Page:A literal translation of the Saxon Chronicle.djvu/152

140 nothing there but old walls and wild woods. He found also hidden in the old wall the records which the abbot Headda had formerly written, how King Wulfhere and his brother Æthelred had built the monastery, and had made it free of the King, of the Bishop, and of all earthly service; and how the Pope Agatho had confirmed this with his rescript, and the Archbishop Deusdedit also. He then caused the monastery to be rebuilt, and he appointed an abbot whose name was Aldulf, and he peopled that place with monks, which was before a wilderness. Then he came to the King, and caused him to look at the writings which had been found, and the King then answered and said, "I King Edgar, before God and in presence of the Archbishop Dunstan, do this day grant to St. Peter's monastery of Medeshamstede, freedom from subjection to the King and to the Bishop, and do endow it with all these adjoining villages, to wit, Æst-feld (Eastfield), and Dodes-thorp (Dasthorp), and Ege (Eye), and Pastun (Paston). And I so make it free, that no Bishop shall have any authority over it, but the abbot of the monastery alone And I give the town called Undela (Oundle) with all the land belonging to it, which is called the Eahte hundred, with the markets