Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1859 edition. Excerpt: ... NOTES AND REFERENCES. The names of Herbert de Bosham, Roger de Pontigny, Edward Grim, and John of Salisbury, tell their own tale of their respective opportunities of learning the events they narrate, as they have been frequently mentioned as personally present, and as having taken parts in the scenes of which they were afterwards the historians. John of Salisbury was so called because he was for many years a canon of that church (Fitz-St. Vita, ed. Giles, i. p. 215). He was elected Bishop of Chartres on the 22d of July 1176 (Gerv. p. 1434), before which time he had written his Life of St. Thomas (vide infr. note 436). The date of Herbert's book is given us by himself (i. p. 37). He began it in the fourteenth year after the martyrdom, and ended it in the pontificate of Urban III. (i. p. 367), who reigned from December 1185 to October 1187. It was professedly supplemental to the writers who had preceded him. William Fitz-Stephens gives his own credentials: "I was the fellow-citizen of my lord, his cleric, and one of his household. Called by himself to a share of his anxieties, I was dictator in his chancery; when he sung Mass, I was the subdeacon of his chapel; when he sat to hear causes, I read the letters and documents that were presented; and I conducted some causes at his bidding. I was present with him at the Council of Northampton, where matters were transacted of such high importance; I saw his martyrdom at Canterbury; and of many other things which are here written I was an eye and ear witness, while others, again, I learnt from those who witnessed them." Odo, the prior whom St. Thomas had appointed just before his martyrdom (supr. p. 336), was made Abbot of Battel, July 19, 1175 (Chron. of Battel, p. 166; Gerv. p. 1432). He was...
