Canute the Great Part 14

[226] Adamus, _Gesta_, ii., c. 50: schol. 38. It seems to have been customary to add a Christian name in baptism.

There is an allusion to Canute's conversion in the Chronicle of Ademar de Chabannes (ii., c. 55), who seems to believe that Canute became a Christian after the conquest of England. But the authority of the Aquitanian chronicler, though contemporary, cannot be so weighty as that of the records of the church of Bremen which the Scholiast seems to have used in the entry cited above. For Ademar's statement see Waitz, _Scriptores (M.G.H.)_, iv., 140.

[227] Langebek, _Scriptores_, ii., 454: Osbern's tract concerning the translation of Saint Alphege. Osbern tells us that Ethelnoth was dear to Canute because he had anointed him with the sacred chrism. This cannot refer to his coronation, nor is it likely to have reference to his baptism, as Ethelnoth, would scarcely have given Canute a German name.

It seems, therefore, that it must allude to his confirmation.

[228] Liebermann, _Geschichte der Angelsachsen_, i., 273.

[229] Florence of Worcester, _Chronicon_, i., 183.

[230] _Gesta Pontific.u.m_, 200.

[231] Kemble, _Codex Diplomaticus_, No. 743. Florence of Worcester, _Chronicon_, i., 185. To this he afterwards added the see of Worcester, to which he was appointed by Harold in 1038. _Ibid._, 193.

[232] _Gesta Pontific.u.m_, 200-201.

[233] Stubbs, _Registrum Sacrum Anglicanum_, 31.

[234] _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_, 1020.

[235] _Memorials of Saint Edmund's Abbey_, I., xxvii, 47, 126.

[236] _Ibid._, i., 343.

[237] William of Malmesbury, _Gesta Pontific.u.m_, 190.

[238] _Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham_, 325-326.

[239] _Historia Rameseiensis_, 127-128.

[240] Simeon of Durham, _Opera Omnia_, i., 90.

[241] Liebermann, _Gesetze der Angelsachsen_, i., 298.

[242] Most of these details are from Osbern's tract on the life and translation of Saint Alphege. See Langebek, _Scriptores_, ii., or Wharton's _Anglia Sacra_, ii. The account in the _Chronicle_ is briefer but more reliable.

[243] Kemble, _Codex Diplomaticus_, Nos. 727 and 731; of these the former is scarcely genuine.

[244] William of Malmesbury, _Gesta Regum_, i., 224.

[245] _Liber de Hyda_, x.x.xvi.

[246] _Ibid._, 324.

[247] Kemble, _Codex Diplomaticus_, No. 740.

[248] _Ibid._, No. 729.

[249] _Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham_, 83.

[250] Kemble, _Codex Diplomaticus_, Nos. 728, 743.

[251] _Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon_, i., 434 ff.

[252] _Annales Monastici_, ii., 16.

[253] Kemble, _Codex Diplomaticus_, No. 749.

[254] Gervase of Canterbury, _Historical Works_, ii., 56. The arm was brought to England from Rome by Archbishop Ethelnoth. William of Malmesbury, _Gesta Regum_, i., 224.

[255] Sec. 9.

[256] Sec. 15. As the term used for sorceress seems to be Norse, this prohibition was evidently aimed at practices in the Danelaw.

[257] Sec. 17.

[258] Secs. 18-20.

CHAPTER VIII

THE TWILIGHT OF THE G.o.dS

The question what att.i.tude to a.s.sume toward the organised English Church may have caused Canute some embarra.s.sment; but the English problem was simple compared with the religious complications that the young King had to face in the North. England was Christian, at least officially, while Scandinavia was still largely heathen; though every day saw the camps of Christendom pitched a little farther toward the Arctic. In all the Northern kingdoms missionaries were at work planting the seeds of the new faith. By the close of the millennium Christianity had made great progress in the Danish kingdom; it was firmly rooted in Jutland and had found a foothold on the islands and in Scania. Among the Norwegians the new wors.h.i.+p had also made some progress; but in Sweden the darkness of heathendom still hung heavy and low.

