BOOK I. -Extraordinary use of the Roman computation by kalends, &c.-Necessity of inquiries with respect to the authors and witnesses of charters-Recent forgery of a charter of Henry II to the town of Liverpool-Diplomatic doctrine of dates-General and particular rulesCircumstances to be noticed in English charters. THEORETICAL writers on historical composition have established the maxim, that they who relate the events of ages anterior to their own, deserve credit so far only as they acquaint us with the sources, from which they derive their information.* These historical authorities resolve themselves into two classes of corroborative testimony,-public acts and monuments, and private writers. Among the former are medals, inscriptions, charters, diplomas, statutes, and, in short, all instruments of a national character; in the latter class are comprised authors of histories, chronicles, annals, memoirs, and letters, who are either contemporary, or remote from the events, which they relate, and whose credibility is necessarily proportionate to their presence or distance. Hence the verification of facts requires the institution of a comparison between the record and the monuments of the age described, between the narration and its reasoning, and the documents on which the assertions and inferences depend. He that would verify the accounts of the historian, or that would compare public records and authors of the same period together, will often find himself perplexed by the irregularity and obscurity which embarrass the chronology of the middle ages. The statesman, the churchman, and the historian, in speaking of the same time, employ very different language; and, indeed, it rarely happens that two contemporary writers agree in adopting the * "Des historiens qui racontent les événemens des siècles antérieurs au temps où ils ont vécu, ne mêritent proprement de foi qu'autant qu'ils font connoître les sources où ils ont puisse."-P. GREFFET, Traité des différentes sortes de Preuves qui servent à établir la Verité de l'Histoire. same chronological terms. If the indications of the time be not understood, it is evident, that the order of events will be liable to be deranged, that anachronisms will arise, that things will be confounded with persons, and that the effect will often be mistaken for the cause, the cause for the effect.* BOOK dates in English Gibbon, the historian, remarks on the chronology of Irregular English history, that it "may be considered as a neglected department. Events, narrated by our ancient writers, are History. frequently put, with a variation of one, two, or more years. This often depends merely upon the different modes they followed in calculating the commencement of the year. Some began it in the month of March, and antedated events near a year: thus the year 1000 with them begins 25th March, 999. Others began the year in March, and yet retarded it three months, reckoning, for example, the space of the year 1000 preceding 25th March, as belonging to the year 999. Others began the year 25th December. Others at Easter, and varied its commencement as Easter varied. Some who compute from 1st January, still reckon one or two more years from Christ's birth than we do."+ In different copies of the Saxon Chronicle the same events are frequently assigned to different dates; thus occasioning a diversity by which our historians have been much perplexed. If in one and the same Chronicle the same year is found to be dated from divers epochs, no little uncertainty may be expected from a comparison of divers chronicles with each other; all these variations will occur, and charters will not * M. Koch, Tableau des Revolutions de l'Europe, Tom. I., p. 27. Miscell. Works, Vol. III., p. 610. The Oxford Copy, commonly called Laud's MS., assigns for example, a series of important events to the year MXLVI; the Cotton MS. (Domit. A. VIII.) places the same events in the year MXLVIII; and the Worcester MS. (Tiberius B. IV.) ascribes them to the year ML. Different commencements of the year are found in each of the eight ancient copies of this interesting monument of our infant language. BOOK be found exempt from the same obscurity.* Gervase of Canterbury, early in the thirteenth century, lamented the confusion, which had been introduced into history by the diversity of computation, prevalent in his time, when chronicles were multiplied almost to infinity, and when authors assumed the liberty of reckoning the current year according to their own peculiar notions or local customs.