Page:Somerset Historical Essays.djvu/63

 unfavorable contrast to the terseness of the clause: ' ideo terrenis caelestia et caducis aeterna mercanda sunt.'

Exactly the same opening is found in B. C. S. 64 (except that it has 'possumus', not 'poterimus'), another grant by Caedwalla to Wilfrid, A.D. 683. This is a Chichester charter, drawn up in much the same language as the Pagham charter, but with an obviously impossible signature. Two Worcester charters (B. C. S. 187, 218) have the same amplification of the moral, but in a corrupted form: the former of these was supposed to be a contemporary document of a. d. 759, but it is now regarded as of later date (see Stevenson, loc. tit., p. 695 n.); the latter also claims to be of the middle of the eighth century, but we have only a copy of it in Hemming's chartulary.

Malmesbury has a special form of the text and its moral. Thus B. C. S. 58 (dated 681) begins thus:

In nomine domini dei nostri Jhesu Christi salvatoris.

Nichil intulimus (ut apostolicum confirmat oraculum) in hunc mundum, nee auferre quid possumus: iccirco terrenis ac caducis aeterna ac mansura mercanda sunt.

We note here the omission of 'verum'. B. C. S. 59 (680 for 681) has the same form, save that it does not omit verum'. Variations of the same form, with 'verum' omitted, are found in B. C. S. 70 and 279. The Malmesbury charters are for the most part quite untrustworthy.

There are three Worcester charters in which 'verum' is omitted (B. C. S. 164, 216, 701); but the omission does not seem to occur anywhere else. In these three charters the text is not followed by the moral: and this is the case with those to which we now go on to refer.

Abingdon, another home of forgery, has a peculiar form of the text. It prefixes Job i. 21: 'Nudus egressus sum,' &c, and for our text it reads:

&hellip; verum nee ab eo auferre quid poterimus.

This is found in B. C. S. 680 (Athelstan); 1058, 1080, 1169, 1171, 1172 (all Edgar).

Winchester occasionally has this form (B. C. S. 1114, 1149, 1230); but it occurs nowhere else. We have noticed that 'poterimus' is found in Cod. Boern.

We may add two isolated forms: B. C. S. 182, which has 'sed' for 'verum', and B. C. S. 206, which has 'veruntamen' (cf. Cod. Fuldensis).

The perusal and classification of these various forms may perhaps be of service to students of the chartularies in which they occur. I shall not venture to comment on them further than to say that we turn back with relief to the simple form in our two Glastonbury charters, confirmed in our belief that here more surely than in any of the rest we have the language of the seventh century.