Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 11.djvu/272

ON THE LIFE AND DEATH OF EARL GODWINE. GoDWiNE, the great Earl of the West-Saxons, himself the deliverer and virtual ruler of Enoland at one of the most momentous periods of her earlier history, and yet more famous as the father of her last truly native and elective sove- reign, bears nevertheless a character ^vhich has been by many of our historians, both of early and of recent date, handed down to us in the blackest colours. Even those N'ho are merciful to the supposed perjury and usurpation of the son, generally fall without any compunction upon the father ; some, indeed, scarcely mention him without the addition of "traitor," almost as a portion of his style and title. But on looking more narrowly into the annals nearest to his own time, we find that liis crimes become less distinctly visible, while his great and good qualities begin to stand out in more conspicuous colours. It w^as the manifest policy both of Norman and of ecclesiastical writers to cast every possible obloquy upon a family which formed the great obstacle to the establishment of Norman influence, and which was always more or less in disfavour with the Church. Uotli (jJodwine and Harold may be fairly classed among the assertors of the ecclesiastical inde- pendence of England ; but such a title was still less likely than their defence of its political liberty, to win them favour from writers in the interest of the papal see. The accusations against them are in many cases belied by facts, in others they are grossly absurd and trifling ; but it is a very curious study to mark how they originated, and how they are copied from one writer ])y aiu^ther, usually attaching to themselves some fuilher mythical r<';iliir('s by the way. 1 have thcrcfoir thdii^ht it advisable to pay moi'e attention than they in thcinsclvi's deserved to tin; narratives of very late and inferior wi'iters. For what is true in every case applies most especially to this, that it is the pai't of a good historian not only to know what r(!ally did haj)p<;n at a remote jieriod, hut also what intervening ages have cunceiviMl to have happened.