Page:St. Oswald and the Church of Worcester.djvu/30



On this charter Mr. Stevenson expresses no opinion.

It is verbally the same as B. C. S. 210, Offa's grant of lands to Ridda with reversion to the monastery of Breodun, only the necessary variations being made.

For ad monasterium vocabulo æt Breodune we have ad monasterium sanctae Mariae vocabulo Ƿeogerna Ceastre.

The bounds in B.C.S. 210 are given briefly and in Latin. Here, however, they are much fuller and in Anglo-Saxon.

The witnesses are with one exception the same in both documents.

There is thus little to help us to distinguish between these two charters as regards the question of genuineness. But it is important to observe that the church of Worcester showed another charter for the five hides at Esig in Gloucestershire, viz. B. C. S. 487, a grant of King Burgred in the next century, A.D. 855. This is somewhat inconsistent with the grant of King Offa c. A.D. 775.

We cannot, therefore, regard this charter (B. C. S. 226) as affording any solid evidence of the existence of St Mary's church in the eighth century. It is almost certainly a forgery based on B. C. S. 210.

This is a duplicate, mutatis mutandis, of B. C. S. 246, a grant to the monastery of Clive, co. Gloucester, which is accepted by Mr. Stevenson; but he regards the present charter as doubtful.

In the inserted passage, qua eandem æcclesiam Æthilbaldus rex avo meo Eanulfo conscripsit, we seem to have a confusion with the church of Breodun, which in B. C. S. 234 and 236 is ascribed to this Eanulf, grandfather of Offa, as its founder. The passage, which is unintelligible as it stands, is nearly identical with a passage in B. C. S. 273, where also it is followed by the clause tamdiu fides Christiana apud Anglos in Brittania maneat. This clause is also found in B. C. S. 236 (just mentioned); but otherwise not in any charter of the eighth century.

The three charters B. C. S. 231, 236, 273, are thus closely connected; and the least trustworthy of the three seems to be B. C. S. 231.

This charter is one of those transcribed in Smith's Bede; but it is