The design, construction and arrangement of the tables
The Atlas of Attestations comprises a series of tables showing attestations of the various categories of witnesses in charters issued in the names of Anglo-Saxon kings from c. 670 to 1066. The tables for the seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries are organised in ways which differ, necessarily, from the tables for the tenth and eleventh centuries; but, as a general principle, each table represents the attestations of a particular category of witness (e.g. all ecclesiastics, or all laymen, or archbishops and bishops, or abbots, or ealdormen, or thegns), as recorded in charters of a particular kingdom, or of a particular period, or of a particular king. Tables are also included showing attestations in non-royal charters, covering the clergy of Christ Church, Canterbury (in the ninth century) and of Worcester (in the ninth, tenth and eleventh centuries). For an overall view of the structure of the Atlas, see the list of tables (pp. 17–20).
The design of the tables
The tables in the Atlas of Attestations have been designed as far as possible in accordance with a standard set of conventions. Each vertical column represents attestations in the particular charter identified at the top of the column:
S indicates number of the charter in P. H. Sawyer, Anglo-Saxon Charters: An Annotated List and Bibliography (London, 1968; revised edition forthcoming)
BCS indicates number of the charter in W. de G. Birch, ed., Cartularium Saxonicum, 3 vols. (London, 1885-93), for charters issued up to 975
KCD indicates number of the charter in J. M. Kemble, ed., Codex Diplomaticus Ævi Saxonici, 6 vols. (London, 1839-48), for charters issued after 975
Archive indicates archive in which the charter was preserved (most abbreviations should be self-explanatory: e.g. Ab = Abingdon; CCC = Christ Church, Canterbury; Glast = Glastonbury; OMW = Old Minster, Winchester; StAC = St Augustine’s, Canterbury; Wor = Worcester)
BA ASC indicates number in the appropriate fascicule of the corpus of Anglo-Saxon charters in course of publication under the auspices of the British Academy - Royal Historical Society Joint Committee on Anglo-Saxon Charters
Other headings or conventions vary in accordance with the particular requirements or possibilities of a given table. Place and/or specific date of issue are indicated in those cases where the charter contains that information. In West Saxon charters of the ninth century, ‘WS’ indicates a charter which belongs to the West Saxon, as opposed to the Kentish, diplomatic tradition. In the tenth century, ‘Æth A’ indicates a charter of the royal scribe designated ‘Æthelstan A’; ‘Dn B’ indicates a charter of the ‘Dunstan B’ type; ‘allit’ indicates a charter of the ‘alliterative’ type; ‘Edg A’ indicates a charter of the royal scribe designated ‘Edgar A’, or a charter of the ‘Edgar A’ type; and ‘Orth’ indicates a charter of the ‘Orthodoxorum’ type.
The basic conventions used for designating the attestation of a particular person are as follows:
00 a number against a name indicates the occurrence of the person in question in the witness-list, and his (or her) relative position among a particular group of witnesses; an asterisk against a number (00*) indicates, in the case of a bishop, that the bishop’s see is explicitly identified in the charter (a feature seen in S 726 (964), and in charters of the 990s)
[00] a number in square brackets indicates that the attestation has been ‘emended’ in some way (e.g. correction of a garbled form, or of an obvious error)
<00> a number in angle brackets indicates that the attestation is clearly impossible at the given date
• a bullet indicates the mention of a person in the text of the charter, or his occurrence in a context where it is not possible to designate his attestation by means of a number
ben/bn indicates ‘beneficiary’ of the charter in question
In the cases of certain tables, the given status of a witness is indicated by the use of an appropriate abbreviation (e.g. fil[ius] r[egis], fra[ter] r[egis], pat[ricius], pri[nceps], pre[fectus], dux, com[es], nob[ilis], min[inster], mil[es], p[res]b[yter]). An incomprehensible abbreviation should be regarded as an encouragement to refer to the text itself, where all will be revealed. The ‘historical’ principles which lie behind the design or arrangement of particular tables are explained further below.
