r '/ ^ ■.^^ :> . .Ifef^^^V IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-S) 1.0 I.I |50 *■■ u 13^ ii Ut Hli AS 12.0 2.5 12.2 K 1.8 Photographic Sciences Corporation 4* "» wiig^i>Wl!lt|iiilii8iiiH>ilin ^i^ was Peter Le Neve, Esq., Norroy King-at-Arms, and their first Secre* li. at a niOARDUa COUINENSIS. 7 to Roman history, which, with tho aid of his namu, obtained such uni- vorsal and enduring orodenuo. Ill tho year 1350, when Abbot Nicholas do Lythington ruled over tho licnediotino IMonastory of St. I'otcr, Westminster, llichiird of Cirencester, a native of tho ancient city In Glouccstcrshiro from whence his name is derived, entered that .Afonnstcry, at an early ago. Hence, when tho fume of his literary labours had {:;ivon importance to his name, ho was sometimes referred to as tho Monk of Westminster. Nothing is known of his family; though it has boon inferred from tho education ho had received, in an ago when facilities for tho attain- ment of any high intellectual culture wore beyond tho reach of tho people at largo, that his relatives must have belonged to a superior rank in society. Education, however, was then exclusively in tho hands of tho Church ; and ho may havo been admitted to the enjoy- ment of its advantages in return for his own eager desire for know- ledge. Ilis name occurs in documents of various dates, pertaining to the monastery, up to tho closing year of tho century. He obtained in 1391, a licence to visit Rome, from Abbot William, of Colchester, who records therein the virtues and piety of the literary monk, and his regularity in fulSlling all tho requirements of Rencdictino rule. Ho appears to have been an inmate of the Abbey infirmary in 1401, where he died in that or tho following year; and doubtless his ashes lie in the neighbouring cloisters, outsido that Poet's Corner to which tho ambition of England's later generations of literary men turns in seeking for death's rarest honours. The genuine historical work of Richard of Cirencester is his " Speculum Historialo do Gestis regum Angliie." His other authentic works are theological ; his " Tractatus super Syui- bolum Majus at Minus;" and his " Liber do OiBciis Ecclcsiasticis." But whatever rightful merit pertained to him, has been eclipsed by tho spurious reputRtion which has attached to his name since tho middle of the eighteenth century, as a monk of such enlightened zeal, as tu have ransacked the libraries and ecclesiastical establishments of Eng- land, and explored its ancient remains, with a view to the elucidation of Roman Britain. The fault of the Tractate, viewed simply as an ingenious invention, is that it is too good for what it professes to be. To Whitaker, Roy, Pinkerton, Chalmers, and all later Roman antiquaries, the idea of being able to retrace the Watling, Iknield, or Errayn Street, and 8 RI0ARDU8 OORINCNBIi, royiow thoir ravonrito o'jccta of study undor the guidance of an intcllinont observer of the fourfocnth century, wns poiwesucd of too fascinating o charm to bo lightly rcjootc('. Dr. Uruce Ncarchos in Tain for any trnco, olong tho lino of tho Ilomnn Woll, of what was abun- dantly manifest to lid ""ley littlo more thnn n century before. What would ho not give to ki iw how it looked to iho eyes of tho good monk, Richard, in tho ycur 13r)0, before tho waste of five centuries hadand nnnaxcd." Nothing could bo better devised for Hccurin;» a reception to iho reputed discovery. Kvoty nook and cranny of Uoman Kn^linid had already been ranwiekod with lovin;; zeal by the Liticohisliiro aniii|uaryj iraai,'ination bad boon called in wlicro facts failed, to eku out a coherent narrative; but still muci. rctnaiii'd ob^'curo, I'ut here w:is the pulitcly approoiativo foreign mivant. full of respect for the Doctor and praise of his works; and, in the midst of all Iiis pleasant " candour and respect," dropping inoidentully the hint of a recovered history of Roman IJritain, an it presented itself to the eyes of an antiquarian brother of the jionodietino ^lonastory of St. Peter, in the year I'SriO, with all that the vrasto of five centuries had since defaced and obliterated. Soon aflor the receipt of IJortram's first letter. Dr. Stukcley was presented to tho Rectory of St. Ooorgo the Martyr, Queen Square, London ; and so was permanently established within easy access to his favourite literary associates, whoso meetings were now held in tho Mitre Tavern, Fleet Street, until their removal, in 1753, to a house of their own in Chancery Lane. Tho stimulus of such society speedily manifested its influence. He had not, apparently, while resident at Stamford, fully appreciated the advantages of a history of Roman Britain, as studied by an observer of tho fourteenth century; or been, as ho .says, "solicitous about Richard of Westminster." But, (h he writes In 1747, " in November, that year, the Duke of Montagu, who was pleas'd to have a favour for me, drew mo from a beloved retiretnont, ■where I proposed to spend tho remainder of my life ; " and so ho gucs on to state : " when I became fix'd in London, I thought it proper to cultivate my Copenhagen correspondence, and I received another Latin letter from Mr. Oramm ; and soon after an account of his death, and a print of him in profile." Of his Danish Majesty's privy-counsellor and chief librarian, a word or two more may be needful before the close ; but it was not till after tho news of his deaili that the correspondence with Bertram was renew- ed, and his great literary discovery actually transcribed. The discus- sions with the Gales, Talman, Vertuc, and other antiquaries at the Mitre meetings, soon fanned the old zeal into renewed fervour ; and, as Dr. Stukeley tolls us, he " began to think of the manuscript, and desired /;■/ 10 KIOABDUS C0RINEN8I8. some little extract from it j then an imitation of the hand-wviting, which I showed to my late friend, Mr. Caslcy, Keeper in the Cotton Library, who immediately pronounced it to be 400 years old. I pressed Mr. Bertram to get the manuscript into his hands, if possible ; which at length, with some diflSculty he accomplished ; and on my solicitation sent me, in letters, a transcript of the whole, and at last a copy of the map : he having an excellent hand in drawing. Upon perusal, I seriously solicited him to print it, as the greatest treasure we now can boast of in this kind of learning." The date of the reception of the completed transcript and map, we learn from Dr. Stukeley's Journal, extracts from which appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine for August, 1835. He thus writes, under date, March 1st, 174:8-9 : " I ree'd from my friend, Jlr. Bertram of Copen- hagen, a copy of his curious IMS. of Ric'us Westmonasteriensis with the map— t'is a most valuable curiosity to the antiquitys of Brittan, being compiled out of old manuscripts in Westminster Library, now lost ;" and by the 31st of the same month he is able to record in his journal : " I finished the translation of liicardus Westmonasteriensis." Whatever may have been the cause of Dr. Stukeley's indifference on first receiving Bertram's hint of his reputed discovery, his zeal now became unbounded ; and the reception of his labours by European scholars and historians left him no reason to doubt that it was ex- pended in a worthy cause. In 1757, he published the " Itinerary," with an abstract of the remaining portions of the work. In professed obedience to his urgent entreaties, Bertram himself, in the following year, put the whole to press, and published at Copenhagen, a volume in which Richard figures alongside of Gildas and Nennius, under the title " Britannicarum Gentium Historia; Antiqua) Scriptures tres : Ricar- dus Corinensis, Gildas Badonicus, Nennius Banchorensis, &c." The book was in immediate demand, and, if only genuine, — which nobody then doubted, — well merited the most careful study. The Itinerary contains eighteen Itei-s, professedly compiled by Richard from certain fragments written by a Roman General, — supposed by Stukeley, in defiance of all possibilities, to have been Agricola j — and from Ptolemy and other authors. Richard, indeed, in a style won- derfully unlike that of a monkish historian, takes credit to himsolf for having altered the work, as he hopes for the better, with their assistance. The Itinerary of Antoninus, the most ample record on the subject, contains references to one hi:ndred and thirteen Roman stations, while A, BICAEDU8 C0RINENSI8. 