¹ Gransden, A., Historical Writing in England c. 550 to c. 1307 (Ithaca, N.Y., 1974), 318. At the outset, I wish to acknowledge the generous help I have received in making this study. Above all, I am grateful to the librarians who have granted me access to the relevant manuscripts and have arranged for them to be photocopied. Moreover, at an early stage I benefited from the advice and assistance of the late C. R. Cheney; I am similarly obliged to Schafer Williams and Alexandra Mason (see n. 26 below) and to James A. Brundage, Casey Law, and R. Dean Ware. Finally, for the tables, I am indebted to the skill of Paul Hotvedt and Pam LeRow.Google Scholar

² Memoriale fratris Walteri de Coventria: The Historical Collections of Walter of Coventry, ed. Stubbs, W., 2 vols., Rolls Series, no. 58 (London, 1872–73) 2:vii. Cited hereafter as Walt. Cov. plus volume, page, and line numbers (e.g., 2:278/11).Google Scholar

³ Holt, J. C., Magna Carta, 2d ed. (Cambridge, 1992), 223. Likewise, , “this surprisingly accurate and sympathetic account survives in the chronicle of Barnwell priory” (215). Holt had planned to edit the “Barnwell” annals 1202–26 for the Oxford Medieval Texts series (Gransden, , Historical Writing, 339, n. 161) but has now abandoned the project (personal communication).Google Scholar

⁴ The “Barnwell” annals 1202–26 fill 84 pages in the Rolls edition (Walt. Cov., 2:196–279).Google Scholar

⁵ Walt. Cov., l:xx, xxii.Google Scholar

⁶ Walt. Cov., l:xx–xxi.Google Scholar

⁷ A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1912) 1:405. On the meaning of memoriale, see also Ker, N. R., Medieval Libraries of Great Britain, 2d ed., Royal Historical Society, Guides and Handbooks, no. 3 (London, 1964), 329. Further references in Luard, H. R., ed., Matthaei Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani Chronica majora, 7 vols., Rolls Series, no. 57 (London, 1872–83) 2:xii, n. 2; Russell, J. C., Dictionary of Writers of Thirteenth Century England, in Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, Special Supplement, no. 3 (London, n. d. [1936]), 176.Google Scholar

⁸ James, , Descriptive Catalogue, 1:404.Google Scholar

⁹ Walt. Cov., l:xxiii–xxvi, xxx–xxxiv. For the use of dominus , see The Chronicle of St Mary's Abbey, York, ed. Craster, H. H. E. and Thornton, M. E., Surtees Society 148 (London, 1934).Google Scholar

¹⁰ Walt. Cov., l:xl, xlv–xlvii. See also Coxe, H. O., Catalogus codicum MSS. qui in collegiis aulisque Oxoniensibus hodie adservantur, 2 (Oxford, 1852).Google Scholar

¹¹ Walt. Cov., l:xxxix.Google Scholar

¹² Thomas Gale (d. 1702) collated several manuscripts in the margin of his copy of Walter of Coventry, today preserved as Cambridge, Trinity College, MS Gale O. xi (Walt. Cov., l:xii). Stubbs could not identify some of Gale's sources for certain (l:xxviii–xxx), but he had no doubt that the manuscript Gale cited simply as “Cotton” was Vitellius E. xiii (2:227, n. 4, and 240, n. 5).Google Scholar

¹³ Inc. “Inter scripturae sacrae cronographos prima causa dissentionum translationum est varietas.” Quoted by Hardy, T. D., Descriptive Catalogue of Materials Relating to the History of Great Britain and Ireland, 4 vols., Rolls Series, no. 26 (London, 1862–71) 3:344.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Stubbs stated that there is a change of hand on fol. 105v^b at the close of the 1225 annal (Walt. Cov., l:xlii), but he was mistaken. An insignificant change can be perceived on fol. 110v, in the annal for 1228, for there the ink becomes lighter and the characters slightly larger, but as the break occurs in midsentence, it is hardly possible that the exemplar ended at that point. A similar variation is found on fol. 89v within the annal for 1217.Google Scholar