The construction and arrangement of the tables
The Atlas is intended to be comprehensive in its coverage, but of course it has to be used with all due caution and understanding. Most witness-lists would have originated in the form of a written memorandum taken by someone present at the meeting of the king and his councillors; but much could happen to a list of names in the onward course of its transmission. The scribe of the original charter may have edited it in accordance with his own conventions, and in accordance with the amount of space available on the parchment; a cartulary copyist may have introduced errors in transcription, abbreviated the list, or jumbled the order; and a modern editor may have made mistakes of his own. It must be admitted that the construction of tables of witness-lists, of the kind contained in this Atlas, is simply another stage in the process of transmission, affording ample scope for the introduction of further misunderstanding and error.
The data in the tables is derived from a set of loose-leaf photocopies of printed texts of the entire corpus of Anglo-Saxon charters, made in the mid-1970s and, over the years, checked against the available manuscripts and corrected or annotated accordingly. These photocopies have been re-arranged, over the years, in an order which has involved local rearrangement of the order in Sawyer’s catalogue. The attempt has been made, for example, to place charters issued earlier in a particular year before those charters issued demonstrably or apparently later in the same year. Examples abound in the tenth century, for example in connection with charters dated 940, 956, 962, 963, and 983. Undated and misdated charters have been placed in what would appear to be their appropriate chronological positions. It should be noted that the charters of each period, or reign, are listed on the tables in the same relative order, from one table to another.
In certain instances the printed text has proved to be in need of correction (for example, in the form of a particular name, or in the omission of a name, or in an apparent misunderstanding of the order intended by a scribe); in others it has proved necessary to emend a manuscript reading (in clear instances of scribal error). The names on the tables are given, necessarily, in normalised forms, and should not be expected to reproduce exactly the form which appears in the transmitted text of the charter in question.
In tables representing attestations of ecclesiastics, the attempt has been made to identify a bishop by placing him in a chronological list of names for each see during the period in question (checked against episcopal lists, where available); unidentified or ‘surplus’ bishops are grouped together after the main sequence. In ‘Mercian’ charters of the eighth and ninth centuries, the several ‘Mercian’ bishoprics (Lichfield, Leicester, Lindsey, Hereford, Worcester) are grouped together, ahead of the two East Anglian sees (Dunwich, Elmham), London (always something of a special case), the south-eastern sees (Canterbury, Rochester, Selsey), and the West Saxon sees (Winchester, Sherborne); on these tables, shading in a vertical column indicates that the charter in question was apparently or explicitly issued at a church council. In ‘West Saxon’ charters of the ninth century, priority is given to Sherborne and Winchester, followed by the south-eastern sees, London (still a special case), and the ‘Mercian’ and East Anglian sees; a few records of church councils have been introduced (marked by shading of the vertical column) to provide some form of control for the first half of the century. The episcopal sees in the province of Canterbury were re-organised in the early tenth century, during the reign of Edward the Elder. From the reign of Æthelstan onwards, the arrangement is essentially regional: the three south-eastern sees (Canterbury, Rochester, Selsey) are followed by London, the six ‘West Saxon’ sees (Winchester, Ramsbury, Sherborne, Crediton or Exeter, Wells, Cornwall), the four ‘Mercian’ sees (Lichfield, Hereford, Worcester, Dorchester), the two sees of eastern England (Lindsey, Elmham), and the two northern sees (York, and Chester-le-Street or Durham). Other bishops, or unidentified bishops, are placed at the end. Attestations of abbots are more difficult to arrange in a meaningful way, because the problems of identification are far greater; they are generally listed, therefore, in a single alphabetical sequence. In some cases (for charters of Æthelstan, Edmund, Eadred, and Eadwig), abbots are included on a table alongside bishops and other ecclesiastics; in other cases, they are accorded tables of their own.
The tables representing attestations of laymen naturally present special difficulties. In general, the first instance of a name in a witness-list has been placed in the first row for the name in question (under, e.g., 1 Ælfsige); the second instance of the same name has been placed in the second row for the name (under 2 Ælfsige); and so on. For further comment on the necessary processes of disambiguation and identification, see further below.
