[ Footnotes to Introduction]
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[1.] In particular, we find there a complete proof, supported by some fifty examples, that, as can be traced, through the forms ase, als, alse, also, to the A.S. eall-swa; a proof, that in the difficult phrase lond and lithe, the word lithe [also spelt lede, lude] is equivalent to the French tenement, rente, or fe; and, thirdly, a complete refutation of Mr Singer’s extraordinary notion that the adverb swithe means a sword!
[2.] In the same way, William of Palerne was prepared by me for the press, subject to his advice; see William of Palerne, Introduction, p. ii.
[3.] I say nearly, because I have not been able to verify every reference to every poem quoted. I have verified and critically examined all the citations from the poem itself, from Ritson’s Romances, Weber’s Romances, Laȝamon, Beowulf, Chaucer, Langland, and Sir Walter Scott’s edition of Sir Tristrem (3rd edition, 1811).
[4.] To this, the reader is referred for fuller information.
[5.] “The word Breton, which some critics refer to Armorica, is here applied to a story of mere English birth.” Hallam; Lit. of Europe, 6th ed. 1860; vol. i. p. 36. See the whole passage.
[6.] “The Chronicler writes of him, f. 6. ‘Il feu le plus beau bacheleir qe vnqes reigna en Engleterre, ceo dit le Bruit, par quoy ly lays ly apellerunt King Adelstane with gilden kroket, pour ce q’il feu si beaus.’ We have here notice of another of those curious historical poems, the loss of which can never be sufficiently deplored. The term crocket (derived by Skinner from the Fr. crochet, uncinulus) points out the period of the poem’s composition, since the fashion alluded to of wearing those large rolls of hair so called, only arose at the latter end of Hen. III. reign, and continued through the reign of Edw. I. and part of his successor’s.”
[7.] See below, § 16.