11 10 hand-writing, r in the Cotton old. I pressed )ossiblo ; which 1 my solicitation it a. copy of the Ipon perusal, I ire we now can 3t and map, we appeared in the ites, under date, rtram of Copen- asteriensis with itys of Brittan, r Library, now record in his lonasteriensis," fa indifference 7, his zeal now 3 by European that it was ex- le " Itinerary," In professed the following agen, a volume lius, under the res tres : Ricar- iis, &c." The -which nobody iled by Richard — supposed by Igricola ; — and 1 a style won- to himsolf for heir assistance, a the subject, stations, while ; I Richard mentions one hundred and seventy-six. To the Scottish antiquary his additions are peculiarly tempting : for he fills up the whole map of Roman Scotland to the Moray Firth, and plants a rauni- cipium on the site of Inverness. No wonder that the Copenhngcn edition soon became scarce. A third edition, forming part of Dr. Stukeley's "Itinerarium Curiosum" in two amply illustrated folio volumes, was issued after his death. In 1809, Hatcher published ano- ther edition, with a translation, commentary, maps, and fac-simile of the MS. A reprint of this followed in 1841 ; and so recently as 1848, it was once more reproduced, as one of " Six Old English Chronicles," edited, with illustrative notes, for "Rohn's Antiquarian Library," by J. A. Giles, D.C.L., late Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford : \7ithout a hint of any suspicion of its genuineness. The time for challenge had seemingly gore by. Authenticated by Gibbon and other historians; by Whitaker, Roy, and the whole fellow- ship of antiquaries: it seemed bcGtting later edilors to elucidate tho text, with no further challenge than consisted with the probable short- comings of a monkish antiquary of the middle ages. Yet the history of the original discovery curiously illustrates the uncritical credulity of that eighteenth century. Bertram, an unknown foreigner, informed Stukeley of the MS. as then " in a friend's hand." By-and-by ho is able to state that, not without some difficulty, it has been transferred from its nameless owner to himself His friend imd patron, the privy- councillor Gramm, possibly left on the mind of Dr. Stukeley the im- pression, after perusal of his " prolix and elaborate Latin cpi.stle," that he had seen it. Rut the privy-councillor died before the MS. was transcribed; Bertram himself died in 1705, and nobody from that day till this ever saw it, or hejrd of any one who had done so. Nevertheless, this work continued, for nearly a century, to be regarded among British scholars as the indispensable hand-book of the Roman antiquary, and still forms a part of some of his most useful text-books. Mr. Ackcrman has printed it in his " Archreological Index," as tho legitimate sequence to Ptolemy, Antoninus, and the Notitia. Still later, Mr. Thomas Wright has followed his example, and in the appen- dix to his " Celt, Roman, and Saxon," after giving the portion of tho Antonine Itinerary relating to Britain, he adds in succession the "Itinerary of Richard," and tho "Ravenna List." When his edition of 1852 appeared, the authority of Richard's Tractate had become mat- ter of discussion, and so the author inserts a saving clause to lighten •* rf y ' 12 EI0ARDU8 COBINENSIS. his critical responsibility. Richard's description of Britain, he says, " appears to be made up of very discordant materials. How much was really the work of a monk of Westminster, and how much we owe to the modern editor, Bertram of Copenhagen, it is not easy to say, for the manuscript has very strangely disappeared. It appears, however, that the old monk had before him a Roman itinerary similar to that of Antoninus, or perhaps a map, from which he extracted the part rela- ting to Uritain. That this Itinerary was not invented by Bertram f, jms clear from the circumstance that his roads, though they are not always the same as those in Antoninus, have been traced where he traces them, and that their existence was certainly not known in Ber- tram's time;" and so having thus asserted thts genuineness of the Itinerary, he proceeds to insert it as the legitimate link between that ascribed to Antoninus Augustus, assigned to A.D. 320, and another derived from the Cosmography of the anonymous writer of Ravenna, compiled not later than the seventh century. This process of inserting the spurious document between two genuine ones was first adopted by Bertram himself; and, while the authentic Gildas and Nennius, selected by him for the purpose, gave an air of genuineness to their new found associate ; the reputed monk- ish antiquary of the fourteenth century appeared to no slight advantage alongside of those credulous Celtic chroniclers. But, in reality the forging of such an Itinerary as Bertram produced required neither learning nor ingenuity. " It appears that the old monk had before him a Roman itinerary similar to that of Antoninus," says the author of the " Celt, Roman, and Saxon," and so it "seems clear" to him that Bertram could not have invented it. But what if Bertram, him- self, had the Antonine Itinerary before him, along with any map of Roman Britain, the feat of making such a one as he produced to Dr. Stukeley lay within the compass of any ordinary school boy's capacity for invention. The Itinerary is nothing more than a series of local names, arranged in columns, in geographical sequence, with the dis- tances in thousand paces, stated in Roman numerals : though this indispensable requirement of an itinerary is omitted by Richard when- ever he is in more than usual uncertainty; or, as Mr. Thomas Wright says : " The text of Richard's Diaphragmata is in some parts imperfect, from the damaged state of the manuscript." In reality the whole Iter Britanniarum of Antoninus is engrafted into Richard's Itinerary, with the exception of less than a dozen towns. The series are broken occa- & BICARDUS CORINENSIS. 