It should be emphasised that the inclusion of a charter in a table does not necessarily indicate the acceptance of that charter as an authentic instrument. It is the case, however, that witness-lists in forged charters were almost invariably derived from genuine charters; and it would have been inadvisable, therefore, as well as misleading, to leave them out of the reckoning. A cross (x) at the top of a column, underneath the date, is a warning that a list is demonstrably unacceptable as it stands.
Matters of interpretation
Analysis of charters is fundamental to the study of Anglo-Saxon history from c. 670 to 1066; analysis of witness-lists is an essential aspect of the criticism and analysis of charters, and has a direct bearing in its own right on many aspects of Anglo-Saxon history. The guiding principle behind the compilation of this Atlas has been that analysis of charters is best undertaken in a way which allows the evidence of all surviving charters to be compared with each other, and which in so doing takes full account of the ‘archival’ factors which lie at the heart of their preservation, transmission, and criticism. An observed relationship between two or more charters preserved in the same archive might signify in-house production of some sort (and may or may not be a suspicious feature); an observed relationship between charters preserved in different archives is most likely to have originated in circumstances which obtained at the time of production. It is always necessary, therefore, to be able to proceed in a way which makes it possible readily to distinguish a charter preserved in one archive from a charter preserved in another.
The Atlas is intended to facilitate the study and criticism of Anglo-Saxon charters by making it that much easier to compare the names in the witness-list of one charter with the names in the witness-lists of other charters, and at the same time to judge the compatibility of the list as a whole with the given date of the charter in question. At the same time, the Atlas should facilitate the process of distinguishing a set of attestations in the name of one person from sets of attestations in the names of other persons of the same status and bearing the same name; and it may make it easier in this way to form some impression of the course of that person’s career, and to judge his standing among those of his own kind, as a necessary stage in the compilation of a prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England. The Atlas may also help to reduce to some kind of order the basic evidence bearing on succession to high ecclesiastical and secular office in Anglo-Saxon England, and may facilitate the process of comparing this evidence with the evidence derived from calendars, obituaries, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, other sets of annals, and post-Conquest chronicles. In the case of ecclesiastics, it is evidently a matter of some importance to be able to relate attestations in the name of one bishop to attestations in the name of another (whether or not of the same name), and (at all periods, but especially in the later tenth and eleventh centuries) to be able to relate attestations of abbots to attestations of bishops; and in the case of laymen, it is useful and often instructive to be able to relate attestations in the name of a thegn to attestations in the name of an ealdorman, and indeed attestations of any one layman to another. In certain cases, information derived from some other source (such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) has been incorporated at an appropriate place in a table; and there is scope for the addition of further information of the same kind. It is otherwise hoped that the Atlas may prove to be of use for general historical purposes. For example, it provides a form of reference for the attestations of a particular person (as opposed to a relatively meaningless string of Sawyer numbers), in a context which makes it possible to view the attestations in question alongside the attestations of other persons; but above all, it exposes patterns, changes in patterns, and absences of patterns, which invite further investigation.
The process of disambiguation
Once the raw data has been unscrambled, and reduced to tabular form, the attestations have to be ‘disambiguated’, sympathetically, in order for the information to make any sense. It is obviously impossible to be sure in many cases that an instance of a particular name in one charter relates to the same person as an instance of the same name in another charter. The difficulty applies throughout the Atlas; but it is most apparent in the tables representing attestations of thegns in the tenth and eleventh centuries. As noted above, the first instance of a name in a witness-list is placed in the first row for the name in question (under, e.g., 1 Ælfsige); the second instance of the same name has been placed in the second row for the name (under 2 Ælfsige); and so on. There can be absolutely no guarantee that the attestations registered against a particular name in a horizontal row will necessarily relate to one person; and much, therefore, has to be left to the complex and often frustratingly inconclusive process of determining whether a set of attestations can be resolved into a single person, or distinguishing one set of attestations from another, or relating attestations of an abbot or thegn to attestations of a bishop or ealdorman. In this process it is necessary above all to exercise a combination of historical judgement and common sense. If the occurrences of a particular name are concentrated in a particular period (of anything from five to thirty years), or if they display some other characteristic (e.g. distinctive style or spelling, regularity of occurrence, regularity of association with others, degree of prominence, coincidence of appearance and disappearance with other sets of attestations, or connection of some kind with the transaction), there might be good reason for regarding the attestations as representing those of a particular person, and drawing appropriate conclusions. In order to be able to conduct this process, it is necessary to be able to view all of the available evidence at one glance, and thus take account of all of the options; and in order to be able to judge the significance of a set of attestations in the name of one person, including any changes in a person’s position, or appearances in relation to non-appearances, it is necessary to be able to judge the set of attestations against the background of and in the context of other sets of attestations.
