A Handbook of the English Language Part 63

He sleeps the sleep of the righteous?

8. Whether do you say--It is I your master who command you, or It is I your master who commands you!

9. Barbican it _hight_. Translate this into Latin.

10. Explain in full the following constructions--

a. I have ridden a horse.

b. I am to blame.

c. I am beaten.

d. A part of the body.

e. All fled but John.

11. What is meant by the _Succession of Tenses_? Show the logical necessity of it.

12. Or _hear'st_ thou rather pure ethereal stream, Whose fountain _who can_ tell?--MILTON.

Give the meaning of this pa.s.sage, and explain the figure of speech exhibited in the words in Italics.

13. The _door_ being open the steed was stolen.--In what case is _door_?

PART VI.

1. The way was long, the wind was cold. Express the metre of this symbolically.

2. Define _rhyme_.

3. Give instances of _Service metre_, _Blank heroics_, _Alexandrines_.

PART VII.

1. How far do the present dialects of England coincide with the parts, that took their names from the _Angles_ and the _Saxons_ respectively.

2. What traces of Danish or Norse occupancy do we find in local names?

NOTES.

[1] The immediate authority for these descents, dates, and localities is Sharon Turner. They are nearly the same as those which are noticed in Mr.

Kemble's _Saxons in England_. In the former writer, however, they are given as historical facts; in the latter they are subjected to criticism, and considered as exceptionable.

[2] It is from Beda that the current opinions as to the details of the Anglo-Saxon invasion are taken; especially the threefold division into Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. These migrations were so large and numerous that the original country of the Angles was left a desert. The distribution of the three divisions over the different parts of England was also Beda's.

The work of this important writer--the great luminary of early England--is the _Historia Ecclesiastica_, a t.i.tle which prepares us for a great preponderance of the ecclesiastical over the secular history.

Now Beda's date was the middle of the eighth century.

And his locality was the monastery of Wearmouth, in the county of Durham.

Both of these facts must be borne in mind when we consider the value of his authority, i.e., his means of knowing, as determined by the conditions of time and place.

Christianity was introduced among the Anglo-Saxons of Kent A.D. 597. For the times between them and A.D. 740, we have in Mr. Kemble's _Codex Diplomaticus_ eighty-five charters, all in Latin, and most of them of uncertain authenticity. They are chiefly grants of different kings of Kent, Wess.e.x, the Hwiccas, Mercia, and Northumberland, a few being of Bishops.

[3] Gildas was a _British_ ecclesiastic, as Beda was an _English_ one. His locality was North Wales: his time earlier than Beda's by perhaps one hundred years.

He states that he was born the year of the _pugna Badonica_, currently called the _Battle of Bath_.

Now a chronological table called _Annales Cambrenses_, places that event within one hundred years of the supposed landing of Hengist.

But there is no reason for believing this to be a cotemporary entry. Hence, all that can be safely said of Gildas is that he was about as far removed from the seat of the Germanic invasions, in locality, as Beda, whilst in point of time he was nearer.

As a writer he is far inferior, being pre-eminently verbose, vague, and indefinite.

_Gildas_, as far as he states facts at all, gives the _British_ account of the conquest.

No other doc.u.ments have come down to our time.

Beda's own authorities--as we learn from his introduction--were certain of the most learned bishops and abbots of his cotemporaries, of whom he sought special information as to the antiquities of their own establishments. Of cotemporary writers, in the way of authority, there is no mention.

For the times between the "accredited date of Hengist and Horsa's landing (A.D. 449) and A.D. 597 (a period of about one hundred and fifty years) the only authorities are a few quotations from Solinus, Gildas, and a Legendary Life of St. Germa.n.u.s."--_Saxons in Engl._ i. 27.

[4] This account is from Jornandes, who is generally considered as the chief repertory of the traditions respecting the Gothic populations. He lived about A.D. 530. The Gepidae were said to be the _laggards_ of the migration, and the vessel which carried them to have been left behind: and as _gepanta_ in their language meant _slow_, their name is taken therefrom.

[5] Widukind was a monk of Corvey in Flanders, who wrote the Ecclesiastical History of his monastery.

[6] Geoffry of Monmouth, like Gildas, is a _British_ authority. His date was the reign of Henry II. The _Welsh_ traditions form the staple of Geoffry's work, for which it is the great repertory.

[7] The _date_ of this was the reign of Marcus Antoninus. Its _place_, the Danubian provinces of Rhaetia, and Pannonia. It was carried on by the Germans of the _frontier_ or _march_--from whence the name--in alliance with the Jazyges, who were undoubtedly Slavonic, and the Quadi, who were probably so. Its details are obscure--the chief authority being Dio Ca.s.sius.

[8] The reign of Valentinian was from A.D. 365 to A.D. 375.

[9] The date of this has been variously placed in A.D. 438, and between A.D. 395 and A.D. 407. Either is earlier than A.D. 449.

[10] The Saxon Chronicle consists of a series of entries from the earliest times to the reign of King Stephen, each under its year: the year of the Anglo-Saxon invasion being the usual one, i.e., A.D. 449. The value of such a work depends upon the extent to which the chronological entries are cotemporaneous with the events noticed. Where this is the case, the statement is of the highest historical value; where, however, it is merely taken from some earlier authority, or from a tradition, it loses the character of a _register_, and becomes merely a series of dates--correct or incorrect as the case may be. Where the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle really begins to be a cotemporaneous register is uncertain--all that is certain being that it _is_ so for the _latest_, and is _not_ so for _earliest_ entries.

The notices in question come under the former cla.s.s. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle had been edited by the Master of Trinity College, Oxford (Dr.

Ingram), and a.n.a.lyzed by Miss Gurney.

[11] a.s.serius was a learned Welsh ecclesiastic who was invited by King Alfred into Wess.e.x, and employed by that king as one of his a.s.sociates and a.s.sistants in civilizing and instructing his subjects. Several works are mentioned as having been written by a.s.serius, but the only one extant is his history of King Alfred, which is a chronicle of various events between the year of Alfred's birth, A.D. 849, to A.D. 889.

a.s.serius is supposed to have died Bishop of Sherborne, A.D. 910.

[12] The compounds of the Anglo-Saxon word _ware_ = _occupants_, _inhabitants_, are too numerous to leave any doubt as to this, and several other, derivations. _Cant-ware_ = _Cant-icolae_ = _people of Kent_: _Hwic-ware_ = _Hviccas_ = _the people_ of parts of Worcesters.h.i.+re,[67]

Glosters.h.i.+re, and (to judge from the name) of _War-wick_s.h.i.+re also.