These are some of the things to which the writer of history must go for his facts and for his inspiration, and it is to these that the student, whose business is to learn and not to write, ought occasionally to resort to enliven and supplement what he finds in the books. As there are many kinds of sources, so there are many ways in which such materials may be utilized. If, for example, you are studying the life of the Greeks and in that connection pay a visit to a museum of fine arts and scrutinize Greek statuary, Greek vases, and Greek coins, you are very clearly using sources. If your subject is the church life of the later Middle Ages and you journey to Rheims or Amiens or Paris to contemplate the splendid cathedrals in these cities, with their spires Various ways of using sources and arches and ornamentation, you are, in every proper sense, using sources. You are doing the same thing if you make an observation trip to the Egyptian pyramids, or to the excavated Roman forum, or if you traverse the line of old Watling Street—nay, if you but visit Faneuil Hall, or tramp over the battlefield of Gettysburg. Many of these more purely "material" sources can be made use of only after long and sometimes arduous journeys, or through the valuable, but somewhat less satisfactory, medium of pictures and descriptions. Happily, however, the art of printing and the practice of accumulating enormous libraries have made possible the indefinite duplication of written sources, and consequently the use of them at almost any time and in almost any place. There is but one Sphinx, one Parthenon, one Sistine Chapel; there are not many Roman roads, feudal castles, or Gothic cathedrals; but scarcely a library in any civilized country is without a considerable number of the monumental documents of human history—the funeral oration of Pericles, the laws of Tiberius Gracchus, Magna Charta, the theses of Luther, the Bill of Rights, the Constitution of the United States—not to mention the all but limitless masses of histories, biographies, poems, letters, essays, memoirs, legal codes, and official records of every variety which are available for any one who seriously desires to make use of them.
But why should the younger student trouble himself, or be troubled, with any of these things? Might he not get all the history he can be expected to know from books written by scholars who have given their lives to exploring, organizing, and sifting just such sources? There can be no question that schools and colleges to-day have the use of better text-books in history than have ever before been available, and that truer notions of the subject in its various relations can be had from even the most narrow devotion to these texts than could be had from the study of their predecessors a generation ago. If the object of studying history were solely to acquire facts, it would, generally speaking, be a waste of time for high school or younger college students to wander far from text-books. But, assuming that history is studied not alone for the mastery of facts but also for the broadening of culture, and for certain kinds of mental training, the properly regulated use of sources by the student himself is to be justified on at least three grounds: (1) Sources The value of sources to the student help to an understanding of the point of view of the men, and the spirit of the age under consideration. The ability to dissociate one's self from his own surroundings and habits of thinking and to put himself in the company of Cæsar, of Frederick Barbarossa, or of Innocent III., as the occasion may require, is the hardest, but perhaps the most valuable, thing that the student of history can hope to get. (2) Sources add appreciably to the vividness and reality of history. However well-written the modern description of Charlemagne, for example, the student ought to find a somewhat different flavor in the account by the great Emperor's own friend and secretary, Einhard; and, similarly, Matthew Paris's picture of the raving and fuming of Frederick II. at his excommunication by Pope Gregory ought to bring the reader into a somewhat more intimate appreciation of the character of the proud German-Sicilian emperor. (3) The use of sources, in connection with the reading of secondary works, may be expected to train the student, to some extent at least, in methods of testing the accuracy of modern writers, especially when the subject in hand is one that lends itself to a variety of interpretations. In the sources the makers of history, or those who stood close to them, are allowed to speak for themselves, or for their times, and the study of such materials not only helps plant in the student's mind the conception of fairness and impartiality in judging historical characters, but also cultivates the habit of tracing things back to their origins and verifying what others have asserted about them. So far as practicable the student of history, from the age of fourteen and onwards, should be encouraged to develop the critical or judicial temperament along with the purely acquisitive.