18 laiD, Le aays; [ow maoh was lob we owe to isy to say, for ears, however, lilar to that of the part rela- i by Bertram li they are not iced where he known in Ber- inencss of the : between that I, and another >r of Ravenna, between two ind, while the 1 purpose, gave reputed monk- ight advantage in reality the quired neither ok had before says the author clear" to him Bertram, him- ith any map of )roduced to Dr. boy's capacity series of local , with the dia- : though this Richard when- rhomas Wright parts imperfect, ' the whole Iter I Itinerary, with re broken ooca - Bionally, and sometimes inverted ; but just where the measurements of new roads arc in request the manuscript is sure to fail. But indeed the only manuscript ever ascertained to have been seen by Danish or English antiquary is the Bertram correspondence with Dr. Stukeley. Its transcriber was not even put to the trouble of rendering his iters in fourteenth century characters. The manuscripts of Antoninus are numerous ; but the discrepancies in the distances given in different MSS., consequent on the liability to error in the transcription of arbitrary numerals, greatly detract from its value ; so that a genuine itinerary of later date, with trustworthy admeasurements; or oven an accurate transcript of an early manu- script of the Jlinerarium ascribed to Antoninus, would be an important addition to Roman geography. No one, however, has pretended to ac- credit Richard with this virtue ; but in lieu of it, he is appealed to for novel additions to the elder itinerary. "Two imperfect itineraries," says Mr. Thomas Wright, "giving the names and distances from each other of the towns and stations on the principal military roads, have been preserved." The first of these is that of Antoninus j " the other is contained in the work of Richard of Cirencester, and is supposed to have been copied by a monk of the fourteenth century, from an older itinerary or map. They differ little from each other; but our faith in Richard's Itinerary is strengthened by the circumstance that nearly all the roads he gives which arc not in Antoninus have been ascertained to exist." The ground of faith, thus indicated, in Richard, is vague enough when analysed ; for the most he has done is to supply a string of names, with, or without specific distances, between certain well-known Roman towns. Enthu- siastic antiquaries have done the rest. The names supplied by him have been appropriated to sites of Roman camps, stations, or traces of earth-works of any kind: but while the names in the Not ilia have been repeatedly localised by their discovery on inscribed altars and tablets, or on vessels, such as the famous bronze Rudge Cup : no single name among all the places mentioned for the first time in Richard's Itinerary has been verified by such means. Without this, the appro- priation of his names to intermediate points between well-ascertained Roman stations can furnish no corroboration of his text. Nevertheless, the foremost authorities among Roman antiquaries of our own day have been no less ready than General Roy was, a century before, to adopt Richard as their guide. The history, indeed, of the L ,• it 'I - ■ 14 RICARDUS OORINKNSIS. eager reception, — without one dissentient voice, — of a professed manu- script of the fourteenth century, unheard of boforo ; unseen, so far as now appears, by anybody; and ascribed to a monk whose chronicle and theological writings were well known ; but whose name had never before been heard of in connection with so remarkable a work : is highly interesting as an illustration of the crude ideas as to literary or historical evidence which then prevailed. As to Dr. Stukeley, his delight at the discovery of the treasure he had been privileged to introduce to the learned world was unbounded. Apologising for the short-comings of his earlier labours and researches in the field of Britanno-Roman antiquities, he thus introduces the new-found luminary by whose beams all doubt and obscurities are to bo dissipated : " the more readily, therefore, I can excuse myself, in regard to imperfections in that work [the Itincrarium Curiosuni], as I had not sight of our author's treatise, Richard of Cirencester, at that time absolutely unknown. Since, then, I have had the good fortune to save this most invaluable work of his, I could not refrain from con- tributing somewhat toward giving an account of it and of its author:" and so — after once more felicitating himself and all who share in his literary and antiquarian sympathies, on having reason to congratulate themselves " that the present work of Richard is happily rescued from oblivion, and most likely from destruction ;" — he proceeds to narrate the mode by which his knowledge of it was acquired. The " Dc Sttii Britannia;" was recognised from the first as a com- pilation ; was indeed professedly set forth by its author as such. " Compiled out of old manuscripts in Westminster Library, now lost," says Dr. Stukeley; "the old monk had before him a Roman itinerary similar to that of Antoninus," says Mr. Thomas Wright. Of ancient authors ho, of course, makes use. Diodorus, Pliny, Coesar, Tacitus, &c., are quoted : and with such minute accordance with certain texts — as we shall find, — as to furnish very amusing anachronisms for a monk of the fourteenth century. Solinus, the Latin geographer, is followed verbatim in the opening sentence, as elsewhere, without reference or acknowledgement. That, however, an old monk might perhaps be allowed to do without challenge. But when he betrays a like famili- arity with Camden ; reproduces hints of Horsley j and even suggests a suspicion whether he may not have been a borrower from Stukeley himself: any faith in the authenticity of an ancient manuscript of the De Situ Britannia:, becomes impossible. RICARDl'S COUINENSIS. 15 a professed manu- unseen, so far as lose chronicle and niUHo bad never kable a work : is IS as to literary or f the treasure he d was unbounded, irs and researches IS introduces the obscurities are to excuse myself, ia ■ Curi'osutn'], as I rencester, at that the good fortune refrain from con- d of its author : " who share in his n to congratulate pily rescued from roceeds to narrate ;he first as a corn- author as such, brary, now lost," Roman itinerary ght. Of ancient Jsar, Tacitus, &e., Bertain texts — as ms for a monk of aher, is followed lout reference or ight perhaps be lys a like famili- 1 even suggests a r from Stukeley lanuscript of the A school of Roman antiquaries, however, was at work in that eighteenth century, with much learning and zeal, but with still more credulity. Sir Walter Scott has pictured them with graphic humour in his immortal Antiquary, with his " Essay upon Castramctation, with some particular remarks upon the vestiges of ancient fortifications hue- ly discovered by the Author at the Kaim of Kinpruncs :" the supposed Castra pruinis of Claudian. Agricola was the central figure of all their speculations ; and Tacitus the authority on whose narrative their discoveries and speculations were ever throwing new light. In tbo midst of such seductive toils, the discovery of Richard's manuscript, was like the lost books of Livy to the historian of early Rome. The aoutcst among the critical investigators of the age — though engaged in controversies carried on with a bitterness happily unknown to modern literary dissentions, — concurred in welcoming the Benedictine's Itinerary ; and so ingeniously adapted its vaguest hints to their own speculations and discoveries, that for nearly three quarters of a century, no doubt, was raised as to Bertram's good faith in the reputed discovery. Foremost among those who thus gave confirmation to Richard's treatise on ancient British geography, by identifying its iters and stations with their own discoveries, was the distinguished author of " The Military Antiquities of the Romans in North Britain." Major- General Roy had served as an oCGccr of engineers under the Duke of Cumberland, in his Scottish Campaign of 1745. He was employed in the surveys and military works suggested by the events of that critical period; and was subsequently commissioned to construct a map of Scotland from actual survey. In doing so be made careful and accu- rate drawings of Roman camps, roads, and other earth-works : the whole of which, with his descrittivc narrative, furnished the materials for a costly folio printed at the expense of the Society of Antiquaries of London, in 1791, under the comprehensive title of "The Military Antiquities of the Romans in North Britain ; and particularly their ancient system of castramctation : illustrated from vestiges of the camps of Agricola existing there. Hence his march from South into North Britain is in some degree traced ; comprehending also a treatise, wherein the ancient geography of that part of the island is rectified, chiefly from the lights furnished by Richard of Cirencester." The work of General Roy is, and ever will be, an invaluable contri- bution to the history of the period of Roman occupation of Britain. It furnishes accurate surveys of many important earth-works, since ft... *«l--,.i'. \ I 16 SIOABDUS CORINZNSIS. defaced or vbolly destroyed ; and by assooiating the name of Biobard with tbe accurate and trustwortby record of his own surveys and men- surations, the supposed monkish antiquary was presented anew to tbe learned world with credentials scarcely admitting of challenge by any ordinary critic. Gibbon discriminated between the ** fanciful conjectures" of Stukeley and the numismatic materials accumulated by him in his " Medallio History ;" but of Richard and his " Be Situ Bntannicc, ho says : " he shows a genuine knowledge of antiquity very extraordinary for a monk of the fourteenth century." No wonder, therefore, that such historians as Lingard and Lappenberg ; and a whole century of Roman antiqua- ries: have appealed undoubtingly to the monkish chronicler. Whitaker in his "History of Manchester," and Stuart in his " Caledonia Romana," deal with him as an undoubted and valuable authority. Ritson, the keenest of literary censors, accepts his treatise unchallenged. Roy says of him, " it is evident that Richard had borrowed very consider- ably from the Alexandrian geographer ; yet there ia one part of his work, namely, that including the Diaphragmata [i. e., the Itinerary], which is quite new and curious, and carries along with it the appearance of being truly genuine." Nearly every English writer on Roman history or antiquities in the latter half of the eighteenth century refers to it in like fashion, as a valuable addition to the materials at his command. Stuart makes no distinction between the provinces of Roman Britain recorded in the "Notitia Imperii" and that of Vespa- siana, which rests on tbe sole authority of Richard, and spread, accord- ing to tho author of the " Caledonia Romana,*' " from the barrier of Antoninus northward, and was bounded, as is supposed, by the great valley through which now passes the Caledonian Canal ; " so also Mr. Charles Roach Smith, one of the most zealous among the Roman antiquaries of our own day, uses Richard's Itinerary as a safe guide to Roman Britiua; and in his excellent work devoted to "the Antiqui- ties of Richborough, Reculver, and Lyme, in Kent," unhesitatingly employs him to correct, or supplement the geography of Ptolemy, and the Itinerary of Antoninus. The latter, according to his received text, makes DunrohriviSf or Rochester, thirty-seven miles distant from Londinium; whilst Richard assigns only twenty-seven miles. But Mr. C. R. Smith accounts for it by assuming for the former an indi- rect route ; and finds in '' the apparent discrepancy one of the internal evidences of the authenticity of this writer." RIOARDUS C0RINENSI8. 17 5 the name of Riobard own surveys and men- presented anew to the ng of challenge by any DJeotures"ofStukeley him in his " Medallio itamicc, he says : " he raordinary for a monk •e, that such historians ry of Roman antiqua- chronicler. Whitaker " Caledonia Romana," ithority. Ritson, the unchallenged. Roy rrowed very consider- re is one part of his [«• c, the Itinerary], yith it the appearance ih writer on Roman > eighteenth century a the materials at his in the provinces of ' and that of Vespa- , and spread, accord- ' from the barrier of posed, by the great 'anal J » so also Mr. among the Roman rary as a safe guide sd to "the Antiqui- nt," unhesitatingly hy of Ptolemy, and to his received text, niles distant from seven miles. But the former an indi- one of the internal It need not excite our wonder that what is thus set forth by the highest antiquarian authorities, is taught without hesitation in schools and colleges. The maps provided for them are supplemented with names derived from Richard's Itinerary ; and the authoritative book of reference on Ancient Geography produced under the editorship of Dr. William Smith, presents to every student of Roman Britain a text in which Richard of Cirencester amends Ptolemy, overrides Tacitus, and mingles truth and fable in inextricable confusion. The difficulties of the Romano-British antiquary have been perplex- ing enough ; but once he fully awakes to the worthlessness of this long accepted authority, the complexities attendant on his researches will be wonderfully multiplied : when he is compelled to be on his guard in every reference to his authorities, for more than a century subsequent to the year 1748, lest he too be cheated with the cbiifif they have thus persistently mingled with the true grains of knowledge. So recently as 1858, Mr. Henry MaoLaucblan's " Survey of the Roman Wall " issued from the press, in fulfilment of the liberrl pur- pose of the late Duke of Northumberland. There Richard of Ciren- cester is referred to, along with Nennius and Bedc, without a doubt being hinted as to the one being less genuine than the other ; and on the elaborately executed maps of the survey the names of Roman stations are taken as freely from Richard as from any other authority. The same is true of the maps of the Ordnance Survey; of Mr. C. C, Babbington's Map of Roman Cambridgeshire ; and indeed of nearly every map of Roman Britain published during the present century. So far, then, it is obvious that, if the '• Be Situ Britanniae," ascribed to Richard of Cirencester be indeed one of the literary forgeries of the eighteenth century, produced in that age of perverse ingenuity which gave birth to Hardyknute, Ossian, Rowley, and other poetic creations of the Bame class : its fabricator had his abundant reward. His success is, indeed, without a parallel in the history of literary frauds : unless we go back to a time little less modern than that of the Westminster monk, when Ingulfs reputed History of his Abbey of Croyland, and its Saxon charters, — including the Golden Charter of Ethelbald, res- plendent with illuminations wholly unknown in Saxon times ; — were produced in A.D. 1415, by Prior Richard, to the discomfiture of his opponents, when prosecuting a suit in the King's Court, against those who were treating his ecclesiastical sentence of excommunication with open contempts Hickes, in his JDisserlatio Hpistolaris, inclines to 2 I 18 RIOARDUS C0RINEN8IS. l! „ , :■ oast the odium of their forgery on Abbot Ingulfus himself, who died A.D. 1109. Sir Francis Palgravo thinks both History and Charters no older than the end of the thirteenth, or first half of the fourteenth century. But Mr. H. T. Riley, in his " History and Charters of Ingulfus considered," (^Archceol. Journ.) fixes on Prior Richard him- self as contriver, forger, and producer of the fraudulent documents : not as a literary hoax ; but as deliberately forged evidence in the prosecution of a suit in the Courts of Henry V. at Westminster. Such legal forgeries appear to have been no less characteristic of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries than the literary ones of Macpherson and Ireland were of their later ago. Their manufacture had become a regular trade; and not only spurious Royal Charters, but even Papal Bulls, could be had to order: such as those ascribed to the Popes Honorius and Sergius L, produced by the Prior of Barnwell, as popal delegate for Pope Martin Y. in 1430, and still inscribed on the Great Register of