English origin of the collection cannot be ruled out.



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navem mentis meae variis Germanicarum gentium tempestatum fluctibus quassatam precibus vestris in portu firme petre stabilire studeatis.68 [the vessel of my mind, tossed by the recurrent storms of the various Germanic tribes, may by your prayers be brought to a safe and rockbound harbour.]69

Writing to Pehthelm in the same year he further states: ‘Germanicum mare periculosum est navigantibus’. These are the words of a restless cosmopolitan missionary, who travelled the seas between England and the European continent for more than forty years in exile pro amore dei. He founded dioceses and monasteries in Germany, educated the Pippinid rulers and regularly visited the popes in Rome. Yet mentally, he turns the absence from his home island into an ongoing, insecure sea-journey, whether he was on a ship to Frisia or treading perfectly solid Thuringian or Frankish soil. Despite its repetition in the writings of Boniface we may assume that this metaphor was not just a handy Virgilian trope for him. Its mental geography played a central part in giving ‘his own life a mythic shape’.70 For the missionary it is a life lived mostly in self-imposed exile, led as a struggle against a sea of Germanic paganism. At the end of this life Boniface was hoping to reach a port, not in this world, but the next. This haven is heaven itself: navem fragilitatis nostrae, ne fluctibus Germanicarum tempestatum submergatur, dextera sua protegente et gubernante inlesam custodiendo ad caelestis Hierusalem litus tranquillum perducat.71 [He will hold our frail vessel in His guiding and protecting hand, [and] preserve it from the waves of the German tempests, and bring it safely to the peaceful shore of the heavenly Jerusalem.]72

While living in this unstable world, the soul of a true Christian thus feels a desire for the journey beyond. It can anticipate this travel by power of the mind: Uton nu bihealden þa wunderlice swiftnesse þare sawlæ. Heo hafæð swa mycele swiftnesse, þæt heo on ane tid, gif heo wyle, bisceawiæð heofenum & ofer sæ flyhð, lond & burga geondfaræð. [Let us now notice the wonderful swiftness of the soul. It has such great swiftness that, if it will, at one and the same time, it contemplates the heavens and flies over the sea and journeys through lands and cities.]73 68 Die Briefe des Heiligen Bonifatius und Lullus, ed. Michael Tangl, Monumenta Germaniae

Historica, Epistolae Selectae, 1 (Berlin: Weidmannsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1955), p. 57.

69 The Letters of Saint Boniface, trans. Ephraim Emerton (New York: Columbia University

Press, 1940), p. 62. 70 Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, p. 138. 71 Briefe des Heiligen Bonifatius, p. 63. 72 Letters of Saint Boniface, p. 79. 73 Ælfric’s Lives of Saints, ed. W. W. Skeat, EETS o.s. 76, 2 vols (London: Trübner, 1881–5), vol. I, no. I, 122. Malcolm Godden, ‘Anglo-Saxons on the Mind’, in Learning and Literature

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In this excursus, Belfour homily IX recalls Augustine’s well-known trinitarian concept of the soul’s memory, understanding and will (memoria, intelligentia, voluntas), which stands at the heart of the poetic reasoning in The Wanderer and The Seafarer.74 Out of the understanding of human memory as a process happening in the present emerges a strong sense of transience and a desire for a life in the next world. This desire of the soul to travel is hinted at by the mysterious ‘anfloga’ (line 62) in The Seafarer or by the concluding half line ‘flerende gæst’ (line 9) of Exeter Book Riddle 7 (‘swan’), where the flying swan may represent any living being’s soul, a fleeting, lonely, temporary guest on earth. Avian representatives of souls are also at the centre of the much debated ‘fleotendra ferð’ (The Wanderer, line 54), which, apart from a fleeting mind of failing memories, might not just be understood as symbols, but as materialised souls of lost companions.75 The metaphorical meaning of birds in these poems crucially draws on two ancient functions of ornithological observation: the taking of auspices concerning the future and the navigation at sea in foggy weather or cloudy darkness with the help of bird-flight direction, especially between islands. Both functions translate beautifully on the tropological and eschatological levels of spiritual exegesis that we encounter in homilies: travelling the sea of this worldly life the human soul needs moral orientation and the safe promise of a life in a realm beyond the earthly existence. Spiritual safety on the sea of life in this world would be provided by the church, which, in the words of Tertullian or bishop Avitus of Vienne (d. 523), is a ship that guides the Christian soul through dangerous currents (‘Ecclesia est navis quae nos per varios casus velut inter marinos gurgites ducit’).76 Ecclesiastical doctrine promised the Anglo-Saxon believer plain sailing in morally shallow waters and protection on the day of judgement, echoed in the words of homily Napier XLVI: ‘Cyrice is þære sawle scip and sceld on domes dæg’.77 Such comparisons between churches and ships were a familiar figure of early allegorical exegesis, with its most palpable manifestation in the architectural term ‘nave’ denoting the in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies presented to Peter Clemoes, ed. Michael Lapidge and Helmut Gneuss (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 271–98. 74 See especially Peter Clemoes, ‘Mens absentia cogitans in The Seafarer and The Wanderer’, in Medieval Literature and Civilization: Studies in Memory of G. N. Garmonsway, ed. D. A. Pearsall and R. A. Waldron (London: Athlone Press, 1969), pp. 62–77. Reworkings of the Augustinian concept by some Anglo-Saxons are comprehensively discussed in Godden, ‘Anglo-Saxons on the Mind’. 75 On this discussion, see especially Clemoes, ‘Mens absentia cogitans’, pp. 66–7 and Susan Irvine, ‘Speaking One’s Mind in The Wanderer’, in Inside Old English: Essays in Honour of Bruce Mitchell, ed. John Walmsley (Oxford: Blackwell, 2006), pp. 117–33 (pp. 119–21). 76 Avitus Viennensis: Homilia de rogationibus, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 59 (Paris: Migne, 1847), col. 0294. 77 ‘The church is ship and shield of the soul on doomsday’; Wulfstan: Sammlung der ihm zugeschriebenen Homilien nebst Untersuchungen über ihre Echtheit, ed. Arthur Napier, repr. with an appendix by Klaus Ostheeren (Dublin: Weidmann, 1967), no. XLVI, p. 232, lines 23–4.



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long hall of Christian sacred edifices. As a church cannot do without a cross, a sailing ship needs its mast to be ready to sail. Not only do masts resemble crosses in shape, but significantly medieval ships would often place a cross on top of their highest mast.78 Based on this close symbolic link, Carl Berkhout’s retaining of the often emended manuscript reading ‘holmwudu’ in line 91a of the celebrated and unique Old English poem The Dream of the Rood can be plausibly extended: the cross could then be seen as God’s tropological symbol raised over a ship, which could well stand for the institution of the church, as the poem turns towards its exhortative conclusion.79 On the eschatological level, of course, nothing stands against the cross itself being the lignum maris, carrying the faithful to the eternal homeland.80 Along the lines of this moral symbolism, the church would navigate the dismal waters of this world, orienting itself towards the religious firmament with the glittering stella maris, the Virgin Mary, at its centre. The adoration of Mary as the star of the sea has its origin, possibly, in I Kings 18.41–45, a passage which speaks about a small cloud above the sea, signifying hope after a long drought. Jerome’s allusion to Mary as ‘stilla maris’ (‘a drop in the sea’) may be derived from this image.81 Whether or not ‘stella maris’ is a copying error from Jerome remains to be proven, but the expressions can first be found in the ninth-century writings of Paschasius Radbertus, an author widely read in Anglo-Saxon England.82 Assmann homily X on the Nativity of the Virgin Mary explains her role as a guiding star thus: Sæsteorra heo is gecweden, forðan þe se steorra on niht gecyþeð scipliðendum mannum, hwyder bið east & west & suð & norð.83 [She is called star of the sea, for the star tells the seafaring people in the night which direction is east and west and south and north.]

Throughout Europe this Marian motif worked well as a Christian reinterpretation of numerous pagan beliefs concerning the Pole Star (Polaris). In the case of the Anglo-Saxons, its likeness to the meaning of the rune tir in the Old English Rune Poem (originally used for the god Tyr) can still be recognised: ᛏ (tir) biþ tacna sum, healdeð trywa wel wiþ æþelingas, a biþ on færylde, ofer nihta genipu næfre swiceþ. (The Rune Poem, 48–50) 78 See, for example, London, British Library, MS Yates Thompson 26, fol. 26r. 79 Carl T. Berkhout, ‘The Problem of OE Holmwudu’, Mediaeval Studies, 36 (1974), 429–33. 80 For this exegetical variant, see Augustine, In Joannis Euangelium, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 35

(Paris: Migne, 1841), col. 1389–91.

81 Patrick Bartley, ‘The Old Irish Litany’, The Irish Monthly, 47 (1919), 293–300 (p. 299). 82 Paschasius Radbertus: Expositio in Euangelium Matthaei, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 120 (Paris:

Migne, 1852), col. 0094B.

83 Angelsächsische Homilien und Heiligenleben, ed. B. Assmann, repr. by P. Clemoes, Biblio-

thek der Angelsächsischen Prosa, 3 (Darmstadt: WBG, 1964), no. X, p. 117, lines 15–9.

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[Tir is one of the signs (stars), it holds troth well with nobles; always on its course it never deceives over the mists of the night.]

Mary was memorialised as the stella maris in the sumptuous Ave Maris Stella, a hymn occasionally ascribed to Venantius Fortunatus, and the particular adoration of Mary by seafarers is evidenced by numerous other medieval hymns and antiphons, most notably the eleventh-century Salve regina sometimes ascribed to Hermannus Contractus.84 This customary Marian antiphon prays for a meeting with the saviour Christ after a life in exile (‘Et Jesum . . . post hoc exsilium ostende’).85 It remained popular throughout the entire Middle Ages and was sung, for example, by Columbus’s men aboard the Santa Maria the night before they beheld the New World for the first time.86 Finding a new world and a new life at the end of all earthly existence is a promise of hope for all pious Christians. After having travelled this transient earthly realm the soul needs to prepare for the journey beyond, hoping, as we have seen, for a safe passage over the depths of hell. The spatial confrontation with the end of a terrestrial realm, such as on an island coast, may be exactly the situation by which the meditation and study of έσχατος could be inspired and in which it would flourish. It may not be coincidental that John reports receiving his first apocalyptic visions on the island of Patmos (Revelation 1.9). That his Book of Revelation originated in this notable insular context was imparted to the Anglo-Saxons through vernacular preaching, and the setting no doubt tallied with their own perceptions of temporal and spatial confinements and of transience in general.87 Standing at a sea cliff or the plain shore Anglo-Saxons may, like Beowulf, have pondered their own death and fear of judgement, yet not simply because they had the impression of gazing into an infernal abyss.88 In a very straight allegorical sense, the coast acted as a symbol for the end of the world, as the eschatological interpretation of a Latin Angers homily (‘Litus intellegitur finis mundi’) confirms.89 Not surprisingly, this homily draws on an Irish gospel commentary by pseudo-Jerome in this passage.90 In the perception of the island coast as a landscape of the end, several maritime elements become mentally transformed into signs heralding the Day of 84 Inge B. Milfull, The Hymns of the Anglo-Saxon Church, Cambridge Studies in Anglo-

Saxon England, 17 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 271–4. Andreas Schwerd, Hymnen und Sequenzen, (Munich: Kösel Verlag, 1954), no. 25. 85 Anonymus, Meditatio in Salve Regina, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 184 (Paris: Migne, 1854), col. 1080B. 86 Christopher Columbus, Schiffstagebuch (Leipzig: Reclam, 1989), p. 22. 87 See Kenneth G. Schaefer, ‘An Edition of Five Old English Homilies for Palm Sunday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Columbia University, 1972), pp. 249–59, lines 45–8. 88 Beowulf, lines 2417–21. 89 Rudolf, ‘Angers’, fol. 286v, lines 24–5. 90 Anonymous, Expositio Quatuor Evangeliorum, ed. J. P. Migne, PL, 30 (Paris: Migne, 1846), col. 552C–D.



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Judgement. Bede famously adds the roaring waves to his slideshow of doomsday images, in his poem De die iudicii, available to the non-Latinate Anglo-Saxon in the eminent Old English poem Judgement Day II and reworked in homily Napier XXIX: and se egeslica sweg ungerydre sæ eall manna mod miclum gedrefeð. (JD II, 102–3)91 [And the dreadful crashing of the boisterous sea troubles the mind of all people.]

The sound of the sea frightens man, and flooding waves, several cubits high, are also the first among the evils mentioned in Old English prognostics on the fifteen days before judgement.92 Before this intellectual background (and long before global warming) any major storm tide could certainly have triggered such anxieties in the islander susceptible to the power of this rhetoric. Versions of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle seem to reflect this angst in their entry for 1014 AD: and on þissum geare on Sancte Michæles mæsseæfan com þet mycele sæflod geond wide þisne eard and ærn swa feor up swa næfre ær ne dyde and adrencte feala tuna and manncynnes unarimædlice geteall.93 [And in this year on the eve of Michaelmas came the great seaflood against this land and reached as far up as it never did before. And it drowned many towns and a countless number of humankind.]

Both the novel height of the flood and the all-encompassing formulation ‘manncynnes unarimædlice geteall’ strike a chord of fear of the end of the world. Adding to the sheer force of nature, the military menace coming from the sea reinforced the dread of doomsday, especially in the historical context of the turn from the first to the second millennium. Reading and interpreting the political signs of their times, Ælfric and Wulfstan both readily identify the invading Viking armies as apocalyptic punishment on the English for their decline in morals.94 Perspective may have a psychological relevance here, as islanders can usually see their sea-enemies approach from afar, long before they arrive. We 91 Text according to ASPR 6. For a comprehensive discussion see Graham Caie, The Old

English Poem Judgement Day II: A Critical Edition with Editions of Bede’s De die Iudicii and the Hatton 113 Homily Be domes Dæge (Cambridge: Brewer, 2000). 92 Early English Homilies from the Twelfth-Century MS. Vespasian D.XIV, ed. R. D.-N. Warner, EETS o.s., 152 (London: Trübner, 1917), pp. 89–91. 93 E-Chronicle, entry for AD 1014. 94 A careful study is undertaken by Malcolm Godden, ‘Apocalypse and Invasion in Late Anglo-Saxon England’, in From Anglo-Saxon to Early Middle English: Studies presented to E. G. Stanley, ed. Malcolm Godden, Douglas Gray, and Terry Hoad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), pp. 130–62.

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may then better understand the fatalistic hora novissima tempora pessima trope, which resonates in the Wulfstanian corpus as ‘swa leng swa wyrse’ and under the influence of which many Anglo-Saxons seem to have accepted the ongoing raids and tributes as parts of a clearly foreseeable end of time. Few seem to have resisted in such threatening circumstances, Byrhtnoth being one of the possible exceptions. In the Battle of Maldon the Vikings advance from Northey Island within the River Blackwater, walking the landscape of transition on the ominous bridge that can only be passed during ebb tide. Presented by the poet as nameless and faceless enemies coming from the sea, a hellish place in certain contexts as we have seen, they are thoroughly diabolised by Byrhtnoth as helsceaðas in a final prayer for his soul, moments before the pagan warriors finish his life: ‘Nu ic ah, milde metod, mæste þearfe þæt þu minum gaste godes geunne, þæt min sawul to ðe siðian mote on þin geweald, þeoden engla, mid friþe ferian. Ic eom frymdi to þe þæt hi helsceaðan hynan ne moton.’ ða hine heowon hæðene scealcas […] (Maldon, 175–81) [‘Now I have, merciful Creator, greatest need that you may grant good to my spirit so that my soul may travel to you and journey with peace into your keeping, ruler of angels. I pray you that hellish assailants be not allowed to harm it.’ Then heathen attackers felled him.]

Rarely does one find alliteration on the same sound in consecutive lines of Old English poems, and its use in lines 180–81 indeed assumes a highlighting poetic function here. By sound congruency which exceeds simple alliteration through paronomasia, the ‘helsceaðan’ find their doppelgangers in ‘hæðene scealcas’ of the next line (not the only doppelgangers in the poem). These heathen assailants, then, carry the devilish character of the Vikings beyond Byrhtnoth’s death straight into the second part of the poem. This phono-semantic connection is crucial, because it marks the exact moment of transition in which the battle over Byrhtnoth’s corpse takes on a transfigured meaning: the defence of his physical body, as it is lying on the shore of his homeland, symbolically fuses into the defence of English territory, just as Byrhtnoth very proudly assumed the metonymical identity of his people in his earlier reply to the Viking messenger (‘Gehyrst þu, sælida, hwæt þis folc segeð?’, line 45).95 Simultaneously, the scene clearly prefigures the fight over Byrhtnoth’s soul in the conflict between AngloSaxon ‘angels’ and Viking ‘devils’.96 All this takes place in a coastal setting, the place where corpses are set adrift in Germanic ship burials. The departure of the 95 ‘Do you hear, sailor, what this folk says?’. 96 For this struggle of the soul, see Fred C. Robinson, ‘God, Death and Loyalty in the Battle

of Maldon’, in The Tomb of Beowulf and Other Essays on Old English, ed. by Fred C. Robinson (Oxford: Blackwell, 1993), pp. 105–21 (pp. 108–10).



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soul from the metaphorical island of the body thus finds a most adequate location in the transitional littoral landscape, never expressed better cinematically than in the final shot of Andrei Tarkovsky’s Ivan’s Childhood.97 Both land and physical existence are declared spatially and temporally finite; the spirit is sent forth into the unknown. When meditating on the post mortem fate of their soul, many Anglo-Saxons would have pinned their greatest hope on St Michael the archangel, God’s chief champion striving for their salvation. His prominent role as the leader of the heavenly army is defined in Revelation 12.7–9, where Michael and his angels fight the dragon Satan and his host, finally taking the victory. Over the centuries Michael’s qualities were enhanced, as he would not only fulfil the function of a mere defender of the soul after death, but also act as a psychopomp, a protector and guide that leads the soul to heaven. The first mention of Michael as psychopomp in an English context occurs in Stephen of Ripon’s Life of Wilfrid (ed. Colgrave, p. 142). Richard Johnson suggests that Stephen was elaborating on an Irish vision of St Columba, adding the figure of Michael who conducts Wilfrid’s soul to heaven.98 The text is silent on the actual method of transport of the soul, but there is some evidence in Old English literature that moves Michael’s role into the context of the sea and seafaring. In the Old English Martyrology, for example, the hermit St Erasmus is thrown into jail after challenging the emperor Maximian by refusing to pray to an idol. St Michael appears that night and leads him to a ship, allowing him to escape. Even though Erasmus does not die in the scene, Michael conducts him away from possible danger. In like manner, help is granted to St Christina, who is thrown into the sea with a stone around her neck because she publicly confessed her faith in Christ. Saved by angels and baptised three-fold in the sea she walks back over the water to Tyrus, led by Michael.99 While these stories are examples rooted in hagiographical commonplaces, they also accentuate Michael’s role as protector and psychopomp rather than as fighter. According to Johnson, these two roles appear to be the ones with which the Irish tradition was particularly preoccupied. It is interesting in this context to find one particularly rare treatment of Michael in the margins of Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 41, in a uniquely preserved Old English homily celebrating the archangel. The laudative character of this text is generated by a rhythmical prose style, in which Michael’s different roles and deeds are presented in a litanic catalogue. The homily’s resemblance to a hymn or sequence was noted by Raymond Grant, who suggests the list lent itself to possible incantation.100 97 Ivanovo detstvo, dir. by Andrei Tarkovsky (Mosfilm, 1962). 98 See his Saint Michael the Archangel in Medieval English Legend (Woodbridge: Boydell,

2005), p. 74.

99 Das altenglische Martyrologium, ed. G. Kotzor, Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften,

Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 88/1 (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1981), pp. 112.10–114.13 (Erasmus) and 152.8–154.8 (Christina). 100 Three Homilies from Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41: The Assumption, St. Michael and The Passion, ed. Raymond S. Grant (Ottawa: The Tecumseh Press, 1982), p. 7.

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The different roles in this catalogue number more than twenty and quite unusually depict Michael not only as the saviour of Abel’s soul, slayer of the firstborns of Egypt and master builder of Solomon’s temple, but also as the captain of a ship of dead souls: Þis is se halga heahengel, Sanctus michael and se æðela nowend and se gleawa frumlida and se þancwirðesta stigend se ðe his scip gefelleð and mid heofonlicum wælum hit gefylleð þæt is ðonne mid þam halgum saulum. And mid ðy wrygelse ðære godcundan gefillnesse ofer þæs sæs yðe he hit gelædeð þæt is ðanne ofer ðisses middangeardes frecennesse and þa halegan saula gelædeð to þære yðe ðæs heofoncundan lifes.101 [This is the holy archangel, St Michael, the noble helmsman and the skilful captain and the most thankworthy sailor, who loads his ship and fills it with heavenly bodies, that is with the holy souls. And with the sail of the divine fulfilment he steers it over the danger(s) of this world, leading the souls to the wave of the heavenly life.]

Many of the archangel’s deeds in this eulogy have parallels in Irish liturgical writings, such as the pseudo-Gregorian Liber responsalis siue Antiphonarius; his function as guardian and conveyor is equally evident, but to the best of my knowledge scholars have been unable to identify a direct source for this specific image of the good sailor.102 While a classical analogue in the figure of Charon (the ferryman who carries the soul of the deceased across the River Styx) suggests itself, he neither transports souls without payment nor possesses potential fighting skills. There is no reason to deny this poetic image of Michael an insular, perhaps Irish, possibly even a genuinely Anglo-Saxon origin. This seems even more likely because it is exactly in the textual genre of litanic sequences and enumerations that spaces of creative variation opened up for the medieval preacher.103 To confirm this point, several deliberately artistic features can be spotted in the passage: first there is the notable occurrence of the words nowend, frumlida and stigend. As in Old English poetry, we may naturally expect to encounter some exceptional nouns in such a variational cluster of terms used for a seafarer. Indeed, nowend is very rare in Old English; apart from the homily it only occurs in glosses to Aldhelm’s De laude virginitatis and in a single instance in Gregory’s Dialogues. Its participial ending points to a stem *now- that is not attested by the corpus of Old English. The word bears phonological resemblance to Old Irish 101 Tristram, Vier altenglische Predigten, no. 2, pp. 152–61, lines 121–30. 102 See J. E. Cross, ‘An Unpublished Story of Michael the Archangel and Its Connections’, in

Magister Regis, ed. Kaske, pp. 23–35 (p. 26). See also Wright, The Irish Tradition, p. 262, n. 167, who notes a similarity with the Liber Flavus Fergusiorum. 103 I have drawn attention to this phenomenon as a possible result of troping in ‘Journey to the Borderland: Two Poetic Passages on Judgement Day in Old English Homilies Revisited’, The Proceedings of the Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies Postgraduate Conference (Manchester: MANCASS, 2005), 1–14 (pp. 10–12), available at www.arts.manchester.ac.uk/ mancass/epapers/



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nau and Welsh noe, both denoting ‘ship’ (cf. Latin navis). While nowend could hence have been derived from either of these nouns, stigend, equally participial, occurs only in glosses to the gospels. Its literal meaning probably centres on the act of climbing aboard a ship. The compound frumlida is a hapax legomenon, remarkable for a ‘prose’ text, since the similar, but equally rare sælida occurs in Old English poetry exclusively. The basic component lida (‘sailor’, ‘traveller’) in both compounds, is probably an Old Norse loan (cf. ON lið for ‘ship’, liði for ‘follower’) and therefore not without potentially exotic undertones. In The Battle of Maldon, Byrhtnoth addresses the Viking messenger as sælida (line 45), and Christ himself, unrecognised by Andreas, is praised by the same as sælida (‘Næfre ic sælidan selran mette’) in the Old English poem on the apostle.104 Whereas nowend may invite speculation about an Irish source, frumlida could be explained as a qualitative expression which compares Michael’s bravery and skill to that of a Viking skipper. Nevertheless, it may be the very assembly of these words of different origins which could betray an Anglo-Saxon composer, who meant to add some North Sea sounds and thus a touch of the wondrously foreign to Michael, an angelic otherworldly being.105 The homilist’s rhetoric finally shines in the neat array of two-stress phrases and the wordplay of gefellð – gefylleð – gefillnesse. Michael’s ship is filled with souls, extending the popular trope of the body being a vessel filled with the liquid of the soul; the soul, however, finds its own divine fulfilment in a charming reversal of the image: the hostile waves of this world are transformed into a joyful surge, which the (liquid) souls may join in the glorious wave of the heavenly life. Conclusion In this discussion I have attempted to outline the special impact the insular landscape in primarily homiletic motifs had on the construction of an AngloSaxon mental geography and the understanding of the self within this spiritual setting. As a starting point of my examinations I addressed a specific notion of insular identity in transcendental thought, elucidated through a psychological analogy between land and sea, on the one hand, and body and soul on the other. In the image of the world-island, a tropological centre with clearly conceivable confinements was studied as a concentrated expression of universal transience of the secular and corporeal, but also as expression of a physical isolation of the individual in this world. The hanging sinner crucially illustrated the nature of a damned soul whose state of punishment in this topic of inexpressibility is solitary and essentially land-bound. Salvation for the soul in the island mentality 104 ‘Never did I meet a better sailor’. Andreas and the Fates of the Apostles, ed. Kenneth R. Brooks (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), p. 16, line 471. 105 In this regard I disagree with Richard F. Johnson, who sees no conflation of influences in the Michael homily (see his ‘Archangel in the Margins: St. Michael in the Homilies of Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41’, Traditio, 53 (1998), 63–91 (p. 91)).

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has finally been demonstrated to be closely related to a free departure from the ‘body of the land’. Exceptionally devout Christians, such as Boniface, even try to begin this journey towards salvation in this world, in a voyage that presupposes a state of exile, a motif of strong currency in Old English literature. Faithful believers, if not as itinerant as the missionaries, are urged to at least direct their minds towards their soul-journeys after death. Until then the body is bound to the land just as the soul is imprisoned in the body. The soul’s release and safe traversing of the oceanus dissociabilis depends on the body’s morally good conduct during its secular existence. To the attentive reader it may have become apparent that many of the motifs and topics analysed share a possible Irish influence through commonly used sources or analogues. In search of a particular insular reflex in the homilies we may first take this as reliable confirmation of the uncontentious Irish imprint on Anglo-Saxon Christianity. However, the majority of vernacular textual witnesses analysed date largely to the time between 900 and 1200 AD and therefore originated in an intellectual milieu which had achieved a clear understanding of certain religious writings as being canonical, especially those of the postBenedictine Reform period. When Ælfric complains about great heresy (‘mycel gedwyld’), especially with regard to the Visio Pauli, he is certainly referring to some of the motifs discussed here.106 Ælfric’s desire for a pure canon must be read as the opinion of an idealistic member of the monastic clergy, the realities of preaching, however, exploited the full rhetorical force of images that may have been considered as heterodox by some. It is because of this context that the homiletic motifs analysed here can be seen as an exceptional preference, as they were chosen or retained by Anglo-Saxon preachers in spite of their noncanonical nature. Their use over a century after Ælfric remains as intensive and fresh as in the tenth-century reform period, partly as a result of their continuous independent treatment and revision. The lack of orthodoxy should also remind us that the rhetorical strategies of pastoral exhortation often favour the persuasive effect in performance over the purity of religious doctrine. The preponderance of rhetorical artistry may well explain certain paradoxical constellations and changing, if not conflicting, spiritual senses of the islescape in those texts. We must then look at the motifs analysed with sufficient care if we want to judge a wider impact of these texts on the construction of Anglo-Saxon insular identity. However, their survival, dissemination and variation strongly suggests an exceptional interest and creativity of those who preserved and used these texts, and these were, beyond doubt, people of religious and political power and influence. This fondness of the insular tropes and their creative adaptation, which might have an origin in the oldest Irish immrama, continues in English literature throughout the Middle Ages and beyond, such as in the well-known works of More, Shakespeare, 106 For Ælfric’s attack on the Visio Pauli, see Ælfric’s Catholic Homilies: The Second Series Text,

ed. Malcolm Godden, EETS s.s., 5 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979), p. 190.



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Defoe, Stevenson, Golding or Huxley. For the Anglo-Saxons, as for many of their descendants, the spiritual islescape fosters the identification of the self as ultimately lonely in this world, it draws their minds towards the vanquishing of the liminally secular, and, in the incomprehensible vastness of the sea, provides them with a foretaste of eternity.

Lost at Sea: Nautical Travels in the Old English Exodus, the Old English Andreas, and Accounts of the adventus Saxonum

Fabienne L. Michelet I. Myths of origins play a crucial role in the emergence and strengthening of an idealised sense of collective identity. Inscribed in a community’s shared memory, they are a means through which a particular group or society expresses its sense of itself. These real or imagined origins include both a genealogical and a geographical component, thus situating an individual and the group to which he or she belongs in time and space. They offer a narrative of how a particular community came into being, they shed light on its present situation and, by implication, they foreshadow its rightful future. Many elements combine to create a sense of collective identity: the one I will focus on here has to do with localisation, that is, with the establishment of a privileged link to a particular geographical area, ‘one’s own place’. As Anthony Smith points out, the land in question need not actually be occupied or possessed; what matters is that the community has a ‘homeland’ and that a certain bond is felt to exist between people and land.1 There are several ways in which a people may lay claim to a given land. Through myths of autochthony, a population can imagine itself as stemming from the present space occupied by the community. An autochthon (etymologically ‘sprung from the land’) necessarily postulates and justifies the existence of an essential link between land and people. As a product of the land and as its first inhabitants, an autochthonous people often sees itself as its rightful possessors: the population does not come from afar but is home-grown. Other myths of origins imagine the geographical roots to lie elsewhere. A people may either have been exiled from its rightful homeland, or may be marching toward a promised destination. In the latter case, the union between people and land is actualised only at the end of a migration journey. As Nicholas Howe demonstrated in his now classic Migration and Mythmaking in Anglo-Saxon England, the Anglo-Saxons adopted the second model for 1

Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986), p. 28.

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their myth of cultural identity.2 The memory of their ancestors’ migration from the Continent to the British Isles in the fifth century became the starting point in a process of mythmaking which, as Howe contends, juxtaposed the AngloSaxons’ ancestral migration to the biblical exodus. This convergence shaped the Anglo-Saxons’ collective memory and, consequently, their perception of themselves as a people.3 The ancestral migration became the founding and defining event of the Anglo-Saxons’ culture; its memory offers, to quote Howe, ‘a vision for interpreting their culture’, ‘a myth of cultural identity’ through which the Anglo-Saxons conceived of themselves as a people.4 The ‘migration myth’, now often understood more loosely than Howe’s focus on the juxtaposition of Germanic and biblical migration narratives, refers to the body of stories and allusions dealing with the Germanic tribes’ crossing from the Continent to England. The adventus Saxonum presents the arrival of the Germanic tribes in Britain as a precisely datable and dramatic event. This is a major landmark in the Anglo-Saxons’ remembered history and it permeates their cultural production. There are recurrent mentions of this event in the Old English corpus: in addition to Bede, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and Æthelweard (which will be discussed at more length below), one should also mention Alcuin, the Preface to Manuscript A of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Ohthere in the Old English Orosius, Wulfstan in his Sermo Lupi ad Anglos, and the poet of The Battle of Brunanburh: all allude to the landing on British shores of the Anglo-Saxon tribes.5 As Howe further contends, other texts, such as Beowulf or Exodus, to which Paul Battles adds Genesis A, do not refer explicitly to the Germanic tribes’ founding migration, but they nevertheless betray a ‘deeply absorbed sense of this myth’.6 The knowledge and memory of this founding migration was alive and productive throughout the Anglo-Saxon period. Yet, the recourse to this foundation myth was not without its pitfalls. For, it constantly reminded the Anglo-Saxons that they originally came from across the sea and that they arrived in a land which was already settled and which they had to conquer militarily. Moreover, 2

Nicholas Howe, Migration and Mythmaking in Anglo-Saxon England (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001; first publ. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989). 3 Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, p. ix. 4 Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, p. ix; ‘Introduction’, pp. 1–7. 5 ‘Letter of Alcuin to Ethelred, king of Northumbria’, in English Historical Documents: c. 500–1042, ed. Dorothy Whitelock (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1955), p. 776; The AngloSaxon Chronicle: A Collaborative Edition: iii MS A., ed. Janet Bately (Cambridge: Brewer, 1986), p. 2; The Old English Orosius, ed. Janet Bately, EETS s.s., 6 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980), p. 1; Sermo Lupi ad Anglos, ed. Dorothy Whitelock (London: Methuen, 1963; first publ. 1939), pp. 65–6, lines 184–99; The Battle of Brunanburh 65b–73. The Anglo-Saxon Minor Poems, ed. Elliott van Kirk Dobbie, ASPR, 6 (London: Routledge, 1942; repr. 1968), pp. 16–20. 6 Howe, quoted by Paul Battles, ‘Genesis A and the Anglo-Saxon “Migration Myth”’, ASE, 29 (2000), 43–66 (p. 44).



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the Germanic tribes who migrated to England were heathen outsiders appropriating the land of the Christian Britons. One could therefore suppose that their Anglo-Saxon descendants might have been happy to resort to narrative strategies that enhanced their ancestors’ achievements by suggesting that they had been successfully tested during their journey and that they consequently deserved the lands they appropriated. But rather surprisingly, this is not the case and the dangers and trials inherent in the sea journey are not emphasised. In what follows, I will first look at accounts of the migration which historical sources preserve, such as Gildas’s De Excidio Britonum, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, and Æthelweard’s Chronicle, before turning to vernacular poetry for further insights, focusing in particular on Andreas and Exodus. II. In the third chapter of the De Excidio Britonum, Gildas describes the island of Britain and he emphasises its remoteness. He says that the island lies virtually at the end of the world and that it is surrounded from all sides by an uncrossable sea.7 And the sea is indeed uncrossable for the Britons who, when attacked by their northern neighbours, the Picts and the Scots, ask the Romans for help in a letter in which they complain that ‘the barbarians push us back to the sea, the sea pushes us back to the barbarians; between these two kinds of death, we are either drowned or slaughtered’.8 The sea is here a threat, a factor of isolation, and an obstacle that cannot be mastered. But this holds true for the Britons, not for the other tribes or peoples that Gildas mentions. Neither the Picts nor the Scots, the Romans nor the Germanic tribes face such difficulties when sailing to and from Britain. When migrating to their new homeland, the Germanic tribes encounter no difficulty in crossing the Channel. Gildas reports the coming of the Angles and the Saxons as follows: ‘then a pack of cubs burst forth from the lair of the barbarian lioness, coming in three keels, as they call warships in their language. The winds were favourable; favourable too the omens and auguries…’9 The animal imagery used here suggests speed and savageness; the mention of fair winds and auspicious omens, that the migration is in the nature of things. Following positive reports on this first venture, a second troop is sent as reinforcement and again, Gildas does not emphasise the sea crossing, merely saying 7

‘Brittannia insula in extremo ferme orbis limite’, Gildas, The Ruin of Britain, 3. 1, p. 89. The island is ‘intransmeabili undique circulo . . . vallata’, The Ruin of Britain, 3. 1, pp. 89–90. Gildas, The Ruin of Britain and Other Works, ed. and trans. Michael Winterbottom (London: Phillimore, 1978). The translations are from this edition. Translation on p. 16. 8 ‘[R]epellunt barbari ad mare, repellit mare ad barbaros; inter haec duo genera funerum aut iugulamur aut mergimur’. Gildas, The Ruin of Britain, 20. 1, p. 95. Translation on pp. 23–4. 9 ‘Tum erumpens grex catulorum de cubili leaenae barbarae, tribus, ut lingua eius exprimitur, cyulis, nostra longis navibus, secundis velis omine auguriisque . . .’, Gildas, The Ruin of Britain, 23.3; p. 97. Translation on p. 26; italics in the original.

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that the new contingent arrives by ship.10 Contrary to the Britons’ experience of danger, the Germanic tribes encounter no difficulties when crossing the Channel. They come and go as they please, it seems, and Gildas does not provide extended descriptions of their sea journeys. Although Bede adds to Gildas’s account of the coming of the Angles and the Saxons, he nevertheless draws a similarly scant picture of the migration journey in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People. The Germanic tribes are invited to come to Britain by Vortigern, the leader of the Britons. Bede reports this event saying simply that ‘At that time the race of the Angles or Saxons . . . came to Britain in three warships’.11 In the famous lines that follow, Bede gives us plenty of information about which tribes came and where they settled in Britain, but very little detail on the crossing itself. Omitting Gildas’s favourable winds and omens, Bede is even more concise than his predecessor. Crossing the Channel is again easy when reinforcements reach Britain following favourable reports on the new land and a larger fleet is sent over: ‘A report of this as well as of the fertility of the island and the slackness of the Britons reached their homes and at once a much larger fleet was sent over.’12 And yet, the Northumbrian historian does describe difficult sea travels at other points in the Ecclesiastical History. One example is found in the account of Germanus’s and Lupus’s fight against the Pelagian heresy in Britain, which follows the account of the migration of the Angles and the Saxons and the Britons’ victory at Mount Badon. Germanus and Lupus, on their way to Britain, encounter a severe storm at sea.13 This episode can evidently be read allegorically, as Bede makes clear in the table of contents where he announces that chapter xvii will narrate ‘how Bishop Germanus sailed for Britain with Lupus and how he stilled, by divine power, first of all the raging of the sea and afterwards the raging of the Pelagians’.14 Both the extreme weather and the heresy are tempests that the holy men will tame. Bede closely follows his source, the Life of St. Germanus,

10 ‘Cui supradicta genetrix, comperiens primo agmini fuisse prosperatum, item mittit

satellitum canumque prolixiorem catastam, quae ratibus advecta adunatur cum manipularibus spuriis’, Gildas, The Ruin of Britain, 23.4, p. 97. ‘The mother lioness learnt that her first contingent had prospered, and she sent a second and larger troop of satellite dogs. It arrived by ship, and joined up with the false units’, p. 26. 11 ‘[T]unc Anglorum siue Saxonum gens . . . Brittaniam tribus longis nauibus aduehitur’, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, I. xv, p.50. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. and trans. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969; repr. 1991). The translations are from this edition. 12 ‘Quod ubi domi nuntiatum est, simul et insulae fertilitas ac segnitia Brettonum, mittitur confestim illo classis prolixior’, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, I. xv, p. 50. 13 For other storms in the Ecclesiastical History: III. 15, p. 260; V. 1, pp. 454–56; V. 9, p. 478. 14 ‘[u]t Germanus episcopus cum Lupo Brittaniam nauigans et primo maris et postmodum Pelagianorum tempestatem diuina uirtute sedauerit’. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, I. table of contents, p. 10.



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for the description of the tempest, though he abridges it slightly.15 As Constantius before him, Bede recounts how during the storm, when all on board pray at the exhortation of Germanus, divine help is granted, the tempest dies down, and favourable winds help the ship reach safety. The devils and the storm they raise are thus the first enemies which Germanus and Lupus vanquish on their way to Britain. The account of this stormy crossing to Britain no doubt echoes the Biblical episode in which Jesus calms the storm.16 For, as Jesus, Germanus is asleep while the tempest rages and he eventually calms the raging waves and winds after his frightened companions wake him up. The story of Jonah also possibly resonates at this point. Jonah, trying to escape God’s command to go and preach to the Ninevites, embarks on a ship and flees. But the ship’s progress is impeded by a severe tempest during which Jonah sleeps. When woken up, Jonah admits that he is to blame for the storm and he recommends that the mariners throw him overboard. They do so and Jonah is swallowed by the whale. The story of Jonah is preserved in a number of Old English Rogationtide homilies.17 There are two noticeable elements which the author of the Vercelli Homily preserved from his sources: the first is the image of the ship ferrying Jonah being now stuck in the torrential rain, strong wind and terrible storm that God sends: ‘swa þæt þæt scip ne mihte naþer ne forð swymman ne underbæc’ [‘so that the ship could neither sail forward nor backward’].18 The motionless ship is then contrasted with the fish which, having swallowed Jonah, is guided to its destination by the currents of the sea, according to God’s will: ‘syððan, eal swa hit God wolde, seo sæ þone fisc ferede oð he com to þam ilcan eðle . . .’ [‘afterwards, just as God intended it, the sea carried the fish until it came to the same country . . .’].19 The progress at sea, the ease of the sailing and the direction of the journey are all subject to divine will and power. As in the account of Germanus’s and Lupus’s crossing to 15 Constance de Lyon, Vie de Saint Germain d’Auxerre, ed. and trans. René Borius, Sources

Chrétiennes, 112 (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1965).

16 Matthew viii. 23–7; Mark iv. 35–40; Luke viii. 22–5. 17 Paul Szarmach has offered a critical analysis of three versions of the story. The homilies

are Vercelli Homily XIX in the Vercelli Book (also extant as Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 162, pp. 403–12 and Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 303, pp. 215–19); Ælfric’s homily In Letania Maiore, Catholic Homilies, First Series, xviii; and British Library, Cotton Cleopatra B.xiii, 44r–55v. Paul E. Szarmach, ‘Three Versions of the Jonah Story: An Investigation of Narrative Technique in Old English Homilies’, ASE, 1 (1972), 183–92; The Vercelli Homilies and Related Texts, ed. Donald G. Scragg, EETS o.s., 300 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), pp. 315–26 (pp. 321–3); Ælfric’s Catholic Homilies: The First Series Text, ed. Peter Clemoes, EETS s.s., 17 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 317–24 (pp. 317–18); Nuove Omelie anglosassoni della rinascenza benedettina, ed. and trans. A. M. Luiselli Fadda, Filologia Germanica, Testi e Studi, 1 (Florence: Le Monnier, 1977). 18 Vercelli Book, homily xix, lines 121–2, p. 322. 19 Vercelli Book, homily xix, lines 130–1, p. 322, and line 1, p. 323. The story of Jonah is closely modelled on its source, the homiliary of St Père de Chartres. Scragg gives the text of the homiliary in the notes.

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Britain, the nautical travels are under God’s control and a storm at sea represents a test of faith or holiness for the protagonists. But to recognise the allegorical meanings which underlie the account of the storm that Germanus and Lupus encounter on their way to Britain should not overshadow the fact that Bede includes the description of a storm at sea at this point in his narrative and represents the crossing to Britain as a test for the holy men. Literary critics have long recognised that the ‘storm at sea’ is a set piece inherited from classical literature which exhibits certain recurrent characteristics. These include a sudden change of weather; the personification of the raging sea; strong winds; huge waves; pervading darkness; rain, lightning and thunder; human behaviour such as fear or cries; damages to the boat; prayers; and eventually thanks to God.20 Bede attributes to devils the sudden outbreak of a storm in which the sky darkens, sails cannot resist furious winds, and mariners, toiling in vain and fearing shipwreck, pray for help. The ship is about to sink when their collective prayers are answered and, thanks to God, the tempest dies down.21 Both the biblical parallels and the echoes of classical literature informing this description of the storm heighten Germanus’s achievements and indicate that his journey is divinely sanctioned. Contextual differences may, to some extent, explain the discrepancies between the accounts of the Germanic migration and of Germanus’s travel across the Channel: Germanus’s journey is a pious project and a difficult journey represents the hardships and dangers faced while in the world; the Germanic migration results in land occupation and nothing stands in the way of the newcomers en 20 Danièle James-Raoul mentions, for instance, Homer, Odyssey, V, 291ff; Virgil, Aeneid, I,

81–123; III, 192–204; V, 8–31; Ovid, Metamorphoses, XI, v. 480–572; Fasti, I, III, v. 587–600. Danièle James-Raoul, ‘L’ écriture de la tempête en mer dans la littérature de fiction, de pèlerinage et de voyage’, in Mondes marins du Moyen Age: Actes du 30ème colloque du CUER MA: 3, 4 et 5 mars 2005, Senefiance, 52, ed. Chantal Connochie-Bourgne (Aix-en-Provence: Université de Provence, 2006), pp. 217–29 (p. 218). 21 ‘[…] [U]sque ad medium itineris, quo a Gallico sinu Brittanias usque tenditur, secundis flatibus nauis tuta uolabat. Tum subito occurrit pergentibus inimica uis daemonum, qui tantos talesque uiros ad recuperandam tendere populorum salutem inuiderent; concitant procellas, caelum diemque nubium nocte subducunt, uentorum furores uela non sustinent; cedebant ministeria uicta nautarum; ferebatur nauigium oratione non uiribus . . . oratio uno ore et clamore profunditur. Adest Diuinitas, fugantur inimici, tranquillitas serena subsequitur, uenti e contrario ad itineris ministeria reuertuntur, decursisque breui spatiis pelagi optati litoris quiete potiuntur.’ Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, I. xvii, pp. 54–6; ‘The ship sped along safely with favouring winds and had reached half-way across the channel between Britain and Gaul, when suddenly they were met on their way by the hostile fury of devils; these were enraged that men of such quality should be sent to restore salvation to the people. They raised storms, they darkened the sky, turning day into night with clouds; the sails could not resist the fury of the winds; the sailors toiled in vain; the ship was supported by prayers rather than by their efforts . . . with one consent and one voice they offered up their prayers. Divine help was forthcoming, the adversaries were put to flight, peace and calm followed, and the contrary winds veered round and helped them on their way; after a quick and peaceful crossing they reached the land they sought.’



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route to their new homeland. Yet both Gildas and Bede inscribe the Anglo-Saxon migration in a providential scheme of history and could therefore have elaborated in biblical and Christian terms on the sea journey to highlight the coming of the Germanic tribes as an event willed by God. They could also have elaborated on the sea crossing in heroic terms to enhance the courage and martial prowess of the protagonists. But neither chose to do so. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle provides another important account of Britain’s early history. The entry that Manuscript A, the oldest surviving manuscriptwitness to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,22 provides for the year 449, the year in which the Germanic leaders Hengest and Horsa first arrive in Britain at Vortigern’s invitation, does not however elaborate on the migration journey. The annal simply says: ‘Her . . . Hengest 7 Horsa from Wyrtgeorne geleaþade Bretta kyninge gesohton Bretene on þam staþe þe is genemned Ypwinesfleot, ærest Brettum to fultume, ac hie eft on hie fuhton’ [‘In that year . . . Hengest and Horsa, invited by Vortigern, king of the Britons, reached Britain in that place that is called Ebbsfleet, first to help the Britons, but they afterwards fought against them’].23 Subsequently, hand 8, a post-Conquest hand, adds information on the various Germanic tribes based on Bede. But as in Gildas and Bede, the newcomers suddenly appear on British shores, with only the scantest details being given about their journey across the sea. Æthelweard’s Chronicle, a tenth-century Latin translation of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, presents itself as a more promising mine to work, since the author, addressing his cousin Matilda in the Preface, announces: ‘In the following pages you can very easily find by way of example so many wars and slayings of men and no small wreck of navies on the waves of the ocean, especially with reference to the arrival of our ancestors in Britain from Germany.’24 But even though Æthelweard repeatedly mentions naval encounters between the Anglo-Saxons and the Danes,25 when he comes to the actual migration, he only gives a very brief 22 The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: A Collaborative Edition: iii MS A., ed. Janet Bately (Cambridge:

Brewer, 1986), p. ix. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, MS A, 449, p. 17. Other versions of the Chronicle, for example, Manuscript E, an instance of the northern recension of the Chronicle, present a similarly scant picture of the migration, although it incorporates material from Bede. ‘Her . . . gelaðode Wyrtgeorn Angelcin hider, 7 hi þa coman on þrim ceolum hider to Brytene on þam stede Heopwinesfleot’ [‘Here . . . Vortigern invited the English people here and then they came here to Britain in three ships at the place Ebbsfleet’], The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: A Collaborative Edition: vii MS E, ed. Susan Irvine (Cambridge: Brewer, 2004), p. 16. Old English translations are my own. 24 ‘Quin etiam de priscorum aduentu parentum a Germania in Brittanniam, tot bella, tot cædes uirorum, classiumque periclitationem gurgite oceani non paruam, in subpositis paginulis facilius inuenire potes exemplar’. The Chronicle of Æthelweard, ed. A. Campbell (London: Nelson, 1962), p. 1. Translations are from this edition. 25 See, for instance, the battle that Alfred loses at the mouth of the Stour in the year 885 (The Chronicle of Æthelweard, p. 45) or the tempest that sinks Danish ships near Swanage in 877 (The Chronicle of Æthelweard, p. 42). 23

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account of the journey: ‘The young men just mentioned [Hengest and Horsa] accordingly arrived, doing what the king and council had asked. They had three ships and were decked in arms and ready with everything needed for war. The anchor was dropped in the sea, and the ships stood by the shore.’26 After their first victory over the Scots, the Germanic mercenaries send good reports back home and their relatives quickly send them a great fleet with an army which is well received by Vortigern. And once the Anglo-Saxon tribes turn against the Britons and appropriate their land, ‘a multitude was conveyed to them from all the provinces of the German area’.27 In the end, the great gurgites and periclitationes that Æthelweard announces are not mentioned in connection with the sea-journey that took the Anglo-Saxon tribes to Britain. Æthelweard no more highlights their sailing across the Channel than Gildas or Bede do. Reading these accounts of the migration, one is struck by the absence of any detailed description of the Germanic tribes’ crossing, especially given the prominence of the migration motif in the Anglo-Saxons’ collective memory. Why such brief accounts? Why is the ‘founding event’ of Anglo-Saxon identity thus downplayed? This is all the more surprising when compared with the place that the sea occupies in Old English poetry. Nautical travels are recurrent features in vernacular verse: Beowulf, Elene, Andreas, The Seafarer, The Wanderer, Genesis A, Christ II, The Whale …, all contain episodes of literal or metaphorical sailing or sea-crossing. Forty years ago, Robert Diamond identified and analysed the voyage at sea as a formulaic theme of Old English poetry. He notes that the theme can be subdivided into smaller units, such as: the voyage is announced; the voyagers go to the shore; the ship is launched; the voyage itself; the voyagers see their goal; they moor their ship and go ashore.28 Colette Stévanovitch, refining Diamond’s argument, distinguishes between ‘easy crossings’, that is, accounts which reduce the sea journey to one or two lines only (found in Beowulf and Genesis A) and ‘difficult crossings’ which Stévanovitch identifies as an important theme of vernacular poetry often inviting symbolic interpretation (Elene, The Wanderer, Christ II, and Andreas).29 I have chosen to concentrate here on two poems, Andreas and Exodus, hoping that they may provide a fresh outlook on how sea travels are represented and on why historical records do not elaborate further on the Germanic migration itself. I will look for elements of answer in the complex relationships uniting collective memory and space, more precisely in the link between place and personal or collective identity. 26 ‘[A]duecti igitur sunt præfati iuuenes [Hengest and Horsa] explentes petitionem regis

senatusque, cum tribus dromonibus armis ornati, et omni instructione bellica præparati, proiicitur ancora ponto, stant in littore puppes.’ The Chronicle of Æthelweard, p. 7. 27 ‘[Q]uibus et aduecta est multitudo omni ex prouincia Germaniæ partis’. The Chronicle of Æthelweard, p. 8. 28 Robert E. Diamond, ‘Theme as Ornament in Anglo-Saxon Poetry’, PMLA, 76 (1961), 461–88 (p. 465). 29 Colette Stévanovitch, ‘Le thème de la traversée dans la poésie vieil-anglaise’, Speculum Medii Aevi, 3 (1997), 147–54.



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III. Neither Andreas nor Exodus offer accounts of maritime journeys that are as formulaic as those found, for instance, in Elene or Christ II. As Diamond observes, the Andreas poet, despite devoting a lengthy passage to a sea voyage, does not develop it as a set piece; as for Exodus, it combines two different themes: battle and storm at sea.30 And yet, I have chosen to focus on these two poems because Andreas offers a very long account of a travel at sea, while Exodus clearly resonates with my reflections on how the adventus is described since the poem not only narrates a venture at sea, but also tells of a journey of migration. The poet of the Old English Exodus places a clear emphasis on the episode of the Red Sea crossing; for him, the crossing is the exodus.31 ‘The heroic act of Exodus is the successful sið, or journey’, as Nicholas Howe points out.32 How, therefore, is the journey across the Red Sea represented? How does the Exodus poet speak of the maritime spaces which figure prominently in his text? I will reflect on one precise point, namely the confusion between land and sea, especially in the depiction of the floor of the Red Sea. What follows ties in with Catherine Clarke’s essay in this volume in focusing on the land uncovered by the sea’s retreating waters and in recognising the ambiguous nature of this freshly emerged space. Whereas Clarke situates her reflections in the tradition of medieval representations of tidal spaces, I will examine the Red Sea floor in terms of commemorative topography. Many scholars have commented on the poet’s striking use of nautical imagery, in particular on the fact that the Israelites are portrayed as sailing across the desert.33 For instance, in lines 105b–106a, the Hebrews follow the cloud-pillar: ‘sæmen æfter | foron flodwege’ [‘the sailors went following the path of the ocean’].34 They are called sæmen and they advance on a flodwege (‘sea’, literally ‘path of the ocean’) while still in the desert.35 And yet, about twenty lines below, they are 30 31 32 33

Diamond, ‘Theme as Ornament’, p. 467 and p. 468. Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, p. 102. Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, p. 81. This is seen as an indication that the exodus should be understood as man’s progress through the sea of life. The Old English Exodus, ed. Edward Burroughs Irving, Jr (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1970; first publ. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1953), p. 30; Exodus, ed. Peter J. Lucas (London: Methuen, 1977; repr. Exeter: Exeter University Press, 1994), pp. 67–88; John F. Vickrey, ‘Exodus and the Battle in the Sea’, Traditio, 28 (1972), 119–40; J. R. Hall, ‘Old English Exodus and the Sea of Contradiction’, Mediaevalia, 9 (1986 for 1983), 25–44 (p. 29); John P. Hermann, Allegories of War: Language and Violence in Old English Poetry (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press, 1989), p. 66; Malcolm Godden, ‘Biblical Literature: The Old Testament’, in The Cambridge Companion to Old English Literature, ed. Malcolm Godden and Michael Lapidge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), pp. 206–26 (p. 218). 34 Exodus 105b–106a. Exodus, ed. Lucas. 35 See Dictionary of Old English, flodweg (Dictionary of Old English: A to G, ed. Angus Cameron, Ashley Crandell Amos, Antonette diPaolo Healey, et al., online edn (Toronto:

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unambiguously depicted as being on land. The army glitters in the sunshine and Gesawon randwigan rihte stræte, … oðþæt sæfæsten landes æt ende leodmægne forstod, fus on forðweg.36

Here, the paths on which the Israelites advance are a rihte stræt (‘straight/correct road’) and a forðweg (‘onward course, journey’). Forðweg punctuates the fugitives’ progress, as it appears four times in the poem. These repetitions suggest that the Israelites are in fact following a path inviting them to go and guiding their journey, both in the desert and on the sea floor.37 Yet even if the image of the way and the phrase rihte stræt obviously conjure up the Christian metaphor of Christ as the Way, the poet also exploits this metaphor as a literal narrative device.38 The word stræt appears once again in Exodus, this time as part of the compound herestræt. After the Red Sea opens, Moses tells his companions that now: Wegas syndon dryge, haswe herestræta, holm gerymed, ealde staðolas, þa ic ær ne gefrægn ofer middangeard men geferan, fage feldas.39

Moses describes the bottom of the sea using terms which refer to land, as evidenced by his use of weg (‘way, path; a road for passengers’), stræt (‘a road; in a town, a street, a paved road’), staðol (‘a foundation; base’), and feld (‘open country, plain’). But as the Israelites had both ‘sailed’ and walked across the desert, when they actually venture on the sea floor, the picture is similarly ambiguous. The poet says that the tribe of Judah, which goes first, ‘wod on wægstream... | ofer grenne grund, …| on onette uncuð gelad’ [‘advanced into the sea, … on the green ground, hastened along unknown water-passages’]).40 These lines mix a phrase clearly referring to land (grenne grund) with two others denoting the sea (wægstream and gelad).41 And a few lines below, the Israelites raise their battleDictionary of Old English Project, 2007), available at www.doe.utoronto.ca. 36 ‘The warriors saw the straight/correct road… until the fastness of the sea at the extremity of the land stood in the way of the people’s army, eager for the onward journey’, Exodus 126–9a. 37 Exodus 32b, 129a, and 248a, and Exodus 350a, respectively. 38 See Lisa J. Kiser, ‘Andreas and the lifes weg: Convention and Innovation in Old English Metaphor’, NM, 85 (1984), 65–75. 39 ‘The ways are dry, the military roads grey, the sea is opened up, the old foundations – never have I heard before on earth men travelling there – the wide spaces of many hues’, Exodus 283b–7a. 40 Exodus 311–13. 41 On gelad, see Dennis Cronan, ‘Old English gelad: “A Passage across Water”’, Neophilologus, 71 (1987), 316–19 and Margaret Gelling, ‘The Landscape of Beowulf’, ASE, 31 (2002), 7–11.



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standard ‘þa hie on sund stigon’ [‘when they went into the sea’].42 In short, when the sea opens up, Moses describes what lies before the advancing army as a tract of land with ways and streets that it is to follow. But when the Israelites actually advance on the sea floor, they progress through a liquid element. This oscillation between land and sea emphasises the uncertain and ambiguous nature of the space which the Israelites are about to enter. When he sees the Red Sea opening up, Moses confirms that a new, completely unknown domain spreads out in front of the Israelites: he says that he has never heard before of men travelling there, ‘. . . ic ær ne gefrægn | ofer middangeard men geferan’ [‘never before have I heard on earth men going there’],43 and that the waves had always covered the sea floor: ‘þa forð heonon | in ece tid yðe þeahton’ [‘which the waves in everlasting time had ever since covered’].44 And yet, the utter strangeness that Moses ascribes to the sea floor is contradicted by the ways and roads that lie ready for the Israelites. This space has in fact been mapped to direct the progress of Moses and his companions, and the paths which the Israelites are invited to follow give a direction to their journey. Crucially, the Egyptians face a very different situation. They meet their death in the raging waters: ‘þær ær wegas lagon | mere modgode (mægen wæs adrenced)’ On grund, see Hugh T. Keenan, ‘Exodus 312: “The Green Street of Paradise’’’, NM, 71 (1970), 455–60; A. N. Doane, ‘‘‘The Green Street of Paradise’’: A Note on Lexis and Meaning in Old English Poetry’, NM, 74 (1973), 456–65; Hugh T. Keenan, ‘Exodus 312a: Further Notes on the Eschatological ‘‘Green Ground’’’, NM, 74 (1973), 217–19; Kari Sajavaara, ‘The Withered Footprints on the Green Street of Paradise’, NM, 76 (1975), 34–8; Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, p. 89, note 16; Clare Lynch, ‘Enigmatic Diction in the Old English Exodus’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Cambridge University, 2000), p. 148 (grund) and p. 189 (gelad). 42 Exodus 319b. On sund, see R. D. Fulk, ‘Afloat in Semantic Space: Old English sund and the Nature of Beowulf ’s Exploit with Breca’, Journal of English and Germanic Philology, 104 (2005), 456–72; Dennis Cronan, ‘Poetic Meanings in the Old English Poetic Vocabulary’, English Studies, 84 (2003), 397–425 (p. 404); and Roberta Frank, ‘‘‘Mere’’ and ‘‘Sund’’: Two Sea-Changes in Beowulf’, in Modes of Interpretation in Old English Literature: Essays in Honor of Stanley B. Greenfield, ed. P. R. Brown, G. R. Crampton, and F. C. Robinson (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986), pp. 153–72. 43 Exodus 285b–6. 44 Exodus 287b–8. Note that Lucas emends MS þeahton to þeccað, on the grounds that the sequence of tenses becomes confused. He takes the passage to mean that ‘men have never before trodden the sea-bottom (285–6) and that they will not do so again because the waves will cover it’. Irving however allows the MS reading to stand, pointing out that ‘what the poet means here is evidently something like “the fields which waves have always covered up to this point in time”’. He admits that forð heonon and expressions with ece … ordinarily look forward to the future as well. The Old English Exodus, ed. Irving, p. 85. Krapp and Tolkien both retain þeahton, Tolkien observing the Exodus poet’s boldness in his use of language and concluding that the poet ‘seems to be using the fixed expression forð heonon “reckoning on from now” in the sense “from now back into eternity”’. The Old English Exodus. Text, Translation and Commentary by J. R. R. Tolkien, ed. Joan Turville-Petre (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981), p. 60. The Junius Manuscript, ed. George Philip Krapp, ASPR, 1 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1931; repr. 1964), pp. 91–107.

