f. A DESCENT FROM KING AETHELRED II OF ENGLAND (ca. 968-1016) with various proofs / CHART SHOWING DESCENTS FROM 5 MAYFLOWER PASSENGERS / WODEN’S DAY: THE PAGAN ROOTS OF KING ALFRED’S TREE; PATRILINEAL
SOME DESCENDANTS OF ALICE FREEMAN
Alice Freeman was a descendant of Aethelred II (Without Counsel), King of England (2nd great-grandson of Alfred the Great). I know of no other royal lines for Alice Freeman. Attempts to link her to Henry I have been unsatisfactory, and even if successful would rely on an unproved illegitimate connection. An alleged descent from Charlemagne is insufficiently supported. Nor does there appear to be descents from Scottish kings.
This is the oldest bloodline in the world.
1. Aethelred II, King of England, b. ca. 968, d. 23 Apr 1016, buried in St. Paul’s, London, son of Edgar the Peaceful, King of England; m. (1) Aelfgifu (or Elgiva), dau. of an Ealdorman
2. Aelfgifu (or Elgiva) of England; m. Uchtred, Earl of Northumberland, d. 1016
(Sir Archibald H. Dunbar, Scottish Kings A Revised Chronology Of Scottish History 1005–1625; also texts marked * that follow.)
(Simeon of Durham; in the style of ancient historians, he has invented Ucthred’s speech.)
3. Ealgyth of Northumberland; m. Maldred, lord of Carlisle and Allendale, son of Crinan the Thane, d. 1045
There is confusion as to the identity of Maldred’s father Crinan: was Crinan the Thane identical with Crinan, lay abbott of Dunkeld, who had married Bethoc, daughter of King Malcolm II? Note that the passage from The Complete Peerage below uses the term “presumably.” However, in the Competition of 1291 for the Scottish crown, Gospatric’s descendant Patrick of Dunbar presented his petition based upon descent from a bastard daughter of King William the Lion, rather than legitimate descent from King Malcolm II. If Crinan the Thane was the same person as Crinan, lay abbott of Dunkeld, then Maldred cannot be the son of Bethoc, but was the son of another wife. A lay abbott was the secular lord of the abbey’s lands. Gospatric’s father is proven to be Maldred, and the chart, prepared by Sir Archibald H. Dunbar, Bart., is in error showing Maldred as a grandson of King Malcolm II. Regardless of whether Crinan the Thane was also Crinan the lay abbott, Gospatric has no known descent from Scottish kings.
4. Gospatric I (Gwas Patric), Earl of Northumberland and Dunbar, b. ca. 1040, d. 1074/5; m. a sister of Edmund
(As Gospatric paid a fine to King William I of England to succeed to the Earldom of Northumberland, there can be no doubt he was the son of Maldred, whose wife was heiress to Northumberland. The Latin phrase “nam ex materno sanguine attinebat ad eum honor illius comitatus” essentially means “he succeeded to the office by reason of his mother’s blood or family.” This Gospatric and his son Gospatric are not to be confused with Gospatric Lord of Workington.)
(The Complete Peerage, Vol. 9, pp. 704-705, Dunbar.)
(* The tradition that Gospatric became a monk and is buried in the crypt of Durham cathedral is not universally accepted and may be myth.)
(*)
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle of Worcester records that soon after 11 Sep 1068: “Three sons of King Swein with 240 ships came from Denmark into the Humber—and Jarl Osbern and Jarl Thurkill. And there came against them Prince Edgar, and Earl Waltheof, and Earl Gospatric with the Northumbrians, and all the people of the land, riding and marching with an enormous raiding-army … and thus all resolutely went to York and broke down and demolished the castle, and won countless treasures in there, and there killed many hundreds of French men ….”
5. Gospatric II, 2nd Earl of Dunbar, held serjeanty of Beanley, d. 23 Aug 1138; m. unknown, but evidently not Sibilla
(The Scots Peerage, Vol. 3, pp. 246-247, Dunbar, and passage that follows, p. 249.)
6. Juliana of Dunbar; m. Ralph (Ranulf) de Merlay, lord of Morpeth, d. 1160, son of William de Merlay
7. Roger de Merlay, d. 1188; m. Alice de Stuteville, daughter of Roger de Stuteville
8. Agnes de Merlay; m. Richard Gobion, d. bef. 29 Dec 1230 in Gascony
9. Hugh Gobion, d. 1275; m. Matilda, liv. 5 Jul 1271
(Biography of Hugh Gobion from The Knights of Edward I.)
