are to be found in them; nor do they hardly ever descend to a description of the
customs, manners, or domestic economy of their Countrymen. TheSaxon Chronicle,
for instance, which is the best of them, and upon some accounts extremely valuable, is
almost such an epitome as Lucius Floras and Eutropius have left us of the Roman
history. As for Ethelward, his book is judged to be an imperfect translation of the
Saxon Chronicle;[9] and thePseudo-Asser, or Chronicle of St. Neot, is a poor,
defective performance. How absurd would it be, then, to argue against the existence
of customs or facts, from the silence of such scanty records as these! Whoever would
carry his researches deep into that period of history, might safely plead the excuse of a
learned writer, who had particularly studied the Ante-Norman historians. "Conjecturis
(licet nusquam verisimili fundamento) aliquoties indulgemus... utpote ab Historicis
jejune nimis et indiligenter res nostras tractantibus coacti... Nostri... nuda factorum
commemoratione plerumque contenti, reliqua omnia, sive ob ipsarum rerum, sive
meliorum literarum, sive Historicorum officii ignorantiam, fere intacta prætereunt."--
Vide plura in Præfat. ad Ælfr. Vitam à Spelman. Ox. 1678, fol.
(H)Minstrels and Harpers.] That the Harp (Cithara) was the common musical
instrument of the Anglo-Saxon, might be inferred from the very word itself, which is
not derived from the British, or any other Celtic language, but of genuine Gothic
original, and current among every branch of that people, viz. Ang: Sax. Hearpe,
Hearpa. Iceland,Harpa, Haurpa. Dan. and Belg.Harpe. Germ.Harpffe, Harpffa. Gal.
Harpe. Span. Harpa. Ital. Arpa. [Vid. Jun. Etym.--Menage Etym., Sec.] As also from
this, that the word Hearpe is constantly used, in the Anglo-Saxon versions, to express
the Latin words Citharo, Lyra, and even Cymbalum; the wordPsalmusitself being
sometimes translatedHearp Sang, Harp Song. [Glos. Jun. R. apud Lye Anglo-Sax.
Lexic.]
But the fact itself is positively proved by the express testimony of Bede, who
tells us that it was usual at festival meetings for this instrument to be handed round,
and each of the company to sing to it in his turn.-- See his Hist. Eccles. Anglor. lib. iv.
c. 24, where, speaking of their sacred poet Cædmon, who lived in the times of the
Heptarchy (ob. circ. 680), He says:--
"Nihil unquam frivoli et supervacui poematis facere potuit; sed ea
tantummode, quo ad religionem pertinent, religiosam ejus linguam decebant.
Siquidem in habitu sæculari, usque ad tempera provectioris ætatis eo nonnunquam in
convivio, cum esset lætitiæ causa decretum ut omnes per ordinemcantaredeberent,
ille ubi appropinquare sibicitharamcernebat, surgebat a media cœna, et egressus, ad
suam domum repedebat."
I shall now subjoin King Alfred's own Anglo-Saxon translation of this
passage, with a literal interlineary English version.
"He.. næfre noht leasunga, ne ideles leodhes thyrcean ne mihte. ac
He.. never no leasings, nor idle songs compose ne might; but lo!
erne dha an dha dhe to æfestnese belumpon 7 his dha æfestan
only those things which to religion [piety] belong, and his then pious
tungan gedafenode singan: Mæs he se man in theorolt hade
tongue became to sing: He was the [a] man in worldly [secular] state
Geseted odh dha tide dhe he thær of gelyfedre ylde 7 he næfne
set to the time in which he was of an advanced age; and he never