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[‘where previously ways had lain, the sea raged (the army was drowned)’].45 The poet links the death of the Egyptians to the disappearance of the ways. He insists that no Egyptian comes out of this adventure alive, repeating that there will be no survivor: ‘. . . þæs heriges ham eft ne com | ealles ungrundes ænig to lafe’, not even a spelboda to tell of the disaster [‘not one of all this immense army came home as a survivor’].46 Ungrund, the hapax legomenon which describes the Egyptian army here is quite striking. Translated as ‘bottomless, boundless, immense’ by Bosworth and Toller, its contextual meaning here is clearly ‘immense’, emphasising the size of the enemy troops.47 But even if the prefix ‘un-’ can be used as an intensive, it commonly expresses negation. In the present case therefore, it is possible that the meaning ‘bottomless’ or, literally ‘without ground’, comes into play too. With the return of the waters, the Egyptians quite literally lose their footing and drown. Clare Lynch points out that, since the term grund is used both of the land and of the sea in Old English poetry, ‘whilst the Egyptians are clearly landless at the point at which they drown, they are also – according to the metaphor of the poem in which land and sea are intertwined – in some respect “sealess”’.48 The expanse that was tamed and charted for the Israelites has disappeared. The Egyptians are denied a space in which to exist, whether on land or in the sea. This opposition between the organised and charted region that the Israelites cross and the amorphous space which engulfs their enemies brings to mind an observation by Jacques Le Goff who points out that:  sur le plan idéologique l’opposition antique traditionnelle ville-campagne ... est peu pertinente dans le monde de l’Occident médiéval où le dualisme fondamental culture-nature s’exprime d’avantage à travers l’opposition entre ce qui est bâti, cultivé et habité (ville-château-village ensemble) et ce qui est proprement sauvage (mer, forêt, équivalents occidentaux du désert oriental), univers des hommes en groupe et univers de la solitude.49

In his depiction of the Red Sea, the Exodus-poet plays with such a dichotomy between what is built, cultivated, and inhabited on the one hand, and what is truly wild on the other. When the Read Sea opens, it is compared to fortified buildings towering over the Israelites, buildings which crumble down on the Egyptians when the waters come raging back. When Moses sees the waters retreating, he observes that ‘yð up færeð, ofstum wyrceð | wæter on wealfæsten’ 45 Exodus 458b–9. 46 Exodus 508–9. Spelboda 514a. 47 An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, ed. J. Bosworth and T. N. Toller (Oxford: Oxford University

Press, 1882–98) incl. Supplement by N. T. Toller (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1921). Lucas (ed.) translates the term as ‘measureless, immense’; Irving (ed.) as ‘bottomless, vast’. 48 Lynch, ‘Enigmatic Diction’, p. 148. 49 Jacques Le Goff, ‘Guerriers et bourgeois conquérants: l’image de la ville dans la littérature française du xiie siècle’, in Culture, science et développement, Mélanges Charles Morazé (Toulouse: Privat, 1979), pp. 113–36 (p. 127). See also Jacques Le Goff, L’imaginaire médiéval (Paris: Gallimard, 1985), p. 74.



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[‘the wave mounts, it quickly makes the water into a rampart’],50 that ‘syndon þa foreweallas fægre gestepte’ [‘the outer walls are beautifully built up’],51 that the sæweall astah [‘the wall of sea water mounted up’]52 and that ‘nu se Agend up arærde | reade streamas in randgebeorh’ [‘now the Creator has raised up the red streams in a rampart’].53 Some of the terms used here, such as wealfæsten, for instance, are echoed later in the poem when the waters close on the Egyptians, as is the phrase sæweall astah (made up of a compound pairing weall with a term referring to the sea and of the past form of the verb astigan) in holmweall astah of line 468b.54 The return of the sea is depicted as a crumbling building: ‘randbyrig wæron rofene’ [‘the ramparts were broken’]55 and ‘wicon weallfæsten, wægas burston, | multon meretorras’ [‘the ramparts gave way, the waves/walls broke apart, | towers of sea-water dissolved’].56 These metaphors may have been inspired by Exodus xiv. 22 where the waters form walls on either sides of the Israelites,57 but the Exodus-poet nevertheless amplifies these images and creates verbal echoes linking the scenes of the opening and closing of the Red Sea. Thus, even though the Israelites crossing the Red Sea enter a space that has never been penetrated before, they remain in an area which has been chartered for them and which is tamed. The sea floor is imagined not as a complete wilderness but as an area shaped by some pre-existing order. The traces of this control over space, namely the guiding roads and the protective buildings, vanish with the Egyptians: Pharaoh’s army is doomed when, losing its bearings, it finds itself in a hostile and ill-defined expanse. In Exodus, the bottom of the Red Sea, though a virgin space, is depicted as an expanse controlled and organised by the ways which direct the Israelites to safety (and salvation). Their Egyptian enemies find themselves in the middle of the sea, with all traces of human domination over space having disappeared, be they the paths on the seafloor or the architectural bulwarks formed by the retreating waters, and they are doomed. Without roads on which to tread, lost in an immensity whose foundations give way, the Egyptians are annihilated. They have, in other words, met ‘the limits of their power and authority’.58 Exodus is the story of a migration journey through the retreating Red Sea; it does not really narrate a travel at sea. But the poet, with his complex use of nautical imagery 50 51 52 53 54 55 56

Exodus 282–3a. Exodus 297. Exodus 302b. Exodus 295–6. ‘The wall of sea water mounted up’, Exodus 468b. Exodus 464a. Exodus 484–5a. The Dictionary of Old English points out the wordplay on wāg ‘wall’ / wœg ‘wave’. See Dictionary of Old English, berstan 1.a. 57 ‘Erat enim aqua quasi murus a dextra eorum et leva’, Exodus xiv. 22. On this point, see Lynch, ‘Enigmatic Diction’, p. 149. 58 See Catherine Clarke, ‘Edges and Otherworlds: Imagining Tidal Spaces in Early Medieval Britain’, in this volume, p. 89.

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and the confusion he cultivates between land and sea, suggests that the maritime world is a dangerous space and that the safe path leading to one’s destination is the one that is inscribed on the ground. IV. In contrast to Exodus, Andreas offers an extended account of a sea-voyage, to which one should add the account of the flood which kills the wicked Mermedonians at the end of the poem. Andreas recounts the travel of the apostle Andrew to Mermedonia, where the Lord commands him to go and save Matthew who the wicked and cannibal inhabitants hold captive. After initial hesitations, the saint goes to the seashore where a boat arrives, steered by God and two angels in disguise. They ferry Andrew to Mermedonia where he saves Matthew, is tortured, converts the Mermedonians and eventually leaves their island. Interestingly, the long account of Andrew’s journey to the land of the cannibals includes the description of a storm at sea.59 Almost as soon as the saint and his companions board the ship, a tempest breaks out, in a scene which conforms to the traditional pattern sketched above: the sky grows dark, winds and huge waves swell, the boat is in danger and sailors are despairing of their lives.60 When they 59 The Andreas poet greatly elaborates this scene compared to the poem’s Greek, Latin, and

Old English analogues. All briefly mention a storm or the fear and discomfort that Andrew’s companions experience on board the ship, as well as Andrew’s account of how Christ calmed the storm; but the Andreas poet expands this passage over 160 lines. The legend of Andrew was very popular and numerous predecessors of the poem can be identified, but none of them stands as its direct source. The versions most relevant to the Old English Andreas are those in Greek, Latin, and Old English prose. The main Latin versions of the Andrew legend are found in the Codex Casanatensis, the Codex Vaticanus, and the so-called Bonnet Fragment. There are also two Old English prose renderings of the legend, one preserved in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 198 and one fragmentary version in the Blickling manuscript, Homily XIX. On the sources of the poem, see Alison M. Powell, ‘Verbal Parallels in Andreas and Its Relationship to Beowulf and Cynewulf ’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Cambridge University, 2002), pp. 7–13; Bright’s Old English Grammar and Reader, ed. Frederic G. Cassidy and Richard N. Ringler, 3rd edn (New York: Hold, Rinehart, and Winston, 1891; repr. 1971), pp. 204–05; and Andreas and the Fates of the Apostles, ed. by Kenneth Brooks (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), p. xv. Franz Blatt gives the Greek text, as well as the Casanatensis and Vaticanus versions. Die lateinischen Bearbeitungen der Acta Andreae et Matthiae apud Anthropophagos, ed. by Franz Blatt, Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der älteren Kirche, 12 (Giessen: Töpelmann, 1930), 32–95, 96–148. The Bonnet Fragment is included as ‘Appendix I’ in Andreas and Fates, pp. 177–8. Bright’s Old English Grammar and Reader provides the Old English version of the text preserved in CCCC 198, pp. 203–19, and the Blickling homily is found in The Blickling Homilies, ed. R. Morris, EETS o.s, 58, 63, and 73 (London: Oxford University Press, 1874–1880 (repr. as one volume 1967)), pp. 229–49. With the exception of the Old English version found in CCCC 198, these texts are conveniently translated in The Acts of Andrew in the Country of the Cannibals, trans. Robert Boenig, Garland Library of Medieval Literature, 70 (New York: Garland, 1991). 60 Andreas 372b–80a. The Vercelli Book, ed. George Philip Krapp, ASPR, 2 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1932; repr. 1961), pp. 3–51.



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are offered to be led ashore and disembark, Andrew’s companions vehemently refuse. The Andreas poet has them express their loyalty to Andrew in terms of the duty that comitatus members owe to their leader. They tell Andrew that they would not know where to go as they would be lordless and everywhere despised, having failed: þonne hand ond rond on beaduwange billum forgrunden æt niðplegan nearu þrowedon.61

For them, the tempest at sea is a battle during which they have to stand by their lord, and the storm is an occasion to prove their bravery in combat and their loyalty to their leader. I wish to focus more closely here on two moments of this extended nautical passage: when Andrew objects to his order to travel to Mermedonia and when he praises the divine steersman in the course of the sea journey. At the beginning of his mission, Andrew is reluctant to embark when ordered by God to travel to Mermedonia. He asks: Hu mæg ic, dryhten min, ofer deop gelad fore gefremman on feorne weg swa hrædlice, heofona scyppend, wuldres waldend, swa ðu worde becwist? Ðæt mæg engel þin eað geferan, halig of heofenum con him holma begang, sealte sæstreamas ond swanrade, waroðfaruða gewinn ond wæterbrogan, wegas ofer widland.62

Andrew questions the divine command, arguing that he cannot travel quickly enough to reach Mermedonia in time to save Matthew (who only has three days left to live). Andrew suggests that God would do better to commission one of his angels to go and rescue Matthew. For an angel, familiar with the expanse of the sea, could complete such a long journey swiftly and easily. In this passage, the poet uses six different variations for the sea: holma begang (expanse of the seas, l. 195b), sealte sæstreamas (salty sea-streams, l. 196a), swanrade (‘swan’s road’, sea, l. 196b), waroðfaruða gewin (turmoil of the (shore-)waves, l. 197a), wæterbrogan (terror caused by water, l. 197b). Quite strikingly, this accumulation of terms designating the sea culminates in the sixth one with wegas ofer widland (ways over broad land, l. 198b), a phrase which relocates the travel on land. Karin Olsen has observed that the context in which the phrase wegas ofer widland appears 61 ‘when hand and shield destroyed by swords suffer hardships on the battlefield during the

battle’, Andreas 412b–14.

62 ‘My Lord, Creator of heaven, Ruler of glory, how can I travel over the deep sea, on the far

way as quickly as you say in words? Your angel, holy from heaven, may easily go, he knows the expanse of the seas, the salty sea-streams and the swan’s road, the turmoil of the waves and the terrors of the deep, the ways over broad land’, Andreas 190–8a.

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here does not easily allow for a reference to land.63 She points out that in the present case, wegas can mean both ‘ways’ and ‘waves’. Widland occurs six times in Old English poetry.64 In Genesis A 1412a, the term could refer to the sea, as this passage, which recounts the sailing of the ark on the waters of the Flood, tells us that: ‘gelædde þa wigend weroda drihten | worde ofer widland’ [‘The Lord of hosts led with his word the warrior [Noah] over the broad land’].65 But the phrase makes also sense if widland is understood as ‘face of the earth’.66 More interestingly, the terms widland and wegas appear together in Genesis A, line 156a. At that point, the poet describes the third day of creation and says: Næron metode ða gyta widlond ne wegas nytte, ac stod bewrigen fæste folde mid flode.67

Here, in a passage that underscores the earth’s uselessness before the separation of land and water, the terms widland and wegas clearly refer to land and not to sea. These uses of widland do therefore suggest that in Andreas 198a, wegas ofer widland is an allusion to roads over land.68 Andrew concludes his objections to the travel to Mermedonia with the reminder that: Ne synt me winas cuðe, eorlas elþeodige, ne þær æniges wat hæleða gehygdo, ne me herestræta ofer cald wæter cuðe sindon.69

The herestræta over the cold water are not known to him.70 This compound appears again later in the poem when the angels who eventually fly Andrew to Mermedonia put him down be herestræte.71 There is, in addition to herestræt, another -stræt compound which frames the saint’s journey: faroðstræt. The word appears only twice in the entire vernacular corpus, both times in Andreas. Its first 63 Karin Olsen, ‘The Dichotomy of Land and Sea in the Old English Andreas’, English

Studies, 79 (1998), 385–94 (pp. 390-91). Genesis A 156a, 1412a and 1538a; Andreas 198a; Christ 605a and 1384a. Genesis A 1411–12a. This is the first translation that Bosworth Toller give for the term. ‘Neither the broad land nor the ways were yet useful to the Lord, but the earth stood firmly covered by the water’, Genesis A 155b–7a. 68 On this point, see also Andreas and Fates, ed. Brooks, p. 70. Following Schaar, Brooks argues that the phrase should be understood as ‘the paths over the broad earth’. For Krapp, it is debatable ‘whether one should read wegas, ‘ways, paths’, or wēgas, ‘waves’. The Vercelli Book, ed. Krapp, p. 107, note 198. Claes Schaar, Critical Studies in the Cynewulf Group, Lund Studies in English, 17 (Lund: Gleerup, 1949), pp. 50–1. 69 ‘The lords, the foreign noblemen are not known to me, nor do I know there the thoughts of any man, nor are the military roads over the cold water known to me’, Andreas 198b–201. 70 On herestræt, see Olsen, ‘The Dichotomy of Land and Sea’, p. 391. 71 Andreas 831b. 64 65 66 67



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occurrence is in line 311b in the words that the Lord, posing as the ship’s steersman, addresses to his disciple, when he wonders how Andrew and his companions dare undertake such a long journey without any food and drink to sustain them on faroðstræte.72 The term is repeated at the end of the journey, when Andrew, now in Mermedonia and having realised that it was the Lord who ferried him there, thanks God for having been with his apostle on faroðstræte.73 Even though the Dictionary of Old English translates this hapax as ‘sea way, voyage’, one should notice that stræt is the place where one travels on land. In Andreas, stræt appears six times as a simplex and four times in a compound (twice in herestræt and twice in faroðstræt). It occurs as a simplex when Christ sends his disciples on a mission to go and preach ‘oððe stedewangas stræte gelicgaþ’ [‘as far as the roads lie upon the plains’].74 At one point in the poem, Christ miraculously brings statues to life which he orders to go and raise Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob from the tomb: ‘Ða se þeoden bebead þryðweorc faran, | stan on stræte of stedewange’ [‘Then the Lord ordered the mighty work to go from the plain, a stone on the street’].75 When Andrew enters the city of the Mermedonians, he ‘stop on stræte’ [‘he stepped on the street’];76 once in the city, he sits down by a column which stands stræte neah.77 When he is tortured, Andrew is dragged as far as the stræte stanfage [‘the stone-paved street’] lie,78 and when the flood recedes and Andrew steps out of prison: ‘him wæs gearu sona | . . . stræt gerymed’ [‘a street was cleared, made ready for him’].79 Thus, the use of herestræt and faroðstræt twice at the beginning and twice at the end of Andrew’s crossing to Mermedonia, suggests that the ‘streets’ which guide travellers on land do so at sea too. In her article ‘The Dichotomy of Land and Sea in the Old English Andreas’, Karin Olsen reminds us that the vision of the sea as a tract of land is a common feature in Old English poetry.80 While making a similar point with regard to later medieval romance literature (namely that the formulas used to tell of a sea journey, of the boarding and crossing, are often identical to formulas used to recount travel on land), Gioia Zaganelli, in a recent collection of essays entitled La letteratura del mare, points out that even if formulaic diction has its own rules and requirements, such formulas betray a reluctance to express something that is, deep down, perceived as foreign.81 Sea crossings put distant people in contact; at the same time they open the door to what is faraway and different, 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81

Exodus 311b. Exodus 898a. Andreas 334. Andreas 773–4. Andreas 985a. ‘Near the street’, Andreas 1062a. Andreas 1236a. Andreas 1579b–80b. Olsen, ‘The Dichotomy of Land and Sea in the Old English Andreas’, p. 385. Gioia Zaganelli, ‘Navigatio medievale’, in La letteratura del mare. Atti del Convegno di Napoli, 13–16 settembre 2004 (Rome: Salerno, 2006), pp. 75–91 (p. 77).

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to spaces which are unfamiliar. To conceive of sea travel as a progress along paths and roads may be a means imaginatively to tame an ill-defined maritime world and to remain in control of the trajectory of one’s journey. This vast liquid expanse has to be somehow known, charted, and mastered, before travel can be envisaged. Andrew’s protestations of ignorance support this hypothesis: he contrasts himself, who does not know the foreigners he is sent to (‘ne synt me winas cuðe, | eorlas elþeodige’ [‘the rulers, the foreign noblemen are not known to me’]),82 or their thoughts (‘ne þær æniges wat | hæleða gehygdo’ [‘nor do I know there the thoughts of any man’])83 or the herestræta leading there (‘ne me herestræta | … cuðe sindon’ [‘nor are the military roads known to me’])84 with the Lord’s angel who knows the expanse of the sea (‘… con him holma begang …’ [‘he knows the expanse of the sea’]).85 The contrast set up between Andrew’s repeated claims to ignorance and the angel’s mastery of the sea emphasises that the maritime element is foreign to Andrew and suggests that familiarity with the sea is a divine or angelic privilege quite out of reach for human beings.86 For Andrew, the sea is a vast and unmapped expanse which escapes his control. He however transposes this strange space into the realm of the familiar by imagining a layout of roads and ways which organise and tame it. I wish to conclude on Andreas, to look at the long praise which the saint addresses to the steersman in the course of the crossing.87 Andrew is impressed by the captain’s nautical skills and his enthusiastic speech includes three comparisons which are worth pondering. The saint first tells the steersman: … ic æfre ne geseah ænigne mann, þryðbearn hæleða, þe gelicne, steoran ofer stæfnan.88

If the pilot is so outstanding that he escapes comparison, such is not the case of the ship he guides. Andrew marvels that the boat is so swift: Is þes bat ful scrid, færeð famigheals, fugole gelicost, glideð on geofone.89

82 83 84 85 86 87 88

Exodus 198b–9a. Exodus 199b–200a. Exodus 200b–201. Exodus 195b. See also Stévanovitch, pp. 152–3. Andreas 471–509. ‘I have never seen any man like you, mighty youth of warriors, steer over the prow’, Andreas 493–5a. 89 ‘This boat is very quick, foamy-necked it goes, most like a bird, it glides on the ocean’, Andreas 496b–8a.



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The famous parallel found in Beowulf, when the poet describes the hero’s crossing to the court of the Danish king Hrothgar, is usually evoked at that point, but what interests me here is not the complex relationships uniting the two vernacular poems, but rather the later life of this comparison within Andreas itself.90 For, it is ‘literalised’ later in the poem, when Andrew and his companions fall asleep on the boat and are in fact ‘flown’ to Mermedonia by eagles, in the case of the companions (ll. 863–6), or by angels in the case of Andrew (ll. 827–8).91 The boat flies like a bird on the waves, so much so that the missionaries eventually travel by air to their destination. And last but not least, Andrew compares the sea journey to a stay on land. The dexterity of the steersman is such that ‘is þon geliccost swa he [the boat] on landsceare | stille stande’ [‘it is exactly as if he [the boat] stood still on a tract of land’].92 Even though this comparison is already present in the Greek and Latin analogues of the poem, the Andreas poet elaborates upon and embellishes this passage. He expands by adding that neither storm nor wind can reach the boat, a boat that seems to be standing still even though it is sailing rapidly over the ocean.93 He also enhances the comparisons by punctuating this passage with the repetition, three times, of the adjective gelic (‘like, alike’; twice in the superlative form). Sea travels in Andreas are described as hazardous and nearly impossible undertakings for mere mortals; and when God steers the boat, then this best of all nautical travels involves neither water and nor movement, but is in fact a negation of the sea journey, since it becomes either a flight through the air or a rest on land, with the boat safe from waves and storm. V. Reflecting upon the motif of the storm at sea, Danièle James-Raoul observes that ‘the writing of this motif is linked to the genre of the work, of which it expresses the aim’.94 This is true of the storm, but I would argue that it is also valid for episodes of sea-journey more generally. Because sea-imagery was popular and widespread, it lent itself to varied metaphorical and hagiographic transforma-

90 ‘Gewat þa ofer wægholm winde gefysed | flota famiheals fugle gelicost’ (‘the ship with

a foamy neck went over the sea, impelled by the wind, most like a bird’), Beowulf 217–18. Klaeber’s Beowulf, ed. R. D. Fulk, Robert E. Bjork, and John D. Niles, 4th edn (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008). 91 Some words are missing at this point in the text, but hardly any narrative has been lost. See Andreas and Fates, ed. Brooks, p. 90. This travel by air is mentioned in the analogues of the poem and is thus not an addition of the Andreas poet. 92 Andreas 501–2a. 93 Andreas 502b–5a. 94 ‘l’écriture de ce motif est lié au type générique de l’œuvre et en exprime la visée’, JamesRaoul, p. 217.

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tions.95 Episodes of nautical travels and the metaphors they conjure up form an interesting locus to examine. The texts analysed above suggest that the sea, despite its omnipresence in vernacular poetry, often functions as the stage for actions which clearly gesture toward other times and other places. Both the Exodus and the Andreas poets put the sea to allegorical and heroic uses: crossing the sea is the way to salvation, while it is also a test of bravery, a metaphorical battle during which one’s courage must not fail. Even though the Anglo-Saxons regularly took to the sea for their actual travels, as well as for trading and fishing, their poets commonly represent the sea as a tract of land, as has been observed in Andreas, or they confuse terrestrial and maritime environments, as in Exodus. In this poem, a space needs to evoke previous human occupation, to bear the signs of former use to be hospitable to human beings. Barring a miracle, the sea cannot support such traces; when the last vestiges of human presence vanish, the waters become the ultimate threat, the agent that destroys the Egyptians. In Andreas, knowledge and control of the sea is represented as a divine attribute: angels, not humans, are familiar enough with the sea to undertake the journey to Mermedonia; the best of all steersmen is Christ in disguise; and the best of sea-journeys eventually turns out to be either a stay on land or a flight through the air. Sea-crossing is moreover envisaged as a progress along streets directing the traveller to his or her final destination. Strikingly, we find nothing comparable in the accounts of the Germanic tribes’ migration to Britain. Neither the trials nor the dangers which the AngloSaxons’ ancestors may have faced when they crossed the Channel, nor their mastery of the sea are foregrounded, although Æthelweard briefly alludes to the Saxons’ pirate activities.96 The silence which insular authors observe about the central part of the Anglo-Saxons’ myth of cultural identity is quite noticeable: the Germanic tribes’ journey to Britain is not emphasised; it is hardly even mentioned. This suggests that their travels were imagined neither as a quest – in which case the very expedition leading them to their new homeland would have been highlighted – nor as a test – in which case their worthiness to inhabit the territory of which they are about to take possession would have been emphasised in heroic terms. Even though the memory of the migration remained vivid for the AngloSaxons, it is not the sea journey itself that is remembered, but the fact that the 95 For a concise overview, see, for instance, Peter and Ursula Dronke, Growth of Literature:

The Sea and the God of the Sea, H. M. Chadwick Memorial Lectures, 8 (Cambridge: Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic, 1997). 96 ‘Nam illis diebus agilem audierunt esse piratico in opere gentem Saxonum in tota maritima a Rheno fluuio usque in Doniam urbem, quæ nunc uulgo Danmarc nuncupatur, ac in omni armatura robustam.’ (‘For they had heard that in those days the nation of the Saxons was active in piracy in the whole coastal stretch from the river Rhine to Donia, which is now called Denmark by the common people, and that they were efficient in all military exercises.’ The Chronicle of Æthelweard, pp. 6–7.



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Anglo-Saxons’ ancestors originated from elsewhere and that they took control and appropriated the territory they now inhabit. I have suggested above that the links uniting space and collective memory may shed some light on the reasons behind the elision of sea-crossing episodes in accounts of the Germanic migration. In La mesure du monde, Paul Zumthor underlines the important role played by the ground on which a community lives: it is the support on which significant events are commemorated and the memory of great men inscribed.97 Zumthor insists on this link between territory and story: a territory tacitly narrates the history of the people who live there, of those who fashion and inhabit it.98 A topography commemorating past events and people thus plays a crucial role in holding a group together,99 for it allows for the ‘spatial deployment of collective memory’.100 By contrast, the sea cannot fulfil such a function. Commenting on the sense of home in The Wanderer, Howe points out that the sea in this poem comes close to the ‘horror of vacancy’, as in the open sea, ‘there is nothing that can be set in a landscape, fixed on a map, circumscribed with the brevity of a boundary clause’.101 Collective memory may thus not be comfortable in such an imaginary setting; for the sea, it seems, does not allow for the articulation in geographic terms of a collective sense of self.

97 ‘[U]ne culture entière s’inscrit sur le sol. Tout événement marquant se commémore dans

l’espace: une croix, une pierre levée, signale où il eut lieu; plus souvent, un toponyme nouveau le proclame’, Paul Zumthor, La mesure du monde (Paris: Seuil, 1993), pp. 42–3. 98 Zumthor, La mesure du monde, p. 79. 99 Howe, Migration and Mythmaking, ‘Introduction to the Paperback Edition’, pp. xv–xvi. 100 Monika Otter, Inventiones. Fiction and Referentiality in Twelfth-Century English Historical Writing (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 1996), p. 70. On this point, see also Christopher Tilley, A Phenomenology of Landscape: Places, Paths, and Monuments (Oxford: Berg, 1994), p. 18. 101 Howe, Writing the Map, p. 71.

Edges and Otherworlds: Imagining Tidal Spaces in Early Medieval Britain

Catherine A. M. Clarke The movements of sea tides around the coast of Britain form perhaps the most significant and wide-reaching example of the mutable, permeable edges produced by the interaction of land and water.1 Yet no sustained attention has been paid to the representation of tides and tidal geography in literary texts. This chapter focuses specifically on the depiction of tidal sites in a range of early medieval texts from Britain, asking questions about how these shifting, dynamic, elusive spaces are written and understood. Rather than a comprehensive or exhaustive study, this short discussion seeks to offer a starting-point and to open up possibilities for further exploration. It selects a deliberately broad range of texts for analysis, from late Anglo-Saxon literature to the twelfth century, and also deliberately includes material which reflects both English perceptions of Britain’s tidal geography as well as the experiences of others within the island (in the case of this discussion, Welsh). The chapter suggests some possible approaches to the selected material, traces stylistic parallels and conventions across the texts, and interrogates the potential cultural, ideological, and political messages which these representations of tidal spaces might carry. The symbolic value of sea tides as a marker of the edges of human power and authority is a familiar element of our shared cultural vocabulary. The story of King Cnut vainly commanding the sea has entered oral tradition and popular memory, though the story told by Henry of Huntingdon in the twelfth century differs from many modern versions in its emphasis on the king’s piety and his recognition of the limits of government. ...quod cum in maximo uigore floreret imperii, sedile suum in littore maris cum ascenderet statui iussit. Dixit autem mari ascendenti, ‘Tu mee dicionis es, et terra in qua sedeo mea est, nec fuit qui inpune meo resisteret imperio. Impero igitur tibi ne in terram meam ascendas, nec uestes uel membra dominatoris tui made1

Kelley Wickham-Crowley reminds us that ‘to consider landscape, especially of the isle of Britain, without factoring in the pervasive, changing, and influential presence of water and sea, is to skew how the Anglo-Saxons responded to and imagined themselves in their environment’ (‘Living on the Ecg: The Mutable Boundaries of Land and Water in Anglo-Saxon Contexts’, in A Place to Believe in: Locating Medieval Landscapes, ed. Clare A. Lees and Gillian R. Overing (Philadelphia, PA: Penn State University Press, 2006), pp. 85–110 (p. 110).

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the sea and englishness in the middle ages facere presumas’. Mare uero de more conscendens, pedes regis et crura sine reuerentia madefecit. Rex igitur resiliens ait, ‘Sciant omnes habitants orbem, uanam et friuolam regum esse potentiam, nec regis quempiam nomine dignum, preter eaum cuius nutui celum, terra, mare, legibus obedient eternis.’ ...when he [Cnut] was at the height of his ascendancy, he ordered his chair to be placed on the seashore as the tide was coming in. Then he said to the rising tide, ‘You are subject to me, as the land on which I am sitting is mine, and no one has resisted my overlordship with impunity. I command you, therefore, not to rise on to my land, nor to presume to wet the clothing or limbs of your master.’ But the sea came up as usual, and disrespectfully drenched the king’s feet and shins. So jumping back, the king cried, ‘Let all the world know that the power of kings is empty and worthless, and there is no king worthy of the name save Him by whose will heaven, earth and sea obey eternal laws’.2

Cnut’s performance thus calls attention to the limits of earthly laws when measured against the inexorable workings of nature and the ultimate power of God, and also demonstrates the resistance of tidal spaces to conventional categories of ownership, territory, and control. His declaration to his audience here mimics the language of regal power (the ‘Sciant omnes’ formula familiar from legal documents), yet in fact reveals the limitations of secular jurisdiction and authority. Uncovered by the sea at the ebb of the tide and submerged again when it flows in, tidal spaces defy the usual binaries of water and land, refuse full possession by human communities and authorities, and even evade satisfactory mapping through their lack of fixity and their constantly shifting geography. This chapter will explore the ways in which tidal spaces are imagined in medieval Britain as otherworlds at the edges of human experience and understanding which reveal the limits and vulnerabilities of power and control, whether in terms of physical access and exploitation, secular knowledge, or the assertion of territorial rights and colonialist ambition. As the following analysis will show, literary depictions of tidal spaces from early medieval Britain employ specific techniques in order to elicit complex, hybrid affective responses in their audiences which combine recognition or familiarity with awe and wonder, and fear. For a modern reader, these ambiguities and ambivalences can be usefully described and understood in terms of the Freudian unheimlich or uncanny, an interpretative framework which sharpens our attention to the intersections between space, the familiar, and the unknown or hidden. Crucially, the literary devices typical of early medieval representations of sea tides add up to more than merely an aesthetic or affective result. In their specific historical and geographical contexts, representations of tidal spaces can generate powerful political connotations, hinting at otherworlds in close proximity to ordinary, quotidian experience, yet beyond full understanding

2

Text and translation from Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, ed. and trans. Diana Greenway (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 366–9.



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and resistant to control.3 In the twelfth century, in particular, English material suggests anxieties about the limits of English territory and power within the British archipelago, whilst alternative sources from other dwellers within the island of Britain (in this case, the Welsh) reflect fantasies about other authorities and possibilities beyond English colonial rule. Interest in sea-tides and the places they uncover is reflected in medieval texts reaching back to early Anglo-Saxon England. In late seventh- to early eighthcentury Northumbria, the works of Bede pay close attention to the workings of tides and the unique properties of tidal spaces in both geographical and imaginative terms. The Historia Ecclesiastica includes accounts of the tides around the Isle of Wight and on the Northumbrian coast, and the De Natura Rerum, De Temporibus and De Temporum Ratione draw on the writings of Pliny and Isidore of Seville, as well as Bede’s own first-hand knowledge as a coastal-dweller in north-east England, in order to both consolidate and advance early medieval understanding of tidal activity.4 As has been observed by many readers, tidal space occupies an especially significant place in the cultural geography of Bede’s writing on St Cuthbert, where the peninsula of Lindisfarne forms a liminal site between Cuthbert’s cenobitic career and his later adoption of the eremitic life on the (full) island of Farne.5 In the prose Vita Sancti Cuthberti, Bede describes Lindisfarne as a location which: ...bis cotidie accedente aestu oceani, quem reuma uocant Greci, fit insula, bis renudatis abeunte reumate litoribus contigua terrae redditur... ...owing to the flow of the ocean tide, called in Greek ‘rheuma’, twice a day becomes an island and twice a day, when the tide ebbs from the uncovered shores, becomes again contiguous to the land...6

Typically, Bede’s description here embodies a synthesis of received learning (evidenced by citation of the Greek term) and anecdotal, first-hand observation, underlining the special nature of both the physical landscape and monastic 3

My discussion of ‘otherworlds’ draws on the work of Robert Bartlett on twelfth-century culture in his England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 1075–1225 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), especially pp. 686–92 and Jeffrey Jerome Cohen’s recent edited collection Cultural Diversity in the British Middle Ages: Archipelago, Island, England (New York: Palgrave, 2008), in which Cohen explores literary representations of ‘realms that exist in strange contiguity to everyday life’ (p. 1). 4 See, for example, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. and trans. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), pp. 384 and 385. For a fuller discussion, see Thomas R. Eckenrode, ‘Venerable Bede’s Theory of Ocean Tides’, American Benedictine Review, 25 (1974), 56–74. 5 Sebastian Sobecki comments on the traditional associations between the sea and spiritual peregrinato or asceticism in medieval culture in his The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008), pp. 48–50. 6 Two Lives of Saint Cuthbert, ed. and trans. Bertram Colgrave (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940), pp. 214 and 215.

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community at Lindisfarne as mutable and ambiguous, ‘sometimes linked to the mainland, and sometimes isolated, negotiating a hybrid identity of connection and retreat’.7 As a tidal space, Lindisfarne sits on the edge between wider networks of human power and community on the mainland, and the otherworldly spiritual refinement which the saint eventually achieves in his remote island hermitage.8 Sea tides continue to play a prominent role in the mythology surrounding Cuthbert in the following centuries, including a striking example in Symeon of Durham’s twelfth-century history of the community of Durham known as the Libellus de exordio. Symeon tells the story of a beautiful gospel book ‘auro gemmisque perornatus’ (‘ornamented with gold and gems’) which in the late ninth century is taken away from Lindisfarne by Bishop Eardulf and Abbot Eadred, along with Cuthbert’s body, destined for Ireland.9 David Rollason, like many others, identifies this precious book with the Lindisfarne Gospels, closely associated with Cuthbert.10 As the ship leaves the River Derwent to cross the Irish Sea, the proposed voyage is thwarted by a storm and immense waves which break over the boat. Symeon tells us that: ...nauium medias pene usque tabulas impleuerunt, atque terribili miraculo postque Egypti plagas inaudito protinus in sanguine conuertebantur. They filled it almost to the middle planks and by an awesome miracle unheard of since the plagues of Egypt, they were at once changed into blood.11

Significantly, it seems that the biblical narrative of the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt is present in Symeon’s imagination in this passage. Whilst the explicit allusion here is to the second ‘Plague of Egypt’, in which the Nile is turned to blood, the association between the power of waves and their capacity to overturn – or destroy – those who rebel against God’s will resonates with the Old Testament story of the Egyptians’ submersion in the Red Sea. Indeed, as this chapter will show, the biblical narrative of the crossing of the Red Sea (and the drowning of the Egyptians) seems often to be imaginatively contiguous with early medieval authors’ depictions of the workings of sea tides and waves. In the storm which Symeon describes, the gospel book is lost overboard and ‘in maris ferebatur profunda’ (‘carried down to the depths of the sea’). But a local Northumbrian man, Hunred, has a vision which urges him to go and look for 7 8

Wickham-Crowley, ‘Living on the Ecg’, p. 95. Clare Lees and Gillian Overing point out, however, that this retreat is always imperfect and qualified: even Cuthbert’s hermitage on Farne ‘does not stop the world coming to him’ (Clare A. Lees and Gillian R. Overing, ‘Anglo-Saxon Horizons: Places of the Mind in the Northumbrian Landscape’, in A Place to Believe In, ed. Lees and Overing, pp. 1–26 (p. 19)). 9 Symeon of Durham, Libellus de exordio atque procurso istius, hoc est Dunelmensis, ecclesie, ed. and trans. David Rollason (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000), pp. 114 and 115. 10 Symeon of Durham, Libellus de exordio, p. 115, n. 68. 11 Symeon of Durham, Libellus de exordio, pp. 114 and 115.



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the book ‘ut estu maris recedente’ (‘when the tide went out’).12 When Hunred and his companions reach the seashore, they discover an unfamiliar space uncovered by the sea. Itaque pergentes ad mare, multo quam consueruerat longius recessisse conspiciunt, et tribus uel eo amplius miliariis gradientes, ipsum sanctum euangeliorum codicem reperiunt, qui sicut forinsecus gemmis et auro sui decorum, ita intrinsecus litteris et foliis priorem preferebat pulchitrudinem, ac si ab aqua minime dubitare permisit. So they came to the sea and saw that it had receded much farther than normal. When they had walked three miles or more they found the same holy book of the gospels, which retained its enrichment of gems and gold on the outside, as on the inside it showed the former beauty of its letters and pages, as if it had not been touched by the water at all.13

Here, the marvellous land revealed by the sea – extending, it seems, for miles beyond the usual shoreline – forms a special kind of liminal space between the secular, earthly world and a more powerful agency beyond. Symeon attributes this miracle to Cuthbert and those who made the gospel book, but the tide itself also plays a crucial role in his story, shaping a space in which ordinary expectations can be put aside and Hunred and his friends (and the text’s audience) can encounter something beyond the usual limits of human understanding and control. Whilst only short passages, these excerpts from texts associated with the mythology of Cuthbert feature many of the themes which are prominent across early medieval depictions of sea tides and tidal spaces. In these sources, tides and tidal spaces can function as a marker of the limits of human community, authority, and control, suggest the potential for contiguity with a realm or agency beyond the known secular world and its figures of power, and call up associations with biblical narrative. These characteristics of the literary representation of sea tides recur across the early medieval texts discussed in this chapter. Whilst Symeon of Durham’s account of the great waves at the mouth of the River Derwent seems to be influenced by the Old Testament story of the Egyptians and the Red Sea, the late Old English poem Exodus suggests that this biblical event could itself be imagined and described through imagery derived from the experience of actual tidal activity (or, at least, through the same conventional literary devices used for representing real tidal activity). Although Exodus may seem a strange text to include in an examination of representations of tidal spaces, the poem fits within many of the rhetorical conventions seen across the sources discussed in this chapter, and the story of the crossing of the Red Sea, in turn, is a key biblical allusion frequently mapped onto medieval accounts of tidal activity. Contained in the Junius manuscript of Old English verse (dated to around the year 1000), Exodus has long been recognised as a complex, allu12 Symeon of Durham, Libellus de exordio, pp. 118 and 119. 13 Symeon of Durham, Libellus de exordio, pp. 118 and 119.

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sive, multi-layered text which draws on a range of biblical, patristic, and liturgical sources.14 At its centre, the Old English poem includes a description of the Israelites’ crossing of the Red Sea: a mythical, miraculous, singular event which demonstrates the power of God to intervene in the world and overrule the laws of nature. Yet, when read alongside the other texts discussed in this chapter, the Old English Exodus fits alongside recognisable traditions and literary techniques which shape the early medieval representation of tidal spaces. The space uncovered by the retreating waters of the sea is imagined as an otherworld which is simultaneously strange yet familiar; awe-inspiring and beautiful yet unsettling and disturbing. At lines 282–91 of Exodus, a direct speech by Moses describes the scene as the sea draws back to reveal the space beneath. Yð up færeð, ofstum wyrceð wæter on wealfæsten. Wegas syndon dryge, haswe herestræta, holm gerymed, ealde staðolas, þa ic ær ne gefrægn ofer middangeard men geferan, fage feldas, þa forð heonon in ece tid yðe þeccað. Sælde sægrundas suðwind fornam, bæðweges blæst; brim is areafod, sand sæcir spaw...15 A wave goes upwards, it quickly builds the water into a rampart. The ways are dry, grey army-roads – the sea being opened up – ancient foundations which I never before in all middle-earth have heard of men crossing over, gleaming plains, which from now into eternity the waves will cover. The south wind has driven away the confined depths of the sea, the ocean blast; the water has drawn back, the undertow spews out sand...

As J. R. Hall comments, much of the imagery here ‘has no scriptural source’ but develops the brief passage in Exodus 14:21–2 in order to achieve a powerful aesthetic effect.16 The focus of fascination here is the marvellous nature of the land uncovered by the sea and the idea of walking in a space which is usually hidden deep beneath the water. The passage conveys both a sense of wonder at the unprecedented, miraculous transformation of the natural environment, but 14 For a general overview of dating and sources see Exodus, ed. Peter J. Lucas, rev. edn

(Exeter: Exeter University Press, 1994), pp. 1 and 51–60, and for a discussion of the poem and the baptismal/Easter Vigil liturgy, see Paul G. Remley, Old English Biblical Verse (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 168–230. It is not practical to give an overview of the vast body of scholarship on the poem in this chapter, and references here will be restricted to material directly relevant to details of this argument. 15 Exodus, ed. Lucas, ll. 282–91a. All subsequent citations from Exodus will be taken from this edition. Translations are my own. 16 J. R. Hall, ‘Old English Exodus and the Sea of Contradiction’, Mediaevalia, 9 (1986 for 1983), 25–44 (p. 25).



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also provokes a more complex, ambivalent response to the world uncovered by the waves. First, the poem uses architectural imagery, playing with the idea that water – normally fluid and insubstantial – becomes a solid, robust material. Drawing on the Vulgate reference to the waves as a ‘murus’ (‘wall’, Exodus 14:22), the poem imagines how they build into a defensive rampart (‘wealfæsten’) in order to protect the Israelites, a metaphor developed further a few lines later in the poem when Moses exclaims that: Syndon þa foreweallas fægre gestepte, wrætlicu wægfaru, oð wolcna hrof.17 The retaining walls are beautifully built up into the roof of clouds, a wondrous road through the waves.

The language here seems to revel in the paradox of water as an architectural material: the metaphor of the walls of water suggests both a protective fortress for the Israelites and also, with the reference to the sky as a ‘roof ’, the emotive Anglo-Saxon image of the hall.18 Here, in the most unexpected and apparently hostile environment, the Israelites find safety and shelter. The idea of the Israelites walking across the exposed sea floor also generates intense poetic variation. Their miraculous journey is described as traversing ‘wegas’ (‘ways, paths’), ‘herestræta’ (literally ‘army-roads’ or ‘army-streets’), ‘staðolas’ (the ‘foundations’ of the sea-bed), and ‘feldas’ (‘fields’ or ‘plains’). The poem achieves a powerful effect by transposing a set of terms associated with the solidity of dry land and familiar built structures or demarcated areas to describe the space uncovered by the retreating waves. The sense of wonder attached to this newly revealed landscape is heightened by the use of colour terms which are both highly evocative and allusive, and also ambiguous. The ‘herestræta’ (‘army-roads’) are ‘haswe’ – a term conventionally glossed as ‘grey’, but which, as Peter Lucas notes, is also suggestive of light or brightness and might perhaps be better translated as ‘shining’ or ‘dappled’.19 This then parallels the reference to the ‘fage feldas’ (‘gleaming plains’), creating an imaginative impression of the sparkling, still-wet surfaces which emerge here from beneath the sea. Another related colour term occurs at line 312, where the sea-bed over which the Israelites walk is described as ‘grenne grund’ (‘green ground’). Grene, again, is an adjective with a broad semantic range and complex set of connotations in Old English: it conveys both the greenness of the land and also suggests brightness

17 Exodus, ll. 297–8. The parted waves are also described as a ‘sæweall’ (‘sea-wall’) at line

302b. The image of the sky as a roof recalls Cædmon’s Hymn, which draws on the traditional idea of the mead-hall to describe heaven ‘to rofe’ (‘as a roof ’) for the earth. See The Anglo-Saxon Minor Poems, ed. Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie (London: Routledge, 1942), pp. 105 (Cædmon’s Hymn in the Northumbrian form) and 106 (West Saxon). 19 Exodus, pp. 114–15, n. 284a. 18

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and shining.20 The complexity of the colour vocabulary here is of course typical, to a certain extent, of the difficulties of recovering historical colour lexis and semantics,21 yet the adjectives used to describe the landscape under the sea seem to be selected specifically for the multi-faceted, ambiguous effect they create. Described as ‘fage feldas’ and ‘grenne grund’, the space under the Red Sea which the Israelites cross is evocative of verdant pastoral plains, rather than the rock and sand of an ocean bed. Beyond this, the specific adjective grene is conventionally associated with descriptions of paradisal places in Old English poetry,22 further reinforcing the counter-intuitive nature of the landscape beneath the sea as a site of delight, pleasure, and beauty. Several systems of imagery converge, then, in the poem’s depiction of the space exposed when the waters of the Red Sea recede. This revealed environment is recognisable and familiar in terms of the architecture of a built fortress (or possibly the Anglo-Saxon hall), as a network of paths, roads, and streets, and as a green pastoral landscape, perhaps with its additional Judaeo-Christian connotations of paradise and divine favour and protection. The energy and impact of the passage derives from its representation of the space uncovered by the sea through features of the familiar world transposed into an astonishing context. This application of conventional descriptive topoi to a different, surprising setting is not unique to Exodus: Karin Olsen argues, for example, that the sea is traditionally represented as ‘a tract of land’ in Old English poetry, depicted in terms of roads through the waves and even ‘mountains’ of water.23 However, Sebastian Sobecki is right to query Olsen’s assumptions that such descriptive devices necessarily create a sense of the sea as comfortably ‘natural and integral’ to Anglo-Saxon life,24 and I would also suggest that this technique is capable of generating a more unsettling, disorienting effect than Olsen allows. In the Old English Exodus, and its description of the wondrous space beneath the sea, the meeting of the familiar and the strange creates what we might articulate in modern critical discourse as conditions characteristic of the uncanny. According to Freud’s definition, the uncanny or unheimlich brings together the familiar or ‘homely’ with something strange and novel. Founded on ambiguity and ambivalence, the unheimlich is a 20 For a full discussion of the term grene in Old English poetry, see Ananya Jahanara Kabir,

‘Grene in Old English Poetry: An Investigation into Connotative Meaning and Descriptive Techniques’ (unpublished MPhil. thesis, Oxford University, 1994). 21 For some general discussions, see for example, Nigel F. Barley, ‘Old English Colour Classification: Where Do Matters Stand?’, ASE, 3 (1974), 15–28; or C. P. Biggam, ‘Sociolinguistic Aspects of Old English Colour Lexemes’, ASE, 24 (1995), 51–65. 22 Ananya Jahanara Kabir, Paradise, Death, and Doomsday in Anglo-Saxon Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), pp. 142–7. 23 Karin Olsen, ‘The Dichotomy of Land and Sea in the Old English Andreas’, English Studies, 79 (1998), 385–97 (p. 385). In the case of the Old English Exodus, of course, it is not the sea itself which is being described as dry land, but rather the sea-bed exposed by the parting waves. 24 Sebastian Sobecki, The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008), p. 45.



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site of confluence and convergence between the familiar and the unknown, the comfortable or quotidian and that which is usually concealed or hidden.25 The Old English Exodus generates exactly this unsettling dynamic of ambivalence: the space revealed by the Red Sea is a strangely familiar otherworld, a mirror or parallel landscape marked by recognisable features such as fields, streets and walls, yet discovered in this marvellous location beneath the ocean. It is well established in scholarship on the Old English Exodus that the poem transposes imagery of sea and land in surprising and often counter-intuitive ways in order to reinforce underlying allegorical and theological themes. Most strikingly, the Israelites, wandering in the desert, are repeatedly associated with seafaring and nautical imagery, and even described directly as ‘sæmen’ (l. 105).26 Such imagery links God’s defence of the Israelites with his protection of Noah during the flood, another Old Testament narrative embedded within the poem, who guides his ark safely over ‘niwe flodas’ (l. 362). Such imagery also resonates with the baptismal liturgy of the Easter Vigil, regarded as a shaping framework for the poem’s collection of biblical stories and its emphasis on metaphors of water, light, obedience, and redemption.27 In this allegorical scheme, the Red Sea seems to be both a symbol for baptism and also for sin or the dangers of the world which the obedient Christian must pass through.28 Whilst the Israelites are, metaphorically, the ‘sæmen’ of the poem, the Egyptians are by contrast the ‘landmenn’ (l. 179).29 Whilst the term landmenn is usually understood, along with parallel terms in the poem such as ‘ingemen’ (l. 190), ‘ingefolc’ (l. 142), and ‘ingeðeode’ (l. 444), to imply that the Egyptians are ‘natives’ from within the land (unlike the Israelites, who are there in slavery), the term can also be glossed as ‘inlanders’, and S. A. J. Bradley prefers the translation ‘landlubbers’.30 In these various ways, the poem’s association of the Egyptians with their (dry) land further reinforces the symbolic value of the sea – with its receding, then closing, waves – as the limit of their power and authority. As Dee Dyas comments, the first part of the poem creates a deceptive sense that ‘the Egyptian landmenn are apparently more powerful and secure than the Israelite sæmen who are now on

25 Sigmund Freud, The Uncanny, trans. David McLintock with an introduction by Hugh

Haughton (London: Penguin, 2003), pp. 124–34.

26 Also see Exodus, pp. 89–90, n. 80–90. 27 See Remley, Old English Biblical Verse, pp. 168–230. 28 Hall, ‘Old English Exodus, pp. 26–7. See also Frederick M. Biggs, ‘The End of the Sea:

The Old English Exodus, lines 466b–76a’, Notes and Queries n.s., 32 (1985), 290–1, for a discussion of the possible eschatological meanings of seashore imagery in the poem. 29 Landmenn is usually understood as a formulation in opposition to sæmenn, though Peter Lucas has suggested that this epithet for the Egyptians may in fact have been formed first, from the Latin phrase populus terrae, subsequently inspiring the contrasting idea of the Israelites as seafarers. See Peter J. Lucas, ‘Landmenn and the Destruction of the Egyptian Idols: Two Notes on the Old English Exodus’, Notes and Queries n.s., 37 (1990), 139–41. 30 Anglo-Saxon Poetry, ed. S. A. J. Bradley (London: Dent, 1982), p. 55.

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the move, facing unknown perils in obedience to the call of God’.31 The Egyptians assert earthly power and control through their oppression and persecution of the Israelites, yet when the waters of the Red Sea close over them, their arrogance and vanity is exposed. The poem comments that: Se ðe sped ahte ageat gylp wera. Hie wið God wunnon. (ll. 514b–515) He who owned the power [God] destroyed the boast of those men. They fought against God.

Within the poem (as well as the original Old Testament narrative), the Egyptians are figures of corrupt earthly rule, demonstrated through their unjustifiable oppression and exploitation of the Israelites. The Red Sea forms the insurmountable edge of their power and jurisdiction. How can the narrative of the crossing of the Red Sea in the Old English Exodus contribute to our understanding of the representation of tidal spaces in literature from medieval Britain? As Moses exclaims within the poem, the event depicted here is miraculous and unprecedented, something which he has ‘ær ne gefrægn’ (‘never heard of before’, l. 285b). Yet, despite the undeniably unique nature of the parting of the Red Sea, the account of this phenomenon shares descriptive techniques and thematic elements with representations of real tidal activity in medieval Britain. The space uncovered as the waves draw back is depicted as a marvellous, unsettling otherworld – both strange and familiar – where recognisable landscape features are suddenly discovered in an astonishing, unanticipated context. This uncanny world also unsettles the comfortable assumptions about power and agency which the first part of the poem instigates: in the space revealed by the sea, the Egyptian ‘landmenn’ encounter the limit of their dominion. As with the early-medieval Cuthbert texts already discussed, the (singular kind of ) tidal space represented in the Old English Exodus forms a liminal realm between mankind and an alternative power beyond, calling attention to the limits of earthly authority, knowledge and dominion. The story of the Egyptians and the Red Sea carries both religious and political messages about the need for obedience to God, as well as the vulnerabilities of oppressive rule and imperialist ambition. Yet the possible resonances of the Exodus narrative for an Anglo-Saxon audience are complex and multivalent. Nicholas Howe comments on the ways in which the ‘immediate audience of the poem may have interpreted [the Israelites’] journey as a historical allusion to the Anglo-Saxons’ ancestral migration that brought them to the promised island’.32 Somewhat paradoxically, then, the story of the destruction of the Egyptians in the Red Sea may have served in some way to re-affirm and validate the Anglo-Saxons’ sense of identity 31 Dee Dyas, ‘Land and Sea in the Pilgrim Life: The Seafarer and the Old English Exodus’,

English Language Notes, 35 (1997), 1–9 (p. 2). 32 Nicholas Howe, Writing the Map of Anglo-Saxon England: Essays in Cultural Geography (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008), p. 210.



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as God’s favoured people and their own colonialist and imperialist projects in Britain. Yet the literary representation of tidal spaces maintains a capacity to unsettle and complicate notions of territory, power, and authority. Indeed, in other texts from medieval Britain, the suggestive liminalities of tidal space can hint at the limitations of specific ruling regimes or nations, and the possibilities of alternative worlds and agencies beyond. Moving beyond the Norman Conquest, the late twelfth-century Latin De Laude Cestrie (‘In Praise of Chester’) by the monk Lucian includes an account of the real tidal geography of the Dee estuary in the north-west of England. This lengthy prose text celebrates the city of Chester, and describes its surrounding topography as well as the history, patron saints, and important buildings of the urban landscape. As a monk of the Benedictine abbey of St Werburgh’s, Chester, Lucian offers a vision of the city and its environment that is shaped by religious symbolism and allegory, and the text also reflects his acute awareness of Chester’s situation as a borderland city, located on the (often troubled) boundary between England and Wales.33 Lucian’s description of the tidal River Dee participates in the established conventions of medieval urban encomium, celebrating the natural advantages and wonders of the city’s environment. Yet it also typifies his monastic reading of space through allegory and biblical allusion. Lucian begins his account of the Dee and its estuary by celebrating its productivity in terms of both natural resources and facilitation of international trade. Habet preterea nostra Cestria ex Dei munere, ditantem atque decorantem amnem secus urbis muros pulchrum atque piscosum, et a meridiano latere receptorium nauium ab Aquitania, Hispania, Hibernia, Germania uenientium, qui remige Christo per laborem et prudentiam mercatorum bonis pluribus reparant et reficiunt urbis sinum, ut modis omnibus consolati per graciam Dei nostri, etiam frequenter uberius et profusius bibamus uinum, quam illa regionum loca quae gaudent prouentibus uinearum. Meanwhile God has given our Chester an enriching river, which follows the line of the city walls and teems beautifully with fish, and, in the south, a port for ships coming from Aquitaine, Spain, Ireland and Germany, which, with Christ as their helmsman, bring industrious merchants to replenish the city with a variety of goods, so that, consoled in all ways by the kindness of our God, we may often

33 See Robert W. Barrett, Jr, Against all England: Regional Identity and Cheshire Writing,

1195–1656 (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 2009), pp. 27-43, Catherine A. M. Clarke, Literary Landscapes and the Idea of England, 700–1400 (Cambridge: Brewer, 2006), pp. 98–105 and the introduction to the new partial edition of De Laude Cestrie by Mark Faulkner, www.medievalchester.ac.uk. For an earlier (partial) edition of the text, with critical discussion, see M. V. Taylor, Extracts from the MS. Liber Luciani: De Laude Cestrie, written about the year 1195 and now in the Bodleian Library, Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, 64 (Edinburgh and London: Printed for the Record Society, 1912).

