Note 19 — PART II HISTORICAL STUDIES (continued 2)

Incredible though it may seem that a court official, a chronicler so able and well informed, indeed, in the words of his editor, 'our primary authority for the period',19 should have misstated so grossly an event, as it were, under his own eyes, we must remember that 'Hoveden's personality is to a certain degree vindicated by a sort of carelessness about exact dates'.20 Yet even so, 'few are the points', our supreme authority assures us, 'in which a very close examination and collation with contemporary authors can detect chronological error in Hoveden'.21 Nor, of the eight anachronisms laboriously established by Dr Stubbs, does any one approach in magnitude the error I have here exposed. The importance of every anachronism in its bearing on the authorship of the chronicle is by him clearly explained.