(Inquisitions Post Mortem for Hugh Gobion, 1275.)
10. Joan Gobion, liv. 1312; m. (1) John de Morteyn, of Tilsworth and Marston, co. Bedford, d. 1296
(New England Historical and Genealogical Register, Vol. 79, Issue 4, October 1925; G. Andrews Moriarty, “The Royal Descent of a New England Settler.” One of the most brilliant genealogical articles I’ve ever seen.)
11. Sir John de Morteyn, of Merston and Tillesworth, co. Bedford, d. 1346; m. Joan (or Jane) de Rothwell
(Biography of Sir John de Morteyn from The Knights of Edward I.)
12. Lucy de Morteyn, liv. 8 Mar 1361; m. (his 1st) Sir John Giffard, of Twyford, co. Bucks. & Somerston, Fringford and Cogges, co. Oxford, b. 1301, d. 25 Jan 1368
[This material from Deacon Of Elstowe And London (1898) p. 223 quoting IPMs replaces the defective Giffard/Mortyeyn connection in The Visitation of the County of Oxford 1566, 1582, & 1634. Sir John Morteyn, the subject of the IPM, was the nephew of Joan and Lucy.]
13. Sir Thomas Giffard, of Twyford, b. ca. 1345, d. 25 Sep 1394; m. (1) Elizabeth de Missenden, d. 1367
14. Roger Giffard, esq., of Twyford, b. ca. 1367, d. 14 Apr 1409; m. (3) Isabel Stretele
15. Thomas Giffard, of Twyford, b. 1408, d. 29 May 1469; m. Eleanor Vaux, dau. of Thomas Vaux (The Gifford pedigree of generations 12–15 is confirmed by cases in the Plea Rolls.)
16. John Giffard, esq., of Twyford, b. ca. 1431, d. bef. 23 Sep 1506; m. Agnes Wynslowe, dau. of Thomas Wynslowe (who was d. by 6 Jan 1463) and Agnes Throckmorton, dau. of Sir John Throckmorton (ca. 1380-1445), Under-Treasurer of England, bur. at Church of St. John the Baptist, Fladbury, Warwickshire
17. Thomas Giffard, of Twyford, d. 10 Oct 1511; m. Jane Langston, d. 22 Mar 1534, dau. of John Langston of Caversfield, Buckinghamshire, and Amy Danvers, dau. of John Danvers and his 2nd wife, Joan Bruley; John Danvers was the son of Richard Danvers and Agnes Brancestre, dau. of Sir John Brancestre
(The Bruley family is ancient and somewhat confused, so I will not trace it further here. There is an error in this chart: ”John Langeston” married Amy Danvers, not “Margarett” Danvers. I’ve shown only the children of John Danvers’ second marriage to Joan Bruley; by his first wife, Alice Verney, he also had issue.)
(In the old churches of England it was customary for families of local importance to make a display of their arms. These arms were recorded in 1668 as being displayed in the chancel window in Waterstock church, Oxfordshire, relating to the above Danvers, Bruley, and Quartermaine families. Evidently subsequent restorations have erased their existence.)
