of a visit which he made to some of the companions of his earlier studies, long after he had familiarised himself with the philosophy of the schools. "I found them," says he, "the same men, and in the same place; they had not advanced a single step towards resolving our ancient questions, nor added a single proposition, however small, to their stock of knowledge. Whence I inferred," he adds with great truth, "what indeed it was easy to collect, that dialectic studies, however useful they may be when united to other branches of knowledge, are in themselves barren and unprofitable." Geoffrey of Monmouth. FLOR. CIRC. A. D. 1152. GEOFFREY, OF JEFFERY, of Monmouth, a celebrated British historian, flourished in the reign of Henry I. He was born at Monmouth, and probably received his education in the Benedictine monastery near that place, where tradition still points out the vestiges of a small apartment which is said to have formed his study; unfortunately, however, the building thus indicated is evidently of an age greatly posterior to the time of our historian. He rose successively to the archdeaconry of Monmouth and bishopric of St Asaph, to the latter of which dign'ties he was promoted in the year 1152. He is said by the Magdeburg centuriators to have been raised to the dignity of a cardinal also, but of this there is no clear evidence. It is certain, however, that he was warmly patronised, both in his ecclesiastical and literary capacity, by some of the most influential personages of the age, and amongst others by Robert, earl of Gloucester, and Alexander, bishop of Lincoln. Considerable obscurity hangs over the real origin of the historical work, or chronicle, with which his name is associated. Leland, Bale, Pits, and Price, inform us that Walter Mapes, or Calenius, then archdeacon of Oxford, and a man like Geoffrey himself, of curious research into the history of past times, having collected, during his travels in Armorica, a considerable mass of materials illustrative of early British history, placed them in the hands of Geoffrey of Monmouth, for the purpose of getting them translated and arranged by that scholar, whose previous studies were known to have eminently qualified him for the task. Nothing could have been more gratifying to Geoffrey than such a commission; he addressed himself with eagerness to the task, and in a short time produced chiefly from the materials which had been thus supplied to him, a chronicle of Britain in Latin prose, and a life of the Caledonian Merlin in Latin hexameters.1 There are two editions of Geoffrey's chronicle extant in Latin, one of which was published in 4to, by Ascensius, at Paris, in 1517; the other is included in Commeline's edition of the Rerum Britannicarum Scriptores,' published at Heidelberg in 1587, folio. A translation of the chronicle, by Aaron Thompson, was published at London in 1718, 8vo. Geoffrey also appears to have meditated the translation of a third 1 Bale ii. 65.—Thompson's preface to Jeffrey's Hist. Lond. 1718, p. 30. work on the migration of the British clergy to Armorica; but whether he ever executed this design is unknown. Matthew Paris declares, that in all these works Geoffrey approved himself a faithful translator. But William of Newburgh, Buchanan, Baronius, and others, maintain that he invented a very considerable part of the chronicle, which he professed to translate from a British original; and Turner has adopted the same opinion. "I believe," says this very respectable historian, "the book of Geoffrey of Monmouth, who lived in the twelfth century, to be his own composition, and to abound with fable." Yet, as Mr Ellis remarks,3 it is not easy to reconcile the foregoing passage with the following from the same author :- "I believe Geoffrey to state the fact when he says he found the history of Arthur in a book brought from that country (Bretagne)." The argument drawn by those inclined to cast suspicion on our chronicler from the outrageously coloured tales with which the work abounds, may, it is clear, be quite as good evidence on the other side; the probability is even greater that those wild fables and fictions were the invention of that earlier chronicler for whom Geoffrey professes he performed the office of a translator, than of the translator himself. Geoffrey nowhere exhibits the slightest solicitude to establish the authenticity of any portion of the chronicle. He urges the simple fact, that what he now publishes is translated from the text of a native historian; and when he supplies some deficiencies in the original respecting the struggle for empire between Arthur and Modred, he is careful to state the fact.