Archdeacon, and historian, flourished in the middle of the twelfth century, and is best known by his “History of England to the Death of Stephen,” founded to a large extent upon Bede and Geoffrey of Monmouth, and edited by Sir Henry Savile in 1596. It was translated in 1853 by Thomas Forrester…. Henry wrote on “The Contempt of the World” and other subjects, both in prose and verse.
Henry of Huntingdon’s poetry is superior to the general standard of mediæval Latin verse. It is somewhat miscellaneous, consisting of metrical treatises on herbs, gems, spices, etc., of hymns, of amatory poetry, and epigrams.
Henry of Huntingdon has, unfortunately, never found an intelligent editor even in the Mon. Hist. Brit., though he merits one more than any other historian of the middle ages of England. The spirited manner in which he describes battles was, most probably, caused by his intimate acquaintance with the old songs of the people.
Savile describes him as, in respect of historical merit, although separated by a long interval from Malmesbury, yet making as near an approach to him as any other writer of the time, and as deserving to be placed in the first rank of the most diligent explorers and most truthful expounders of the times preceding their own. He is, indeed, more of an antiquary than an historian. His work, in so far as it is a history of his own time, is of little importance.
His easy, interesting, and fluent narrative, breaking out occasionally into poetry, differs certainly not a little in character, even from the lively pages of William of Malmesbury. Yet it is equally characteristic of the new era and of the revival of letters which began under Henry Beauclerc. For with all his warmth of colouring he is a true historian, who seems to have weighed authorities in his own mind, moralises upon events, and draws his own conclusions.
He had ambition, literary taste, and intellectual quickness, but little perseverance, and less accuracy or judgment. If he wanders less from the subject than his contemporaries, it is because the material he used was scanty, and there was less temptation to stray. It used to be thought that he made use of many Old English popular songs; for in his description of battles in the fifth and sixth centuries he always adds picturesque details to the accounts in the English Chronicles, but close investigation shows that he drew on his imagination for these. He found Old English of even the tenth century hard to translate, and makes astounding mistakes in rendering the Battle of Brunanburh. He is important in the development of historical writing as the last translator of the English Chronicles and the first to accept Welsh tradition and romance without question—a bad precedent. The epigrams occurring in the history are probably from his hand, and the eleventh and twelfth books are wholly poetical.