18. Amy Giffard, b. ca. 1485/90; m. bef. 1511 Richard Samwell, of Edgecote, co. Northampton, d. 3 May 1519
19. Susanna Samwell, b. ca. 1510/5; m. ca. 1535 Peter Edwards, of Peterborough, co. Northampton, b. ca. 1490, d. ca. 1552, son of Peter Edwards
20. Edward Edwards, gent., of Alwalton, co. Huntingdon, b. ca. 1537, d. between Christmas 1591 and 16 Sep 1592; m. Ursula Coles, buried 2 Feb 1606, daughter of Richard Coles and Jane Bond (m. ca. 1536) [will of Jane (Bond) Coles dated 22 Aug 1577; daughter of Robert Bond]
21. Margaret Edwards; m. ca. 1591 Henry Freeman, of Cranford, co. Northampton, b. 1560, son of Thomas Freeman, son of Henry Freeman of Irchester, co. Northampton and Joan Rudd
[This chart, from The Visitations of Northamptonshire 1564 and 1618-19, p. 192, gives a pedigree of Joan Rudd to her great-grandfather, Thomas Rudd of Bedfordshire. Of Robert Pemberton of
Rushden, Northamptonshire, I have this, from the Rushden Town Council: "From the early 13th century until 1929, Rushden Hall was home to a succession of local squires, in particular the Pembertons, Ekins, Fletcher and Sartoris families. The Pemberton's long association with the hall (nearly 200 years) began shortly after 1460 with Robert Pemberton who was MP for Northampton (in 1477-8), High Sheriff (in 1480) and Usher of the Chamber to Richard III *. His grandson, another Robert Pemberton , lived in Rushden Hall during Elizabeth I's reign. He was one of her Gentlemen Ushers of the Wardrobe, and he and his son, Sir Lewis Pemberton, rebuilt the old, primitive hall as an elegant country house. Sir Lewis Pemberton, High Sheriff of Northamptonshire, who passed away in 1639, was the last of the Pembertons to live at Rushden Hall." Sir Lewis Pemberton died deeply in debt and Rushden Hall became the property of the Ekins family. There was a Parris family seated at Littell Linton in Cambridgeshire, but I don't know how Katherine Paris fits into it. The family connections of Alice Freeman are extensive and warrant further investigation. * This is the Robert Pemberton in the above chart. He was evidently a Yorkist, as he is mentioned in May 1476 Close Roll as one of the Ushers of the King's Chamber to Edward IV.]
(This pedigree, from the same Visitation of Northamptonshire, page 41, gives some further history of the Pemberton family, showing that Robert Pemberton’s wife was Alis Lago, daughter of Stephen Lago. Robert Pemberton was the son of William Pemberton of Lancashire, of whom I have nothing further.)
[Referring again to the Rudd chart, which shows that Thomas Rudd married Katherine Paris, daughter of (?) Paris of Linton, Cambridgeshire, I located this chart in The Visitations of Cambridgeshire 1575 and 1619, p. 37, which is her family, though not her line. Sir Philip Paris (1492-1558) was a Catholic recusant. A chart in Blomefield (1739) shows that Elizabeth Paris (d. 1591), daughter of Sir Philip Paris, married Sir Thomas Lovell of Norfolk. Evidently the descendants of Sir Philip Parys knew nothing of their ancestors beyond John Parys. Robert Pemberton and Katherine Paris would have been approximate contemporaries of one another. The Golden Grove Book of Pedigrees shows a Ferdinando Paris of Cambridgeshire marrying Margaret Lovel, daughter of Sir Philip Lovel of Norfolk; the relationship of Ferdinando Paris to John Parris is unclear. Ferdinando Paris had a son Thomas Paris, who had two daughters: Catherine married Thomas Croft of Wigmore, and Mary married Richard Hynton.
The manors of Linton have a complex history. However, it is known that around the mid-14th century, the Parys family had acquired Great Linton. The progenitor of the Parys family of Linton was Robert Parys (d. ca. 1377). By 1428 the Parys family held the manor of Little Linton as well, the manors then becoming united in descent.
A more complete chart of the family was prepared by Everard Green, Somerset Herald-of-Arms (1911-1926), entitled: A Pedigree of the ancient Catholic family of Parys of Linton in the county of Cambridge. It contains some errors. Green shows Katherine (Rudd) Paris as a descendant of Robert and Alienora Parys, but doesn't name her parents. Green indicates the family had its origins in Norfolk, but cites no documentation in support of that assertion.]
Monumental brass of Henry Parys, Esq., d. 1466, at Holy Trinity Church, Hildersham, Cambridgeshire. Such memorials were probably all from a pattern, and not a likeness of the wealthy people who ordered them.
[In order to better understand the Parys family of Linton (the name is variously rendered as Parys, Paris, Parris, etc.), I prepared this chart. I've kept to known facts. The elder line of the family became extinct upon the death of Catherine Parys, ca. 1412. The estates then went to Nicholas Parys, younger son of Robert and Eleanor Parys. Nicholas Parys died without heirs in 1425, whereupon the estates passed to Henry Parys (d. 1427), younger son of Robert Parys (d. 1408). Sir Philip Paris (1492-1558) was the only member of the family to that point to achieve national prominence, profiting greatly from the dissolution of the religious houses during the reign of King Henry VIII.