It should be said that from the reign of King Æthelstan onwards, this kind of analysis comes into its own: the quality of the surviving evidence is superb, and it is extraordinary how such a vast accumulation of data, derived from charters formerly preserved in the archives of such a wide range of religious houses, can be reduced so effectively to a semblance of order.
The Atlas serves not only diplomatic and historical but also numismatic and onomastic purposes. In certain cases it may be that a moneyer with a distinctive name might be found among the laymen attesting a charter of the appropriate issuing authority and date; and the tables might be used as an indication of the development of personal nomenclature, albeit only in the upper range of the social scale, from the seventh century to the eleventh, or as an indication of which names were popular in different kingdoms.
PROVISIONAL COMMENTARY ON THE TABLES
The tables in the Atlas of Attestations remain subject to further revision, refinement, and rearrangement, pending more formal publication in due course. An accompanying introductory booklet, in which the principles underlying the construction of the tables will be explained at greater length, and in which each table will be discussed in turn, is in preparation. The following remarks may help in the meantime to illustrate how the Atlas can be used to cast light on historical developments throughout the period.
The earliest charters
Tables I–IV are based on very flimsy evidence for four political orders in the late seventh and early eighth centuries (Kent, Essex, ‘Mercia’, and Wessex), and need to be approached with all due circumspection.
The eighth century
In Table V (Kentish charters of the eighth century), an attempt is made to distinguish ‘west Kentish’ charters (unshaded) from ‘east Kentish’ charters (lightly shaded), and both from charters emanating from gatherings which represent both parts of the kingdom (more darkly shaded).
In Table VI (ecclesiastics in Mercian charters, 716–57) and Table VIII (bishops in Mercian charters, 757–96), the ‘Mercian’ sees of Lichfield, Leicester, Lindsey, Hereford, and Worcester are given pride of place, followed by and marked off from the rest: the East Anglian sees of Dunwich and Elmham; London, in an interestingly anomalous position; a south-eastern group comprising Canterbury, Rochester, and Selsey; and the West Saxon sees of Winchester and Sherborne. Charters which were produced at meetings of church councils (convened at Clofesho, Aclea, Chelsea, and elsewhere), and which thus bear the attestations of bishops from the whole of the province of Canterbury, are shaded, to indicate that these were meetings convened under the auspices of the archbishop of Canterbury, not under the auspices of the king of the Mercians, lest it should be supposed or imagined that West Saxon bishops were in the habit of attesting ‘Mercian’ charters. Table VI incorporates Bede’s list of the bishops who were holding office in 731 (shaded), and the names of bishops recorded as present at the council of Clofesho in 747 (shaded).
Table VII (laymen in Mercian charters 716–57) and Table X (laymen in Mercian charters 757–96) afford a view of the ‘Mercian’ nobility during the reigns of Æthelbald and Offa. As a row of attestations in a particular name takes shape, in charters preserved in the archives of different religious houses, the isolated attestation is transformed into a record of a person’s career in the king’s entourage; and the question arises whether any of the persons who acquire an identity in this way can be found in any other contexts. In Table VII, Ofa is presumably the person of that name (Oba) named as a retainer of Æthelbald who had once visited Guthlac at Crowland (Felix, Vita S. Guthlaci, ch. 45). Note also the attestations of Æthelbald’s brother, Heardberht. Comparison between Table VII and X provides some impression of the degree of ‘continuity’, or otherwise, from Æthelbald to Offa; see, for example, under Eata (and Heardberht). In Table X itself, note the attestations of Queen Cynethryth, and the indications of Offa’s wish to associate himself with his son Ecgfrith (after 787 sometimes styled rex Merciorum). Note also the prominence at court of Brorda, Berhtwald, and others. Brorda’s ‘location’ may be suggested by the nature of his appearance in S 144.
