Volume 1

The chronicle of William de Rishanger, of the Barons' War. The miracles of Simon de Montfort / Edited from manuscripts in the Cottonian Library, by James Orchard Halliwell.

  • Rishanger, William, 1250?-1312?
Date:
1840
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The chronicle of William de Rishanger, of the Barons' War. The miracles of Simon de Montfort / Edited from manuscripts in the Cottonian Library, by James Orchard Halliwell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    III. and probably continued in that office to the time of his death.* Certain, however, it is, that on the 3rd of May 1312, Rishanger was sixty-two years of age, and had then been a Benedictine + monk of St. Alban’s for forty-one years ; and we learn this fact from the following memo- randum in MS. Bib. Reg. 14 C. I. which is in his own handwriting : {—“ Memorandum quod ego frater Willel- mus de Rishanger cronigraphus, die Inventionis Sanctze Crucis, anno gratiz M.ccc.xij., qui est annus regis Kd- wardi filii regis Edwardi quintus, habui in ordine xlj. annos et in etate lxij. annos,” - Bale had evidently seen this note when he wrote his brief notice of Rishanger ; § and his assertion that the historian flourished in 1312, has been converted by Pits to died about 1312, and by ticus Virunnius in an inquiry which bears on the custom of sovereigns having their histories written for the benefit of posterity, and in such a manner as to preclude the possibility of the authors being swayed by the opinions of the reigning monarch. Cf. pref.ad Mat. Par. * Vossius de Hist. Lat. p.'790. Cf. Bale, iv. 94, et Pits, 403. + St. Alban’s was a Benedictine monastery. t A fac-simile of this curious note, together with a specimen from the chronicle itself, will be found at the commencement of the volume. See also Casley’s Catalogue of the Royal Library, p. 230. § His words are, “ Claruit anno a Christi Jesu natalitio 1312, annos wetatis habens 62, in monachatu vero 41, sub pradicto rege Edwardo secundo, in suo tandem coenobio sepultus.”—Edit, Basil. 1557, p. 377.