POLITICAL HISTORY 



had attained some measure of independence or had reverted to the 

 dominion of Northumberland, with which it had been politically 

 connected before the government of that kingdom had been thrown 

 into confusion by the Danish inroads. 



Of the Danish predominance in the district south of the Solway 

 there can be no doubt. It has been pointed out by Mr. Freeman ' that 

 no proof was needed to show that Cumberland and Westmorland were 

 largely Scandinavian to this day, but there was no record how they had 

 become so. In Northumberland, he says, we know when the Danes 

 settled, and we know something of the dynasties which they founded. 

 But the Scandinavian settlement of Cumberland Norwegian no doubt 

 rather than Danish we know only by its results. We have no state- 

 ment as to its date, and we know that no Scandinavian dynasty was 

 founded there. The clue to the great puzzle of Cumbrian ethnology 

 might not have been so difficult to find, had attention been given to the 

 political association of the western district with Northumberland. There 

 was no occasion for a Scandinavian dynasty, and no need for a separate 

 record of the Scandinavian settlement on the understanding that Cum- 

 berland continued subject to Northumbrian dominion, except at rare 

 intervals, during the Danish ascendency. There is documentary proof, 

 however, the value of which cannot be exaggerated, that the territory 

 in the neighbourhood of Carlisle was politically connected with North- 

 umberland for some period during the eleventh century, subject to 

 Northumbrian law, and ruled by Northumbrian earls. As this evidence 

 is new to history, it calls for special examination. 



The document in question, of which athirteenth century copy written 

 on vellum and wonderfully well preserved exists in the muniment room 

 at Lowther Castle, is a writ or grant of Gospatric bestowing certain 

 privileges on his freemen and dependants in the neighbourhood of Carlisle. 

 The deed, which is in English and of unrivalled interest, throws a wel- 

 come light on the political and territorial history of Cumberland, and 

 adds much to our knowledge of the district before it was conquered by 

 William Rufus in 1092. As the contents display so many evidences of 

 genuineness, both philological and topographical, there is no hazard in re- 

 garding the document as of unquestionable authority. By its means we 

 can compel the darkness in some measure to yield up its secret, and we 

 are enabled to set back the domain of ascertained knowledge, imperfect 

 though it be, for a period of at least half a century. Before Gospatric's 

 writ was made public, we could not get behind the statement in the 

 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that Dolfin was ruler of Carlisle in 1092, and we 

 possessed no trustworthy evidence about the tenure or tenants of the 

 district, except what might be gathered from the great Inquest of Fees 

 in 121 2, a feudal transaction which we were compelled to accept, in the 

 absence of the Domesday Survey, as the foundation of the territorial 

 history of Cumberland. The date of the grant is very difficult to fix 

 with any approach to exactness, but it may be assigned to some period 



1 Norman Conquest, i. 634. 

 231 



