[96] Fylgia, tutelary divinity. See Note (H), at the end of the volume.
[97] Morthwyrtha, worshipper of the dead.
[98] It is a disputed question whether the saex of the earliest Saxon invaders was a long or short curved weapon,—nay, whether it was curved or straight; but the author sides with those who contend that it was a short, crooked weapon, easily concealed by a cloak, and similar to those depicted on the banner of the East Saxons.
[99] See Note (K), at the end of the volume.
[100] Saxon Chronicle, Florence Wigorn. Sir F. Palgrave says that the title of Childe is equivalent to that of Atheling. With that remarkable appreciation of evidence which generally makes him so invaluable as a judicial authority where accounts are contradictory, Sir F. Palgrave discards with silent contempt the absurd romance of Godwin's station of herdsman, to which, upon such very fallacious and flimsy authorities, Thierry and Sharon Turner have been betrayed into lending their distinguished names.
[101] This first wife Thyra, was of very unpopular repute with the Saxons. She was accused of sending young English persons as slaves into Denmark, and is said to have been killed by lightning.
[102] It is just, however, to Godwin to say, that there is no proof of his share in this barbarous transaction; the presumptions, on the contrary, are in his favour; but the authorities are too contradictory, and the whole event too obscure, to enable us unhesitatingly to confirm the acquittal he received in his own age, and from his own national tribunal.
[103] Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
[104] William of Malmesbury.
[105] So Robert of Gloucester says pithily of William, "Kyng Wylliam was to mild men debonnere ynou."—HEARNE, v. ii. p. 309.