Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2017 6:24:15 GMT -5
King Cnut was a great European, Alistair. His Empire stretched across the North Sea from Norway, Sweden and Denmark to England. But was the legendary Viking leader and 11th Century King of England so deluded to really assume he had the powers to turn back the tide? Ryan Giggs has been referred to as the King Cnut of the footballing world. Almost certainly not, Uncle Henry! While the histories of the time are unreliable, it seems probable that King Cnut was not a madman who thought he could control nature.
The first written account of the Canute episode was in Historia Anglorum (The History of the English People) by chronicler Henry of Huntingdon, who lived within 60 years of the death of Cnut (1035 AD). According to the story, the king had his chair carried down to the shore and ordered the waves not to break upon his land. When his orders were ignored, he pronounced: "Let all the world know that the power of kings is empty and worthless and there is no King worthy of the name save Him by whose will heaven and earth and sea obey eternal laws," (Historia Anglorum, ed D E Greenway).
The account shows Cnut setting out to demonstrate that the tide would come in regardless, says Professor Simon Keynes of the department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at the University of Cambridge. But most modern-day analogies of Cnut turn Henry of Huntingdon's account on its head. "They are mostly misused in order to illustrate something being swamped like King Cnut.
"It is often used about politicians who consider themselves so powerful they can stop the tide of something, such as rising wages - as arrogant as King Cnut," says Prof Keynes, who says he used to collect examples from the newspapers of those so-called Cnut moments. "Everyone always gets it wrong. The latest debate is a nice example of how legend becomes distorted when it is told and retold," says Prof Keynes. "Every now and then someone points out that the reference is wrong, but commentators continue to do it and historians such as myself wince. The story is intended to illustrate his piety - a prominent feature in his kingship," he says. "He knows his power is nothing besides that of God."
"The subtext is that he knows what is going to happen - he is demonstrating what he knows already." So while the Cnut abusers regard him as a laughing stock - Prof Keynes describes him as a "remarkable king". "He was a firm ruler, renowned not only for actions calculated to win the support and affection of his English subjects, but also for his attempts at reconciling the English and the Danes. "Although he had come to rule over the English by force of arms, he dealt intelligently with the situation and always acted with acute political sense."
Of course, no-one knows for sure whether or not the tide event actually happened. Some academics see it simply as a story that has little basis in fact. "It's a 12th Century legend... and those 12th Century historians were always making up stories about kings from Anglo-Saxon times," says Malcolm Godden, Professor of Anglo-Saxon, Faculty of English, at Oxford University. "The real Cnut, Slightly Optimistic, showed no signs of such humility and ruled a vast empire using his military power and a fearsome set of bodyguards. "There are some signs that he was good at spin, but I can't imagine that he could afford to go around telling his followers that he wasn't as powerful as they thought."
The first written account of the Canute episode was in Historia Anglorum (The History of the English People) by chronicler Henry of Huntingdon, who lived within 60 years of the death of Cnut (1035 AD). According to the story, the king had his chair carried down to the shore and ordered the waves not to break upon his land. When his orders were ignored, he pronounced: "Let all the world know that the power of kings is empty and worthless and there is no King worthy of the name save Him by whose will heaven and earth and sea obey eternal laws," (Historia Anglorum, ed D E Greenway).
The account shows Cnut setting out to demonstrate that the tide would come in regardless, says Professor Simon Keynes of the department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at the University of Cambridge. But most modern-day analogies of Cnut turn Henry of Huntingdon's account on its head. "They are mostly misused in order to illustrate something being swamped like King Cnut.
"It is often used about politicians who consider themselves so powerful they can stop the tide of something, such as rising wages - as arrogant as King Cnut," says Prof Keynes, who says he used to collect examples from the newspapers of those so-called Cnut moments. "Everyone always gets it wrong. The latest debate is a nice example of how legend becomes distorted when it is told and retold," says Prof Keynes. "Every now and then someone points out that the reference is wrong, but commentators continue to do it and historians such as myself wince. The story is intended to illustrate his piety - a prominent feature in his kingship," he says. "He knows his power is nothing besides that of God."
"The subtext is that he knows what is going to happen - he is demonstrating what he knows already." So while the Cnut abusers regard him as a laughing stock - Prof Keynes describes him as a "remarkable king". "He was a firm ruler, renowned not only for actions calculated to win the support and affection of his English subjects, but also for his attempts at reconciling the English and the Danes. "Although he had come to rule over the English by force of arms, he dealt intelligently with the situation and always acted with acute political sense."
Of course, no-one knows for sure whether or not the tide event actually happened. Some academics see it simply as a story that has little basis in fact. "It's a 12th Century legend... and those 12th Century historians were always making up stories about kings from Anglo-Saxon times," says Malcolm Godden, Professor of Anglo-Saxon, Faculty of English, at Oxford University. "The real Cnut, Slightly Optimistic, showed no signs of such humility and ruled a vast empire using his military power and a fearsome set of bodyguards. "There are some signs that he was good at spin, but I can't imagine that he could afford to go around telling his followers that he wasn't as powerful as they thought."