EARLY HISTORY 27 



clear proof that Cnut claimed the British seas as part of his 

 dominions. 1 



There appears to be only one instance before the Norman 

 Conquest in regard to which priina facie evidence was pro- 

 duced that an English king expressly claimed the sovereignty 

 of the sea, and as it is constantly quoted by later writers it 

 may be worth while examining it. The chronicles agree that 

 the naval power of England was specially manifested by King 

 Edgar (A.D. 959-975), who is said to have possessed a fleet of 

 several thousand vessels, with which he cruised every year 

 along the English coasts. In the words of the Saxon Chronicle, 

 " no fleet was so daring, nor army so strong, that mid the English 

 nation took from him aught, the while that the noble king 

 ruled on his throne." 2 According to William of Malmesbury, 

 who wrote in the twelfth century, Edgar usually styled him- 

 self the sovereign lord of all Albion and of the maritime or 

 insular kings dwelling round about, 3 the assumption being that 

 he also exercised sovereignty over the intervening and surround- 

 ing seas. In a charter by which Edgar, in 964, granted large 

 revenues to the Cathedral Church at Worcester, the claim to 

 the ocean around Britain is more definite, and it is this version 

 that is usually quoted by the writers maintaining the antiquity 

 of the English rights. 4 The title thus said to have been used 

 by Edgar is expressive enough, but an important difference in 

 the wording of this part of the charter is to be found in the 

 transcript printed by Coke in the Epistle to the Fourth Book 

 of Reports, by Spelman, 5 Wilkins, 6 and by the more recent 

 authorities on Anglo-Saxon charters, Kemble, 7 Thorpe, 8 and 



1 Mare Clausum, lib. ii. c. xii. " Canutus autem Rex suse ditionis esse Oceanum 

 Britaimicum verbis expressissimis item est testatus." Prynne uses the same 

 argument. Animadversions on Coke's Fourth Institute, 88. 



2 Ed. Petrie, 395. 



3 Gesta Regum Anglorum, i. 235 ; Eng. Hist. Soc. " Ego Edgarus totius Albionis 

 Basileus nee non maritimorum seu insulanorum Regum circumhabitantium." 



4 " Ego Edgardus Anglorum Basileus omniumque Regum insularum, Oceanique 

 Britanniam circumjacentis cunctarumque nationum quae infra earn includuntur 

 Imperator et Dominus," &c. Dee, General and Rare -Memorials, 58, 60 ; Selden, 

 Mare Clausum, ii. c. xii. (quoting from a charter of Inspeximus, Rot. Pat., 

 1 Edw. IV., m. 23); Prynne, op. cit., 87. 



5 Concilia, i. 432. Ibid., i. 239. 



7 Codex Diplomaticus, ii. 404, vi. 237. 



8 Diplomatarium Anglicum jEvi Saxonici, 211. 



