Matthew Paris illustrated the Life of St. Edward the confessor, contained in the Luard translation.
See https://saga1066.blogspot.com/2021/11/lives-of-edward-confessor.html
This image from the manuscript is placed immediately before the report of Godwin’s death in 1053, suggesting that it takes place between 1042 and 1053. But as we note below there are problems with this. The manuscript was written c 1245, almost 200 years after the deaths of Harold and Tostig.
The fight of Tostig and Harold and Edward’s prophecy
page 267, commencing line 3133
At dinner sat the king one day.
Enough there he had of royal array ;
The father of the queen was there,
Godwin the rich and famous earl ;
By the side of the king he sat, in the land
As one who was of the highest condition ;
And he had two very beautiful sons,
Valiant and brave youths.
Lo his two sons
Play in game before him,
One was Tostin, the other Harold,
Who was than Tostin bolder
And stronger ; so hotly do they play
That both are made very angry ;
One to the other gives such a blow
That it strikes him down there and quite stuns him.
Harold enraged directly
Seizes Tostin by the hair,
So that he drags him down by the locks,
Tries to force out both his eyes,
Covers him with blood and strikes him with his fist,
So that he keeps him all supine on the ground.
He would have strangled him, had he not been rescued,
So wrathful, raging, and vicious was he.
The king observes the combatants ;
He is pensive about it, hesitates to speak
For he sees in them the event such
As after long time was disclosed.
They were brothers of the queen.
Extract from an evil root ;
The lady who was of that origin.
Was born as the rose from the thorn.
Said the king, Seest thou not
Of thy sons, earl, the struggle?
Yes, sire, this is their amusement ;
But it is a quarrel, cruel and violent.
Sire." ''Nor ill, nor danger
Expect you from it?" "Sire, nothing."
The king deeply sighs,
" Earl Godwin, I will tell you,
If it please you that it should be revealed to you :
The meaning of this circumstance
Is not infantine simplicity;
Much significance has it ;
It is not simple infantine play,
My heart is all pensive concerning it ;
Of what is to come certain
I will make you ; from Heaven it is made known
to me.
"When they shall be of full age,
And shall have greater courage.
The one who is stronger, through envy
Shall the other rob of life ;
But the vanquished shall soon be avenged.
Discomfited soon shall be the elder;
Their life shall not be lasting,
Nor their power stable."
After a few years the prophecy
Was verified and accomplished.
For after the death of their father,
And the death of the king, a bitter
Change arose in the kingdom,
Whence hate grew between them.
Nor can I relate the whole story,
But the result to which it reaches,
So as to make clear the speech of Edward,
Which was proved true, though late,
Harold hated Tostin much.
And drove him out and banished him,
For Harold was king of England,
To whom Tostin was unequal in war ;
He drove him away and discomfited him,
And had him exiled as a waif;
If he had caught him, he would have put him to death
With great misery and sin and wrong.
Edward became king of England in 1042. Harold Godwinson is thought to have been born in 1022, and Tostig in 1026. This means that at the time of Edward’s coronation Harold was 20 and Tostig was 16. For this event to have happened after Edward’s coronation the two sons of Godwin would be much older than the little boys depicted in the poem and in the illustrations. Alternatively the event took place in Normandy before Edward was crowned king, and would necessitate a visit of Godwin and his sons to Edward before 1042.
This problem with dates lends us to question this alleged miracle of Edward’s. Either it is a fabrication, or it suggests that Godwin was visiting Edward on the continent some years before his coronation. Godwin was accused of complicity in the death of Alfred in 1036. At this time, Harold was 16 and Tostig 12, and Edward was not yet married to Queen Edith. Did this event take place prior to Edward’s visit to England that year? There are so may errors of fact in this account we have to ask did it take place at all?
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