¹⁵ In Stubbs's edition, the CMV annals 1002–1201 occupy 630 printed pages, whereas A's annals A.D. 1–1201, though beginning a millennium earlier, would cover hardly more than 60 such pages.Google Scholar

¹⁶ The first blank occurs on the first folio of the new quire: “nstabat,” fol. 103r = Walt. Cov., 2:272/31. Similar blanks are left through the last annal, for 1232.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Walt. Cov., l:xli; cf. 2:vii, lxxxvi; Stubbs admitted the possibility “that it existed in an earlier form before it was incorporated in the Barnwell book” but preferred the traditional ascription to a canon of Barnwell (2: viii).Google Scholar

¹⁸ MGH SS 27 (1885), 185, n. 6. Coggeshall relates the tale.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Changes of head in the period 1202–25 are recorded for seventeen religious houses: Peterborough, Crowland, Thorney, Abingdon, Battle, Burton, Bury, St. Augustine's Canterbury, Evesham, Holme St. Benets, Leicester, Ramsey, Reading, Selby, Waltham, Westminster, Whitby.Google Scholar

²⁰ Quoted by Stubbs, , Walt. Cov., 2:212, n. 4, and 2:218, n. 1 (A 81r and 83r).Google Scholar

²¹ Prior William of Bedford was elected on 23 Oct. 1213 and died on 28 Nov. according to the Liber memorandorum ecclesie de Bernewelle [MS Harley 3601, ca. 1296], ed. Clark, J. W. (Cambridge, 1907), 67–68; but A's annotator notes the obit at the end of the annal for 1214, thereby extending the prior's term by a year.Google Scholar

²² “Dominus Johannes Whaddum Canonicus Et Vicarius De Waterbeche plantavit cimitorium sancti Egidii De Bernwell’ huiusmodi debitoribus. Anno domini m.cccc.xl.iiii.” (A 68v, s.a. 1093). Gransden's transcription has him planting “arboribus viridibus” (Historical Writing, 339, n. 162), not establishing a cemetery “huiusmodi debitoribus.” The marginal “huiusmodi” apparently refers to the text — at this point from Florence of Worcester — which tells how St. Margaret “servos et ancillas Dei dilexit et honoravit” by providing food and clothing to the poor (Walt. Cov., 1:108). Barnwell had received two-thirds of the tithes of Waterbeach as part of its original endowment in 1092, and a century later the church itself was under the priory's control: see Liber memorandorum, xxxiv, xxxvi, 40, 66. In 1468, Johannes Waddon was prior of Barnwell (ibid., 5, n. 1).Google Scholar

²³ Extracts from the A-annals 1190, 1194, 1198, 1228 are quoted by Stubbs, , Walt. Cov., l:xli, n. 2. C. R. Cheney pointed out to me that a Crowland provenance for A was more likely than Barnwell, which I had accepted on Stubbs's authority in “An Eyewitness Account of the 1225 Council of Bourges,” Studia Gratiana 12 (1967): 61–80, at 68.Google Scholar

²⁴ Walt. Cov., 2:231, at n. 3. Cf. Gransden, , Historical Writing, 340.Google Scholar

²⁵ If the stemma I am proposing is correct, the order of the 1216 annal in CMV should also be found in L. This would confirm the present hypothesis that the altered order of the annal is peculiar to A.Google Scholar

²⁶ Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1894–1899 (London, 1901), 195–96; cf. vii. I am indebted to the late Schafer Williams, who kindly examined the manuscript for me in 1969, and to Alexandra Mason, who did likewise in 1977; I examined it myself in 1984.Google Scholar

²⁷ Text similar to that of Florence in Lambeth MS 42 (Abingdon, saec. xii ex.). The Cat. Add. 1894–99 also noted an Abingdon entry in L at A.D. 948.Google Scholar

²⁸ Annals of the first millennium similar to those found in A were incorporated into the chronicle of “John of Peterborough” (S), which, as we shall see, borrowed much from Alpha. See also Walt. Cov., l:xxxix, n. 1, and xlii, n. 2.Google Scholar