the University of Cambridge. The History and Charters of Croyland Abbey were prepared by its prior with a graver criminal intent than the MS. of his reputed West- minster namesake. Both achieved the amplest success that their forgers could desire ; but the discrediting of the former is no more than a curious question of antiquarian research, whereas the latter has not wholly ceased even now to sully the pure stream of historical evidence. Let us then review the grounds on which it has at length been displaced from its long accredited position as an indisputable authority on the traces of the Roman occupation of Britain ; and fol- low out the researches which first cast suspicion on a treatise appealed to without hesitation from the days of Gibbon almost to our own. The Itinerary, itself, as has been already said, was a simple enough invention, though now it is the only part of the work for which any defence is attempted. The Commentary consists of tw(^° books the first of which extends to eight chapters. Book II. breaks off, in a fragmentary condition, in its second chapter. The narrative is, for the most part, prosaic enough to have proceeded from the Bene- dictine scriptorium ; but in his seventh chapter the old monk is repre- sented as thrown into some doubt about the profitableness of antiqua- rian researches. His Abbot had, it would seem, taken him to task for wasting the precious hours of life, all too brief for occupations that ought to engross the thoughts of a cloistered Benedictine, on what were only fit to delude the world with unmeaning trifles. Richard ' *«iae > ' -^ i .LI I I I j i i.i l ■ .>•;,({. wim i n i l t i • -- BICARDUS CORINENSIS. 10 bimself, who died 5ry and Charters of the fourteenth and Charters of ior Richard him- ent documents: evidence in the istminster. 'racteristio of the a of Maopherson re had become a but even Papal ed to the Popes irnweli, as papal )ed on the Great prepared by its I reputed West- icess that their mer is no more >s the latter has m of historical it has at length an indisputable •itain; and fol- •eatise appealed St to our own. simple enough ork for which of tw^ books fl- breaks off, 3 narrative is, rom the Bene- monk is repre- ss of antiqua- > him to task r occupations nedictine, on ies. Bichard enters on the dofonoo of hxa labours in an orthoJux fushion whidi seems about as much of au anachronism as his antiquarian zcul. IIu yields, however, to tho good Abbot's remonstrauco, lest ho should indeed merit the title of an unprofitable servant, and hastens to brini; his work to a close. " Tho following Itinerary," ho .says, " is derived from fragments loft by [a Roman General. Its order is in sunio in- Btanccs changed, according to Ptolemy and others : it is hoped for the better ;" and so he proceeds to treat of the ninety-two cities of tho Britons. Ptolemy, Antoninus, and other available authorities have been freely used and improved upon. Ycspasiana, for example, is a provinco affirmed to have been formed in the time of Agricuhi out of a region to the north of the Antonino wall, conquered in tho reign of Domitian ; but of which Agricola's own soiMn-law and biographer says nothing. Among the Roman Stations in Richard's fourteenth Iter, " Ad Isca per glcbon lindum usque," is Alauna, mentioned by Ptolemy as a town of the Damnii, in Warwickshire, with its modern name of Alchos- ter. But there is another Aluhester, or Alccster, in Oxfordshire, also celebrated as the scene of Roman discoveries. Tho former of those is stated in Baxter's Glossary to have been called " EUeneester," by Mathew Paris; and so Richard — it might almost seem blundering over Baxter's Glossarium Anliqiiitatum Britannicarum of 1733, — makes out of tho wrong Alchester his ^iia Castra ; which properly belonged to a wholly different Iter. Again, the establishment of another pro- vince, that of Valentia, erected by Theodosius, about A.D. 3G9, is ascribed to Constantino, who died thirty-two years before. In the Ninth Iter, " Ad montem Grampium," all Scottish antiquaries were charmed with the promised identification of the famous Mens Grampius of Galgacua. But tho location given to it would in no way harmonize with (heir theories; and, if modern critics are to be believed, monk Richard anticipated a blunder of the printing press when he adopted the popular name : for Tacitus, according to tho most trustworthy MSS., wrote Grouptus, not Grampius. The first doubts cast on the authenticity of the " De Situ Britannisc" of Richard of Cirencester, were set forth in a document issued by the English Historical Society in 1838, as reasons which guided the Coun- cil in omitting it from their republication of ancient materials of English History. Bat the judgment was not a unanimous one; and research was encouraged, ia the hope that the discovery of an ancient manu- .,-, ii/Jl 't niOAnOUB CORINKNBIS. script or Iho work might still sorre to remove all incrcdulitj. But moiinwhile Dr. Carl Wex, a distioguishcd German Boholar engaged uo a revised edition of the Agrioola of Tacitus, on turning to Diehard for the elucidation of his text, was surprised by the discovery that the reputed occupant of a Benedictine cell in the monastery of St. Peter's* Westminster, in 1350, bad systematically adopted readings traceable to an edition of Tacitus printed nt Venico more than a hundred years after his tiuio, and supplemented by the conjectural emendations of later editors. A careless corapositcr of A.D. 1497 for example, has in sotting up the passage (cap. 10), " quod nisi Paulinus cognito provincial) motu subvenisset," &o., repeat d two letters thus, co cognito. The conjectural emendation by an ^.iitor of the following century of eo cognito was adopted os the reading of subsequent editions ; and OD turning to Richard, he is found to have anticipated the double blunder before compositors or typographical errors had a being I Similar ex- amples abound. Bertram's iugenious monk of the fourteenth century has an intuitive perception of all conceivable raisreadings, and antici- pates everywhere the corrupt text of the seventeenth century. Cumu- lative evidence of this kind, by which the minutest typographical blunders, and their conjectural emendations by later editors, are all found in a professed MS. of the fourteenth century, ought to sulHco as a settlement of the question. That a Westminster monk of 1<350 should find Tacitus and all other classical works at his elbow, might of itself surprise us ; but that he should quote the blunders of modern printers can onlr be reconciled with any probability by assuming the all- comprehensive misreading of 1350 for 1750. In 1846 Dr. Carl Wex embodied the prolegomena of his edition of the Agricola of Tacitus — in so far as these refer to The Tractate on Britain, — in an article published in the Rheinischea Museum, at Frankfort-on- thc-Maioe, in which he is by no means complimentary to " Stukoleio et anglicis nntiquariis," in reference to their championship of this masquerading monk of the eighteenth century. Mr. Arthur Ilusaey, in 1853, drew attention, in the Gentleman's Magazine, to the spurious character of the work, and indicated Camden as the source of much of its materials. More recently, Mr. B. B. Woodward, the learned curator of the Royal Library at Windsor Castle, has followed out an independent series of researches no less curious and conclusive. If it surpasses every probability that a monk of the four- teenth century should be found anticipating the cumulative blunders, If '■-^■■■nfciMiMdiME^ifcyitfatolM^ \ RICARDUS C0RINEN8TB. 21 dulitj. But liar engaged g to Richard Tcry that the ■ St. Peter's. I traceable to ndred years