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drink more and better wine, than those places in the region which glory in their success in viticulture.34

Whilst elsewhere Lucian acknowledges Chester’s remote location at the furthest edge of England (and the island of Britain) and remarks that its former role was in ‘Romani seruans limitem imperii’ (‘protecting the limit of the Roman Empire’),35 here the text positions the city emphatically at the centre of global networks of trade and communication. With the river and its harbour presented repeatedly as a gift from God, Lucian skilfully appropriates even the secular landscape of the city and its associated activities of trade and commerce within his own monastic discourse. As Robert Barrett comments, the use of such techniques by Lucian throughout De Laude Cestrie serve to shape his representation of ‘urban Chester as a thoroughly monastic space’ with his own abbey of St Werburgh’s at its very centre.36 From his description of the river and harbour, Lucian moves on to focus more specifically on the natural phenomenon of the tidal estuary, signalled by the marginal gloss ‘De maris accessu at recessu’ (‘Concerning the tides’ or, more literally, ‘Concerning the flowing and ebbing of the seas’).37 Preterea reumate cotidiano non cessat eam reuisere maris patentissima plenitudo, que apertis et opertis latissimis harenarum campis, indesinenter grate uel ingrate aliquid mittere uel mutuare consueuit, et suo accessu uel recessu affere quippiam uel auferre. Unde nuper piscium copiam prouincialibus attulit et piscatoribus uitam ademit. Qui auidi preter modum, aquam biberunt ultra modum et dum fretum exhaurire uolunt, fluctibus absorti sunt. Adhuc eciam nostros serenat obtutus speciosissimum maris litus, mirabili Creatoris potencia, nunc existens aqua, nunc arida, ubi parente pelago Potentis imperio quantumlibet consuetis, tamen ampla sensatis datur ammiratio, quod eodem die, eodem loco et aptissimum iter facit Deus uiatoribus ad gradiendum, et altissimum gurgitem aquatilibus ad natandum. Quod aliquis delicatus aut durus, nesciens naturam maris, credere fortasse contempneret, si non orbis astrueret, oculus comprobaret. Meanwhile the very patent plenty of the sea does not cease to revisit Chester with a daily tide, which, to the very broad fields of sand, both open and hidden, is accustomed ceaselessly for better or for worse to send or lend, and by its advance and retreat to bring forth and take away. In our own time it has brought a great catch of fish from neighbouring areas and took the lives of fishermen. Insatiable beyond measure, they overdrained the sea and when they wanted to drain it further, they were engulfed by waves. This most special shoreline still brightens 34 De Laude Cestrie (Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 672), fol. 11r. All quotations

from De Laude Cestrie are taken from the partial edition by Mark Faulkner at www.medievalchester.ac.uk. Translations are also by Mark Faulkner, with some of my own modifications. 35 De Laude Cestrie, fol. 11r. 36 Barrett, Against all England, p. 35. 37 Fol. 11r, left-hand margin. Mark Faulkner suggests that both the main text of the manuscript and its marginal apparatus may be in Lucian’s own hand. See the Introduction to De Laude Cestrie, www.medievalchester.ac.uk.



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our eyes, now being wet, now dry, obeying the powerful Creator, giving rise to a marvellous wonder when in the same place and the same day God makes there both a very suitable crossing for travellers to walk on and a deep sea in which marine creatures might swim. Naïve or seasoned, anyone ignorant of the nature of the sea may perhaps disdain to believe this, but their eyes will confirm it.38

As in De Laude Cestrie as a whole, this description of the Chester tides is packed with biblical resonance and allusion. The rhetorical parallels which articulate how the tide is accustomed to ‘send or lend’ things and ‘bring forth and take away’ recall the biblical formulation of God’s power and favour in Job 1:21: ‘Dominus dedit Dominus abstulit’ (‘The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away). The series of balanced rhetorical doublets throughout this passage (including also ‘apertis et opertis’, ‘grate vel ingrate’, ‘nunc... aqua, nunc arida’) creates a rhythmic effect of ebb and flow which evokes the movements of the sea itself. Lucian’s condemnation of the fishermen who have literally ‘drunk’ (‘biberunt’) too excessively from the sea – perhaps a comment on their greedy, ungrateful exploitation of the waters – again turns the natural phenomenon of the incoming tide into a parable against arrogance and avarice. At this point, and throughout Lucian’s description, the biblical model of Exodus and the crossing of the Red Sea shapes the text’s presentation of the Dee estuary and its tidal geography. The image of the water closing over the greedy fishermen who ‘fluctibus absorti sunt’ (‘were engulfed by waves’) recalls the potent narrative of God’s destruction of the disobedient Egyptians. The passage also focuses, in a similar way to the Old English Exodus, on the marvellous transformation from dry land to deep sea which the movement of the tide performs, sustaining a comparable tone of awe and wonder. The transformation of deep water into a dry route ‘viatoribus ad gradiendum’ (‘for travellers to walk on’) certainly recalls the Israelites’ miraculous crossing of the Red Sea. The final sentence pushes even further the sense of the estuary tides as miracle, with Lucian insisting on the difficulty of believing this wonder to be true. His suggestion of the need for direct, visual proof (‘oculus comprobaret’) resonates with the biblical story of ‘Doubting Thomas’ ( John 20:24–9), and an additional marginal gloss here serves only to reinforce the amazing, almost incredible nature of the tidal activity Lucian relates, with its statement that ‘Hoc uere contigit et habitator nouit’ (‘The inhabitant knows this really happened’).39 Alongside its heavy use of biblical analogy and allusion, Lucian’s account of the Dee estuary also employs specific rhetorical techniques to shape a sense of its tidal landscape as a strange, intriguing otherworld. The retreat of the sea to reveal a route for travellers (the term ‘viatoribus’ specifically implies their pursuit of a roadway or path) suggests the presence of a hidden, oddly parallel geography beneath the waves. The expansive beach uncovered at low tide is described as ‘latissimis harenarum campis’ (‘very broad fields of sand’), transposing the delightful open fields of classical pastoral tradition – as well as, perhaps, the 38 Fol. 11r. 39 Marginal note in left-hand margin.

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Anglo-Saxon tradition of the green plains of paradise – into an astonishing new location, sometimes revealed, sometimes hidden (‘apertis et opertis’). This is a landscape of beauty and pleasure, as well as a site in which God’s justice is performed. The seashore literally ‘brightens’ (‘serenat’) the eyes of onlookers, suggesting once again both pleasure and the shining, sparkling quality of the wet sands. Lucian’s description conveys a sustained mood of wonder and amazement at this otherworldly landscape of roads and fields exposed by the ebbing tide: the deliberate synthesis of the familiar and the strange in his account generates a sense of the uncanny. And there is a further suggestion of a mysterious, unsettling confluence between the known and the unknown, the familiar and the hidden, in Lucian’s description. He refers to the tide’s power to carry things to Chester (and to take away), suggesting both the familiar cargo of merchant ships as well as, perhaps, the more mysterious flotsam and jetsam washed into Chester from unknown origins. Once again, this description of a tidal landscape evokes its mysterious, fascinating potential as an edge and liminal space, bordering between the known and understood world of local experience and other realms and agencies beyond. The tidal activity of the Dee estuary clearly plays a significant role in local mythology and the formation of identities in medieval Chester, across both English and Welsh communities within the city and the surrounding areas of Cheshire and North Wales. Lucian’s urban encomium reflects anxiety about proximity of his city to the Welsh, presenting them as a potential threat but also recording how Qui olim discidiis et odiis amaris Britanniam in Angliam mutauerunt, et quibus adhuc moribus fulgeant, qui uicinantur eis, cum lacrimis legunt. The English once subsumed Wales [or the British] into England causing bitter discord and hatred which still afflict the surrounded people, when they tearfully read about these events.40

Whilst Lucian’s interpretation of Chester, its history and surrounding environment is informed by his position within the English city and his reproduction of colonialist attitudes to Wales, the geography which he describes yields very different meanings and possibilities for Welsh writers and audiences.41 Indeed, Lucian’s notion that the tide itself has the power to carry things into the city has parallels in a specific Welsh tradition associated with the sea at Chester, which suggests an alternative way in which the city’s geography might be used to formulate a sense of identity and cultural authority. From the thirteenth century onwards, the church of St John in Chester housed a wooden image of the crucified Christ, believed to be formed from relics of the True Cross and known as 40 Fol. 12v. 41 For an overview of relationships between Chester and Wales in the Middle Ages see,

Helen Fulton, ‘Colonial Chester’, www.medievalchester.ac.uk.



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the Rood of Chester. Whilst this artefact attracted pilgrims from both England and Wales, it is Welsh poetry that ‘provides by far the most extensive body of evidence for the cult of the Rood of Chester’.42 The legend of the origins of this Rood, which surfaces throughout the Welsh poetry, is that the relic was washed into the city, miraculously, by the tide. Whilst most of this Welsh poetry dates to the late Middle Ages, it reflects earlier medieval belief and practice, as well as oral traditions attached to the Chester Rood. At least ten Welsh poems by eight authors focus on the relics of the cross at St John’s Church, with possible passing references in other texts.43 Only Ieuan Llawdden (fl. 1450) is specific in giving a provenance for the miraculous Rood, suggesting that it was brought by a tide (‘llanw’) to Chester across the Irish Sea from Dublin.44 The more general myth of the cross’s arrival in Chester borne on the tide is mentioned by the late fifteenth-century poet Dafydd ap Hywel, who describes it as ‘nofiwr’ (‘a swimmer’), and a verse prayer to the Rood of Chester by Bedo Brwynllys (fl. c.1460) also mentions the legend of its journey by sea.45 The fifteenth-century poet Maredudd ap Rhys also celebrates the miraculous origin of the Chester cross in his poem ‘Garllaes fûm o’r gwyw oerllwm’, in which he reflects on its journey up the Dee estuary. ...Llanw a’i dug dduw Llun i dir. Llawenydd i’r dydd a’r don A’i llywiodd i Gaerlleon, Lle daeth nerth a gallu dwys O law Agla i’w eglwys. ....a tide brought it on a Monday to the land. Joy to the day and the wave that steered it to Chester, where strength and solemn power came from the hand of the Lord to its church.46

As is typical in many of the Welsh poems to the Rood of Chester, Maredudd focuses on its healing properties and its ‘living image’ of Christ. The most extensive references to the Chester Rood and the myth of the tide occur in a lengthy poem ‘To the Rood of Chester’ by the fourteenth-century poet Gruffudd ap Maredudd ap Dafydd (fl. 1352–82), a native of Anglesey whose work is recorded in the Red Book of Hergest (c.1400).47 Near the beginning of

42 Barry J. Lewis, Welsh Poetry and English Pilgrimage: Gruffudd ap Maredudd and the Rood

of Chester (Aberystwyth: University of Wales, Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, 2005), p. 20. 43 Lewis, Welsh Poetry, pp. 14–15 and 19. 44 Lewis, Welsh Poetry, p. 20. 45 Lewis, Welsh Poetry, pp. 18–19. 46 Text and translation by Helen Fulton, www.medievalchester.ac.uk. 47 Lewis, Welsh Poetry, p. 6.

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the poem, Gruffudd evokes the mystery of the Rood’s arrival from unknown origins: Dylan natur Delis arwain Dyddug mordon Dyfrdwy waeddgreg Delw werthforaf

fawrdeg eglur o ddwfr dwyrain ar ei dwyfron, arial gwaneg a glodforaf

fordwy Gogledd, i Ddeifr diredd. arw ei dyfredd, ar ael Gwynedd, o gludfawredd...

The great, fair, bright tumult of the northern sea, having the nature of the ocean, It bore his delivery from the waters of the east to the lands of the English. A sea-wave with its rough waters bore on its breast To the hoarse-voiced Dee, force of a wave upon the brow of Gwynedd, The most precious image which I praise on account of its riches...48

The two points of the compass mentioned here – north and east – are both suggestive of mystery, the unknown and potentials beyond man’s understanding, generating associations with both the hidden worlds of the far north and, of course, the religious implications of the east as the imagined location of Jerusalem, the Holy Land, and even, possibly, the earthly paradise. Allusions to the sea continue throughout the poem, including references to the ‘môr-waneg’ (‘sea-wave’, l. 37, with further references to the waves at ll. 60 and 203) and the Dee estuary (ll. 209–10). A more sustained passage at lines 187–90 imagines the journey of the Rood in detail: Llanw llwybr glud Lloegr dud y dug Llun Llyw pum oes ar groes grog; Mawrchwedl llawen gan wenyg, Marchog bron mordon mawrdeg. The tide whose course is unwavering brought to the land of England An image of the Ruler of the five ages on a rood-cross; Great, joyous tidings with the waves, Great and fair rider of the breast of the sea-wave.

Again, the image of the tide – inexorable, steady, yet beyond human understanding – is at the centre of the poet’s understanding of the relic’s mystery and miraculous origins. Despite its location in England – and more specifically Chester, a site of colonialist aggression and oppression of the Welsh – Gruffudd acknowledges that the Rood is a gift sent from across (or beyond) the sea by God. Indeed, the poem praises Chester as the relics’ host, contrasting markedly with much contemporary Welsh poetry which treats the city with, unsurprisingly, hostility and contempt.49 For example, the poem celebrates how ‘Môr od 48 Lewis, Welsh Poetry, pp. 30 and 35, ll. 19–23. All subsequent quotations from the poem

will be taken from this edition.

49 See Fulton, ‘Colonial Chester’, www.medievalchester.ac.uk.



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ddysg Mab Mair a ddug’ (‘the sea under the instruction of Mary’s Son’) sent the Rood ‘I Loegr dir oleuGaer deg’ (‘To fair, splendid Chester of the land of England’) (ll. 179–82). In the Gruffudd ap Maredudd poem to the Rood of Chester, the healing properties of the cross feature less prominently than in the poem by Maredudd ap Rhys. Instead, the cross becomes a symbol of Christ’s power and victory, and a device for drawing together a range of (often complex) allusions to providential history. Lines 85–92 describe how the tide carries this token of God’s grace and protection up the Dee estuary and into Chester. Doeth delw fyw fy Llyw, llyrion – prif obaith, Praff Adeiliad iaith proffwydolion, Dawn a phlaid gweiniaid, uwch gwynion – foroedd A phrifdeg lysoedd ffrydau gleision. Darogan Dylan, dail geirw gwelwon – môr, I fyddinfawr gôr fu ei ddanfon: Dug o gaeth alaeth, faith alon – ofid, Ei bobl i rydid, Bibl arodion. The living image of my Lord came, pathways of the chief hope, Mighty Builder of the language of the prophets, Source of grace and support for the weak, above the white seas And the fair courts of the blue currents. A prophecy from the ocean, leaves of the pale waves of the sea, Was the sending of him to a chancel whose host is great: He brought from captive misery, from long suffering at the hands of enemies, His people to freedom, so the Bible accounts go.

In this passage, as well as throughout the poem, the cross is represented as a symbol of comfort and support for those who are weak or oppressed, suggesting a particularly significant and appropriate understanding of God’s power for Welsh audiences under English colonial rule. Indeed, the imagery of the sea and waves here seems to encourage an association with the Old Testament story of the Exodus – and, perhaps more specifically, the crossing of the Red Sea – in which God guides his people from oppression and bondage ‘i rydid’ (‘into freedom’). Although never explicitly stated, parallels or analogies between the biblical Israelites and the medieval Welsh are clearly sustainable here. Throughout this text, the Rood of Chester is imagined as a token of hope and victory, embodying the promise (or continuing reality) of an alternative divine power and order which transcends any earthly government and, perhaps especially, the secular authority of English rule. With repeated allusions to the tidal Dee estuary and the wide seas beyond, the poem cultivates a mystical, enigmatic geography in contrast to the colonialist map of North Wales drawn by the English. Chester – the site of English control and oppression – is juxtaposed with the possibility of other realms and agencies beyond. Whilst this idea is explored most fully in the Gruffudd ap Maredudd text, the presence of the myth of the Rood’s arrival on

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the tide has a similar resonance across these medieval Welsh poems. As acts of resistance to colonialist rule, the poems to the Rood of Chester imagine an alternative geography not shaped by English power, using imagery of the tide and the mystical forces which drive it to suggest the presence of otherworlds and other forces beyond English control. Of course, the Dee estuary holds a particular significance as an edge and ‘interspace’ in terms of the experiences and identities of both Welsh and English communities in medieval Chester and the surrounding area of North Wales.50 Whilst the river marks the border between England and Wales, its shifting, tidal nature exposes the unattainable ‘fantasy’ of stable geography and ‘precise’ territorial definition.51 Gerald of Wales famously comments on how the fluctuation of the river offers a prognosis for which nation – Welsh or English – will be successful in battle in any particular year,52 and its shifting, unpredictable course is characteristic of the unstable, ambiguous geography which Gerald encounters throughout Wales. In The Journey through Wales, for example, Gerald has to contend with fording the capricious tidal river and quicksands at Neath (South Wales), his horse being ‘almost sucked down into the abyss’.53 Shortly afterwards, whilst in the Gower, Gerald hears the story of a boy who not long previously discovered a tunnel through a hill into a hidden underground realm: ‘a most attractive country, where there were lovely rivers and meadows, and delightful woodlands and plains’.54 Recent scholarship has called attention to the prominence and potential significance of depictions of these and similar ‘otherworlds’ in twelfth-century literature. Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, in particular, has explored the particular ways in which ‘medieval Welsh and Irish texts offer stories of realms that exist in strange contiguity to everyday life, domains often entered through a hill or barrow that seem to be of two worlds at once’.55 Cohen suggests that these narratives can ‘reveal the difference between stories of England and stories of Britain, between the attenuated narrative of a kingdom that masqueraded as the entirety of an island and the histories of a tempestuous world too vast, too motley, too entangled within an archipelago of other realms to be so reduced’.56 The sea itself can function as a potential portal or interface between the worlds 50 For the notion of ‘interspace’, see Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Hybridity, Identity, and Monstrosity

in Medieval Britain (New York: Palgrave, 2006), p. 103.

51 For the ‘fantasy’ of the nation, see Patricia Ingham, Sovereign Fantasies: Arthurian Romance

and the Making of Britain (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001), p. 17, and for the desire to fix the nation in ‘precise’, definable terms see R. R. Davies, The First English Empire: Power and Identities in the British Isles, 1093–1343 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 35–46, and also p. 54. 52 Geraldus Cambrensis, ‘Itinerarium Kambriae’, in Opera, ed. James F. Dimock, Rolls Series, 21 (London: Longman, 1868), Liber II, cap. ix, pp. 1–227 (p. 139). 53 Gerald of Wales, The Journey through Wales and the Description of Wales, ed. Betty Radice, trans. Lewis Thorpe (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1978), pp. 130–1. 54 Gerald of Wales, The Journey through Wales and the Description of Wales, pp. 133–4. 55 Cohen, Cultural Diversity, p. 1. 56 Cohen, Cultural Diversity, p. 4.



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of the known and the other or hidden, as demonstrated by Ralph of Coggeshall’s story of the strange sea-man (or fish, or wicked spirit) who climbs ashore on a Suffolk beach.57 Robert Bartlett discusses this case as an example of the ‘uncanny creatures [who] lived in the world’s unknown spaces’, clustered at ‘the borders of the human and the mundane world’, with which twelfth-century texts are fascinated.58 Once again, the edges of the sea signify a limit to human understanding and authority, the liminal space of the seashore functioning as a site where the familiar and the strange combine in disturbing and unsettling ways. Whilst Bartlett shows how the discussion of otherworlds and their occupants plays a broader role in debates about identity and knowledge in the twelfth century, Cohen’s analysis of medieval British texts generates a persuasive postcolonialist perspective on these representations of hidden realms suppressed within the island. Both of these readings open up productive approaches to the accounts of tidal spaces discussed in this chapter. This chapter has brought together a deliberately diverse – even eclectic – range of texts, in an attempt to develop some initial perspectives on the representation of tidal spaces in earlier medieval Britain. Whilst tracing parallels and analogies across these sources, my analysis has also examined how representations of tidal spaces might function differently within different texts and contexts, and for different audiences. Across the material discussed here, tidal locations are repeatedly described in terms of ambiguous otherworldly spaces, or as liminal sites suggestive of other domains and agencies beyond the familiar geographical and political landscapes of dry land. I have used the term unheimlich or ‘uncanny’ to articulate the unsettling ambivalences generated by many of these descriptions, which simultaneously represent tidal spaces as both familiar reproductions of recognisable dry-land geography (including buildings, roads and ‘pastoral’ fields), and as strange, unknowable landscapes usually hidden beneath the depths of the sea. Tidal spaces refuse clear definition as either land or sea, and defy human control, exposing the limitations of human authority over the natural environment and assertions of territorial ownership. The capacity of tides to deliver onto the seashore things brought from an unknown ‘elsewhere’ also hints at the existence of powers and agencies which exceed human understanding and regulation. The potential of the tidal space as a suggestive edge or otherworld is exploited differently according to the different kinds of text and genre examined here, as well as the specific cultural, social and political context in which it was produced. In terms of the meanings carried by these texts, the moral-didactic, religious and political are always intimately enmeshed. In the Cuthbert texts discussed here, tidal geography suggests a gradual removal from the spaces of human power towards a fuller acceptance of God’s authority. The tidal peninsula of Lindisfarne marks Cuthbert’s partial retreat 57 Radulph de Coggeshall Chronicon Anglicarum, ed. Joseph Stevenson (London: Longman,

1875), pp. 117–18.

58 Bartlett, England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, pp. 688 and 692.

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from the concerns of secular (and cenobitic monastic) community, whilst the miracle of the low tide which returns the lost Lindisfarne Gospels demonstrates the capacity of divine agency to intervene at this mysterious geographic edge. Symeon of Durham’s narrative also reflects a political dimension to the apparently miraculous activity of the tides which he describes: the enormous waves which overwhelm the boat as it sets sail for Ireland punish the churchmen who intend to take the gospel book away from its Northumbrian home. In Symeon’s story, God’s power visits mankind through the movements of the sea and tide, in order to assert the claims of a local community to its rightful property and heritage. In the Old English Exodus we also find a complex layering of meaning within its story of a miraculous tidal event. Here, the religious message is obvious: whilst the Israelites pass in obedience to God through the otherworldly space uncovered by the parting waters of the Red Sea, the waves close over the Egyptians in punishment of their rebellion and arrogance. Yet the poem also yields possible political resonances for Anglo-Saxon audiences, serving as a parable against the pursuit of earthly power and oppression of the weak (as exemplified by the Egyptian ‘landmenn’), yet also simultaneously affirming the Anglo-Saxons’ own colonialist projects in Britain as the latter-day equivalent of God’s ‘chosen people’ settling their Promised Land. The intersection of otherworldly tidal geography and the politics of power, territory and nation is even more prominent in texts associated with Chester, dating from the late twelfth century onwards. Lucian’s description of the Dee estuary imagines the landscape as an uncanny mirror or parallel world of roads and fields uncovered by the sea, suggesting the possibility of unknown other realms in immediate proximity to quotidian experience. Jeffrey Jerome Cohen’s analysis of the ‘kingdoms without number’ which fascinate twelfth-century English texts is valuable here:59 does Lucian’s account of the tidal geography of Chester suggest an anxiety about the contiguity of other, suppressed, realms and domains, or the lack of fixity and definition of territorial bounds and rights? Certainly, despite Philip Morgan’s view that Lucian ‘saw the late twelfth century as a period of newly established peace [with the Welsh]’,60 the De Laude Cestrie as a whole betrays an anxiety about the precarious borderland situation of Chester and its contiguity with the troubling, hidden otherworlds of British culture and tradition. Lucian’s account of the Chester tides is shaped by a concern with the elusive, slippery nature of local geography (like the changing course of the Dee estuary, the boundary between England and Wales), and by an acute awareness of the existence of places beyond English knowledge and control right up to the walls of his city. The Welsh poems associated with the Chester Rood represent a telling alternative perspective to these anxieties about identity and territory, 59 Cohen, Cultural Diversity, pp. 89–90. 60 Philip Morgan, ‘Cheshire and Wales’, in Power and Identity in the Middle Ages: Essays in

Memory of Rees Davies, ed. Huw Pryce and John Watts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 195–210 (p. 197).



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using the myth of the tidal origins of the relics in St John’s Church to evoke the possibility of powers and agencies beyond English control. The poetry imagines the tidal movement of the Dee carrying the Rood into Chester from a (usually) unspecified, mysterious otherworld of mythic and religious associations. As a destination for pilgrimage and subject for devotional verse, the relics of the cross represent an alternative symbol of power and authority which transcends the colonialist administration and regulation experienced by the Welsh at the hands of the English in Chester and the surrounding areas of North Wales. In the Welsh poems, the tide with its miraculous cargo becomes a powerful symbol of the edge of English control and rule, and the possibility of alternative powers and forces beyond. Clearly, more work remains to be done on this topic, and this chapter has provided only a preliminary overview of certain selected texts with suggestions of possible shared themes and rhetorical techniques, as well as some contrasts and divergences. Beyond the simple binary of land and sea, tidal spaces complicate easy assumptions about geography, territory, and power, and generate a range of challenging moral, religious, and political implications. In the material examined here, the different ways in which tidal spaces function as otherworlds and suggestive edges confirm the susceptibility of British island topography to symbolic readings and politically charged interpretations in medieval texts.

East Anglia and the Sea in the Narratives of the Vie de St Edmund and Waldef

Judith Weiss In 1963, in a groundbreaking book, Dominica Legge asserted that ‘the love of the sea and of voyages is characteristic of Anglo-Norman literature’.1 Over forty years later, scholars are more cautious and more inclined to detect ambivalent attitudes in such literature. Sebastian Sobecki sees, in Anglo-Norman narratives after Benedeit’s St Brendan, a ‘growing uneasiness towards the deep’ and anxieties about the ‘cold, treacherous and tempestuous sea of Northern Europe’, even if this sea enabled communications and carried Christianity.2 The Vie de St Edmund, by Denis Piramus (c. 1170), and the anonymous romance of Waldef (1200–10), both unfinished, enable us to explore both views. These narratives have many features in common: they are influenced by Wace’s Brut, they write in East Anglia on whose history and topography they are knowledgeable, and they are acutely aware of its coastline’s vulnerability to invasion. But they also have fundamentally different attitudes to the sea, which probably in the end comes down to their different genres: one is a saint’s life, with its undercurrent of optimism in the power and ultimate beneficence of God, and the other is a romance which, though generically uncharacteristic in its lack of optimism – it recurrently portrays disorder and political injustice – sees progress achieved through secular rather than religious means.3 1

M. Dominica Legge, Anglo-Norman Literature and Its Background (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), p. 84 (talking about Denis Piramus and the Vie). 2 Sebastian Sobecki, The Sea and Middle English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008), pp. 11 and 56. 3 La Vie Seint Edmund le Rei: Poème Anglo-Normand du XIIe Siècle Par Denis Piramus, ed. Hilding Kjellman (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1974; first printed Göteborg, 1935); Le Roman de Waldef, ed. A. J. Holden, Bibliotheca Bodmeriana (Cologny-Geneva: Fondation Martin Bodmer, 1984). Legge (p. 84) denied Edmund was much indebted to Wace; Holden (pp. 27–8) mentions Wace’s influence on Waldef but does not cite some of the most striking borrowings. Denis Piramus writes as a monk in Bury St Edmunds Abbey; the poet of Waldef might have been linked to an East Anglian religious foundation (Holden, Waldef, p. 17). He knew the legends of St Edmund – he refers at one point to the saint as ‘lord of Caister’ which is ‘his city’ (lines 249, 252) – but there seems no direct influence from Piramus. On Waldef’s ‘problematic rejection of the generic expectations and values of romance’, see Rosalind Field, ‘Waldef and the Matter of/with England’, in Medieval Insular Romance: Translation and Inno-

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The most remarkable feature of the Vie de St Edmund would seem to support Legge’s assertion. By the time Denis Piramus composed his work, there were many versions of the saint’s life in existence, and yet his is the only one to describe with nautical detail Edmund’s voyage by sea from Saxony to East Anglia. It is a pleasing irony that this journey rests ultimately on a fundamental misunderstanding of the earliest known Life of the saint. The Continental scholar, Abbo of Fleury, spent a couple of years (c. 986–8) at Ramsey abbey, where the monks commissioned him to write about the patron saint of Bury St Edmunds, martyred by the Danes in 869–70; the result was the Passio Sancti Edmundi.4 Abbo (c. 945–1004) claimed to have heard his story of Edmund first-hand from St Dunstan but ‘almost certainly … knew virtually nothing about St Edmund’s death’.5 He used Bede for his account of the arrival in Britain of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes but, unlike his source, claimed that East Anglia was settled not by Angles but Saxons; Edmund was thus descended from a line of kings, ‘sprung from the noble stock of the Old Saxons’ (ex antiquorum Saxonum nobili prosapia oriundus), that is, from Continental Saxons whose descendants had arrived in Britain.6 Abbo’s phrase continued to be repeated almost verbatim by subsequent writers but whereas most chroniclers, in both Latin and Anglo-Norman, correctly represented Edmund as English, the mid-twelfth-century Geoffrey of Wells misunderstood the words: he assumed Edmund came from the Continent, and so his De Infantia Sancti Eadmundi invents a story that King Offa of East Anglia, on a journey to Jerusalem to pray for an heir, passes through the land of his relative, the king of the Saxons, and chooses his son as his successor. Edmund thus sails to East Anglia, though this journey is not described. The Vie de St Edmund depends on Geoffrey for its account of Edmund’s enfances, and elaborates the saint’s marine travels.7

vation, ed. Judith Weiss, Jennifer Fellows, and Morgan Dickson (Cambridge: Brewer, 2000), pp. 25–39 (p. 35). 4 For Abbo’s text, see Lord Francis Hervey, Corolla Sancti Eadmundi: The Garland of Saint Edmund King and Martyr (London: John Murray, 1907) and Three Lives of English Saints, ed. Michael Winterbottom (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1972). I use Hervey’s text and translation. 5 Antonia Gransden, Legends, Traditions and History in Medieval England (London and Rio Grande, OH: Hambledon Press, 1992), p. 87. 6 Hervey, Corolla, p. 13; Dorothy Whitelock, ‘Fact and Fiction in the Legend of St Edmund’, Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology, 31 (1970), 217–33 (p. 219) 7 Geoffrey of Wells’s account, probably between c. 1150 and January 1156, was dedicated to Abbot Ording at Bury. It is found in Hervey, Corolla, pp. 135–49. See also Paul Antony Hayward, ‘Geoffrey of Wells’s Liber de infantia Sancti Edmundi and the “Anarchy” of King Stephen’s Reign’, in St Edmund, King and Martyr, ed. Anthony Bale (York: York Medieval Press, 2009), pp. 63–86; Whitelock, ‘Fact and Fiction’, pp. 219–25, and the early thirteenthcentury Passiun de Seint Edmund, ed. Judith Grant (London: Anglo-Norman Text Society, 1978), p. 70. Legge (Anglo-Norman Literature, p. 84) incorrectly says that Ording wrote the De Infantia.



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It is clear Denis Piramus must have had first-hand experience of the sea. The voyage, which lasts for 123 lines, is packed with the vocabulary of navigation: not just the many synonyms for ‘ship’ (one of which, esneke 1375, describes a light craft used by the Vikings) but precise terms like deshaneke (unfurl, 1376), hobens (guy-ropes, 1377), lof (clew-line, 1378) and boelines (bow-lines, 1381).8 It is impossible not to recall the famous voyage of King Arthur to the Continent (lines 11190–281) in Wace’s Brut twenty years earlier, which employs much of the same specialised vocabulary, and it is odd that Kjellman, the Vie’s editor, while acknowledging Piramus’s use of Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia regum Britanniae, never mentions the probability that he knew Wace and his addition to the Historia at this point.9 This is not to say that Piramus imitates Wace, but they are alike in their (possibly first-hand) detailed knowledge of the sea and ships.10 The ship episodes in the Brut and the Vie both convey the initial impression of human skill, control, and determination – the very opposite situation to the wrecked or rudderless boat which in romances so often brings a hero or heroine to land. Arthur’s sailors ‘secure the guy-ropes … manoeuvre the rudder … capture the wind in the sails … secure the studding-sails … strap the brails to the mast’ (lines 11208, 11215–16, 11219–20, 11225, 11231).11 Edmund’s crew draw up the dinghy, once out of port, into a new, strong, well made and secure ship (lines 1365–70), arrange their ropes, unfurl the sails, pull on the guy-ropes, tack to the left, and tug the bow-lines so they receive the wind (lines 1374, 1376, 1377, 1378, 1381–2). In both texts all seems well in hand. Yet Arthur’s ominous dream on board ship casts a mysterious shadow over an otherwise perfect crossing. In the Vie, with greater irony, human skill is of no avail without God’s assistance: first the wind drops so they cannot sail fast (lines 405–08), then, near Zeeland, it becomes so violent that the ships are damaged, they cannot land, and suffer

8

Kjellman, the editor of the Vie, supplies a detailed discussion (pp. cxvi–cxxi) of these terms; more of them occur in other parts of the narrative such as the invasion by the Danes Ingar, Hubbe, and Bern. 9 Legge is also dismissive: ‘the debt to Wace is not advertised and does not amount to very much’ (Anglo-Norman Literature, p. 84). 10 Sobecki believes that Wace was ‘a land-dweller’, an ‘observer’ (p. 25) but given his use of nautical terms, descriptions of storms at sea in both the Vie de St Nicolas and the Brut, and origins in the island of Jersey, it seems likely he was quite familiar with sailing himself. However, Le Saux comments that Wace’s Roman de Rou ‘draws on first-hand accounts of the practicalities of travelling by sea’, while Burgess reports the frequent conclusion that Wace was a carpenter’s son involved in the building of William’s ships: Françoise H. M. Le Saux, A Companion to Wace (Cambridge: Brewer, 2005), p. 23, and Wace, The Roman de Rou, translated by Glyn Burgess ( Jersey: Société Jersiaise, 2002), p. xix. On descriptions of storms at sea in Wace’s Vie de St Nicolas, see The Life of St Nicholas, ed. Mary Sinclair Crawford (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1923), p. 11. 11 Wace’s ‘Roman de Brut’: A History of the British, text and translation by Judith Weiss (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2002).

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the torment of no fresh water (lines 1423–32). Only the saint through his intercession can save them:

A genuilluns s’est acuté E Dampnedeu ad reclamé Ke il tel oré lur tramette Ki a sauf port les mette… Un vent surst devers miedi, Bien aspre, ki les acoilli, Ki en la veile e en lur tref Fiert, si empeint avant lur nief. Les mariners en sunt mult lié; Lur lof unt enz mult tost lancié, E alaschent lur boëlines E estreinent lur holgurdines. Aspre est le vent, li sigle legier, Unc ne les covint haneker. Bon vent aveient e bien portant. (lines 1439–59)

[He fell to his knees and called upon God to send them such a breeze as would bring them to a safe port… A very violent wind sprang up from the south which seized them, which struck their sail and mast and drove the ship forward. The sailors were delighted; very quickly they hauled their clew-line down, paid out their bow-lines and tightened their brails. The wind was violent, the sails light in weight: they never had to clew them up on the yards. They had a good and favourable wind.]12

Finally, when once again they are drifting, un dulz oré, un suple vent (a sweet breeze, a light wind, 1472) brings them to Lynn. The wind and the sea, instructed by God, have brought Edmund, a foreigner (and the East Anglians are anxious about foreine gent, 1616) but also the chosen heir, to land, just as it will later bring the devastating Danish invaders. There is nothing resembling this voyage in Waldef, but there is a similar constant anxiety about estranges gent (110). This is manifested in various ways. The romance opens, not with an introduction to the hero and his family, but with ‘a foundation myth for Norfolk and the main towns of East Anglia’;13 these towns are founded by the Romans to protect the coastline against invasion but both before and after their departure they remain vulnerable: they are sur la mer/ U genz soloient ariver/ Qui la terre gaster soloient/ E granz damages i fesoient (‘on the sea, where people used to arrive and lay the land waste and inflict great damage’, lines 151–4). No doubt this anxiety about marine invaders is owed to an enduring memory of the continual Danish attacks on East Anglia from 841 onwards, and some of the towns mentioned, like Brancaster and Caister (lines 216, 205), may reflect knowledge of them as fortified naval bases. The Vie has a 12 For the translation of the more unusual words in this passage I am indebted to Kjellman’s

investigations into the nautical terms.

13 Field, ‘Waldef’, p. 34.



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similar historical memory of the Danes, who errouent od lur navie./ Destrut en aveient meint païs,/ Meint people destrut e occis./ Nule contrée lez la mer/ Ne se put d’els ja garder (‘voyaged with their fleet. With it they ravaged many a country, destroyed and killed many people. No land next to the sea could ever defend itself from them’, lines 1916–20). The sea in Waldef dominates the actions of the hero, his family and his allies, and for much of the time is seen in a hostile light as a dangerous, unpredictable power. The poet, unlike Piramus or Wace, does not have a sailor’s familiarity with it, though he is well aware of how perilous it can be if one is on it in a small boat in stormy weather: the hero’s foes capture him this way (9825–98).14 More frequently the poet uses the sea in ways familiar from romances, to bring enemies or to separate and bring together again husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, and children. A large middle section of the poem depicts the abduction of Waldef ’s queen and their two sons from Caister by Saracens from Spain; while he takes ship to search for them, the separation is further increased by storms which divide mother from children and brothers from each other (6952–7122). Divine intervention is hinted at or overtly stated in the preservation of family members, as when Gudlac is the only person to escape a shipwreck (11971–86).15 Gudlac is en route to England at the time and is diverted to Denmark. Though ignorant of who he is, he knows he was born in England and hopes to discover his identity by returning there: En Engleterre né i fui Mais jo ne sai pas qui jo sui, Ne qui m’est ne pere ne mere Ne qui m’est serur ne frère… (lines 12185–8) [I was born in England but I don’t know who I am, nor who is my father or mother, or sister or brother]

The shipwreck is not random but crucial to the plot: Denmark provides Gudlac with the arms and men to further his enquiries. In his search for origins he resembles his father and brother: the young Waldef had to return to England from Normandy to discover ki jo sui e dunt jo sui nez/ E de quel gent jo sui estrait [‘who I am and where I was born, and which people I come from’, lines 2724–5), while Guiac leaves the grateful king of Cologne, whom he has been serving, hoping to find the same: 14 Waldef is amusing himself boating near Attleborough which, in a striking and peculiar

lapse in the poet’s knowledge of East Anglian topography, is described as being on the sea (9821; see also 341). See Holden’s Introduction to Waldef, which sees the poem as following a convention that ‘toute grande ville devait être munie d’un port’ and observes ‘les déplacements par mer sont particulièrement importants dans notre poème’ (pp. 32–3). 15 See also the preservation of Queen Ereburc who, like Jonah, is seen as a cause of the storm, and is only saved from drowning by the appearance of fine weather (lines 7057–94).

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the sea and englishness in the middle ages Iço li vint dunc en purpens Que il iert entre estranges genz Ne que il pur voirs ne savoit De queles genz il né estoit, Mais tant suvent oï avoit, Si cume la gent li disoit, Que il iert d’Engleterre né E d’iloques iert aporté. Dunc a primes se purpensa… ..qu’il en Angleterre irroit.

(lines 11769–77, 11787)

[Then it came into his mind that he was amongst foreigners, and did not truly know into which nation he had been born, but he had heard very often what people told him, that he had been born in England and brought from there. Then for the first time he decided… to go to England.]

The brothers each take ship toward their native land, bent on conquest (lines 11782, 12461, 12506, 12562) and meet on the high seas, where they first fight, then make friends, and then are separated by a storm, so that each arrives separately and (unwittingly) attacks his father. It now becomes apparent that the insistent vocabulary of conquest is no longer positive but increasingly used to focus our attention on the negative side of a lust for power and wealth. Waldef ’s distress at what he supposes are foreigners destroying his land – jo voi ci estrange gent/ Qui ma tere vont destruiant (lines 13785–6) makes us see Guiac and Gudlac in precisely that light, not as newly identified Englishmen; moreover, Guiac’s combat with his father threatens to split the family apart. In a deliberate reference to part of the Belin and Brenne episode in Wace, the disastrous outcome of this combat is only thwarted by the mother who bares her breasts to her husband and son, whereupon the separated family is reunited.16 Not for long, however; the brothers’ ambition, citing Brenne and Belin as their inspiration (15001), is to conquerre… mult luing en estrange regné (‘to make far-off conquests in foreign lands’, lines 14976–7). They cannot be dissuaded by their father’s eloquent plea to stay at home and conquer territories nearer at hand, and set off once again on their travels. There are two outcomes to their aspirations. One is at the summit of Guiac’s career: he defeats the emperor of Germany and decides to extend his empire eastwards to Rome, Greece, and the Earthly Paradise. He is only deflected from this arrogant course by the warning of a mysterious pilgrim and by messengers from England: Waldef ’s desertion

16 Wace, Brut, lines 2709–816; Waldef, lines 14, 453–544. For a discussion of how Wace’s

concern with issues of dangerous ambition and overweening power devoid of justice might have influenced Waldef, see Judith Weiss, ‘Wace to La3amon via Waldef’, in La3amon’s Brut: Approaches and Explorations, ed. Rosamund Allen, forthcoming; see also my ‘Insular Beginnings: Anglo-Norman Romance’, in A Companion to Romance, ed. Corinne Saunders (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004), pp. 26–44 (p. 36).



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by his sons, as he prophesied (lines 15281–91), and laments (lines 21343–7), has resulted in his death, at the hands of pagans from the sea. We shall never know quite how the poet of Waldef reconciled what at this point in his narrative seem to be contradictory points of view. A Latin translation was made of the poem around 1400 by Johannes Bramis, a monk at Thetford, which provides us with an ending, though not necessarily the one originally envisaged: Guiac emerges from self-imposed retirement from the world as a beggar to assume once more the reins of power and invades Greece and Rome, finally reigning as Emperor over both empires.17 But this outcome, which involves yet more journeying around the world, is in opposition to a number of firm indications in the surviving Anglo-Norman narrative that Guiac is intended to leave the poem and not reappear. His previous ambitions and values have completely changed after the arrival of the pilgrim. Anticipating the action of the hero of Gui de Warewic, which as Holden showed owes much to the earlier poem,18 Guiac resolves: A Deu le roi, nostre sengnur, Me rendrai ui en icest jur

(lines 21559–60)

[Today, this very day, I shall enter the service of God the king, Our Lord]

The poet states unequivocally that Guiac and his followers never saw each other again (22146), he never returned from exile (22150), and even cites a supposed folk-tale that he was abducted by fairies and remained forever in their land (lines 22151–60). His brother Gudlac and his men, resisting all attractive Continental offers, take ship for England. It would seem that the murder of Waldef, by pagans Brand and Hildebrand and their African giant Hunewald, is on the point of being avenged, but that is where the poem breaks off. Lacking its ending, one can only point to the tendency of the latter part of the narrative, which seems to modify its earlier admiration for the roistering exploits abroad of Waldef ’s sons and substitute a conviction that staying put and working towards peace at home through strong internal alliances is preferable. The overall narrative arch of Waldef is remarkable for the number of enemies who subsequently are reconciled and become friends; even Guiac urges this course upon his father at one point: E dun ne sunt il voz veisins? Il ne sunt vileins ne frarins, Einz sunt bons rois e de grant pris, E tuz estes né d’un païs E ensemble devez tenir, (lines 15087–92)

17 On Bramis, see Holden, Waldef, pp. 15–16, 18–19 (a slip on p. 19 tells us that Bramis’s

translation, the Historia Regis Waldei, was into English).

18 Holden, Waldef, pp. 29–31.

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the sea and englishness in the middle ages [And are they not then your neighbours? They are neither wicked nor base but good kings of great renown, and you are all born in the same land and ought to keep together, each supporting the other]

Here Waldef resembles the Vie de St Edmund and both perhaps are influenced by Wace. The Brut is continually aware of time and change (especially linguistic change where altered place-names mark transfers of power), and it shows us (as Geoffrey’s Historia did) how former enemies can become friends.19 The Prologue in Waldef also charts such changes of name and transfers of power as inevitable – Changa le siecle, changa tens (‘the world changed, times changed’, 257). The Vie shows us the Saxons voyaging to eastern England and settling there; in time these foreins d’ultre-mer (‘foreigners from overseas’, 265) become the natives who, in their turn, dread the arrival of foreine gent (1616) and are attacked by the Danish uthlages (‘pirates’, 1905). The Vie as it breaks off, unfinished, shows us East Anglia in the thick of vigorously resisting a second wave of attacks by the Danish king Swein, but Piramus must have been well aware that Swein’s son Knut founded the monastery at Bury St Edmunds: in time even the Danes become assimilated and Christianised. In any case his poem, after depicting Edmund’s martyrdom, has constantly emphasised the superior power of the saint, through the performance of miracles, to the abuse of all worldly power. The Vie de St Edmund, then, shows us the sea as bringing detested invaders but also the saint who will save the kingdom from internal discord and then, through his martyrdom, allow the growth of a lucrative cult. Edmund continued to be venerated by the Normans; in the course of the twelfth century his house at Bury became one of the most renowned monasteries in England.20 The ship bringing him to East Anglia is both a real ship with real sailors21 and the Ship of the Church carrying the Christian faith across the ocean of treacherous earthly existence.22 The love of the sea detected by Legge has to be seen in this context: in the end God and his purposes will triumph, both using and thwarting the efforts of man. Waldef, written by a landlubber uninterested in the practicalities of sailing, uses the ocean as a plot mechanism to transport his hero and his family hither and thither, and its storms to disrupt, though often through that 19 Such as Elfrid and Cadwan, Roman de Brut, lines 14000–15. For changes of place-name

in Waldef, see lines 215–18 and 243–7.

20 Susan J. Ridyard, ‘Condigna Veneratio: Post-Conquest Attitudes to the Saints of the

Anglo-Saxons’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 9 (1986), 179–206 (pp. 187–8); Antonia Gransden, Legends, p. 98. 21 That St Edmund was seen, rather like St Nicholas, as having a special connection with sea journeys is seen from the fact that he was often prayed to by those experiencing danger at sea: see Simon Yarrow, Saints and Their Communities: Miracle Stories in Twelfth-Century England (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2006), pp. 54–5. 22 See V. A. Kolve, Chaucer and the Imagery of Narrative: The First Five Canterbury Tales (London: Edward Arnold, 1984), pp. 308, 335; Peter and Ursula Dronke, Growth of Literature: The Sea and the God of the Sea, H. M. Chadwick Memorial Lectures, 8 (Cambridge: Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic, 1998), p. 11.



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disruption to further, their wishes. But in the end – though who knows what the original end would have been? – it conveys a suspicion of the sea, of its use for the arrogant extension of possibly unjustified power, of its enabling of murderous enemies. Its messages are mixed, interesting and, finally, undiscoverable.

The Sea and Border Crossings in the Alliterative Morte Arthure

Kathy Lavezzo The Somnium Scipionis or Dream of Scipio occupies the final book of Cicero’s de Republica, and was familiar to medieval readers thanks to its incorporation into Macrobius’s extremely influential commentary. A product of the late-republic era of the Roman Empire, Cicero’s text offers a spatially inflected commentary on imperial conquest in which the ocean plays a critical role. In the dream, young Scipio Aemilianus finds himself perched high amongst the stars with the ghost of his grandfather, Scipio Africanus. Upon seeing his grandson focus his gaze upon his earthly home, Africanus schools him on the ordering of the cosmos and its nine harmonising spheres. That lesson on the grandeur and concord of the universe, however, does not prevent Scipio from singling earth out for his continued attention, a move that prompts the following commentary by Africanus: Again I see you gazing at the region and abode of mortals. If it seems as small to you as it really is, why not fix your attention upon the heavens and contemn what is mortal? ... You see, Scipio, that the inhabited portions on earth are widely separated and narrow, and that vast wastes lie between these inhabited spots, as we might call them; the earth’s inhabitants are so cut off that there can be no communication among different groups. You see that the earth is girt and surrounded by certain zones. ... There are two that are habitable, and of these the southern zone, in which the inhabitants press their footprints opposite to yours, has no contact with your race; the other, northern, is inhabited by the Romans. But look closely, see how small is the portion allotted to you! The whole of the portion you inhabit is narrow at the top and broad at the sides and is in truth a small island encircled by that sea which you call the Atlantic, the Great Sea, or Ocean. But you can see how small it is despite its name!1

As James Romm has pointed out, Africanus’s lesson on geography carries an ethical message regarding how a statesman should seek not earthly glory but heavenly wisdom. Himself a world conqueror, Africanus does not stress the territorial extent of the empire but rather its limits. The earth he describes is divided into five climatic zones whose two habitable regions, the northern conti1 Commentary on the Dream of Scipio, ed. and trans. William Stahl (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), pp. 74–5 (my emphasis).

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nent controlled by the Romans and the southern region known as the Antipodes, are forever separated from each other by ‘vast wastes’. In Romm’s words, ‘Where geographic reach has become a measure of political power, Cicero’s focus on the lands that must remain out of reach translates into a warning that the limits of power must not be transcended.’2 Crucial to that geographic message is Ocean, the term classical writers used to describe the waters thought to surround the oikoumené or known world. By surrounding the northern habitable zone, Ocean adds to its diminutive nature, making Rome the capital of nothing more than ‘a small island’. Moreover, the sea represents a border that cannot and indeed should not be crossed. In a move that reflects classical notions of the oceanus dissociabilis or dividing sea offered by Horace and others, Cicero views the imperial aims of Roman generals, from the Scipios to Julius Caesar, ‘as inexorably circumscribed by Ocean’.3 As it turned out, of course, Caesar eventually crossed the sea to conquer Britain, proving that Ocean was not as insurmountable as Cicero suggests. But the status of the sea as a charged border would continue to inform discussions of empire in the west, both by ancient authors as well as by medieval writers interested in Rome and questions of expansion. As much emerges in the Alliterative Morte Arthure, a late fourteenth-century poetic account of King Arthur’s legendary conquests and, in particular, his effort to defeat the Roman emperor Lucius and seize his empire. In that anonymous text, which straddles the generic line between epic and romance, Arthur overcomes Lucius and comes quite close to taking Rome. But ultimately the king’s imperial mission fails. Arthur is forced to turn back home to England upon learning that his nephew Mordred – the man he left in charge of his realm – has taken for himself both the crown and Queen Guinevere. In the civil war that ensues, the king is killed and the empire he built dissolves. While Mordred’s rebellion obviously causes Arthur’s fall, other reasons emerge in the poem as well, including a rationale that we might best describe as geographic. That spatial cause for the king’s failure appears, tellingly, in a ‘schewying’ (3401, ‘dream’) which the king experiences near the end of the poem, just before he learns of his nephew’s treason and is forced to end his Roman campaign.4 The second of two somnia featured in the Morte, the dream features the wheel of fortune and culminates in the goddess Fortuna enthroning Arthur and bestowing upon him the accoutrements of imperial dominion. As Arthur puts it to a wise man to whom he recounts his dream: 2

The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought: Geography, Exploration, and Fiction (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992), p. 135. 3 Romm, The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought, p. 136; Sebastian Sobecki, The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008), pp. 26–7. 4 All citations of the Morte are from Morte Arthure: A Critical Edition, ed. Mary Hamel (New York: Garland, 1984); translations are my own in consultation with Hamel and Benson’s edition (King Arthur’s Death: The Middle English Stanzaic Morte Arthur and Alliterative Morte Arthure, ed. Larry D. Benson and rev. Edward E. Foster (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1994).



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Scho lifte me vp lightly with hir leue hondes And sette me softely in the see, þe septre me rechede; Craftely with a kambe cho kembede myn heuede, That the krispan[d]e kroke to my crownne raughte, Dressid one me a diademe that dighte was full faire And syne profres me a pome pighte full of faire stonys, Enamelde with azoure, the erth thereon depayntide, Serkylde with the salte see appone sere halfes, In sygne þat I sothely was souerayne in erthe. (3349–57) [She lifted me up lightly with her slim hands and gently set me in the seat, and gave me the sceptre. With a comb she skilfully arranged my hair so that the curling lock reached my crown. [She] placed upon me a crown that was adorned very beautifully, and then offers me an orb adorned entirely with beautiful gems, enamelled in blue, with the earth depicted thereupon, encircled with the salty ocean upon every side, as a token that I truly was sovereign on earth.]

In this charged scene, of all the symbols of Arthur’s would-be global empire, it is the pome or orb which receives special stress, due both to its final, privileged positioning in the list and the detailed description lavished upon it. While Arthur does not describe the ‘septre’ and states merely that his crown ‘dighte was full faire’, he dwells upon the ‘pome’ for some three lines. Those lines clarify that the ‘pome’ is no apple but a gem-encrusted sphere depicting the earth. As in the Dream of Scipio, geography is central to Arthur’s dream in the Morte and, I would suggest, serves a similarly critical function. To be sure, orbs usually functioned in late medieval culture as straightforward signs of power. Royal portraits and seals of fourteenth-century English kings such as Richard II and Edward III depicted those monarchs holding globes; similarly, Holy Roman Emperors such as Frederick II (1220–50) were portrayed bearing orbs.5 The world imagined by those globes only intensified their authoritative force. Unlike the zonal world depicted in Cicero’s text, medieval royal orbs offer another image of the earth, known as the cross-orb or T-O schema. Representing not all the territories of the world but only the terra cognita of Asia, Africa, and Europe, royal orbs suppress the presence of unknown and unreachable lands on earth. The orb of Arthur’s dream obviously reflects that impulse; Lady Fortune gives it to him as a ‘sygne’ that he ‘was souerayne in erthe’. Yet Arthur’s globe is also unusual in its inclusion of the world ocean, a detail that royal orbs typically omit. Indeed, the Morte, like Cicero’s Dream of Scipio, lays particular stress on the salty blue sea that encircles the known world on all sides, rendering it a kind of island. That stress on Ocean in the Morte serves a 5

See, for example, the Great Seal of Edward III; the portrait of Richard II in Westminster Abbey; and the depiction of the seal of Frederick II in Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora; Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 16, fol 127, c. 1250. On the relationship between mappae mundi and medieval English kingship, see Daniel Birkholz, The King’s Two Maps: Cartography and Culture in Thirteenth-Century England (London: Routledge, 2004).

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didactic function as well. In the same way that the sea serves in Scipio’s dream as a watery limit that should not be breached, the Morte poet invokes the sea here to suggest the transgressive nature of Arthur’s territorial expansion. As much emerges in the manner in which the poem likens the globe to the notorious apple of paradise. After giving the world to Arthur, Lady Fortune takes the king into an Edenic pomarie or apple orchard, where she urges the king to ‘reche... to þe ripeste... for Rome es thyn awen’ (3389, ‘reach... for the ripest... because Rome is yours’). Shortly after Arthur eats the apple (and imbibes wine from a well), Fortune’s mood abruptly shifts and, as Arthur recounts, ‘Abowte scho whirles the whele and whirles me vndire,/ Till all my qwarters þat whille whare qwaste al to peces’ (3388–9, ‘She whirls the wheel and whirls me under [it]/ until my entire body was smashed into pieces’). Details such as the pun on pomarie and pome, the contiguity of those two episodes, and their appearance just before the king’s abject crushing by Fortune’s spinning wheel, imply that Arthur’s global conquest transgresses in the manner of the Fall. As much as Mordred’s treason, Arthur’s crossing of the world ocean to ‘consume’ continental territories accounts for the collapse of his imperial project. But crucially, the poet offers his geographic critique of Arthurian imperialism from a completely different vantage point than that assumed by Cicero. While the Roman philosopher lived in the privileged centre of the oikoumené, the Morte poet hailed from the watery border of the known world. The extent to which the English were self-conscious about their ocean location emerges in the literary matière of which the Morte is a part. The great instigator of the matter of Britain, Geoffrey of Monmouth, opens his Historia Regum Britanniae (c. 1138) with the statement, ‘Brittania insularum optima in occidentali occeano’ (2, 53, ‘Britain, the best of islands, is situated in the Western Ocean’) and has the goddess Diana describe Britain to its eponymous founder, Brutus, as none other than an ‘Insula in occeano’ (9, 65, ‘an island in the sea’).6 Around the same time as the Morte, we find the author of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight opening his alliterative poem with an account of the translation of empire that describes the Trojan Brutus’s mythic founding of Britain beyond la Manche, ‘fer ouer þe French flod’ (13, ‘far beyond the French sea’). As these and other geographic accounts of England’s global location affirm, the border identity of the world ocean belonged to England as well. The same ocean that, for an ancient writer like Cicero, functioned as a barrier preventing world conquest, instead served for medieval English writers like the Morte poet as a means of defining Britain and more particularly, England, as world limit.7 Thus the ‘salte see’ surrounding the 6

Citations of Geoffrey’s text refer to page numbers first from Wright and then from Thorpe (The Historia Regum Britanniae of Geoffrey of Monmouth, Vol. I, Bern, Bürgerbibliothek, MS. 568, ed. Neil Wright (Cambridge: Brewer, 1984) and The History of the Kings of Britain, trans. Lewis Thorpe (New York: Penguin, 1966)). 7 I discuss the national uses of English geographic marginality in non-Arthurian texts in Angels on the Edge of the World: Geography, Literature, and English Community, 1000–1534 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2006).



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world portrayed on Arthur’s orb works as a reminder in the Morte of the king’s insular roots and, more critically, his problematic rejection of that island identity. Encoded in the ocean encircling the earth, I am suggesting, is a critique of Arthur’s Roman project as well as an affirmation of his circumscribed Englishness. As we shall see, at the start of the Morte, the sea provides Arthur with a source for his sovereignty, as the king exerts his power over a realm clearly defined as insular. But as the king crosses over the Channel and pushes further and further into Europe during his Roman campaign, he evinces a certain disrespect for British insularity that accounts for the failure of that imperial project and, ultimately, the collapse of Arthurian England altogether. To be sure, this is not to say that the Morte is wholly critical of Arthur’s imperial project. My reading of the poem follows critics such as Larry Benson, Patricia DeMarco, Patricia Ingham, and Lee Patterson in reading the Morte as a deeply ambivalent work. In an important early account of the lack of unity in the poem, Benson observes how the text manages to ‘maintain contradicting attitudes and... derive aesthetic pleasure from the tension of unresolved conflicts’.8 Benson made this astute observation some forty years ago in specific reference to the tension in the poem ‘between the ‘‘excess’’ of earthly kingship and the [Christian] virtue of renunciation’ (p. 80). Thus at the same time that the poet criticises Arthur’s imperialism from a spiritual perspective, it celebrates the king’s martial conquests, as ‘the sheer gusto of [the poet’s] descriptions of battle’ makes clear (p. 82). In a more recent and spatially inflected account of such contradictions in the Morte, Chism has seized upon the paradoxical pleasure the poet takes in the violation of boundaries and, particularly, the penetration of the limits of a knight’s body.9 For example, in its intricate account of Sir Priamus’s piercing of Gawain’s armour, his clothing and, finally, his flesh, the Morte embraces an outpouring of blood that triumphantly supplants ‘armorial insignia’ as the finest, indeed even sacramental, signifier of chivalric prowess, even as it threatens to end Gawain’s life.10 As Chism has made clear, the ambivalence of the Morte assumes a distinctly spatial form, insofar as the poem at once embraces and recoils from boundary crossings associated with martial excess. The poet focuses repeatedly on shifts across dividing lines, relishes the passage into one space from another, enjoys testing how far a boundary can be exceeded, and even revels in the destruction that can result from going too far. Empire is unquestionably at the heart of such fraught border crossings in the Morte. Indeed, the Morte poet evinces an unparalleled investment in the idea of Arthur pushing past the limits of Britain to Rome. The Arthur of the Morte gets geographically closer to his imperial goal than his literary predecessors. As William Matthews has pointed out, while ‘in the original Arthurian chronicles, 8

‘The Alliterative Morte Arthure and Medieval Tragedy’, Tennessee Studies in Literature, 11 (1966), 75–87 (p. 75). 9 Alliterative Revivals (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002). 10 Alliterative Revivals, p. 220.

