PREFACE. Gildas; its § 1. IT is difficult to fix, with any degree of The Life of certainty, the writer, the age, or the authority of author. the following Life of Gildas. It is cited by Bale,' Pits,2 Usher,3 and Tanner,* as the undoubted production of Caradoc of Lancarvan; but their authority for so doing is by no means satisfactory. The narrative itself contains no evidence upon which such an opinion can be grounded; we have no list of Caradoc's writings to show that he was the author of a life of Gildas; nor does the title prefixed to any of the early copies warrant such an inference. In tracing backwards this assumption, we cannot advance higher than the time of Henry the Eighth, when the name of Caradoc was prefixed to the manuscript copy now in the Royal Library in the British Museum. § 2. The author, whoever he might be, had occasion more than once to speak of St. Cadoc, abbot of Lancarvan; this individual is always mentioned with respect, but scarcely in the terms in which, it may be presumed, Caradoc would have recorded his virtues. The miraculous bell which was preserved at Lancarvan af ' Illustrium Majoris Britanniæ | etc. 4 Dubl. 1639. This work Scriptorum Catalogus, ii. 87, fol. is more generally known under Basil. 1559. the title of the 'Primordia.' 2 De Illustribus Scriptoribus, p. 214. Britanniæ 3 Britannicarum Ecclesiarum Antiquitates, pp. 442, 676, 677, 4 Bibliotheca Britannico-Hibernica, p. 153, fol. Lond. 1748. 57. Its age. forded too tempting an opportunity for enlarging upon the celebrity of that establishment to have been totally lost sight of by one of its inmates. 2 § 3. The age of this composition is also doubtful; but it appears to carry marks of higher antiquity than that generally assigned to it, in accordance with the theory which has ascribed it to Caradoc. It mentions King Arthur simply as 'Arthurus rex," Arthurus tyrannus," or, at most, as 'rex totius Majoris Britanniæ," without any of those high-sounding epithets which were afterwards lavished upon him; and it does not scruple to call him 'rex rebellis,'* and to say that he was frequently routed by Howel and his brothers. At the same time, his rival, Howel, is celebrated as 'belliger assiduus et miles famosissimus,' 'magnanimus juvenis,' 'victoriosissimus juvenis, et optimus, ut aiebant et sperabant indigenæ, futurus rex !' Arthur is introduced 'dolens et lacrimans,' and doing penance through the remainder of his life, simply for having slain in battle one who had risen in arms against him.' From such passages it may be presumed that this legend was written before Geoffrey of Monmouth, who was a contemporary of Caradoc, had firmly established Arthur in the minds of all succeeding writers as 'præclarus et spectabilis super omnes homines.'8 § 4. A yet stronger argument to the same effect may be drawn from the account of Guenever's elopement from her husband. Arthur is here mentioned as a petty king of Devonshire and Cornwall, who for a year is unable to dis cover the retreat of his wife, although she resided at Glastonbury; who finds an equal in the king of Somersetshire; who consents to a disgraceful peace with the ravisher of his wife, and receives her back after her long absence.' A writer, who had been contemporary with, or posterior to, Geoffrey of Monmouth, would have treated the subject differently. § 5. The authority of this production cannot Its authority. be ranked in the highest class; it seems rather to have preserved the traditionary than the real history of Gildas. Setting aside, however, the error respecting Pope Alexander,' (apparently an interpolation,) Usher has shown that the details of this legend are consistent with chronology, and as such has used them in his Primordia. used. § 6. This Life of Gildas is now, for the first Manuscripts time, printed in a complete form. The text is founded upon the following authorities. A. The Burney MS. 310, (p. 330,) now in the British Museum. This volume is upon vellum, in folio, and was written at Finchale, near Durham, in the year 1381.3 The text which it furnishes is in general accurate, and forms the basis of this edition. B. The Royal MS. 13 B. vii. (fol. 20), now in the British Museum. This volume is upon paper, in folio, and was written in or about the reign of Henry the Eighth. It agrees closely with the former manuscript, and in some instances corrects it. There is no me 1 § 10, 11; see also the remarks upon the word 'Meluas' in the former of those sections. 27, see the Note. See (Raine's) Priory of Finchale, p. xxxiii, (8vo. 1837,) one of the publications of the Surtees Society. |