The other two pedigrees cited here: that of Katherine (Paris) Rudd and Ferdinando Paris are fragmentary. Evidently both Katherine (Paris) Rudd and Ferdinando Paris are descendants, though not children, of Henry Parys (d. 1427). Unfortunately, the term "Esquire" does not have a precise meaning, but was applied to any man whose ancestors or himself had a coat of arms. That Katherine (Paris) Rudd's father is termed "Esq." indicates he was of this family. It doesn't necessarily mean her father was Henry Paris (d. 1466), but he is the most likely candidate. Since the Rudd chart indicates no dates for Katherine (Paris) Rudd, the best course to learn the identity of her father would be to check records at Higham Ferrers. The Parys family somehow emerged from obscurity and amassed enough capital to become country squires, a position they maintained well into the 17th century.]
(From: ”Alice (Freeman) (Tompson) Parke,” by Clarence Almon Torrey, in The American Genealogist and New Haven Genealogical Magazine,” July 1936. This article dovetails with the Moriarty article cited above. )
(Visitation of Northamptonshire 1618-1619; this chart omits a generation, as Henry Freeman who married Margaret Edwards was actually the grandson of Henry Freeman of Irchester, Northamptonshire.)
[Torrey (1936) corrects the Visitation, and we can apply some dates: Henry Freeman, who m. ca. 1530/3 Joan Rudd, was b. ca. 1505/8, d. ca. 1585; and his son Thomas, who d. ca. 1586, was the grandfather of Alice Freeman.]
22. Alice Freeman, “of Cranford,” b. ca. 1595, d. 11 Feb 1664/5 New London, CT; m. (1) 16 Nov 1616 (his 2nd) John Thompson, gent., of Little Preston, Northamptonshire, d. 6 Nov 1626 in London, son of John Thompson (baptisms of the Thompson children are recorded at the parish of Preston Capes) (2) Robert Parke
23. Bridget Thompson, bpt. 11 Sep 1622, d. Aug 1643; m. (his 1st) Mar 1640/1 Capt. George Denison, gent., bp. Bishop’s Stortford, co. Hertford, 10 Dec 1620, d. Hartford, CT, 23 Aug 1694
24. Hannah Denison, b. 20 May 1643; m. (2) 15 Jul 1680 Capt. Joseph Saxton
25. Mary Saxton, bpt. 4 Sep 1681, d. 17 Oct 1750; m. 15 Dec 1697 Benjamin Minor, d. 28 Feb 1711
26. Mary Minor, b. 1699; m. 28 Oct 1717 James Chipman, b. 18 Sep 1697, liv. 1756
27. Stephen Chipman, b. ca. 1738, prob. in NY, d. 1772 Kent Co., DE; m. Agnes — (poss. related to Jonathan Emerson of Kent Co., DE)
28. James Chipman of Bledsoe Co., TN, b. 1771, d. bef. 1830; m. Betsy — who was living 1832
29. William Chipman, b. 1814, d. 1874 Lauderdale Co., TN; m. Milly Standifer, daughter of Benjamin and Nancy (Echols) Standifer
30. Joseph H. Chipman, b. 1852, d. ca. 1897 Madison Co., TN; m. (1) 31 Aug 1873 Sarah A. Miller, d. 1880 Lauderdale Co., TN, daughter of Howard and Leitha Caroline (Hargis) Miller
31. James Edward Chipman; m. (1) 26 Dec 1901 Allie May Oxley, b. 4 Mar 1887, d. 27 Dec 1935, daughter of Aquilla Voin and Mariah Caroline (Riddle) Oxley:
and had the following children:
Jewell Vester Chipman, m. (1) Ruby Ethel Bohannon; Lawcie Idella Chipman, m. Arvil A. Mason; Beecher Edgar Chipman, m. (1) Jewel Winifred Bailey; Winford William Chipman, m. Ada Hill; Pauline Aquilla Chipman, m. (1) Carl Davis Page.
[Wedding photo: James Edward and Allie May (Oxley) Chipman.]
