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"Cavill, Paul"
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Writing the history of parliament in Tudor and early Stuart England
This volume of essays explores the rise of parliament in the historical imagination of early modern England. The enduring controversy about the nature of parliament informs nearly all debates about the momentous religious, political and governmental changes of the period – most significantly, the character of the Reformation and the causes of the Revolution. Meanwhile, scholars of ideas have emphasised the historicist turn that shaped political culture. Religious and intellectual imperatives from the sixteenth century onwards evoked a new interest in the evolution of parliament, framing the ways that contemporaries interpreted, legitimised and contested Church, state and political hierarchies. Parliamentary ‘history’ is explored through the analysis of chronicles, more overtly ‘literary’ texts, antiquarian scholarship, religious polemic, political pamphlets, and of the intricate processes that forge memory and tradition.
eBook
Mortuary dues in early sixteenth-century England
Mortuaries were death duties owed to parish priests. The early sixteenth century was a pivotal moment in their long history. In 1529, an act of parliament significantly altered these dues. This article explores mortuary practices in the preceding decades. It examines what mortuaries were, who gave them, and what purpose they served. The importance of local custom is emphasised. The article reconsiders the modern view that mortuary dues were generally disliked. A more complex attitude explains both why mortuaries were reformed and why they would survive for centuries thereafter. Mortuary dues exemplify the symbiotic relationship between law and custom.
Journal Article
WE(O)NDUN, SYMEON OF DURHAM, AND THE BATTLE OF BRUNANBURH
Introduction The battle of Brunanburh, fought in 937 by King Athelstan against a coalition of Dublin-based Scandinavians under Anlaf Guthfrithsson, men of Alba under King Constantine, and Cumbrians under King Owain, resulted in a victory for the English.1 The battle has been the foc us of widespread attention in recent years, with a controversy continuing about where it was fought. [...]a relatively early source, recorded in the Historia de regibus Anglorum et Dacorum (formerly known from Thomas Arnold's edition as the Historia regum),6 and Symeon of Durham's Libellus de exordio (hereafter LDE),7 both extant in manuscripts from the twelfth century (see below), and clearly preserving earlier tradition, give an entirely different name, We(o)ndun, for the site of the battle. Alistair Campbell emended the name to ·Weordun to refer to the river Wear in County Durham.8 More recently, Michael Wood has identified a place on the basis of this name, and believes that this resolves the controversy about where the battle took place; he fixes it at Went Hill near Doncaster.9 Another recent writer, Andrew Breeze, locates it as the hill at Lanchester.10 The purpose of this article is to review the evidence available relating to this name, We(o)ndun, through a consideration of the sources, texts, manuscripts, and language of the writers. Wood assures the reader that Wendun in the Historia de regibus Anglorum et Dacorum is from: an early and trustworthy Northumbrian source ... a short set of tenth-century annals with a special interest in the bishops of St Cuthbert's ... presumably written in Chester-le-Street in the second quarter of the tenth century ... it is conceivably our earliest source for the battle. ... a set of tenth-century annals.21 He adds in a footnote on the same page that the source was 'a contemporary record written in Chester-le-Street from the 890s to 954'.
Journal Article
The Battle of Brunanburh: The Lanchester Hypothesis
The location of the battle of Brunanburh in 937 remains a source of disagreement among investigators. In recent years many places have been identified as Brunanburh. This article interrogates the claims of Andrew Breeze, in several works, to have securely located the battle at Lanchester in County Durham. The methods by which Breeze reaches his conclusion are analyzed, and the arguments he cites for it are examined. Breeze’s main proposals are discussed: that Brunanburh refers to the River Browney in County Durham; that the name We(o)ndun recorded by Symeon of Durham refers to a wen-shaped hill; and that dinges- in the Old English poem on the battle should be emended to dingles-. Alternative interpretations of the material are given, some based on hitherto unexamined evidence, including a new suggestion for the etymology of Dingley in Northamptonshire. It is argued that the Lanchester hypothesis does not stand linguistic and critical analysis.
Journal Article
Perjury in Early Tudor England
The break with Rome was enforced through a nationwide programme of oath-taking. The Henrician regime resorted to oaths because they were already fundamental to the functioning of the polity. In the preceding half-century, activities as diverse as heresy prosecution, tax assessment and debt litigation depended upon oaths. Irrespective of their often mundane subject matter, oaths were held to be religious acts. Prolific oath-taking, however, led to frequent oath-breaking. Perjury was therefore a more pressing and broader concept than it is today. It was an offence against God, against oneself and against others. How this crime was prosecuted and punished sheds light on the intersection of religious doctrine, legal systems and social practice in pre-Reformation England. An analysis of perjury also draws attention to a jurisdictional shift that was underway before the Reformation. In 1485, church courts had exercised an extensive cognizance of perjury; by 1535, they no longer did. The most important factor contributing to this decline in ecclesiastical jurisdiction was the constraint imposed by common lawyers on what cases the church courts could hear. Common law defined the crime of perjury more narrowly than did canon law. Hence the contraction of the church's jurisdiction would alter how perjury was perceived.
Journal Article
JONATHAN DAVIS-SECORD. Joinings: Compound Words in Old English Literature
Old English compounds have been widely studied as linguistic entities, in terms of their function in metrical and formulaic composition, and in relation to style. Davis-Secords book embraces this scholarship intelligently, but goes beyond it by assimilating recent work in both literary and linguistic disciplines. He applies translation theory, linguistic neuropsychology, speech genres, and stylistic analysis to compounds and their use in both prose and poetry in useful detail. Generally the focus on specifics (Julianas speeches contain more prosaic compounds than those of other speakers in that poem, e.g. pp. 1069) does not diminish the interest of broader issues (e.g. why Ælfric tends to avoid compounds, Chapter 7). (Author abstract)
Journal Article