The History of England, Volume I From Egbert through Edward the Martyr Edgar
by David Hume
This prince, who mounted the throne in such early youth, soon
discovered an excellent capacity in the administration of affairs; and
his reign is one of the most fortunate that we meet with in the
ancient English history. He showed no aversion to war, he made the
wisest preparations against invaders; and by his vigour and foresight
he was enabled, without any danger of suffering insults, to indulge
his inclination towards peace, and to employ himself in supporting and
improving the internal government of his kingdom. He maintained a
body of disciplined troops; which he quartered in the north, in order
to keep the mutinous Northumbrians in subjection, and to repel the
inroads of the Scots. He built and supported a powerful navy [c]; and
that he might retain the seamen in the practice of their duty, and
always present a formidable armament to his enemies, he stationed
three squadrons off the coast, and ordered them to make, from time to
time, the circuit of his dominions [d]. The foreign Danes dared not
to approach a country which appeared in such a posture of defence: the
domestic Danes saw inevitable destruction to be the consequence of
their tumults and insurrections: the neighbouring sovereigns, the King
of Scotland, the Princes of Wales, of the Isle of Man, of the Orkneys,
and even of Ireland [e], were reduced to pay submission to so
formidable a monarch. He carried his superiority to a great height,
and might have excited an universal combination against him, had not
his power been so well established as to deprive his enemies of all
hope of shaking it. It is said, that residing once at Chester, and
having purposed to go by water to the abbey of St. John the Baptist,
he obliged eight of his tributary princes to row him in a barge upon
the Dee [f]. The English historians are fond of mentioning the name
of Kenneth III, King of Scots, among the number: the Scottish
historians either deny the fact, or assert that their king, if ever he
acknowledged himself a vassal to Edgar, did him homage not for his
crown, but for the dominions which he held in England.
[ [c] Higden, p. 265. [d] See note [C] at the end of the volume.
[e] Spell. Conc. p. 32. [f] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8. Hoveden, p.
406. H. Hunting. lib. 5. p. 356.]
But the chief means by which Edgar maintained his authority, and
preserved public peace, was the paying of court to Dunstan and the
monks, who had at first placed him on the throne, and who, by their
pretensions to superior sanctity and purity of manners, had acquired
an ascendant over the people. He favoured their scheme for
dispossessing the secular canons of all the monasteries [g]; he
bestowed preferment on none but their partisans; he allowed Dunstan to
resign the see of Worcester into the hands of Oswald, one of his
creatures [h]; and to place Ethelwold, another of them, in that of
Winchester [i]; he consulted these prelates in the administration of
all ecclesiastical, and even in that of many civil affairs; and though
the vigour of his own genius prevented him from being implicitly
guided by them, the king and the bishops found such advantages in
their mutual agreement, that they always acted in concert, and united
their influence in preserving the peace and tranquillity of the
kingdom.
[ [g] Chron. Sax. p. 117, 118. W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8. Hoveden,
p. 425, 426 Osberne, p. 112. [h] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8.
Hoveden, p. 425.]
In order to complete the great work of placing the new order of monks
in all the convents, Edgar summoned a general council of the prelates
and the heads of the religious orders. He here inveighed against the
dissolute lives of the secular clergy; the smallness of their tonsure,
which, it is probable, maintained no longer any resemblance to the
crown of thorns; their negligence in attending the exercise of their
function; their mixing with the laity in the pleasures of gaming,
hunting, dancing, and singing; and their openly living with
concubines, by which it is commonly supposed he meant their wives. He
then turned himself to Dunstan, the primate; and in the name of King
Edred, whom he supposed to look down from heaven with indignation
against all those enormities, he thus addressed him: "It is you,
Dunstan, by whose advice I founded monasteries, built churches, and
expended my treasure in the support of religion and religious houses.
You were my counsellor and assistant in all my schemes: you were the
director of my conscience: to you I was obedient in all things. When
did you call for supplies which I refused you? Was my assistance ever
wanting to the poor? Did I deny support and establishments to the
clergy and the convents? Did I not hearken to your instructions, who
told me that these charities were, of all others, the most grateful to
my Maker, and fixed a perpetual fund for the support of religion? And
are all our pious endeavours now frustrated by the dissolute lives of
the priests? Not that I throw any blame on you; you have reasoned,
besought, inculcated, inveighed; but it now behoves you to use sharper
and more vigorous remedies; and conjoining your spiritual authority
with the civil power, to purge effectually the temple of God from
thieves and intruders [k]." It is easy to imagine that this harangue
had the desired effect; and that, when the king and prelates thus
concurred with the popular prejudices, it was not long before the
monks prevailed, and established their new discipline in almost all
the convents.
[ [i] Gervase, p. 1646. Brompton, p. 864. Flor. Wigorn. p. 606.