This line had gone unrecognized because, until the White & Coles article, it wasn’t generally known that James and Mary (Minor) Chipman had descendants. Their first three children–James, Mary, and Deborah–were born in Stonington, CT, where their births were recorded in the town records (of which I have a copy). Deborah was probably the child who died on in New London, CT in Oct. 1725. Paris (Perez) and John were born in New London, CT. About 1730 the family moved to Smithtown, L.I., New York, where Benjamin and Stephen were probably born. About 1744 the family moved to DE.
Mary (Minor) Chipman was of a distinguished New England family. Her great-grandparents, Thomas and Grace (Palmer) Minor were ancestors of Ulysses Simpson Grant, Union Civil War general and 18th President of the United States. Thomas Minor and two other ancestors, James Avery and George Denison, played important roles in King Philip’s War (1675-1676).
Drake, James D. (1999). King Philip’s War Civil War in New England 1675-1676. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.
Mary (Minor) Chipman’s husband James Chipman was a descendant of five Mayflower passengers: Richard Warren, John Howland, John and Joan (Hurst) Tilley, and the Tilley’s daughter Elizabeth. John Tilley was Joan’s 2nd husband.
Chart (with corrected dates):
Abigail (Warren) Snow was the daughter of Richard and Elizabeth Warren. Nothing is known of the origin of Richard Warren. Elizabeth (Tilley) Howland was the daughter of John and Joan (Hurst) Tilley, who died the first winter in Plymouth.
Diana Frances Spencer, Princess of Wales, was a descendant of Alice Freeman through Dorothy Thompson, sister of 23. Bridget Thompson, as follows:
[So how did this miracle of genealogy transpire, that a future king of England finds himself a descendant of Alice Freeman? This illustrates why I don't like Roberts' style of "scholarship." There's a story behind these numbered ciphers. I should not have had to track down the details, but in the spirit of the recent royal marriage, and the record sales of Kleenex it inspired, here goes:
Gens. 30 & 31 are the links that connect the American and British sides of this pedigree. Ellen Wood was the daughter of a wealthy Chillicothe, Ohio businessman. She married Franklin H. Work (1819-1911) in 1857. The couple moved to New York City, where Work amassed a sizable fortune trading on the New Stock Exchange. He was also fond of horses, and perhaps it was in racing circles that his daughter Frances Eleanor Work met and married James Boothby Burke Roche (1852-1920). It was a Gilded Age romance that didn't end well: after four children, the couple divorced in 1891. Frances accused Roche of desertion, a charge he denied. Frances was never to be Lady Fermoy, as Roche didn't inherit the barony until 1 Sep 1920, about two months before his death. However, Frances' son Edmund became the 4th Baron Fermoy. The Barons Fermoy are based in Cork and Limerick in Ireland. In 1883 the family held 21,314 acres in Ireland.]
*****
*****
To paraphrase one prominent prosopographer, prosopography is:
The analysis of the sum of data about many individuals to learn the different types of connections between them, and how they operated within and upon the social, political, legal, economic, and intellectual institutions of their time.
PROSOPOGRAPHY OF ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND
(I have herein furnished the evidence which might be difficult to locate. It’s appalling that an ancient line like this should require re-inventing the wheel. While not a line of great pomp and splendor, it has a significant advantage over most royal lines: it happens to be true.
The point of this exercise is to take the reader through various types of materials—though certainly not all—used in constructing medieval pedigrees. When researching ancestors of this period, the first steps should be to review published work on the family, evaluate the quality of evidence adduced, and then acquire extant Visitations, and the Calendars of Inquisitions Post Mortem for the reigning monarchs. If the family was of the peerage or closely associated with a peer, The Complete Peerage and The Scots Peerage are invaluable. Most of these materials, except The Complete Peerage, are available as downloads via Internet Archive or Google Books. For knights active during the reign of King Edward I, The Knights of Edward I is also useful, and of course some of those knights spill over into the reign of King Edward II. Not everyone who qualified for knighthood wished to be one; it could be a costly dignity.)
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WODEN’S DAY: THE PAGAN ROOTS OF KING ALFRED’S TREE
Asser; Keynes, Simon, trans; Lapidge, Michael, trans. (2004). Alfred the Great Asser’s Life of King Alfred and Other Contemporary Sources. London: Penguin Books Ltd.
Bowker, Alfred. (1902). The King Alfred Millenary A Record of the Proceedings of the National Commemoration. London: Macmillan And Co., Limited.