indations of mple, has in to provincioD jnito. The ntury of eo na ; and od ble blunder Similar ex- nth century and antici- ry. Cumu- pographical tors, are all to sufflco as ik of 1350 w, might of of modern suming the ition of the on Britain, ankfort-on- '< Stukoleio lip of this 'entletnan'a )d Camden yir. B. B, Isor Castle, urious and r the four- blunders, and the latest mispriDts of ill-oditod classics : tho mnrvcl is littlo Ic^s when ho is shown to have been beforehand in like uiiiiinor wilh the conjectures and bold hypotheses of Canidon. Wo leiirn from tho ybtitia Imperii tho names of the five provinces of Britiiiti, but for the relativo position or boundaries of, at least, three out of tlui fuo, wo are loft wholly to conjocturo. Roman antiquaries have aeeordliigly sbifted their localitios according to tho theories they advoentcd ; iiud Cuwden, among tho rest, has his hypothesis : anticipated as a domnn- strable geographical distribution of tho iloman divi>ioiis of the island, in Richard's Tractate. To thoso ho does, indued, aJd V,.,i>,m,inn, apparently as his own entirely novel contribution to iloman geograpliy ; but even this Mr. Woodward conceives to be traccablo to a hint of tlio great Elizabethan antifiuary. Camden assumes a liver Vrvs on which to place KLnnicum, or York, but Richard already had it. Out of Ptolemy's TrlsunUni ho constvucts, by means of a false etymology from Iluntu, a word Anionn, and applies it to the River Itchcn j but the old monk of Westminster was before him in this ingenious blundering. Camden makes of the " -Madua " of tho Peutingerian Table a river, and identifies it with tho Medwuy ; the "Lemana" of elder authorities becomes with him the " Lemanus fluviusj" Richard adopts both, and adds, to complete tho rivers of Cantium, the " Sturius et Dubris :" he or his alter cjo, having mistaken the name of tho town of Dover for that of a river. These are more illustrations of the blundering servility with which Camden's ingenious hypotheses are adopted ; and his errors accepted, even to such orthographic variations as " Segontium " for " Seu;on- cium." The examples cited by Mr. Woodward of Richard's anticipa- tions of such ponjectures and assumptions arc numerous and conclusive beyond all dispute. One of the boldest of his conversions of a niero analogy into a fact will best illustrate this process of manufacture of ancient geography. Camden in support of his etymology of the name of Cornwall, says there were promontories in Crete and in the Tauric Chersonese, called /i>«/y iiiraiTta, because of their resemblance to the horn of a ram; and so Richard supplies us with authority for naming the British " Ram's Head " of Camden Kino'j idrutzov. There is tome satisfaction in referring to the labours of P]nglish scholars in the exposure of a fraud on which English scholarship has expended such misplaced zeal. Yet even now, there are antiquaries of good repute who have not disavowed their faith in the antiquarian 22 niOARDVS COniNENHtS. r. Stukeloy and ^ "'K'lt of the postor. to tho pos.sibIo Itcrcd, patched, > ndapt it to tho oy the ori^'inaj. nn hypothesis, as Uichard of to tho Abbey nJont that ho inrd of Ciren- I antique MS. Kicardi Cori- The title is " Speculum " But tho ivhon printed odied sundry I'n transcript, id a map so unlike that engraved by Stukdey, '^at the latu . seems a more crude Bkotoh preparatory to the other. But Huch discrcpancioH, if noticed, excited no au«pioion. So p:rwt\y was tho work in demand, that, some ci^U years later another^ Eng- lish edition was projected, and its proposed editor wrote to Copen- hagen in order to procure an exact fac-Mmilo of tho original map. But Bertram hud died on tho Hth of .January, ITI).'), and nobody Iroin that day to this ha.s been hoard of who ever had a ^;limpso of cither map or manuscript. Richard's other, and undoubtedly genuine works are traced without diiTiculty ; but tho amplest catalogues of ancient manuscripts contain no notice of that to which ho owes all his modern fame. . But lot us hear what one of tho most diligent of modern Uoman investigators has to say on his behalf. " llicluud of (.'irencoster's J)c Situ Bntanniw. has been (luestioned," says Mr. Charles lloach Smith, in his " lUchborough ;" " and Bertram, who published it, has been accused of having collected his materials from tho best ancient and modern authorities, and arranged tho entire work. Hatcher, in the preface to his translation, has ably combated tho objections brought against the originality of the Itinerary ; and in one of his letters to me, dated Salisbury, November 2n, 1840, ho writes: ' Cuptam Jolliflo kindly called my attention to the Gentleman s Mayazinc, for tho obser* vations on Richard of Cirencester. After all, they are only fighting with tho wind. In my edition I gave up, long ago, his description ot Britain, and his chronology, except the account of the rank held by the British towns, which was knowu only to our native antiquaries ; and this in more instances than one. As for poor Bertram, the sneers at him arc as unmerited as they are ridiculous.' " Tho old editor ot Richard adds, " I intended once, to havo set this question at rest; but that time is gone by;" and so tho worthy antiquary died in tho faith of Bertram's honesty, and Richard's genuineness. But there is a confirmation, of a kind peculiarly suitable to the character of Bertram's " Richard," which has escaped tho notice ot his enthusiastic defenders. The very reverend Jeremiah MiUcs, D.U. Dean of Exoter, and President of the Society of Antiquaries of London, rendered the same pious services to " Thomas Rowlic, parish prieste of St. John's, in tho city of Bristol, A.D. UG3," which Dr. btukeley did to " Richard of Cirencester," the Benedictine monk of Westmin- ster Our incredulous age has come, for tho most part, to believe thut ■•Tff-r 24 niOARDUS OOBINENSId. Thomas Ghatterton, the Bristol Blueooat boy, was the sole author of the Rowley poems. But Dr. Milles published a very learned quarto to prove the genuineness of the apocryphal priest, and the antiquity of the marveiious charity-boy's " iElla," " Hastings," " The Bristowe Tragedy," and the rest. The Dean did not meddle with the reputed prose works of his medieval priest. They were then in preparation for the press by a no less painstaking Bristol antiquary : Mr. William Barrett, Surgeon and F. S. A. But among the latter is a passage, which, had any unbeliever then ventured a doubt as to the genuine- ness of Richard's Itinerary, would have been hailed by his champions as an irrefragable confutation. It curiously illustrates the revolution of opinion in the interval, that the same evidence would now suflSce, were 'iny such needed, to confute all the voluminous arguments of Dean Milles in support of the imaginary poet-priest of the fifteenth century. The good priest Rowley is in search of manuscripts and antiquarian treasures of all sorts, for his nlv .. J aud patron, Maister William Canynge, Mayor of Bristol. But the times are full of trouble, for they are those of the wars of the Roses ; and Rowley, writing from Cirencester, betrays his political sympathies. But, after a brief comment on my Lord of Warwick's unprincipled ambition, he thus passes to a more congenial theme, suited to the place from which he writes. " I have founde the papers of Fryar Rycharde : he saieth nothynge of Bristolle, albeit he haveth a long storie of Seyncte Yyncente and the Queede. His ceile is most lovelie depycted on the whyte walles wythe black cole, displaieynge the Iters of the Woste." Such was the spirit of that eighteenth century ; ingenious, inventive, but wholly unscrupulous aa to the