The result of all these enquiries is, to guard against plausible details which can only mislead us. If we endeavour to destroy the credit of traditions which have long existed, it is only to put something in their place, inconsistent with them, but of more value: to reduce them to what they really are, lest their authority should render the truth more obscure, and its pursuit more difficult than is necessary; but to use them wherever they seem capable of guiding our researches, and are not irreconcilable with our other conclusions.
Far less in the fabulous records adopted by historians, than in the divisions of the land itself, according to the populations that occupied it, and the rank of their several members, must the truth be sought. The names of the tribes and families have survived in the localities where they settled, while their peculiar forms of customary law have become as it were melted together into one general system; and the national legends which each of them most probably possessed, have either perished altogether, or are now to be traced only in proper names which fill up the genealogies of the royal families[[55]]. To these local names I shall return hereafter; they will furnish a strong confirmation of what has been advanced in this chapter as to the probability of an early and wide dispersion of Teutonic settlers in Britain.
[1]. Ancient Laws and Institutes of England; comprising Laws enacted under the Anglosaxon Kings from Æðelbirht to Cnut, with an English translation of the Saxon: the Laws called Edward the Confessor’s; the Laws of William the Conqueror, and those ascribed to Henry the First; also Monumenta Ecclesiastica Anglicana, from the seventh to the tenth century: and the ancient Latin version of the Anglosaxon Laws. With a copious Glossary, etc. (By B. Thorpe, Esq.). Printed by command of his late Majesty, King William the Fourth, under the direction of the Commissioners on the Public Records of the Kingdom. MDCCCXL.
[2]. Codex Diplomaticus Aevi Saxonici. Opera J. M. Kemble, M.A., vol. i. London, 1839; vol. ii. 1840; vol. iii. 1845; vol. iv. 1846; vol. v. 1847; vol. vi. 1848. Published by authority of the Historical Society of England.
[3]. Beda, Hist. Eccl. i. 14, 15. Gildas, Hist. § 14. Nennius, Hist. § 38.
[4]. It is uncertain from the MSS. whether this lady is to be called Rouwen or Ronwen. The usual English tradition gives her name as Rowena; if this be accurate, I presume our pagan forefathers knew something of a divine personage—Hróðwén—possibly a dialectical form of the great and glorious goddess Hréðe; for whom refer to Chapter X. of this Book.
[5]. The story of the treacherous murder perpetrated upon the Welsh chieftains does not claim an English origin. It is related of the Oldsaxons upon the continent, in connexion with the conquest of the Thuringians. See Widukind.
[6]. Conf. Nennius, Hist. 37 seq., 46 seq. Beda, Hist. Ecc. i. 14, 15. Gildas, Hist. § 25.
[7]. The Anglosaxon Traveller’s Song contains a multitude of names which cannot be found elsewhere. Paulus Diaconus and Jornandes have evidently used ancient poems as the foundation of their histories. The lays of the various Germanic cycles still furnish details respecting Hermanaric, Otachar, Theodoric, Hiltibrant and other heroes of this troubled period. But the reader who would judge of the fragmentary and unsatisfactory result of all that the ancient world has recorded of the new, had better consult that most remarkable work of Zeuss, Die Deutschen und die Nachbarstämme. Munich, 1837. He will there see how the profoundest science halts after the reality of ancient ages, and strives in vain to reduce their manifold falsehood to a truth.