Note 10 — Chapter XXIV

WALTHAM ABBEY, founded or restored by Harold. According to William of Poitiers, and Ordericus, the body was brought to William; and being refused to Ghita, Harold's mother, was committed to William Malet, to be buried on the sea shore. William of Malmsbury has a different account: he says the body was given to Ghita, who bore it to Waltham. Perhaps this and other variations of the story were subsequent inventions, to suppress the dishonourable truth, as to William's revenge. The accounts in Benoit, the Brut, and L'Estoire de Seint Ædward, are in our appendix. The story told in the Waltham MS. (Cott. Jul. D. vi.) as to the pious offices of Osgod Cnoppe, and Ailric the childemaister, two of its monks, and the more romantic legend, in Harold's life, (Harl. MS. 3776),—see our appendix,—are both quoted in Palgrave's History of England, 1831. As to the Editha brought to Osgod's aid in discerning the body, and as to her being different from 'Eddeva pulchra' of Domesday, see Introd. Dom. ii. 79.