In Table IX (abbots in Mercian charters, 757–96), note the consistently prominent appearances of Botwine, abbot of Medeshamstede, and of his successor Beonna. The table also affords an impression of the development of the ‘Mercian’ church in the eighth century. For abbots during Æthelbald’s reign, see Table VI. For abbots in the ninth century, see Tables XV–XVI.
In Table XI (South Saxon charters of the eighth century), the evidence is presented in a way which reflects the particularly complex nature of often composite material, and which is intended to convey a sense of passage through periods of West Saxon and Mercian domination: some of the charters occur more than once across the table, reflecting the different dates of the original record and subsequent confirmations; the narrow vertical line represents the establishment of Mercian overlordship, separating the appearances of certain South Saxon rulers as ‘kings’ from their later appearances as ‘ealdormen’; and the shaded areas represent intrusive political powers.
In the case of Table XII (West Saxon charters of the eighth century), it is questionable what if anything can be gathered from the scatter of sparse information; but a useful impression emerges of the preferred terminology for secular office-holders (which should be compared with the impression created by other tables for the eighth and ninth centuries), and of consistent appearances of particular men in charters preserved in different archives (instances of which are picked out with horizontal shading).
The ninth century
In Table XIII (bishops in Mercian charters, 796–826) and Table XIV (bishops in Mercian charters, c. 830 – c. 920), the ‘Mercian’ sees of Lichfield, Leicester, Lindsey, Hereford, and Worcester are again given pride of place, followed by and marked off from the rest: the East Anglian sees of Dunwich and Elmham; London, in an interestingly anomalous position; a south-eastern group comprising Canterbury, Rochester, and Selsey; and the West Saxon sees of Winchester and Sherborne. Charters which were produced at meetings of church councils (convened at Clofesho, Aclea, and elsewhere), and which thus bear the attestations of bishops from the whole of the province of Canterbury, are shaded; see above under Table VI.
In Table XV (abbots in Mercian charters, 797–826) and Table XVI (abbots in Mercian charters, c. 830 – c. 920), a basic distinction is made between ordinary ‘Mercian’ charters (unshaded) and charters which emanate from church councils (shaded). One of the records from the council of Clofesho in 803 is wholly exceptional in grouping abbots under their respective bishops; another fastens on those who in this way can be identified as coming from the diocese of Leicester. The attestations of a certain Piot, in the early ninth century, are of particular interest; as is the general terminology in the charters of this period.
In Table XVII (laymen in Mercian charters of the ninth century), all laymen are given in a single alphabetical sequence, with an abbreviation indicating their specified status (if any); an interesting aspect of the table is the opportunity which it affords to identify the possible attestations, in the charters of their predecessors, of men who subsequently became kings of the Mercians (see under Ceolwulf, Beornwulf, Ludeca, Berhtwulf, Burgred, and Æthelred, but not Wiglaf or Ceolwulf II).
Table XVIII (lesser clergy in the ninth century) reveals the names of ‘Mercian’ clergy in the ninth century, and offers (for example) a view of the community from which King Alfred may have drawn some of his helpers in the 880s and 890s.
In Table XIX (bishops in West Saxon charters of the ninth century), the sees of Sherborne and Winchester are given pride of place, followed by and marked off from the rest: the south-eastern sees of Canterbury, Rochester, and Selsey, which came under West Saxon control in the 820s; the see of London, still in an anomalous position (though note the two appearances of Bishop Deorwulf in the 860s); and the East Anglian and ‘Mercian’ sees. ‘WS’ indicates a charter belonging to the West Saxon diplomatic tradition, as opposed to a ‘Kentish’ charter; ‘1 Dcm’ indicates a ‘First Decimation’ charter (844); ‘2 Dcm’ indicates a ‘Second Decimation’ charter (854). Attestations in records emanating from selected church councils (Clofesho 825; Croft 836; æt Æstran 839; London 845) are introduced to provide some form of control; the columns in question are shaded, again to indicate that these were not meetings convened under the auspices of a king.
