Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Ethelwerd
ETHELWERD or ÆTHELWEARD (d. 998?), chronicler, who, according to his own statement, was great-great-grandson of King Æthelred, elder brother of Alfred, wrote a short Latin chronicle in which he styles himself ‘Patricius Consul Fabius Quæstor,’ the first two titles merely signifying that he was an ealdorman, and the rest being a rhetorical flourish. It is probable that he may be identified with the Æthelweard described in the teste of a charter of 997 as the ealdorman of the western provinces (Kemble, Codex Dipl. 698), a title which seems to signify that he ruled over Devonshire, Dorsetshire, and Somersetshire, that he was the father of Æthelmær the Great, who succeeded to his office, the founder of Cerne Abbey, and the friend of Ælfric the Grammarian (the date at which he ceases to attest charters seems to make it impossible to identify him with Æthelweard the successor of Æthelmær), that he joined with Archbishop Sigeric and the ealdorman Ælfric in 991 in making the peace by which the Danes were for the first time bought off (Thorpe, Ancient Laws, i. 284), and that in 994 he accompanied Bishop Ælfheah on an embassy to Olaf of Norway, and persuaded him to meet King Æthelred at Andover and make a lasting peace with him. He witnessed several charters as ealdorman from 975 to 998 inclusive (Kemble, Codex Dipl. 590–700), and as his subscriptions appear to cease in 998, it may be supposed that he died in or about that year. William of Malmesbury, who calls the chronicler ‘Elwardus,’ describes him as ‘illustrious and magnificent’ (Prolog. Gesta Regum). He wrote his chronicle for his kinswoman, Matilda, the great-great-granddaughter of Alfred, who was apparently the daughter of Liudulf of Suabia, the son of the German king, Otto (afterwards emperor), by Eadgyth, daughter of Eadward the Elder, and who married Obizzo, count of Milan, and died 1011 (Stevenson). The chronicle of Æthelweard consists of four short books; the first begins with the creation and goes down to 449; the early part of the book seems to be taken from some abstracts of Isidore's ‘Origines,’ the rest comes from Bæda. The remainder of his work is a meagre compilation from the ‘Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.’ It evidently represents some version of the ‘Chronicle’ which does not exist now, and gives some few facts that are not found elsewhere, as, for example, that the ealdorman, Hun, who fell at Ellandune, was buried at Winchester, which seems the only hint we have as to the locality of the battle. In this way Æthelweard's work has done good service, for it has helped historians to arrive at the way in which the book generally called the ‘Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’ was really written. His work ends with a Latin translation of one of the poems on Eadgar, the last date being 973. His chronology is confused; he scarcely ever mentions a year, and simply dates his events by stating that they took place a year, or two years, after the events last recorded. His style is affected and obscure. He was utterly careless of grammar, and as with this carelessness he combined an attempt to write tersely, he is sometimes almost unintelligible. At the same time his chronicle has an important place in our literary history as the work of a layman at a time when ecclesiastics were the only people that wrote anything. Strangely enough, Bishop Nicolson, thinking that the Matilda for whom Æthelweard wrote was the wife of the Conqueror, declares that it is certain that he was alive in 1090 (English Hist. Library, p. 40), and still more strangely Wright unreservedly accepts the bishop's opinion. Some of Æthelweard's blunders are perhaps to be attributed to the carelessness of his original editor, Savile. The only manuscript of the chronicle known to have existed was in the Cottonian collection, and was burnt in 1731. This was transcribed by Savile and printed in his ‘Scriptores post Bædam,’ London, 1596, reprinted more carelessly, Frankfort, 1601. Æthelweard's chronicle is also included in the ‘Monumenta Historica Britannica,’ 1848, where Petrie has reprinted Savile's text, giving emendations in foot-notes. It has been translated by Giles in his ‘Six Old English Chronicles,’ and by Stevenson in vol. ii. of ‘Church Historians of England.’
[Little can be added to what Sir T. D. Hardy has said about Æthelweard in Mon. Hist. Brit. pref. p. 81, and Cat. of Materials, i. 571 sq. (Rolls Ser.); Fabii Ethelwerdi Chron., Mon. Hist. Brit. 499–521; A.-S. Chron. ann. 991, 994; Florence of Worcester, i. 152 (Engl. Hist. Soc.); William of Malmesbury, Prologue to Gesta Regum (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Robertson's Historical Essays, pp. 178, 188; Freeman's Norman Conquest, i. 305, 318; Stevenson's Church Historians, ii. pref. ix; Gent. Mag. 1857, p. 120 sq., an art. by Riley in the form of a review of Giles's and Stevenson's translations; Wright's Biog. Lit. (Anglo-Saxon), p. 522.]