²⁹ Namely items r–u in Table 3 = Walt. Cov., 2:274–79.Google Scholar

³⁰ Stubbs thought they were taken directly from MS Cotton Julius A. xi (Walt. Cov., l:xliii), but Cat. Add. 1894–99 identifies L as the immediate source (p. 196). Neither A nor L was included among the Crowland books listed in the highly selective Franciscan finding-list (saec. xiv in.) published by Boese, H., “Ein mittelalterliches Bücherverzeichnis von Croyland Abbey,” Bibliothek, Bibliothekar, Bibliothekswissenschaft: Festschrift Joris Vorstius zum 60. Geburtstag dargebracht, ed. Roloff, Heinrich (Leipzig, 1954), 286–95.Google Scholar

³¹ Walt. Cov., l:xxxv–xliv.Google Scholar

³² E.g., as set forth by Maas, Paul, Textual Criticism, trans. Flower, B. (Oxford, 1958).Google Scholar

³³ In Stubbs's edition, the passage collated begins “Harum bajulus litterarum” and runs to the end of the chronicle (Walt. Cov., 2:274–79); cf. Tables 3 and 4 below, items r-v. Google Scholar

³⁴ E.g. Walt. Cov., l:xxxviii; 2:viii.Google Scholar

³⁵ MGH SS 27:185, n. 6, citing Walt. Cov., 2:256, n. 3: provide CMV] om. A. The correct reading is confirmed by the patent-roll text printed in Councils and Synods with Other Documents Relating to the English Church, 2, ed. Powicke, F. M. and Cheney, C. R., part 1 (Oxford, 1964), 160.Google Scholar

³⁶ Walt. Cov., 2:276/11: suadebant? ACM] suadebant? Nonne ad id toto videbantur desiderio aspirare? Tunc tamen sedes apostolica distulit, ne videretur ad hoc concilium evocasse (convocasse SaSb) AvSaSb.Google Scholar

³⁷ Walt. Cov., l:xlii.Google Scholar

³⁸ Walt Cov., 2:274–79.Google Scholar

³⁹ Stubbs noted s.a. 1190 two instances in which M omits a portion of Hoveden's text that is found in C: Walt. Cov., 1:398, n. 6 (5 words) and n. 7 (11 words).Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Walt. Cov., l:xlv–xlvii.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Walt. Cov., l:xliv, n. 4.Google Scholar

⁴² Walt. Cov., 2:230, n. 5.Google Scholar

⁴³ Walt. Cov. , 2:233, n. 1.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Walt. Cov., 2:255, n. 2.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Walt. Cov., 2:227, n. 4. V's reading is known from Gale's collation. If L is Beta's exemplar, as I argue above, then it should be illegible at this point, which would confirm my reconstruction.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Walt. Cov., 2:240, n. 5 (Gale's collation).Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Walt. Cov., l:xxxix.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ I collated a photocopy of L against Stubbs's text and variants in Walt. Cov., 2:254–60; the fragments of L can be identified with the text on 261–73 but presented no variants. In particular it should be noted that several variants indicate that L cannot have been derived from A: 2:256/35 provide CLM] om. A; 2:260/37 res CLM] rex A.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Walt. Cov., l:xxxv–xxxvii.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Walt. Cov., l:xxxviii, xli; Hardy, , Descriptive Catalogue, 3:345.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Walt. Cov., 1:184–86, 308–9. The Spalding annalist (“John of Peterborough”) also drew on these annals (n. 74 below).Google Scholar

