[6] Thus Fil. Villani (De origine civitatis Florentiae, ed. 1847, p. 23), speaking of the Glossator Accursius, says of the Glossae that “tantae auctoritatis gratiaeque fuere, ut omnium consensu publice approbarentur, et reiectis aliis, quibuscumque penitus abolitis, solae juxta textum legum adpositae sunt et ubique terrarum sine controversia pro legibus celebrantur, ita ut nefas sit, non secus quam textui, Glossis Accursii contraire.” For similar testimonies see Bayle’s Dictionnaire, s.v. “Accursius,” and Rudorff, Röm. Rechtsgeschichte, i. 338 (1857).
[7] The so-called Malberg glosses, found in various texts of the Lex Salica, are not glosses in the ordinary sense of the word, but precious remains of the parent of the present literary Dutch, namely, the Low German dialect spoken by the Salian Franks who conquered Gaul from the Romans at the end of the 5th century. It is supposed that the conquerors brought their Frankish law with them, either written down, or by oral tradition; that they translated it into Latin for the sake of the Romans settled in the country, and that the translators, not always knowing a proper Latin equivalent for certain things or actions, retained in their translations the Frankish technical names or phrases which they had attempted to translate into Latin. E.g. in chapter ii., by the side of “porcellus lactans” (a sucking-pig), we find the Frankish “chramnechaltio,” lit. a stye-porker. The person who stole such a pig (still kept in an enclosed place, in a stye) was fined three times as much as one who stole a “porcellus de campo qui sine matre vivere possit,” as the Latin text has it, for which the Malberg technical expression appears to have been ingymus, that is, a one year (winter) old animal, i.e. a yearling. Nearly all these glosses are preceded by “mal” or “malb,” which is thought to be a contraction for “malberg,” the Frankish for “forum.” The antiquity and importance of these glosses for philology may be realized from the fact that the Latin translation of the Lex Salica probably dates from the latter end of the 5th century. For further information cf. Jac. Grimm’s preface to Joh. Merkel’s ed. (1850), and H. Kern’s notes to J. H. Hessels’s ed. (London, 1880) of the Lex Salica.
[8] Anglo-Saxon scholars ascribe an earlier date to the text of the MS. on account of certain archaisms in its Anglo-Saxon words.
GLOSSOP, a market town and municipal borough, in the High Peak parliamentary division of Derbyshire, England, on the extreme northern border of the county; 13 m. E. by S. of Manchester by the Great Central railway. Pop. (1901) 21,526. It is the chief seat of the cotton manufacture in Derbyshire, and it has also woollen and paper mills, dye and print works, and bleaching greens. The town consists of three main divisions, the Old Town (or Glossop proper), Howard Town (or Glossop Dale) and Mill Town. An older parish church was replaced by that of All Saints in 1830; there is also a very fine Roman Catholic church. In the immediate neighbourhood is Glossop Hall, the seat of Lord Howard, lord of the manor, a picturesque old building with extensive terraced gardens. On a hill near the town is Melandra Castle, the site of a Roman fort guarding Longdendale and the way into the hills of the Peak District. In the neighbourhood also a great railway viaduct spans the Dinting valley with sixteen arches. To the north, in Longdendale, there are five lakes belonging to the water-supply system of Manchester, formed by damming the Etherow, a stream which descends from the high moors north-east of Glossop. The town is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 3052 acres.
Glossop was granted by Henry I. to William Peverel, on the attainder of whose son it reverted to the crown. In 1157 it was gifted by Henry II. to the abbey of Basingwerk. Henry VIII. bestowed it on the earl of Shrewsbury. It was made a municipal borough in 1866.
GLOUCESTER, EARLS AND DUKES OF. The English earldom of Gloucester was held by several members of the royal family, including Robert, a natural son of Henry I., and John, afterwards king, and others, until 1218, when Gilbert de Clare was recognized as earl of Gloucester. It remained in the family of Clare (q.v.) until 1314, when another Earl Gilbert was killed at Bannockburn; and after this date it was claimed by various relatives of the Clares, among them by the younger Hugh le Despenser (d. 1326) and by Hugh Audley (d. 1347), both of whom had married sisters of Earl Gilbert. In 1397 Thomas le Despenser (1373-1400), a descendant of the Clares, was created earl of Gloucester; but in 1399 he was degraded from his earldom and in January 1400 was beheaded.
The dukedom dates from 1385, when Thomas of Woodstock, a younger son of Edward III., was created duke of Gloucester, but his honours were forfeited when he was found guilty of treason in 1397. The next holder of the title was Humphrey, a son of Henry IV., who was created duke of Gloucester in 1414. He died without sons in 1447, and in 1461 the title was revived in favour of Richard, brother of Edward IV., who became king as Richard III. in 1483.
In 1659 Henry (1639-1660), a brother of Charles II., was formally created duke of Gloucester, a title which he had borne since infancy. This prince, sharing the exile of the Stuarts, had incensed his mother, Queen Henrietta Maria, by his firm adherence to the Protestant religion, and had fought among the Spaniards at Dunkirk in 1658. Having returned to England with Charles II., he died unmarried in London on the 13th of September 1660. The next duke was William (1689-1700), son of the princess Anne, who was, after his mother, the heir to the English throne, and who was declared duke of Gloucester by his uncle, William III., in 1689, but no patent for this creation was ever passed. William died on the 30th of July 1700, and again the title became extinct.