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news of Mordred’s rebellion comes to the king in Burgundy, and he turns home from there, abandoning his plan to march on Rome’, the protagonist of the Morte travels into Italy all the way to Viterbo, a mere 100 kilometres from Rome, where the king expects to receive his imperial anointing in no less than two weeks.11 Clearly, the Morte poet relishes the idea of Arthur travelling as far as possible into the continent, away from the boundaries of his English homeland. At the same time, however, such national border violations enable a larger scale version of the destructions witnessed at the scale of the knightly body. Chism implies as much in her analysis of Arthur’s first battle after he crosses the Channel, his fight with the giant of Mont St Michel. As a cannibal, a tyrant, and a rapist, the giant represents notions of wrongful consumption and conquest that render him a figure of the Roman emperor Lucius, who emerges in the Morte as an orientalised oppressor. Arthur’s defeat of the giant suggests his opposition to such excesses. But curiously, after killing the vile giant, Arthur keeps for himself two of his enemy’s possessions, a club and a bizarre garment made of the beards of kings. As Chism points out: By virtue of these shared emblems the poem shatters the ideological boundaries between different sides of the conflict just as Arthur transgresses the boundaries of England, France, and Italy. As Arthur moves into Lucius’s territory across the sea in France, he acquires symbols that recall Lucius’s tyranny, while Lucius is linked to symbols originally associated with Arthur.12

Implicit in Chism’s interpretation is how the king’s crossing of England’s geographic limits creates a kind of opening or aperture through which the symbols and actions associated with England and Rome problematically circulate back and forth. In the same way that Priamus’s wounding harms Gawain even as it affirms his valour, Arthur’s bursting past or ‘wounding’ of England’s limits is a show of imperial might that also threatens the integrity of both Arthur and his nation insofar as it opens them up to destructive currents. Beyond the passage of the tyrannous giant’s accoutrements to Arthur, those flows include the circulation of the dragon emblem on both English and Roman heraldic objects, and, near the close of the poem, the movement of Saracens and other foreigners onto English soil.13 11

The Tragedy of Arthur: A Study of the Alliterative Morte Arthure (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1960), p. 51. See also George Parks, ‘King Arthur and the Roads to Rome’, Journal of English and Germanic Philology, 45 (1946), 164–70. Matthews is referring to the chronicles of Geoffrey of Monmouth, Wace, and La3amon. The fourth Brut source of the Morte, Robert Mannyng’s chronicle, tells us that Arthur gets as far as the Alps (14,025). Matthews speculates that Arthur’s arrival in Italy reflects a tradition present in certain medieval histories; for example, Peter Langtoft’s chronicle, the Flores Historiarum, Higden’s Polychronicon, the Worcester Annals all place Arthur in Italy (pp. 51–2). 12 Alliterative Revivals, p. 210. 13 On the dragon, see Arthur’s first dream (760ff; discussed below), 1252 (where the dragon is associated with Lucius); on the Saracens brought into England by Mordred, see, for example, 3527–30.



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The question of flows and currents finds its epitome in the Morte in its representation of water, which everywhere informs the martial boundary crossings imaged in the poem. Gawain’s gushing wounds are quenched and healed by a balm distilled from the four rivers that ‘flowes owte of Paradice when þe flode ryses’ (2706) (‘flow out of Paradise when the tide rises’); and the majority of battles depicted in the poem occur alongside streams, rivers and the ocean. But of all such fluid bodies, the sea proves most crucial to the imperial tensions depicted in the Morte. As a border setting Arthur’s British homeland apart from the rest of the known world, the ocean sets an imperial idea of global conquest against a more national notion of English isolation and insularity. As Sebastian Sobecki has argued, ‘a literary history of the sea’ became during the Middle Ages ‘part of the vernacular discourse of Englishness’, and the Alliterative Morte Arthure is no exception.14 At the same time that the poet relishes the idea of pressing beyond England’s watery border further and further into the oikoumené, he registers the status of Arthur’s Roman project as a wrongful violation of English insularity. As the aforementioned citations of English insularity in Geoffrey of Monmouth and the Gawain poet indicate, the literary history that the Morte poet inherited provided him with much inspiration for his oceanic meditation on English expansion. Namely, the poet’s primary sources, Geoffrey’s Historia, Wace’s Anglo-Norman Roman de Brut (1155), La3amon’s Middle English Brut (c. 1185–1220) and the 1338 Middle English chronicle of Robert Mannyng of Brunne, all exhibit an awareness of the charged relationship between Englishness and the sea. But insofar as, among all medieval Arthurian texts, the Morte seems most invested in the sea as a tool for engaging with questions of empire and nation, what circumstances peculiar to his time and place may have influenced the poet to adopt that perspective? Although such historical questions cannot be answered with firm precision, we can point to some broad trends regarding fourteenth-century warfare, commerce, and the sea that may have informed the Morte. The only extant version of the poem appears in a miscellany dating from the 1440s, Lincoln Cathedral Library MS 91. But the Morte likely was composed earlier, near the turn of the fourteenth century, and has been read productively by scholars as a commentary on kingship, war, and imperialism during both the reigns of the unpopular Richard II (1377–99) and his far more successful predecessor, Edward III (1327–77).15 Edward enjoyed many military successes during the war he initiated against France. In particular, the king’s sea victories during the Hundred Years War provide a suggestive context for the Morte poet’s embrace of the idea of Arthur crossing the Channel in quest of imperial grandeur. Edward’s 1340 victory at Sluys against the French and their Genoese 14 Sobecki, The Sea and Medieval English Literature, p. 4. 15 Patricia DeMarco offers the most recent historicisation of the Morte and English warfare

(‘An Arthur for the Ricardian Age: Crown, Nobility, and the Alliterative Morte Arthure’, Speculum, 80 (2005), 464–93). She offers a helpful overview of critical work on the dating of the poem and its historical affiliations on pp. 464–7.

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and Castilian allies was, in Timothy Runyan’s words, a ‘naval engagement’ of unmatched ‘scope’ for the period.16 That naval success, along with similar achievements in 1350 (at Les Espangols sur Mer, off Winchelsea) and in 1372 (at La Rochelle), supported the idea of the sea as a powerful means or passageway to military expansion, and even led to Edward’s special alignment with the sea. Parliament proclaimed Edward ‘Lord of the Sea’, and the king had a gold noble minted that portrayed him, bedecked with sword and shield, standing over a ship upon surging waves.17 Such affirmations of naval warfare, however, would necessarily be counterbalanced by an awareness of the costs of war for a poet composing his work at the end of the fourteenth century. Indeed, even before the ascent of Richard to the throne, English writers may have been attuned to the excesses of war. Edward’s battles were expensive, and the naval aspect of the battle against France may have cost more than its land-based military counterpart.18 Moreover, although Edward fashioned himself as an ocean ruler, by failing to keep up a regular navy and relying instead on private suppliers, the monarch allowed English sea power to decline and made possible ‘the great French raids of the latter years of his reign’.19 With the reign of Richard the costs of war as well as the diminishment of England as a martial power only intensified. All of Richard’s initial naval (as well as military) forays were highly pricy failures costing some 250,000 pounds, and the king’s reign was marked overall by the contraction of England’s continental holdings.20 Still, Richard did harbour imperial desires throughout his reign, and in 1397 he even dallied with election as none other than Holy Roman Emperor.21 16 ‘Ships and Mariners in Later Medieval England’, The Journal of British Studies, 16 (1977),

1–17 (p. 9).

17 ‘Ships and Mariners in Later Medieval England’, pp. 16–17. 18 ‘Ships and Mariners in Later Medieval England’, p. 4. 19 James A. Williamson, The English Channel: A History (Cleveland, OH and New York:

World Publishing, 1959), pp. 118–19.

20 Nigel Saul, Richard II (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1997), p. 48,

and DeMarco, ‘An Arthur for the Ricardian Age’, p. 468. 21 During the nineties, when the war on the continent was at a relative standstill, Richard endeavored to consolidate his power through military expeditions to Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. Richard aspired, through this English expansion within the British Isles, to create, as Saul puts it, ‘congeries of lordships, with the core and the peripheries on a sort of continuum and it is possible that he had in mind the ‘‘imperial’’ notion of a crown possessed of many dependencies’ (Richard II, p. 270). The apparent success the German electors had in deluding Richard into believing in his eventual Roman overlordship suggests how the king may have fancied that his earlier military expeditions in Britain constituted a mere prelude to greater imperial triumphs (May McKisack, The Fourteenth Century, 1307–1399 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959), p. 477). In addition to Richard’s flirtation with imperial election, other actions demonstrated his attachment to Rome and things Roman. During the schism that occurred a year after Richard assumed the throne, England joined Germany and Italy to support the Roman papacy of Urban VI (1378–89). Two years later, Richard married Anne of Bohemia, the daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV (1346–78). Warfare also was promoted by Richard’s aristocratic foes; one of whom enjoyed a notable naval victory: in 1381, the Earl of



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All of which is to say, while the purview of this essay precludes the detailed analysis required for a full consideration of fourteenth-century warfare, conquest, and marine enterprises, this short overview should provide a sense of how a writer working at the end of the century had ample reasons both to embrace and to reject the idea of Arthur’s imperial journeying beyond the Channel to Rome. If, close to the end of the Morte, the orb of Arthur’s Fortune dream recalls the insularity and global marginality abandoned by the king through his Roman campaign, at the start of the poem we see what Arthur has lost due to that imperial effort: an ability to invoke the sea as a means of imagining England and showcasing his sovereignty. The plot of the poem is set in motion when Roman ambassadors arrive at Arthur’s court to relate Lucius’s demand that Arthur come to Rome to give both tribute and an explanation for the fact that he ‘ocupyes the lanndez/That awe homage of alde till hym and his eldyrs’ (98–9, ‘occupies the lands that owe homage of old to him and his elders’). After spending a week deliberating with his knights and hosting the Roman envoys, Arthur rejects Lucius’s demands and instead determines to fight the emperor and take Rome for himself. Then, in a revealing passage, Arthur gives the ambassadors detailed directions for their safe passage as they depart from England. In this episode original to the Morte, geography serves in Arthur’s instructions as a means of producing England as a discrete and sizeable entity. Arthur specifies that the envoys must take no more than a week to travel ‘fro Carlisle to the coste’ or from Carlisle to the coast (476), and thus evokes a path that cuts crosswise over the entirety of England, from its north-western border near Scotland to its southeastern coastline at Sandwich. The highly personal role Arthur plays in laying out the logistics of the journey – the path the Romans take on Watling Street, how many miles per day they must travel, etc. – demonstrates how territory serves as an important means of producing Arthur’s sovereignty. And among the spaces used to construct that royal identity, the ocean is particularly charged. While the sea surrounds not only England but also all of Britain, insularity has a national import insofar as it serves in Arthur’s instructions as a charged limit for specifically English territories traced from Carlisle to the Channel. Indeed, the sea as English border forms part of the climax of Arthur’s speech, which ends: Be now lathe or leefe, right as þe thynkes – For bothe þi lyffe and thi lym ligges þer appon, þofe sir Lucius had laide þe the lordchipe of Rome. For be þou founden a fute withowte þe flode merkes Aftyr þe aughtende day when vndroun es rungen, þou sall be heuedede in hye and with horsse drawen, And seyn heyly be hangede, houndes to gnawen! (458–64, my emphasis) Arundel captured 50 French and Flemish ships and gained much popular favour by distributing cheap wine seized through the attack.

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the sea and englishness in the middle ages [Whether [my command] is now loathsome or agreeable to you, both your life and your limbs hang upon it, even if Sir Lucius had given you the lordship of Rome. If you are found a foot outside the edge of the sea, after the eighth day when the third hour is rung, you shall be beheaded swiftly and drawn apart by horses, and then hung highly for hounds to gnaw upon [my emphasis].]

Jumping between national and human scales, Arthur warns the envoys that if they fail to rid England of their bodies, if they so much as keep one foot outside England’s ocean border beyond the time allotted for their journey, their infringement upon English territory will result in the violent violation of Roman bodies. That Arthur immediately follows his denigration of Lucius by evoking the sea as national limit makes clear how, more than any other location, the ocean serves to delimit English territory and construct Arthurian power over and against Roman authority. Arthur’s national deployment of the sea in his warning to the ambassadors gains more force and significance when we compare it to a moment earlier in the poem, when Lucius uses the sea to connote Roman authority. When the Roman messengers arrive at Arthur’s court, they caution the king that if he rebels against the emperor’s summons, Lucius ‘sall the seke ouer þe see, wyth sexten kynges, / Bryne Bretayn þe brade and bryttyn thy knyghtys,/ And brynge the bouxsomly as a beste with brethe whare hym lykes’ (103–07, ‘shall seek you over the sea, burn Great Britain and beat down your knights/ and bring you buxomly as a beast with anger where he likes’). Styling himself as an unstoppable ‘hunter’ of Arthur, whom the emperor will ‘tame’ and lead around like a domesticated animal, Lucius invokes the Channel as an easy passage to Britain and thus recalls its historical status during the medieval period ‘as a path by which invaders came’.22 More precisely, Lucius threatens to repeat the conquest of his Roman predecessor, Julius Caesar, and restore Britain to its ancient status as a western outpost of the Roman Empire. In that initial Roman invasion, which first appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History, Caesar similarly ties the sea to a certain English vulnerability to conquest, though that vulnerability results from the status of the sea not as an easy passage but as an isolating border. Geoffrey writes that while ‘aspexisset... ad occeanum’ (35, 107, ‘gazing across the ocean’) upon Britain from the coast of Gaul, Caesar muses that he shall conquer the island easily since the Britons ‘ualde degenerati sunt a nobis nec quid sit militia nouerunt cum infra occeanum extra orbem commaneant’ (35, 107, ‘must be very degenerate when compared with us, and they can know nothing at all about modern warfare, living as they do beyond the deep sea and quite cut off from the world’). Caesar’s notion of the sea as a boundary that makes the English easy targets, a people woefully ignorant of advances in martial technology, is soon 22 Williamson, The English Channel: A History, p. 32. Williamson claims that while ‘The idea

of using the sea as a defence was early formulated and sometimes applied from Roman times onward’, not until Tudor times would there be the establishment of a regular navy (p. 32).



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challenged in Geoffrey’s text, which depicts the English as a people for whom isolation has fostered a fierce independence. Conquest hardly proves easy for the Romans, who are defeated repeatedly before they eventually overcome the Britons. Similarly, in the Morte, Arthur overturns Lucius’s claims of territorial mastery. Instead of being led docilely ‘as a beste’ by Lucius in Britain, Arthur exerts his sovereign control over England as he dictates the movements of the imperial emissaries from Carlisle to the coast. Unlike Arthur’s safe-conduct terms, Lucius’s threat of conquest appears in virtually all of the sources of the Morte, two of which offer an even more involved Roman deployment of the sea than that offered by the Morte poet. Constructing the Channel as a border on either side of which Arthur cannot avoid his imperial sway, Wace’s Lucius proclaims: ‘Ne qui pas que tu m’i atendes/ Ne que de mei France defendes;/ Ja de ça mer, al mien espeir,/ Ne t’oseras faire veeir./ E si tu ultre mer esteies/ Ja ma venue n’atendreies./ Ne savras en nul liu tapir/ Dunt jo ne te face saillir’ (‘it is my conviction you will never dare to show your face beyond the Channel. And if you were overseas, you would never await my arrival. There is no place you’ll be able to take cover out of which I won’t rout you’).23 Expanding upon Wace, Mannyng has Lucius warn Arthur that: If it be so þou mak delay & wille not com at þi day ne bewe tille our commandment, Þan telle I þe þat Þou ert schent. Þorgh force, ffrance I wille þe reue; Of Bretayne nouht a fote leue. I wene not þou wille abide, & if þou do þou sale þe hide. I trowe nouht on þis half þe se Þou sale dur schewe Þees, if I kom, forsope þou flees...24 [But if you delay, and will not come on the appointed day and will not bow to our commandment, then I tell you that you are destroyed. Through force, I will deprive you of France; I will not leave you one foot of Britain. I believe that you will not wait, and if you do you shall hide yourself. I do not believe that on this side of the sea you shall dare show yourself to me, and if you are on this half, if I come, truly you will flee...] (my emphasis)

Repeatedly referring to the each ‘half ’ of the ‘þe se’, Mannyng’s Lucius lays an unprecedented stress on the Channel as a border separating ‘Bretayne’ from the rest of the world. Moreover, Mannyng has Lucius imbue his warning with temporal and spatial characteristics that the Morte poet recalls in Arthur’s safe 23 Wace, Roman de Brut: Text and Translation, ed. and trans. Judith Weiss, rev. edn (Exeter:

University of Exeter Press, 2002), ll. 10,701–08.

24 The Chronicle, ed. Idelle Sullens (Binghamton, NY: Binghamton University, 1996), ll.

11,517–27.

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passage instructions. Like Arthur’s insistence upon the envoys keeping to their brisk seven-day timeline, Lucius demands that Arthur come to Rome without ‘delay’. And in the same way that Arthur threatens that if the envoys are so much as ‘a foot without the flood marches’ they will die, Lucius warns that if Arthur hesitates, the emperor will ‘Of Bretayne nouht a fote leue’ for its king. The Morte poet, in other words, uses Arthur’s safe-conduct speech to do more than invert the geographic logic of Lucius’s threat as it appears earlier his poem. He also takes the oceanic rhetoric that Wace and especially Mannyng applied to Lucius and applies them to Arthur, so that not the Romans but the English exert their sovereign authority over every ‘foot’ of a Britain defined by its positioning in the Channel. In contrast to the image of an Arthur cowering on either side of the sea conjured by Lucius’s missive, Arthur’s words deploy the sea as the boundary of an expansive English territory over which the king enjoys utter sovereignty and the Romans endure the anxious and frantic relationship of disempowered ‘alienes’ or strangers. Upon taking their leave of Arthur, the Romans ‘for reddour... reden and risted them neuer’ (485, ‘fearfully ride without stopping’) until, with utmost ‘glee’ (489, ‘joy’) of ‘þe sounde of þe see and Sandwyche belles... to þe wane see þey went all att ones... weyde vp þeire ankyrs/ And fleede at þe flore flude’ (490–4, ‘the sound of the sea and the bells of Sandwich, at once they went down to the wine-dark sea,... weighed up their anchors, and fled with the flood tide’). Crucially, the poet’s oceanic evocation of English insularity and Arthurian sovereignty emerges in the context of English imperialism. The Morte opens with a detailed catalogue of over thirty western and northern European sites that Arthur ‘by conquest had wonnen’ (26). That account of the king’s empire, which encompasses the British territories of Wales and Scotland, reaches west to Ireland, north to Norway and inland to France, Germany, and Austria, imagines England as the centre of an expansive empire in which not England but Ireland figures as a border territory situated ‘as Ocean runnes’ (31, ‘where Ocean flows’). Yet, the shift from that initial display of Arthur’s holdings to the more nationalistic notion of English insularity that emerges in Arthur’s safe-conduct instructions, implicitly criticises the king’s imperial efforts. It is as the ruler of, not a global empire, but an island bounded by the sea, that Arthur best exerts his sovereignty. And, when Arthur sets off across the Channel with his men to take the imperial crown from Lucius, he problematically echoes the very movements he ordered the foreign ambassadors to perform. To be sure, the king’s send-off is a far more grand and assured affair than that of the Romans. But similarities such as the speed with which both parties leave English shores and the poet’s identification of Sandwich as the port from which both groups set off on their journeys, make the English disturbing doubles of the very disempowered foreigners Arthur derides.25

25 In Geoffrey, Wace, La3amon, and Mannying, Arthur departs from Southampton, and the

place from which the Romans depart is not specified.



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The Morte poet further criticises Arthur’s channel crossing through shifts in tone from his sources. Like Wace, La3amon, and Mannying, the poet offers a detailed and rousing rendering of the king and his troops readying their ships and setting sail for the continent. The thrill of the moment especially emerges in the poet’s portrayal of an embarkation and departure whose alacrity resonates with the rushing of the ocean itself: sails are ‘vncouerde at ones’ (739, ‘unfurled immediately’), and ships depart ‘tyte, as þe tyde rynnez’ (737, ‘quickly, as the tide runs out’) over ‘wale ythes’ (741, ‘surging waves’). At the same time, however, the Morte does not provide anything like the celebration by Wace (and, later, Mannyng) of the first hardiz or bold sailor who dared to set off for unknown lands.26 Even more significantly, the Morte omits the happy sentiments that all earlier versions of the departure attribute to the king and/or his men. Geoffrey tells us that Arthur sets off ‘cum gaudio’ (116, 237, ‘with joy’), Wace writes that ‘Les genz Artur a joie aloent’ (11239, ‘Arthur’s men went on their way joyfully’), La3amon relates that the king’s men are ‘wunder bliðe’ (12747, ‘extremely happy’), and Mannyng describes the troops as ‘ioyfulle & glad’ (11801, ‘joyful and happy’) as they set off across the Channel.27 In sharp contrast to those previous texts, the Morte refers to ‘steryn’ (735, ‘stern’) knights as well as minstrels ‘sterynly’ (745, ‘loudly’) singing aboard ship. Modifiers whose connotations encompass strength, violence, severity, boldness, dread, and cruelty, the adjective steren and adverb sterenly transform what was a joyful crossing in earlier texts into serious and possibly even dreadful business (MED, s.v. stern(e, sternli). That bleak tone worsens thanks to a dream Arthur experiences on ship while lulled by the ‘swoghe’ (759, ‘swaying’) of the sea. Unlike the king’s later dream about Fortuna, which is original to the Morte, this early somnium appears in all prior chronicle accounts, and involves a tremendous battle between a dragon and a bear in which the former beast prevails. In the Morte as in most versions, the bear signifies some sort of opponent of the king, such as the Roman emperor Lucius or the giant of Mont St Michel, while the dragon symbolises Arthur and his forces. The orientation of the two battling beasts certainly urges those linkages. While the bear, like Lucius and the giant, hails from the East, the dragon – whose ‘dredfull’ (760) appearance recalls the ‘steren’ English forces – moves away from Arthur’s far western homeland, ‘owte of the weste landez’ (762, ‘out of the 26 Wace writes that ‘mult fu hardiz, mult fu curteis/ Cil ki fist nef premierement/ E en

mer se mist aval vent,/ Terre querant qu’il ne veeit/ E rivage qu’il ne saveit’ (11,234–8). In the Lambeth manuscript of Mannyng’s chronicle, the following lines are added at line 11,798 of Petyt MS 511 (used by Sullens in her edition): ‘Queynte he was & right hardy/ & engynous man & sley/ þat first fond schip on se to fare/ & turned wyþ þe wynd þer he nyste whare/ Lond to seke þat he saw nought/ Ne whiderward he schulde be brought.’ 27 Wace, La3amon, and Mannying’s texts are cited by line number. Translations of Wace are taken from Roman de Brut, ed. and trans. Weiss. Translations of La3amon are mine in consultation with Layamon’s Arthur: The Arthurian Section of Layamon’s Brut, ed. and trans. W. R. J. Barron and S. C. Weinberg, rev. edn. (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2001). Translations of Mannying are my own.

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western lands’) and crosses over the ‘wale ythez’ (763, ‘surging waves’) of the ‘depe’ (761, ‘sea’). The sheer fact that the dragon of the Morte defeats the bear renders Arthur’s dream a good omen of battles to come. At the same time, however, the dream disturbs. The poet refers to the dream as Arthur’s ‘tourmente’ (810, ‘torment’), and has the king claim that unless it is interpreted for him, he will quickly ‘swelte’ (813, ‘die’).28 The stern tenor of Arthur’s daytime departure from Britain thus deepens into a mood of sheer terror after the king’s dream. Curiously, the source of Arthur’s fright is the very dragon that signifies him and his troops. When the king awakes and approaches some wise men to interpret his dream, he tells them that he has been ‘drechede with a dragon and syche a derfe beste’ (811, ‘destroyed by a dragon and such a cruel beast’). Indeed, the poet foregrounds the English threat posed by the dragon, by initially describing it as ‘dryfande ouer þe depe to drenchen hys pople’ (761, ‘driving over the deep to drown his people’), an action that is repeated verbatim by the sages when they claim that the dragon ‘That come dryfande ouer þe deepe to drynchen thy pople’ (816, ‘who came driving over the sea to drown your people’) is Arthur himself. The self-destruction indicated by the dragon – who at once represents Arthur and his people even as it endeavours to harm them – shows how this early dream, like the later wheel of fortune dream, foretells not only the rise but also the fall of the king.29 And it does so, importantly, via water: the dragon threatens to ‘drenschen’ or engulf, drown, drink up, or sink the English people (MED, s.v., ‘drenchen’). The Morte poet’s image of a drowning dragon marks a departure from his closest source for this episode, La3amon. La3amon’s chronicle similarly deploys Arthur’s first dream to look toward the collapse of Arthurian England, but he does so via that element we normally associate with dragons, fire: ‘mid his feure he liht al þis lond-riche’ (12774, ‘with his fire he burned up all this rich land’). However, elsewhere in the Brut, in a separate dream that, like the wheel of fortune dream in the Morte, occurs later in the narrative, La3amon does use drowning to connote Arthur’s downfall. Like the wheel of fortune dream in the Morte, La3amon’s dream foretells Arthur’s demise, although it does not do so via Lady Fortune. Rather, the dream opens with Arthur atop a hall, gazing upon ‘alle þa lond’ he controls, and features Mordred and Guinevere destroying the hall. The ocean plays a role in the denouement of the dream, in which a Lion abducts the king, runs off ‘to þere sæ’ (‘to the sea’) and takes Arthur into the ‘vðen’ (‘surging’) ocean. Rescued by a fish, the king finds himself on shore ‘al wet and weri of sor3en and seoc’ (‘all wet and weary, sick with sorrow’). Shortly after the king awakes from his dream, news reaches Arthur confirming Mordred and Guinevere’s treason. As much as the collapse of Arthur’s hall, his near drowning in the sea indicates the end of his 28 Cf. La3amon, who writes that ‘feorlic wes pat sweouen, þene king hit auerde’ (12753, ‘terri-

fying was that dream, it terrified the king’).

29 Karl Heinz Göller, ‘The Dream of the Dragon and the Bear’, in The Alliterative Morte

Arthure: A Reassessment of the Poem, ed. Karl Heinz Göller (Cambridge: Brewer, 1981), pp. 130–52.



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territorial power. The Morte similarly deploys the idea of drowning to connote the demise of Arthurian England, but departs from La3amon in, first, foregrounding it through a dream that appears much earlier in the narrative, at the beginning rather than at the end of Arthur’s battles; and, second, by using it to represent the king not merely as a victim of drowning but its instigator. As Arthur’s safe-conduct instructions demonstrate, the Morte poet lays stress on the capacity of the sea to define England and imbue it with a distinctly insular identity. Similarly, in Arthur’s first dream at sea, the poet uniquely links the dragon with the sea and associates the bear with the earth to imply the oceanic resonances of England. The bear exerts his might in and through the land. As he approaches the dragon, the bear’s roar, tramping, and bounding ‘roggede all þe erthe’ (784, ‘shakes all the earth’); while fighting his opponent, the bear ‘rawmpyde so ruydly that all pe erthe ryfes’ (794, ‘reared up on his hind legs so roughly that all the earth trembles’). In contrast, the dragon’s power is realised on the sea: the ‘flode’ (773, ‘water’) is set ablaze by his fiery breath, and, after the bear is overcome by the dragon, the sea serves as watery grave upon which the bear’s corpse may ‘fleete whare hym lykes’ (803, ‘float where he pleases’). The dragon’s link with the sea emerges also on his body, which the poet renders fish-like at one point – when he calls the beast a ‘schrympe’ (767, ‘shrimp’) and whose head and shoulders are ‘oundyd’ (765, ‘adorned’) with wavy bands of blue that mimic the ocean swells that have soothed Arthur to sleep. Literally covered in waves, the dragon enjoys an essential relationship to the sea, thus suggesting how that bestial signifier of Arthur indicates the king’s own defining connection to Ocean. Arthur, however, violates that right relationship to the sea by travelling with his men across the Channel. By ‘wanderande vnworthyly’ (763, ‘shamefully wandering’) towards the continent, the dragon (and the king he symbolises) relinquish a productive identification with the sea, so the water that served to manifest, make legible and exalt the identity of England and its Arthurian ruler now threatens a national engulfment or drowning. Arthur’s own crossing of the Channel to engage in his Roman project offers on a grand scale a version of border crossings that proliferate in the poem. The bulk of the Morte consists in battle scenes – against the Romans and their allies, the Duke of Lorraine and Sir Priamus – that relish and recoil from border violations of a distinctly martial nature, as Chism and others have shown. When, for example, we are told that upon being assailed by Arthur’s forces, the Romans’ ‘braynes forebrusten thurghe burneste helmes’ (2272, ‘brains burst forth from the burnished helmets’), we see a stress placed on crossing of multiple boundaries: brains seep out not only beyond the skull that should contain them; they explode out of the man-made object that should cover the skull itself. The description of the helmets as burneste or polished only heightens the violation of a beautiful artefact by viscera.30 30 It’s worth noting just how many of those images of combat occur alongside coasts,

streams, and rivers, as do representations of the English and Romans setting up camp (e.g.

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The pleasure and horror of border crossings emerges most spectacularly in the depiction of the abject yet fascinating giant of Mont St Michel, whose eating habits violate the line between consumer and consumed, and whose body undoes the division between multiple categories of identity. The six inches of foam covering the giant’s face constitutes an abject corporeal emission – like the ‘wound with blood and pus, or the sickly acrid smell of sweat’ theorised by Julia Kristeva – that horrifies by confounding the categories of the inanimate and animate.31 Just as the saliva oozing from the Giant’s visage disrupts identity categories, so too does his body itself, which like the ‘fantastic fusion beings of horror’, presents the viewer with ‘colligation[s] of ontologically or biologically separate orders’.32 In a monstrous blazon cataloguing the features of the ‘bullenekkyde’ (‘bull-necked’) and ‘shouell-fotede’ (‘shovel-footed’) beast, who is as ‘harske as a hunde-fisch’ (1084, ‘coarse as a shark’) and has ‘ruyd armes as an ake’ (1096, ‘coarse arms like an oak’) the poet uses similes and metaphors to render the giant an amalgam of beasts, fish, plants, and even inanimate objects. Arthur himself explicitly addresses the unclean nature of the border-crossing giant. The monster’s feeding on humans, made all the more disturbing by the sophisticated cooking and serving of that cannibal fare, is called by the king ‘cury vnclene’ (1063, ‘unclean culinary art’); and the giant’s rape of the king’s female cousin, similarly, is described by Arthur as the forcing of ‘fylth’ (1071, ‘filth’) upon an innocent woman. But, as Chism, Geraldine Heng, and others have observed, for all his awareness of the abject dangers posed by the filthy giant, Arthur bears certain disturbing affinities with him. In his connections and even his attraction to the giant and his accoutrements, Arthur admits his desire for the various unclean border crossings and violations – sexual, gustatory, sartorial, etc. – that the monster epitomises. Most important in terms of the poem’s engagement with empire, in retaining for himself the giant’s beard cloak, the king registers his desire for an imperialism that is viscerally abject. The kirtle, as Heng puts it, is ‘an anatomical map of all the territories under the giant’s dominion and sway: a highly colored-in map, in other words, of empire’.33 The oceanic investments of the Morte also inform Arthur’s relationship to the giant, who after all inhabits a territory constituted by its unstable border (i.e. the shifting tides that alternately unite St Michael’s Mount to the continent and sunder the landmass from the world). Particularly suggestive is the Morte poet’s 1230, 1291, 1337, 1402, 1455, 1497, 1535, 1998, 2372, 2704, 2798, 3216). We might speculate that the multiple ‘salte strandez’ depicted along Arthur’s imperial mission represent synechdocally the larger world ocean, and therefore serve as reminders of how the king’s martial border crossings are of a piece with the Channel passage that preceded them. 31 Julia Kristeva, Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection, trans. Leon S. Roudiez (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982), p. 3. 32 Noel Carroll, The Philosophy of Horror, or Paradoxes of the Heart (New York: Routledge, 1990), p. 45. 33 Geraldine Heng, Empire of Magic: Medieval Romance and the Politics of Cultural Fantasy (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), p. 120.



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unique identification of the monster as ‘of Geen’ (843, ‘from Genoa’). ‘Premodern Genoa’, as David Wallace has pointed out, ‘was hardly a place at all: hemmed in by mountains, it crowded down to the sea and, in many senses was all at sea; for Genovesi like Caboto and Colombo lived by transporting the soldiery, luxury goods and dyestuffs (so essential for Flanders) from place to place’.34 In his original linkage of the giant to Genoa, the Morte poet may well have had in mind how the monster’s location far from Italy, by ‘salte stremes/In Seynt Mighell Mount’ (898–9, ‘salt streams, on St Michael’s Mount’) resonated with the manner in which ‘the Genoese were imagined to be, literally and figuratively, all at sea, for the chief business of their tottering republic was the sea’.35 Genoa stood during the late Middle Ages for a commerce-based version of ancient Roman expansion, an embrace of ocean currents that took the Genovesi and their trading ships in directions that ‘push[ed] out the limits of the known or navigable world’.36 The Morte implies the impropriety of that sea-based expansion by representing a Genovese as a horrifying giant, even as it admits the attractions of ocean crossings by portraying Arthur’s odd attraction to the monster. The Morte’s final, telling, and highly original engagement with the sea appears in its account of Arthur’s return to Britain to face his rebellious nephew, Mordred. That conflict initiates in the Morte with a lengthy naval battle between the respective forces of the rebel and his uncle, a move that separates the Morte poet from Geoffrey, Wace, and La3amon, all of whom have a landlocked Mordred oppose Arthur’s ships from the coast. Mannying alone represents a conflict at sea, though that battle is significantly expanded and altered by the Morte poet. Unlike his literary predecessors, the Morte poet urges us to pause over the sea bordering Britain, to anticipate the battle that occurs there; to imagine fleets floating, sailing, and fighting upon it; and to recall that ocean-based conflict after it has ended. Only the Morte visualises Mordred’s pagan forces floating at sea on ships defensively ‘chokkode togedyrs’ (3603, ‘chained together’), recounts the loading of weapons upon Arthur’s ships, and describes the priming of the boats to sail back to England. Through these and other details, such as the violent weather that oppresses Arthur’s ships and, of course, the sea battle itself, the Morte poet lays an unprecedented stress on the sea as a setting for the civil war that concludes the poem. Moreover, the poet frames that ocean conflict by, on the one hand, looking toward it while Arthur is still in Italy and looking back upon the event after Mordred has moved inland. Included in the bad news brought to Arthur by the messenger Sir Cradoke, is Mordred’s gathering of ‘seuen skore chippes’ (3546, ‘seven-score ships’) on the coast; shortly after that encounter, the king repeats Cradoke’s words nearly verbatim to his men.37 Then, after the battle, 34 David Wallace, Premodern Places: Calais to Surinam, Chaucer to Aphra Behn (Oxford:

Blackwell, 2004), p. 5.

35 Wallace, Premodern Places, p. 184. 36 Wallace, Premodern Places, p. 185; cf. Heng, Empire of Magic, pp. 117–20. 37 Cradoke tells Arthur ‘Att Southampton on the see es seuen skore chippes/ Frawghte

full of ferse folke owt of ferre lades,/ For to fyghte with thy frappe when pow them assailles’

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Mordred sends a messenger to Guinevere in York to tell her ‘the kyng was aryued [and]/ One floode foughten with his fleete’ (3905–06, ‘the king had arrived and fought against his fleet at sea’). Most striking of all such lingerings over the sea is what occurs just after the conflict ends. While Arthur ultimately triumphs over Mordred, he nevertheless finds his passage onto English soil delayed: Be this the folke was fellyde, thane was þe flode passede; Thane was it slyke a slowde, in slakkes full hugge That let þe kyng for to lande, in the lawe watyre. (3718–21) [When the enemy troops were thus overcome, the high tide had passed; then there was mud in a muddy place consisting of colossal mud flats so that the king was prevented from landing in the low water.]

With the ebb of the tide, there emerge off the coast of Britain mudflats that waylay Arthur and his men. In preventing Arthur from entering England, the ocean effectively performs the role assumed by Mordred in earlier texts. Geoffrey writes that, due to Mordred’s land-based forces Arthur’s men ‘tametsi magno labore litora adepti fuerunt’ (130, 258–9, ‘only with enormous difficulty, occupied the seashore’); Wace writes that while Arthur’s men ‘Cil des nefs d’arive s’esforcent,/ Cil de la terre lur deforcent’ (13085–06, ‘in the ships struggled to land, those on land prevented them’); and Mannyng states that Mordred ‘letted him to haf entre; /Þe mot nouht com out of Þe se’ (‘prevented him from entering, so that he might not come out of the sea’). While all prior versions give Mordred the upper hand during his fight against Arthur’s navy, the Morte poet renders Arthur victorious and never lays stress on the traitor’s capacity to put off his uncle. Instead, the sea itself stops the king in his tracks. The words used by the Morte poet to describe the mudflats – ‘then was it slyke a slowde in slakkes full hugge’ – have proved challenging for editors, who have variously translated them as ‘there was water near the shore such a slush in very large pools’ (Benson), ‘there was mud on a slant in slopes full huge’ (Hamel), ‘there was such sludge in shoals so wide’ (Krishna), ‘and the shore was like a mire, with great banks of mud’ (Gardner).38 ‘Slowde’ proves particularly difficult insofar as the noun is original to the Morte, and may exemplify the poet’s tendency to embrace alliteration at the expense of clarity. As Derek Pearsall has observed, when the Morte poet self-consciously showcases his use of alliteration, ‘it is almost as if the poet is reveling in his verbal invention and daring’, so that (3546–8, ‘At Southampton on the sea are seven score ships/Fraught full of fierce folk out of far lands/To fight with your army when you attack them’). Arthur tells his men ‘They hafe semblede on the see seuen schore chippis/Full of ferren folk to feghte with myn one./Forthy to Bretayne the brode buske vs byhouys’ (3577–9, ‘On the sea they have assembled seven score ships,/Full of foreign folk to fight with me alone./Therefore to Britain the broad it behoves us to hasten’). The Morte poet is expanding upon 13,491–2 in Mannyng. 38 The Alliterative Morte Arthure: A Critical Edition, ed. Valerie Krishna (New York: Franklin, 1976).



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‘sometimes it appears to be all poetry and no sense’.39 But I would argue instead that in this instance, at least, form mirrors content. The auditor or reader of the Morte, that is, dwells upon the poem’s muddy meaning at the very moment that Arthur lingers due to oceanic mud. The onomatopoeic qualities of the line only add to that mirroring of style and import. Slyke, slowde, and slakes encourage slow enunciation due to their status as what Hugh Bredin calls ‘exemplary onomatopoeia’, words whose plosiveness, voicing, and juncture demand considerable ‘muscular and pulmonary effort’.40 Forced to remain in the Channel, Arthur endures precisely the opposite relationship to English space he enjoyed before his Roman war. The king who once threatened bodily harm to a Roman senator if he kept ‘a foot without the flood marches’ of England, now finds himself stuck on the wrong side of the coastline, disassociated from English territory. But the mudflats do more than literally account for Arthur’s sequestration from Britain; they materially resonate why the king in a sense no longer merits the sovereignty over English land that he exhibits at the start of the poem. Mud, sludge, and slime are strongly affiliated with dirt, filth, and unclean entities. Isidore of Seville, in his hugely influential Etymologies, suggests as much when he writes that the slug is named limax, from limus or mud ‘because it is born in mud or of mud, whence it is considered always dirty and unclean’.41 A mixture of water and dirt, sludge epitomises abjection through its disrespect for the border between land and sea. The mudflats thus recall and critique the multiple border crossings manifested everywhere in the Morte, and, above all, Arthur’s violation of English insularity through his Roman mission. Through the mudflats, Arthur finds himself stymied by a version of his own border transgressions. But given the tendency of the Morte to both criticise and embrace excess, this is hardly the end of the story. To return to the formal qualities of the mudflat scene, its embrace of alliteration at the price of coherence suggests a poetic pleasure taken by the poet in a literary ‘muddiness’, a literary enjoyment that undermines his use of the mudflats to critique Arthur. Moreover, the mudflats ultimately do not impede Arthur, or his best knight. In order to reach the shore, Gawain first ‘gyrdis in þe watere, / That to þe girdyll he gos in all his gylte wedys’ (3726–7, ‘leaps in the water, so that to the waist he goes in all of his gilded clothing’) and eventually the king as well ‘slippes in in the sloppes o slant to þe girdyll’ (3923, ‘slips into the muddy waters aslant to the waist’). Like Gawain before him Arthur viscerally experiences the pleasures of abjection and excess by immersing his body in sloppes or sludge. As Hamel points out in her critical edition, the poet’s rendering of the king wading from boat to land ‘is especially 39 Arthurian Romance: A Short Introduction (Malden, MA and Oxford: Blackwell, 2003), p.

65.

40 ‘Onomatopoeia as a Figure and a Linguistic Principle’, New Literary History, 27 (1996),

555–69 (p. 563). 41 Isidore of Seville’s Etymologies: Complete English Translation, trans. Priscilla Throop, 2 vols (Charlotte, VT: MedievalMS, 2005), II, XII.5.3 (no pagination).

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vivid, as Arthur slips so that his garments are muddied on a slant from his waist down as he splashes to shore’ (p. 382). We might add that the poet indicates the enjoyment he takes in this episode by, on the one hand, repeating ‘in’, which lends an overdetermined quality to the moment; and, on the other hand, terming the mud ‘sloppes’, yet another word of murky meaning that is original to the poem.42 From a post-structuralist perspective, we might say that the muddying of Gawain and Arthur, their engulfment by an entity that defies borders and hence meanings, adumbrates the destructions that end the Morte: both men die, and Arthurian Britain collapses altogether. But we might also say that the ‘slowding’ of Arthur embodies a paradox of English national fantasy. Even as the imagining of an English community in the Middle Ages is enabled by the heightened sense of boundedness that arises from insularity and oceanic limitations, that incipient nationalism is also defined by the desire to disturb and disrespect borders. World borders themselves, after all, were viewed during the Middle Ages as notably unruly sites: the home of the so-called monstrous races, and the habitation of the unruly and wild Britons described by Gildas, Geoffrey of Monmouth and their inheritors. More than any other Arthurian writer in the Middle Ages, the Morte poet demonstrates how Englishness emerged in the Middle Ages often through its annihilation.

42 Hamel follows the Thornton manuscript in repeating ‘in’ in line 3923; see The Thornton

Manuscript (Lincoln Cathedral MS. 91), ed. Derek Brewer and A. E. B. Owen (London: The Scolar Press, 1977), 94r. That repetition of course may simply be a scribal error.

‘From Hulle to Cartage’: Maps, England, and the Sea

Alfred Hiatt Two theories, both inherited from classical Greek and Roman scientific texts, underpinned the representation of the sea on medieval English maps. The first was that the known world, comprising Asia, Europe, and Africa, was surrounded by an encircling ocean, within which the islands of Britain and Ireland could be found. The second theory – distinct, but not necessarily incompatible with the first – was that the known world was just one of four land masses, which were divided by two oceans: an outer, encircling ocean ran from the north to the south pole, intersecting with another ocean that ran along the equator. Tides generated by the intersection of these two oceans were thought to flow from the centre of the earth to its northern and southern extremities. These theories found visual expression on the maps of the world (mappae mundi) produced in England and throughout much of continental Europe from at least 1000 to 1500, and in the zonal world map that typically illustrated copies of Macrobius’s widely disseminated commentary on Cicero’s Dream of Scipio. In the following pages, I will argue that both of these learned models contributed to the conceptualisation of the position of the British Isles in relation to the sea, and to other lands and peoples. However, I will also emphasise the importance of another genre of map for the question of the sea and English identity, one frequently marginalised in discussions of English cartography: the sea-chart. The kind of representation found on sea-charts, and in related genres, such as detailed written descriptions of coastlines, needs to be considered in relation to those of mappae mundi and Macrobian maps, not to perpetuate stale dichotomies between secular and religious world views, or between experience and theory, but so as to explore the diversity and richness of English geographical cultures from the twelfth to fifteenth centuries. Ocean Flows The ancient Greek notion of an encircling ocean was transmitted to Anglo-Saxon England through a fairly large number of classical and late antique texts.1 Bede, 1

In particular, Paulus Orosius, Historiae adversum paganos, 1.1.2; Isidore of Seville, Etymologiae, 14.2 and De natura rerum, 40, 44, 48; Macrobius, Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis,

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the Old English Orosius, and certain anonymous works all described an outer ocean, as well as interior seas.2 This legacy of Greek and Roman spatial representation seems to have contributed, within learned circles at least, to a clear sense of Britain and Ireland as being defined by their position in the north-west, at once connected to and separated from the coasts of western Europe and to even more remote islands, such as Thule, by the sea.3 The earliest surviving English mappa mundi, the Cotton Map of c. 1000, conforms, in broad terms, to this paradigm (Figure 2). The Cotton Map appears in BL Cotton MS Tiberius B.V.1 (f. 56v), a collection which includes a strong element of computistical and historiographical material. There are a number of unusual features that distinguish the Cotton map from other mappae mundi, and that have led to suggestions that it is ultimately derived from a Roman original, or even from the world map contained in Ptolemy of Alexandria’s Geographia.4 These features include the map’s square shape, its emphasis on Roman provincial boundaries in Asia and Africa, and the unusual contours given to Britain. There are, however, several points of continuity between the Cotton Map’s representation of Britain and that of later mappae mundi. In the first place, the British Isles (Britannia, Hibernia, and the Orcades) are shown within an outer ocean that surrounds the three partes of 2.9; Martianus Capella, De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii, 6.603 all provided authority for the notion of an encircling ocean. See Michael Lapidge, The Anglo-Saxon Library (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 311, 320, 321, 323, 325 for the presence of these texts in Anglo-Saxon England. On classical theories of Ocean, see James S. Romm, The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought: Geography, Exploration, and Fiction (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992), pp. 12–26. The evidence of certain Icelandic texts, such as the cosmological poem Völuspá, and Snorri Sturluson’s Gylfaginning, suggests the existence of pre-Christian Germanic notions of an encircling ocean. 2 Bede, De natura rerum, in Bedae Venerabilis Opera Didascalica, ed. C. W. Jones, CCSL, 123A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1975), p. 51 (‘Terrarum orbis uniuersus, Oceano cinctus, in tres diuiditur partes’); The Old English Orosius, ed. Janet Bately, EETS s.s., 6 (London: Oxford University Press, 1980), I.i (p. 8): ‘Oceanus utan ymbligeþ, þone [mon] garsæcg hateđ...’, translating Orosius, Historiae adversum paganos 1.1.2 ‘... orbem totius terrae, oceani limbo circumsaeptum...; ‘Christ and Satan’ ll. 4–6: ‘Seolfa he gesette sunnan and monan,/ stanas and eorðan, stream uton sæ,/ wæter and wolcn, ðurh his wundra miht.’: The Junius Manuscript, ed. by George P. Krapp, ASPR, 1 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1931). 3 Gildas, De excidio Britonum, 3.1; Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica, 1.1; on Thule see Monique Mund-Dopchie, Ultima Thulé: Histoire d’un lieu et genèse d’un mythe (Geneva: Librairie Droz, 2009). 4 See, in particular, P. McGurk, ‘The Mappa Mundi’, in An Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Illustrated Miscellany (British Library Cotton Tiberius B.V. Part I), ed. P. McGurk, D. N. Dumville, M. R. Godden, and A. Knock (Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1983), pp. 79–86; Evelyn Edson, Mapping Time and Space: How Medieval Mapmakers Viewed their World (London: British Library, 1997), pp. 74–80. On the theory of Roman origins, see P. D. A. Harvey, Medieval Maps (London: British Library, 1991), pp. 21–5; on the possibility of Ptolemaic descent, see Patrick Gautier Dalché, La Géographie de Ptolémée en Occident (IVe-XVe siècle) (Turnhout: Brepols, 2009), p. 90. The compiler of Cotton Tiberius B.V.1 seems to have intended the map to accompany a copy of Priscian’s translation of the Periegesis of Dionysius, though it does not correspond to that text.



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Figure 2. British Library, Cotton Tiberius B.V.1, f. 56v: the Cotton mappa mundi, produced in England c. 1000. East is at the top, with Britain and Scandinavia located in the map’s lower left corner. The map shows a prominent Mediterranean basin, along with an outer ocean surrounding the known world of Asia, Europe, and Africa.

the known world. Second, although located at the ‘ends of the earth’, Britain is disproportionately large, and certain connections to neighbouring peoples (Sclaui, Suđbryttas, Scridefinnas) and places (Sleswic, Neronorroen, Island, Tylen) in north-west Europe seem to be suggested.5 Third, while most names of places and peoples on the map are in Latin, there are six vernacular toponyms 5

On the ‘regional centrality’ of Britain constructed on the Cotton Map, see Fabienne L. Michelet, Creation, Migration, and Conquest: Imaginary Geography and Sense of Space in Old English Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 156–7.

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and ethnonyms, all situated in or near Britain.6 The willingness to use vernacular words and orthography in the British region – including, in this instance, an ‘eth’ in ‘Suđbryttas’ and a ‘wynn’ in ‘Sleswic’ and ‘Wintonia’ – is a feature of several later maps, world and regional, produced in England. Cotton Tiberius B.V.1 contains another, ostensibly very different map (f. 29r) (Figure 3). It shows the division of the world into five zones: one central zone (usually associated with intense heat, as well as the equatorial ocean); two polar zones (renowned for their fearsome cold); and two temperate zones (one in the north, including the known world, and one in the south, in this case simply left blank). Two world oceans – the equatorial, and the outer, encircling ocean – are represented on this image.7 Particular attention is drawn to the equatorial ocean, and the division of the earth into four equal segments, by means of a lengthy inscription at the map’s centre: aequinoctialis zona hic incipiens paene tota alluitur superius et inferius mari quod dum per medium taerrae (sic) circumlabitur in IIIIor quasi insulas totus orbis dividitur quae inhabitentur est enim solstitialis superior et inferior habitabitabilis (sic) similiter superior et inferior hiemalis sicque fit ut per medium et in circuitu orbis mare currat quod calore vel frigore est intransmeabile est que deprehensus totius orbis ambitus in stadiis ducentis quinquaginta duobus milibus. almost all the equinoctial zone beginning here is bathed above and below by the sea which because it flows around through the middle of the earth the whole world is divided into, as it were, four islands which may be inhabited. For the Tropic of Cancer is habitable above and below, and similarly the Tropic of Capricorn above and below; and so it is that the sea, which is impassable due to heat or cold, runs through the middle of the world as well as encircling it, and it is calculated that the circuit of the entire world is 252,000 stades.

It is unusual to find such a long inscription in the central (or any) zone,8 but the theory it presents is quite standard, and derives from Macrobius’s Commentary: the extent of the ocean sea determines the division of the world into four land masses, and its size (along with the cold and heat) ensures the isolation of each segment from any other.9 To reinforce the point about ocean flows an inscription 6 Suđbryttas; Neronorroen; Sleswic; Scridefinnas (The Old English Orosius’ ‘Scridefinne’); Tylen (‘Thule’); Island. ‘Camri’ appears to be a Latinisation of Cymry, and presumably refers to Strathclyde British and Welsh: McGurk, ‘The Mappa Mundi’, pp. 80, 86–7. 7 P. McGurk, ‘The Macrobian Zonal Map’, in An Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Illustrated Miscellany, pp. 65–6; Edson, Mapping Time and Space, pp. 77–8. 8 Similar lengthy inscriptions on the topic of the flow of ocean can be found in Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Preussischer Kulturbesitz, MS 138 (ex Phillipps MS 1833), f. 39v, a map associated with Abbo of Fleury, which illustrates extracts from Macrobius’ Commentary, copied in Dijon, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 448, f. 76r. For discussion see Leonid S. Chekin, Northern Eurasia in Medieval Cartography: Inventory, Text, Translation, and Commentary (Turnhout: Brepols, 2006), pp. 104–07, McGurk, ‘Macrobian Zonal Map’, pp. 65–6. 9 Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius, Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis, ed. J. Willis (Leipzig: Teubner, 1970), 9.2–6.



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Figure 3. British Library, Cotton Tiberius B.V.1, f. 29r: map showing the division of the earth into five zones, within an encircling outer ocean. North is at the top. A lengthy inscription in the central, equatorial zone describes the role of ocean in dividing the earth into four segments or ‘islands’.

indicating their direction to the north or south is repeated around the outer circle of the globe: ‘hinc refluit oceanus ad septentrionem/austrum per lxiii stadiorum’ (‘the ocean flows back from here to the north/south through 63 stades’). The representation in the northern temperate zone of Africa, Asia Maior et Minor, and notably ‘Æquitania’, along with two unmarked cities (probably Rome and Jerusalem), the Mediterranean and the Pillars of Hercules in the far west, allows the reader to connect the known world to the global image. As the presence of these maps in the same manuscript testifies, the two world images were complementary. Both represented certain theoretical propositions about the relationship of land to sea, but both also – to varying degrees – attempted to locate the local region of the viewer in relation to a world space. It is important to dwell a little more on the hemispherical world image, since it would have been at least as well known as the depictions of the known world

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Figure 4. BL Cotton Faustina C.1, f. 87v: zonal map illustrating book two of Macrobius’ Commentary on the Dream of Scipio. South is at the top

on mappae mundi (and because it is often neglected in discussions of maps and English identity). The zonal map that appears in Cotton Tiberius B.V.1 is a relative of the world map that illustrated Macrobius’s fifth-century Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis in manuscripts from the tenth to the fifteenth centuries. The popularity of Macrobius’s Commentary seems to have reached its height in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but it continued to be copied and cited throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In particular, the incorporation of certain of its cosmological elements, including the doctrine of zonal divisions, into standard university textbooks such as John of Sacrobosco’s De



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sphera ensured the wide dissemination of the scientific aspects of the text.10 The text of the Commentary indicates that, as part of a series of scientific diagrams, Macrobius drew, or had drawn, a map.11 The purpose of the map was to illustrate the direction of ocean flows, the formation of seas, and the relationship of the known world to unknown but hypothesised regions: quia et singulae de quattuor habitationibus parvae quaedam efficiuntur insulae, Oceano bis eas ut diximus ambiente. omnia haec ante oculos locare potest descriptio substituta, ex qua et nostri maris originem, quae totius una est, et Rubri atque Indici ortum videbis, Caspiumque mare unde oriatur invenies...12 because each of the four habitable areas is made into little islands by the two bands of Ocean, as we said previously. All these things can be found before your eyes in the inserted image, through which you will see both the origin of our sea, which is one part of the whole Ocean, and the rising of the Red and Indian seas. You will also discover the source of the Caspian Sea.

In representing the extent of the earth, and the impenetrable divides between known and unknown parts of the world, the map had the further, moral, purpose of illustrating the limited duration of fame. The Commentary underwent a revival of interest in the ninth century, and by the following century, when the text enjoyed rapid dissemination, the map of Macrobius had become a consistent feature of manuscript copies.13 Of around thirty Macrobius maps that date from before or around 1100 at least two appear in manuscripts with a British provenance, one Welsh, the other possibly from Exeter. The former, BL Cotton Faustina C.1,14 reproduces a simple zonal map in place of the somewhat more complex image indicated by Macrobius’s words in book two of the Commentary (Figure 4). Oriented to the south, the map in Cotton Faustina C.1, f. 87v, appears within the body of the text, a sign of its integral nature. It is divided into five zones, marked simply (from south to north) Australis, Temperata Zona, Torrida Zona, Temperata Zona, and Septentrionalis, surrounded by an outer band of ocean and intersected by the horizontal band of the equatorial ocean. Around the outer ocean cardinal points are marked along with four gulfs (‘sinus’), somewhat displaced from their usual positions at the poles and far east and west. The flows of ocean are not marked, as they are in some versions of the map. However, alongside the diagram a gloss in the hand of the main scribe records: ‘Sic refluit inaltera superficie terrae occianus. Vt fiant iiii insolae de tota terra’ (‘Thus the 10 Lynn Thorndike, The Sphere of Sacrobosco and Its Commentators (Chicago, IL: Chicago

University Press, 1949), p. 20.

11 Macrobius, Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis, 2.9.7–8. 12 Macrobius, Commentarii, 9.6–7. All translations are mine unless otherwise stated. 13 Alfred Hiatt, ‘The Map of Macrobius before 1100’, Imago Mundi, 59 (2007), 149–76 (pp.

154–9). 14 See Alison Peden, ‘Science and Philosophy in Wales at the Time of the Norman Conquest: A Macrobius Manuscript from Llanbadarn’, Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies, 2 (1981), 21–45.

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Figure 5. Oxford, Bodleian Auct. F.2.20, f. 53v: zonal map illustrating book two of Macrobius’ Commentary. North is at the top, with a sketch of Neptune unusually placed in the central zone.



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ocean flows back on either side of the earth’s surface, making four islands of the entire earth’). As this gloss makes clear, the image is to be conceived of as representing one half, two of the four islands, of the earth. The manuscript of possible Exeter provenance, Oxford Bodleian Auct. F.2.20, presents a fairly standard version of the map of Macrobius on f. 53v, with one remarkable additional feature (Figure 5).15 The map is divided into five zones: Frigida Septentrionalis; Temperata nostra; Temperata Australis; Frigida Inhabitabilis. Just two places are marked: Italia and Orcades (the Orkneys). The zonal divisions, the representation of both hemispheres, and the depiction of the major bodies of water in Bodleian Auct. F.2.20 are in accordance with Macrobius’s text. The encircling and equatorial oceans are coloured in red, along with the Red, Indian, and Caspian seas. The Orcades are not mentioned by Macrobius himself, and they may constitute a later addition to the map. If so, however, they were added no later than the tenth century, from which point they are a very consistent feature of Macrobius maps. Their presence seems to be intended to function as a marker of the westernmost extent of the known world. Far from an abstraction, then, a British audience in particular would have seen the map of Macrobius as an image that set their own part of the world in a larger context, one that drew attention to the position of the ‘western isles’ in the midst of powerful oceanic currents that moved from the equator to the north pole. Most unexpected, however, is the presence of a sketch of Neptune in the central zone, pouring out the contents of an amphora into the equatorial ocean. As this figure attests, the transmission of an image, however widespread and regularised, is never static: it remains susceptible to the addition of unique elements, in this case a classicising attempt to respond to the text’s emphasis on ocean currents. Maps of Britain, Britain on the Map There is fairly clear evidence that the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries saw a growth of interest in the production of relatively detailed maps of Britain. Matthew Paris produced a map of England, Wales, and Scotland, extant in four versions, in the 1250s. Recent research on the most detailed medieval map of Britain, the Gough map, strongly suggests that it existed in multiple copies, only one of which survives.16 The sea is certainly not a negligible feature of these regnal/regional maps, since it performs the essential function of defining the island, but more interestingly it serves to connect Britain with places and peoples on the continent and on nearby islands and peninsulas. One version of Matthew 15 See Chekin, Northern Eurasia in Medieval Cartography, pp. 102 and 415. 16 For a summary of the evidence, see Peter Barber, ‘Mapmaking in England, ca. 1470–1650’,

in The History of Cartography, Vol. 3: Cartography in the European Renaissance, ed. David Woodward (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2007), pp. 1589–669 (pp. 1590–1). On dating, see most recently T. M. Smallwood, ‘The Date of the Gough Map’, Imago Mundi, 62 (2010), 3–29, who argues for a re-dating of the map (usually given as c. 1360) to the first quarter of the fifteenth century.