In preparing a source book, such as the present one, the purpose is to further the study of the most profitable sources by removing some of the greater difficulties, particularly those of accessibility and language. Clearly impracticable as anything like historical "research" undoubtedly is for younger students, it is none the less believed that there are abundant first-hand materials in the range of history which such students will not only find profitable but actually enjoy, and that any Simplicity of many mediæval sources acquaintance with these things that may be acquired in earlier studies will be of inestimable advantage subsequently. It is furthermore believed, contrary to the assertions that one sometimes hears, that the history of the Middle Ages lends itself to this sort of treatment with scarcely, if any, less facility than that of other periods. Certainly Gregory's Clovis, Asser's Alfred, Einhard's Charlemagne, and Joinville's St. Louis are living personalities, no less vividly portrayed than the heroes of a boy's storybook. Tacitus's description of the early Germans, Ammianus's account of the crossing of the Danube by the Visigoths and his pictures of the Huns, Bede's narrative of the Saxon invasion of Britain, the affectionate letter Stephen of Blois to his wife and children, the portrayal of the sweet-spirited St. Francis by the Three Companions, and Froissart's free and easy sketch of the battle of Crécy are all interesting, easily comprehended, and even adapted to whet the appetite for a larger acquaintance with these various people and events. Even solid documents, like the Salic law, the Benedictine Rule, the Peace of Constance, and the Golden Bull, if not in themselves exactly attractive, may be made to have a certain interest for the younger student when he realizes that to know mediæval history at all he is under the imperative necessity of getting much of the framework of things either from such materials or from text-books which essentially reproduce them. It is hoped that at least a reasonable proportion of the selections herewith presented may serve in some measure to overcome for the student the remote and intangible character which the Middle Ages have much too commonly, though perhaps not unnaturally, been felt to possess.
CONTENTS
| SECTION | PAGE | |
| CHAPTER I.—THE EARLY GERMANS | ||
| 1. A Sketch by Cæsar | [19] | |
| 2. A Description by Tacitus | [23] | |
| CHAPTER II.—THE VISIGOTHIC INVASION | ||
| 3. The Visigoths Cross the Danube (376) | [32] | |
| 4. The Battle of Adrianople (378) | [37] | |
| CHAPTER III.—THE HUNS | ||
| 5. Description by a Græco-Roman Poet and a Roman Historian | [42] | |
| CHAPTER IV.—THE EARLY FRANKS | ||
| 6. The Deeds of Clovis as Related by Gregory of Tours | [47] | |
| 7. The Law of the Salian Franks | [59] | |
| CHAPTER V.—THE ANGLES AND SAXONS INBRITAIN | ||
| 8. The Saxon Invasion (cir. 449) | [68] | |
| 9. The Mission of Augustine (597) | [72] | |
| CHAPTER VI.—THE DEVELOPMENT OF THECHRISTIAN CHURCH | ||
| 10. Pope Leo's Sermon on the Petrine Supremacy | [78] | |
| 11. The Rule of St. Benedict | [83] | |
| 12. Gregory the Great on the Life of the Pastor | [90] | |
| CHAPTER VII.—THE RISE OF MOHAMMEDANISM | ||
| 13. Selections from the Koran | [97] | |
| CHAPTER VIII.—THE BEGINNINGS OF THECAROLINGIAN DYNASTY OF FRANKISH KINGS | ||
| 14. Pepin the Short Takes the Title of King (751) | [105] | |
| CHAPTER IX.—THE AGE OF CHARLEMAGNE | ||
| 15. Charlemagne the Man | [108] | |
| 16. The War with the Saxons (772-803) | [114] | |
| 17. The Capitulary Concerning the Saxon Territory (cir. 780) | [118] | |
| 18. The Capitulary Concerning the Royal Domains (cir. 800) | [124] | |
| 19. An Inventory of one of Charlemagne's Estates | [127] | |
| 20. Charlemagne Crowned Emperor (800) | [130] | |
| 21. The General Capitulary for the Missi (802) | [134] | |
| 22. A Letter of Charlemagne to Abbot Fulrad | [141] | |
| 23. The Carolingian Revival of Learning | [144] | |
| CHAPTER X.—THE ERA OF THE LATERCAROLINGIANS | ||
| 24. The Oaths of Strassburg (842) | [149] | |
| 25. The Treaty of Verdun (843) | [154] | |
| 26. A Chronicle of the Frankish Kingdom in the Ninth Century | [157] | |