uses to which its ingenuity was applied. Yet Bertram aqd Chatterton, though foremost among the " literary forgers " of that eighteen century, must not be classed together, as though they stood on common ground. Chatterton did indeed deceive Barrett, Milles, and many another credulous dupe ; but now that his mystifications have all vanished, his priest Rowley remains as an ingenious, and harmless fiction ; and his Ballads, Epics, and Dramatic Interludes take a permanent rank in the poetic literature of his age. But the De Situ Britanniae, if a forgery of that eighteenth century, is not merely worthless : it is one of the most mischievous of literary impostures, reflecting disgrace on its mendacious perpetrator; and tainting with misconception and falsehood the investigations of honest m ft nja. i xJweM*o^J l Iio sole author of learned quarto to tlie antiquity of ;'The Bristowe ith the reputed " '0 preparation •y: Mr. William ■er ia a passage, to the genuine- y his champions s the revolution uld now suffice, 3 arguments of of the fifteenth nd antiquarian illiam Canynge, r they are those 1 Cirencester, inmeut on my »8es to a more 'es. "I have jeofBristolle, ' the Queede. I wythe black ' spirit of that scrupulous aa the " literary together, as deed deceive low that his mains as an id Dramatic of his age. I century, is of literary rator; and i of honest BICABDtJS COaiNENSIS. 25 and laborious workers in an important department of historical re- search. It becomes a matter of interest then, to recover any information that can now bo obtained relative to this Charles Julius Bertram, Professor of the English Language at the Royal Naval School of Copenhagen ; and to this I am able to make a slight contribution. In the first edition of the «' Prehistoric Annals of Scotland," published in 1851, 1 referred to " the Monk of Westminster, whom antiquaries may bo pardoned suspecting to have assumed the cowl for the purpose of disguise, being in truth a monk not of the fourteenth but of the eighteenth century." This led to a correspondence with an Anglo-Roman antiquary who wad still a devout believer in Richard and his Itinerary : in conse- quence of which I wrote to my late friend. Professor P. A. Munch, of Christiania, the Norwegian historian, begging him to ascertain for mo anything that he could from literary friends at Copenhagen relative to Bertram, or his manuscript. In his reply Professor Munch says : " I have got an answer from Mr. Werlauff about Richardus Corinensis, containing everything that he knows of information as to this matter. The MS. is nowhere to be found, that is sure enough. Yet Mr. Werlauff is not at all inclined to think it a forgery : an opinion which indeed surprises me very much. That Stukcley — says Mr. Werlauff, — knew the Bertram MS. already ten years before the first edition was made, appearb from a letter, written by Dr. Stukeley to the celebrated Hans Gramm at Copenhagen, (dated Sept. 1, 1747,) of which letter an abridgement is given in the preface. In the original, however, the passage runs much more complete, as follows : " Bertramo tuo me oommendatum facias oro, quern felicem tuo patrociuio existimo. Feli- oem me quoque reddidit, tuo in lespcctu, fragmentum suum M.SS- Ricardi mon. Weatmonasteriensis. Ilarum est cimelium in bibliothecis nostris ignotum. Ego non indignum censeo ut prelo committatur, opus nostris antiquariis acceptissimum." " This " adds Professor Munch, " certainly does not savoir of anything like forgery or falsehood on the part of Stukeley :" an idea which no one familiar with tho character of that amiable enthusiast would think of entertaining. Mr. Werlauff inferred, from a reference in one of Bertram's papers, that he had come to Denmark some time before his father : having, according to his interpretation of that notice, arrived in Copenhagen ten years prior to 1748, " indirectly asked to come by King Christian." But, according to Worm's Lexicon of Danish Authors, Bertram was V I BIOABDVS C0RINENSI3. born in 1723, and was therefore barely fifteen at the date of this sup- posed royal invitation. We may therefore still adhere to the more pro- bable account that he accompanied his father, in the suite of the Princess Louisa, in 1743. " As for Bertram," continues Professor Munch, " ho seems tc have been rathc-r a worthy man. His father, a silk-dyer, is said to have immigrated into Denmark with the people and menials accompanying the English Princess Louisa. In 1744, he established himself at Copenhagen as a hosier. His son, the Bertram in question, was a student, a kind of proteg6 of King Christian VI. From papers in the Record OflSce of the Academical Council at Copenhagen, it appears that he gave in to the said Council a petition, dated 5th July, 1747, requesting that ho might be inscribed as a student, although belonging to the Anglican Church. Ho meant to excolcre historiam, antiquitates, philoso})Jiiam, el mathesin. On the 23rd March, 1748, he petitioned the King that he might bo appointed to lecture puhlice on the English Language. There exists still in the Library at Copenhagen a frag- ment of Bertram's treatise on Cnut the Great ; " and it may be added that the literary characteristics of this manuscript are said to furnish very poor evidence of the scholarship of their transcriber. It only remains to state that Bertram died January 8tb, 17G5, in his forty- second year ; and Dr. Stukeley survived him less than two months. A certain authority and weight has heretofore been given to " Pro- fessor " Bertram, which it now appears was wholly without foundation. At the date of his letter to Dr. Stukeley he was not even an under- graduate. He was only petitioning for admission as a student at the University of Copenhagen j and his professed transcripts of the Richard MS. were the product of an undergraduate's pen. As to his professor- ship, with its high sounding title : it does not appear to have amounted to much more than the tutorial work to which many a Scottish under- graduate resorts under similar circumstances, with a view to eke out his slender finances, and help him on to his degree. Nevertheless there is a certain appearance of scholarship, and some facility in Latin composition, involved in the concocting of the Richard MS. which might be supposed to surpass the powers of an under- graduate. He quotes some fifteen or sixteen ancient authors, includ- ing Diodorus Siculus, Livy, Strabo, Cassar, Pomponius Mela, Virgil, Pliny, Lucan, Tacitus, &c. Most of his references may indeed bo found, as already stated, in Camden; and the remainder could readily RIOARDtrS C0BINEN8IS. 27 late of this gup- the more pro- e suite of the 3 seems tc have s said to have accompanying led himself at uestion, was a a papers in the ;en, it appears -h July, 1747, 'Ugh belonging n, antt'quitates, r he petitioned in the English ihagen a frag- may be added lid to furnish ber. It only in his forty- months. ?en to " Pro- It foundation, en an under- udent at the P the Richard his professor- ire amounted ottish under- eke out his ip, and some the Bichard •f an under- hors, includ- Hela, Virgil, ' indeed be ould readily be oullod from more familiar pages, including those of Stukclcy himself. Yet it might be assumed, without inquiry, that some scholarship, and a degree of practise in Latin composition, were necessary, in order to put together such a piece of work for the eyes of European scholars. It is noteworthy, therefore, that Bertram in his petition for admission to the University, professed to study History, Antiquities, riiilosophy and Mathematics ; but of the Classical Languages nothing is said. Arc wo to infer from this that ho