Such a continuous chain of occurrences as that exhibited in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, would, it is reasonable to suppose, display a gradation of changes in the Anglo-Saxon tongue, during the two centuries from the time of Ælfred to the death of Harold: such is not, however, the case, as the language is the same throughout, with regard both to its vocabulary and its inflexions; nor until some time after the Conquest do we observe any material corruptions; they then begin to be but too manifest. Yet, even here we have hardly a just criterion in the Peterborough, or Laudian, manuscript, much of the later parts of which are evidently the work of illiterate, or even foreign, monks, glaringly ignorant of the use of genders and cases. From this period may be dated the break-up of the old "English undefiled." The evil was for some time partial in its influence: its focus was the Norman court; the Saxon, at least its vocabulary, long kept its ground in the country: as an example of this may be compared the courtly jargon of Chaucer with the rugged downright Saxon of Piers Ploughman.
I regret my inability to supply any information relative to the authors of the poetic effusions in the Saxon Chronicle. Are they by the writers of the prose narrative, or are they only insertions? The latter seems to me the more probable opinion. Of these, the first, not only in the order of time, but in excellence, is the ode on the Battle of Brunnanburh (A.D. 937); and a matter it is of regret that the name of its author has irrecoverably perished. Of the other pieces, little can be said in praise; they are rather rhythmical and alliterative prose than poetry; while, on the other hand, the effusion on the assassination of king Eadward, and the account of the murder of the young prince Ælfred, son of the Confessor, may be regarded as unmetrical poetry. In preceding editions of the Chronicle an attempt has been made to reduce them to metrical