Chron. Abb. St. Petri de Burgo, p 27, 28. [k] Abbas Rieval. p. 360,
361. Spell. Conc. p. 476, 477, 478]
We may remark, that the declamations against the secular clergy are,
both here and in all the historians, conveyed in general terms; and as
that order of men are commonly restrained by the decency of their
character, it is difficult to believe that the complaints against
their dissolute manners could be so universally just as is pretended.
It is more probable that the monks paid court to the populace by an
affected austerity of life; and representing the most innocent
liberties, taken by the other clergy, as great and unpardonable
enormities, thereby prepared the way for the increase of their own
power and influence. Edgar, however, like a true politician,
concurred with the prevailing party; and he even indulged them in
pretensions, which, though they might, when complied with, engage the
monks to support royal authority during his own reign, proved
afterwards dangerous to his successors, and gave disturbance to the
whole civil power. He seconded the policy of the court of Rome, in
granting to some monasteries an exemption from episcopal jurisdiction;
he allowed the convents, even those of royal foundation, to usurp the
election of their own abbot: and he admitted their forgeries of
ancient charters, by which, from the pretended grant of former kings,
they assumed many privileges and immunities [l]
[ [l] Chron. Sax. p. 118. W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8. Seldeni
Spicileg. ad Eadm. p. 149, 157.]
These merits of Edgar have procured him the highest panegyrics from
the monks, and he is transmitted to us, not only under the character
of a consummate statesman and an active prince, praises to which he
seems to have been justly entitled, but under that of a of a great
saint and a man of virtue. But nothing could more betray both his
hypocrisy in inveighing against the licentiousness of the secular
clergy, and the interested spirit of his partisans, in bestowing such
eulogies on his piety, than the usual tenour of his conduct, which was
licentious to the highest degree, and violated every law, human and
divine. Yet those very monks who, as we are told by Ingulf, a very
ancient historian, had no idea of any moral or religious merit, except
chastity and obedience, not only connived at his enormities, but
loaded him with the greatest praises. History, however, has preserved
some instances of his amours, from which, as from a specimen, we may
form a conjecture of the rest.
Edgar broke into a convent, carried off Editha, a nun, by force, and
even committed violence on her person [m]. For this act of sacrilege
he was reprimanded by Dunstan; and that he might reconcile himself to
the church, he was obliged not to separate from his mistress, but to
abstain from wearing his crown during seven years, and to deprive
himself so long of that vain ornament [n]; punishment very unequal to
that which had been inflicted on the unfortunate Edwy, who, for a
marriage which, in the strictest sense, could only deserve the name
of irregular, was expelled his kingdom, saw his queen treated with
singular barbarity, was loaded with calumnies, and has been
represented to us under the most odious colours. Such is the
ascendant which may be attained, by hypocrisy and cabal, over mankind.
[ [m] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8. Osberne, p. 3. Diceto p. 457.
Higden, p. 265, 267, 266. Spell. Conc. p. 481. [n] Osberne, p. 111.]
There was another mistress of Edgar, with whom he first formed a
connexion by a kind of accident. Passing one day by Andover, he
lodged in the house of a nobleman, whose daughter, being endowed with
all the graces of person and behaviour, inflamed him at first sight
with the highest desire; and he resolved by any expedient to gratify
it. As he had not leisure to employ courtship or address for
attaining his purpose, he went directly to her mother, declared the
violence of his passion, and desired that the young lady might be
allowed to pass that very night with him. The mother was a woman of
virtue, and determined not to dishonour her daughter and her family by
compliance; but being well acquainted with the impetuosity of the
king’s temper, she thought it would be easier, as well as safer, to
deceive than refuse him. She feigned therefore a submission to his
will; but secretly ordered a waiting maid, of no disagreeable figure,
to steal into the king’s bed, after all the company should be retired
to rest. In the morning before daybreak, the damsel, agreeably to the
injunctions of her mistress, offered to retire; but Edgar, who had no
reserve in his pleasures, and whose love to his bedfellow was rather
inflamed by enjoyment, refused his consent, and employed force and
entreaties to detain her. Elfleda, (for that was the name of the
maid,) trusting to her own charms, and to the love with which, she
hoped, she had now inspired the king, made probably but a faint
resistance; and the return of light discovered the deceit to Edgar.
He had passed a night so much to his satisfaction, that he expressed
no displeasure with the old lady on account of her fraud; his love was
transferred to Elfleda; she became his favourite mistress; and
maintained her ascendant over him till his marriage with Elfrida [o].
[ [o] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8. Higden, p. 268.]