Table XX (abbots, etc., in West Saxon charters of the ninth century) shows what is known of a period during which religious life was supposed to be in state of terminal decline. Certain abbots (e.g. Ealhheard) managed to make an impression. A royal priest called Heahmund eventually became bishop of Sherborne; another royal priest, called Heremod, maintained his position throughout the 860s.
In the case of Table XXI (laymen in West Saxon charters of the ninth century), it is easier than in the case of Table XVII (laymen in Mercian charters of the same period) to recognise a distinction between ealdormen, thegns, and others. There is plenty of scope for further analysis: tracing the careers of particular persons in the entourages of particular kings; attempting to reconstruct the succession to high secular office; or observing the separation of the king’s activity in the West Saxon and south-eastern parts of the extended kingdom. Note the distinctively inclusive nature of the meetings represented by S 327 (860) and S 337 (867).
Table XXII represents an attempt to reorganise the attestations of West Saxon ealdormen in relation to their known or presumed shires. One emerges from this exercise with a strong sense of a well-controlled administrative system, with ealdormen appointed by the king over each of the constituent shires of the kingdom of the West Saxons and its south-eastern extension (and two ealdormen in Kent); the ‘others’ (listed on pp. 4–5) can be slotted into gaps in accordance with one’s historical judgement. The apparent contrast between the political orders represented by Table XVII (Mercia) and Table XXII (Wessex) is also instructive, and potentially of great significance in understanding developments during this most important period.
Table XXIII (particular groups of ninth-century West Saxon charters) is intended to facilitate comparison of the witness-lists in two significant groups of West Saxon charters: the so-called ‘Second Decimation’ charters of King Æthelwulf, dated 854, from the archives of Winchester, Malmesbury, Abingdon, Glastonbury, and one unknown; and the group of ‘West Saxon’ charters issued by Kings Æthelbald, Æthelberht, and Æthelred in the period 858–70. Note that Æthelbald and Æthelberht appear as ealdormen in 854; note also the intriguing attestations of the brothers, and other members of the royal family, in the later group of charters.
Table XXIV (Kentish laymen in the ninth century) represents the members of the local ‘Kentish’ nobility who occur in ‘Mercian’ charters of the early ninth century. The most significant among them was Oswulf, about whom much could and has been written.
Table XXV (Kentish clergy in the ninth century) represents members of the Kentish clergy, doubtless mixed up with some laymen, in the ninth century. The table bears, of course, on the changing composition of the community at Christ Church, Canterbury, and gives some impression of the state of the community in the second and third quarters of the century, in the period which occasioned King Alfred’s complaints about the condition of religious life at the time of his accession in 871.
The tenth and eleventh centuries
The general historical significance of the tables which cover charters issued in the tenth and eleventh centuries is self-evident. They will be found to bear in one way or another upon many of the most basic historical issues of the period; but only if they are judged always in relation to other available evidence (law-codes, wills, chronicles, church calendars, saints’ Lives, etc.) can they be expected to release their information.
Table XXVI conveys an impression of the surviving number of charters from year to year, and shows how remarkable must have been the circumstances behind the production of so many charters in 956.
Tables XXVII–XXX serve to define and to convey essential information about four distinctive groups of tenth-century charters: ‘Æthelstan A’ and ‘Edgar A’ were arguably royal scribes; the charters of the ‘Dunstan B’ type are associated with Glastonbury abbey; and the charters of the ‘alliterative’ type are associated with Koenwald, bishop of Worcester.