⁵² Walt. Cov., l:xxxv–xliv.Google Scholar

⁵³ See text after n. 27 above.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ The papal legate Otto arrived in England in September 1225, as reported in item r, bearing q, Honorius Ill's undated letter Certum est fili. Strangely, this letter is not recorded either by Potthast or by Pressutti, P., Regesta Honorii papae III, 2 vols. (Rome, 1888–95). Its authenticity is shown by a follow-up letter, Recolentes fida utiliaque, 11 July 1226 (Pressutti 6016), the text of which is printed by Horoy, C. A., Honorii III Romani pontificis opera omnia, 5 vols., Medii aevi bibliotheca patristica 1–5 (Paris, 1879–82) 5:123–26, no. 174, from La Porte du Theil's transcript. The nuncio's name there is erroneously given as Octavianus, doubtless because the transcriber wrongly expanded Octo (= Otto) or an abbreviation therefor; otherwise the mission of 1225 is described in unmistakable detail. The letter was probably written in mid-August, at the same time as one addressed jointly to Archbishop Langton and “magistro Ottoni”: Dilectis filiis abbate, 13 Aug. 1225, Pressutti 5601. This date is consistent with the normal travel time from the curia to England, which was about a month.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Walt. Cov., l:xlv–xlvii, 2:vii.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ On Crowland elements in Barnwell-Coventry, see Gransden, , Historical Writing, 339–40.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Walt. Cov., l:xlii, xliv.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ London, Society of Antiquaries, MS 60. Annals 1122–1294 (fols. 68r-132v) ed. Stapleton, T. [and Bruce, J.] as Chronicon Petroburgense, Camden Society, o.s. 47 (London, 1849), 1–155. For description, see Davis, G. R. C., Medieval Cartularies of Great Britain, A Short Catalogue (London, 1958), 86, no. 754.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Powicke, F. M., The Thirteenth Century, 1216–1307, 2d ed., Oxford History of England, 4 (Oxford, 1962), 376–77.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ No annals in N for 1231, 1234, 1244, 1255–57, 1260–62, 1269–71. See Chronicon Petroburgense, vii–xiv.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Chronicon Petroburgense, 7–8.Google Scholar

⁶² Ibid., 8–9.Google Scholar

⁶³ Statutes of the Realm, 1 (London, 1810), 22, 26. Cf. Councils and Synods, 2.1:137.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ The bishops’ excommunication of those who declared their income fraudulently to the assessors was probably proclaimed on the same occasion as that against violators of Magna Carta. Cf. Councils and Synods, 2.1:137, n. 1.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Acta Stephani Langton Cantuariensis archiepiscopi A.D. 1207–28, ed. Major, K., Canterbury and York Society, no. 50 (Oxford, 1950), 106–7, no. 88; Councils and Synods, 2.1:161–62. Major restored the damaged Salisbury text from Walt. Cov., 2:256–57. Instead of the incipit “Cum necesse” (j), the Salisbury copy has “Cum igitur necesse.” Following an error by the editor of the Salisbury Register (Rolls Series, no. 78, 1:367), Major mistook xvi. kal. Julii to be 16 July; Cheney gives the correct date, 16 June. He assigns both of Langton's letters to “May-June 1226.” Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Acta Langton, ed. Major, , 107–8, no. 89; Councils and Synods, 2.1:162. The letter begins with a reference to (h): “A memoria vestra non credimus excidisse quanta diligentia scripserit dominus papa nobis et vobis necnon ecclesie Anglicane ut domino regi secundum facultates ecclesiarum nostrarum competens auxilium faceremus” (Cheney's ed.).Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Councils and Synods, 2.1:158–65, esp. nos. I, II, IIIb.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ This alteration in the accounting system may explain why the tax was still being collected in 1226. The accounts were audited in January and June 1226; some were still due in December 1226, and the final accounting was made shortly after January 1227. Mitchell, S. K., Studies in Taxation under John and Henry III, Yale Historical Publications, no. 2 (New Haven, 1914), 164, nn. 224–25. Cazel, F. A., “The Fifteenth of 1225,” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 24 (1961): 68, n. 1.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ To be on the safe side, I have assumed that “in quaternione sequenti” (N 72v) refers to N 74–77, which falls between the annals 1230 and 1232. The edition simply states (13): “At the bottom of fol. lxxiii. verso, is this entry: — M^oc^oc^oxxxi. Quere in quinto folio. The four next leaves are indexes, and other matters, but on the fifth leaf the Chronicle continues — (fol. lxxviii.r^o.).” If upon examination there proved to be no copy of the Bedford charter on N 74–77, it would then follow that the quire in question, and the reference to it, were in Alpha.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ MS Cotton Claudius A. v, fols. 2–45: Chronicon, saec. xiv ex., attributed to Peterborough by ex-libris (Ker, , Medieval Libraries, 151). Ed. Giles, J. A., Chronicon Angliae Petriburgense, Caxton Society, no. 2 (London, 1845); this is a revision of the 1723 edition by J. Sparke.Google Scholar