Norse Christianity doubtless filtered in with the viking raids: with the plunder of the Catholic South and West, the sea-kings also appropriated many of the forms and ideas of Western civilisation, and it is not to be supposed that the fields of religious thought were neglected or overlooked. King Hakon the Good became a Christian at the court of his foster-father, Ethelstan, the grandson of Alfred.[259] The sons of Eric Bloodax were also baptised in England, where their father had found an exile's refuge.[260] Olaf Trygvesson found his faith and his mission while fighting as viking in England. Olaf the Saint received baptism in Rouen on his return from a raid as viking mercenary. Thus Norway had been in close touch with the new faith for nearly a century; and yet, Christianity had made but little actual progress. During the reign of Canute the Danish Church reached the stage of effective organisation, while in Norway the religious activities were still of the missionary type.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HAMMERS OF THOR (From the closing years of heathendom).]

The forces of the Anse-G.o.ds were in retreat all along the religious frontier; but it is not to be supposed that they were panic-stricken. To their zeal for the ancestral wors.h.i.+p was added a love for the conflict which inspired the faithful to contest every inch of the Christian advance. The challenge of Thor has a sort of historic reality in it: in a sense the issue of religion was settled in the North by wager of battle. In his admiration for strength and force, many a Northman seemed willing to follow the lead of the stronger cult.

The Anse-faith of the viking age seems to have been a development of an ancient form of heaven wors.h.i.+p or possibly of sun wors.h.i.+p, traces of which have been found in the North from the days of the stone age.[261]

In time the deity came to be viewed from various angles, and each particular aspect was individualised and made the object of separate wors.h.i.+p. Thus, apparently, arose the three great divinities, Thor, Woden, and Frey. Thor is the G.o.d of strength, the mighty defender of G.o.ds and men. His name (O. Eng. _Thunor_), his flaming beard, the crash of his hammer-stroke show that the Thor-conception was closely a.s.sociated with early notions of thunder and lightning. Similarly, the name of Woden[262] a.s.sociates his divinity with the untamed forces of nature, the fury of the tempest, the wrath of the storm. He is, therefore, the G.o.d of the battle rush, the divine force that inspires the athletic frenzy of the berserk. Thor is armed with a hammer, Woden with a spear. Thor rides in a cart drawn by rams; Woden's mount is a swift eight-footed horse. But Woden is more than a mere G.o.d of conflict; he is wise and cunning and knows the mysteries of the world. Frey is the G.o.d of fruitfulness, the sun-G.o.d as giver of life and growth. He should be wors.h.i.+pped by tillers of the soil.

In the course of time, new deities were admitted to the Scandinavian pantheon; some of these were no doubt developed from older conceptions; others were evidently introduced from neighbouring cults. Gradually the old, rude beliefs came to be overlaid with myths, a series of strange tales, bold, strong, and weird. Recent scholars have held that many of these were borrowed from the bulging storehouse of Christian faith and legend--the result of intellectual contact between the old races and the Norse immigrant on the Western Islands.[263] But even where this borrowing can be clearly traced, the modifying touches of the Norse imagination are clearly in evidence.

The Northern peoples also developed a system of ethics of which we have a remarkable statement in the Eddic poem, the "Song of the High One."

While of a lower character than that a.s.sociated with Christianity, it was, when we consider the soil from which it sprang, a remarkable growth. Candour, honesty, courage, strength, fidelity, and hospitality were enjoined and emphasised. The Northman was impressed with the fact that all things seem perishable; but he hoped that the fame of a good life would continue after death.

Cattle die, kinsmen die, Finally dies one-self; But never shall perish the fame of him Who has won a good renown.

Cattle die, kinsmen die, Finally dies one-self; But one thing I know that always remains, Judgment pa.s.sed on the dead.[264]

But the duties toward the hostile and the weak, that Christianity strove to inculcate, the Northman did not appreciate: slavery was common; weak and unwelcome children were often exposed at birth; revenge was a sacred duty.