Tables XXXIa–c represent attestations of members of the royal family in the formative years of the kingdom of the English. Note, for example, the absence of Queen Eadgifu (wife of Edward the Elder) during the reign of King Æthelstan (and the sporadic appearances of her sons Edmund and Eadred), contrasted with her more regular appearances during the reigns of Edmund and Eadred themselves; note also her absence (apart from an occurrence in 959) during the reign of King Eadwig, and her sporadic appearances during the reign of King Edgar, most notably in the New Minster charter of 966.
Table XXXII represents a digest of information about tenth-century ealdormen abstracted from Tables xxxviii (Æthelstan), xlii (Edmund), xlv (Eadred), l (Eadwig), lvi (Edgar), and lviii (Edward the Martyr), and would respond well to further refinement, when a more systematic attempt has been made to identify the ealdormen on the ground, and in relation to each other; the group of ealdormen in the lower part of the table are essentially the ‘Danelaw’ earls who appear most strikingly in the charters of ‘Æthelstan A’ (928–35), and in the ‘alliterative’ charters thereafter (see further below).
Table XXXIII (bishops during the reign of Edward the Elder) reflects Edward’s position as ‘king of the Anglo-Saxons’ (with meetings attended from the outset by ‘Mercian’ as well as West Saxon and south-eastern bishops); all of the charters were issued before the sub-division of the West Saxon sees of Sherborne and Winchester.
Table XXXIV (abbots and priests during the reign of Edward the Elder) illustrates the extent to which Edward’s household was penetrated by identifiably ‘Winchester’ clergy (identified in relation to the composition of S 1443, 1285, 1287, and 385).
Table XXXV (laymen during the reign of Edward the Elder) would respond to detailed comparison with the tables representing attestations of laymen during the reigns of King Alfred and King Æthelstan; it is only unfortunate that no charters survive for the years from 910 to 924.
Table XXXVI (Welsh and Scottish sub-kings) illustrates the attendance of rulers from other parts of Britain at meetings convened under the auspices of successive kings of the English; it also reveals the remarkable fact that occurrences of these men are confined to charters drafted by ‘Æthelstan A’ and to charters of the ‘alliterative’ type.
Table XXXVII (ecclesiastics during the reign of King Æthelstan) exposes the no less remarkable fact that ‘Æthelstan A’ (and, later, the draftsman of the ‘alliterative’ charters) made a point of including ‘superfluous’ bishops, and abbots; note also the apparently significant ‘absence’ of the bishop of Winchester in charters of 925–6 (shaded), the prominence generally accorded to the bishop of Lichfield in the charters of ‘Æthelstan A’, and the contrast between the charters of ‘Æthelstan A’ and those of his successors in the royal writing office.
Table XXXIX affords much scope for further analysis. Thegns who were particularly prominent at King Æthelstan’s court, and beneficiaries of the charters, are selected in Table XXXIXa.
Table XL presents the range of names in an important lease issued by the New Minster, Winchester, arguably in the period 925 x 927; the question arises whether it is possible to distinguish usefully between members of King Æthelstan’s entourage, members of the community of the New Minster, thegns of the Winchester area, and other laymen who had not yet attained this status.
Tables XLI–XLVI, representing attestions of ecclesiastics and laymen during the reigns of Edmund and Eadred, can be brought to bear in many different ways on the years of political turmoil in the 940s and 950s, and on the apparent disintegration of royal government during the closing years of Eadred’s reign. The attestations of Wulfstan, archbishop of York, are particularly interesting in their unfolding political context; note also the sporadic appearances of Dunstan, Æthelwold, and others, in the early days of the monastic reform movement.
Tables XLVII–LIII contain a wealth of information about the reign of the hapless King Eadwig. Among them, Tables XLVIIa–b are organised in a way which reflects the basis for the classification of the charters of 956 into different groups; Table XLIX (1–5) reflects different ways of interpreting the evidence for the multiplicity of bishops called Brihthelm in the 950s, which happens to be a matter of considerable historical importance and which will be pursued at greater length in the introductory booklet; and Table LII illustrates the circumstances behind the division and re-unification of the kingdom in 957–9.
