Question as to unity of authorship. Peculiar sense of the word aedificia.
§ 35. I have so far spoken of ‘our author’ in the singular. But the question must now be faced: is the work (apart from actual and possible interpolations) the composition of a single hand? When I first took up this question I rather hoped that the result to be arrived at would be, that the annals were the work of one author, the biographical notes of another, while the florid head-links, of which I spoke before[193], would be the work of the later editor who combined the two documents. This would have been a result dear to the heart of the higher critic. But any such theory, however pretty, will not stand a moment’s examination. Allowing for the difference of subject-matter, the same characteristics appear both in the annalistic and biographical sections. Thus of five instances of the Celtic use of left and right instead of north and south, two occur in the annals and three in the biography; ‘Britannia,’ in the sense of ‘Wales,’ occurs six times in the biography and once in the annals[194]. So there are some not quite common words and expressions, for which the writer has an evident predilection, which are sprinkled about both parts of the work. The details are too dry for reproduction here, and may be safely relegated to the obscurity of a footnote[195]. But one instance is of sufficient general interest to merit discussion. This is the use of the word ‘aedificia’ in the sense of articles of goldsmiths’ work. To this I can produce no parallel from any other writer; but the meaning seems to me practically certain in three instances, and probable in the fourth; and of these four cases one occurs in the annals, and the rest in the biography. The first instance is where Alfred, after Guthrum’s baptism, gives him ‘multa et optima aedificia[196].’ It is clear that Guthrum did not carry away with him edifices, in the ordinary sense of the word. Lappenberg would alter ‘aedificia’ into ‘beneficia[197]’; ‘mit vollem Rechte,’ says Pauli[198]; but this will hardly do in other cases, as we shall see.
The next instance is where Asser says that Alfred ‘by his novel contrivance made “aedificia” more venerable and precious than any of his predecessors[199].’ Here the ordinary meaning is just possible, though the epithet ‘pretiosiora’ and the fact that ‘aurifices et artifices’ are mentioned just before, point decidedly the other way. The third passage speaks of ‘aedificia of gold and silver incomparably wrought under his instructions[200].’ Even the most Celtic imagination cannot suppose that Alfred built edifices, in the ordinary sense, of the precious metals, especially as his own royal halls and chambers are expressly stated to have been of stone and wood[201]. The fourth passage tells how Alfred had workmen who were skilled ‘in omni terreno aedificio[202],’ where the meaning is probably the same. The use of the word in so strange a sense in both parts of the work seems to me a strong proof of unity of authorship. The usage, however, becomes a little less strange if we remember how much of the goldsmith’s art at that time would go to the making of shrines and reliquaries, which really were ‘edifices’ in miniature. The two middle passages which speak of Alfred’s ‘novel contrivance,’ and of his personal instructions to his workmen, are of singular interest in connexion with the Alfred Jewel; and the fact that my friend Professor Earle, who has made a special study of that jewel, agrees with my interpretation of these passages, adds greatly to my confidence in advancing it. Alfred’s love for this kind of art seems to have been hereditary. William of Malmesbury gives an account of a shrine which Æthelwulf had made to contain the bones of St. Aldhelm. ‘The covering is of crystal, whereon the king’s name may be read in letters of gold[203].’ This exactly answers to the character of the Alfred Jewel.
Asser’s style.
§ 36. Of Asser’s style two prominent characteristics are a fondness for long parentheses[204], and a tiresome trick of repeating a word or phrase, sometimes with a slight variation, at intervals, in some cases longer, in others very short[205]. He certainly would have had no chance with the editor who objected to the quotation ‘to the pure all things are pure,’ on the ground that it sinned against the rule of the office that the same word must not be repeated within six lines. Occasionally he seems as if he could not get away from a phrase, but clings to it, as a drowning man clings to a plank; and I think that this feature is due, not to any love for these particular words and phrases, but to a poverty of expression like that which causes the repetitions of an unpractised speaker. These characteristics come out most strongly no doubt in the biographical sections, but they are not wholly absent from the others[206].
Relation of Asser to the Saxon Chronicle. Mistranslation, or misunderstanding.
§ 37. The next question which must be considered is the relation of the Latin Annals of Asser to the corresponding passages of the Saxon Chronicle. Sir Henry Howorth indeed expresses roundly his conviction that Asser wrote (if indeed he would not rather say forged) the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle[207]. This I regard as quite inconceivable. Sir James Ramsay, without going so far as this, records that ‘several’ passages have convinced him that the Latin of Asser is more original than the Saxon of the Chronicle[208]. Unfortunately he does not indicate these passages. My own conviction is unfalteringly the other way. In the first place there is at least one passage in Asser which can only be explained as a mistranslation of the Chronicle. It occurs under 876. Here the Chronicle has a phrase which puzzled all translators of the Chronicle, mediaeval and modern, till it was cleared up by Professor Earle. It runs thus: ‘The mounted force (i.e. of the Danes) stole away from the fyrd and got into Exeter.’ Asser misunderstands this, making it a defeat of a native body of cavalry by the Danes[209]. At 886[210] there seems also to be a mistranslation or misunderstanding, but the text is possibly corrupt, and Florence has not improved it.
‘East-Seaxum.’
Again, such forms as ‘Middel-Seaxum[211],’ ‘East-Seaxum[212],’ ‘Suð-Seaxum[213],’ ‘Eald-Seaxum[214],’ which contain the Saxon dative plural surely imply a Saxon original. It may be noted too that Asser retains the Saxon name of the river Seine, Signe[215], whereas the more classical Florence translates it into the Latin form, Sequana. Phrases again like ‘ipso eodem anno[216]’ for ‘þy ilcan geare,’ and the constantly recurring ‘loco funeris dominati sunt[217]’ for ‘ahton wælstowe geweald,’ ‘superius’ for ‘ufor[218]’ point the same way.
Omission.