GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH.
Geoffrey of Monmouth was the first person, after the conquest, who attempted to write any thing concerning the ancient history of Britain. Although the century, in which he lived, is known, yet neither his family, the time of his birth, nor the place of his education has been ascertained. We are only informed that he was born at Monmouth, and became archdeacon of that place, and that he was consecrated bishop ofSt.Asaph, in 1152, which he resigned to live in the monastery of Abingdon. By some writers he is called a monk of the Dominican order, but, according to Leland, without sufficient authority. Warton says that he was a Benedictine monk.
The history which has made his name celebrated, is entitledChronicon sive Historia Britonum. This history, written in the British or Armorican language, was brought into England by Walter Mapes, otherwise Calenius, archdeacon of Oxford, a learned man, and a diligent collector of histories. Travelling through France, about the year 1100, he procured in Armorica, this ancient chronicle, and, on his return, communicated it to Geoffrey, who, according to Warton, (History of English Poetry,) was an elegant Latin writer, and admirably skilled in the British tongue. Geoffrey, at the request and recommendation of Walter, translated this British chronicle into Latin, executing the translation with some degree of purity, and fidelity, insomuch that Matthew Paris speaking of him with reference to this history, says that he approved himselfInterpres verus. With whatever fidelity the translation might be made, Geoffrey, however, was guilty of several interpolations, for he confesses that he took some part of his account of king Arthur’s achievements, from the mouth of his friend Walter, the archdeacon. He also owns that the account of Merlin’s prophecies was not in the Armorican original. The speeches and letters were his own forgeries, and in the description of battles, he has not scrupled to make frequent variations and additions.
Geoffrey dedicated his translation to Robert,Earl of Gloucester, natural son of king Henry the first; this, however, did not protect him from the lash even of his contemporaries, for his fables, it appears, were soon discovered, and William Neubrigensis, who lived about the same time, in the beginning of the history which he wrote, thus speaks of him; “In these days a certain writer is risen, who has devised many foolish fictions of the Britons; he is namedGeoffrey, and with what little shame, and great confidence does he frame his falsehoods.” William himself, however, did not escape censure for thus animadverting upon Geoffrey.
It is difficult to ascertain at what period the original of Geoffrey’s history was compiled. The subject of it, when divested of its romantic embellishments, is a deduction of the Welsh princes, from the Trojan Brutus to Cadwallader, who reigned in the seventh century; and this notion of their extraction from the Trojans, had so infatuated the Welsh, that even so late as the year 1284, archbishop Peckham, in his injunctions to the diocese ofSt.Asaph, orders the people to abstain from giving credit to idle dreams and visions, a superstition which they had contracted from their belief in the dream of their founder Brutus, in the temple of Diana, concerning his arrival in Britain. The archbishop very seriously, advises them to boast no more of their relation to the conquered and fugitiveTrojans, but to glory in the victorious cross ofChrist.
The Welsh were not singular in being desirous of tracing their descent from the Trojans, for several European nations were anciently fond of being considered as the offspring of that people. A French historian of the sixth century ascribes the origin of his countrymen to Francio, a son of Priam, and so universal was this humour, and to such an absurd excess of extravagance was it carried, that under the reign of Justinian, even the Greeks themselves were ambitious of being thought to be descended from their ancient enemies the Trojans. The most rational mode of accounting for this predilection, is to suppose, that the revival of Virgil’s Æneid, about the sixth or seventh century, which represents the Trojans as the founders of Rome, the capital of the supreme Pontiff, and a city on various other accounts in the early ages of christianity, highly reverenced and distinguished, occasioned an emulation in many other European nations of claiming an alliance to the same celebrated original. In the mean time it is not quite improbable, that as most of the European nations had become provinces of the Roman empire, those who fancied themselves to be of Trojan extraction might have imbibed this notion, or at least have acquired a general knowledge of the Trojan story from their conquerors, more especially theBritons, who continued so long under the Roman Government.
Geoffrey produces Homer in attestation of a fact asserted in his history; but in such a manner as shews that he knew little more than Homer’s name, and was but imperfectly acquainted with Homer’s subject. Geoffrey says that Brutus having ravaged the province of Aquitaine with fire and sword, came to a place where the city of Tours now stands,as Homer testifies.