Tables LIV–LVII cover the reign of King Edgar; and it is to be expected that further analysis may throw much light on the consolidation of royal power in the re-unified kingdom of the English. Special interest attaches to Table LV (abbots), which reveals how the progress of the monastic reform movement began to find due reflection in the inclusion of abbots in the witness-lists, how Æthelwold of Abingdon (shaded) remained in glorious isolation during the early 960s (until his promotion to the see of Winchester in 963), and how the number of recognised abbots did not begin to increase significantly until the mid to late 960s. Thegns who were particularly prominent at King Edgar’s court are selected in Table LVIIa, showing the succession of thegns who occupied pole position (Ælfwine, 957–9; Ælfgar, 959–62, evidently the ‘king’s kinsman in Devon’, whose death in 962 is recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle; Byrhtferth, 962–70; and Æthelweard, 970–5).
Tables LIX–LXIII cover the reign of King Æthelred the Unready. The historical significance of this evidence has been examined in some detail elsewhere; suffice it to remark here upon the curious ‘absence’ of the bishop of Rochester in 984–8 (Table LXa, shaded), on the regularity of the attestations of the ealdorman until disturbed by Eadric Streona in 1009 x 1012 (Table LXII), and on the identification of particular groups among the thegns at the king’s court (Table LXIII).
Table LXIV is the product of an attempt to assess the degree of ‘continuity’, among the king’s thegns, from the last years of Æthelred’s reign into the opening years of Cnut’s reign.
Tables LXV–LXX cover the reigns of the Danish kings. Among them, attention should be drawn to Table LXVIII, representing the ‘return’ of royal priests (last registered in any number during the reign of Edward the Elder, but never to be forgotten), and to Table LXX (thegns), which distinguishes between men bearing ‘English’ and ‘Scandinavian’ names, and which throws light in this way, among others, on the composition of the Anglo-Danish court. The significance of Table LXIX (Scandinavian and English earls) has been explored fully elsewhere; in brief, it shows how a period a power-sharing was followed by the emergence of two main factions, and, in particular, it reveals how the prominence of Earl Godwine was deeply rooted in the events of the 1020s.
Tables LXXI–LXXV cover the reign of Edward the Confessor. Particular interest attaches to Tables LXXIV (earls) and LXXV (thegns), which are arranged in ways intended to facilitate understanding of the domestic politics of the years preceding the crisis of 1051–2, and of the years leading thence to the Norman Conquest. The dominance of the House of Godwine is striking.
The church of Worcester
Tables LXXVI–LXXVIII represent the evidence of the Worcester leases of the tenth and eleventh centuries. Among them, Table LXXVI is the product of an attempt to show (following many others who have examined the same material) how the numerous leases issued in the period 957–96 illustrate changes in the composition of the Worcester community, during the episcopate of Bishop Oswald. It is well known that the basic impression is of a community comprising ‘clerics’, ‘deacons’, and ‘priests’, and so, in effect, a community of ‘secular’ clergy; but the question arises whether many of them were not in fact professed monks (reflected in the terminology of one or two of the leases), rising through the clerical grades, and whether there is necessarily much difference, therefore, between this community and, say, the communities of the Old and New Minsters at Winchester, whose members certainly liked to employ similar titles where appropriate.
A modern analogy
The table showing attestations of ministers in the cabinets of Mrs Thatcher and Mr Major is provided to show what more recent events look like when reduced to a similar form. It is based on the lists of Cabinet members published at the beginning of each volume of Hansard.
The lists rank the ministers in an order which is evidently significant, and which appears to be based on a combination of different criteria (e.g. seniority of appointment, distinction of office, and standing in the Prime Minister’s favour); interestingly, practices seem to vary during the regimes of different Prime Ministers.
The analogy is not precise; but one can get from the table at least some sense of the rise and fall of ministers, and for further explanation one can turn to Lady Thatcher’s memoirs (and to the memoirs of those concerned).
I am grateful to Lord Waldegrave for helping me to understand the inwardness of the lists. He suggests that the analysis could be refined by taking into account the number of Cabinet committees which a minister chairs or on which a minister serves.