[IV. CHARTER OF HENRY THE SECOND]
[Manuscript:] Harleian Charter 111 B. 49, British Museum. The upper half contains a version in Latin, excepting the passage ‘sacha . . . frimþa,’ which is in English; the names of six witnesses are appended. On the lower half is the present text; on the back, ‘carta reḡ. H. ii de sacha & socne.’ The document is in a French record hand, and the writer was evidently little versed in the insular script. He uses both þ and th, ƿ and w.
[Facsimile:] Keller, plate xiii.
[Editions:] Hickes, G., Linguarum Vett. Septentrionalium Thesaurus, i. p. xvi; Dugdale, W., Monasticon, i. 111; Birch, W. de Gray, Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature, New Series, xi. 312; Stratmann, F. H., Anglia, vii. 220; Earle, J., A Handbook to the Land Charters, 346 (with the Latin); Kluge, F., Mittelenglisches Lesebuch, 5.
[Phonology:] The language is not contemporary, for the drafter, who was not the scribe, used as a model a charter (H2) in the same terms, granted to William of Corbeil (see 6/28) and the monks of Christ Church by Henry the First in 1123 A.D., a copy of which exists in Campbell Charter, xxi. 6, B.M., reproduced in Facsimiles of Royal and other Charters in the British Museum, i. no. 6, and printed in Lye’s Dictionary, ii. appendix. H2 differs from our text in its dialect, which is mainly Southern, with some Kentish forms, in greater regularity of grammar, in details of names and relationships, but in little else. It was derived from a charter (H1) granted to S. Anselm and Christ Church by Henry the First, c. 1107 A.D., extant in Campbell Charter, xxix. 5, and Cotton Charter, vii. 1, printed in the Journal of the British Archaeological Association, xxix. 242, also imperfectly in Hickes and in Dugdale, i. 109, 111. It also shows traces of its Kentish origin. But it was ultimately based on the Charter (E) granted by Edward the Confessor to Archbishop Stigand, c. 1052 A.D., Campbell Charter, xxi. 5, reproduced in Facsimiles of Ancient Charters in the British Museum, part iv, no. 38, and printed in Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature, i., New Series; and the chain extended back to the first extant example of the formula, the charter (C) of Cnut to Æthelnoth, A.D. 1020, preserved by a copy in a Canterbury book, the MacDurnan Gospels (now at Lambeth), and printed in Earle, 232.
There is another copy of the present document, but fragmentary and decayed, in the muniment room of Canterbury Cathedral.
H1, H2, and the Harley Charter (H3) here printed, have been accepted by Dölle in his book, Zur Sprache Londons vor Chaucer (Morsbach’s Studien, xxxii), as specimens of the English of the London Chancellery. As the editors of the Facsimiles of Royal and other Charters point out, H1, H2 are in a book hand, not that of an official court scribe; they are without witnesses or place of execution. Their seals do not prove them to be the original grant, for both H1 and its duplicate Cotton Charter, vii. 1, have seals, and a note on the back of the latter appears to indicate that it is one of four copies. The duplicate of H3 also has its seal, attached, like the others, in an unusual way to the left side of the document, as if to show that both documents and seals are replicas of the original. They are, in fact, copies, and the natural assumption is that they were made at Canterbury to provide against risk of loss or damage to the actual grant.
H3 is on a different footing: it is properly attested, its place of origin is given, and its seal is attached in the usual way at the foot. But it is not in a charter hand, and its language shows that it was prepared by a Canterbury scribe to be placed before the king for his acceptance.
It should be noted that the English words from saca to frimtha also appear in the Latin version with the following variants: Sacha, Wude, felde, tolnes, grithbreches, thiofes, flemene.
The charter is then a patchwork of old and new; its phonological position may be defined by an attempt at a version in Late West-Saxon. Ic Henric · þurh Godes gife Englalandes cyng · grēte ealle mīne bisceopas ⁊ ealle mīne scīrgerēfan ⁊ ealle mīne þegnas frencisce ⁊ englisce · on þām scīrum þe Þeobald ærcebisceop ⁊ se hīrēd æt xpīstes cyrican on Cantwarabyrig habbað land inne frēondlice · ⁊ ic cȳðe ēow þæt ic hæbbe heom geunnen ꝥ hi bēon ǣlc þāra landa wurðe þe hi hæfdon in Ēadweardes cynges dæge · ⁊ on Willhelmes cynges mīnes furðor ealdefæder · ⁊ on Henrices cynges mīnes ealdefæder · ⁊ sace ⁊ sōcne · on strande ⁊ on streame · on wudum ⁊ on feldum · tolles ⁊ tēames · griðbryces · ⁊ hāmsōcne · ⁊ fōrstealles · ⁊ infangeneþēofes · ⁊ flȳmena fyrmðe · ofer heora āgene menn · binnan burgum ⁊ butan · swā ful ⁊ swā forð swā mīne āgene wīcneras hit sēcan sceoldon · ⁊ ofer swā fela þegnas swā ic heom tolǣten hæbbe · And ic nelle ꝥ ǣnig mann ǣnig þing þǣrof tēo · butan hī ⁊ heora wīcneras þām þe hi hit betǣcan willað · ne frencisce ne englisce · for þām þingum þe ic hæbbe Crīste þās gerihta forgifen minre sāwle to ēcere ālȳsednesse · ⁊ ic nelle geþafian ꝥ ǣnig mann þis ābrece be mīnum fullan frēondscipe. God ēow gehealde.