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Paris’s map of Britain inserts a column along the east and west coasts of the island, identifying the nations that different parts of Britain face, from Norway to Normandy.17 The Gough map represents the east coast of Ireland on one side of Britain, and on the other marks Norway, ‘Dacia’ (i.e. Denmark), ‘Sklus’, ‘Graveling’, Calais (with a vignette, possibly suggesting its post-1347 possession by the English), Wissant, and Bologne.18 On the Gough map in particular some care has gone into depicting Britain’s offshore islands. It shows the Orkney Islands, along with ‘Lez Outislez’ and the Isle of Bute off the west coast of Scotland, the Isle of Man, ‘Holy Island’ (Lindisfarne), and in the south the Isle of Wight, as well as five Channel Islands. Far from isolating Britain, both the Gough map and Matthew Paris’s maps of Britain insist on its contingent position in a network of regional affiliations and implicit rivalries within the larger maps of Europe and the world. The relationship between these regional maps and mappae mundi remains opaque, although the interest of Matthew in both world maps and regional maps shows the possibility for cross-fertilisation.19 Mappa mundi traditions, which flourished in England from the twelfth to the fourteenth centuries, reveal varying levels of interest in Britain and Ireland on the part of mapmakers. Some maps, such as the Sawley map of c. 1200, simply show two elongated islands, empty apart from the toponyms ‘Britannia insula’ and ‘hibernia’;20 others show far more detailed representations. Virtually all agree, however, in locating the British Isles on the north-west edge of the world image. Of the later English mappae mundi two in particular are notable for their depiction of Britain. The Hereford map (c. 1300) offers a relatively large and detailed representation of England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland (Figure 6). Roughly half of the 81 toponyms on the British Isles are in English, including cities and towns (‘edenburgh’, ‘Snotingham’, ‘oxenford’, ‘hereford’, ‘baþe’), rivers (‘vse’, ‘aven’, ‘de’ [Dee], ‘Medey’ [Medway]), and ‘mons cleoe’. Latin is preferred for the names of nations (Anglia, Scocia, Wallia), counties (Norhumbria, Wircestria, Cornubia), and usually for cities with particular ecclesiastical significance (Sanctus andreas, Eboracum, duremum, Lincolnia, cantuaria, Ahrmaca civitas Sancti Patricii [Armagh]).21 However, the use of Latin 17 BL, Cotton Claudius D.VI, f. 12v. See Suzanne Lewis, The Art of Matthew Paris in the

Chronica Majora (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1987), pp. 364–72. See Nick Millea, The Gough Map: The Earliest Road Map of Great Britain? (Oxford: Bodleian Library, 2007) for recent discussion and transcription, and Daniel Birkholz, The King’s Two Maps: Cartography and Culture in Thirteenth-Century England (London: Routledge, 2004) for the concept of a ‘map of the realm’. An interactive Gough map is available at www. qub.ac.uk/urban_mapping/gough_map. 19 Lewis, The Art of Matthew Paris, pp. 372–6. 20 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 66, p. 2. For a transcription of the map’s toponyms, see Danielle Lecoq, ‘La mappemonde d’Henri de Mayence ou l’image du monde au XIIe siècle’, in Iconographie médiévale: Image, texte, contexte, ed. Gaston Duchet-Suchaux (Paris: CNRS, 1990), pp. 155–207. 21 The Hereford Map, ed. and trans. Scott D. Westrem (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), pp. 297–325. 18



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Figure 6. The Hereford Mappa Mundi, detail: the British Isles and Augustus Caesar. The map’s relatively large representation of Britain appears in the far northwest and it abuts a representation in the frame of Augustus Caesar handing a sealed charter to three surveyors. A prayer for the map’s maker, Richard of Haldingham and Sleaford, appears immediately beneath the seal on Augustus’s charter

and English on this section of the map is neither hierarchical nor is it rigorously categorised; instead, it seems to reflect the tendency for geographical description within the area(s) familiar to the makers and audience of the map to be linguistically mixed.22 On the frame of the Hereford map, adjacent to the British Isles, is an image of Augustus Caesar handing a charter to three surveyors, commanding them to go into the entire world and report back to the senate. Beneath that tableau, an inscription, written in Anglo-Norman, urges whoever may ‘read, hear 22 See, for example, the representation of German regions on the Ebstorf map, also c. 1300:

Die Ebstorfer Weltkarte, ed. Hartmut Kugler, 2 vols (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2007).

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or see’ this ‘estorie’ – variously translatable as ‘work’, ‘representation’, ‘history’ – to pray for the soul of its maker, Richard of Haldingham or Sleaford.23 The conjunction of historical and linguistic elements – classical and vernacular, Latin, English, and French – seems designed to associate the site of the map’s immediate production with its origins in Roman imperial authority, and the birth of Christ. The position of the isles at the ends of the world into which Augustus sends his surveyors is made palpable by the emperor’s appearance immediately below. The vernacular place names, meanwhile, suggest that, for the medieval reader or hearer of the map, Britain might function as a vital point of reference, familiar and contemporary on one hand, and on the other subject to the aligned forces of imperial survey and Christian conversion. Many modern observers of medieval mappae mundi are struck by the apparent lack of centrality, or indeed visibility, accorded to the British Isles on texts such as the Hereford map. An apparent exception to this reticence is the Evesham map, a late fourteenth-century world map possibly commissioned by the abbot of Evesham, which offers what at first glance is the most striking display of nationalism on any English mappa mundi (Figure 7).24 The mapmaker has adapted the world map typically used to illustrate Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon and expanded significantly the number of toponyms in England to more than fifty. Evesham Abbey appears on a par with Canterbury Cathedral, while England itself is swollen to the extent that it extends from Zeeland to the north coast of Africa. It would be wrong, however, to interpret such distortions as simply parochial. They inflate the region, but only to situate it in relation to the world: the mappa mundi is not subordinated to the task of regional ostentation. Instead the origin of the map is located, and knowingly magnified, but it is still to be read as part of the world image, neither its centre nor its fulcrum. Prominence is also given to Jerusalem and to the earthly paradise at the top (far east) of the map. Rather than nationalism, one option would be to see the size of England on the Evesham map as a pragmatic response to a desire to insert a particularly detailed representation of southern England. The toponyms in England, almost all of which are in English, are overwhelmingly from the south and west of the island, and include several not extant on any earlier map.25 An attentive observer of the map is encouraged to read what should be the east coast of England as the south coast, extending from Dover on the far left to Barnstaple, Minehead, and Bristol on the right. The enlarged depiction of England may also indicate 23 The Hereford Map, ed. and trans. Westrem, p. 11: ‘Tuz ki cest estorie ont/ Ou oyront ou

lirront ou veront,/ Prient a Jhesu en deyte/ De Richard de Haldingham o de Lafford eyt pite,/ Ki lat fet e compasse,/ Ki joie en cel li seit done’ (‘Let all those who have this history – or who shall hear, or read, or see it – pray to Jesus in his divinity to have pity on Richard of Holdingham or of Sleaford, who made it and laid it out, that joy in heaven may be granted to him’). 24 Peter Barber, ‘The Evesham World Map: A Late Medieval English View of God and the World’, Imago Mundi, 47 (1995), 13–33 (p. 21). 25 Barber, ‘The Evesham World Map’, pp. 24–7.



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Figure 7. College of Arms, MS Muniments 18/19: the Evesham map. East at the top. The Evesham map is notable for its remarkably large depiction of the British Isles, but it also features a sizeable and ornate earthly paradise, as well as a prominent representation of the city of Jerusalem.

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that the growing expectation on the part of the map’s makers and audience for a detailed representation of the British Isles was starting to strafe against the format of the mappa mundi. The traditionally restricted position of the British Isles may have seemed inadequate to contain the level of regional detail that was increasingly available towards the end of the fourteenth century. Mappae maris: English Connections As the preceding discussion suggests, certain formal features of mappae mundi meant that England’s insularity was always recorded on the world image, but rarely emphasised. Far more weight was given to the proximity of England to terrestrial routes. There was, however, a genre of map on which, during the later Middle Ages, the relationship between the British isles and the sea was redefined. Medieval sea-charts (often termed portolans, or portolan charts in anglophone literature) characteristically represent coastlines with far greater precision and level of toponymic detail than can be found on any other genre of medieval map.26 The standard format of the earliest sea-charts showed the entire Mediterranean basin and the Black Sea coasts, and included parts of north Africa and Asia minor. Some, though not all, sea-charts showed the Atlantic, and in certain instances they extended as far as Scandinavia and the North Sea;27 most of these more extensive charts include some representation of the British Isles (see Figure 8). This format could be expanded somewhat by the provision of interior details (notably the portrayal of kings and other rulers in Africa and Asia) to form a mappa mundi, such as the Catalan Atlas of c. 1375. Consistent features of sea-charts are the provision of a scale bar, and the presence of a network of interconnecting lines which are organised to represent 32 directions, in theory at least to assist the calculation of distances and the correct courses to follow between places on the map.28 Sea-charts usually play a minimal role in histories of medieval English cartography. Apart from one instance, it appears that sea-charts were not produced in England, and it has been supposed that as a consequence 26 On medieval sea-charts, see in particular Tony Campbell, ‘Portolan Charts from the

Late Thirteenth Century to 1500’, in The History of Cartography. Volume One: Cartography in Prehistoric, Ancient, and Medieval Europe and the Mediterranean, ed. J. B. Harley and David Woodward (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1987), pp. 370–463; Patrick Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle: le Liber de existencia riveriarum et forma maris nostri Mediterranei (Pise, circa 1200) (Rome: École Française de Rome, 1995); Piero Falchetta, Marinai, mercanti, cartografi, pittori. Ricerche sulla cartografia nautica a Venezia (sec. XIV–XV) (Venice: Atento Veneto, 1995); Ramon J. Pujades i Bataller, Les Cartes portolanes: La representació medieval d’una mar solcada/Portolan Charts: The Medieval Representation of a Ploughed Sea (Barcelona: Institut Cartogràfic de Catalunya, 2007). 27 Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, p. 424. 28 See Campbell, ‘Portolan Charts from the Late Thirteenth Century to 1500’, esp. pp. 376–80; Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle, pp. 69–76; Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, pp. 462, 473–6.



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they were barely known.29 There is, however, a certain amount of evidence to cast doubt on the latter assumption at least. Sea-charts were produced in significant numbers in Europe from the second half of the fourteenth century. On the basis of survivals and references to now-lost charts, Ramon Pujades has recently calculated ‘well over four hundred works of nautical cartography from earlier than 1500’.30 And while it is certainly the case that the centres of production of sea-charts were located in Genoa, Venice, and on the island of Majorca, it is equally clear that, during the fourteenth century, if not earlier, some of these maps reached English shores. The earliest surviving sea-chart is known as the Carte Pisane, a map usually dated to the late thirteenth century.31 However, the discovery of a late twelfthde existencia riveriarum et forma maris nostri medicentury text entitled the Liber ���������������������������������������������������� terranei (roughly translatable as ‘Book of the existence of regions and the image of our Mediterranean Sea’) has revealed the existence of sea-charts around a century earlier.32 The Liber de existencia riveriarum consists of a detailed list of places and some natural features along the coastlines of the Mediterranean basin, the Black Sea, parts of the Atlantic and selected islands. In a short prologue, the author explains that, in compiling his work, he drew on a sea-chart, and that – under the influence of a certain canon of Pisa – he emended the map to show regions of religious significance.33 The nature of the places recorded in the Liber de existencia riveriarum, and the frequent reference to directions in terms of winds, leaves little doubt that a sea-chart was utilised in its composition. Internal evidence supports the supposition, derived from the prologue, that the Liber de existencia riveriarum was compiled in Pisa.34 Nevertheless, a tentative English connection is provided by the codex that contains the unique copy of the Liber de existencia riveriarum et forma maris nostri Mediterranei: BL Cotton Domitian A. XIII. The first section of this manuscript, which contains the Annals of Winchester and Richard of Devizes’s Chronicon de tempore regis Ricardi primi, probably originates from one of the two monasteries of Winchester, St Swithun,

29 Catherine Delano Smith and Roger J. P. Kain, English Maps: A History (London: The

British Library, 1999), p. 153: ‘[P]rior to the sixteenth century, English sailors used information passed on orally. A few may have set eyes on a portolan chart... but such charts... would have been dismissed by English sailors as a curiosity’; see Sarah Tyacke, ‘Chartmaking in England and Its Context, 1500–1660’, in The History of Cartography, Vol. 3: Cartography in the European Renaissance, ed. David Woodward (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2007), pp. 1722–53, esp. 1727–9. 30 Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, p. 439. 31 Now Paris, BNF, Dép. des Cartes et Plans, Rés. Ge. B 1118. See Campbell, ‘Portolan Charts from the Late Thirteenth Century to 1500’, pp. 382–3, 404. 32 Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle. 33 Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle, pp. 115–16; and esp. pp. 9–36 for Gautier Dalché’s discussion; see Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, pp. 511–13. 34 Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle, pp. 83–106.

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or Hyde.35 The section of the manuscript that contains the Liber de existencia riveriarum was clearly copied separately and only later bound with the Annals of Winchester section; nevertheless, the possibility remains that the Liber de existencia riveriarum was copied at Winchester, a city on the route from London to Southampton and Portsmouth, with firm connections to the royal administration.36 The possible presence of a text such as the Liber de existencia riveriarum in England c. 1200 certainly does not in itself prove the complementary presence of sea-charts. However, the detailed description of the Mediterranean is perfectly consistent with evidence of a strong and quite pragmatic interest in maritime travel within certain sections of learned society in twelfth- and thirteenth-century England. Chronicles such as the Gesta and Chronica of Roger Howden, and crusade narratives such as De expugnatione Lyxbonensi contain rather detailed descriptions of sea routes along the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts.37 Another recently unearthed late twelfth-century text, De viis maris – discovered, like the Liber de existencia riveriarum, by Patrick Gautier Dalché, and tentatively attributed by him to Roger Howden38 – describes an itinerary from Yorkshire along the English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Sicilian coastlines, supplemented by a description of the near east derived from a certain ‘Tractatus Margariti ducis piratarum’. Such texts reveal not only a sophisticated and wide-ranging knowledge of coastal topography, but also a strong sense of political geography, borne of practical necessity as well as ideology. De viis maris carefully notes the jurisdictions of the areas described, and draws particular attention to a stretch of water between Spain and north Africa where the nearest harbours on either side are under Muslim control: Et est sciendum quod ab introitu districtarum Affrice usque ad Scalonam que est prope Iherusalem, tota terra paganorum in dextra parte nauigii, et ex opposito ab introitu districtarum Affrice usque ad montem magnum qui dicitur Muscian est Hyspania Sarracenica. Et iuxta illam est uia nauium euntium in peregrinatione in terram Iherosolimitanam. Et a monte illo qui dicitur Muscian usque ad Scaloniam in sinistra parte nauigii secus mare fere tota terra est terra christianorum.39

35 Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle, p. 6; N. R. Ker, Medieval Libraries

of Great Britain: A List of Surviving Books, 2nd edn (London: Royal Historical Society, 1964), pp. 103, 200. 36 Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle, p. 6. 37 Chronica magistri Rogeri de Houedene, ed. William Stubbs, Rolls Series, 51, 4 vols (London: Longman, 1870), III, 39–54, 155–61, 165–6; Gesta regis Henrici II Benedicti Abbatis, ed. William Stubbs, Rolls Series, 49, 2 vols (London: Longman, 1867), II, 112–25; 192–9, 203–06; De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, ed. and trans. Charles Wendell David (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936; repr. 2001), pp. 52–68. See further Du Yorkshire a l’Inde: une ‘géographie’ urbaine et maritime de la fin du XIIe siècle (Roger de Howden?), ed. Patrick Gautier Dalché (Geneva: Droz, 2005), p. 116. 38 For Gautier Dalché’s discussion, see Du Yorkshire a l’Inde, pp. 21–48. 39 ‘De viis maris’, in Du Yorkshire a l’Inde, ed. Gautier Dalché, 6.6, p. 195.



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And it should be known that from the entrance to the African regions as far as Scalona [Ashqelon], which is near Jerusalem, all the land on the right side of the ship is pagan territory, and on the opposite shore, from the entrance to the African regions as far as the great mountain which is called Muscian [sierra de Montsià], is Saracen Spain. And next to this land is the path for ships going on pilgrimage to Jerusalem. And from that mountain which is called Muscian as far as Scalona on the left side of the ship following the sea almost the whole land is Christian.

The contexts of pilgrimage and crusade obviously contribute to a heightened consciousness of Christian identity, in which the sea remains unaligned, dividing rival faiths, and on occasion offering a passage through potentially hostile territories. De viis maris, which is notably less detailed the further it progresses away from Britain and the Atlantic coasts, testifies to ‘a northern tradition of sea books... anterior to and independent of Mediterranean portolans’.40 It is not until the fourteenth century, however, that evidence appears for the circulation in England of sea-charts, as opposed to written descriptions and listings of itineraries and places. This hiatus is not particularly surprising. The relatively small number of sea-charts and atlases that survive from earlier than the 1340s seem to indicate a fairly restricted circulation across Europe.41 The number of references to the ownership of sea-charts starts to increase markedly in the second half of the fourteenth century, particularly in Italian and Catalan sources, suggesting that they had by then become cheaper and more readily available.42 It is from this ‘mature phase’43 of sea-chart production that the evidence of English circulation emerges. In 1374, amongst the bequest to Merton College, Oxford, made by William Reed (d. 1385), a former fellow and bishop of Chichester, are found several astrological instruments, globes, and a ‘carta maris’. Subsequently, a list of books at the College made in 1452 records two ‘cartae maritimae’, one of which is presumed to be Reed’s gift.44 Similarly, a list of books bequeathed to the monastery of St Peter’s, Westminster by brother Richard Exeter (d. 1396/7) includes a ‘mappa Anglie’, a ‘mappa Scocie’, and a ‘mappa maris’, the last of which surely refers to a sea-chart.45 Exeter had entered the monastery in 1358 or 1359; he became its prior 40 Gautier Dalché, De viis maris, p. 121. In medieval usage at least, portolans are not maps

but written directions for navigation, usually from place to place along a sea coast, often including specific comments on the approaches to harbours. 41 For helpful listings of extant maps, see Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, pp. 63–70. 42 Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, p. 521. 43 Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, p. 521. 44 Rodney Thomson, ‘Medieval Maps at Merton College, Oxford’, Imago Mundi, 61 (2009), 84–90 (p. 85); see F. M. Powicke, The Medieval Books of Merton College (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1931), pp. 80 (‘cartam marinam’), 82 (‘cartam marinam cum capsula et circino de laton’); on Reed, see A. B. Emden, A Biographical Register of the University of Oxford to AD 1500, 3 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957–9), s.n. Rede, III, 1556–60. 45 English Benedictine Libraries: The Shorter Catalogues, ed. R. Sharpe, J. P. Carley, R. M. Thomson, and A. G. Watson (London: British Library, 1996), p. 629.

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in 1377, retired in 1382, and is regarded as a possible author of the Westminster Chronicle, a continuation of Higden’s Polychronicon covering the years 1381–94.46 The means by which Exeter acquired his ‘mappa maris’ are unknown, but at least three possibilities can be adduced. First, in his role as prior, Exeter received books from the library of the former abbot of Westminster, Cardinal Simon Langham, which had been carried back from Avignon after Langham’s death in 1376.47 Sea-charts were in circulation at Avignon at the latest by the 1330s, when a chart formed the basis for the remarkable designs of the papal notary Opicinus de Canistris.48 Extant lists of Langham’s gifts to the monastery do not include reference to a map, but there is reason to think that some items were not recorded.49 A somewhat more likely source for the map may, however, be Oxford, especially as William Reed’s bequest to Merton College demonstrates the presence of at least one sea-chart there. Exeter was certainly resident in Oxford in 1375–6, probably at Gloucester College, and he may have spent as many as four additional years at the University in the 1370s.50 The extent of Exeter’s contact with Reed and other members of Merton is unknown, but it may be significant that the Westminster chronicler makes a point of noting the death of Reed, and praising his expertise in astronomy: ‘doctor sacre theologie episcopus Cicestren’ qui in astronomia sensus suos multum vexabat quia in illa facultate fuit peritus’.51 It is certainly possible that Exeter copied all three of his maps while in Oxford, since, in addition to Reed’s ‘carta maris’, by the fifteenth century, and probably earlier, Merton was in possession of a ‘mappa Anglie’, which was housed in the College Library.52 Of course, the source of the map may have been even closer to home: the position of Westminster simultaneously alongside a mercantile city and in close proximity to the royal court would have provided yet more opportunities for Exeter to have acquired maps. 46 The Westminster Chronicle 1381–1394, ed. L. C. Hector and Barbara F. Harvey (Oxford:

Clarendon Press, 1982), pp. xl–xliii; English Benedictine Libraries: The Shorter Catalogues, p. 627. 47 English Benedictine Libraries: The Shorter Catalogues, p. 627. 48 On Opicinus, see especially Richard Salomon, Opicinus de Canistris: Weltbild und Bekenntnisse eines avignonesischen Klerikers des 14. Jahrhunderts, 2 vols (London: Warburg Institute, 1936); and Salomon, ‘A Newly Discovered MS of Opicinus de Canistris’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 16 (1953), 45–59; Victoria Morse, ‘A Complex Terrain: Church, Society, and the Individual in the works of Opicino de Canistris (1296–c. 1354)’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 1996); Pierluigi Tozzi, La città e il mondo in Opicino de Canistris (1296–1350 ca.) (Varzi: Edizioni Guardamagna, 1996). 49 English Benedictine Libraries: The Shorter Catalogues, pp. 613–26. 50 The Westminster Chronicle, ed. Hector and Harvey, p. xl. Westminster monks were ‘invariably members of Gloucester College from their first appearance at Oxford’: Barbara F. Harvey, ‘The Monks of Westminster and the University of Oxford’, in The Reign of Richard II: Essays in Honour of May McKisack, ed. F. R. H. Du Boulay and Caroline M. Barron (London: Athlone Press, 1971), pp. 108–130 (p. 110). 51 The Westminster Chronicle 1381–1394, p. 130 52 Thomson, ‘Medieval Maps at Merton College, Oxford’, p. 86.



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Further evidence of interest and indeed active response to sea-charts in England comes from the Aslake world map, an unfinished and damaged world map which seems to date from the second half of the fourteenth century.53 This map owes its name to its use as binding for the rental of estates of one Walter Aslake of Norfolk, a landowner closely associated with Creake Abbey in northwest Norfolk.54 While the Aslake map contains many features consistent with the traditions of medieval mappae mundi, such as the presence of monstrous races in southern Africa, it also shows a surprising level of influence from seacharts. Contemporary place names appear along the coast of Africa from Iarissa (modern El Arrouch) to milela (Melilla), while ‘ffes’ is marked inland. Most strikingly, there are indications of the Canary Islands in the Atlantic: ‘Insula Canaria’ (Gran Canaria), ‘ffort vent...a’ (Fuerteventura), ‘... delinferno’ (Isola de l’Inferno, i.e. Tenerife), written at right angles to the coast in imitation of the manner of sea-charts.55 The apparent implausibility of the presence of a sea-chart in rural Norfolk has led Peter Barber to hypothesise that the maker of the Aslake map incorporated toponomy and (to a lesser extent) coastal outlines from a chart he had seen elsewhere, with Westminster the most likely candidate.56 The record of the sea-chart at Westminster in the possession of Richard Exeter certainly supports Barber’s suggestion, even if it cannot conclusively prove it. At the very least, however, we can be confident not only of the existence of a sea-chart in at least one monastery and one university College in England by the end of the fourteenth century, but also – thanks to the Aslake map – that such maps were, on occasion, being examined and used to fashion images of the world. Another route of entry of sea-charts into late medieval England was that of the high status gift. On 14 July 1399, the Florentine merchant Baldassare degli Ubriachi wrote to his agent in Barcelona, Simone d’Andrea Bellandi, regarding the commission of four ‘mapamundi’ from the chart maker Francesco Beccari. Baldassare stated that he intended to show a map to the king of Aragon, then to the king of Navarre, and finally ‘to carry it with me into England and to give it to the King of England’.57 The mappae mundi requested by Baldassare seem to have been of the type produced in Majorca in the second half of the fourteenth century, which adopted the format of the sea-chart but which extended the territory depicted to include sub-Saharan Africa, parts of Asia, and certain Atlantic islands, as well as adding decorative features. Beccari quickly fell into 53 Peter Barber, ‘Old Encounters New: The Aslake World Map’, in Géographie du monde au

Moyen Âge et à la Renaissance, ed. Monique Pelletier (Paris: C.T.H.S., 1989), pp. 69–88. Barber, ‘The Aslake World Map’, p. 71. Barber, ‘The Aslake World Map’, pp. 82–4. Barber, ‘The Aslake World Map’, pp. 84–5. Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, p. 430: ‘Con questa n’è una a mastro Fancesco, il quale sollicito quanto più posso facci sia conpiuto il primo per tutto questo mese, e il più tosto potrà come elli m’à scritto, dandoli intenzione ch’io la vorrò qua mostrare al Re, e poi a quello di Navarra, e poi portarla mecho inn’Inghilterra e donalla al Re d’Inghilterra’; see R. A. Skelton, ‘A Contract for World Maps at Barcelona, 1399–1400’, Imago Mundi, 22 (1968), 107–13.

54 55 56 57

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dispute with Baldassare, with the result that the contract appears never to have been fulfilled, although two of the four commissioned maps were completed. The map commissioned by Baldassare was apparently not presented to the king of England (who, by the time the maps were completed, would have been Henry IV). What remains significant is Baldassare’s conviction that an expensive mappa mundi was a suitable gift for a king, and his stated intention of showing maps to other European sovereigns before making the gift. The inference that can be drawn is that maps with a significant emphasis on the sea could be found at certain royal courts, and that from there copies could be made for further distribution. If the possession of sea-charts in fourteenth-century England seems to have been restricted to a few learned scholars, the royal court, and perhaps members of the merchant community, there is evidence of an increasing familiarity with, and use of, sea-charts in England in the fifteenth century. The Venetian naval officer and mapmaker Andrea Bianco signed a chart of 1448 ‘Andrea biancho. venician comito di galia mi fexe a londra MCCCCXXXXVIII’.58 The absence of any other sea-charts known to have been made in England suggests that Bianco’s was made during a brief visit to London on a Venetian galley.59 But Bianco’s map shows the likelihood that sea-charts circulated through contacts with Italian and Catalan merchants and sailors who frequented English ports. Moreover, the nature of Bianco’s map is suggestive: it does not show the Mediterranean, but instead extends from the British Isles and the Frisian coast in the north, to the Atlantic coastlines of France, Spain, and Portugal, and then on well past the Canaries as far down the African coast as Cape Verde. We have no evidence that this map ever resided in English hands, but such a map would have offered an image of the British Isles very much enmeshed in the context of an expanding Atlantic littoral, within reach of that sea’s inviting archipelagos. High-profile gifts, such as Bartholomew Columbus’s presentation of a map of the world to Henry VII in 1488, along with the maps of Sebastian Cabot,60 testify to the connections between charts and overseas exploration that were emerging at the end of the fifteenth century. At the same time, it is possible to see a continuation of the tradition of compiling detailed written records of coastal topography and toponomy visible in De viis maris and other twelfth-century texts. In 1478 William Worcester copied a list of Atlantic islands, including the Canaries and the Cape Verde Isles, ‘from the book of Christopher Baldement clerk, who laboured in several of the said 80 islands’.61 Around a decade earlier Sir John Paston had copied into his Book of Knighthood a detailed set of sailing direc58 Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, F.260 Inf. (1). 59 Campbell suggests that Bianco drew the chart ashore during three and a half months of

cargo loading and customs clearance: ‘Portolan Charts from the Late Thirteenth Century to 1500’, p. 433; Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, pp. 489, 496. 60 Tyacke, ‘Chartmaking in England’, pp. 1727–9. 61 William Worcester, Itineraries, ed. John H. Harvey (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), pp. 372–3. Worcester presumably refers here to Cristoforo Buondelmonte’s Isolario of 1420.



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tions from Berwick-upon-Tweed to Gibraltar, the earliest known ‘rutter’ (routier) composed entirely in English.62 In sum, the picture sometimes painted of sea-charts as a strange and largely unknown technology in England seems to need revision. It is, furthermore, worth noting that extant records of the circulation of these maps points to their presence in diverse contexts: monks and university scholars, as well as mariners and monarchs, would have had access to sea-charts. This mixed audience indicates that the notion of a division between ecclesiastical and secular functions of maps – very strongly held in previous literature on cartography, and still often repeated today63 – no longer seems tenable in any rigid sense. This division has encouraged the view that one can distinguish between pragmatic and spiritual readings of maps, and the production of maps for these purposes. In its crudest form such a theory would deem mappae mundi primarily the products of churchmen, myopic and uninterested in geographic reality, desirous only of symbolic and allegorical readings. And it would oppose to mappae mundi the pragmatic and dynamic genre of the sea-chart – the map of mariners and merchants, but not of monks. A small amount of imagination only is needed to see the reductive nature of such a paradigm. May we not allow the possibility that a merchant might have wanted to look at a map to see holy sites (some of which, such as the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, are regularly portrayed on sea-charts), and that, conversely, a monk might have been interested to know where Cyprus was in relation to Genoa? Imagination aside, there is plenty of evidence to point to the convergence of ‘pragmatic’ and ‘religious’ ends within medieval cartography.64 Richard Exeter, for example, a monk who is known to have lived in some opulence, possessed at his death several fine vestments, including fur-lined tunics and a London cloak, 21 plates, 23 potagers, and 24 saucers, a chess-set, and had amongst his collection of books not only maps but a copy of the Polychronicon bound with Pipino’s translation of Marco Polo (‘polycronicon cum libro Marci Pauli’), Petrus Comestor’s Historia scholastica, a ‘Bellum troianum cum multis tractatibus’, as well as Richard Rolle’s Incendium amoris, and Willelmus Durandus’s Rationale divinorum officiorum.65 Interests, especially within the monastery, could be very broad.

62 The work appears to have circulated reasonably widely in fifteenth-century England, and

certainly beyond its primary audience: Geoffrey A. Lester, ‘The Earliest English Sailing Directions’, in Popular and Practical Science of Medieval England, ed. Lister M. Matheson (East Lansing, MI: Colleagues Press, 1994), pp. 331–67. 63 Bagrow and Skelton, for example, devote separate chapters to ‘The Christian Middle Ages’ and ‘Mediaeval sea-charts’, although they do acknowledge the influence of sea-charts on later medieval mappae mundi: Leo Bagrow, History of Cartography, rev. R. A. Skelton (London: Watts, 1964); see recently Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, 509. 64 See Gautier Dalché, Carte marine et portulan au XIIe siècle. 65 English Benedictine Libraries: The Shorter Catalogues, pp. 627–9.

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From Hulle to Cartage: Maps and Identity In what ways, then, did the sea-chart genre of maps alter the depiction of the British Isles found on mappae mundi and on zonal maps, and what implications might this revised image hold for the question of English identity? It should first be noted that the representation of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland on sea-charts seems to have undergone fairly rapid alteration and, in the cases of England and Ireland, improvement in the period between the earliest surviving chart, the late thirteenth-century Carte Pisane, and the second quarter of the fourteenth century. While a rudimentary outline of the southern coast of England appears on the Carte Pisane, with only a handful of toponyms from Cornwall to Canterbury, subsequent sea-charts in general depict the southern and eastern coasts of England and the east coast of Ireland in greater detail. BL MS Additional 25691, for example, an anonymous chart of 1339–50 attributed to the Majorcan atelier of Angelino Dulceti, gives some prominence to England and Ireland in its top left corner (Figure 8). Although the toponym ‘Ingeltera’ dominates the interior, the map also marks Scotland and Wales. There is a reasonable density of toponyms along the southern coasts of England from Bristol (Bristo) in the west to Lynn (Lenna) in the east, with London (londres) the one prominent interior place name. The north-west coastline of England and Scotland is not depicted at all, but a sporadic representation of east coast harbours includes Hull, Scarborough (Scirdenborg), Berwick, and Dundee. A second point is that the emphasis of sea-charts on the Mediterranean and Black Sea coastlines, including the coast of north Africa, left the British Isles looking at once peripheral yet, by means of the sea, connected to these mercantile and political worlds. These connections to the Atlantic coasts of Europe, as well as to southern Europe and even north Africa, would have come as no surprise to medieval English audiences familiar with non-cartographic descriptions of routes and travel narratives. But sea-charts swiftly conveyed information about the locations of Atlantic islands such as the Canaries, in addition to parts of the west African coast that became known to Europeans in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Sea-charts, in other words, encouraged a consciousness of England’s place within an Atlantic, as well as Mediterranean, spatial order. Dulceti’s map may have the Mediterranean as its primary focus, but it also outlines a North Sea geography, extending as far as Norway and Denmark, and marking significant continental ports such as Rostock and Lübeck, as well as the course of the Rhine. Its representation of the coasts in greatest proximity to southern England, those of Flanders, Normandy, and Brittany, is detailed. And its representation of the Atlantic includes the Canaries, while at its westernmost extent the words ‘mare oceanno’ are repeated three times, evoking the unknown extent of the western ocean. As mappae mundi like the Aslake map show, such information was of interest to an English audience.



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Disclaimer: Some images in the printed version of this book are not available for inclusion in the eBook. To view the image on this page please refer to the printed version of this book. Figure 8: British Library, Additional 25691: sea chart, atelier of Angelino Dulceti, 1339-50. North is at the top. The British Isles are located in the map’s top left corner.

If we can assume that maps of the kind produced by Dulceti were circulating in England, probably within very limited circles, from the late fourteenth century onwards, it is not too great a leap at least to allow the possibility that sea-charts, as well as mappae mundi, could have influenced the spatial conceptions of some English literary authors. To take a well-known example, Chaucer’s Man of Law’s Tale has been linked to the world image found on mappae mundi,66 and it is certainly possible to understand the wanderings of Custance in terms of the geography set out on texts such as the Sawley or Hereford maps. Boccaccio’s version of the same story (Decameron 5.2), which is located much more firmly in the mercantile world of commercial exchange between Italy (specifically the island of Lipari) and north Africa,67 may seem a better fit for a sea-chart derived sense of space. But given the presence of a ‘mappa maris’ at Westminster during Chaucer’s lifetime, and the possibility that his own travels – not least to Genoa – would have brought him into contact with such maps, it does not seem unreasonable to connect the journeys of Custance with the rather more precise image of the Mediterranean and Atlantic shores presented on a sea-chart. Of course, the very point of Custance’s drifting is the consignment of the map- and rudder-less Christian subject to God’s will; and the general paucity of topographical detail 66 See Kathy Lavezzo, Angels on the Edge of the World: Geography, Literature, and English

Community, 1000–1537 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2006), pp. 93–113, who does acknowledge the contemporaneity of sea-charts but regards them as ‘the exception rather than the rule’ (p. 95); see also Scott Westrem’s discussion of Chaucer’s topographical reference in the context of medieval maps, including sea-charts: ‘Geography and Travel’, in A Companion to Chaucer, ed. Peter Brown (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 195–217. 67 See in particular David Wallace’s comparison of the two versions in Chaucerian Polity: Absolutist Lineages and Associational Forms in England and Italy (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1997), pp. 205–11.

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in the ‘Man of Law’s Tale’ precludes the conclusion that Chaucer wrote it with a sea-chart in front of him. However, there seems to me no reason to doubt that he could have possessed quite a clear sense of the distance between European and North African coasts, as well as a good idea of the maritime route between London and Rome. In particular, the references to the ‘See of Grece’ (i.e. eastern Mediterranean) and the ‘Strayte of Marrok’, through which Custance passes on her voyage from Syria to Northumberland, and later to ‘Jubaltare’ (Gibraltar), and ‘Septe’ (Ceuta) as she re-enters the Mediterranean,68 are much more compatible with the sea-chart tradition, or with texts such as De viis maris, than with mappae mundi, which normally depict the Strait of Gibraltar with the Pillars of Hercules, or the mountains on either side of the straits, ‘Calpe’ and ‘Atlas’. Similarly, Chaucer’s Shipman, who ‘knew alle the havenes, as they were,/ Fro Gootlond to the cape of Fynystere,/ And every cryke in Britaigne and in Spayne’,69 may well be a figure for traditional modes of coast-hugging navigation, with knowledge hard won by experience, but he may equally share in the culture of the makers of sea-charts, who after all relied on the advice of mariners, and who aspired to similarly detailed displays of coastal toponomy.70 In fact, Chaucer’s remark of the Shipman’s craft that ‘[t]her nas noon swich from Hulle to Cartage’ nicely illustrates his mixture of geographic registers. The reference to Hull seems baffling if one refers only to mappae mundi traditions, but it makes more sense when one consults sea-charts, where ‘ullo’ is a fairly regular presence due to its significance at the mouth of the Humber. ‘Cartage’ may refer to Cartagena on the Mediterranean coast of Spain, but at the very least it echoes the name of the classical city, which is an integral part of the depiction of north Africa on mappae mundi.71 Glossing ‘from Hull to Cartagena’ keeps us securely within the sea-chart/portolan register (though it is unclear why the Shipman stopped at Cartagena); glossing ‘from Hull to Carthage’ dislocates the spatial 68 ‘The Man of Law’s Tale’, in The Riverside Chaucer, ed. Larry D. Benson, 3rd edn (Cambridge, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1987), ll. 464–5, 947. Magoun maintained that Chaucer ‘had in mind’ the ridge of seven peaks known as the ‘Septem Fratres’, rather than Ceuta, a port at the foot of the mountains: Francis P. Magoun, A Chaucer Gazetteer (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1961), pp. 142–3. De viis maris includes ‘Scep, que est una de nobilissimis ciuitatibus Affrice’ (6.6, p. 195) and ‘Iubaltarie insula mons magnus’ (6.6, p. 196) in its description of the ‘terra paganorum quam habent in Hyspania’. 69 ‘General Prologue’, in The Riverside Chaucer, ll. 407–09. 70 ‘lodemonage’ (MED: a) navigation, skill in navigation; a course followed; b) the cost of pilotage) is usually not interpreted as including piloting by recourse to maps in the statement that ‘... [the Shipman’s] craft to rekene wel his tydes,/ His stremes, and his daungers hym bisides,/ His herberwe, and his moone, his lodemenage,/ Ther nas noon swich from Hulle to Cartage’: ‘General Prologue’, ll. 401–04. On the question of the usage of sea-charts by medieval mariners see the contrasting positions of Gautier Dalché, ‘L’usage des cartes marines aux XIVe et XVe siècles’, in Spazi, tempi, misure e percorsi nell’Europa del bassomedioevo (Spoleto: Centro Italiano di Studi sull’alto Medioevo, 1996), pp. 97–128, and Pujades, Les Cartes portolanes, esp. pp. 456–63. 71 The Riverside Chaucer accordingly glosses l. 404 ‘Carthage, Tunisia, or Cartagena, Spain’.



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and temporal frames, moving from contemporary mercantile city to Dido and Aeneas, from sea-chart to mappa mundi. Such shifts and overlays are far from abnormal in medieval spatial thinking and representation. Maps – in the medieval as in the modern era – have the capacity to change as well as to represent identity.72 However, given the relative lack of detailed accounts of map use or even awareness in the Middle Ages, it would be hazardous to assert that medieval English identity was shaped in any significant degree by maps. Moreover, the absence of any map of England, as opposed to maps of Britain, the Mediterranean, or the world, rather suggests the lack of any clear visual expression of national identity. Instead, the surviving medieval maps seem to present an image of England’s interconnections with natural forces and regional networks – and indeed with other parts of its own archipelago. Mappae mundi may well have depicted England on the edge of the known world, albeit sometimes in significant detail, but zonal maps positioned the westernmost islands of Europe within a global system of oceanic currents, extending from the equator to the poles. Maps of Britain such as those produced by Matthew Paris, or the Gough map, reveal a strong interest in the surrounding region, from Scandinavia to the Flemish and French coasts, to Ireland. Sea-charts, in their initial format, showed England at one end of the Mediterranean world, but by the second half of the fifteenth century a new perspective saw the British Isles at the north of an emerging Atlantic space that extended south down the coast of Africa and west far into the ocean sea. The representation of England on maps, whether as part of a world or regional image, existed in more than one context, and was always susceptible to multiple readings.

72 See Thongchai Winichikul, Siam Mapped: A History of the Geo-Body of a Nation (Hono-

lulu, HI: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1994).

Lingua Franca: Overseas Travel and Language Contact in The Book of Margery Kempe* Jonathan Hsy The Book of Margery Kempe (c. 1436) is an English narrative that conspicuously spans both sides of the sea. The Proem opens with an ‘Englyschman’ who comes ‘into Yngland’ from ‘beyonden the see [in] Dewchland’ (Proem, ll. 66–89), and a merchant’s voyage from England ‘seylyng ovyr the see’ (2.2.12) launches Book 2 of the text; the protagonist of the Book of course makes her own trips back and forth over the Channel, and the text traces her movements through a striking range of insular and Continental settings.1 So well-travelled is she, in fact, that the narrator proclaims the text could not possibly relate all of her experiences ‘as wel on yen half the see as on this halfe, on the watyr as on the lond’ (2.8.546). This chapter considers the geocultural ramifications of the Book’s curious ineffability topos. In this moment, the narrator asserts that overseas travel and trans-Channel perspectives are crucial to the text’s operations – yet this claim would appear to run counter to the aims of modern scholars who would characterise The Book of Margery Kempe as idiosyncratically ‘English’ or insular in its content, genre, or style. The Book’s first modern editors, for instance, sought to ascribe distinctive features of this text to ‘native influences’, only to acknowledge (however reluctantly) that the text incorporates Latin traditions as well as Continental literary models.2 Moreover, the Book’s protagonist traverses far-flung geographical spaces, * I thank Sebastian Sobecki for organising the conference session at which this paper was first presented and inviting me to contribute to this volume. I further extend my thanks to Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Theresa Coletti, and my colleagues affiliated with The George Washington University Medieval and Early Modern Studies Institute for their feedback on a previous version of this chapter. 1 All citations from the text are from The Book of Margery Kempe, ed. Lynn Staley (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1996). For ease of reference across modern editions of the text, all my citations (with the exception of the Proem) include the relevant book, chapter, and line numbers. 2 As Staley observes, Margery Kempe’s ‘prose treatise is frequently described as the first autobiography in English’, an assertion that problematically positions the Book as the forerunner to later literary traditions (Staley, The Book of Margery Kempe, p. 1); see also The Book of Margery Kempe: Annotated Edition, ed. Barry Windeatt (Cambridge: Brewer, 2004, repr. 2006), p. 31. In the first critical edition of the Middle English text (The Book of Margery Kempe, ed. Sanford Brown Meech and Hope Emily Allen, EETS o.s., 212 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1940)), Hope Emily Allen presents ‘a study of foreign influences on the

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languages, and nations beyond England. In other words, the Book’s ineffability topos suggests how profoundly maritime and cross-cultural contexts inform the protagonist’s journeys, and the text asks readers to marvel at her very capacity to transcend linguistic and national boundaries. In approaching this English Book as a decidedly trans-Channel production, this chapter reassesses the narrative not only as hagiography or spiritual autobiography (as many have done so well) but also as an intricate work of travel writing; the wondrous Book transports the reader over ground and water and inhabits ‘many divers contres and places’ beyond England (Proem, l. 115), and the text exhibits all the while a complex narrative and stylistic richness.3 In narrating the protagonist’s many travels, the Book explores the complex relationship between language and national identity, often under unexpected circumstances. Throughout the Book, the protagonist interacts with a surprising array of non-English speakers: Germanic scribes, Latinate and multilingual priests, and Continental (Romance-speaking) women, among others; each encounter not only sanctifies the protagonist but also provides (in many cases) an opportunity for creative literary experimentation, including artful portrayals of non-English speech patterns. Margery’s experiences are intricately shaped by her interactions with non-English speakers on both sides of the sea (as the text dutifully reminds us), and her perpetual motion through polylingual environments challenges readers to continually re-evaluate Kempe’s own relationship to English identity.4 Before proceeding with my reading of the Book, I should clarify that I follow the lead of Lynn Staley in bifurcating the name of Margery Kempe: ‘Margery’ refers to the fictional protagonist inside the text, ‘Kempe’ to an authorial figure or agent outside of it.5 Staley’s influential analysis of the Book discerns (among Book of Margery Kempe’, acknowledging that ‘the influences which above all instituted the writing of the book were not English’ (p. lvii); nonetheless, she still asserts that ‘when the book was written it owed its distinctive qualities, to a considerable degree, to native influences’ (p. lvii). 3 Readings of The Book of Margery Kempe as travel literature are surprisingly few. See Terrence Bowers, ‘Margery Kempe as Traveler’, Studies in Philology, 97 (2000), 1–28. Curiously, the Proem’s stated investment in ‘many divers contres and places’ resonates with the Preface to the Travels of one John Mandeville, born in ‘Ingelond’, who ‘travelide aboute in the worlde in many diverse contreis to se mervailes and customes of contreis and diversiteis of folkys and diverse shap of men and of beistis’ (The Book of John Mandeville, ed. Tamarah Kohanski and C. David Benson (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2007), pp. 1–3). 4 The fact that Margery Kempe moves through many multilingual environments is not a new observation. On the ‘quadri-lingual environment’ of Italian, German, English, and Latin in the Book, see Sarah Beckwith, ‘Problems of Authority in Late Medieval English Mysticism: Language, Agency, and Authority in The Book of Margery Kempe’, Exemplaria, 4 (1992), 171–99 (esp. 190). On Margery’s ‘perpetual motion’ and the capacity of non-verbal vocalisations to ‘move her through and across language’, see Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Medieval Identity Machines (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2003), pp. 175–7. 5 Staley, The Book of Margery Kempe, p. 3.



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other things) a mobile ‘Englishness’ in the Book, and Staley employs the word ‘English’ in reference to the adjective’s intertwined national, ethnic, and linguistic connotations: ‘Margery […] gathers around herself a ‘nation’ of folk who likewise define community in terms of language, relationship, and habit of unity. However, the language – English – is a medium of true communication among otherwise unlike people’ (p. 170). Staley’s reading of the Book lucidly connects the Englishness of Kempe’s work to relevant local, insular contexts (including debates over the vernacularisation of the Gospel),6 but this reading of Margery’s travelling English-language community – one that she ‘gathers around herself ’ and defines a ‘habit of unity’ – has the potential to diminish the richness of Margery’s frequent cross-linguistic exchanges and movements through polyglot communities. Margery, after all, does not maintain a hermetically sealed ‘English’ bubble as she travels – among other things, her English company abandons her during her journeys – and she readily interacts with non-English speakers on both sides of the sea. As a result, the Book pursues non-Anglocentric, transnational, and multidirectional trajectories. This chapter has three sections. The first examines instances of cross-linguistic exchange that transpire in Margery’s hometown of Lynn as well as her travels abroad. In the second section of this chapter, I explore how previous narratives about holy female seafarers can inform the intricate representation of cross-linguistic encounters in the Book. The third section of this essay examines a single motif in the Book – seaborne prayer – in order to bridge Margery Kempe’s local East Anglian milieu and seemingly distant Continental maritime contexts. What happens once we heed the Book’s assertion that events on both sides of the sea (‘yen half the see as on this halfe’) comprise equally important aspects of the protagonist’s story? How might a particular sensitivity to travels ‘on the watyr as on the lond’ illuminate this text’s own exploration of English identity? Cross-Linguistic Communication: On Land and Sea In order to see just how pervasively the Book conjoins overseas travel and cross-linguistic exchange and troubles unitary conceptions of ‘Englishness’, we can begin (fittingly enough) with the text’s opening. The Proem first situates the Book not in England or even in Britain per se but rather in a transnational, polyglot nexus of cultural production. The text introduces a certain expatriated ‘Englyschman […] dwellyng in Dewchlond’ – that is, in present-day Germany or Dutch-speaking Low Countries, or another Germanic region on the Continent – who sails ‘into Yngland wyth hys wyfe and hys goodys’ to dwell in Margery’s home (Proem, ll. 66–72). This Anglo-Germanic scribe records Margery’s ‘felyngs’ but produces an unintelligibly hybrid text: ‘neithyr good Englysch ne Dewch’, as the Book states (l. 74). Only after Margery takes it to another priest ‘preyng hym to wrytyn this booke and […] grawntyng hym a grett summe of good for hys 6

Staley, The Book of Margery Kempe, p. 170.

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labowr’ and praying God to ‘purchasyn hym grace to reden it and wrytyn it’ is this garbled German/English text made legible (ll. 95–6). Aided by Margery’s prayer, the man reads the text and renders it into proper (‘good’) English (ll. 95–6). In this convoluted opening gambit, the Proem situates the reader on the English ‘side’ of the Continent through a series of well-chosen prepositions: this ‘Englyschman’ returns ‘into Yngland […] fro beyonden the see […] in Dewchland’ (ll. 66–84, emphasis added). That is, the text initially presumes a narrative orientation with England as its reference point, and the Continent is somewhere ‘beyonden’ the sea. Nonetheless, the Proem also ascribes to the Book a curious sense of motion and a restless transnational orbit, and the implicit geographical orientation of the reader is actually in flux throughout ensuing narrative. For instance, the Proem defines the first amanuensis as ‘a man dwelling in Dewchlond’ (placing the reader, as it were, on the Continent) before the text claims him as ‘an Englyschman in hys byrth’ (ll. 67–8). The second scribe whom Margery prays (and pays) to re-write the hybrid German/English text ‘had sum tym red letters of the other mannys wrytyng sent fro beyonden the see whyl he was in Dewchland’ (ll. 86–7). The exact referent of the masculine pronoun in the phrase ‘whyl he was in Dewchland’ is potentially ambiguous; while most would read the text as suggesting the second scribe was in England when he received the first man’s letters from overseas, it could also be the case that the second scribe was himself in ‘Dewchland’ when he received the first man’s letters from England. In any case, we see that the initially hybrid, linguistically indeterminate text (which only later transmutes into the Book) owes its very existence not to a single point of origin in England but rather to an intricate circuit of transactions: an exchange of goods, letters, and services launched by an act of overseas travel. The very casual way in which the Proem characterises movements between ‘Dewchland’ and ‘Yngland’ and marriages between different ethnic and linguistic groups deserves closer attention here; the text readily suggests that Kempe’s hometown of Lynn was a busy port town, frequented by Germanic visitors whose lives were intimately entwined with those of native English inhabitants.7 Contemporary documents produced in Lynn include multilingual epistolary and business correspondence that attests to frequent exchange between Lynn residents and overseas communities throughout the Hanseatic League. The commonplace book of Kempe’s contemporary William Asshebourne, town clerk of Lynn, was collated between 1408 and 1417 and it gathers together (among other documents) letters between Lynn’s mercantile community and Hanseatic traders overseas; a friendly Latin letter to Lynn’s Mayor from authorities in Danzig (or 7

For more on Lynn’s Hanseatic connections, see Kate Parker, ‘Lynn and the Making of a Mystic’, in A Companion to the Book of Margery Kempe, ed. John H. Arnold and Katherine J. Lewis (Cambridge: Brewer, 2004), pp. 55–73. On the Kempe family’s professional connections with Danzig, Lübeck, Stralsund and other ports, see Anthony Goodman, Margery Kempe and Her World (London: Longman, 2002), p. 65.



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Gdańsk, in modern-day Poland) fondly recalls one ‘Edwardus Faukes noster convicinus dilectus quo nobiscum Dansik in naccione Anglico diu moratus est’ (‘Edward Faukes, our beloved neighbour who dwelled for a long time among us within the English ‘nation’ [merchant community] in Danzig’) (fol. 56v), and an English letter sent back to England from Lynn merchants in Danzig establishes ordinances for the community while residing abroad (fols 6v–8).8 In the broader context of such intimate English/Hanseatic neighbouring in port cities, the marriage of Margery’s merchant son to a ‘wife in Pruce [Prussia] in Dewchelond’ (2.1.51–2) and her own journey to accompany her daughter-in-law (‘a Dewche woman’) back to ‘hir owyn cuntré’ may very well have struck Kempe’s neighbours as relatively routine, everyday occurrences (2.2.109–12).9 The Proem invites us to situate the Book within much larger networks of Anglo-Hanseatic epistolary, economic, and cultural exchange, and the narrative exploits the mixed local sociolinguistic landscape of Lynn in the service of bolstering Margery’s saintly status. In order for Kempe’s narrative fiction to claim a powerful rhetorical effect, readers must believe that the protagonist Margery is both illiterate and monolingual. By narrating the repeated and tortuous acts of cross-linguistic conversion that must transpire in order to bring the text into being (and, eventually, to transform it into legible ‘good Englysch’), the Proem renders the Book all the more authoritative – and amazing. Despite the culturally hybrid coastal setting that the Book so breezily acknowledges in its Proem, Margery’s linguistic ‘Englishness’ (that is, her identity as a woman who speaks only English) is frequently asserted throughout the text. Kempe or her amanuenses often highlight Margery’s purported monolingualism as a narrative device, seeking to extend the motif of the protagonist’s unlikely, miraculous authority. In one episode, the steward of Leicester addresses Margery in Latin and she responds: ‘Spekyth Englysch […] for I undyrstonde not what ye sey’ (1.47.2650–1). Yet inside York Minster, Margery responds to Latinate clerics with great aplomb, suggesting she has at least some aural facility with Latin (and, as the narrator asserts, divine inspiration).10 Once the protagonist has crossed onto the ‘other’ side of the sea, a complex chain of inter-vernacular and Latin/ vernacular miracles ensues. In ‘Seynt Jonys Cherch Lateranens’ in Rome, Margery delivers her confession to another German priest, who understands no English.11 8

King’s Lynn Borough Archives, KL/C10/2. The Danzig letters on fols. 56v and 6v-8 are transcribed by Dorothy M. Owen, The Making of King’s Lynn: A Documentary Survey (London: Published for the British Academy by Oxford University Press, 1984), documents no. 353 (p. 382) and no. 348 (pp. 278–80). 9 As Parker astutely observes: ‘The frequent visits of foreigners to the town and to [Margery Kempe’s] own home, and the everyday comings and goings of searfaring men and merchants must have made distant travel second nature to the inhabitants of Lynn [and] perhaps her intrepid journeying was viewed as relatively unremarkable’ (‘Lynn and the Making of a Mystic’, 67). 10 See Book 1, Chapter 51. 11 See Book 1, Chapter 33.

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Elsewhere, Margery tells a story ‘in hyr owyn langage in Englysch’ to the same ‘Duche preste’ who repeats it, in ‘the same wordys’, to a rapt audience – in Latin (1.40.2280–99). Through ‘mervylows’ episodes of cross-linguistic communication, the Book repeatedly affirms the protagonist’s saintly status.12 While the language miracles within the Book are indeed compelling, we should not take at face value the text’s narrative assertions about protagonist’s limited language capacities.13 Elsewhere, the narrative reveals that Margery’s language proficiencies extend beyond Latin to include other vernaculars. Wandering ‘in the strete’ near Rome, an impoverished Margery encounters a wealthy lady, ‘Dame Margarete Florentyn’, whom she first met in Assisi (1.38.2169). Neither woman speaks the other’s language, so they communicate through a mixture of simplified French and assorted gestures: [Margery] met wyth a worshepful lady, Dame Margarete Florentyn, the same lady that browt hir fro Assyse into Rome. And neithyr of hem cowd wel undirstand other but be syngnys er tokenys and in fewe comown wordys. And than the lady seyd onto hir, ‘Margerya in poverté?’ Sche, undirstondyng what the lady ment, seyd agen, ‘Ya, grawnt poverté, Madam.’ Than the lady comawndyd hir to etyn wyth hir every Sonday and set hir at hir owen tabil abovyn hirself and leyd hir mete wyth hir owyn handys. (1.38.2177–84)

In this encounter, the Book effects a stylised portrayal of a mundane cross-linguistic exchange. In contrast to the miraculous language encounters that occur elsewhere in the Book (which carry strong Pentacostal and hagiographical resonances), this encounter between English ‘Margery’ and her Continental namesake ‘Margarete’ foregrounds the earthbound mechanics of human communication. ‘Margerya in poverté?’ ‘Ya, grawnt poverté, Madam.’ Here, Margery pleas for aid, and Dame Margarete responds with acts of charity. By offering direct discourse, and narrating its immediate after-effects, the Book showcases the very worldly circumstances that shape Margery’s speech. This Margery/Margarete encounter is also conspicuous for another reason; it reveals the potential malleability of national and ethnic affiliations among travellers who are far from home, when conventional social codes and rules of interaction are held, as it were, in suspension. The ethnic and linguistic origin of Margarete is, after all, unspecified; ‘Margarete’ works as a Germanic or Romanic form of the name, and ‘Dame Florentyne’ comes not from Florence but ‘fro Rome’. Whatever language(s) the women use at home, both the English Margery and her Continental namesake Margarete speak an improvised lingua franca on the road. Touchingly, the two women bridge the gulf of socioeconomic differ12 On the trope of ‘xenoglossia’ (the miraculous ability to speak or understand a language

that is previously unknown), see Christine Cooper, ‘Miraculous Translation in The Book of Margery Kempe’, Studies in Philology, 101 (2004), 70–98. 13 Indeed, Karma Lochrie reminds us not to underestimate the Latinity of the Book (Margery Kempe and Translations of the Flesh (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1994), p. 114).



