NOTES TO THE FIRST VOLUME.

4T2

by stress of weather to the terfitories of Guy, count ofPonthieu: But besides that this story is not probable initself, and is contradicted by most of the ancient historians ,it is contradicted by a very curious and authentic monumentlately discovered. It is a tapestry , preserved in the ducalpalace of Rouen , and supposed to have been wrought byorders of Matilda, wife to the Conqueror: At least it is ofvery great antiquity. Harold is there represented as takinghis departure from king Edward in execution of somecommillion, and mounting his vessel with a great train.The design of redeeming his brother and nephew , whowere hostages is the most likely cause that can be assigned;and is accordingly mentioned by Eadmer , Hoveden ,Brompton, and Simeon of Durham. For a farther accountof this piece of tapestry , see Histoire de 1 'Academic deLitterature, torn. ix. page

NOTE [G], p. 264.

It appears from the ancient translations of the Saxonannals and laws , and from king Alfred’s translation ofBede, as well as from all the ancient historians, thatcomes in Latin , alderman in Saxon, and earl in Dano-Saxon were quite fynonimous. There is only a clause ina law of king Athelstan’s , ( fee Spellm. Cone. p. 406. )which has stumbled some antiquaries , and has made themimagine that an earl was superior to an alderman. Thev eregild or the price of an earl’s blood is there fixed atis 000 thrimsas, equal to that of an archbishop; whereasthat of a bishop and alderman is only gooo thrimsas.To solve this difficulty we must have recourse to Selden’sconjecture, (fee his Titles of Honour , chap. v. p 6 o;,604. ) that the term of earl was in the age of Athelstanjust beginning to be in use in England, and stood at thattime for the atheling or prince of the blood, heir to thecrown. This he confirms by a law of Canute, § ss.where an atheling and an archbishop are put upon thesame footing. In another law of the same Athelstan the