was already so perfect in them as to regard their further study superfluous; or must we assume, in accordance with the ordinary practise of undergraduates, that ho exercised his options in selecting the departments best suited to his tastes and acquirenients? In reality the latinity of Richard, which so charmed Dr. Stukclcy and his contemporaries, is very much in the style of undergraduate, or school-boy Latin composition; and can only have passed muster with them on the assumption that it was fr.ir monkish Latin, which must not bo tried by too high a standard. Mr. Woodward has pointed out the anachronism of a monk of the fourteenth century, using the word fiatio, neither in its ancient sense, as the spot on which a guard was placed ; nor in its medieval sense as a religious station, or halting- place for ecclesiastical processions : hut in its wholly modern and anti- quarian acceptance. Similar examples abound. But, in truth, most of the original paragraphs, by means of which the classical quotations are pieced together, read very much like a school-boy's exercise, first written in English, and then translated, word by word, with the help of his dictionary. This suggests an inquiry, which has hitherto been overlooked, though by^no means without its important bearing on the general question. What part was " the famous m. Gramm, Privy Councillor and Chief Librarian to his Danish Majesty," playing in the ingenious mystification, when he wrote the " prolix and elaborate Latin epistle which Bertram enclosed to Dr. Stukclcy in his own first reply? Tho correspondence with Bertram was apparently conducted, on both sides, in English. But to Ilcrr Gramm, as wo have seen. Dr. Stukclcy replied in a Latin epistle as elaborate and stately as his own, in which he refers to the rare and seemingly unique Copenhagen fragments of a newly discovered work of Richard, monk of Westminster. It i.^no slight apology for Dr. Stukeley's unquestioning reception of Ber- tram's transcripts of an unheard-of fourteenth century MS., that its existence was thus guaranteed by one of tho very highest authontiea: 28 the Custodian of the Royal Tih Copenhagen to certify toTf. '^' ""^ '^e fittest of «n MoMuo,; anj ™ 7-,- ' P^Posed to pureh..?-.'!' "™™ >» gel of Be«^ ^fctuLo?;"" u"" '"'=■ ""°»« ii" r" °/ "" •"»'»■ P~i uf '.°™';,»"«' We ee.„ i, o ''l'f?b°"'°' "« ™».f..- 'k»»ubje.,„fe,ab„„^™.<'°P»l«ge« Bejel l,i;^/;''"'''J~aj o or tne wondrous -'-'?'«s*«e»«Sfc._ 1 ««' of all men in rofessed discovery, lettered dignitarv fo'-e Dr. Stukeley of Westminster" fairlj roused, he 'ge •• strove to get for the British P' of the whole, "nd the excuses )wappear,-_can- c'rcumstances. 'an in the same >reigner about a "^ergraduate, is 'e or raanufac- >rest and most s Dr. Stukeley ique, lajr readj Jt had been rned secretary the strongest g secured for n of Bertram, ter his death, I'estj's privy lerr Gramm ce with Dr. rtram could 1 we, then, ■riminis in '% palmed >ore or less 'or a whole history? ret 'Mittle wondrous BIOABDVS OOKINENSId. 29 history of Roman Britain, were not transmitted to Dr. Stukeloy till after the death of Mr. Gramm ; nor indeed was it till after that event that Bertram professed to have " at length, with some diflSiculty, got the manuscript into his own hands." It is perhaps a bold hypothesis to conceive of one in the posicion of the Rojal Librarian bearing any share in a literary forgery. But the age was characterised by singularly loose ideas on such subjects ; and the part he is shown to hove taken in the correspondence is equally inexplicable, whether we suppose that a genuine MS. did exist, about which he gave himself no further trouble, or that a hoax was being perpetrated on English scholars in which he bore a part. Had the Latin of the commentary been as creditable to the scholarship of its reputed author as the enthusiasm of its first editors represented it to be, we might have been tempted to trace in it the hand of Dr. Stukeley's "prolix and elaborate" Latin correspondent. But in reality the portions of the Tractate not made up of quotations, are, as has been already said, very much in the stylo of Latin to be expected from the Anglo-Danish undergraduate. Assuming, therefore, his ability to pro- duce the Latin commentary, his familiarity with the English language rendered him otherwise well fitted for the task. As to Mr. Gramm, he had been in England, visited the Universities, was remembered by Mr. Martin Folkes as a learned foreigner, and possibly carried away with him reminiscences of its antiquarian enthusiasts which bore fruit of a kind then cultivated on thj tree of knowledge. The writings of Dr. Stukeley are seasoned with a suflBeicnt stock of credulous fancy to provoke even a grave privy councillor into lending a helping hand at a trial of his gullibility. If, on the contrary, we suppose him to have been Bertram's dupe and tool, he must Lave proved even more gi:Ilible than the English antiquary. As to the motives which induced the chief culprit to~carry out his fraud with consistent pertinacity, they need not greatly perplex us. It was a work of time : begun probably with no deliberate purpose of carrying it to the culpable extent it ultimately reached. Bertram's first letter was probably the mere hoax of a clever, but thoughtless undergraduate. But for the opportune death of Hans Gramm, — what- ever the nature of his share in the correspondence may have been, — it may be presumed that the later stages of full-developed imposture would never have been reached. But when Dr. Stukeley settled in London, " began to think of the manuscript," and became "solicitoua - ii lW HJ i ini i l i .mm i u f i i. i u i n, i | i , | inni i 30 BIOARDUS OOaiMENSIS. about Richard of Westminster," his Copenhagen correspondent had to choose between confessing, and persisting in the forgery ;— and how many subsequent pages of antiquarian literature depended on his choice I Dr. Stukcley's importunities could not be evaded; and once committed to his dishonest course, Bertram carried it out consistently to the end. His success may have delighted or alarmed him, according to the aspect in which he regarded it; but, tried by the standard of that eighteenth century, his delight is more probable than his alarm. He had achieved for himself a name among European scholars, and established confiden- tial relations with foreign literati ; and he thenceforth cultivated them without dread of exposure. He appears to have attained to the highest academic honours, and to have maintained a friendly correspondence with his learned English dupe to the last. So late as Oct. 80, 1763> Stukeley records in his Diary : " I received from my friend. Dr. Bertram, 3 copies of the designs of the Danish Military, colored : one for the King." In the age of Psalmanazar, Macpherson, and Ghatterton ; a century which gave birth to the " Hardyknute," the Ossian Epics, and the Rowley Poems; to "the Double Falsehood" of Theobald, the "Vorti- gern and Rowena" of Ireland, and so much else of a like kind : it cannot be denied that the fabricator of the " CommentarioH geogra' phici de Situ Britannia', et Stationum quas Homani ipsi in ea Insula scdificaverunt," ascribed to Richard of Cirencester, had his abundant reward. Not only Dr. Stukeley and his credulous brother antiquaries, among whom the ingenious but fanciful Whitaker may be classed; but the incredulous Ritson, the laborious and accurate Roy, with some of the very foremost of historians. Gibbon, Suhm, Lappenberg, and Lingard : have bowed to his authority ; and a whole century of Euro- pean scholars has yielded unquestioning faith to his bold imposture. A ^i h m mm y mmmmwrnmrnm