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ence that separates them by converging upon the ‘comown’ word poverté – which works equally well as (say) a French or a Middle English word. Moreover, the adjectival form of ‘grawnt’ is a peculiar usage that appears nowhere else in the Book, perhaps reflecting Margery’s intuitive approximation of French. In short, the ‘Englysch’ Margery may not actually speak Latin, but she can – when push comes to shove – display a functional proficiency in at least one other vernacular language. This transient dialogue arguably incorporates elements of three different languages (Middle English, French, and Margery’s ‘Ya’ has a certain Germanic tinge), and Book depicts the fluid, dynamic sort of linguistic exchange that readily occurred along travel routes when people from different socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds were forced, by necessity, to interact. The Book may even record snippets of a Franco-Italian trade pidgin, or some other Romancebased vernacular.14 While this representation of mixed language is indeed fleeting, there is a cumulative effect to such instances of interpersonal communication throughout the Book that evince a spoken lingua franca just beyond the text’s reach.15 This term ‘lingua franca’ of course has its origins in maritime cultural settings, and sociolinguistic research on pidgin and creole languages has revealed the complex hybridisation of languages and cultural accommodation between speakers that occurs most conspicuously in maritime contact zones around the globe.16 Taxonomising the reported speech in this episode as ‘belonging’ to any particular language is ultimately problematic; Sanford Brown Meech, for instance, characterises Margery’s speech as ‘a mongrel Italian’,17 while Barry Windeatt discerns ‘attempts to recall the question and [Margery’s] own response in broken Italian’.18 However, the women’s speech could more accurately be considered a functional adaptation rather than any attempt to replicate ‘one’ particular language (be it 14 On the cultural and literary status of franco-veneto, ‘a peculiar hybrid of languages’ used in

late-medieval northern Italy, see Alison Cornish, ‘Translatio Galliae: Effects of Early FrancoItalian Literary Exchange’, Romanic Review, 97 (2006), 309–30 (esp. 320). 15 A similarly hybrid vernacular exchange occurs between Margery and a housewife earlier in Assisi. Margery asks the wife to help her find her ring signifying marriage to Christ: ‘Madam, my bone maryd ryng to Jhesu Crist, as ho seyth, it is away’ (1.31.1822–3). The housewife retrieves the ring from under the bed and asks for forgiveness: ‘Bone Christian, prey pur me’ (1.31.1830). The words ‘bone’ [good] and ‘pur’ [for] occur only in this passage of the Book, suggesting that in this moment both women are adopting some sort of Romance-derived speech. 16 On the distinction between pidgins and creoles, see April McMahon, Understanding Language Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), esp. ‘Pidgins and Creoles’ (pp. 253–83), ‘Language Death’ (pp. 284–313); Suzanne Romaine, Pidgin and Creole Languages (London: Longman, 1993). My use of ‘contact zone’ implicitly engages with the work of Mary Louise Pratt, ‘Criticism in the Contact Zone: Decentering Community and Nation’, in Critical Theory, Cultural Poetics, and Latin American Narrative, ed. Steven M. Bell et al. (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1993), pp. 83–102. 17 Meech and Allen, The Book of Margery Kempe, footnote to 93/26–7 (p. 303). 18 Windeatt, The Book of Margery Kempe, footnote to line 3059 (p. 201).

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French, Italian, or something along the lines of a spoken franco-veneto); as the text suggests, the women are converging upon a ‘comown’ improvised tongue. Indeed, we can discern in this exchange many discourse features surprisingly consistent with contemporary maritime pidgins: the lack of personal pronouns, the omission of the copula, and a drastically reduced lexicon drawing from different substrate languages.19 In short, this fleeting snippet of dialogue offers a tantalisingly lifelike – and artfully stylised – representation of language contact. This discussion of the Continental linguistic miracles and the landlocked Margery/Margrete encounter might seem quite removed from the notion of sea travel that began this chapter. However, this particular cross-linguistic exchange must be put in the context of the Book’s more pervasive interests in translingual communication, including the initial feats of miraculous translation that launch the text itself. Moreover, we can see in the Margery/Margarete episode how readily some strategies of linguistic accommodation that are typically associated with maritime settings are actually enacted by two women who happen to be on land. In other words, we witness the very fluidity of linguistic boundaries in Margery Kempe’s varied cultural milieux. In the Proem, an expatriated ‘Englyschman in hys byrth’ dwells in Margery’s own home to record her dictation, producing a text that floats uneasily between his native and acquired tongues (‘neithyr good Englysch ne Dewch’). In the Margery/Margarete episode, the English woman and Continental lady arrive at shared idioma in which is itself ‘neithyr’ speaker’s native tongue. In this case, neither speaker is entirely ‘at home’, yet each woman may nonetheless understand the other’s speech and make herself be understood. The ‘comown’ language these women inhabit is, paradoxically, both familiar and strange.20 Thus we see in Proem’s unnamed ‘Englyschman’ and in Margery herself two travellers who find themselves momentarily ‘at sea’, not quite ‘at home’ in their own language. Holy Seafarers, Littoral Encounters, and Fluid Languages As I have suggested, the Book invests in language contact on both sides of the sea, narrating instances of translinguistic exchange on land or in the home. 19 See footnote 16 (above) for sociolinguistic overviews of pidgins and creoles. McMahon

observes that the lexicon of a pidgin is characteristically reduced when compared to its superstrate and substrate languages (Understanding Language Change, p. 258); its words are often multifunctional, acting as nouns, verbs, and adjectives; and expression of complex ideas often involves circumlocution and periphrasis (p. 259). Romaine notes that pidgins are characterised by minimal pronominal systems (Pidgin and Creole Languages, p. 26) and often lack the copula (p. 29). 20 On the complex relationship between late-medieval English and French vernaculars (especially for certain writers in England, for whom French doubled as a native and alien tongue), see Ardis Butterfield, The Familiar Enemy: Chaucer, Language, and Nation in the Hundred Years War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). See for instance the role of ‘linguistic strangeness’ in the works of Kempe’s channel-crossing contemporary Charles d’Orléans (p. 307), as well as earlier writers Geoffrey Chaucer (pp. 292–6) and Thomas Usk (pp. 335–41).



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Spanning contact zones in England and the Continent, the Book transports the reader across the sea through a series of intimate cross-linguistic encounters; in terms of geographical trajectories, the reader moves from Margery’s home in Lynn (in the oral genesis of the hybrid German/English text) to a roadside encounter near Rome (a hybrid Romance-inflected exchange between women). While these moments are indeed intriguing in their own right, the Book conspicuously diverges from the representations of cross-linguistic encounters in other narrative genres. In other hagiographical and romance texts – particularly texts featuring female travellers – such ad hoc intermediate exchanges tend to occur not on land or within domestic spaces; instead, they typically transpire over the sea or along the coasts. It is perhaps unsurprising that the sea would feature as a frequent, even inevitable, contact zone for travellers and a rich site of interaction between people of different linguistic or cultural backgrounds. As Sebastian Sobecki has demonstrated, the coastline or the seashore is a key cultural interface in Middle English romance.21 Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Man of Law’s Tale, for instance, features a virtuous, sea-tossed female protagonist Custance who adopts a mixed Latinate vernacular in order to be understood when she washes ashore in Northumberland: ‘In hir langage mercy she bisoghte […] A maner Latyn corrupt was hir speche, / But algates therby was she understonde’ (ll. 516–20).22 Although Chaucer does not provide direct discourse for his own protagonist, we might imagine Custance adopting some improvised ‘maner’ of speech in order to communicate with the strangers she has encountered – much along the lines of the snippets of hybrid dialogue so artfully portrayed in the Book. When Chaucer’s Roman woman lands in Britain, she adopts a ‘maner Latyn corrupt’ (a certain intermediate type of Latinate speech) in order to communicate; like Margery (the traveller in a foreign land), Custance must struggle to make herself understood.23 This littoral encounter in Chaucer’s narrative invites comparison with the story’s analogues in other languages; English and non-English writers adapt the fictional setting of this cross-linguistic episode to divergent narrative ends. In Giovanni Boccaccio’s Decameron, Gostanza (Italian Doppelgängerin of Custance) washes ashore not in Britain but in North Africa, and she is shocked to hear 21 Sebastian Sobecki, ‘Littoral Encounters: The Shore as Cultural Interface in King Horn’,

Al-Masaq: Islam and the Medieval Mediterranean, 18 (2006), 79–86; see also his more recent The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008). 22 Unless indicated otherwise, all citations from the Constance narrative and its analogues are drawn from Sources and Analogues of The Canterbury Tales, Volume II, ed. Robert Correale with Mary Hamel (Cambridge: Brewer, 2005); see the analogues to The Man of Law’s Prologue and Tale, ed. and trans. Correale, pp. 277–50. 23 For an informative and influential reading of literary representations of hybrid, intermediate Latinate speech, see William Rothwell, ‘The Trilingual England of Geoffrey Chaucer’, Studies in the Age of Chaucer, 16 (1994), 45–67 (esp. 53). On the status of spoken Italian as the ‘portal to Latin’, see Nick Havely, ‘The Italian Background’, in Chaucer: An Oxford Guide, ed. Steve Ellis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 313–31 (esp. 131).

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a Saracen fisherwoman address her in an intelligible language, ‘la favella latina’ (5.2.17).24 Boccaccio’s narrator even foregrounds the cognitive dissonance that his shipwrecked protagonist feels at this particular moment; viewing an alien topography she does not recognise, Gostanza hears a familiar tongue – and thus (despite her unfamiliar physical surroundings) she assumes the wind must have shifted direction, transporting her back to her point of origin.25 In his Middle English rendition of the tale, John Gower is silent on his protagonist’s language once she washes ashore in Northumberland, but she presumably speaks ‘Saxoun’ (English). Indeed, when Gower’s Constance is intercepted over the sea, she gives the mariner her Saxon name, ‘Couste’ (ll. 1161–3 and 1400–06); fittingly enough, the climactic moment of interpersonal recognition that ends Gower’s tale occurs once ‘Couste’ has passed over the coast. In the parallel shipwreck moment in Nicholas Trivet’s Anglo-Norman account, the Roman Constance explicitly speaks very good Saxon: ‘Et [ele] lui respoundi en Sessoneis [...] come cele q’estoit aprise en diverses langages’ (‘And she, as one who was skilled in various languages, answered him in Saxon’, ll. 129–30, p. 303).26 In the analogues of this story, writers in different cultural and linguistic traditions imaginatively exploit the sheer flexibility of the sea, experimenting with diverse strategies for portraying a protagonist’s coastal speech. In many of these seafaring narratives, the protagonist’s spoken language does not immediately fix her cultural or ethnic identity, and cross-cultural misperceptions complicate her presumed geographical origin. In Trivet’s account, Constance speaks ‘Sessoneis’ so well that her hosts assume she must hail from a Germanicspeaking country, even if her actual point of origin is Rome: ‘puis qe[…] l’avoit oy si renablement parler sa lange[...] esperoit qe ele estoit fille de ascun roi des Sessouns outre mere, come d’Alemayne, oue de Sessoine, ou de Suece, oue de Denemarche’ (‘he heard her speak his language so competently (and) supposed she was the daughter of some king of the Saxons beyond the sea as of Germany or Saxony or Sweden or Denmark’, ll. 137–40, p. 303). The Anglo-Norman text is perhaps most illuminating in what it reveals about the perceived relationship between language capacity and geographical origin. Embracing shared pre-Conquest Germanic origins, the text does not specify one particular homeland for ‘Couste’ but instead offers a range of possible homelands back on the Continent. 24 Italian citations of the Decameron are from Tutte le opere di Giovanni Boccaccio, ed.

Vittorio Branca, 12 vols (Milan: Mondadori, 1964). English translations of Boccaccio are my own. 25 ‘La giovane, udendo la favella latina, dubitò non forse altro vento l’avesse a Lipari ritornata’ (‘The young woman, hearing this Latinate speech [e.g. an intelligible Romance vernacular], wondered if the wind had not shifted and had carried her back to Lipari’) (5.2.17). For an expanded reading of this episode (including the difficulty in translating the phrase ‘la favella latina’), see Jonathan Hsy, ‘“Oure Occian”: Littoral Language and the Constance Narratives of Chaucer and Boccaccio’, in Europe and Its Others: Mediterranean Interperceptions, ed. Paul Gifford and Tessa Hauswedell (New York: Peter Lang, 2010), pp. 205–24. 26 Correale with Hamel, Sources and Analogues of The Canterbury Tales.



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That is, Germanic speech is perceived to imply some point of origin ‘outre mere’ (or as the Book later states, ‘beyonden the see’) and Trivet suggests a continuum of mutually intelligible Germanic speaking regions along northern Continental shores. In addition to depicting amazing travels and cross-cultural encounters, these Constance narratives richly synthesise (or overlay) seafaring and hagiographical motifs. These accounts of cross-linguistic encounters are, in other words, just as hagiographical as they are maritime, engaging with the milieux of diverse coastal environments.27 Gower’s Constance is ‘putte upon the wawes wilde’ (l. 713) and Chaucer’s Custance traverses ‘wilde wawes’ and ‘dryveth forth into oure occian/ Thurghout oure wilde see’ (ll. 458–9), steered by the ‘wyl of Crist’ (l. 511).28 If we now situate The Book of Margery Kempe alongside these literary seafarers, we can see some of the intricate texture of the Book’s stylised dialogue in a different light. Saintly Margery traverses this very same tempestuous, wild ‘see’ more than once and is she is (like Custance or ‘Couste’) intimately familiar with Germanic cultural contexts.29 The various scribes and monks within the Book hail from an expansively defined ‘Dewcheland’, a range of Germanic-speaking lands that include the modern-day Low Countries, Germany, Poland, and other coastal contact zones along the Baltic Sea. In other respects, the Book’s fictional portrayals of language contact provide compelling counterparts to any number of English/French/Italian Constance scenarios. While Constance narratives depict a sea-tossed Roman or Italian protagonist who switches into an intermediate language when she reaches Britain, The Book of Margery Kempe reverses this trajectory; the English Margery must adapt and modulate her speech when she moves inland, through Northern Italy on her way to Rome. In addition, the Book takes these moments of language contact that typically transpire in seafaring

27 This strong association between the protagonist and Germanic language proficiency has

a correspondence in the Anglo-Norman account by Nicholas Trivet. When Constance is greeted by a naval officer upon washing ashore, she goes by her Saxon name, because that is what the Germanic seafaring people call her: ‘respondu qe ele estoit Couste nomé, qar issit l’apelerent les Sessoneis’ (Correale with Hamel, Sources and Analogues of The Canterbury Tales, ll. 450–1, pp. 321). 28 Seafaring motifs are often transmuted into hagiographical themes within Trivet’s account. The protagonist sets out to sea alone ‘[m]es Dieux estoit [son] mariner’ (‘but God was her mariner’, 114); ‘Dieux, qi governa le nef le seint homme Noé en le grant deluve, maunda un vent covenable et enchasa la nef en Engleterre desouz une chastel en le roialme de Northumbreland’ (‘God, who steered the ship of the holy man Noah in the great Flood, sent a favourable wind and drove the boat to England, beneath a castle in the kingdom of Northumberland’) (Correale with Hamel, Sources and Analogues of The Canterbury Tales, ll. 117–19, p. 303). 29 For a rich discussion of Margery Kempe’s Hanseatic and Baltic connections in Book 2, see David Wallace, Margery in Dańsk, William Matthews Memorial Lecture, Birkbeck, University of London, 19 May 2005 (London, 2006); the text is also available online at www. bbk.ac.uk/events/matthews/david_wallace.

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travel narratives and instead takes the unexpected strategy of situating such verbal exchanges on land. While the Book is quite stylised in its representation of spoken dialogue, the Book offers a compelling mimesis of medieval language contact. If we read Margery as a monoglot English speaker, then the Book’s translingual English‘Duche’-Latin miracles and quotidian English-French-Italian interactions place this protagonist in a rich nexus of overlapping sociolinguistic spheres.30 But the Book, in a much more pragmatic sense, also explores how a traveller might improvise and adapt to new sociolinguistic circumstances on the fly. Margery confronts significant language barriers once she crosses from port towns in Germanic-speaking lands into Romance-speaking ones farther inland. As in Trivet’s Anglo-Norman story, we might imagine Margery’s northern Continental travels as traversing a linguistic spectrum of Germanic intelligibility ‘outre mere’ (‘beyonden the see’), while Margery’s more conspicuous challenges communicating in Romance/Mediterranean areas reveal (by contrast) her altered relationship to a new linguistic landscape. This focus on maritime trade languages and language contact over land and sea allows us investigate how the Book transports this motif of cross-linguistic encounter into unexpected fictional topographies. Exploiting the narrative possibilities afforded by overseas travel, the text creatively stages fictional cross-linguistic encounters on solid land or even within enclosed urban spaces (e.g. Margery’s own home). Maritime Language and Seaborne Prayer In re-routing this discussion of the Book’s protagonist via comparison to other fictional seafaring women, we discern how the text retains the verbal traces of dispersed cultural and linguistic environments. Rather than insisting upon any fixed, insular Englishness, the Book actively inhabits a polyglot milieu that readily extends beyond ‘this lond’ of England (or Britain) to encompass the Continental landmass and its waterways. Most importantly, the text – as it invites itself to be read – presents a narrative that straddles both sides of a body of water: the nebulous ‘see’, be it la Manche (the Channel) or die Nordsee (North Sea), the Mediterranean, or even (when we include Book 2 of the text) the Baltic Sea. By re-reading the Book as earnestly engaged in ‘yen half ’ as with ‘this halfe’ of the sea (and travels on land as well as water), we gain insight into how medieval texts depict cross-language encounters; such texts explore rich interactions between language speakers on the very level of narrative fiction as well as reported dialogue.

30 For a few examples of the diverse ways these translingual interactions have been inter-

preted, see Beckwith, ‘Problems of Authority in Late Medieval English Mysticism’, p. 190; Cohen, Medieval Identity Machines, p. 117; Lochrie, Margery Kempe and Translations of the Flesh, p. 114; and Staley, The Book of Margery Kempe, p. 151.



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This section of the essay examines how a polylingual, maritime approach to the Book informs a particularly salient motif throughout the text: seaborne prayer. The previous sections examined Margery’s encounters with non-English speakers, and we shall see how Margery’s frequent prayers to Christ and the Virgin Mary – uttered immediately before, during, or after sea voyages – participate in local trade discourses prevalent in the port towns through which Margery travels. When Margery departs Rome ‘purposyng to gon ageyn into her owyn natyf lond’ (1.42.2339), she makes her way ‘into Inglondward […] owte of Rome’ (1.42.2359–60) to the port of ‘Medylborwgh’ (Middelburg, in the present-day Netherlands, 1.42.2366). Fearing the ‘many thevys be the wey which wolde spoyl hem of her goodys’, she prays to Christ: Crist Jhesu, in whom is al my trost, as thow hast behyst me many tymes befor that there schulde no man be disesyd in my cumpany, and I was nevyr deceived ne defrawdyd in thi promysse […] grawnt that I and myn felawschep wythowtyn hyndryng of body er of catel […] may gon hom ageyn into owr lond lych as we come hedyr. (1.42.2340–6)

Both Sebastian Sobecki and David Wallace have elaborated upon the complex hagiographical discourses prevalent in such moments of prayer and how the holy seafaring motif links the Book to Chaucer’s Custance and other holy seafarers.31 During Margery’s later sea voyages en route to Danzig ‘tempestys weryn so grevows and hedows that thei myth not rewlyn ne governe her schip’ (2.3.208); the narrator observes that they ‘cowde no bettyr chefsyawns than comendyn hem self and her schip to the governawns of owr Lord; thei left her craft and her cunnyng and leet owr Lord dryvyn hem wher he wolde’ (2.3.203–10). In this moment, the text puns on God as the gubernator (guide, rudder) or helmsman of the ship, activating numerous spiritual resonances at once.32 Elsewhere in the text, of course, the sea acts quite transparently as a spiritual metaphor, conjoining movements across language with movements across space. In a vernacular echo of James 1:8, the Book at one point states that ‘a dubbyl man in sowle is evyr unstabyl and unstedfast in al hys weys’ and that a man is ‘evyrmor dowtyng is lyke to the flood of the see, the whech is mevyd and born abowte wyth the wynd, and that man is not lyche to receyven the gyftys of God’ (1.18.969–72). Here, sea travel serves as a figure for spiritual wavering, and God’s steadfast guidance (elsewhere in the text) stands in marked contrast to the capricious winds and tempests of the sea: ‘Dowtyr, for alle thes cawsys and many other cawsys and benefetys whech I have schewyd for the on this half the see and on yon half the see, thu hast gret cawse to lovyn me’ (1.65.3817–19). Throughout the Book, tempests often serve a clear signifying function, as the cessation of 31 See Sobecki, Sea and Medieval English Literature, pp. 137–8. See also Wallace, Margery in

Dańsk, pp. 6–7.

32 Sobecki aligns this moment in the Book to Insular and Latin accounts of St Brendan, but

the discourse readily evokes available francophone texts as well; see footnote 28 on Trivet’s account of Constance (above).

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such storms suggest the efficacy of Margery’s prayers, and – as Jeffrey Jerome Cohen has astutely observed – tempests and winds in and of themselves can often register for Margery as divine communication.33 In Book 2 we witness a significant shift in the sea’s spiritual significance; here, the spiritual instability of mercantile life is projected onto the sea itself, a crucial aspect of the livelihood of Lynn traders. ‘The seyd creatur had a sone, a tal yong man, dwellyng wyth a worschepful burgeys in Lynne, usyng marchawndyse and seylyng ovyr the see’, the Book reveals, and Margery seeks to ‘drawyn [him] owt of the perellys of this wretchyd and unstabyl worlde yyf hir power myth a teynyd therto’ (2.1.11–14). Indeed, it is ‘sone aftyr the same yong man passyd ovyr the see in wey of marchawndyse’ that he falls ‘into the synne of letchery’, and the discourse that the narrator employs in order to describe the merchant-son’s spiritual error is unmistakably nautical. He errs ‘thorw evyl entisyng of other personys and foly of hys owyn governawnce’, and this highly-charged term ‘governawnce’ evokes once again the steering and guidance of God (2.1.24–7). Margery’s seaborne prayers evoke both divine guidance and spiritual allusions, yet the protagonist’s prayers simultaneously deploy discourses that are much more mundane and pragmatic. Many modern readers have remarked upon the pervasive ‘language of the marketplace’ and contractual language in the Book, and the pragmatic register of the agreements between Margery and Christ have been characterised either as symptoms of ‘a very material mysticism’ or, to put it more pointedly, a ‘very mercantile mysticism’.34 I would like to draw attention to how all of these maritime prayers slip into an identifiable linguistic register: francophone business correspondence. Maryanne Kowaleski astutely suggests that everyday ‘communication between English mariners’ and non-English speakers ‘may have been eased by the use of French as the lingua franca of not only maritime law and some port-town records, but also as the basis of a common argot in the Atlantic littoral’.35 Indeed, we could readily extend Kowaleski’s insight to that most maritime of ports, Margery Kempe’s own hometown of Lynn. East Anglian city folk including the mayors, aldermen, and guild members of Margery Kempe’s hometown – or, as a fourteenth-century entry in the town’s Red Register puts it, ‘les burgeys de la ville de Lenne’ (fol. 142d) – recorded their own letters to foreign merchants and instructions for native and alien fishers and traders in this language. French documents included in the Red Register of the Mayor and Commonalty of Lynn often invest in relating final bequests or dispensation of charity, or 33 Cohen, Medieval Identity Machines, p. 118. 34 Sarah Beckwith, ‘A Very Material Mysticism: The Medieval Mysticism of Margery Kempe’,

in Medieval Literature: Criticism, Ideology and History, ed. David Aers (Brighton: Harvester Press, 1986), pp. 34–57; Roger Ladd, ‘Margery Kempe and Her Mercantile Mysticism’, in Fifteenth Century Studies, 26 (2001), 121–41. 35 Maryanne Kowaleski, ‘The French of England: A Maritime Lingua Franca?’, in Language and Culture in Medieval Britain: The French of England, ed. Jocelyn Wogan-Browne et al. (York: York Medieval Press, 2010), pp. 103–17.



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offering a written record of more quotidian business transactions.36 In a French ‘lettre’ within the Register, Paul Lomb states that he and two other men of Lynn have pooled their money to jointly purchase two houses in another town: ‘nous eyons jointement purchacee de nostre commun argent deux places mesones en la ville de Seynt Boltoff ’ (fol. 16). In another part of the Red Register, a French ordinance proclaims that ‘touz les burgeys de la ville de Lenne qui tenount ou tentrount hostes qils averount la vjme partie de lour hostes de totes maners de marchandises venantz ala dite ville’ (‘all the burgesses of the town of Lynn who take in strangers [non-native traders] shall have the sixth part from those strangers all manner of merchandise coming to the said town’), with the exception of various sorts of ‘peysshon fresch’ (‘fresh fish’, fol. 142d). In addition, these strangers ‘ne concelount nule manners de marchaundises’ (‘shall not conceal any manner of merchandise’) and ‘sil nul hoste soit trove coupable en nul des poyntz avauntditz [il] perdraient le profyst’ (‘if any stranger be found guilty of the aforesaid matters, they should lose the profits’, fol. 142d). In this coastal context, we see once again a close proximity between ‘naytif ’ English and ‘straunge’ inhabitants, and for the burgesses of Lynn Anglo-French is both a foreign and a native language (note the hybrid, macaronic quality of the phrase ‘peysshon fresch’). Given its status as a trade language in major urban centres, French appears particularly useful when members of the merchant classes must communicate with people outside (or from outside) Lynn itself: for example, a letter recording a purchase of a property in a different town, or an ordinance concerning the treatment of foreign traders in Lynn. For the burgesses and civic community of Lynn, French serves not only as a literal lingua franca with the potential to communicate with people beyond the city itself but it also functions as an identifiable trade register, one that commonly narrates the movements of commodities, property, and people.37 In this local context, Margery’s pre-travel prayer to Christ – uttered just prior to yet another perilous sea voyage – assumes a culturally significant resonance. When Margery prays in the port of Middelburg, she asks that Christ protect her ‘cumpany’, reminds Him that she was ‘nevyr deceived ne defrawdyd in thi promysse’, and she requests that Christ ‘grawnt’ her freedom of movement without ‘hynderawnce of body er of catel’ (1.42.2340–6). All the contractual terms in her 36 The Red Register of King’s Lynn, Vol. I, transcribed R. F. Isaacson and ed. Holcome Ingleby

(King’s Lynn: Thew, 1919–21). 37 In the memorandum book of William Asshebourne (King’s Lynn Borough Archives, KL/ C10/2), letters concerning diplomacy, maritime trade, or international conflicts are recorded in French, although some letters on behalf of Lynn’s Mayor and merchant community are written down in English (see footnote 8 above). French documents to and from Lynn’s Mayor and burgesses concern Exchequer documents, ‘chev[is]aunce’ (a loan request), and the confiscation of certain vessels arriving in Lynn (see fols 20v, 21v, and 22v); French letters between the Mayor and burgesses of Lynn and Admiral Thomas Beaufort appear on fols 26v, and 50. For letters in English, see fols 6v-8, 51v, and 52 (these folios include letters from Lynn merchants to authorities in Wismar, Rostock, and Stralsund).

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appeal – compaignye, graunt, promyse, hinderaunce, and catel – are, unsurprisingly, words of French origin. It is precisely when the protagonist moves across the sea, or stands on the verge of embarking onto the water, that the Book breaks into its clearest francophone register. Insofar as The Book of Margery Kempe is a literary text, the particular Frenchinflected language in Margery’s maritime prayers resonates with fictional representations of mercantile figures across medieval genres, particularly in other East Anglian coastal settings. William Langland’s ‘Covetyse’, for example, whose speech abounds with francophone merchant jargon, speaks ‘no Frenssh, but of the fertheste ende of Norfolk’ (Piers Plowman, B.V.235); that is, he claims mastery only over the professional variety of French used in Norfolk ports (like Lynn) and other areas where he must conduct trade, with the ‘fertheste ende’ (the sea itself ) as Norfolk’s outer limit.38 The Digby Mary Magdalen, written down in East Anglia c. 1500, is a ‘littoral [play]… where much of the narrative consists of boarding ships and disembarking, with stage directions frequently referring to coasts’.39 In one scene, ‘Galaunt’ and ‘Coryosite’ approach Mary, speaking in overtly Frenchified discourse. Galaunt, who identifies himself as a ‘frysch new… marchant’ by vocation, suddenly appears (presumably ‘frysch’ off the boat) and Coryosite marvels at his ‘ressplendant’ clothing (ll. 500–03).40 Not only does their discourse employ a great deal of francophone vocabulary, but the rhyme patterns that give form to their speeches consistently stress French-derived word endings: ‘galaunt’, ‘marchant’, ‘peneawnt’, ‘constant’, ‘ressplendant’ (ll. 500–08).41 It is clear that the francophone tenor of Margery’s prayers signal resonance with the more practical, mercantile concerns of everyday life in Lynn. In Book 2, sea travel becomes much more complex in its narrative functions; at first pragmatic considerations over maritime travel serve to authorise or authenticate the account. This section opens with an uncharacteristically detailed consideration of the pragmatics of sea travel, drawing the Book’s resonance even closer to epistolary and business correspondence of Margery’s hometown burgesses. In Book 2, Margery writes ‘letterys’ to her merchant son on the Continent, ‘seying that whedyr he come be londe er be watyr’ he should be ‘certifiid of hys moderys cownsel’, and the narrative tells us that the son dutifully hiryd a schip er ellys a part of a schip in whech he putt hys good, hys wife, hys childe, and hys owyn self, purposyng alle to comyn into Inglond togedyr. Whan thei weryn in the schip, ther resyn swech tempestys that thei durstyn not takyn 38 William Langland, The Vision of Piers Plowman: A Critical Edition of the B-Text based

on Trinity College Cambridge MS B.15.17, ed. A. V. C. Schmidt, 2nd edn (London: Dent, 2000). 39 Sobecki, Sea and Medieval English Literature, p. 109. 40 Mary Magdalen in The Late Medieval Religious Plays of Bodleian MSS Digby 133 and E Museo 160, ed. Donald C. Baker et al. (London: Oxford University Press, 1982), pp. 24–95. 41 For an excellent reading of the expressly French tenor of Galaunt’s performance, see Deanne Williams, The French Fetish from Chaucer to Shakespeare (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 116.



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the see, and so thei comyn on lond ageyn, bothyn he, hys wife, and her childe. (2.2.90–6)

The intricate prose style evokes French epistolary conventions and business parlance. Exploiting stylised repetition (‘hys good, hys wife, hys child, and hys owyn self[…] he, hys wife, and her childe’), this passage mimics the reckoning of merchandise and transport of people and goods that so often concerns francophone maritime writing. Indeed, Margery’s prayers to cease this tempest at sea closely resemble francophone contractual agreements: ‘thu hast oftyn tyme behite me that I schulde nevyr perischyn neithyr on londe ne in watyr ne wyth no tempest’ (2.3.213–14); ‘I, unworthy wretche, am deceyvyd and defrawdyd of the promys that thu hast mad many tyme onto me […] wythdrawe thes tempestys and schewe us mercy’ (2.3.217–20). These seaborne prayers to Christ and the Virgin Mary strategically adopt the register of French-inflected business correspondence and the anaphoraladen, formulaic requests and responses throughout the Book nicely echo the rhetorical devices used in contemporaneous mercantile and maritime documents of Lynn. Compare, for example, the letter of Lynn ambassadors to the queen of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway concerning negotiations between Hanseatic and Lynn merchants (c. 1416). Here, Lynn merchants pray that the queen excuse their delayed arrival, and the letter, recorded in humble Middle English, evokes high-status French epistolary models: oure merchauntes being here ate Lenne for nedefull causes hadden non er understondyng of this matere because that schippes of oure merchauntes for divers tempests and contrarious wyndes hav ben in comyng and seilling from your cite of Northberne [i.e. Bergen] to Lenne[…]these same procuratours in her viage at this tyme be taryed by tempests contrarious wyndes or ellis be swich other cause reasonable they mighten be yowre godly and gracious mediacion ben fully had [sic] excused. (fol. 94v)42

This letter serves a practical purpose, but even so it artfully deploys its own rhetorical devices; here, the capricious whims of the sea (‘divers tempests and contrarious wyndes’) are a justifiable excuse for a delayed arrival. The formulaic repetition of phrases (‘tempests and contrarious wyndes[…] tempests contrarious wyndes or ellis’) evokes the ebb and flow of sea-travel, as well as the uneven turning of the waves. In the French-inflected Middle English of the Book, Margery’s earnest prayers about ‘tempests’ recall such pragmatic discursive rhythms, and at one point the Virgin Mary’s response ‘I telle the trewly thes wyndys and tempestys schal sone sesyn’ (2.3.239) echoes Christ’s own formulaic language regarding winds and ‘tempestys’ elsewhere in the Book. If we attend to the rich French (and French-inflected) discourse of the Book’s maritime prayers, we see how readily the narrative transmits the very sounds of home even when the protagonist is sailing far afield in foreign waters. That is, 42 See also Owen, The Making of King’s Lynn, no. 365 (pp. 286–7).

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the language of the civic scribe or bureaucrat ‘outre mere’ or ‘beyonden the see’ in Lynn is still readily heard and preserved through the text’s style of narration. It is precisely during such moments across the sea – or even physically upon the sea itself – that Margery’s speech registers as most homely, most local, and most francophone. Margery Kempe’s Language-Worlds I would like to conclude with the most self-consciously ‘mervylows’ section of the Book – the journey over the sea to ports of the Hanseatic League in Book 2 – as an extended episode in which these cultural phenomena I have been tracing ultimately converge. The Book makes one final detour into another (Germanic) language context, all the while transporting the protagonist along an itinerary of major ports: Danzig, Stralsund, Calais, Dover, Canterbury, London, and of course Lynn. The Book’s account of Margery’s overseas travel, as we have seen, readily participates in francophone mercantile discourse, particularly when sea travel is involved. While Margery fears the potential ‘hynderawns of body er of catel’ while travelling over land, her anxieties over sea travel are even more pronounced. As discussed earlier, when Margery is on the verge of sailing ‘forth to Medylborwgh’ in order to ‘takyn her jurné into Inglondward’ (1.42.2366–7), the weather causes trepidation and she prays for protection; on a later trip ‘whan sche come fro Seynt Jamys’ (Santiago de Compostela in modern-day Spain) (1.45.2385–6), she utters a similar prayer: ‘Befor that sche entryd the schip, sche mad hir preyerys that God schulde kepe hem and preserve hem fro venjawns, tempestys, and perellys in the se’ (1.45.2587–8). Fears over loss of life or goods while traversing these North Atlantic sea routes preoccupied medieval merchants and shipmen alike, as Chaucer states.43 In a familiar convergence of travel, trade, and tale telling, Margery arrives on land post-tempest and tells ‘good talys’ in order to earn some money: And, whan thei wer in the lityl schip, it began to waxin gret tempestys and dyrke wedyr. […] And, whan thei wer on the londe, the forseyd creatur fel downe on hir knes kyssyng the grownde, hyly thankyng God that had browt hem hom in safté. Than had this creatur neithyr peny ne halfpeny in hir purse. And so thei happyd

43 Chaucer states: ‘Us moste putte oure good in aventure./A marchant, pardee, may nat ay

endure[…] Somtyme his good is drowned in the see,/And somtyme comth it sauf unto the londe’ (The Canon’s Yeoman’s Tale, ll. 946–50). In The General Prologue, the Merchant fears sea piracy along the same Middelburg trajectory that Margery follows: ‘He wolde the see were kept for any thing/Bitwixe Middelburgh and Orewelle’ (ll. 276–7). The Shipman draws ‘many a draughte of wyn[…] whil that the chapman sleep’ during his own journeys ‘[f ]ro Burdeux-ward’ (ll. 396–7), tracing much the same route that Margery takes ‘fro Seynt Jamys ageyn’ (1.45.2585–6) and ‘hom ageyn to Bristowe’ (1.45.2600). For Lynn documents concerning Middelburg-Lynn trade matters, see KL/C10/2, fols 87v and 124.



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to meten wyth other pilgrimys whech govyn hir three halfpenys, inasmeche as sche had in comownyng telde hem good talys. (1.43.2396–404)

The heavy use of parataxis evokes (once again) the bureaucratic prose of French business documents produced in Kempe’s hometown, but if we view the use of repetition here as a distinct rhetorical or stylistic strategy, we can appreciate the Book’s aesthetic and mimetic qualities.44 Here, the anaphora-laden prose (‘And, whan thei wer… And, whan thei wer… And so thei happyd…’) has a lulling, rhythmic effect; the narrative flow almost conveys the ups and downs of movements over sea and land. Moreover, the loss of goods that begins this passage (‘neithyr peny ne halfpeny in hir purse’) leads to the very generation of narrative (the ‘good talys’) that the reader is now consuming. The material in Book 2 ultimately sees the combined forces of the cultural phenomena I have been describing throughout this essay. The Book’s resonance as travel writing becomes most apparent as we witness the spectacular collision of hagiographical, mercantile, and maritime motifs: ‘tempestys’, ‘perellys’, ‘merveyls’, and seaborne prayers, all narrated along the way to the Hanseatic port of ‘Danske in Duchelond’, or Danzig (2.4.259). Margery arrives safely at this port in 1433, but when it is time for her to depart she is not granted leave: ‘sche han no leve to gon owt of that lond, for sche was an Englisch woman, and so had sche gret vexacyon and meche lettyng er sche myth getyn leve of on of the heerys of Pruce for to gon thens’ (2.4.283–5). As Staley and others have noted, 1433 was a time of rocky relations between England and the Hanseatic League, and Margery’s status as ‘an Englisch woman’ leaves her movements at the discretion of ‘the heerys of Pruce’, or the Teutonic Knights in Prussia.45 Wallace has astutely observes that the honorific title of ‘heerys’ – as the Teutonic Knights were known – marks the single occurrence of this Germanic loan-word in the entire Book.46 In this passage, the unexpected slippage into Germanic honorifics signals Margery’s submission to the authority of the men who hold the power to permit or restrict her movements. It is on the way to Aachen (‘to Akunward’) that Margery’s final slippage into Germanic vernacular occurs. Margery meets ‘a monke’ with ‘hys cumpany [of ] chapmen’, falls out of favour with these men and is abandoned, only to be verbally assaulted by a different group of men who come from nearby: ‘Thei clepyd hir Englisch sterte and spokyn many lewyd wordys unto hir, schewyng unclenly cher’ (2.6.388–9). This Book mildly ventriloquises the derogatory ‘langage’ and ‘lewyd 44 For an informative initial reading of the stylistic features of the Book’s prose, see A. C.

Spearing, ‘Margery Kempe’, in A Companion to Middle English Prose, ed. A. S. G. Edwards (Cambridge: Brewer, 2004), pp. 83–97 (esp. 93). 45 Staley, The Book of Margery Kempe, p. 216. George Warner observes that the contemporary Middle English poem The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye (dated 1436) expresses a great deal of ‘bitter feeling against the Flemings[…] the High Germans of Prussia and the Easterlings or members of the Hanse League’ (The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye: A Poem on the Use of SeaPower, 1436 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1926), p. xxv). 46 Wallace, Margery in Dańsk, p. 21.

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wordys’ of Margery’s male tormenters, Continental men (possibly speakers of a Germanic language) who call her an ‘Englisch sterte’.47 Eventually, Margery’s itinerary takes her through other port towns (Calais, Dover, London), and the Book wends its way to a conclusion. After travels in ‘divers contres and places’ and encounters with speakers of ‘divers’ languages, Margery at last returns to her hometown of Lynn. In a lengthy prayer to God and a final appeal to the audience, the Book’s narrator proclaims that ‘this world[…] wolde merveylyn and wonderyn’ at what the text relates (2.3.234–5). If, as Staley has suggested, ‘Kempe uses the prayer to establish Margery’s singular position’, then ‘she also uses it to compose a world’ (p. 182). Indeed, we might say that the Book’s intricately rendered prayers transmit aspects of the discrete language-worlds through which Margery moves. The Book of Margery Kempe employs fictional geography to depict scenes of cross-linguistic communication both at home and overseas, and it readily highlights the dynamic, contingent relationship between language and place, particularly within coastal and maritime settings. Unlike other tales of sea-tossed protagonists, some of the Book’s most fluid linguistic exchanges occur, strangely enough, on land. Diverging from common ‘generic crossroads’ in romance and hagiography (which often explore the complexity of overseas and littoral encounters), the Book exploits roadways, homes, and urban domestic spaces as fictional settings for its surprisingly diverse and geographically disparate moments of language contact. These many instances of translinguistic slippage in the narrative and the layered, multilingual texture of the Book’s prose artfully augment the wideranging travels of the text’s fictional protagonist. Just as the Book dips into a hybrid Romance-inflected vernacular when narrating encounters in northern Italy and into an identifiably francophone contractual jargon when transmitting seaborne prayers, so does the text drift toward Germanic speech when Margery sails through Hanseatic ports. As we have seen, these episodes legitimise the Book – giving the text a veneer of authenticity or imbuing the text with some ‘local colour’ – and these rhetorical touches, all the while, enhance the narrative stylistically. Ultimately, The Book of Margery Kempe exposes an unsettled English insularity, revealing that linguistic ‘belonging’ for the protagonist is paradoxically both grounded and fluid. In the Book’s many traversals of land and sea, Margery’s Englishness is imminently portable: it emerges most conspicuously when in she is in transit, between spaces and between languages.

47 The Middle English Dictionary defines ‘sterte’ as ‘a derogatory and probably salacious

term for an Englishwoman’, and Staley conjectures that it is ‘probably a reference to continental jokes about the English having tails’ (p. 220). The Middle English word is Germanic in origin (OE steorte, sterte), although cognates exist in Germanic languages; see also Meech and Allen, The Book of Margery Kempe, footnote to 236/29–30 (p. 345).

‘Birthplace for the Poetry of the Sea-ruling Nation’: Stopford Brooke and Old English

Chris Jones Stopford Brooke is a figure largely overlooked by scholarship concerned with the history of the discipline of Old English Studies.1 This is hardly surprising; such work usually concerns itself with tracing a teleological narrative of material and intellectual discoveries, problem solving, and the advancement of knowledge about Anglo-Saxon literary culture, as it is assumed to have actually existed, from a position of relative naivety and ignorance, to the present state of understanding. As with all discipline histories, literary, Anglo-Saxon or otherwise, that present state of understanding tends to be seen as both the vindication and the summative bequest of the past’s cumulative process of interrogating its own roots and histories. Consequently only those contributions which aid that forward progress towards our current basis of knowledge for the past tend to find themselves written into such narratives. Brooke did not make such contributions. He did not discover new manuscript materials, edit previously unedited texts, propose new solutions to difficult cruces, make new developments in the theory of Old English metre, identify sources or analogues, or hit upon a new law governing Germanic sound shifts. In short he made no philological advance of the kind now viewed as a rung in the ladder of progress by which we have reached our present vantage point on Anglo-Saxon literary culture, and which would have justified his place in the story of the rise of Anglo-Saxon Studies. Yet as a literary historian, Brooke’s role not only in transmitting knowledge of Old English literary culture to Victorian Britain, but also in shaping that knowledge into narratives with wide reach and influence, was of critical importance to the place that Old English occupied in general literary culture during the latter decades of the nineteenth century and the early decades of the twentieth. Arguably Brooke played a significant role in shaping tastes for, and expectations of, Old English literature, and poetry in particular: tastes and expectations which 1

J. R. Hall makes one passing reference to his having written a ‘well-received work of literary criticism, The History of Early English Literature, Being the History of English Poetry from its Beginnings to the Accession of King Ælfred (1892)’. J. R. Hall, ‘Anglo-Saxon Studies in the Nineteenth Century: England, Denmark, America’, in A Companion to Anglo-Saxon Literature, ed. Phillip Pulsiano and Elaine Treharne (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001), pp. 434–54 (p. 444).

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had an important effect on the construction of a twentieth-century canon of Old English, and which still condition our views of this poetry. This chapter will consider the ways in which Brooke positions Old English at the beginning of, and contiguous with, an unbroken literary sense of Englishness in several of his published writings, and argue that the motif and imagery of the sea is seen as crucial to establishing this continuity, and as a defining essentialist quality of literary Englishness. This sense of literary continuity from Old to modern English is in contradistinction to that of many twentieth-century literary histories, which satisfy themselves with narratives of rupture and disjunction, in view of the facts that the major surviving codices of Old English poetry show little sign of use after the eleventh century, and that the editorial recovery of those texts did not begin until the sixteenth century and only got fully underway during the nineteenth.2 In effect Brooke reads a set of late Romanticist and nationalist ideals back over Old English poetry, shaping that body of writing to fit the interpretative frame he brings to it,3 before transmitting it, newly romanticised and nationalised, to a wider and less specialist audience. Before the methods and consequences of this, aesthetic, political, and otherwise, are examined in detail, it is necessary to review the nature and scope of Brooke’s achievements, as well as the claim for his significance, as readers are likely to be unfamiliar with these. Brooke was an Irish-born preacher, ordained in London in 1857, who became chaplain to the British embassy in Berlin from 1863 to 1865.4 In that same year he published a biography of the preacher F. W. Robertson ‘to great acclaim’, and as a result secured himself the attention of a wide and influential public. In 1867 he became chaplain to Queen Victoria, who wanted him made canon of 2

For which story see D. J. Palmer, The Rise of English Studies (London: Oxford University Press, 1965); Hans Aarsleff, The Study of Language in England, 1780–1860 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967); Allen J. Frantzen, Desire for Origins: New Language, Old English and Teaching the Tradition (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1990); T. A. Shippey and Andreas Haarder, ed., Beowulf: The Critical Heritage (London: Routledge, 1998); Timothy Graham, ed., The Recovery of Old English: Anglo-Saxon Studies in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Kalamazoo, MI: Western Michigan University Press, 2000); Timothy Graham, ‘Anglo-Saxon Studies: Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries’, in A Companion to AngloSaxon Literature, ed. Pulsiano and Treharne, pp. 415–33; Hall, ‘Anglo-Saxon Studies’. 3 New work on Henry Sweet (like Brooke, an admirer of Shelley) has argued that his influential Anglo-Saxon Reader is similarly shaped by such Romanticist concerns, and partly responsible for propagating a romanticised Old English, in which nature poetry forms a large part of the canon. Mark Atherton, ‘Priming the Poets: the Making of Henry’s Sweet’s AngloSaxon Reader’, in Anglo-Saxon Culture and the Modern Imagination, ed. David Clark and Nick Perkins (Cambridge: Brewer, 2010), pp.31-50. On interpretative frames generally, see Erving Goffman, Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience (New York: Harper and Row, 1974). 4 Biographical information here, and where otherwise unreferenced is from R. K. Webb, ‘Brooke, Stopford Augustus (1832–1916)’, in DNB. Brooke was born near Letterkenny in Co. Donegal. Lawrence Pearsall Jacks, Life and Letters of Stopford Brooke, 2 vols (London: John Murray, 1917), I, p. 1.



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Westminster, although Disraeli and Gladstone objected.5 He preached to large and fashionable audiences in Bloomsbury’s Bedford Chapel from 1876 until his retirement in 1895 (he died in 1916). Brooke published numerous sermons, political pamphlets, and lectures; Theology in the English Poets: Cowper, Coleridge, Wordsworth and Burns was based on a series of lectures he gave at a chapel in York Street, St James’s in 1872.6 Brooke was in fact an all-round man of letters in the old school style. He published widely on English poetry, with a particular fondness for Shelley, Tennyson, and the poetry (if not the painting) of the Pre-Raphaelites, and for nature poetry generally.7 He was himself a poet of modest but some ability,8 publishing a verse drama,9 and he corresponded with a number of the major literary figures of his time, including Tennyson, Ruskin, Matthew Arnold, Burne-Jones, Holman Hunt, and William Morris.10 His friend George Bernard Shaw modelled Candida’s Morell on him.11 A member of several London literary societies, Brooke was also instrumental in setting up the Wordsworth Trust and opening Dove Cottage to the public.12 His reputation was such that late in life he was invited to give (but was unable to carry out) a course of lectures at the Lowell Institute of English Poetry in America.13 From this brief vita it is clear, then, that Brooke’s views on Old English would have had wide reach and currency in late Victorian and Edwardian Britain, and the potential to shape literary critical tastes regarding Old English, even if they were not of crucial importance to the scholarly march of progress in AngloSaxon studies. Even so, it has recently been argued that Brooke’s views on the Old English Seafarer influenced as significant and scholarly a canon-shaping text as Henry Sweet’s Anglo-Saxon Reader in Prose and Verse. Mark Atherton suggests 5 6

Jacks, Life and Letters, I, pp. 272 and 309. Stopford Brooke, Theology in the English Poets: Cowper, Coleridge, Wordsworth and Burns (London: H. S. King, 1874). 7 In advising a young correspondent on what to read, Brooke wrote on 7 January 1905, ‘take with you on all occasions a volume of Shelley, or Wordsworth, or Tennyson’. Jacks, Life and Letters, p. 545. A select bibliography of his literary criticism not concerned with Old English includes: Stopford Brooke, Milton (London: Macmillan, 1879); Dove Cottage: Wordsworth’s Home from 1800–1808 (London: Macmillan, 1890); The Development of Theology as Illustrated in English Poetry 1780 to 1830 (London: Philip Green, 1893); Tennyson: his Art and Relation to Modern Life (London: Isbister, 1894); The Poetry of Robert Browning (London: Isbister, 1902); On Ten Plays of Shakespeare (London: Constable, 1905); Studies in Poetry: William Blake, Walter Scott, Shelley and Keats (London: Duckworth, 1907); A Study of Clough, Arnold, Rossetti, and Morris with an Introduction on the Course of Poetry from 1822 to 1852 (London: Pitman, 1908); Ten More Plays of Shakespeare (London: Constable, 1913); Naturalism in English Poetry (London: Dent, 1920). 8 Stopford Brooke, Poems (London: Macmillan, 1888). 9 Stopford Brooke, Riquet of the Tuft: A Love Drama (London: Macmillan, 1880). 10 Jacks, Life and Letters of Stopford Brooke, I, p. 317. 11 Arthur H. Nethercot, ‘The Truth about Candida’, PMLA, 64 (1949), 639–47 (644). 12 www.wordsworth.org.uk/history/index.asp?pageid=36 [accessed 18 June 2010]. Jacks, Life and Letters, II, p. 457. 13 Jacks, Life and Letters of Stopford Brooke, II, p. 467.

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that Sweet’s decision to include The Seafarer in the 1894 edition of the Reader, and to relegate the last sixteen lines of the Old English text to the end notes,14 may have been due to Brooke’s 1892 dismissal of the second, Christian half as ‘a sad business’.15 If so, Brooke was not only indirectly responsible for affecting the reception of that important poem for several generations of students, but also likely influenced twice-over its most influential translator of the twentieth century, Ezra Pound. For Pound, who was also suspicious of the ‘platitudinous address to the Deity’ (he does not translate anything after line 99a),16 not only used the truncated poem in Sweet’s seventh edition as his base text,17 but seems to have known Brooke’s History of Early English Literature himself, annotating his copy of Sweet with a reference to it.18 Pound’s familiarity with Brooke’s History (which his college library acquired eleven years before his Old English studies began) would explain his subtitling an early Anglo-Saxonist poem, ‘At the Heart O’ Me’, as ‘A. D. 751’, for Brooke dates the comparable Old English poem The Husband’s Message to the middle of the eighth century.19 Brooke’s frequent theoretical statements on the practice of translating poetry in his History, as well as his own translations from Old English are remarkably consistent with Pound’s later theory and praxis, and comments that Brooke makes on Widsith as ‘our [that is the English] Ulysses’ may have planted the germ of the idea for the Homeric-Anglo-Saxon conjunction with which Pound would begin his epic Cantos, early in the poet’s mind.20 It seems likely then that Brooke played an important role in directing the incorporation of Old English within the poetics of one of the twentieth-century’s most influential practitioners.

14 Henry Sweet, An Anglo-Saxon Reader in Prose and Verse, 7th edn, rev. (Oxford: Clarendon,

1894), pp. 171–4 and 222–4.

15 Atherton, ‘Priming the Poets’. Stopford A. Brooke, The History of Early English Literature,

Being the History of English Poetry from its Beginnings to the Accession of King Ælfred, 2 vols (London: Macmillan, 1892), II, 170–82. Sweet had always admired The Seafarer as ‘undoubtedly the finest [poem] of them all’, but in earlier editions had noted that he had selected The Wanderer in preference to the The Seafarer ‘as being less fragmentary and corrupt’. Henry Sweet, ed., An Anglo-Saxon Reader in Prose and Verse, 2nd edn (Oxford: Clarendon, 1879), p. 174. 16 Ezra Pound, ‘I Gather the Limbs of Osiris’, The New Age, 10 (1911), 107. 17 Fred C. Robinson, ‘“The Might of the North”: Pound’s Anglo-Saxon Studies and “The Seafarer”’: Yale Review, 71 (1982), 199–224 (200). This essay is reprinted in Fred C. Robinson, The Tomb of Beowulf and Other Essays on Old English (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1993), 239–58. See also Chris Jones, Strange Likeness: The Use of Old English in Twentieth-century Poetry (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 20. 18 Robinson, ‘“Might of the North”’, 207. 19 Ezra Pound, ‘At the Heart O’ Me’, in Michael King, ed., The Collected Early Poems of Ezra Pound (London: Faber, 1977), pp. 81–2. Brooke, History of Early English Literature, ii, 169–70. Robinson, ‘“Might of the North”’, 212. 20 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, 6. For more detail on the likely influence of Brooke’s History on Pound’s poetics, see Jones, Strange Likeness, pp. 24–7, p. 30 fn. 48, p. 42 fn. 69 and p. 50.



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It is also evident from the preceding summary of Brooke’s literary interests and publications that he is concerned with the whole span of English literary history and he situates Old English very deliberately within this longue durée of Englishness. Englishness is seen as a cultural structure already in evidence in many of its most characteristic qualities from the very earliest written records of the Anglo-Saxon period. Thus Brooke deploys Old English literature as a litmus test for a form of English essentialism, and as an explanatory tool for the manifest greatness of an English-speaking imperial Britain. As we will soon note, the representation of the sea is used as an especial touchstone of this English essentialism. Three works in particular are crucial to this vision of Old English and its relationship with Brooke’s project of describing a history of English mentalité. The first to be published was English Literature from AD 670 to 1832 in John Green’s ‘Literature Primers’ series.21 It is almost unthinkable now that an introductory textbook aimed in the first instance at schoolchildren should have such sweep and ambition; there is certainly no place for Old English literature within the British state school system any longer. Nevertheless the primer sold hundreds of thousands of copies which ‘circulated through the schools and colleges of the Empire’,22 was translated into several languages and revised and reprinted dozens of times until as late as 1948. It also won the admiration of Matthew Arnold.23 The second work that should be considered is the aforementioned two-volume History of Early English Literature which seems to have been influential on Sweet and Pound among others.24 This History was not reissued, for it was always intended as the beginning of a greater history of English poetry,25 and indeed was to some extent superseded by the third text of present concern, the 1898 English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest, which incorporated, in condensed form, some of the text of the History.26 This work, which Brooke intended to find an audience among school students,27 was reissued several times until 1930. At this juncture, a brief digression on the politics of Brooke’s interest in Englishness is in order. For, as can be seen even in the title of the aforementioned Theology in the English Poets: Cowper, Coleridge, Wordsworth and Burns, Brooke’s 21 Stopford A. Brooke, English Literature from AD 670 to AD 1832 (London: Macmillan,

1876).

22 Jack, Life and Letters, II, 286. 23 Jack, Life and Letters, II, 285–87. 24 Other twentieth-century poets whose use of Old English may have been conditioned

by Brooke include W. S. Graham and (through his teacher Ritchie Girvan), Edwin Morgan. Jones, Strange Likeness, pp. 153 and 163. Ritchie Girvan, Beowulf and the Seventh Century: Language and Content (London: Methuen, 1935), pp. 52–5. 25 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, i, p. v. 26 Stopford A. Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest (London: Macmillan, 1898). 27 Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. v.

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notion of Englishness is a capacious one that can subsume within it other archipelagic British identities. To twenty-first-century readers the obsessive emphasis on Englishness that recurs throughout his literary writings may seem strange in an Irishman. Yet for Brooke it is the manifest destiny of a greater England, one inclusive of all the archipelagic British nations that is important, and that guarantees the present and future greatness of a collective Great Britain. Brooke’s pamphlet Coercion, Concession, and Home Rule argued vigorously for Home Rule to be granted to Ireland, not as a precursor to independence, but precisely to ensure that nationalist claims for full independence had but small grounds, and so that Ireland might remain within a united, if not fully centralised Englishspeaking imperial federation.28 Indeed, Brooke saw it as necessary that Ireland more fully embrace its anglophonism by translating its literature into English in order better to preserve and disseminate that heritage.29 Such a transaction would also fulfil a bond of reciprocity more than a millennium old; for Brooke believed that just as Irish literature now needed the English language, Irish had once been critical to the production of English poetry: It was the Irish imaginative spirit which was the most vital influence in the creation of Anglo-Saxon poetry. The whole of Northumbria was drenched with Irish sentiment.30

Although this detail is in advance of the main discussion of English identity within Brooke’s literary histories, it is important to establish from the beginning that Brooke’s relationship with Englishness is complex. He invests in English as the guarantee of his own identity as both native and alien: separate and united by a common tongue, as well as a shared sea. Nowhere is the adoption of Englishness more apparent in Brooke’s writings than in the first chapter of the primer to English Literature. The Irishman’s use of the first-person pronoun here is as noteworthy as is the evident sense of patriotic pride at the long pedigree of English literature: The story is a long one. It begins about the year 670, and it is still going on in the year 1875. Into this little book then is to be put the story of 1,200 years. No people that have ever been in the world can look back so far as we English can to the beginnings of our literature; no people can point to so long and splendid a train of poets and prose writers; no nation has on the whole written so much and

28 Stopford Brooke, Coercion, Concession, and Home Rule (London: The National Press

Agency, 1885). See also A Moral Aspect of Home Rule: A Lecture Delivered July 4th, 1886 (London: Cassell, 1886). It is indicative of Brooke’s dual loyalties that at times in his writings he uses the first person plural pronoun to include himself with ‘Englishmen’ (p. 4) and at other times with Irishmen; see The Need and Use of Getting Irish Literature into the English Tongue: An Address (London: T. F. Unwin, 1893), pp. 11–18. 29 Brooke, Need and Use of Getting Irish Literature into the English Tongue. This lecture was given at the inaugural meeting of the Irish Literary Society in London. 30 Brooke, Need and Use, p. 49.