| 27. The Northmen in the Country of the Franks | [163] | |
| 28. Later Carolingian Efforts to Preserve Order | [173] | |
| 29. The Election of Hugh Capet (987) | [177] | |
| CHAPTER XI.—ALFRED THE GREAT IN WAR ANDIN PEACE | ||
| 30. The Danes in England | [181] | |
| 31. Alfred's Interest in Education | [185] | |
| 32. Alfred's Laws | [194] | |
| CHAPTER XII.—THE ORDEAL | ||
| 33. Tests by Hot Water, Cold Water, and Fire | [196] | |
| CHAPTER XIII.—THE FEUDAL SYSTEM | ||
| 34. Older Institutions Involving Elements of Feudalism | [203] | |
| 35. The Granting of Fiefs | [214] | |
| 36. The Ceremonies of Homage and Fealty | [216] | |
| 37. The Mutual Obligations of Lords and Vassals | [220] | |
| 38. Some of the More Important Rights of the Lord | [221] | |
| 39. The Peace and the Truce of God | [228] | |
| CHAPTER XIV.—THE NORMAN CONQUEST | ||
| 40. The Battle of Hastings: the English and the Normans | [233] | |
| 41. William the Conqueror as Man and as King | [241] | |
| CHAPTER XV.—THE MONASTIC REFORMATIONOF THE TENTH, ELEVENTH, AND TWELFTHCENTURIES | ||
| 42. The Foundation Charter of the Monastery of Cluny (910) | [245] | |
| 43. The Early Career of St. Bernard and the Founding of Clairvaux | [250] | |
| 44. A Description of Clairvaux | [258] | |
| CHAPTER XVI.—THE CONFLICT OVER INVESTITURE | ||
| 45. Gregory VII.'s Conception of the Papal Authority | [261] | |
| 46. Letter of Gregory VII. to Henry IV. (1075) | [264] | |
| 47. Henry IV.'s Reply to Gregory's Letter (1076) | [269] | |
| 48. Henry IV. Deposed by Gregory (1076) | [272] | |
| 49. The Penance of Henry IV. at Canossa (1077) | [273] | |
| 50. The Concordat of Worms (1122) | [278] | |
| CHAPTER XVII.—THE CRUSADES | ||
| 51. Speech of Pope Urban II. at the Council of Clermont (1095) | [282] | |
| 52. The Starting of the Crusaders (1096) | [288] | |
| 53. A Letter from a Crusader to his Wife | [291] | |
| CHAPTER XVIII.—THE GREAT CHARTER | ||
| 54. The Winning of the Great Charter | [297] | |
| 55. Extracts from the Charter | [303] | |
| CHAPTER XIX.—THE REIGN OF SAINT LOUIS | ||
| 56. The Character and Deeds of the King as Described byJoinville | [311] | |
| CHAPTER XX.—MUNICIPAL ORGANIZATION ANDACTIVITY | ||
| 57. Some Twelfth Century Town Charters | [325] | |
| 58. The Colonization of Eastern Germany | [330] | |
| 59. The League of Rhenish Cities (1254) | [334] | |
| CHAPTER XXI.—UNIVERSITIES AND STUDENTLIFE | ||
| 60. Privileges Granted to Students and Masters | [340] | |
| 61. The Foundation of the University of Heidelberg (1386) | [345] | |
| 62. Mediæval Students' Songs | [351] | |
| CHAPTER XXII.—THE FRIARS | ||
| 63. The Life of St. Francis | [362] | |
| 64. The Rule of St. Francis | [373] | |
| 65. The Will of St. Francis | [376] | |
| CHAPTER XXIII.—THE PAPACY AND THE TEMPORALPOWERS IN THE LATER MIDDLE AGES | ||
| 66. The Interdict Laid on France by Innocent III. (1200) | [380] | |
| 67. The Bull "Unam Sanctam" of Boniface VIII. (1302) | [383] | |
| 68. The Great Schism and the Councils of Pisa and Constance | [389] | |
| 69. The Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges (1438) | [393] | |
| CHAPTER XXIV.—THE EMPIRE IN THE TWELFTH,THIRTEENTH, AND FOURTEENTH CENTURIES | ||
| 70. The Peace of Constance (1183) | [398] | |
| 71. Current Rumors Concerning the Life and Character ofFrederick II. | [402] | |
| 72. The Golden Bull of Charles IV. (1356) | [409] | |
| CHAPTER XXV.—THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR | ||
| 73. An Occasion of War between the Kings of England and France | [418] | |
| 74. Edward III. Assumes the Arms and Title of the King ofFrance | [421] | |
| 75. The Naval Battle of Sluys (1340) | [424] | |
| 76. The Battle of Crécy (1346) | [427] | |
| 77. The Sack of Limoges (1370) | [436] | |
| 78. The Treaties of Bretigny (1360) and Troyes (1420) | [439] | |
| CHAPTER XXVI.—THE BEGINNINGS OF THEITALIAN RENAISSANCE | ||
| 79. Dante's Defense of Italian as a Literary Language | [445] | |
| 80. Dante's Conception of the Imperial Power | [452] | |
| 81. Petrarch's Love of the Classics | [462] | |
| 82. Petrarch's Letter to Posterity | [469] | |
| CHAPTER XXVII.—FORESHADOWINGS OF THEREFORMATION | ||
| 83. The Reply of Wyclif to the Summons of Pope Urban VI.(1384) | [474] | |