⁷¹ S has been inscribed, “Chronicon Angliae per Johannem Abbatem Burgi Sancti Petri,” quoted by Giles (n. 70 above), xi. For attempts to identify the author, see the article “John of Peterborough” in the Dictionary of National Biography , 29 (1892), 451; Walt. Cov., l:xliv; Liebermann, F., “Ueber ostenglische Geschichtsquellen des 12., 13., 14., Jahrhunderts, besonders den falschen Ingulf,” Neues Archiv der Gesellschaft für ältere deutsche Geschichtskunde 18 (1893): 227–67, at 235–36. Ker does not consider such formulas as a statement of authorship: “If an inscription consists only of the word per followed by a personal name in the accusative case, it may be uncertain whether the person named wrote the manuscript, procured or gave it, or merely handed it over” (Medieval Libraries, 330). The reference in S is probably to John Deeping, abbot of Peterborough 1408–38, as dated by Dugdale, W., Monasticon Anglicanum, 2d ed., 1 (London, 1817), 361. The manuscript itself was written ca. 1380, well before Deeping's abbacy, as Liebermann pointed out (“Ueber ostenglische Geschichtsquellen,” 235–36).Google Scholar

⁷² Chronicon Angliae Petriburgense, 49, 57–58, 131, 139–41, 149, 157, 166, 170. The last annals (1354–58) omit to mention either Spalding or her prior.Google Scholar

⁷³ Chronicon Angliae Petriburgense, 36, 151. Noted by Liebermann, MGH SS 27:183.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Walt. Cov., l:xxxvii. Liebermann, , “Ostenglische Geschichtsquellen” (n. 71 above), 233. The BM catalogue description (see at n. 26 above), expressly notes the presence of these annals in L.Google Scholar

⁷⁵ A Hungarian archbishop present at Becket's translation in 1220 is qualified Strigonensi only in S. Even more convincing is the substitution of secum detulit, in quibus idem papa (ed. Giles, , 123) for the obviously corrupt praecipiens (see Walt. Cov., 2:244/8).Google Scholar

⁷⁶ In L, the closing sentence of f is paraphrased at the opening of k, but S preserves no trace of this doublet. Presumably when L's redactor inserted ghij, to pick up the thread of his narrative he composed item (k), “Cum igitur rex … mobilium concesserunt.” Spalding (ed. Giles, , 127) retains the original transition (italics in common with L): “(f) In concilio apud Londoniam rex Henricus concessit libertates, tam ecclesiae quam regni, a forestis, sicut chartae suae inde confectae testantur. Item in eodem concilio, pro praedictarum libertatum concessione, quinta decima domino regi omnium mobilium, de communi assensu, per totam Angliam concessa est; (k) exceptis de equitaturis … Hospitalariorum.” The “pro libertatibus” of the rubric (e) may echo in the second sentence.Google Scholar

⁷⁷ The source, Martin of Troppau, stated the length of the pontificates of Honorius III and Gregory IX but gave no anno Domini, hence Spalding's error: MGH SS 22 (1872), 439.Google Scholar

⁷⁸ Chronicon Angliae Petriburgense, 128–29; cf. Walt. Cov., 2:272/6–30.Google Scholar

⁷⁹ See n. 69 above.Google Scholar

⁸⁰ Handbook of British Chronology, 3d ed., ed. Fryde, E. B. et al., Royal Historical Society, Guides and Handbooks, no. 2 (London, 1986), 244.Google Scholar

⁸¹ S, ed. Giles, , 129–30; N, ed. Stapleton, , 9–10.Google Scholar

⁸² In MS Cotton Julius A. xi: see Walt. Cov., l:xxxv, n. 1, and text after n. 49 above.Google Scholar

⁸³ Stubbs, similarly wavering between Peterborough and Crowland as the provenance of A, likewise assigned it to “the Fen country”: Walt. Cov., l:xliv.Google Scholar