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so well. Every English man and woman has good reason to be proud of the work done by their forefathers in prose and poetry.31

Brooke attaches the same sense of importance to the continuity of English ethnicity as he does to the continuity of English literature; indeed, the two are treated as reflexes of each other; elsewhere he writes ‘questions of race are often questions of literature’.32 For this reason, Brooke’s literary historical narratives always also possess a political dimension. In treating the Norman Conquest, Brooke must find a way of rendering safe its potential threat to his desire to see Englishness as a set of unbroken and undiluted institutions, cultural and ethnic. He does so by defining ethnicity as blood kinship, and by appealing to a notion of common Scandinavian stock for all the groups of the post-eleventh-century English population: The invasion of England by the Danes left our speech and our literature still English. The Danes were of our stock and tongue, and we absorbed them. The invasion of England by the Normans seemed likely to crush the English people, to root out their literature, and even to threaten their speech. But that which happened to the Danes happened to the Normans also, and for the same reason. They were originally of like blood to the English, and of like speech; and though during their settlement in Normandy they had become French in manner and language, and their literature French, yet the old blood prevailed in the end.33

That southern Scandinavia is seen as the ancestral homeland of the original English peoples partly explains why the sea comes to figure so prominently in Brooke’s portrayal of English identity, although it is equally the case that Brooke’s romantic preoccupation with the sea is part of his reason for emphasising the Scandinavian origins of the English. For Brooke subscribes to an aetiological myth of migration by sea, one which recent scholarship suggests the AngloSaxons themselves may have believed in:34 This literature is written in English, the tongue of our fathers. They lived while this island of ours was still called Britain, in Sleswick, Jutland and Holstein; but, either because they were pressed from the inland or for pure love of adventure, they took to the sea.35

31 Stopford A. Brooke, English Literature from AD 670 to AD 1832, 2nd edn, rev. (London: Macmillan, 1876), p. 7. Later editions add the further patriotic observation that: ‘It is the earliest extant body of poetry in any modern language.’ Stopford A. Brooke, English Literature from AD 670 to AD 1832, 3rd edn, rev. (London: Macmillan, 1897), p. 6. 32 Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 8. 33 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), p. 19; (1897), p. 23. 34 See Nicholas Howe, Migration and Mythmaking in Anglo-Saxon England, 2nd edn (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001). 35 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), p. 8. A slightly revised version of this passage occurs at pp. 3–4 of the 1897 text.

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This linking of the lust for seafaring with the will to adventure, or as it might be identified, imperial ambition,36 is a collocation that is repeated throughout Brooke’s writings. Indeed the ubiquitous co-presence of both the sea and war throughout English literary and political history, is made a dual touchstone of the permanent and unchanging essentialist English character: When we came to Britain we were great warriors and great sea pirates – ‘sea wolves’ as a Roman poet calls us; and all our poetry down to the present day is full of war, and still more of the sea. No nation has ever written so much sea-poetry. It is in the blood of our fathers, who chanted their sea war-songs as they sailed.37

In later versions of the primer, Brooke constructs a category of ‘The First English Poems’, that is to say, the continental and, in his view, still largely heathen poetry, before going on to describe the bulk of the surviving poetry, which he sees as coming from the post-migration period and after the spirit of Christianity entered English poetry.38 This is ‘the English poetry which we may possibly say belonged to the older England over the sea’, and along with Widsith, Deor’s Complaint and The Fight at Finnsburg [sic], Brooke includes parts of Beowulf, which he invests with particular importance as foundational to Englishness: The whole poem, Pagan as it is, is English to its very root. It is sacred to us, our Genesis, the book of our very origins.39

Significantly then, for Brooke the origins of ‘all our poetry down to the present day’, is not merely in Old English (a view that is contentious enough in some circles today),40 but also over the sea. English poetry is not native to English soil, but is born of the sea, arriving, like Scyld and Beowulf do in ‘our old English epic’,41 borne on its waves. Originally Brooke’s primer had divided Old English poetry into the categories ‘greater’ and ‘lesser’ poems, primarily on the grounds of length, the former category including Beowulf and the Biblical narrative poems of the Junius manuscript that were still then attributed to Caedmon or his ‘school’. At this stage, however, Brooke seems to have had little or no direct reading knowledge of Anglo-Saxon, but to have relied primarily on translations, probably as much into German as into Modern English. For it was not until he began preparing for the 1892 36 Brooke supported British imperial policy overseas. See, for example, Jacks, Life and Letters,

II, 377.

37 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), p. 8. 38 The belief in the paganism of surviving early English poetry is, of course, entirely conven-

tional for the time, although as an ordained minister Brooke did not romanticise this in the same way that some of his contemporaries did. See Eric Stanley, The Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism (Cambridge: Brewer, 1975). Reprinted in Eric Stanley, Imagining the Anglo-Saxon Past (Cambridge: Brewer, 2000). 39 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 10. 40 See Peter Jackson, ‘The Future of Old English: A Personal Essay’, SELIM, 3 (1993), 154–67 and James Fenton, An Introduction to English Poetry (London: Penguin, 2002), p. 1. 41 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 8.



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History of Early English Literature that Brooke began to teach himself AngloSaxon. Writing to John Green (series editor for the Primers) on 16 November 1882, he says of Cynewulf ’s poetry: It is so interesting – so poetical often, so strangely modern too in its note that I am not satisfied with blundering through with a translation. So I have begun to learn Anglo-Saxon, and as far as prose goes find it easy enough. Where it isn’t English it is German – at least nearly all the words have their High German equivalents. I should think that in six months I shall know it fairly well.42

A little more than two months later, he again writes to Green, on 23 February 1883: I am getting on fast enough with Anglo-Saxon, and shall, long before my book comes out, be able to read it well. I have already translated direct three or four of Cynewulf ’s poems. You can have no conception how modern they are in spirit. It is no exaggeration to say that, two or three things being excepted, they might have been by Tennyson. I have been amazed. The German translation gives no idea of them.43

Consequently, later editions of the primer tend to make much more specific observations about Old English poetry than the original publication. These extend to remarks on the technical character or quality of the poetry, such as recognition of the metaphorical compound now usually termed ‘kenning’: ‘it [Old English poetry] uses the ordinary metaphorical phrases of Teutonic poetry, such as the whale’s-road for the sea’;44 or of that aspect of lexical auxesis we call variation: ‘for the most part, save when the subject is war or sea-voyaging, the poetry is diffuse, and wearies by a constant repetition’.45 Notably Brooke illustrates his points with nautical examples wherever possible, and in the latter case the twin English subjects supreme, sea and war, are the only topics for which the Old English poets are excused their appositive style. Contemporary parallels are drawn more often in the later versions of the primer in order to illustrate the immutability of English poetry’s distinctive characteristics. In the original publication these were limited to noting the nineteenth-century commonplace that Milton’s portrait of Satan was similar to that in the ‘Caedmonian’ Genesis,46 but by the third edition Brooke is finding them everywhere, demonstrating that Englishness is essentially an unchanging construct: When Tennyson used such adjectives as hollow-vaulted, dainty-woeful, he was returning to the custom of his ancient predecessors.47 42 43 44 45 46 47

Jacks, Life and Letters, II, 373–4. Jacks, Life and Letters, II, 376. Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 6. Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 6. Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), p. 14. Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 6.

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This may be the earliest case of a critic praising a contemporary poet’s practice of coining compound words in a manner analogous to that of Anglo-Saxon poets, and as such it is an early example of encouragement to adopt deliberate AngloSaxonisms of technique in poetry. Yet it is not only in matters of technique that modern English poetry has Old English precedent, but also in the matter of sensibility: Many of the poems are extraordinarily modern in feeling. The hymns of Cynewulf might have been written by Crashaw. The sentiment of the Wanderer and the Ruin might belong to this century. The Seafarer has the same note of feeling for the sea which prevails in the sea-poetry of Swinburne and Tennyson.48 ...the Seafarer, apparently a dialogue between an old and a young sailor about the dangers and the fascination of the sea, breathes the spirit which filled the heart of our forefathers while they sang and sailed, and is extraordinarily modern in note. The blank-verse manner of Tennyson is in it, and the spirit of it is strangely re-echoed in the Sailor Boy.49

Even in that other literary category by which the English are especially identified, ‘War Poetry’, Brooke is as likely to compare the terrestrial engagements commemorated in The Battle of Maldon and The Battle of Brunanburh with modern poems about naval battles as he is land battles: ‘They are the fitting source, in their simplicity and patriotism, of such war-songs as the Battle of the Baltic and the Siege of Lucknow.’50 ‘Battle of the Baltic’ was written by the Scottish poet Thomas Campbell to commemorate the British victory at the Battle of Copenhagen (1801), in which Nelson distinguished himself by ignoring an order to withdraw, over a primarily Danish-Norwegian fleet representing the Second League of Armed Neutrality of Denmark, Sweden, Prussia, and Russia, and perhaps, therefore comparable in Brooke’s eyes to the coalition of the North set against Æthelstan in Brunanburh.51 Several poems were written in the aftermath of the infamous siege of Lucknow (1857), during India’s First War of Independence. The only one called ‘The Siege of Lucknow’ was privately published by the minor Canadian poet Mary Herbert,52 and it is possible that Brooke had Tennyson’s more famous ‘Defence of Lucknow’ in mind,53 especially in view of the frequency with which 48 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 7. On p. 17 Brooke likens ‘Cynewulf ’s’ riddle

on the hurricane to Shelley’s ‘Ode on West Wind’. 49 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 16. For Tennyson’s ‘The Sailor Boy’ see Christopher Ricks, The Poems of Tennyson, 2nd edn, 3 vols (Harlow: Longman, 1987), II, 300. 50 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 18. 51 ‘Battle of the Baltic’, in J. Logie Robertson, ed., The Complete Poetical Works of Thomas Campbell (London: Oxford University Press, 1907), pp. 189–91. 52 Mary E. Herbert, Flowers by the Wayside, A Miscellany of Prose and Verse (Halifax, NS: Citizen Office, 1865). 53 Ricks, The Poems of Tennyson, III, 36–9.



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he refers to the Poet Laureate, and that he knew Tennyson’s own translation of Brunanburh, which had come out in the same volume as ‘The Defence of Lucknow’: Ballads and Other Poems in 1880.54 In Anglo-Saxon battle poetry then, even when it is concerned solely with combat on land, and with defeat as often as victory, Brooke finds precedent for nineteenth-century celebrations of the extension of British imperial power overseas. Although Brooke’s fascination with the sea is partly political, and to do with the origin myth of the English as a seafaring migratory people, it also partly the result of a conventional Romantic idealisation of untamed and uninhabited natural environments as embodying the sublime. That Old English poetry seems to find an aesthetic of the sublime in nature is a source of pride for Brooke, and causes him to value it as unique among early mediaeval vernacular literatures: ‘It is the only early poetry which has poems wholly dedicated to descriptions of nature.’55 This romanticisation of wild landscapes in general is seen in his early praise for Beowulf: ...its poetical interest lies in its descriptions of wild nature, [...] and of the way in which the Nature-worship of our people made dreadful and savage places seem dwelt in – as if the places had a spirit – by monstrous beings. For it was thus that all that half-natural, half-spiritual world began in our poetry which, when men grew gentler and the country more cultivated, became so beautiful as faeryland.56

Yet after his direct encounter with the poem, this praise of Beowulf as, in effect, playing host to a number of embedded Romantic nature lyrics, is expanded to include specific mention of those passages describing the sea, alongside the terrestrial geography of the sublime: Moreover, the descriptions of the sea and the voyage, and of the savage places of the cliffs and the moor, are instinct with the spirit which is still alive among our poetry, and which makes dreadful and lonely wildernesses seem dwelt in...57

Brooke acknowledges that non-sublime presentations of the natural world occur in Old English, but glosses over these rather more cursorily, suggesting that depictions of nature in more gentle guise are due to the influence of Christianity. Even then, his one example of this ‘soft note’ is an image of seafaring; he quotes in translation the scene from Maxims I, of a sailor returning home to his Frisian wife on shore.58 The twin attractions of the sea as origin myth, and of the sea as Romantic sublime, are united in the novel take that Brooke has on Bede’s anecdote of the 54 Alfred Tennyson, ‘The Battle of Brunanburh’, in Ballads and Other Poems (London: Kegan

Paul, 1880), pp. 169–78. ‘The Defence of Lucknow’, pp. 99–111. Brooke reproduced Tennyson’s translation in his English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest, pp. 256–60. 55 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 7. 56 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), p. 10. 57 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), pp. 9–10. 58 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), p. 13; (1897), p. 11.

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poet Caedmon, laying almost unique emphasis on the backdrop to the legendary composition of the first poem in English with a named author: Cædmon’s Poem, written about 670, is for us the beginning of English poetry, and the story of its origin ought to be loved by us. Nor should we fail to reverence the place where it began. Above the small land-locked harbour of Whitby rises and juts out towards the sea the dark cliff where Hild’s monastery stood, looking out over the German Ocean. It is a wild, wind-swept upland, and the sea beats furiously beneath, and standing there one feels that it is a fitting birthplace for the poetry of the sea-ruling nation. Nor is the verse of the first poet without the stormy note of the scenery among which it was written.59

Presumably the last sentence refers to Caedmon’s supposed authorship of the narrative Biblical poems in the Junius manuscript (Bodleian MS Junius 11), which include two praiseworthy depictions of the sea, that of the flood: The account of the creation in the older Genesis has the grandeur of a nature-myth. The description of the flood is full of the experience of one who had known the sea in storm.60

And that of the parting of the Red Sea: The Exodus is remarkable for its descriptions of war and a marching host, and especially for the elaborate painting of the breaking up of the sea, which was probably done by one who had himself battled with a whirling gale on the German Ocean.61

As is also evident from these extracts, Brooke sets some store by the presumed personal experience of the poet in depicting nature. The logic of the Romantic prejudice that personal knowledge is the guarantee of authenticity in art is here reversed: because these portrayals of the sea are so vividly authentic, they must have been written by one who knew the sea intimately. We see the same logic in evidence with regard to the attribution of authorship of ‘the great number of the Riddles’ to Cynewulf: ‘They are written by one who knew the sea and its dangers, the iron coasts and storms of Northumbria’, once again emphasising knowledge of the sea, even though that subject does not once appear to be an answer to any of the Old English riddles.62 What is also evident here is that the experience of hardship, and of being at the mercy of the sublime violence of nature is critical to Brooke’s understanding of poetic creativity. In effect Brooke reads the aesthetic theories of Burke, Kant, Goethe, and Coleridge back over Old English poetry.63 59 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1876), pp. 11–12. The passage survives, with minor

revision, in the 1897 edition, p. 12. 60 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 14. 61 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), p. 14. 62 Brooke, primer to English Literature (1897), pp. 16–17. 63 Brooke recommends the Clarendon edition of Burke’s select works to a correspondent. Jacks, Life and Letters, II, p. 545. In a diary entry for 28 October 1902, in which he wishes to be in the wilds of nature rather than London, Brooke likens the sound of gulls and cormorants



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This causes him to value in particular those lyric poems, and lyrical extracts from longer poems in Old English which best exemplify eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury Romantic ideas of the sublime in nature. As a consequence, his canon of Old English poetry, a canon which was enormously influential in shaping that which the twentieth century inherited from the nineteenth, results in large part from Brooke’s refraction of Old English through Romanticism. One can perhaps see its effects not only in the increasing focus in modern anthologies on the lyrics of The Exeter Book, but also, for example, in Pound and other modern poets’ attraction to those passages of The Seafarer and The Wanderer in which exile from the comforts of land functions for them as an essential prerequisite to the specialist, anti-bourgeois knowledge of the pilgrim as artist/artist as pilgrim.64 As Brooke’s primer has been treated in such detail, his History of Early English Literature to King Ælfred, and his English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest can both be dealt with rather more cursorily; indeed, they primarily revise, expand and otherwise develop the criticism set out in the primer. The preface to the History is even more concerned than the primer to locate the genesis of both English poetry and English ethnicity (in terms that strike the modern reader as more blatantly racist) in the early centuries of the Anglo-Saxon period: ‘...in the two hundred years between 670 and 870, the roots of English poetry, the roots of that vast over-shadowing tree, were set’, and ‘Here, too, we can best discern, and here isolate most easily, those elements in English character, which existing before the race was mixed, have been, not the cause of our poetry, but the cause of why the poetry has been of so high an excellence.’65 Brooke’s belief in an identifiable English essentialism in this period is also even clearer in these later works: ‘In this Anglo-Saxon poetry of which I write we grasp most clearly the dominant English essence.’66 Moreover, the link between this unchanging essentialism and a supposed seafaring spirit is amplified,67 to the philosophy of Kant: Jacks, II, p. 412. On the effect of reading Goethe’s depiction of the sublime in nature, see Jacks, I, pp. 67–8. Jacks identifies the pantheon of poets who inculcated a love of nature in the young Brooke as ‘Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Tennyson, Goethe’. Vol II, p. 87. 64 See, for example, Jones, Strange Likeness: on Pound, pp. 23, 28–30, 47–54; on Auden, pp. 85–97; on Edwin Morgan and W. S. Graham, pp. 151–4. Also Chris Jones, ‘“One a Bird Bore Off ”: Anglo-Saxon and the Elegiac in The Cantos’, Paideuma, 30 (2001), 91–8. Pound makes a similar critical manoeuvre to Brooke when he writes, ‘Virgil came to life again in 1514 partly or possibly because Gavin Douglas knew the sea better than Virgil had’. Ezra Pound, ABC of Reading (London: Faber, 1951), p. 45. 65 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, I, vii. See also vi. For an alternative metaphor, of Old English as ‘the ground’ from which ‘the roots of English song’ have grown, see Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 155. 66 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, I, vii. Also English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest, p. 83. 67 See Brooke’s comments on Ælfred’s translation of Orosius’ account of the voyages of Ohthere and Wulfstan, and on Widsith. History of Early English Literature, I, p. 6. Also on the ‘passion for [...] movement, which Tennyson has drawn in Ulysses, but which is far more

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and the idea of the English as a 1900-year-long ‘singing folk’ and migratory sea people is emphasised: ‘The first emigration was to Britain, the second to America.’68 Just as Brooke had earlier likened Brunanburh to Campbell’s ‘Battle of the Baltic’, so he sees in the figure of Beowulf a prototype for Nelson and Drake,69 and in Beowulf ’s qualities ‘the ancient English ideal’, which ‘for 1200 years or so [...] have been repeated in the lives of the English warriors by land and sea whom we chiefly honour. The type, especially, of the great sea-captains has been the same throughout.’70 The notion of Beowulf as a poem of the sea is given further emphasis,71 and the Grendelkin are presented, slightly idiosyncratically, as monsters of the sea.72 The comparison of Old English battle poetry to modern English is extended, with Brunanburh’s ‘abrupt and clashing lines’ apparently anticipating not only Campbell’s ‘Battle of the Baltic’, but also Drayton’s ‘Battle of Agincourt’ and Tennyson’s ‘Charge of the Light Brigade’.73 Beowulf too is now placed in a lineage of modern English works, mostly to do with nautical subjects: not only the ‘Battle of the Baltic’, and Tennyson’s ‘The Sailor Boy’,74 but also his poem ‘The Revenge’ (which Brooke calls the ‘Fight of the Revenge’, and Browning’s ‘Hervé Riel’, both concerned with historical English naval victories, as well as ‘Swinburne’s sea-songs’, for ‘the very temper of mind which pervades modern poetry of the sea – a mingling of melancholy and exaltation – is to be found in English poetry before the Conquest’.75 The lived experience of the sea’s sublime is still a guarantee of poetic authenticity: ‘There can be no doubt from his poetry that Cynewulf lived constantly near the sea and a rocky coast, and that he watched it with all the care of Tennyson.’76 This belief underwrites an expanded treatment of Cynewulf ’s authorship of the riddles, with Brooke writing of the storm riddle ‘there is no finer description of a great northern gale than this in the whole of our literature’.77

English than Greek; the inability to remain at ease, the longing “to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield,” which has always been the mark of English seamen’ (History, I, p. 35). 68 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, I, p. 15; English Literature from the Beginning, p. 93. 69 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, I, pp. 29 and 35. Also English Literature from the Beginning, p. 63. 70 Brooke, History of Early English Literature, I, p. 31. 71 See History, I, pp. 37, 40–3; English Literature from the Beginning, pp. 70–3. 72 Brooke, History, I, pp. 51–2 and 57–62. In English Literature from the Beginning, Brooke seems to treat Grendel as a mythological allegory of the sea, p. 59. 73 Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 256. 74 The Seafarer is also likened to ‘The Sailor Boy’: Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 153. 75 Ricks, Poems of Tennyson, III, pp. 25–30. Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke, ed., Poems of Robert Browning (New York: Thomas Y. Cromwell, 1896), pp. 314–18. Brooke, History, I, p. 41. 76 Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 93. 77 Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 95.



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In the History Brooke dedicates a whole chapter to the image of the sea in a number of other Old English poems, noting that ‘no natural object engaged them [The early English] so much as the Sea, and for no object have they so many names’.78 The chapter catalogues these names, and their various shades of meaning, and expands the discussion of ‘Caedmonian’ and ‘Cynewulfian’ treatments of the sea which we saw set out in brief in the primer,79 adding to them liberal extracts in translation from Andreas. Here too Brooke sees the manifest destiny of the English to exercise naval supremacy in the ‘the sea-rovers of Beowulf ’s time’, who were ‘true sea-dogs, the forerunners of the men who sailed in wasp-like ships from the southern harbours of England to the Spanish main’. Brooke even fancifully imagines that in Beowulf he hears ‘a phrase which a Spanish Don might have used when he heard that the ships of that devil, Drake, were seen in the offing’.80 And in English Literature from the Beginning to the Norman Conquest, he colourfully elaborates on the continental ur-English as a warfaring and piratical sea-faring people, going so far into the realm of fancy as to imagine these proto-English sea captains singing poetry from the prows of their vessels as they went into storm and battle.81 To conclude, Brooke’s importance not only as a disseminator of information about Old English poetry, but also as a shaper of tastes regarding that literature should no longer be overlooked. His views were read by an extremely wide public and most likely had an effect on Sweet’s canon-defining Anglo-Saxon Reader, on several grand men of Victorian letters, some of them, such as Tennyson and Morris, themselves translators of Old English poetry, and on the practice of one of the most influential modernists of the twentieth century, Pound. His own taste for nineteenth-century nature poetry, and his commitment to the aesthetic philosophy of the Romantic sublime, led him to single out and valorise those Old English poems and passages that most easily support such a view of literature as universal and ahistorical. In this way Brooke licensed cultural biases that are still largely with us in our contemporary canon, with its emphasis on The Exeter Book poems (the ‘elegies’ in particular) and with our preference for the more lyrical passages from longer poems such as Beowulf, over those, for example, of direct speech. To secure this Romantic view of Old English literature, Brooke focuses in particular on depictions of the sea in its poetry as the ultimate inhospitable and sublimely awe-inspiring natural environment. Furthermore, Brooke elides cultural and ethnic markers of identity to fashion highly politicised literary histories that validate narratives of the imperial manifest destiny of a Greater England which will also accommodate his own sense of simultaneous belonging and difference as a British Irishman. The image of the sea and of its early mastery by the English becomes important to this project, partly as an aetiological myth 78 79 80 81

Brooke, History, I, p. 223. See also Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, p. 127, 139, and 163–4. Brooke, History, I, p. 231. Brooke, English Literature from the Beginning, pp. 38–9.

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to explain contemporary British naval supremacy. His emphasis on the continuities, parallels and analogues between Old English and modern (especially, but not exclusively contemporary) English poetry are part of a wider nineteenth-century concern to see Englishness as an essentially stable construct of long-standing pedigree, and cultural achievements as legitimising political achievements.82 The centrality of Old English to contemporary senses of Englishness, which Brooke was able to take so much for granted, would be contested and surrendered later in the twentieth century, in part due to the nature of its politicisation by the likes of Brooke and others during the nineteenth century. This would not mean that place for Old English could no longer be found within modern English poetry, but rather that tropes of rupture and recovery, of difference and alterity, would become more important than those on which Brooke relied, of continuity and similitude.83 Now that ‘England’ is no longer the sea-ruling nation, Old English has become something of an obstacle to the progress of linear narratives about cultural and ethnic identities, but, like the sea itself, an obstacle that can be successfully traversed in the pursuit of new narrative horizons.

82 Chris Jones, ‘Anglo-Saxonism in Nineteenth-century Poetry’, Literature Compass, 7 (2010),

358–69. 83 See Chris Jones, ‘New Old English: The Place of Old English in Twentieth- and Twentyfirst-century Poetry’, forthcoming in Literature Compass.

Ruling the Waves: Saxons, Vikings, and the Sea in the Formation of an Anglo-British Identity in the Nineteenth Century

Joanne Parker When the Danish Princess Alexandra arrived in Britain in 1863 to marry Albert Edward, the prince of Wales, she was welcomed in verse by Alfred Austin, the future poet laureate, with the promise that the nautical expertise of her ‘Viking’ ancestors would make her a welcome presence in her new home.1 For much of the nineteenth century, England’s relationship with the sea was essential to two projects which were central to national identity. One was the justification of British colonialism. The other was the need to cement what Linda Colley has termed an ‘Anglo-British’ identity by culturally consolidating the political unions of Scotland and Ireland with England.2 As part of both projects, interest focused on England’s relationship with the sea in the medieval period: a heritage which was made to stand proxy for the early history of the British navy. In particular, the British navy was claimed to be Saxon in origin. However, a rival claim also arose in the peripheral areas of Britain: that the country owed its nautical prowess to the influx of ‘Viking’ blood that had resulted from Norse invasions. This chapter will consider the relationship between those competing assertions, and their relevance to British national identities during the Victorian era. Several different Saxon and Viking leaders from the period between the fifth and the eleventh centuries were celebrated in the nineteenth century as venerable founders of the British navy. However, one Saxon monarch was credited above all other figures with this achievement – and in the dozens of Victorian narratives about his reign it is easiest to observe the ways in which competing Viking and Saxon claims interacted. King Alfred the Great enjoyed something of a ‘cult’ in England during the nineteenth century, and as a national icon was credited with the foundation of just about everything from trial-by-jury to Oxford University.3 His alleged foundation of the British navy, however, perhaps contributed more 1 2

Alfred Austin, England’s Darling, 5th edn (London: Macmillan, 1896), p. v. Linda Colley, Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707–1837 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992). 3 On this see Joanne Parker, England’s Darling: The Victorian Cult of Alfred the Great (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2007).

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than any other single claim to the monarch’s popularity. In his 1836 epic poem Alfred the Great, G. L. Newnham Collingwood opined: Not for other cause Does England dearer hold her Alfred’s name, Than that he first gave to the island-queen Dominion o’er the waters.4

While in the preface to his 1865 ballet Sketch of Alfred the Great, M. Lonsdale asserted that in creating a navy, Alfred had ‘laid the foundation of his Country’s future Fame and Greatness’.5 Alfred made a particularly convenient starting point for British naval history. As a southern English monarch from the pre-Norman period he not only rendered the origins of the British navy decidedly English, he also disassociated them from any connection with modern-day France. Moreover, as he had ruled in the ninth century, exactly one thousand years before Victoria, this made the British navy a venerably millennial institution. Thus in his 1849 poem ‘The Order of Alfred’, for instance, Martin Farquhar Tupper called for a new honour to be instituted in Alfred’s name, asserting: ‘Sailors, ten centuries our British boast,/ He sent you first afloat on every coast […] Merchants, who waft your venture on the breeze,/ He gave you first the freedom of the seas’.6 On considering the Anglo-Saxon sources for Alfred’s reign, however, the monarch seems an unlikely choice to have been hailed by the Victorians as the progenitor of British naval supremacy. To begin with, sea-borne defences were carried out off England’s coasts well before his reign. During the sovereignty of his father, Æthelwulf, for instance, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells us that Alfred’s elder brother Æthelstan ‘fought in ships, and struck a great raiding army at Sandwich, and captured nine ships and put the others to flight’.7 Furthermore, Alfred’s own reign was not particularly marked by naval successes. Asser’s Life of King Alfred, probably written during the king’s lifetime, makes just three brief references to occasions on which Alfred engaged the Danes in naval encounters. The first relates that in 875, Alfred captured one out of six Viking ships ‘and the others escaped’; the second (more positive) records that Alfred captured two Viking ships and had a further two surrender to him in 882; and the last states that in 885, Alfred managed to destroy several Danish ships – before their comrades arrived and ‘the Vikings had the victory’.8 4

George Lewes Newnham Collingwood, Alfred the Great: A Poem (London: J. Ridgeway, 1836), p. 138. 5 M. Lonsdale, Sketch of Alfred the Great (London: privately printed, 1865), p. 3. See also Edward A. Freeman, Old English History, 2nd edn (London: Macmillan, 1871), p. 55. 6 Martin Farquhar Tupper, ‘The Order of Alfred’, in Ballads for the Times (London: Arthur Hall, Virtue, 1851), p. 253. 7 Michael Swanton, ed., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles (London: Phoenix, 2000), p. 65. 8 Simon Keynes and Michael Lapidge, ed., Alfred the Great: Asser’s Life of King Alfred and Other Contemporary Sources (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1983), pp. 82, 86, 87.



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The origin of the Alfredian claim to the genesis of Britain’s navy seems to have been the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’s account of how in the year 897: King Alfred ordered long-ships to be built to oppose the askrs; they were well-nigh twice as long as the others, some had 60 oars, some more; they were both swifter and less flexible, and also more responsive than the others; they were neither of Frisian design nor of Danish, but as it seemed to himself that they might be most useful.9

This account particularly appealed to Victorian historians because of its insistence that Alfred had boats built ‘as it seemed to himself that they might be most useful’. The suggestion that the king might have been personally involved in the scheme chimed well with Carlylean calls for leaders to be talented and skilled individuals – ‘the ablest man’. So in his 1902 history Alfred to Victoria: Hands across a Thousand Years, George Eayrs for instance pronounced that ‘Britain’s maritime supremacy’ had begun when Alfred’s ‘sharp eye saw that the sea might be a highway to sovereignty’.10 Several authors of fiction even dramatised scenes in which Alfred is involved in a hands-on sense with the creation of a navy. In her 1900 novel, In the Days of Alfred the Great, Eva March Tappan has the monarch persuade his councillors to establish a navy, assuring them that he can teach men both how to build ships and how to sail them – knowledge that he has gained from his reading of classical texts.11 Earlier in the century, Richard Kelsey had likewise stressed in his 1852 epic poem Alfred of Wessex that the West Saxon fleet owed its entire creation to ‘Alfred’s workmanship,/ Alfred’s conception’.12 And it was perhaps the notion that Alfred had been personally involved with establishing a navy that led also to the Victorian formation of the friendly society known as ‘The Royal Alfred Aged Merchant Seamen’s Institute’. Although the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle seems to have been the ultimate source for Alfred’s foundation of a navy, the notion probably reached most nineteenthcentury authors indirectly, via one of two seminal eighteenth-century publications. Sir John Spelman’s Life of Alfred the Great was not published in English until 1709, though the text was composed during the years of the English Civil War, when Spelman was serving in the Royalist camp at Oxford.13 The work was well-researched: as preparation, its author consulted a wide range of manuscript and print sources, particularly those held in the ill-fated library of Robert Cotton, which included a copy of Asser’s Life of King Alfred. Nevertheless, one of its prime concerns was contemporary relevance and it was therefore inevitably 9 The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, p. 90. 10 George Eayrs, Alfred to Victoria: Hands across a Thousand Years (London: Swan Sonnen-

schein, 1902), p. 27. 11 Eva March Tappan, In the Days of Alfred the Great (London: Gay and Bird, 1900), p. 256. 12 Richard Kelsey, Alfred of Wessex: A Poem, 3 vols (Battle: privately printed, 1852), I, p. 262. 13 DNB.

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riven with distortion and exaggeration. So in Spelman’s text, Alfred does not just design longboats that are ‘swifter and more stable and also higher’ than the Danish fleet (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, AD 896), rather he is ‘the first that put to sea such a Navy as was awful unto Strangers, begun the first Mastery of the Seas’.14 As The Life of King Alfred was to remain the only widely-known biography of the Saxon king until well into the Victorian age, this claim proved to be both influential and enduring – as witnessed by the number of nineteenthcentury writers who explicitly refer to Alfred’s ships as a ‘navy’.15 Spelman’s assertion was also further popularised by a play which was commissioned in the mid-eighteenth century by Frederick, son of George II, to be performed on 1 August 1740 – the anniversary date of the succession of the Hanoverian line to the British throne. In the last lines of David Mallet and James Thomson’s 1740 Alfred: A Masque, a hermit prophesies: Britons proceed, the subject Deep command Awe with your navies every hostile land In vain their threats, their armies all in vain They rule the balanc’d world, who rule the main.16

The hermit then performs a ‘Grand Ode in Honour of Great Britain’. The ditty is now better known as ‘Rule, Britannia’. As well as being an assertion and celebration of Britain’s Saxon (or broadly Germanic) heritage and thus an endorsement of its Hanoverian royal family, the song is also one of the most famous expressions ever of British naval pride. Its chorus resounds ‘Rule Britannia, rule the waves’ and in performance it was accompanied by a shadow-play of King Alfred’s new ships conquering those of the Danes.17 Mallet and Thomson’s play was reworked in 1854 as an oratorio, in which both the song and the hermit’s prophecy were given to Alfred himself, thus implying that the king somehow anticipated the union of Great Britain (he addresses his countrymen not as Saxons but as Britons) and foresaw that in designing new ships, his actions represented the beginnings of what would become British naval pre-eminence. This suggestion that their navy had not only had an early originator but, more importantly, one who had been strategic and far-seeing, clearly appealed to Victorian enthusiasts for Alfred. In a number of nineteenth-century plays, in particular, Alfred therefore speaks prophetically and proudly of Britain’s great naval future.18 In James Sheridan Knowles’s 1831 play, Alfred the Great: Or, the Patriot King, for instance, he prophetically announces: 14 John Spelman, The Life of Alfred the Great (Oxford: Maurice Atkins, 1707), pp. 58, 150. 15 Clare A. Simmons, Reversing the Conquest: History and Myth in Nineteenth-Century British

Literature (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1990), p. 40.

16 David Mallet and James Thomson, Alfred: A Masque (London: A. Millar, 1740), p. 44. 17 Mallet and Thomson, Alfred: A Masque, p. 42. 18 See for instance, Edmund L. Hill, Alfred the Great: A Drama (London: T. Fisher Unwin,

1901), p. 22; George Lewes Newnham Collingwood, Alfred the Great: A Poem (London: James Ridgeway, 1836), p. 120.



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My countrymen! Sons of the sea – henceforth her restless plain Shall be your battlefield! There shall you meet The threat’ning storm of war! There shall it burst Its rage unfelt at home.19

Lines from ‘Rule, Britannia’ also found their way directly into a number of nineteenth-century plays and poems about Alfred. M. Lonsdale’s 1865 ballet, Sketch of Alfred the Great, for instance, ends with the triumphal line ‘Britannia rules the waves!’20 The apogee of King Alfred’s association with the navy in England came in 1901 – a year believed (erroneously) to mark the thousandth anniversary of the monarch’s death. On 28 October of that year in Portsmouth, the countess of Lathom launched an armoured cruiser, built at a cost of one million pounds, in front of a thousands-strong crowd of spectators. The vessel’s name was HMS King Alfred.21 In his report of the launch, Alfred Bowker the mayor of Winchester (once Alfred’s capital) commented ‘Now so much is Alfred the founder that every ship in our navy might have his name’, but noted approvingly: It cannot be gainsaid that the launch of that mighty cruiser, H.M.S. King Alfred, was a fitting commemoration of the Millenary of King Alfred’s association with the navy of England. Alfred caused ships to be built which were swifter and larger than those of the Danes; and to this day the ships of England are larger, swifter, and more numerous than those of her enemies. The first-class armoured cruiser is the highest developed type of warship yet built, for she combines within herself the power of an ordinary battleship with the fleetness of the fastest ocean greyhound, thus embodying the same ideal which animated King Alfred 1000 years ago in the formation of his fleet.22

Alfred’s association with the navy was also invoked at the commemoration of his death held in Winchester the same year. A long procession of dignitaries wound its way through the city’s streets to the square where a new statue of the king was to be unveiled before a large and enthusiastic crowd of spectators. Making up the entourage were British ambassadors from every corner of the empire, prominent academics from English-speaking universities worldwide, lord mayors, and distinguished clergy from across the country, and military units fresh from the Boer War. It was headed, however, by sailors from the Royal Portsmouth Naval Brigade – to remind those present first and foremost of Alfred’s connection with the navy.23 19 James Sheridan Knowles, Alfred the Great: Or, the Patriot King (London: James Ridgeway,

1831), p. 85. 20 M. Lonsdale, Sketch of Alfred the Great: Or, The Danish Invasion: A Grand Historical Ballet (London: privately printed, 1865). 21 The Times, 28 October 1901, p. 7. 22 Alfred Bowker, The King Alfred Millenary: A Record of the National Commemoration (London: A. and C. Black, 1902), p. 147. 23 The Times, 21 September 1901, p. 10; Bowker, The King Alfred Millenary, pp. 104–06.

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The Winchester statue was unveiled by the former prime minister Lord Rosebery, who stood before the assembled crowds and asked them to imagine that a seer could have led the King Alfred ‘to the banks of the Thames, and […] shown him the little Saxon fort developed into a world-capital and a world-mart’.24 One reason why nineteenth-century Britain was so interested in the ships of an Anglo-Saxon monarch was the need to justify the country’s rampant colonialism by identifying early precedents for it. Two passages in the ninth-century sources for Alfred’s life assisted with this aim. In Asser’s Life of King Alfred it is stated that Alfred had ‘daily involvement with the nations which lie from the Mediterranean to the farthest limit of Ireland’.25 This ‘involvement’ was typically interpreted by nineteenth-century writers as the earliest instance of British overseas trade. Writing in 1901, for instance, Walter Besant claimed that Alfred ‘endeavoured to remove the separation of his island from the rest of the world […] he created commercial relations with foreign countries’.26 More important though was the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’s account of how in 883 Alfred sent two of his men, Sigehelm and Athelstan, with alms to the shrine of St Thomas.27 According to versions B and C of the chronicle this shrine was in Judea. In manuscripts D, E and F of the text, however, ‘Judea’ is mistranscribed as ‘India’.28 The corrupted, Indian version of the account became dominant in the nineteenth century. In part this was simply because of India’s economic importance to Britain during this period – with the loss of America, it represented the most lucrative, extensive, and established of Britain’s colonial territories. The slightest suggestion that Alfred’s men had sailed there a thousand years earlier was thus inevitably seized upon as an event laden with portentous significance – indeed, as proof that England had always been ordained by God to rule over the subcontinent.29 Thus Thomas Hughes in his 1869 Alfred the Great: A Biography described the mission of Sigehelm and Athelstan as ‘the first intercourse between England and the great empire which has since been committed to her in the East’, while Sir Clements Markham, in his essay ‘Alfred as a Geographer’, described how they visited a country ‘which was destined, in after ages, to become the brightest gem in the diadem of the descendants of Alfred the Great’.30 The fact that it was the Indian (rather than the Judean) version of Alfred’s alms-giving that featured in John Spelman’s history also probably helped to guar24 Bowker, The King Alfred Millenary, pp. 9, 111. 25 Asser’s Life of King Alfred, p. 101. 26 Walter Besant, The Story of King Alfred (London: George Newnes, 1901), p. 192. See also

Frederic Harrison, ‘Alfred as King’, in Alfred the Great: Containing Chapters on his Life and Times, ed. Alfred Bowker (London: A. and C. Black, 1899), p. 59. 27 The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, p. 79. 28 Richard Abels, Alfred the Great: War, Kingship and Culture in Anglo-Saxon England (London: Longman, 1998), p. 190. 29 On India’s importance in the nineteenth century, see C. C. Eldridge, England’s Mission: The Imperial Idea in the Age of Gladstone and Disraeli (London: Macmillan, 1973), p. 209. 30 Clements Markham, ‘Alfred as a Geographer’, in Bowker, Alfred the Great, p. 166.



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antee that story’s ascendancy in the nineteenth century. Spelman also claimed that Alfred designed new ships not only for warfare but for ‘traffic’ – and that, having carried the king’s alms to the East Indies, they came back with ‘a fair return of precious stones, perfumes, and other Eastern rarities’.31 This rewriting of the incident with its mercantile stress upon ‘fair returns’ clearly needs to be understood in the context of burgeoning Anglo-Indian trade. It was developed enthusiastically in the eighteenth century. Paul Rapin’s History of England (translated into English in 1732), for instance, further secularised Spelman’s account by omitting all mention of Alfred’s alms and presenting the Indian voyage purely as the dispatch of ‘merchants’ wishing to ‘traffik’.32 Some early Victorian writers also adopted the idea. The anonymous Catholic historian ‘J. F. R.’ stated in his 1845 life of Alfred that ‘Swithelm’ brought ‘precious stones, perfumes and other valuables’ back from India to King Alfred, while in Stratford Canning’s 1876 play Alfred the Great in Athelnay, the Saxon king himself asserts: ‘Girt by the seas, we must have fleets to guard/ Our naked coasts, and line them with the gold/ Of wealthier lands’.33 The nineteenth century, however, saw increasing moral examination in Britain of the country’s colonialism. This intensified after the 1857 Indian uprising and the founding of the Indian National Congress, when increasing numbers of British critics began to denounce the acquisitiveness and violence of British control in India.34 Pro-imperial discourse responded by stressing that Britain’s occupation of India was motivated not primarily by profit, but by a desire to disseminate Christianity among the subcontinent’s supposedly benighted Hindu and Muslim populations. From the mid-nineteenth century, therefore, the sailors whom Alfred had supposedly sent to India tended to be drawn upon not as an early example of British trade – but rather to demonstrate the longevity of Britain’s Christian concern for the country. All mention of merchants disappeared and, instead, the claim that a Saxon king had sent alms to an Indian shrine was once again stressed. Writing of Alfred’s venture in his 1862 article, ‘Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman Christianity’, for instance, John Tulloch asserted ‘It is interesting to be able to trace back the first intercourse between England and Hindastan [sic] to the year 883, and to know that it consisted in an interchange of Christian feeling.’35 31

Spelman, The Life of Alfred the Great, p. 152. It is interesting to note that Spelman here substitutes the East Indies for India. This change probably reflects the fact that in the seventeenth century when he was writing, the former region was of greatest consequence to Britain, in terms of overseas trade. No nineteenth-century writers reiterated or remarked upon Spelman’s innovation, however. 32 Paul Rapin, The History of England, trans. John Kelly (London: Mechell, 1732), p. 113. 33 J. F. R., Lives of Alfred the Great, Sir Thomas More, and John Evelyn (London: privately printed, 1845), p. 40; Stratford Canning, Alfred the Great in Athelnay: An Historical Play (London: Bernard Quaritch, 1876), p. 172. 34 See for instance, Anon, ‘The English in India’, Bentley’s Miscellany, 42 (1857), 331–46. 35 John Tulloch, ‘Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman Christianity’, The North British Review, 37 (1862), 52.

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It was not only Christianity that was drawn upon as a means of defending British colonialism in the nineteenth century. The empire was also endorsed as a mechanism to facilitate the dissemination of culture, law and constitutionalism around the globe.36 Alfred’s reputation as the venerable founder of Britain’s lawcode and democracy meant that he was often invoked in such rhetoric. Thus Conan Doyle celebrated Alfred as having ‘inaugurated that respect for law and order which is now the distinguishing mark of every British colony’.37 The earliest example of Alfred’s use in this context is Henry James Pye’s 1801 epic poem, in which a druid character prophetically assures Alfred ‘By British arms and British virtues borne,/ Shall arts of cultured life the waste adorn’.38 Pye’s pro-imperial view of non-European countries as cultureless wastelands is expressed in many later Victorian texts. His allusion to ‘British arms’ was another matter, however, and marks the poem as an early-nineteenth-century work. As the empire came under increasing scrutiny, later writers were more diplomatic. Tupper’s 1849 poem ‘The Alfred Medals’ presents King Alfred’s progeny not as a conquering army, but as ‘Ambassadors of truth to every coast/ And mercy’s messengers from pole to pole’, while in Edmund Hill’s 1901 play Alfred the Great, Alfred himself looks proudly forward to the many peoples whom his institutions will ‘make free’, prophesying: I see an Empire stretching o’er the seas, Of many lands, of many races knit, And held together in the bonds of love, Whose mother is this English land of ours, Free and unfettered, free and making free.39

Although Alfred speaks of an ‘English land’ in Hill’s play, both the navy and the empire which he was credited with founding were very much British institutions in the nineteenth century – Glasgow was one of the country’s chief shipping capitals, while a high percentage of colonial administrators were Scottish or Irish.40 Asserting that Alfred had been the father of the empire and navy was therefore not only a means of justifying those institutions but also a way of encouraging non-English Britons to view Alfred – and English history more broadly – as part of their own heritage. This agenda can first be seen in a number of eighteenth-century texts – where it is sometimes far from subtle. In the anonymous 1753 play Alfred the Great: Deliverer of his Country, for instance, Alfred 36 On this subject, see Eldridge, England’s Mission, p. 239; Archibald Paton Thornton, The

Imperial Idea and its Enemies. A Study in British Power (London: Macmillan, 1985), p. ix.

37 Bowker, The King Alfred Millenary, p. 21. 38 Henry James Pye, Alfred: An Epic Poem (London: Suttaby, Evance and Fox, 1815; first publ.

1801), p. 153.

39 Martin Farquhar Tupper, ‘The Alfred Medals’, in Ballads for the Times, p. 258; Hill, Alfred

the Great, p. 86.

40 See Jeremy Black and Donald M. Macraild, Nineteenth-Century Britain (Basingstoke:

Palgrave, 2003), pp. 202–03.



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plans to establish a standing navy ‘when we become a People so united,/ As by one Faith, I hope, we soon shall be/ Free from intestine Wars’. He goes on to predict that ‘we may defy/ The Danes, or any other potent Neighbours:/ So we preserve the Scotch, and Welch our friend’.41 Here the Danes – or ‘Vikings’ – are unequivocally a foreign other. As the nineteenth century progressed, however, they increasingly became King Alfred’s rivals in another sense – as alternative progenitors of the British navy and empire. Although the world of Scandinavian sea-adventurers was first popularised in Britain in the late eighteenth century, through the translations of Thomas Percy and the short poems of John Campbell, up until the publication of Sir Walter Scott’s novel The Pirate in 1822, the Old North tended to be represented in predominantly landlocked terms, with representations focusing on indoor feasting and land-based conflict.42 Among the volumes in Scott’s home library at Abbotsford, however, was a coy of E. J. Bjorner’s Nordska Kampa Dater (1737) which contained the legendary Old Norse tales of the Volsungs, Ragnarr, and Frithiof, with their accounts of dangerous sea-voyages by which reputations were forged and fortunes made.43 Drawing on these, Scott’s novel successfully glamorised the nomadic life of the sea-borne Viking, ‘living and laughing through he world’ with ‘the black raven standard waving at the topmast’.44 In the following decades, English translations of Norse sagas fuelled a fascination with this image in Britain. In 1839, George Stephens published an English translation of Frithiof ’s saga, with its account of the hero’s perilous voyage to the Orkneys in a magical ship.45 In 1844, Samuel Laing translated The Heimskringla, with its account of the construction of a Viking longship, and an introduction asserting that the Vikings were the origin of Britain’s naval supremacy and imperial prowess.46 And in 1861, George Dasent’s translation of Njal’s saga was published, inspiring one anonymous reviewer to rename England’s famous admiral ‘Lord Njalson’.47 As a result of the greater availability of such sources, by the 1860s Victorian gentlemen sailors could proudly think of themselves as ‘modern Vikings’ and by 1897, Thomas Carlyle could eulogise in his On Heroes, Hero Worship and the Heroic in History:

41 Anon, Alfred the Great: Deliverer of his Country: A Tragedy (London: privately printed,

1753), p. 66. 42 Andrew Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians (Cambridge: Brewer, 2000), pp. 73–4. 43 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 71 44 Walter Scott, The Pirate (Lerwick: Shetland Times, 1996; first publ. 1822), p. 124. 45 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 118 46 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 99. 47 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 292.

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In the old Sea-Kings too, what an indomitable rugged energy! […] progenitors our own Blakes and Nelsons! […] Hrolf, or Rollo Duke of Normandy, the wild Sea-King, has a share in governing England at this hour.48

By the last two decades of the nineteenth century when Carlyle was writing, ‘the floodgates’ of Old Northernism had really opened and dozens of Viking-age novels appeared in Britain.49 Almost all had a dragon-headed ship on their cover.50 And although the Norsemen were variously depicted by British authors as ‘mercenary soldiers […] self-sufficient farmers, primitive democrats, psychopathic berserks, ardent lovers and complicated poets’, it was through their relationships with the sea, that they were most commonly celebrated: as cutting-edge naval technologists, as colonists, and as merchant adventurers.51 These claims obviously contested the assertions of Alfredianists that the Saxon king was the originator of Britain’s seafaring traditions. As their proponents often hailed from peripheral areas of Great Britain, we may also discern in them a resistance to the centralisation which rendered Scotland, Ireland, and Wales subsidiary components of a union whose dominant partner, culturally and politically, was England. This is seen most clearly in an 1890s text which tackles King Alfred’s claims head-on from an Old Northernist perspective. Gordon Stables’s 1898 adventure novel ’Twixt Daydawn and Light begins with a framing narrative in which himself and an Irish friend sail to Iceland. There they learn from an Icelander: Your Anglese, or English, would ignore us, and expunge from the list of their ancestors those very men to whom, as the greatest naval nation in the world, they owe so much, those Vikings stern who first taught Britannia to rule the ocean waves.52

This point is reiterated several times in the main narrative which relates the Viking invasions of 878. The Vikings were, Stables asserts ‘neither so cruel nor so vile as the Anglo-Saxons in their chronicles make them out to be’, rather they should be viewed as ‘the germs of all that is best and boldest in our present-day civilisation’.53 The reasons for Stables’s affiliation with the Vikings seem to have been twofold. On the one hand, having spent several years in the Royal Navy and then the merchant service, he naturally appreciated the nautical accomplishments of

48 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 284; Thomas Carlyle, On Heroes, Hero Worship

and the Heroic in History, in The Works of Thomas Carlyle, 30 vols (London: Chapman and Hall, 1896–9; first publ. 1840), V, p. 32. 49 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 3. 50 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, pp. 3, 74. 51 Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians, p. 4. 52 Gordon Stables, ’Twixt Daydawn and Light: A Tale of the Times of Alfred the Great (London: Shaw, 1898), p. 144. 53 Stables, ’Twixt Daydawn and Light, pp. 245, 224.



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the Scandinavian nations.54 So he cannot ‘feel myself altogether in order while calling them pirates. They were simply privateering.’55 And he commends their ‘brave hearts’ as ‘the forerunners of those that at the present day beat in the bosoms of every brave and British sailor’.56 Just as importantly, however, although he was an inhabitant of England for most of his adult life, Stables was born and raised in Scotland. Scotland and Denmark are overtly equated in the novel when Stables remarks that, ‘The English […] termed the Vikings heathen; well, they were certainly not Christians, but they were soldiers. The Scottish Highlanders were also considered barbarians.’57 And in the novel’s preface he scoffs at earlier Anglo-Saxonism, which absorbed both Scots and Danes in its creation of an ‘Anglo-British’ national identity, and introduces his own position: […] in the books of English history I have read, I find the authors waxing hysterically happy over every victory they can claim from the ancient Vikings, or ‘heathen Norsemen’. I smile, because they quite forget that we owe some of the best blood that warms our veins to these ‘tameless spirits of the past’. […] In my present tale, then, I have tried – in a pleasant way I hope – to work up to the history of Alfred the Great through the principal foes to his kingdom, the Picts, the Scots, and the so-called Danes.58

Novelists such as Stables, overtly writing about Anglo-Saxon history from a Viking perspective, may have been in a minority in the Victorian period. However, there are signs that at the end of the nineteenth century, the rival claims of Old Northernists to the origins of British sea-faring were increasingly being taken seriously by Anglo-Saxonists – as witnessed by the attempts which some enthusiasts for King Alfred made to accommodate them in Alfredian narratives of naval heritage. The historical novelist Charles Whistler, for instance, in his 1899 King Alfred’s Viking, suggested that although Britain’s first navy was created during the reign of King Alfred and at his instigation, it was a Norwegian – Ranald – who taught the West Saxons how to build the boats and sail them.59 Here, once again, the Vikings seem to stand proxy for peripheral Britons in the nineteenth century. When Ranald is rewarded for his service at the book’s conclusion, by being made ‘leader of the King’s Wessex sea-levies, offering me the rank and fee of an English Ealdorman’, the parallels with the nineteenth-century Scots and Irish who served in the British navy and colonial administration are difficult to ignore.60 A similar compromise about naval heritage is reached in G. A. Henty’s 1886 novel, The Dragon and the Raven, in which although the British navy is inspired 54 55 56 57 58 59 60

DNB. Stables, ’Twixt Daydawn and Light, p. 369. Stables, ’Twixt Daydawn and Light, p. 224. Stables, ’Twixt Daydawn and Light, p. 293. Stables, ’Twixt Daydawn and Light, p. x. Charles Whistler, King Alfred’s Viking (London: Nelson, 1899), pp. 60–8. Whistler, King Alfred’s Viking, p. 284.

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by Viking mastery of the sea, it is created by one of Alfred’s Saxon followers, Edmund, who has lived as a hostage among the Danes, and learned seamanship from them in Denmark.61 Likewise, in Paul Creswick’s 1900 novel In Ælfred’s Days: A Story of Saga the Dane, we meet another figure with a heterogenous upbringing. Creswick’s hero Saga is a Viking child who is adopted by Alfred and brought up with his own son Edward. He and Alfred’s natural son have complementary qualities and create the navy between them. Creswick relates that ‘Edward might plan a scheme well, but Saga would be there to administer it’.62 The depiction of ninth-century seafaring in both Creswick and Henty’s novels points to something more interesting than simply evolving notions about the origins of the British navy. Such novels indicate an increasing interest in questions of union, hybridity, and mixed nationality. They suggest that by the late nineteenth century, Victorian Anglo-Saxonism – a much denigrated enthusiasm in the wake of two World Wars – was already naturally moving away from the simplistic English nationalism with which it is commonly associated, and towards a more complex sense of British national identity. More broadly, through the changing depictions of medieval seafaring which are encountered in nineteenth-century Alfredian texts, from the late eighteenth through to the late nineteenth century, one can glimpse the difficult process by which the newlyforged nation ‘Great Britain’ gradually came to terms with its own hybridity. As Alfred Austen asserted in his welcome to Princess Alexandra, it was time for the British to finally acknowledge: ‘Saxon and Norman and Dane are we’.

61 G. A. Henty, The Dragon and the Raven: Or, The Days of King Alfred (London: Blackie,

1886), p. 345. 62 Paul Creswick, In Ælfred’s Days (London: Ernest Nister, 1900), p. 118.

Afterword: Sea, Island, Mud

David Wallace King Arthur stuck in the mud, returning to but still short of his native Britain, remains for me this volume’s iconic image. At a key moment in the Alliterative Morte Arthure, having defeated the naval forces of Mordred, Arthur finds himself arrested, as Kathy Lavezzo puts it, by ‘oceanic mud’ (p. 131). Occupying neither sea nor land, Arthur momentarily straddles the Old English terms that give us, through the ‘combining [of ] water (ea) and land (land/lond)’ (p. 31), island. Many other key locales in this volume borrow imaginative potency from such meetings of land and water: Maldon, Chester, Lindisfarne, and even Mont St Michel. Indeed, the phenomenon of the tide proves so potent here as to command an entire chapter from Catherine Clarke. After-effects of tides upon marine landscapes reveal the imaginative beggary of our modern terms mud and sludge: ‘thane was it slyke aslowde in slakkes full hugge,’ says the Alliterative Morte of the mudflats; it is pleasing to observe, with Lavezzo, the suggestive alchemy of these terms defeating modern editors.1 And is worth noting that the Bristol Channel, in draining the Severn and the whole heartland of the Arthurian world, experiences the world’s second greatest tidal variation, producing great landscapes or seascapes of slyke. Chaucer’s Shipman knows how to pick his way along the challenging coastlines of Brittany and Galicia, navigating creeks where abrupt transitions between rock and water call for expert local knowledge (1.407–09). There are maps and charts, Alfred Hiatt shows, to facilitate such coast-hugging navigation; there are other kinds of maps to help plan open-sea voyaging; and there are cosmological aids, mappae mundi and illustrations from Macrobius, to pilot yet grander travels. We should not think such generic distinctions of mapping to be water-tight: portolan charts, for example, carry over information from mappae mundi; and locations deep inland feature regularly on maps ostensibly designed to aid coastal navigation. Pragmatic and religious ends, Hiatt argues, often shared medieval mapping spaces: merchants at sea might seek the Holy Sepulchre, and land-tied monks might locate Genoa in relation to Cyprus (p. 153). Hagiographies and 1

Morte Arthure: A Critical Edition, ed. Mary Hamel (New York: Garland, 1984), line 3718, with gloss on p. 376: ‘“then was there mud on a slant, in slopes ful huge”, a precise image of tidal mudflats as seen from the water’. For a slightly different transcription, see King Arthur’s Death: The Middle English Stanzaic Morte Arthur and Alliterative Morte Arthure, ed. Larry D. Benson (Exeter: University of Exeter, 1986); and see further above, p. 130.

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romances often ply the same oceanic spaces, observing distinct generic rules. Seas in romance, Judith Weiss observes, typically serve ‘to separate and bring together again husbands, wives, fathers, mothers and children’ (p. 107); you cross seas in romance to find out who you are. Such questions are rarely posed by hagiography, where the identity of the saint seems always already known; and where God mans the tiller, even in a rudderless boat. But generic boundaries between hagiography and romance are not seamless: saints’ lives take strange turns, and romances may be highjacked – as the Anglo-Norman Waldef is boarded by a Latinising monk, c. 1400 – and brought to a pious end (p. 109). So it is that when Margery Kempe impulsively boards ship for Danzig in 1433, expressly against the direction of her father-confessor,2 we cannot know what kind of boat we are in; and her narrative, caught somewhere between hagiographical and romance registers, seems not to know either. Margery Kempe’s sea journeys run the whole gamut of medieval maritime mapping as laid out by Hiatt. The thousand-mile trip to Danzig via Norway sees her head out across open seas in a largish vessel that doubles as a Ship of the Church. Her escape from Danzig, five or six weeks after arrival, is effected in a much smaller boat that brings her to Stralsund; this nail-biting, coast-hugging operation, which clearly unnerves her, affords much less scope for typological imagining. Her final crossing to England from Calais in 1433 sees her already bonded with the kind of worshipful London company3 that she will keep for the next year or so: for Calais, as prominently featured on the Gough map, forms part of English home territory. Her journey to Compostella, in 1417, had been held up at Bristol for six weeks by Henry V’s second invasion of France (he commandeered all the ships); this quick pilgrim excursion seems entirely routine, with more space given to her sea-prayers than to anything seen in Spain (3635–52). Margery tells us very little, either, about the most significant sea trip of her life: her voyage in a galey from Venice, down the Adriatic coast, and across the Mediterranean to Jaffa in 1414.4 It was at the end of this journey, at Jerusalem, that Margery received her most precious (to her) spiritual gift: an ear-shattering cry, expressive of experiencing Mount Calvary as if actually there (2206–64). Which she was, in place and perhaps time: for ‘spatial distance’, as Winfried Rudolf has it, ‘may be turned into temporal/historical, mythical or religious distance’ (p. 208); when Margery reaches the Holy Sepulchre (as pictured on many a map) this distance closes to nothing. Margery Kempe, Jon Hsy demonstrates, was no mere passenger to be borne about in boats and carts, but rather a traveller negotiating her way through changing languages. Her hometown of Lynn prepared her for this: its languages 2

‘Ye may nat gon’, The Book of Margery Kempe, ed. Barry Windeatt (Cambridge: Brewer, 2004), line 7610. 3 The epithet worschepful is used eight times of the ‘woman of London’ (8151) who flees from Margery at Aachen; meeting up with her at Calais, Margery helps her puke her way across the Channel. 4 This journey’s chief event is a squabble over a stolen sheet (2167–72).



