The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was not one document but a collection of chronicles documenting history from Caesar’s invasions of Britain onwards. Originally there was one manuscript, written by monks in the late 9th century, of which copies were made and distributed to other monasteries, where they were copied and recopied and independently updated as the years went by. What survives today is all or part of nine manuscripts, though none of them are the original versions. Seven of the manuscripts are in the British Library, one in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and one in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.
The original chronicle was written somewhere in Wessex, probably during the reign of Alfred the Great (reigned 871-899). Alfred encouraged education, but it’s not known whether he had anything to do with the chronicle being started. The oldest surviving version is from Winchester and was written by one scribe up to the year 891, after which other scribes added new entries. Other surviving versions were written in Abingdon, Worcester, Canterbury and Peterborough at varying dates. The Peterborough chronicle is the latest, a copy made after a fire at the monastery in 1116 and then updated until 1154, the year Henry II came to the throne.
The chronicles are in the form of annals, a year-by-year account of events. The historical material came from a variety of sources, especially the Venerable Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, but also including some small encyclopedias of world history, and sagas. Contemporary material was then added year by year at the different monasteries. This meant that national events were often recorded in different ways – some in great detail, some as just bare facts – and there are many entries about purely local events that appear only in one chronicle.
One remarkable fact about all the chronicles – and the reason they’re called Anglo-Saxon – is that they’re written not in Latin but in the vernacular, i.e. Old English. One chronicle, written in Canterbury, includes a Latin translation alongside, while the last entries in the Peterborough chronicle, added in 1154, are in Middle English.
How reliable is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as a source? There are certainly some errors and also discrepancies between the surviving versions, not surprisingly as they were written in different places and by scribes with different biases, so that some entries look like political propaganda. There is some variation in dates, partly accounted for by different calendars being used – some began the new year at Christmas, some on 25 March and some even in September. Overall, though, the chronicles aimed to record historical facts – rather than, for instance, making things up in the style of Geoffrey of Monmouth. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is the single most important source for the period in England between the departure of the Romans and the decades following the Norman Conquest. It contains much information not recorded anywhere else, and it’s also important for the history of the English language.
A few entries that mention London:
457. This year Hengest and Esc fought with the Britons on the spot that is called Crayford, and there slew four thousand men. The Britons then forsook the land of Kent, and in great consternation fled to London.
604. This year Augustine consecrated two bishops, Mellitus and Justus. Mellitus he sent to preach baptism to the East-Saxons. Their king was called Seabert, the son of Ricola, Ethelbert’s sister, whom Ethelbert placed there as king. Ethelbert also gave Mellitus the bishopric of London; and to Justus he gave the bishopric of Rochester, which is twenty-four miles from Canterbury.
851. This year Alderman Ceorl, with the men of Devonshire, fought the heathen army at Wemburg, and after making great slaughter obtained the victory. The same year King Athelstan and Alderman Elchere fought in their ships, and slew a large army at Sandwich in Kent, taking nine ships and dispersing the rest. The heathens now for the first time remained over winter in the Isle of Thanet. The same year came three hundred and fifty ships into the mouth of the Thames; the crew of which went upon land, and stormed Canterbury and London; putting to flight Bertulf, king of the Mercians, with his army; and then marched southward over the Thames into Surrey. Here Ethelwulf and his son Ethelbald, at the head of the West-Saxon army, fought with them at Ockley, and made the greatest slaughter of the heathen army that we have ever heard reported to this present day. There also they obtained the victory.
886. This year went the army back again to the west, that before were bent eastward; and proceeding upwards along the Seine, fixed their winter-quarters in the city of Paris. The same year also King Alfred fortified the city of London; and the whole English nation turned to him, except that part of it which was held captive by the Danes. He then committed the city to the care of Alderman Ethered, to hold it under him.
Sources
Wikipedia
Anne Savage, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, Book Club Associates, 1992
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle online: http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/657/pg657-images.html
Carol Stanley
cityoflondonhistory 