This fable of the descent of the Britons from the Trojans was solemnly alleged as an authentic and undeniable proof in a controversy of great national importance by king Edward the first, and his nobility, without the least objection from the opposite party. It was in the famous dispute concerning the subjection of the crown of Scotland to that of England, about the year 1301. The allegations are contained in a letter to Pope Boniface, signed and sealed by the king and his lords. This is a curious instance of the implicit faith with which this tradition continued to be believed, even in a more enlightened age; and an evidence that it was equally credited in Scotland.
As to the story of Brutus in particular, Geoffrey’s hero, it may be presumed, that his legend was not contrived, nor the history of his successors invented, until after the ninth century;for Nennius,[44]who lived about the middle of that century, not only speaks of Brutus with great obscurity and inconsistency, but seems totallyuninformed as to every circumstance of the British affairs which preceded Cæsar’s invasion. There are other proofs that this piece could not have existed before the ninth century. Alfred’s Saxon translation of the Mercian law is mentioned; and Charlemagne’s twelve peers, by an anachronism not uncommon in romance, are said to be present at king Arthur’s magnificent coronation, in the city of Caerleon. It were easy to produce instances, that Geoffrey’s chronicle was, undoubtedly, framed after the legend ofSt.Ursula, the acts ofSt.Lucius, and the historical writings of Venerable Bede, had procured a considerable circulation in the neighbouring countries. At the same time it contains many passages which incline us to determine, that some parts of it, at least, were written after or about the eleventh century.
Warton, (Hist. of Eng. Poetry, Dis. 1.) in order to prove these positions, says, that he will not insist on that passage, in which the title of legate of the apostolic see is attributed to Dubricius, in the character of the primate of Britain, as it appears for obvious reasons, to have been an artful interpolation of Geoffrey, who, it will be remembered, was an ecclesiastic. Other arguments present themselves, possessing more efficiency; Canute’s forest, or Cannock Wood, in Staffordshire, occurs, and Canute died in the year 1036.
At the ideal coronation of king Arthur, just mentioned, a tournament is described, as exhibited in its highest splendour. “Many knights,” says this Armoric chronicler, “famous for feats of chivalry, were present, with apparel and arms of the same colour and fashion. They formed a species of diversion, in imitation of a fight on horseback, and the ladies being placed on the walls of the castles, darted amorous glances on the combatants. None of these ladies esteemed any knight worthy of her love, but such as had given proof of his gallantry, in three several encounters.” Here is the practice of chivalry, under the combined ideas of love and military prowess, as they seem to have subsisted after the feudal constitution had acquired greater degrees, not only of stability, but of splendour and refinement. And, although a species of tournament was exhibited in France, at the reconciliation of the sons of Lewis the Feeble, at the close of the ninth century, and at the beginning of the tenth, the coronation of the emperor Henry, was solemnized with martial entertainments, in which many parties were introduced fighting on horseback, yet it was long afterwards that these games were accompanied with the peculiar formalities, and ceremonious usages here described. In the mean time, we cannot answer for the innovations of a translator, in such a description. The burial of Hengist, the Saxon chief, who is said to havebeen interred not after thePaganfashion, as Geoffrey renders the words of the original, but after themanner of the Soldans, is partly an argument, that our romance was composed about the time of the Crusades. It was not till those memorable campaigns of mistaken devotion, had infatuated the western world, that the Soldans, or sultans of Babylon, of Egypt, of Iconium, and other eastern kingdoms, became familiar in Europe. Not that the notion of this piece, being written so late as the crusades, in the least invalidates the doctrine here delivered. Not even if we suppose that Geoffrey was its original composer. That notion rather tends to confirm, and establish this system.
On the whole it may be affirmed, that Geoffrey’s chronicle, which is supposed to contain the ideas of the Welsh bards, entirely consists of Arabian inventions. And in this view no difference is made, whether it was compiled about the tenth century, at which time, if not before, the Arabians, from their settlements in Spain, must have communicated their romantic fables to other parts of Europe, especially to the French; or whether it first appeared in the eleventh century, after the crusades had multiplied these fables to an excessive degree, and made them universally popular. And although the general cast of the inventions, contained in this romance, is alone sufficient to point out the source from whence they werederived, yet it is thought proper to prove to a demonstration what is here advanced, by producing and examining some particular passages.
