Note 120 — Chapter IX · MINESTEAD AND RUFUS’S STONE.

Vitalis, as before, p. 752. Neither William of Malmesbury nor Vitalis, who go into details, mentions the spot where the King was killed. The Chronicle and Florence of Worcester most briefly relate the accident, though Florence adds that William fell where his father had destroyed a chapel. (Ed. Thorpe, vol. ii. p. 45). Henry of Huntingdon (Historiarum, lib. vii., in Saville’s Scriptores Rerum Anglicarum, p. 378) says but little more, dwelling only on the King’s wickedness and the supernatural appearance of blood. Matthew Paris brings a bishop on the scene, as explaining another dream of the King’s, and gives the King’s speech of “trahe arcum, diabole” to Tiril, which has a certain mad humour about it, as also the incident of the tree, and the apparition of a goat (Hist. Major. Angl. Ed. Wats., pp. 53, 54), which are not to be found in Roger of Wendover (Flores Hist. Ed. Coxe, tom. ii., pp. 157-59), and therefore open to the strongest suspicion. Matthew of Westminster (Flores Hist. Ed. 1601, p. 235) follows, in most of his details, William of Malmesbury. Simon of Durham (De Gestis Regum Anglorum, in Twysden’s Historian Anglicanæ Scriptores Decem, p. 225), as, too, Walter de Hemingburgh (Ed. Hamilton, vol. i. p. 33), and Roger Hoveden (Annalium Pars Prior, in Saville’s Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores, pp. 467, 468), copy Florence of Worcester. So, too, in various ways, with all the later writers, who had access to no new sources of information. Peter Blois, however, in his continuation of Ingulph (Gales’s Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores, tom. i. pp. 110, 111; Oxford, 1684) is more vivid, and adds that the dogs were chasing the stags up a hill; but his whole book is very doubtful, and his account in this particular instance is irreconcilable with the others. Gaimar (L’Estorie des Engles. Ed. Wright. Caxton Society, pp. 217-224), who says that the King was hunting near Brockenhurst (Brokehest), gives a still more detailed account, but we are met by the same difficulties. Of later writers, Leland, in his Itinerary (vol. vi. f. 100, p. 88) states that the King fell at Thorougham, where in his time there was still a chapel standing, evidently meaning Fritham, called Truham in Domesday. Gilpin (Forest Scenery, vol. i. p. 166) mentions a similar tradition; so that there is a very reasonable doubt as to the spot itself being where the Stone stands, especially since, with the exception of the vague remark of Florence, none of the best Chroniclers say one word about the place. Thierry, in many minor particulars, follows Knyghton, whose authority is of little value, and I have therefore omitted all reference to him.