Alfred’s Chronicle and the First Continuations

Abstract

This chapter considers the vernacular chronicle produced at the court of King Alfred, its story, and its late-ninth-century evolution. It argues that this story was both dynastic history and a wider tale of English Christian history. It argues that seeing this chronicle as connected to the court rather than as deliberate royal propaganda solves some long-standing historical debates. Using the evidence of language and a comparative method involving Asser, surviving chronicles, and twelfth-century texts, it suggests that this chronicle was already an evolving text before 900. It questions the idea of deliberate circulation in the early 890s, suggesting an alternative model of copies made at different points. The early 890s were, nonetheless, a significant time of divergence and the beginning of the story of the separate development of vernacular chronicles.