The books of the Arabians and Persians abound with extravagant traditions about the giants Gog and Magog. These they call Jagiouge and Magiouge; and the Caucasian Wall, said to be built by Alexander the Great from the Caspian to the Black Sea, in order to cover the frontiers of his dominion, and to prevent the incursions of the Scythians, is called by the orientals theWall of Gog and Magog. One of the most formidable giants, according to our Armorican Romance, who opposed the landing of Brutus in Britain, was Goemagot. He was twelve cubits high, and would uproot an oak as easily as a hazel wand; but after a most obstinate encounter with Corinæus, he was tumbled into the sea from the summit of a steep cliff on the rocky shores of Cornwall, and dashed in pieces against the huge crags of the declivity. The place where he fell, adds our historian, taking its name from the giants fall, is calledSam Goemagot, orGoemagot’s leapto this day. A no less monstrous giant, whom king Arthur slew onSt.Michael’s mount in Cornwall, is said by this fabler to have come from Spain. Here the origin of these stories is evidently betrayed. The Arabians, or Saracens, as has been before hinted, had conquered Spain, and were settledthere. Arthur having killed this redoubted giant, declares, that he had combated with none of equal strength and prowess, since he overcame the mighty giant, Rytho, on the mountain Arabius, who had made himself a robe of the beards of the kings whom he had killed. A magician brought from Spain is called to the assistance of Edwin a prince of Northumberland, educated under Solomon king of the Armoricans. In the prophecy of Merlin, delivered to Vortigern, after the battle of the Dragons, forged perhaps by the translator Geoffrey, yet apparently in the spirit and manner of the rest, we have the Arabians named, and their situations in Spain and Africa. “From Conan shall come forth a wild boar, whose tusks shall destroy the oaks of the forests of France. TheArabiansandAfricansshall dread him; and he shall continue his rapid course into the most distant parts of Spain.” This is king Arthur. In the same prophecy, mention is made of the “Woods of Africa.” In another place Gormund, king of the Africans occurs. In a battle which Arthur fights against the Romans, some of the principal leaders in the Roman army are Alifantinam, king of Spain; Pandrasus, king of Egypt; Broccus, king of the Medes; Evander, king of Syria; Micipsa, king of Babylon; and a Duke of Phrygia.
The old fictions about Stonehenge werederived from the same inexhaustible source of extravagant imagination. We are told in this Romance, that the giants conveyed the stones which compose this miraculous monument from the farthest coasts of Africa. Every one of these stones is supposed to be mystical, and to maintain a medicinal virtue; an idea drawn from the medical skill of the Arabians, and more particularly from the Arabian doctrine of attributing healing qualities, and other occult properties to stones. Merlin’s transformation of Uther into Gorlois, and of Ulfin into Bricel, by the power of some medical preparation is a species of Arabian magic, which professed to work the most wonderful deceptions of this kind. The attributing of prophetical language to birds was common among the Orientals, and an eagle is supposed to speak at building the walls of the city of Paladur, now Shaftesbury.
The Arabians cultivated the study of Philosophy, particularly Astronomy, with amazing ardour. Hence arose the tradition, reported by our historian, that in king Arthur’s reign, there subsisted at Carleon in Glamorganshire, a college of two hundred philosophers, who studied astronomy and other sciences; and who were particularly employed in watching the courses of the stars, and predicting events to the king from their observations. Edwin’s Spanish magician above mentioned, by his knowledge ofthe flight of birds, and the courses of the stars, is said to fortel future disasters. In the same strain, Merlin prognosticates Uther’s success in battle by the appearance of a comet. The same Enchanter’swonderful skill in mechanical powers, by which he removes the Giant’s Dance, or Stonehenge, from Ireland into England, and the notion that this stupendous structure was raised by aPROFOUND PHILOSOPHICAL KNOWLEDGE OF THE MECHANICAL ARTS, are founded on the Arabian literature. To which we may add king Bladud’s magical operations. Dragons are a sure mark of orientalism. One of these in our Romance is a “terrible dragon flying from the west, breathing fire, and illuminating all the country with the brightness of his eyes.” In another place we have a giant mounted on a winged dragon; the dragon erects his scaly tail, and wafts his rider to the clouds with great rapidity.