Horspool, David. (2006). King Alfred Burnt Cakes And Other Legends. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Swanton, Michael J. (1998). The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group.
The account of the life of King Alfred, attributed to Asser, Bishop of Sherborne, begins with his pedigree, as follows:
Adam, Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Seth, Bedwig, Hwala, Hathra, Itermon, Heremod, Sceldwa, Beaw, Taetwa, Geat (a pagan god), Godwulf, Finn, Frithuwulf, Frealaf, Frithuwald, Woden (a pagan god), Baeldaeg, Brand, Gewis, Elesa, Cerdic, Creoda, Cynric, Ceawlin, Cuthwine, Cutha, Ceolwold, Cenred, Ingild, Eoppa, Eafa, Ealhmund, Egbert, Aethelwulf, ALFRED.
I count them as 45 generations. If we grant each generation 35 years, the pedigree extends well into antiquity, but there is recorded history far older than this.
Historians are inclined to accept the generations from Cerdic as more or less accurate in outline, if not in detail. Before Cerdic there are problems evident to even a casual reader. The 11 generations to Seth are names common to the Old Testament, but by the 17th generation, Sceldwa, the names aren’t Hebrew. How the Hebrews gave issue to Germanic tribes isn’t explained. The myth of an uber-progenitor establishing a colony in a distant land is quite common, found in Virgil’s Aeneid and in Gerald of Wales.
(This fanciful chart shows descents from Woden of the various Anglo-Saxon kings. “Vothinn” or “Othinn” are the same as “Woden.”)
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle contains pedigrees similar to Asser’s, and they don’t always agree with his account. Originating as oral histories, and committed to writing at a later date, they combined and morphed with other oral traditions that are now lost. The text of Asser’s biography of Alfred the Great is dated to 893 CE (Common Era, or Anno Domini).
The Chronicle records for the Year 519 that: “Cerdic and Cynric received the West-Saxon kingdom, and the same year they fought with the Britons, in the place now called Cerdicesford; the royal line of Wessex ruled from that day.” In 530 they are recorded as seizing the Isle of Wight. In 534 Cerdic died, and his son Cynric ruled for 26 years.
Below is a chart of the various royal houses as taken from The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, and we may presume that over the course of the centuries there was much intermarrigage.
A fuller account of the kings of Wessex, in narrative form:
David Horspool discusses the question of whether Asser was actually the author of the life of Alfred that bears his name. As Horspool sums it up, the case against Asser’s authorship is far from conclusive. However, the invention of the printing press was many centuries in the future, and each copy of a book was copied by hand in flickering light. It seems unrealistic to expect all copies to be precisely identical, and perhaps some so-called textual anomalies may be traced to that fact, not every monk having an equal grasp of Latin or his subject, and as errors were corrected additional errors were generated.
One wonders what these people looked like. Below is a tableaux of Queen Osburh teaching Alfred to read, from a re-enactment during The King Alfred Millenary:
St. Margaret, wife of the Scottish King Malcolm III, was a descendant of Alfred, and when her daughter Matilda (or Maud) married the English king Henry I, the bloodline of the Anglo-Saxon royal house eventually passed to the Plantagenets. Undoubtedly, Henry I’s motive was to bolster the legitimacy of Norman rule by co-opting a descendant of the Anglo-Saxon kings.
The list contains two pagan gods, Geat and Woden.
Woden is still with us today, though in a different guise. The day Wednesday means Woden’s Day, just as Tuesday is Tewes’ Day, Thursday is Thor’s Day, and Friday is Freya’s Day. Saturday is Saturn’s Day, Sunday is the day of the Sun, and Monday is the day of the Moon. Thus, four of the days of the week derive their names from Germanic or Scandanavian gods, one from the Roman god Saturn, and two from heavenly bodies. It’s quite a stew.
Woden is the god who sought self-knowledge, and may represent a religion, a political figure who achieved something in the distant past, or the aspirations of a people. Woden is ancient, but there are no contemporary records documenting how he came into being. Just as the saga of Beowulf embodies a much older heroic tradition that was sanitized for Christian consumption, so Woden enters Alfred’s pedigree as a cultural hero, but not as an object of worship.
Scholars complain of revisionist history, but it’s been around since ancient times. Exactly who revised it is the problem. And it struck me that there should be many more generations than this, and that they should not pass into the custody of strangers.