* The chronicle is divided into nine books, the first of which, containing nearly a third of the work, extends from the birth of Brutus to the introduction of Christianity into Britain. The second book extends to the reign of Vortigern. The fourth is episodical, being a translation of Merlin's prophecies. The fifth narrates the reign of Aurelius Ambrosius. The sixth is dedicated to the reign of Uther. The seventh, and most important of the whole, is occupied by the reign of Arthur. The eighth relates the reigns of Constantine, Conan, Vortiporius, Malgo, and Catericus. The ninth, and concluding book, is occupied with the romantic adventures of Edwin and Cadwallo. The work is altogether an extremely entertaining one, whatever be its value as a contribution to the historical literature of the country. It was versified in the Norman dialect by Wace, and again in English by Layamon; and it is to it we owe the affecting story of Shakspeare's Lear, that of Sackville's Ferrex and Pollux, some of the finest episodes in the Polyolbion, and the exquisite fiction of Sabrina in the masque of Comus. • Vindication of the Ancient British Poems, p. 145. Specimens of early English Romance, vol. i. p. 85. Mr Coxe, in his Tour in Monmouthshire,' informs us, that it is the opinion of the best Welsh critics that Geoffrey's work is a vitiated translation of a history of the British kings, written by Tyssilio, or St Talian, bishop of St Asaph, in the 7th rentury. But Lhuyd is of opinion that Tyssilio's work was entirely ecclesiastical. Layamon. FLOR CIRC. A. D. 1180. THE researches which have been made by literary antiquaries into the remote periods of our national history, have been productive of many interesting and not unuseful discoveries. They have enabled us to trace the dependance of literature on. the various circumstances which modify men's characters and determine their condition: they have at the same time shown us how that of our own country has been formed, like a noble river from many small and confluent ones, by the junction of various streams of thought with that which was more properly original and peculiar to the nation. The history of poetry is intimately connected with that of language, particularly in the early stages of a nation's literature. It is probable that the reign of the Romans extinguished the spark of poetry which might exist in the country, instead of fanning it into flame or exciting any new feeling. The men who composed the legions were too civilized to admire the poetry of barbarians, but not sufficiently refined or educated to bring with them any literature of their own. The Saxons fought from different motives, were in a condition far more favourable to the cultivation of poetry,—assimilated better with the native genius of England,—and introduced a language and modes of thinking more naturally in harmony with its wild and northern character. The union consequently of the British and Saxon dialects became close and permanent, and the language which was thence formed gained so firm a hold of the national mind, that two generations of conquerors were unable to loosen it. For a considerable period it remained unchanged and unmixed; and when the Danes flooded it, as it were, with a new vocabulary, it still retained its old and genuine characteristics. The Normans introduced a language altogether new; but, notwithstanding the efforts employed to destroy the Saxon, its words and idioms outlasted the dominion of the Conqueror, and have resisted for a thousand years every revolution both of power and of fashion. It is thus that the labours of the inquirers who have explored the remote tracks of our literature, have led us by a broad line from one period to another, enabling us at every stage to see enough to satisfy a reasonable curiosity. Specimens even exist of the Danish-Saxon, which may be regarded as proof that that language was well cultivated, and that a taste for poetry, a perception of the sublime representations of Scripture, was possessed in a sufficient degree to lay the foundation of a literature. There is reason to believe that the Saxons, before the invasion of the Danes, had not neglected the study of poetry; and Camden, in his rare and curious volume entitled, maines concerning Britaine,' makes allusion to the skill which some, both of the native British and the Saxons, evinced in versification. After contending that "in grandity and gravity, in smoothness and propriety, in quickness and briefness," the poets of England are equal to any, he says, "this would easily appear if any lives were extant of that worthy British lady, Claudia Ruffina, so commended by Martial; or of Gildas, which Lilius Giraldus saw in the libraries of Italy; or of Re old Chedmon, who, by divine inspiration, about the year 680, became so sweet a poet in our English tongue, that with his sweet verses full of compunction, he withdrew many from vice to virtue, and a religious fear of God; or of our Claudius Clemens, one of the first founders of the university of Paris." The specimens which he then gives from some later writers, prove that the feeling of poetry was not lost amid all the troubles which the nation had undergone; what, however, of the passages he extracts are from Latin poems, and he apologises for the uncouth expressions they occasionally exhibit, on the plea that the age was so overcast with the "thick fogs of ignorance, that every little spark of liberal learning seemed wonderful." Joseph of Exeter, who followed King Richard I. to Palestine, was one of the most celebrated poets of that age, and commemorated the acts of his master in a poem called 'Antiocheidos." John Hanvill, a monk of St Albans, was another writer who distinguished himself also in Latin verse; as was also Felix, a monk of Crowland. In the descriptions of these early authors there is a certain strength and vivacity which amply atone for their want of classical correctness; and in the perusal of their remains the student of literary history will be often interested by discovering the germ of that style both of thought and expression, which is so genuine ly English. 