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of quayside trading made concessions to the German-inflected, Hanseatic-based lexis of her Book’s first scribe, and ‘les burgeys de la ville de Lenne’ practised Anglo-French as ‘both a foreign and a native language’ (p. 173). Hsy’s argument that prospective sea travelling inspires Margery’s Book ‘to break into its clearest francophone register’ (p. 174) is highly original, posing questions both of Margery’s formation in prayer, and of the linguistic proclivities of her amanuensis. The notion that ‘the fertheste ende of Norfolk’ abounded in francophone merchant jargon was familiar to Langland’s Covetyse (p. 174), but would not have pleased those English reviewers who first read her Book following its sensational reappearance in 1934. The TLS account of the modernised Book, dated 10 October 1936, rejoices in ‘the happy fact that Norfolk was notorious for ignorance of French’ (p. 805, col. b). The TLS review of the EETS scholarly edition, published on 8 March 1941, opens with words of rapture: ‘at last the incredible creature is available in the Norfolk speech’ (p. 111 col. a). The reviewer is momentarily discomfited by the suggestion, gleaned from Hope Emily Allen’s footnotes, that Margery Kempe might have been susceptible to continental, and especially German, influences. But the riposte is resolute: The authoress who could put into the Deity’s mouth a phrase like ‘Thou shalt be eaten and gnawn of the people of the world as any rat gnaweth the stockfish’ needed no reinforcement from oversea. Professor Meech has no note ascribing this phrase to any known mystical or even proverbial source. Long may it remain the coinage of a fifteenth-century Norfolk woman! (p. 111 col. b)

Mention of stockfish here draws Margery Kempe into contexts of international fishing and trade from which the TLS would seek to dissociate her: but she must, in 1941, be seen to represent self-sufficient Norfolk values. And this is understandable, given the context of a year that many – including Leonard and Virginia Woolf – thought they would never survive.5 The proofs of Allen and Meech’s Book of Margery Kempe had been read and corrected by Dr Mabel Day, EETS Secretary, in air-raid shelters. Great discoveries made at Mound 1, Sutton Hoo, in the spring and summer of 1939 were first announced in the Times under the headline ‘Anglo-Saxon Ship Burial’ on 9 August.6 Such a reminder of English genealogical and maritime ties with Germany was untimely, in the context of incipient conflict; the grave goods were moved to London and spent the war in a tunnel off the Aldwych tube. Sebastian Sobecki thus has sound reasons for beginning his The Sea and Medieval English Literature with Winston Churchill’s famous speech of 4 June 1940 (‘We shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be’). ‘What Churchill invokes,’ writes Sobecki, ‘is a latent, residual understanding of British 5

Virginia Woolf, writing on 27 June 1940, could not ‘conceive that there will be a 27 June 1941’ (The Diary of Virginia Woolf, ed. Anne Olivier Bell, assisted by Andrew McNeillie, 5 vols (London: Hogarth Press, 1977–84), V, 299). 6 In a letter by Guy Maynard, Curator of the Ipswich Corporation Museum (p. 13, col. f ); the Times dedicates no editorial space to the Sutton Hoo finds.

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identity as insular, as cut off from its geo-political context by the sea.’7 Sea-bound insularity comes to define Britishness, but contradictorily, as the British heart both observes and yearns to transcend such defining and confining limits. The poet who expressed such contrary emotions most influentially was John Masefield. Masefield had been poet laureate for a decade when Churchill spoke of ‘our Island’ in 1940, and he would still be in post when Churchill died in 1965. Generations of English schoolchildren learned his poetry by heart, with ‘Sea-Fever’ a particular favourite: I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a grey mist on the sea’s face and a grey dawn breaking.8

Some attempt is made here at Anglo-Saxonish effects, with alliteration in the first two lines and strong-stressed metrical inversions in the third and fourth. A bold claim to be writing within a lexical tradition peculiar to the sea is registered by the epigraph to this early collection, Salt-Water Ballads: ‘The mariners are a pleasant people, but little like those in the towns, and they can speak no other language than that used in ships.’ The Licentiate Vidriera

The 1902 first edition buttresses this implicit claim to authorial sea-dog insiderism by supplying a ‘Glossary’ for land-bound mortals (pp. 109–12); this runs from ‘Abaft the beam’ to ‘Windward or Weather’. But there is no disguising the impressionistic vagueness with which Salt-Water Ballads invokes sea-faring science; the speaker of ‘Sea-Fever’ does seek out a particular stretch of water (as medieval travellers do), but rather ‘the seas’ and then ‘sea’ (singular and plural, in the opening line). This sense that any sea will do is confirmed by the next poem of Salt-Water Ballads, ‘A Wanderer’s Song’ (dedicated to W. B. Yeats). ‘I am tired of brick and mortar and rumbling wagon-wheels’, complains the speaker in line 2: I hunger for the sea’s edge, the limits of the land, Where the wild old Atlantic is shouting on the sand.

(3–4)

The initial ‘brick and mortar’ complaint is modulated as the final stanza opens; a final turn is made to the sea, again, and to Herman Melville: 9 Oh I am sick of brick and stone, the heart o’ me is sick, For windy, green, unquiet sea, the realm o’ Moby Dick. 7 8 9

(13–14)

The Sea and Medieval English Literature (Cambridge: Brewer, 2008), p. 2. John Masefield, Salt-Water Ballads (London: Grant Richards, 1902), p. 59, lines 1–4. Masefield attributes his epigraph to ‘Sea-Change’ (‘Oh Pythagoras – I sailed with thee last voyage’) to Melville (p. 27). Masefield’s opening epigraph (cited above) provides further evidence of bookishness: El Licenciado Vidriera is a novela by Miguel de Cervantes.



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Medieval sea poetry can be bookishly allusive too, but pays closer attention to the particularities and localities of sailing; and as Judith Weiss remarks, some poets show practical knowledge of seafaring (Piramus, Wace), and some – like the poet of Waldef – do not (p. 107). Masefield was an experienced seafarer, albeit a moody and impulsive one: he was wont to leave England as a sailor, but to return home as a paying passenger. The heart-sickness of ‘A Wanderer’s Song’, and the restlessness of ‘Sea-Fever’, tap long-lived Romantic melancholy, hardening perhaps into fin de siécle ennui at the close of the nineteenth century. Masefield’s invocation of the definite-articled sea apprehends the encircling element as a singular, transcendent force: an emphasis far different from the plurality of seas and sea-meanings encountered in medieval poetry and mappings. Perhaps this might be judged an after-effect of Trafalgar: once British control of the oceans was assured in 1805, the sea might be regarded as a single entity fit for signifying transcendence. It is striking, at any event, how artistic spirits – and ultimately the whole holidaying British nation – experiences the pull to the sea in the course of the nineteenth century as a release from toils and travails. Anne Brontë, having seen Branwell and then Emily Brontë laid in the family vault at Haworth late in 1848, headed for Scarborough; racked with tuberculosis, she was determined to die within sight and sound of the sea.10 The same fateful year, 1848, saw Charles Dickens publish Dombey and Son. Little Paul’s excruciating death occurs at the seaside, with the expiring infant imagining himself floating off in a boat; the chapter is headed ‘What the Waves were always saying’.11 A few years later, Matthew Arnold began musings that would lead to ‘On Dover Beach’, first published in New Poems (1867).12 Dover is the great English gateway to continental voyaging, but Arnold is not going anywhere: sea and tide serve him rather as poetic vehicles, evoking ‘a melancholy, long, withdrawing roar’ (25) of fading Faith. His imaging of an earlier time evokes those ocean-wrapped mappae reviewed by Alfred Hiatt, while yet remaining unlocatably vague:

10 Anne arrived at 2, Cliff, Scarborough on Friday 25 May 1849 and died three days later

(Whit Monday); she is the only Brontë not buried in the family vault at St Michael and All Hallows, Haworth. See Edward Chitham, A Life of Anne Brontë (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991), pp. 183–6. 11 Charles Dickens, Dombey and Son, ed. Alan Horsman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982). Gentle Paul, it almost seems, is driven out of London by the savage, half-human energy of the new railway culture. The gouging out of approaches to Euston is a notable feature of the novel; the novel’s villain, Carker, is chased down and run over by a demonic train. Dickens helps readers survive the death of little Paul by opening a new section of his novel (the fifth monthly installment) with Captain Cuttle, a thoroughly good-hearted British seaman. The novel ends with reformed Dombey père walking ‘the sea-beach’ where his sickly son had lain ‘on a little bed by the sea’ (pp. 733–4). 12 Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach, ed. Jonathan Middlebrook, Merrill Literary Casebook Series (Columbus, OH: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company, 1970). For the poem, following the text of the 1890 edition, see pp. 9–10; on its dating, see pp. 65–9.

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the sea and englishness in the middle ages The Sea of Faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore Lay the folds of a bright girdle furl’d.

(21–3)

Matthew Arnold is not actually on Dover beach as he voices this poem; he is looking out of the window.13 Poet and English professor Marilyn Nelson, au contraire, paddles half-immersed in the Atlantic: Wading in the waves, I thought of Matthew Arnold. Then, of slaves.14

The ‘blue Atlantic’ is for Nelson a place for pleasure, but also ‘a bone highway’ (p. 36), a grave to unknown numbers of her African ancestors. Arnold’s ocean figures the passage of time, temporal passage, but not forced historical passages of exile and enslavement. The Romantic transcendence of nineteenth-century English sea poetry, expressed in the idea of the sea, overlooks slavery; this volume does not consider how the whale road became the bone road. The Victorian English, secure in near-global naval supremacy, diligently sought figurations of their happy present in a distant past: an exercise that might now be termed medievalism. King Alfred, Joanne Parker writes, became something of a national icon, credited with founding ‘just about everything from trial-byjury to Oxford University’ (p. 195). But his supposed foundation of the British navy was especially felicitous, since any suggestion of French influence on this pre-modern monarch could be discounted. King Edgar’s claim to archipelagic dominion was promoted much earlier and, however fantastical, impelled John Adams to pick up his pen: for perhaps the British claim to control of Irish waters might push itself westward (p. 30) to engorge America? It is extraordinary that a fake charter, written by twelfth-century monks of Worcester to save their bacon in a local dispute, should undergird claims to British oceanic title that troubled the second President of the United States. The long reach of this textual concoction compares, in its way, with the ‘discovery’ of Arthur and Guenivere by monks of Glastonbury in 1190. This ability of a medieval text or artifact to win future generations to its way of thinking, extending its influence far into the future, seems almost worthy of a new name: counter-medievalism, perhaps, or preemptive medievalism, or even medieval medievalism. Chris Jones offers a fascinating account of how Stopford Brooke, a mediocre and unoriginal scholar, did so much to position ‘Old English at the beginning of, and contiguous with, an unbroken literary sense of Englishness’; ‘the motif and imagery of the sea,’ Jones continues, was seen by Brooke ‘as crucial to establishing this continuity, and as a defining essentialist quality of literary Englishness’ (p. 180). Brooke was chaplain in ordinary to Queen Victoria, a fashionable London 13 ‘Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!’ (line 6). 14 Marilyn Nelson, The Cachoeira Tales and Other Poems (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State

University Press, 2005), p. 43.



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preacher, and a great champion of ‘the manifest greatness of an English-speaking imperial Britain’ (p. 183). But he was also Irish, thus needing to demonstrate how a greater England might enhance the standing of Great Britain, and its constituent parts. Remembering that Iona spawned Lindisfarne, he proposes that Irish poetry in effect created Old English verse; and then recalling that Normans were Scandinavians (hardly affected by their French stopover) he argues that we are all Vikings now. All this helps further explain the nineteenth-century vogue for the sea, and for translations of Norse sagas (including that, as one reviewer wittily put it, of ‘Lord Njalson’, p. 203). Stopford Brooke’s coarse-grained arguments left their mark, extraordinarily, upon Henry Sweet’s canon-defining Anglo-Saxon Reader (p. 181), upon Alfred (sic) Lord Tennyson, William Morris, and even Ezra Pound. And even upon the first volume of The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature, published in 1907 and in print until the 1970s. The Cambridge editors had assembled a philological hall of fame to address runic inscriptions, inter-languages, creolisations, ‘early transition English’, and all their attendant complexities.15 But signs of linguistic diversity are withheld from the Cambridge History page, since these might suggest indeterminate, polyvocal origins for a national history; citations from Anglo-Saxon forego Old English in favour of modern translations by Stopford Brooke. It is thus amazing to learn (p. 187) that Brooke knew no Old English at all before framing his own History of Early English Literature (1892). Something greater than philology nonetheless persuaded him that Old English poems celebrating the battles of Maldon and Brunanburh ‘are the fitting source, in their simplicity and patriotism’ (p. 188) of more recent ‘war-songs’ celebrating Nelson’s victory off Copenhagen (1801) or the siege of Lucknow (1857). Such deep investment in continuity was shared, in matters of national literary tradition, by genuine scholars such as R. W. Chambers, Quain Professor of English at University College, London. Chambers’s most celebrated book, published by the Early English Text Society as something of a mission statement in 1932, was On the Continuity of English Prose from Alfred to More and his School. Chambers quotes approvingly from an essay by J. S. Phillimore, published at Dublin in 1913, that acclaims prose as ‘an institution, part of the equipment of a civilisation, part of its heritable wealth, like its laws’.16 Poetry functions comparably for Stopford Brooke; the unchanging sea encircling the British Isles powerfully images the continuity of English poetic inspiration over time. Continuing efforts to reclaim English-language poetics from British territorial waters are made by Archipelago, a journal first published in 2007 that 15 See The Cambridge History of English Literature, ed. A. W. Ward and A. R. Waller, vol. 1,

From the Beginnings to the Cycles of Romance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1907); contributors include H. Munro Chadwick, M. R. James, W. P. Ker, Israel Gollancz, George Saintsbury, and F. W. Maitland. 16 R. W. Chambers, On the Continuity of English Prose from Alfred to More and his School (London: EETS, 1932), p. lviii. This volume was published by EETS by way of celebrating the centenary of its own somewhat mythical origins in 1832 (‘Prefatory Note’, p. iii).

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locates itself ‘in the unnameable constellation of islands on the eastern Atlantic coast, known variously in other millennia as Britain, Great Britain, Britain and Ireland, etc.; even, too, too readily, the united Kingdom (including the North of partitioned Ireland), though no such thing ever existed, other than in extremis during wartime, but in the letter’.17 Seamus Heaney supplies Archipelago with its opening prose piece – which concludes with a man ‘walking round the island, working the head’ (p. 1) – and with ‘Fragment: “Nairn in Darkness and in Light”’ (p. 62). This fifteen-line poem captures the moment of suddenly seeing dolphins from a pier: ‘dolphins for certain, though none there could agree/ which shift or gleam contained them’ (7–8). Heaney’s revisionary Anglo-Saxonism and fierce Viking northernism18 elsewhere radically rework the nineteenth-century motifs explored in this volume by Joanne Parker. The momentariness and uncertainty of Heaney’s sea-vision off Nairn differentiates it from the heavy-duty transcendentalism of the Victorian sea-seers noted above. But fascination with how sea relates to sky, and both to land, is of long lineage. And the unmistakable romanticism pervading much of Archipelago is only intensified by its epigraph, borrowed from David Jones: ‘Even while we watch the boatman mending his sail, the petroleum is hurting the sea’ (p. ii). This new note of anxiety seems prophetic now, in the summer of 2010, as the American President (in the unspoken context of American deregulation of offshore oil-drilling) repeatedly upbraids British Petroleum for messing up the American shoreline. There is certainly a new fear abroad that human excess is ruining the planet’s oceans. But there is the contrary fear that the watery element might strike back: through dispersal of the Greenland icesheet (perhaps within ten years); through another Boxing Day tsunami, or a greater tide of destruction brought on by meteor strike (as in the film Deep Impact, 1998). Old English, Winfried Rudolf assures us, has the resources to meet such catastrophe: ‘flooding waves, several cubits high… are the first among the evils mentioned in Old English prognostics on the fifteen days before judgement’ (p. 51). For Jane Austen, the British navy of the Napoleonic period allowed men of middling family but great enterprise (including two of her brothers) to challenge the claims of aristocratic pedigree. Persuasion’s heroine sees qualities in Captain Wentworth quite absent in her foppish father (with his incessant reference to Debrett’s Baronetage of England); the novel ends by noting that Anne ‘gloried in being a sailor’s wife’ and thus ‘belonging to that profession which is, if possible, more distinguished in its domestic virtues that in its national importance’.19 Trafalgar emerges as a significant period marker in this book, as in any long view of the British Isles and its attendant literary cultures. But the notion of nationalising oceanic space, which Trafalgar in effect achieves, has a longer pedigree that 17 Andrew McNeillie, ‘Editorial Note’, Archipelago, 1 (2007), p. vii. 18 See Beowulf (London: Faber, 1999); North (London: Faber, 1975). 19 Jane Austen, Persuasion, ed. Janet Todd and Antje Blank (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-

sity Press, 2006), p. 275.



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leads back to earlier voyaging by European powers: such as, for example, Portuguese venturing into the Indian Ocean at the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Amitav Ghosh’s In an Antique Land invites us to reverse-read traditionally Whiggish narratives and consider progressive expansion bringing on incalculable loss: Within the western historiographical record the unarmed character of the Indian Ocean trade is often represented as a lack, or failure, one that invited the intervention of Europe, with its increasing proficiency in war. When a defeat is as complete as was that of the trading cultures of the Indian Ocean, it is hard to allow the vanquished the dignity of nuances of choice and preference. Yet it is worth allowing for the possibility that the peaceful traditions of the oceanic trade may have been, in a quiet and inarticulate way, the product of a rare cultural choice.20

The ‘rare cultural choice’ that Ghosh speaks of here sustains trading and negotiating along extensive coastlines and across shared bodies of water: a modus agendi implicit to Mandeville’s Travels and practically exemplified, as Jon Hsy has shown, by Margery Kempe.21 But the imperative to keep or control seas in the national interest is already, as Sebastian Sobecki shows here and elsewhere,22 awakening in this earlier period: in John Capgrave’s Liber de illustribus Henricis (1453), and in The Libelle of Englyshe Polycye (1436/7, a poem admired and indeed owned by Samuel Pepys, Secretary to the Admiralty). Indeed, it may only have been England’s tenacious attachment to Calais, and the massive expense of sustaining its thousand-man garrison, that hindered it from following in the wake of the Portuguese much sooner. Once the continental foothold of Calais was lost in 1558, however, English ships were free to expand their sea lanes south and west; England might now finally become, in Fernand Braudel’s famous phrase, ‘an island’.23 Medieval maps, Alfred Hiatt has shown, accentuated not England’s insularity, but rather its ‘interconnections with natural forces and regional networks’ (p. 157); maps of Britain ‘insist on its contingent position in a network of regional affiliations and implicit rivalries within the larger maps of Europe and the world’ (p. 142). Literary views are thus ambivalent, mindful that seas function not only to protect the island from enemies, but to wash them ashore; there are in effect, Michelet notes, pathways on the seafloor (p. 71). Geoffrey of Monmouth’s 20 Amitav Ghosh, In an Antique Land (Delhi: Ravi Dayal Publisher, 1992), p. 287. Portu-

guese thinking on their proprietorial rights over the Indian Ocean, Ghosh continues, ran as follows: ‘since none of the people who lived around it had thought to claim ownership of it before their arrival, they could not expect the right of free passage in it now’ (p. 288). 21 To the negotiations noted by Hsy one might add Margery’s transaction with the ‘Sarazyn’ who, for the price of a groat, ‘toke hir undyr his arme’ just outside Jericho ‘and led hir up on to the hey Mownt wher owyr Lord fastyd fowrty days’ (2410–14). 22 See The Sea and Medieval English Literature, pp. 3–4, 158–9; and above, p. 7; Chaucer’s Merchant ‘wolde the see were kept for any thyng’ (1. 276, emphasis added). 23 Civilization and Capitalism, 15th–18th Century, trans. Sîan Reynolds, 3 vols (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1992), III, pp. 353–6.

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Britain, truly archipelagic, scarcely allows insular conquerors a moment’s rest; the very attempt to stabilise a courtly culture seems to draw fresh sails from beyond the maritime horizon. This uncertain relation between secular and sea powers, famously exemplified by King Cnut, returns us to medieval fascination with tides, particularly ‘the resistance of tidal spaces to conventional categories of ownership, territory, and control’ (p. 82). Lindisfarne, an island twice a day, perched between Irish and English, Ionan, and Roman calculations of time and tide; its watery defences could not, however, save it from the Viking sails that broke the horizon in January 793. Monk Lucian’s In Praise of Chester [De Laude Cestrie], Catherine Clarke observes, evokes the Dee estuary’s tidal geography in terms of wonder: for, says Lucian, ‘in the same place and the same day God makes there both a very suitable crossing for travellers to walk on and a deep sea in which marine creatures might swim’ (p. 93). Six or eight insular kings supposedly rowed King Edgar on these waters shortly before his coronation in 973, thereby acknowledging him as ‘maritime, pan-British king’ (p. 21). These same tides mysteriously brought the Rood of Chester to Chester (p. 95): a sea-event comparable to the appearance of one wooden Virgin at Boulogne-sur-Mer (subsequently worshipped by Edward II, Henry VIII, and Chaucer’s Wife of Bath), and another on the east coast of Tenerife (worshipped by the native Guanche). The fact that the Rood of Chester was celebrated chiefly in Welsh verse, rather than in English, suggests a counter-geography; a magical sign of indifference or resistance to Westminster. Such imaginative infiltrations by Welsh poets mirror prior English expropriations, particularly England’s attempt to disenchant Wales by anglicising King Arthur. Which returns us, finally, to Arthur stuck in the mud, momentarily immobile between sea, sky, and English land. The first significant aventure of Arthur’s outward journey from England in the Alliterative Morte Arthure had occurred at Mont St Michel, yet another tidal locale. Arthur, having taken on a cannibalistically spit-roasting giant on the Mount, falls with him ‘fro the toppe’ before killing him ‘at the flode merkes’.24 He then advances on Rome – but not before taking something of this monster with him, namely his club and his obscene garment of kingly beards. On returning to England, or English coastal waters, Arthur defeats his son and nephew Mordred who has, according to the Morte, wedded and impregnated Guinevere (3550–2). Arthur’s momentary suspension in coastal mud, which comes after this naval victory and before his homecoming, does not (Kathy Lavezzo points out, p. 132) disconcert the Morte poet: indeed, great pleasure is taken in Arthur’s slipping and sliding, up to his waist, in mud. In vaingloriously seeking to expand his kingdom, Arthur seems little better than the Emperor Lucius Iberius, or the Genoese giant of St Michel; he is not squeaky-clean. But in eagerly dropping into the seaedged slop, re-grounding himself on his island kingdom, Arthur acknowledges and indeed images his own maculate character. The poem delightedly shares such jouissance with us; mud, it suggests, finds Arthur in his element. 24 ‘At the high water marks’ (Morte Arthure, ed. Hamel, lines 1144–7).



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The complex, ultimately unknowable meanings of the Morte’s mud moment, speaking to the depths and limits of sovereign rule, are currently receiving a fascinating, life-long gloss in the work of visual artist Richard Long. Born right above the Bristol Channel, Long discovered Avonmouth mud to be his natural expressive medium. Huge, sweeping designs made upon floors, or laid directly onto walls, see him working with his right hand dipped in Channel mud; water, as well as earthy sand, features as a key creative element. Riverlines, installed at the Hearst Tower, New York, in 2006, lays massive columns of brown mud, with energetic hand-swirled designs, across a white surface; like the monumental shoreline sculptures of the tide, they cannot last.25 Mud has been as natural, one might say as native, a medium to Long as the use of elephant dung to Chris Ofili; a substance that might by others be regarded as unwholesome or repugnant, clinging on when better shaken loose, takes on almost sacral qualities through powers of local association.26 Richard Long’s other life-long, dedicated art work sees him walking the bounds of particular territories, above all (and beginning with) Britain. From 1998, for example, we have ‘A LINE OF 33 STONES A WALK OF 33 DAYS’, a coast-to-coast epic featuring ‘A STONE PLACED ON THE ROAD EACH DAY ALONG A WALK OF 1030 MILES IN 33 DAYS FROM THE SOUTHERNMOST POINT TO THE NORTHERNMOST POINT OF MAINLAND BRITAIN – THE LIZARD TO DUNNET HEAD’.27 Such compulsive and meticulous traversing of national terrain returns our attention, in the context of this book, to King Arthur: particularly to his detailed calculating, in the Morte, of the route that the Roman envoys must take, and how long they may take, in travelling from Carlisle to Sandwich (475–90). Even Long’s careful noting of journey markers finds equivalent effects in the Middle English poem: as ‘WHITE LIGHT WALK’ (Avon, England, 1987) observes ‘YELLOW PARSNIPS AT 23 MILES/ GREEN RIVER SLIME AT 45 MILES’,28 so Lucian’s ambassadors hear ‘the sound of the se[a] and Sandwich belles’ (490). How extraordinary, then, to find such twinned compulsions in a Middle English poet and a living English artist: to measure an island territory; to mark this island’s boundary, in mud. 25 See Richard Long, Heaven and Earth (London: Tate Publishing, 2009), pp. 30–1. See

further, but less helpfully, William Malpass, The Art of Richard Long (Maidstone: Crescent Moon Publishing, 2005). 26 Ofili, a Mancunian of Nigerian descent, was educated at St Pius X High School and served as an altar boy. He began working dung into his paintings following a trip to Africa in 1992; from 1993 to 2005 his paintings were supported on balls of decorated, lacquered balls of elephant dung. See Klaus Kertess, ‘Just Desserts’, in Chris Ofili, Devil’s Pie (Göttingen: Steidl, 2007), unpaginated; see further Chris Ofili, Afro Muses 1995–2005 (New York: The Studio Museum in Harlem, 2005). 27 Heaven and Earth, p. 94. See further ‘TIDE WALK/ ENGLISH CHANNEL TO BRISTOL CHANNEL/ A WALK OF TWO AND A HALF TIDES RELATIVE TO THE WALKER’ (p. 80). 28 Heaven and Earth, p. 91.

Bibliography

Manuscripts and Archives Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Preussischer Kulturbesitz, MS 138 Cambridge Corpus Christi College MS 16 MS 41 MS 66 MS 162 MS 303 Dijon, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 448 King’s Lynn, Borough Archives, KL/C10/2 London British Library MS Additional 25691 MS Cotton Claudius D. VI MS Cotton Faustina C. 1 MS Cotton Tiberius B.V. 1 MS Yates Thompson 26 College of Arms, MS Muniments 18/19 Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, F.260 Inf. (1) Oxford Bodleian Library MS Auct. F.2.20 MS Bodley 672 MS Hatton 113 MS Hatton 115 MS Junius 11 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, Dép. des Cartes et Plans, Rés. Ge. B 1118

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Index References to illustrations and their captions appear in bold type. Frequent use of apocrypha has made it more practical to list the books of the Bible individually. They are listed under the full names (e.g. Book of Kings, Epistle of James). Aachen  177 Abbo of Fleury Passio Sancti Edmundi  104 Adams, John  29-30, 212 adventus Saxonum  60, 67 Ælfric, abbot of Eynsham  18, 41, 51 56 Catholic Homilies  41 Aelred of Rievaulx Genealogia regum Anglorum  25-26 Aeneas  157 Æthelred, king of England  17 Æthelstan  188, 196 Æthelweard Chronicle  60, 61, 65-66 Æthelwulf  196 Aillte an Mhothair  43 Alain de Lille  38 Alcuin  60 Aldhelm De laude virginitatis  54 Alexandra, princess of Wales and queen consort of the United Kingdom  196, 206 Alfred, king of Wessex  29, 195-206, 212 Alfred the Great: Deliverer of his Country  202-203 Allen, Hope Emily  209 Alliterative Morte Arthure  2-3, 113-32, 207, 216 Althusser, Louis  2 Altitonantis (charter)  9-30 Anderson, Benedict  1-2 Andreas  61, 66, 67, 72-77, 78

Andrew, apostle  55, 72-77 Angevin dynasty  11, 15 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle  18, 51, 60, 65, 196-98, 200 Annals of Winchester  147-48 Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury  15 Antipodes  114 Apocalypse of Baruch  35 Apocalypse of John  50, 53 Apocalypse of Peter  41, 45 Appleton, Elizabeth Edgar: A National Tale  28-29 Private Education or a Practical Plan for the Studies of Young Ladies   29 Archipelago (journal)  213-14 Armstrong, Neil  36 Arnold, Matthew  181, 183 ‘On Dover Beach’  211-12 Arthur, king  2-3, 105, 114-32, 207, 212, 216-17 Aslake, Walter  151 Asser Life of King Alfred  196-97, 200 Asshebourne, William  162 Athelstan  200 Atherton, Mark  181-82 Atlantic Ocean  30, 113, 146, 147, 151, 152, 154, 157, 176, 210, 212 Aubrey, John Brief Lives  28 Augustine  48 Augustus  143-44 Austen, Jane Persuasion  214

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Austin, Alfred England’s Darling  195 Austria  124 Avignon  150 Avitus of Vienne  48 Baldassare degli Ubriachi  151-52 Barber, Peter  151 Barcelona  151 Barnstaple  144 Barrett, Robert  92 Bartlett, Robert  99 Beachy Head  43 Baker, David  1, 2 Barrow, Julia  9-11, 14 n54, 15, 19-20, 22 Battle of Brunanburh  60, 188-89, 192, 213 Battle of Maldon  188 Battles, Paul  60 Beccari, Francesco  151 Bede  104, 189-90 De die iudicii  51 Historia Ecclesiastica  31, 42, 60, 61, 62-63, 65, 66, 83 De natura rerum  83, 133-34 De tempore ratione  83 De temporibus  83 Vita Sancti Cuthberti  83 Bedo Brwynllys  95 Beer, Gillian  32 Bellandi, Simone d’Andrea  151 Belin  108 Benedeit, Voyage of St Brendan  103 Benedictine order  7, 10 n33, 11, 20, 22, 91 Benedictine reform  56 Benson, Larry  117, 130 Beowulf  50, 186, 192-93 Beowulf  33, 42, 45, 50, 60, 66, 77, 186, 189, 192-93 Berkhout, Carl  49 Berlin  180

Berwick-upon-Tweed  153, 154 Besant, Walter  200 Bianco, Andrea  152 Bjorner, E.J.  203 Black Sea  146, 147, 154 Blackwater, river  52 Boccaccio, Giovanni Decameron  155, 167-68 Boer War  199 Bologne  142 Boniface  37, 46-47 Book of Enoch  35, 42 Book of Ezra  36, 37 Book of Judges  18 Book of Kings  49 Book of Margery Kempe  159-78, 208-209, 215 Book of Revelation see Apocalypse of John Bordesley Abbey  13-14, 17 Boulogne  14, 216 Bowker, Alfred  199 BP  214 Bradley, S.A.J.  89 Bradwardine, Thomas  39 Brancaster  106 Braudel, Fernand  215 Bredin, Hugh  131 Brenne  108 Bristol  144, 154, 207, 208, 217 Britain archipelago  3 citizenship  1-3 colonialism  29-30, 82-83, 91, 94, 96-99, 195, 200-202, 205 imperialism  3-4, 10, 14, 17, 19, 25, 29-30, 90-91, 114-21, 124, 128, 183-84, 186, 189, 201-203, 213 as island  1-3, 31-33 polities  4-7 Britishness see under identity Brittany  154, 297 Brontë sisters  211 Brooke, Stopford  179-94, 212-13

Browning, Robert ‘Hervé Riel’  192 Brutus  116 Buondelmonte, Cristoforo Isolario  152 Burke, Edmund  190 Burne-Jones, Edward  181 Bury St Edmunds  104 Byrhtferth of Ramsey Vita S. Oswaldi  21 Byrhtnoth  52, 55 Battle of Maldon  52, 55 Cabot, John  129 Cabot, Sebastian   152 Caedmon  186-87, 189-90, 193 Cairpre Crom  46 Caister  106 Calais  142, 176, 178, 208, 215 Campbell, John  203 Campbell, Thomas ‘Battle of the Baltic’  188, 192, 213 Canary Islands  151-52, 154 Canning, Stratford Alfred the Great in Athelnay  201 Canterbury  15, 154, 176 Canterbury Cathedral  144 Cape Verde  152 Capgrave, John Liber de illustribus Henricis  215 Carlisle  121, 123, 217 Carlyle, Thomas  203-204 Cartagena (Spain)  156-57 Carthage  156-57 Caspian Sea  141 Castile  120 Catalan Atlas  146 Ceuta  156 Chambers, R.W.  213 Channel Islands  142 Charlemagne  8, 10 Charles I, king of England  8, 27 Charlotte, princess of Wales  29 Charon  54

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251

Chaucer Canterbury Tales General Prologue  156 Man of Law’s Tale  155-56, 167 Wife of Bath  216 House of Fame  36 Cheshire  94 Chester  9, 18, 91-98, 100-101 Chester Rood  95-98 Chism, Christine  117-18, 127, 128 Christ II  66, 67 Christina, saint  53 Churchill, Winston  209-10 Cicero De Republica  113-16, 133 Clarke, Catherine A.M.  3 n9, 19 n79, 67, 71 n58, 91 n33, 207, 216 Cogeshall, Ralph  99 Cohen, Jeffrey Jerome  83 n3, 98, 99, 172 Coke, Edward  26, 28 n124, 30 Coleman of Worcester  24 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor  190 Collingwood, George Lewes Newnham Alfred the Great: A Poem  196 Cologne  107 Columba  53 Columbus, Bartholomew  152 Columbus, Christopher  50, 129 Copenhagen  188, 213 Cornwall  154 Sir Cradoke  129 Cromwell, Oliver  4-5 Cnut  2, 16, 81-82, 216 Cotton, Robert  197 Crashaw, Richard  188 Creswick, Paul In Ælfred’s Days: A Story of Saga the Dane  206 Crudwell  24 Custance  155-56, 167, 169, 171 Cuthbert  83-85, 90, 99-100 Cynewulf  187-88, 190, 192, 193

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Cyprus  207 Cyrus the Great  8 Dafydd ap Hywel  95 Danzig (Gdańsk)  162-63, 171, 176, 177, 208 Dasent, George  203 Day, Mabel  209 Dee, river  18-22, 26 n113, 27, 91, 93-98, 100-101 Dee, John  26 General and Rare Memorials Pertayning to the Perfect Arte of Navigation  26 Thallatokratia Brettaniki  26 n116 Deep Impact  214 Defoe Daniel  57 DeMarco, Patricia  117 Denmark  4 n14, 78 n96, 107, 142, 154, 168, 175, 188, 205, 206 Deor’s Complaint  186 Derwent, river  84, 85 Diamond, Robert  66 Diarmait Mac Murchada, king of Leinster  15 Dickens, Charles Dombey and Son  211 Dido  157 Digby Mary Magdalen  174 Disraeli, Benjamin  181 Don, river  37 Dove Cottage  181 Dover  2, 43, 144, 176, 178, 212 Downham, Claire  15 Doyle, Arthur Conan  202 Drake, Francis  193 Dream of the Rood  49 Drayton, Michael ‘Battle of Agincourt’  192 Dryden, John Annus Mariabilis  28 Dublin  10-12, 14-17, 21, 95 mint  8, 16-17 see of  15-16

Dulceti, Andrea  154-55, 155 Dundee  154 Dunstan, saint  104 Dyas, Dee  89 Dyer, Edward  26 n116 Eadmer of Canterbury  15 Eadric of Oswaldslaw  20 East Anglia  103-104, 106, 110, 161, 172, 174 East Indies  201 Eayrs, George Alfred to Victoria: Hands across a Thousand Years  Edgar, king of England  3-30, 212 afterlife  3, 5-11 charters see also under Altitonantis  9-30 and Dublin  15-16 S 796 (‘Malmesbury’ charter)  9, 23-27 Edmund, saint and king of East of Anglia  104-106, 110 Edward the Confessor, king of England  20, 24 Edward II, king of England  216 Edward III, king of England  115, 119-20 Edward VII, king of the United Kingdom  195 Elene  66, 67 England  2, 4-5, 7, 9, 10, 15, 25, 27-30, 42, 46, 47, 107-10, 114, 151-53, 161-62, 170, 185-86, 193-94, 195, 199, 200, 201, 213, 215-216 adventus Saxonum  60-61 Arthurian England  117, 126-27 cartographic representation of  144-46, 154-57 colonialism see under Britain geographical position of  116, 134-36, 141, 146 imperialism see under Britain limits of  118-124, 130-31



index

Welsh border with  91-100 English Channel  61-62, 64, 66, 78, 116-25, 127-31, 159-60, 170, 207, 217 Englishness see under identity Erasmus, hermit  53 Evesham Abbey  144 Exeter  139, 141 Exeter Book Riddle 7  48 Exeter, Richard  149-51 Exodus  60, 61, 66-72, 78, 85-90 De expugnatione Lyxbonensi  148 Farne  83 Fight at Finnsburg  186 Flanders  129, 154 Florence of Worcester  18 Fortune (personified)  114-16, 121, 125, 126 France  116, 118-20, 123, 124, 144, 148, 152, 157, 196, 208, 212 Frederick, prince of Wales  198 Frederick II, emperor of Germany  115 Freud, Sigmund  88-89 Frithiof  203 Gardner, John  130 Gautier Dalché, Patrick  146-49 Gawain  117-19, 131-32 Gdańsk see Danzig Genoa  119, 129, 147, 153, 155, 207, 216 Geoffrey of Monmouth Historia regum Britanniae  105, 110, 116, 119, 122-23, 125, 129, 132, 215-16 Geoffrey of Wells De Infantia Sancti Edmundi  104 George II, king of Great Britain and Ireland  198 Gerald of Wales The Journey through Wales  98 Germanus  62-64 Germany  47, 65, 91, 108, 124, 161, 168, 169, 209 Ghosh, Amitav

253

In an Antique Land  215 Gibraltar  153, 156 Gildas De Excidio Britonum  61-62, 66, 132, 134 Gladstone, William Ewart  181 Glasgow  202 Glastonbury  212 Gloucester College, Oxford  150 Göller, Karl Heinz  126 von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang  190 Golding, William  57 Gospel of John  38 Gower, John Confessio Amantis  168-69 Grant, Raymond  53 Greece  108, 109 Green, John  183, 187 Greenland  214 Gregory the Great  42 Dialogues  54 Grendel  42, 45 Grotius, Hugo Mare liberum  4, 8 Gruffudd ap Maredudd ap Dafydd ‘To the Rood of Chester’  95-97 Gudlac  107, 108, 109 Gui de Warewic  109 Guiac  107, 108 Guinevere  114, 126, 130, 216 Hakluyt, Richard Principall Navigations  8, 26 Hall, J.R.  86 Hamel, Mary  130, 131 Hanseatic League  162-63, 175, 176-78, 209 Harrison, William Description of Britain  26 n116 Harthacnut  11 Haymo of Halberstadt Commentary on Isaiah  46 Heaney, Seamus  214 Heimskringla  203

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Heng, Geraldine  128 Hengest  65-66 Henry I, king of England  15 n59, 19 Henry II, king of England  15 Henry IV, king of England  152 Henry V, king of England  208 Henry VII, king of England  152 Henry VIII, king of England  216 Henry of Huntingdon Historia Anglorum  28, 81-82 Henty, G.A. The Dragon an the Raven  205-206 Herbert, Mary ‘Siege of Lucknow’  188 Hermannus Contractus  50 Heywood, Thomas A True Description of His Majesties Royall Ship  27 Hiatt, Alfred  139 n13, 207, 208, 211, 215 Hill, Edmund Alfred the Great  202 Hogg, James  17 Holden, A.J.  109 Holy Sepulchre, church, Jerusalem  153, 207, 208 Home Office (UK)  1-2 Homilies Angiers homiliary  46 Assmann homily X  49 Bazire/Cross homily XI  39 Belfour homily IX  48 Blickling homily XVI  41-45 Bodley homily  43 The Devil’s Account of the Next World  34-38, 43 Napier homily XXIX  51 Napier homily XLVI  48 Tristram homily III  40 Vercelli homily IX  39-40 Horace  114 Horn legend  3 Horsa  65-66 Howe, Nicholas  59, 67, 90

Hrothgar  77 Hsy, Jonathan  168 n25, 208-209, 215 Hudson, Benjamin  15 n57, 16 Hughes, Thomas  200 Hull  154, 156 Hunt, Holman  181 Husband’s Message  182 Huxley, Aldous  57 Iceland  204 Identity Britannia, allegory  5-7 Britishness  1-3, 7, 210 Englishness  2-3, 5-9, 25, 28, 119, 132, 160-63, 170, 178, 180, 183-187, 193-94, 195, 212 Ieuan Llawdden  95 India  188, 200-203 First War of Independence  188 Indian National Congress  201 Indian Sea  141 Ingham, Patricia  117 Ireland  5, 8, 10, 14-21, 30, 37, 42, 84, 91, 100, 120 n21, 124, 133, 134, 142, 154, 157, 184, 195, 200, 204, 214 Irish Sea  84, 95 Isidore of Seville  83 Isle of Man  142 Isle of Wight  83, 142 Italy  118, 129, 155, 169, 178 Jaffa  207 James I, King of England  28 James-Raoul, Danièle  77 Jerome  49 Jerusalem  104, 137, 144, 145, 149, 153, 208 Johannes Bramis  109 John of Oxenedes  26 n113 John of Sacrobosco De sphera  138-39 John of Worcester  12, 16, 18-23 Chronicon ex chronicis  12, 18-23 John, Eric  15



index

Johnson, Lesley  7 Johnson, Richard  53 Jonah  45, 63 Jones, Chris  182 n17 and 20, 183 n24, 191 n64, 194 n82 and 83, 212 Jones, David  214 Jonson, Ben Vision of Delight  28 Joyce, James Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man  39 Judgement Day II  51 Julius Caesar  114, 122 Kant, Immanuel  190 Kelly, Susan  23-24 Kelsey, Richard Alfred of Wessex  197 Kempe, Margery  159-78, 208-209, 215 King, Edmund  15 n59 King’s Lynn  106, 154, 161-63, 167, 172-76, 178, 208 Knowles, James Sheridan Alfred the Great: Or, the Patriot King  198-99 Kowaleski, Maryanne  172 Krishna, Valerie  130 Kristeva, Julia  128 La Rochelle  120 Laing, Samuel  203 Lanfranc, archbishop of Canterbury  15 Langham, Simon  150 Lapidge, Michael  21 Lavezzo, Kathy  3 n9, 42 n54, 155 n66, 207, 216 La3amon Brut  119, 125, 129 Leabhar Breac  46 Legge, Dominica  103, 104, 105 n9, 110 Le Goff, Jacques  70

255

Les Espangols sur Mer, 120 Libelle of Englyshe Polycye  7, 8, 19, 25-26, 177 n45, 215 Liber de existencia riveriarum et forma maris nostri mediterranei  147-48 Life of St Germanus  62 Lincoln  13, 142 Lindisfarne  83-84, 99-100, 142, 207, 213, 216 Lipari  155 Lomb, Paul  173 London  28, 152, 154, 156, 176, 178, 180, 181, 208, 209, 211 n11, 212 Long, Richard  217 Lonsdale, M. Sketch of Alfred the Great  196, 199 Low Countries  161, 169 Lowell Institute  181 Lucas, Peter  87 Lucian De Laude Cestrie  91-93, 100, 216 Lucifer  44 Lucius  114, 118, 121-25, 216 Lucknow  188, 213 Ludlow  11 Lübeck  154 Lupus  62 Lynch, Clare  70 Mabel, wife of Robert of Gloucester  13-14 Macrobius Commentary on the Somnium Scipionis  36, 113-16, 133, 136, 138, 139 Mael Sechnaill mac Maele Ruanaig, king of Tara  46 Maitland, Frederic  20 Majorca  147, 151, 154 Maldon  207, 213 Mallet, David, and James Thomson Alfred: A Masque  198 Malmesbury  22, 24-25

256

the sea and englishness in the middle ages

La Manche (English Channel) see under Sea Mannyng, Robert Chronicle  119, 123-25, 130 manuscripts Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Preussischer Kulturbesitz, MS 138  136 n8 Cambridge Corpus Christi College MS 16  155 n5 MS 41  53 MS 66  142 n20 MS 162  63 n17 MS 303  38 n35, 63 n17 Dijon, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 448  136 n8 King’s Lynn, Borough Archives, KL/C10/2  163 n8, 176 n43 London British Library MS Additional 25691  154, 155 MS Cotton Claudius D.VI  142 n17 MS Cotton Faustina C.1  138, 139 MS Cotton Tiberius B.V.1  134, 135, 136, 137, MS Yates Thompson 26  49 n78 College of Arms, MS Muniments 18/19  145 Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, F.260 Inf. (1)  152 n58 Oxford Bodleian Library MS Auct. F.2.20  140, 141 MS Bodley 672  92 n34 MS Hatton 113  38, 51 n91 MS Hatton 115  38 n35, 43 MS Junius 11  44 n60, 45, 85, 186, 190

Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, Dép. des Cartes et Plans, Rés. Ge. B 1118  137 n31 maps Aslake world map  151, 154 Carte Pisane  147, 154 Cotton world map  42, 134-38, 135, 137 Evesham map  144, 145 Gough map  141-42, 157, 208 Hereford map  142-44, 143, 155 mappae mundi  133-34, 138, 142, 144, 146, 151, 153-57, 207, 211 portolan charts see sea-charts St John’s College MS 17  42 Sawley map  142, 155 sea-charts  133, 146-57 T-O maps  37, 115 zonal maps  115, 133, 138, 139, 140, 141, 154, 157 Marco Polo  153 Maredudd ap Rhys ‘Garllaes fûm o’r gwyw oerllwm’  95, 97 Markham, Clements  200 Mary  22, 49-50, 171, 174, 175 as stella maris  49-50 Masefield, John  210-11 Salt-Water Ballads ‘Sea-Fever’  210 ‘A Wanderer’s Song’  210 Massachusetts  29-30 Colony of Massachusetts Bay  29 Massachusetts Bay  30 Matilda, empress  11-15, 17 Matthew, apostle  72 Matthew Paris  141, 142, 157 Matthews, William  117-18 Maximian, Roman emperor  53 Maxims I  189 McNeillie, Andrew  214 Mediterranean Sea  37, 135, 137, 147, 148, 152, 154, 155-57, 170 Melrose chronicle  26



index

Melville, Herman  210 Mermedonia  72-75 Merton College, Oxford  149 Michael, archangel  53-54 Michelet, Fabienne  31 n2, 32 n4, 42 n52, 135 n5, 215 Middelburg  171, 173 Milton, John  187 Minehead  144 Mont St Michel  118, 125, 128-29, 207, 216 Mordred  114, 116, 126, 129-30, 207, 216 More, Thomas  56 Morgan, Philip  100 Morris, William  181, 193, 213 Moses  68-70, 86, 90 Mount Badon  62 Mount Calvary  207 navy  4, 19-20, 29, 120, 130, 195-99, 202-206 Neath  98 Nedham, Marchamont Mare clausum  4-8, 27-29 Nelson, Horatio  188, 192, 203-204, 213 Nelson, Marilyn ‘Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!’  212 Neptune  4-7, 141 Netherlands  171 New South Wales  29 New Zealand  29 Nicholas of Worcester  15, 22 Nile  37 Njal  203 Noah  74 Norfolk  106, 151, 174, 209 Normandy  107, 142, 155, 185 North Sea  55, 146, 154, 170 Northey Island  52 Northumbria (Anglo-Saxon region and realm)  83, 100, 190

257

Northumberland  156, 167-68, 184 Norway  10, 124, 142, 154, 175, 208 Nothelm, archbishop of Canterbury  46 Offa, king of East Anglia  104 Ofili, Chris  217-18 Ohthere  60 Olaf Cuaran, king of Dublin  16 Old English Boethius  37 Old English Genesis  60, 66, 74, 187 Old English Maryrology  53 Old English Orosius  60, 134 Olsen, Karin  73-74, 75, 88 Orkney Islands  134, 141, 142, 203 Oswald, bishop of Worcester  10-11, 21 Oswaldslaw (formerly in Worcestershire)  10, 13-14, 19-21 Oxford  150, 195, 197, 212 Paradise  94, 96, 108, 119, 144, 145 Parker, Joanne  29 n133, 195 n3, 212, 214 Paschasius Radbertus  49 Paston, John  152 Pathmos  50 Patrick, bishop of Dublin  15 Patterson, Lee  117 Paul, apostle  35-36, 42 Pearsall, Derek  130 Pelagian controversy  63 Pepys, Samuel  3-4, 215 Percy, Thomas  203 Peter, apostle  22 Peterborough Chronicle  31 Petrus Comestor Historia scholastica  153 Phillimore, J.S.  213 Picts  61, 205 Pillars of Hercules  137, 156 Pinkerton, John  16-17 Piramus, Denis Vie de St Edmund  103-107, 110, 211

258

the sea and englishness in the middle ages

Pisa   147 Pliny  83 Poland  162, 169 Pound, Ezra  30, 182, 183, 191, 193, 213 ‘At the Heart O’ Me’  182 Cantos  30, 182 Poynings, Edward  30 Primrose, Archibald (Lord Rosebery)  200 Prussia  163, 177, 188 Protectorate (Cromwellian)  4-7, 28 pseudo-Gregory Liber responsalis siue Antiphonarius  54 pseudo-Jerome  50 Ptolemy of Alexandria Geographia  134 Pujades, Ramon  147 Pye, Henry James Alfred: An Epic Poem  202 Ragnarr  203 Ramsey Abbey  104 Ranulf Higden Polychronicon   118 n11, 144, 150, 153 Rapin, Paul History of England  201 Red Book of Hergest  95 Red Register  172-73 Red Sea  67-71, 84-90, 93, 97, 141, 190 Reed, William, bishop of Chichester  149-50 Richard II, king of England  115, 119-20 Richard of Devizes Chronicon de tempore regis Ricardi primi  147 Richard of Haldingham (or Sleaford)  144 Riddles  190, 192 Robert of Gloucester  14 Robertson, F.W.  180 Robinson, Fred  34

Roger, bishop of Salisbury  24-25 Roger Howden  148 Chronica  26, 148 Gesta  148 Rollason, David  84 Rolle, Richard Incendium amoris  153 Romanticism  180, 185, 189-91, 193, 211-12 Rome  47, 108-109, 114, 116-18, 121-22, 124, 137, 156, 163, 164, 167-69, 171, 216 Romm, James  113, 114 Romulus  8 Rostock  154 Rudolf, Winfried  46 n67, 50 n89, 208, 214 Ruin  188 Runyan, Timothy  120 Ruskin, John  181 Russia  188 S 796 (‘Malmesbury’ charter)  9, 23-27 St John, church of (Chester)  94, 95, 101 St Peter’s, Westminster  149 St Werburgh’s abbey (Chester)  91-92 Sandwich  121, 124, 196, 217 Santiago de Compostela  176 Saxony  104, 168 Scarborough  154 Scipio Africanus  36, 113-16, 133, 136 n9, 138, 139 Scotland  5, 121, 124, 141, 142, 154, 195, 203, 204, 205 Scott, Walter The Pirate  203 Scyld  186 Sea British ocean  8, 9, 10, 27, 29-30, 212 mud  130-32, 207, 216-218



index

ocean  10, 11, 14, 23, 28-29, 35-38, 42, 46, 56, 65, 67, 77, 83, 86, 88, 89, 96, 97, 110, 113-32, 133-41, 154, 157, 190, 204, 207-208, 211-12, 214-15 oceanus dissociabilis  35, 56, 114 tides  67, 81-85, 91-94, 97-101, 128, 133, 207, 216, 217 The Seafarer  33, 48, 66, 181-82, 188, 191 Selden, John Analecton Anglobritannicon  26 Mare clausum  3-8, 26-28, 29 Titles of Honor  26 Severn, river  207 Shakespeare, William  56 Shaw, George Bernard Candida  181 Shelley, Percy Bysshe  181 Shipman (Chaucer)  156 ship-soke  19-21 Sigehelm  200 Simon, bishop of Worcester  11-15 Simon, James  17 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight  116, 119 Sluys  119 Smith, Anthony D.  59 Sobecki, Sebastian  7, 42 n54, 83 n5, 88, 104, 105 n10, 114 n3, 119, 167, 171, 174 n39, 209, 215, Solomon and Saturn  41 Sovereign of the Seas (ship)  8, 27 Spain  91, 107, 148, 149, 152, 156, 176, 208 Spelman, John Life of Alfred the Great  197-98, 200-201 Stables, Gordon ‘Twixt Daydawn and Light  204-205 Staley, Lynn  160-61, 177, 178 Stephen, king of England  10-17, 21 Stephen of Ripon Life of Wilfrid  53

259

Stephens, George  203 Stévanovitch, Colette  66 Stevenson, Robert Louis  57 Stevenson, William Henry  9 Stow, John Summary of English Chronicles  26 n116 Strait of Gibraltar  156 Stralsund  176, 208 Stuart dynasty  27-28 Sudeley  11 Sweden  168, 175, 188 Sweet, Henry  181-83, 193, 213 Swinburne, Algernon Charles  188, 192 Symeon of Durham Libellus de exordio  84-85, 100 Syria  156 Tappan, Eva March In the Days of Alfred the Great  197 Tarkovsky, Andrei Ivan’s Childhood  53 Taylor, Silas  28 Tenerife  151, 216 Tennyson, Alfred  187-89, 192, 193, 213 ‘Charge of the Light Brigade’  192 ‘Defence of Lucknow’  188-89, 213 Tertullian  48 Testament of Abraham  35 Teutonic Order  177 Thames, river  200 Thetford  109 Thomas, apostle  200 Thornton, David  18-19, 21 Thule  42 Thuringia  42 Tibberton  12 Trafalgar  211, 214-15 The Travels of Sir John Mandeville  215 Trivet, Nicholas  168-70 Troilus  36

260

the sea and englishness in the middle ages

Tulloch, John  201 Tupper, Martin Farquhar ‘The Order of Alfred’  196, 202 Tyrus  53 Venice  147, 152, 208 Victoria, queen of the United Kingdom  180, 212 De viis maris  148, 152, 156 Vikings  16, 51-52, 55, 105, 195-96, 203-206, 213, 214, 216 Visio Sancti Pauli  35-36, 40, 41, 44, 56 Viterbo  118 Volsungs  203 Vortigern  65-66 Wace  107 Roman de Brut  103, 105, 108, 110, 119, 123-25, 129, 130, 211 Waldef  104, 106-11, 208, 211 Waleran of Meulan  11-15, 17, 21 Wales  5, 91, 94-95, 97-98, 100, 101, 124, 139, 141, 142, 154, 203, 204, 216 Wallace, David  2, 129, 155 n67, 169 n29, 171, 177 Walton, Robert  3 The Wanderer  33, 48, 66, 79, 188, 191 Warin of Worcester  22, 24 Warner, William Albion’s England  26 n116 Waterhouse, Edward Fortescutus Illustratus  27 Watling Street  121 Weiss, Judith  105 n11, 108 n16, 123 n23, 125 n27, 208, 211 Westminster  149, 150-51, 155, 181, 216 Westminster Chronicle  150 The Whale  66 Whistler, Charles King Alfred’s Viking  205

Widsith  182 Widsith  186 Widukind of Corvey  42 Wilfrid  53 William de Beauchamp  12 William Langland Piers Plowman  174, 209 William of Malmesbury  11, 12 n44, 16, 22 Gesta pontificum Anglorum  22-23 Gesta regum Anglorum  12, 22-23 Vita Wulfstani  22 Willelmus Durandus Rationale divinorum officiorum  153 Winchester  147-48, 199-200 Wissant  142 Wogan-Browne, Jocelyn  7 Wood, Anthony  27 Woolf, Leonard  209 Woolf, Virginia  209 Worcester earldom of  11-15, 17, 21 Worcester Cathedral Priory  7, 9-22, 24-26, 30, 212 Worcester, William Itineraries  152 Wordsworth Trust  181 Wright, Charles  36, 41, 44 Wulfstan, archbishop of York and bishop of Worcester  18, 51 Sermo Lupi ad Anglos  60 Yeats, W.B.  210 York  130, 163 Yorkshire  148 Zaganelli, Gioia  75 Zeeland  105, 144 Zumthor, Paul  75

spine 23mm A 6 May 2010

Local and imperial, insular and expansive, both English yet British: geographically and culturally, the sea continues to shape changing models of Englishness. This volume traces the many literary origins of insular identity from local communities to the entire archipelago, laying open the continuities and disruptions in the sea’s relationship with English identity in a British context. Ranging from the beginnings of insular literature to Victorian medievalisms, the subjects treated include King Arthur’s struggle with muddy banks, the afterlife of Edgar’s forged charters, Old English homilies and narratives of migration, Welsh and English ideas about Chester, Anglo-Norman views of the sea in the Vie de St Edmund and Waldef, postConquest cartography, The Book of Margery Kempe, the works of the Irish Stopford Brooke, and the making of an Anglo-British identity in Victorian Britain. Sebastian Sobecki is Professor of Medieval English

Literature and Culture at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen.

Contributors: Catherine A. M. Clarke Alfred Hiatt Jonathan Hsy Chris Jones Kathy Lavezzo Fabienne Michelet Joanne Parker Winfried Rudolf Sebastian Sobecki David Wallace Judith Weiss

Cover: The British Isles, Ptolemy’s Cosmographia, 1467. National Library of Poland, MS BN BOZ 2/I, fol. 2v.

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