Arthur and Charlemagne are the first and original heroes of Romance. And as Geoffrey’s history is the grand repository of the acts of Arthur, so a fabulous history ascribed to Turpin is the ground work of all the chimerical legends which have been related concerning the conquests of Charlemagne and his twelve Peers. In these two fabulous chronicles the foundations of romance seem to be laid. The principal characters, the leading subjects, and the fundamentalfictions which have supplied such ample matter to this singular species of composition, are here first displayed. And although the long continuance of the Crusades imported innumerable inventions of a similar complexion, and substituted the achievements of new champions, and the wonders of other countries, yet the tales of Arthur and Charlemagne, diversified indeed, or enlarged with additional embellishments, still continued to prevail, and to be the favourite topics; and this, partly from their early popularity, partly from the quantity and the beauty of the fictions with which they were at first supported, and especially because the design of the Crusades had made those subjects so fashionable in which Christians fought with Infidels. In a word these volumes are the first specimens extant in this mode of writing. No European history before these has mentioned giants, enchanters, dragons, and the like monstrous and arbitrary fictions. And the reason is obvious; they were written at a time when a new and unnatural mode of thinking took place in Europe, introduced by our communication with the East.
Geoffrey, in his chronicle, gives a genealogy of the kings of Britain, from the days of Brutus, including a list of seventy monarchs, who governed this island, previously to the invasion of Julius Cæsar. This list is very distinct and plain, but bears so many marks of invention,either of himself, or of the author, from whom he translated his chronicle, that it has long since been treated as a mere fiction. With respect to the story of Brutus, the bishop ofSt.Asaph is of opinion, that this forgery was intended to pass off the English kings, as being as nobly descended as the kings of other nations, by drawing their descent from the Trojans, according to the belief of the age in which the author lived. Sir William Temple, in his introduction to the History of England, (p.19.) accounts the story of Brutus, as a fabulous invention.
Bishop Nicolson (Hist. Libr.p.37.) says, that the best defence that can be made for Geoffrey’s history, is that which was written by Sir John Price, and published at London, in quarto, in 1573, under the title ofHistoriæ Britannicæ Defensio. This was dedicated by the author, to Lord Burleigh. (See Herbert’s Ames,vol.2.p.935, 1056.)
The chronicle of Geoffrey of Monmouth, has occasioned a long controversy, and divided the learned world as much as any other work given to the public. By some it has been treated as a forgery imposed upon the world by Geoffrey himself, whilst by others the ground work is considered as true, although the history, like most monkish writings, is mixed with childish fables and legendary tales.
The controversy has now been some timefinally decided, and the best Welsh critics allow that Geoffrey’s work was a vitiated translation of the history of the British kings, written by Tyssilio, orSt.Telian, bishop ofSt.Asaph, who flourished in the seventh century. Geoffrey in his work omitted many parts, made considerable alterations, additions, and interpolations, latinised many of the British appellations, and in the opinion of a learned Welshman,[45](Lewis Morris) metaphorically murdered Tyssillio. We may therefore conclude that Geoffrey ought not to be cited as historical authority any more than Amadis de Gaul, or the Seven Champions of Christendom.
Geoffrey’s historical Romance, however, has not only been versified by monkish writers, but has supplied some of our best poets with materials for their sublime compositions. Spenser in the second book of his “Fairie Queene” has given
“A Chronicle of Briton kings”From Brute to Arthur’s rayne;“
“A Chronicle of Briton kings”From Brute to Arthur’s rayne;“
“A Chronicle of Briton kings”From Brute to Arthur’s rayne;“
“A Chronicle of Briton kings
”From Brute to Arthur’s rayne;“
in which he has adorned the genealogy with poetical images, and introduces it with a sublime address to queen Elizabeth, who was proud of tracing her descent from the British line.
In this historical romance is also to be found, the affecting history of Leir, king of Britain, the eleventh in succession after Brutus, who dividedhis kingdom between Goneriller and Regan, his two elder daughters, and disinherited his younger daughter, Cordeilla. Being ungratefully treated by his elder daughters, he was restored to the crown by Cordeilla, who espoused Aganippus, king of the Franks. From this account Shakespeare selected his incomparable tragedy of king Lear; but improved the pathos by making the death of Cordeilla, which name he softened after the example of Spenser into Cordelia, precede that of Lear, whilst in the original story, the aged father is restored to his kingdom, and survived by Cordeilla.