66 It was, however, the great merit-as has been justly remarked—of the Saxons, before the Norman conquest, that they could express most aptly all the conceits of the mind in their own tongue, without borrowing from any. A curious proof is given of this in the words used to express the various objects of religious veneration. Thus, the word gospel, which means literally God's speech, was used instead of evangelium, or any modern derivative. The disciples of Christ were called Leorning cuihtors, that is, learning servants; and religion itself was termed ean-fastnes, as the one and only assurance and fast anker-hold of our souls' health." The methods employed by the Normans to introduce their own tongue would have obliterated the traces of any less firmly rooted language, or of any less intrinsically adapted to perform the offices of such a species of machinery as human speech. But with all the arbitrary power which the conquerors used to effect their purpose, the utmost they could do was to engraft the Norman on the Saxon. The iron tongue of the North lost no particle of its true metal; and after French had long been employed not only in matters of public concern, but in the common intercourse of the better orders of society, the Saxon re-asserted its claims to superiority, and was acknowledged as the staple of the national language. Of the little favour it received from the invaders, the most convincing evidence exists in a variety of ancient documents. In Trevisa's translation of Higden's Polychronicon, as quoted by Warton, we find it distinctly declared, that it was a primary object in the education of children to prevent their knowing any language but French. "Children in scole," says the old author, agenst the usage and manir of all other nations, beeth compelled for to lev hire owne language, and for to construe hir lessons and hire thynges in Frenche; and so they haveth sethe Normans came first into Engelond. Also gentilmen children beeth taught to speke 66 Hist. of English Poetry, vol. i. sect. i. p. 5. 'Lel. P 221. • Ib. p. 259. Frensche from the tyme that they bith rokked in here cradell, and kenneth speke and play with a childes broche: and uplondissche men will likne himself to gentylmen, and fondeth with great besynesse for to speke Frensche to be told of." But the strongest proof, perhaps, that could be given of the extent to which the Normans carried their violent proceedings in respect to the introduction of their language, is the fact, that in the year 1095, a bishop Wolstan of Worcester, was actually deprived of his see for his persevering attachment to his native tongue.* There was, however, a harshness and a want of copiousness in the Saxon which admitted of its being modified without injury by the introduction of new words and modes of expression. We accordingly find that by the commencement of the 13th century poetry began to flow with a smoother melody, and to exhibit a greater variety of images. Some of the specimens to which the date has been affixed of the year 1200, are extremely beautiful in point of sentiment, and are couched in a language evidently rich in poetical expression. One of these contains the following description of spring: Lenten ys come with love to tonne, With blosmen and with briddes ronne, Days ezes in this dales, Notes suete of nyhtegales, Uch foul songe singeth. The threstlecoe hym threteth so, Away is heure winter wo, When woderove springeth; This foules singeth ferly fele, Ant wlyteth on heure wynter wele, That al the wode ryngeth.5 The following love-song will show that the versification had acquired a degree of smoothness when it was produced-which is supposed to have been in the reign of King John-that left little for the poets of a more refined age to effect: When the nyhtegale singes the wodes waxen grene, Ich have lived al this yer, that I may love na more, Suete lemon, y preye the, of love one speche Specimens might also be produced to show that there was no want of variety either in the metre or in the form of the stanza. But the above will suffice to give the reader an idea of the progress which, even at this early period of its literature, the art of versification was making in England. But it was not till a subsequent age that these glimmerings M. Paris, sub ann. • MSS. Harl. • Ibid. |