[297] Geoffrey of Monmouth, iii. 5, 13; Layamon’s Brut, i. 269 f.; John of Wallingford, p. 538; Higden, ii. 92 (from Alfred of Beverley). The whole myth is due to a misunderstanding (wilful, probably, in the first instance) of the partial incorporation in Alfred’s Laws of the Mercian code of Offa.
[298] ‘Primus monarcha Anglorum,’ Lib. de Hyda, p. 48, which gives a long comment on this text; cf. Ric. de Cirencest. Speculum Hist. i. 45: ‘primus … monarcha, et ad quem monarchia regni Anglicani totaliter extitit deuoluta.’ Ethelwerd, though so much nearer the time, is not guiltless in this matter, saying that Alfred ‘obtinuit regnum … super prouincias Brittanniae cunctas,’ p. 514 C.
[299] Wendover, i. 363.
[300] ‘Illam maximam regis credidit dignitatem, nullam in ecclesiis Christi habere potestatem,’ Ailred of Rievaulx, ed. Migne, col. 719.
[301] Bromton, col. 814; Rudborne, Ang. Sac. i. 207; Lib. de Hyda, p. 41.
[302] ‘Uir literatissimus, et philosophus in uniuersitate Oxenfordensi,’ Rudborne, u. s.
[303] Bromton, col. 818: ‘tertiam [partem] scholaribus Oxoniae, nouiter congregatis’; so Lib. de Hyda, p. 45.
[304] Rapin (Eng. trans. 1732), i. 95, 160; Carte (ed. 1747), i. 311, 316. The fiction-monger of the Mirror of Justices treats it as already ancient in the time of Alfred. I owe these references to Sir Frederick Pollock.
[305] Miroir des Justices, pp. 296-298; where the names of the defaulting justices are given, and very marvellous they are. I owe this reference to Draper, p. 35.
[306] See above, §§ 44, 45; cf. also Wallingford, p. 535.