† Some began the year at the Annunciation; some at the Nativity; others at the Circumcision; and many commenced it at the Passion. In addition to this source of perplexity, was the Cycle of the Indiction, which was extended three years before the vulgar era, and which took its course in different places, from different periods of the year. This annalist had formed a design of regulating his own chronology by the Annunciation, but, abandoning that intention lest he should falsify dates, he acquiesced in the practice of his predecessors, who, for the most part, he says, began the new year with the Nativity.§ The difficulties of determining, with precision, the chronological indications of our ancestors are, by no means diminished, by the extravagant number of names which they conferred upon one and the same day and week, and which Dates from were derived partly from local events and customs, and partly from religious ceremonies and offices, as well as from the kalendar of the church, itself overteeming with festivals. Memory, however prodigious its strength, refuses to retain them; and terms, once familiar in the mouth of the rustic, are now enigmas in the study of the learned.|| Lawyers local cus toms and ceremonies occasion error. * L'Art de vérifier les Dates, Tom. I., p. 17, Ed. Paris, 1818. + See Gloss. Art. Years of Christ; Braggot Sunday; Woodmunday, &c. See Gloss. Art. Cycle and Julian Period. Gervase very properly inquires, "How can both computations be true, when one begins the years of the incarnation at the opening, and the other at the end, of the solar year? The difference was seven days. § See Mr. Ingram on Anglo-Saxon Chronology, Introduction to Saxon Chronicle, p. xv. || Dr. Samuel Pegge, whose profound erudition entitles him to be treated with the highest respect, endeavouring to explain the word Brandon, as an LA and genealogists, to whom minute accuracy is often of the utmost importance, must, it is conceived, be sometimes annoyed in their researches by this diversity, since the manner of dating, even by well known terms, has been productive of errors in professional antiquaries,* and of much confusion appellation of the first Sunday in Lent, represents Parascere, one of the * Some remarkable blunders of this kind are exhibited in a professional The BOOK I. BOOK I. Glossaries of dates. among those who employed this style.* A small collection of obscure dates and chronological terms was made by the learned Benedictine authors of L'Art de vérifier les Dates, with a view to remove this serious obstacle to the free and advantageous perusal of medieval compositions. The introduction of obsolete English terms, and a large addition of Latin, French, and Anglo-Norman dates, in the succeeding Glossary, are, it is presumed, an extension of that design, which is still further enlarged by compendious explanations of the leading principles of chronology. The little controversies, with which this science has been clouded, are carefully avoided, and no more is attempted than Locke seems to have recommended.+ 66 * Roger Wendover and Matthew Paris, both living near the time, in naming the important battle of Muret, which was fought on Thursday, September 12, 1213, date it on Friday after the octaves of the Nativity of St. Mary; which Friday was September 20, making an error of eight days. Petrus Lodovensis dates it on Thursday, the eve of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross; that is September 13. Gul. de Podio Laurentii makes the date the day of the Exaltation itself; that is September 14; but Arnold, Bishop of Narbonne, the legate against the Albigenses, announces the event from the field of slaughter, on the morrow of the glorious victory, the sixth day (feria) within the octaves of the Virgin's Nativity," which corresponds with Friday, September 13. The passages are quoted at length by Archbishop Usher, whose business, however, did not require him to notice these inaccuracies.-Tract. de Christ. Eccles. Success., cap. x., s. 39, p. 168. Wilhelm Wyrcester, under the year 1433, mentions the marriage of the Duke of Bedford, on the day of St. Botulph, April 22; and Hearne, in a note on the passage, states from Serenus Cressy, in Hist. Eccl. Brit., p. 375, that the feast was celebrated on the 16th of May, according to English martyrology. -Lib. Nigr. Scaccarii, p. 457. The annalist of Waverley says,-In this year, 1239, in the month of June, on the morrow of St. Botulph, was born at London a son to Henry king of England by his queen Eleanora, and he was called Edward.-Gale, Tom. II., p. 199. It is generally agreed that Edward the First was born June 16, which according to the best ancient kalendars and martyrologies, is the vigil of St. Botulph; and this date agreeing with Butler and others, seems to be correct. + Works, Vol. III., p. 84, Ed. Lond. Fol. 1722. The philosopher commends the "Breviarium Chronologicum" of Dr. Strauchius, as the best calculated to convey the leading principles of this branch of learning. The Breviarium was afterwards translated by Sault, who improved his original |