The circumstances of his marriage with this lady were more singular
and more criminal. Elfrida was daughter and heir of Olgar, Earl of
Devonshire; and though she had been educated in the country, and had
never appeared at court, she had filled all England with the
reputation of her beauty. Edgar himself, who was indifferent to no
accounts of this nature, found his curiosity excited by the frequent
panegyrics which he heard of Elfrida; and reflecting on her noble
birth, he resolved, if he found her charms answerable to their fame,
to obtain possession of her on honourable terms. He communicated his
intention to Earl Athelwold, his favourite; but used the precaution,
before he made any advances to her parents, to order that nobleman, on
some pretence, to pay them a visit, and to bring him a certain account
of the beauty of their daughter. Athelwold, when introduced to the
young lady, found general report to have fallen short of the truth;
and being actuated by the most vehement love, he determined to
sacrifice to this new passion his fidelity to his master, and to the
trust reposed in him. He returned to Edgar and told him, that the
riches alone, and high quality of Elfrida, had been the ground of the
admiration paid her; and that her charms, far from being anywise
extraordinary, would have been overlooked in a woman of inferior
station. When he had, by this deceit, diverted the king from his
purpose, he took an opportunity, after some interval, of turning again
the conversation on Elfrida; he remarked, that though the parentage
and fortune of the lady had not produced on him, as on others, any
illusion with regard to her beauty, he could not forbear reflecting,
that she would, on the whole, be an advantageous match for him, and
might, by her birth and riches, make him sufficient compensation for
the homeliness of her person. If the king, therefore, gave his
approbation, he was determined to make proposals in his own behalf to
the Earl of Devonshire, and doubted not to obtain his, as well as the
young lady’s consent to the marriage. Edgar, pleased with an
expedient for establishing his favourite’s fortune, not only exhorted
him to execute his purpose, but forwarded his success by his
recommendations to the parents of Elfrida; and Athelwold was soon made
happy in the possession of his mistress. Dreading, however, the
detection of the artifice, he employed every pretence for detaining
Elfrida in the country, and for keeping her at a distance from Edgar.
The violent passion of Athelwold had rendered him blind to the
necessary consequences which must attend his conduct, and the
advantages which the numerous enemies that always pursue a royal
favourite would, by its means, be able to make against him. Edgar was
soon informed of the truth; but before he would execute vengeance on
Athelwold’s treachery, he resolved to satisfy himself with his own
eyes of the certainty and full extent of his guilt. He told him that
he intended to pay him a visit in his castle, and be introduced to the
acquaintance of his new married wife; and Athelwold, as he could not
refuse the honour, only craved leave to go before him a few hours,
that he might the better prepare every thing for his reception. He
then discovered the whole matter to Elfrida; and begged her, if she
had any regard either to her own honour or his life, to conceal from
Edgar, by every circumstance of dress and behaviour, that fatal
beauty, which had seduced him from fidelity to his friend, and had
betrayed him into so many falsehoods. Elfrida promised compliance,
though nothing was farther from her intentions. She deemed herself
little beholden to Athelwold for a passion which had deprived her of a
crown; and knowing the force of her own charms, she did not despair
even yet of reaching that dignity, of which her husband’s artifice had
bereaved her. She appeared before the king with all the advantages
which the richest attire and the most engaging airs could bestow upon
her, and she excited at once in his bosom the highest love towards
herself, and the most furious desire of revenge against her husband.
He knew, however, how to dissemble these passions; and seducing
Athelwold into a wood, on pretence of hunting, he stabbed him with his
own hand, and soon after publicly espoused Elfrida [p].
[ [p] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8. Hoveden, p. 426. Brompton, p.
865, 866. Flor. Wigorn. p. 606. Higd. p. 268.]
Before we conclude our account of this reign, we must mention two
circumstances which are remarked by historians. The reputation of
Edgar allured a great number of foreigners to visit his court; and he
gave them encouragement to settle in England [q]. We are told that
they imported all the vices of their respective countries, and
contributed to corrupt the simple manners of the natives [r]. But as
this simplicity of manners, so highly and often so injudiciously
extolled, did not preserve them from barbarity and treachery, the
greatest of all vices, and the most incident to a rude uncultivated
people, we ought perhaps to deem their acquaintance with foreigners
rather an advantage; as it tended to enlarge their views, and to cure
them of those illiberal prejudices and rustic manners to which
islanders are often subject.
[ [q] Chron. Sax. p. 116. H. Hunting. lib 5. p. 356. Brompton, p.
865. [r] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 8.]
Another remarkable incident of this reign was the extirpation of
wolves from England. This advantage was attained by the industrious
policy of Edgar. He took great pains in hunting and pursuing those
ravenous animals; and when he found that all that escaped him had
taken shelter in the mountains and forests of Wales, he changed the
tribute of money imposed on the Welsh princes by Athelstan, his
predecessor [s], into an annual tribute of three hundred heads of
wolves; which produced such diligence in hunting them, that the animal
has been no more seen in this island.
[ [s] W. Malmes. lib. 2. cap. 6. Brompton, p. 838.]
Edgar died after a reign of sixteen years, and in the thirty-third of
his age. He was succeeded by Edward, whom he had by his first
marriage with the daughter of Earl Ordmer.