Milton seems to have been particularly fond of Geoffrey’s tales,[46]to which he was indebted for the beautiful fiction of Sabrina in the mask of Comus. In his youth he even formed the designof making the early period of the British history, from Brutus to Arthur, the subject of an Epic Poem. The poetical language of Milton was peculiarly suited to this species of romance; he would have exalted the legends of Geoffrey, and enriched with the finest imagery the incantations and prophecies of Merlin, the heroic deeds of Vortimer, Aurelius, and Uther Pendragon.
The fables of Geoffrey have been clothed in rhyme by Robert of Gloucester, a monk of the abbey of Gloucester. He has left a poem of considerable length, which is a history of England in verse, from Brutus to the reign of Edward the first. His rhyming chronicle is, however, destitute either of art or imagination, and Geoffrey’s prose, frequently has a more poetical air than this author’s verses. It was evidently written after the year 1278, as the poet mentions king Arthur’s sumptuous tomb, erected in that year, before the high altar of Glastonbury abbey, and he declares himself a living witness of the remarkably dismal weather which distinguished the day on which the battle of Evesham was fought in the year 1265. From these and other circumstances this piece appears to have been composed about the year 1280. It is full of Saxonisms, which indeed abound more or less, in every writer before Gower and Chaucer.
Geoffrey was also copied by an old Frenchpoet, called Maister Wace, or Gasse, from which Robert de Brunne in his metrical chronicle of England translated that part which extends from Æneas to the death of Cadwallader. Wace’s poem is commonly called Roman de Rois d’Angleterre, and is esteemed one of the oldest of the French Romances.
With respect to the materials this chronicle has afforded to other writers, I will here give an instance or two.
Tyrrel, in his history of England, acknowledges that his first book is an epitome of Geoffrey’s pretended history; but at the same time says that if it had not been more for the diversion of the younger sort of readers, and that the work would have been thought to be imperfect without it, he should have been much better satisfied in wholly omitting it.
In the preface to Stow’s chronicle, (folio, 1631) the editor observes that Neubrigensis had written several invectives against Geoffrey, but more out of spleen than judgment. He charges that writer with maliciously endeavouring to destroy the credit of Geoffrey, because he himself having been a supplicant for the bishoprick ofSt.Asaph, had been rejected by the Prince of Wales, and had thus become the opponent of the Welsh history. His observations, Stow says, have been confuted by Sir John Price, Dr. Powel, and also by Lambard, in his perambulations of Kent.Stow then mentions John of Whethamsted, Polydore Virgil, and others, who have written against Geoffrey, and afterwards enumerates a long list of writers, as having uniformly supported him, or in other words, who have copied his history into their own chronicles.—Hume occasionally refers to Geoffrey, as an authority for some matters respecting the Saxon period of his history.
The History of Geoffrey was printed at Paris, in quarto, in 1508, and again in the same size, by Ascensius, in 1517. It was also printed with five other British historians, in folio, at Leyden, in 1587. Ponticus Virunnius, an Italian author, made an abridgment of it, in six books, which was printed at London, by Powel, in 1585, and also in the edition just mentioned.
A translation of Geoffrey’s chronicle was made by Aaron Thompson, and published at London in 1718, to which was prefixed a long preface, relating to the authority of the history. Thompson’s vindication of his author is elaborately written, and he defends him with great skill and learning; but after refuting the charge of forgery, he has failed in his attempt to establish Geoffrey’s work as an historical performance, for he himself invalidates its authority, by acknowledging that it was only such an irregular account, as the Britons were able to preserve in those times of destruction and confusion, with the additionof some romantic tales, which indeed might be traditions among the Welsh, and such as Geoffrey might think entertaining stories for the credulity of the times.
Thompson, in his preface, says that in making his translation, he used two editions of Geoffrey. The first was the Paris edition of Ascensius, 1517, which abounds with abbreviations of words, sometimes rendering their reading ambiguous. The other was the edition of Commeline, printed in the year 1587, which is much the most correct. These two were printed from different manuscripts, and there is a considerable variation between them, especially in the orthography of persons and places. This observation extends to the several ancient abridgments of Geoffrey, by Alfred of Beverley, Ralph Diceto, Matthew of Westminster, Ralph Higden, and Ponticus Virunnius.