I. THE MERCIAN GENEALOGY.

Of the Old English Genealogies, the only one which, in its stages below Woden, immediately concerns the student of Beowulf is the Mercian. This contains three names which also occur in Beowulf, though two of them in a corrupt form—Offa, Wermund (Garmund, Beowulf), and Eomær (Geomor, Beowulf).

This Mercian pedigree is found in its best form in MS Cotton Vesp. B. VI, fol. 109 b,[[316]] and in the sister MS at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (C.C.C.C. 183)[[317]]. Both these MSS are of

the 9th century. They contain lists of popes and bishops, and pedigrees of kings. By noting where these lists stop, we get a limit for the final compilation of the document. It must have been drawn up in its present form between 811 and 814[[318]]. But it was obviously compiled from lists already existing, and some of them were even at that date old. For the genealogy of the Mercian kings, from Woden, is not traced directly down to this period 811-814, but in the first place only as far as Æthelred (reigning 675-704), son of Penda: that is to say, it stops considerably more than a century before the date of the document in which it appears. Additional pedigrees are then appended which show the subsequent stages down to and including Cenwulf, king of Mercia (reigning 796-821). It is difficult to account for such an arrangement except on the hypothesis that the genealogy was committed to writing in the reign of Æthelred, the monarch with whose name it terminates in its first form, and was then brought up to date by the addition of the supplementary names ending with Cenwulf. This is confirmed when we find that precisely the same arrangement holds good for the accompanying Northumbrian pedigree, which terminates with Ecgfrith (670-685), the contemporary of Æthelred of Mercia, and is then brought up to date by additional names.

Genealogies which draw from the same source as the Vespasian genealogies, and show the same peculiarities, are found in the Historia Brittonum (§§ 57-61). They show, even more emphatically than do the Vespasian lists, traces of having been originally drawn up in the time of Æthelred of Mercia (675-704) or possibly of his father Penda, and of having then been brought up to date in subsequent revisions[[319]].

One such revision must have been made about 796[[320]]: it is a

modification of this revision which is found in the Historia Brittonum. Another was that which, as we have seen, must have been made between 811-814, and in this form is found in MS Cotton Vespasian B. VI, MS C.C.C.C. 183, both of the 9th century, and in the (much later) MS Cotton Tiberius B. V.

The genealogy up to Penda is also found in the A.-S. Chronicle under the year 626 (accession of Penda).

This Mercian list, together with the Northumbrian and other pedigrees which accompany it, can claim to be the earliest extant English historical document, having been written down in the 7th century, and recording historic names which (allowing thirty years for a generation) cannot be later than the 4th century A.D. In most similar pedigrees the earliest names are meaningless to us. But the Mercian pedigree differs from the rest, in that we are able from Beowulf, Widsith, Saxo Grammaticus, Sweyn Aageson and the Vitae Offarum, to attach stories to the names of Wermund and Offa. How much of these stories is history, and how much fiction, it is difficult to say—but, with them, extant English history and English poetry and English fiction alike have their beginning.

MS Cotton Vesp. B. VI. MS C.C.C.C. 183.
Aeðilred Peding Æðelred Pending
Penda Pypbing Penda Pybbing
Pypba Crioding Pybba Creoding
Crioda Cynewalding Creoda Cynewalding
Cynewald Cnebbing Cynewald Cnebbing
Cnebba Icling Cnebba Icling
Icil Eamering Icel Eomæring
Eamer Angengeoting Eomær Angengeoting
Angengeot Offing Angengiot Offing
Offa Uærmunding Offa Wærmunding
Uermund Uihtlaeging Wærmund Wihtlæging
Uihtlaeg Wioðulgeoting Wihtlæg Wioþolgeoting
Weoðulgeot Wodning Weoþolgiot Wodning
Woden Frealafing Woden Frealafing