Notes to Chapter 1praise of republicanism; Milton had engaged with Salmasius over just this interpreta-
tive ambiguity: see chapter 8, p. 272.
118 See chapter 7, n. 109. Just before publication Milton likely revised some parts and
added the final sentence or sentences. See chapter 14, pp. 494–5.
119 Nicholas von Maltzahn, Milton’s History of Britain: Republican Historiography in the Eng-
lish Revolution (Oxford, 1991), 176–88.
120 CPW V.1, 231–2, 265–6, 321.
121 Wheloc published a combined edition of Bede’s Church History and Alfred’s Anglo-
Saxon Chronicle with Old English and Latin translation in parallel columns, adding to it
William Lambarde’s Archaionomia, a collection of Old English laws: Historiae Ecclesiastica
Gentis Anglorum Libri V... Ab augustissimo veterum Anglo-Saxonum Rege Aluredo (sive
Alfredo) examinati;... Quibus accesserunt Anglo-Saxonicae Leges (London, 1644). Milton
depended as well on Henry of Huntington’s Historia Anglorum, Matthew of Westmin-
ster’s Flores Historiarum, and William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Regum and Gesta Pontificum,
all of which with some other early historians were edited by Henry Savile, Rerum
Anglicarum Scriptores post Bedam (London, 1596).
122 Pages 252, 327, 308. Also, a narrative of the Scots being aided by a vision in conquer-
ing King Athelstan “seems rather to have been the fancy of some Legend then any
warrantable Record” (251).
123 For example, Siward did not properly understand that “true fortitude glories not in
the feats of War, as they are such, but as they serve to end War soonest by a victorious
Peace” (385).
124 Canute, he points out, “commanded to be observ’d the antient Saxon Laws, call’d
afterwards the Laws of Edward the Confessor, not that He made them, but strictly
observ’d them” (364).
125 See von Maltzahn, Milton’s History of Britain, 189–23; J. C. A. Pocock, The Ancient
Constitution and the Feudal Law (Cambridge, 1957).
126 See chapter 5, p. 123.
127 He points out that the various invaders are, by ancient origin, of the same stock: the
barbarous Saxons are said to be from a part of Denmark, and the later barbarous Dan-
ish invaders were of the same stock as the Normans, so that “Danes drove out Danes,
thir own posterity. And Normans afterwards, none but antienter Normans” (258).
128 The specific vices he paraphrases out of William of Malmesbury: “The Clergy... had
lost all good literature and Religion, scarse able to read and understand thir Latin
Service: he was a miracle to others who knew his Grammar. The Monks went clad in
fine stuffs, and made no difference what they eat; which though in it self no fault, yet
to their Consciences was irreligious. The great men giv’n to gluttony and dissolute
life, made a prey of the common people, abuseing thir Daughters whom they had in
service, then turning them off to the Stews, the meaner sort tipling together night and
day, spent all they had in Drunk’ness, attended with other Vices which effeminate
mens minds. Whence it came to pass, that carried on with fury and rashness more then
any true fortitude or skill of War, they gave to William thir Conqueror so easie a
Conquest. Not but that some few of all sorts were much better among them; but such
were the generality” (402–3).
129 One letter (March, 1658) to the Duke of Curland asked payment of the stipend due a
Scots skipper in the duke’s service; another (April 7) to the Grand Duke of Tuscany
Notes to Chapter 10