A rhyming chronicler, in 1390 entered the household of Harry Percy, “Hotspur,” whom he saw fall on Shrewsbury Field in 1403. Pardoned for his treason, he became constable of Warkworth Castle, fought at Agincourt, and served the crown in confidential missions to Scotland. His chronicle, composed in limping stanzas, and treating the history of England from the earliest times down to Henry VI.’s flight into Scotland, he rewrote and presented to Edward IV. just after his accession. It is poor history and poorer poetry, but the account of the Agincourt campaign has the interest of the eye-witness. Richard Grafton continued it down to Henry VIII. See edition by Sir Henry Ellis (1812).

—Patrick and Groome, 1897, eds., Chambers’s Biographical Dictionary, p. 462.    

1

  Harding a Poet Epick or Historicall, handled himselfe well according to the time and maner of his subiect.

—Puttenham, George, 1589, The Arte of English Poesie, ed. Arber, p. 76.    

2

  In my Judgement, he had drank as hearty a draught of Helicon as any in his age.

—Fuller, Thomas, 1662, The Worthies of England, ed. Nichols, vol. II, p. 514.    

3

  He seems to me to be totally destitute of poetry, both from the wretchedness of his lines, and the unhappiness of his subject.

—Cibber, Theophilus, 1753, Lives of the Poets, vol. I, p. 26.    

4

  Almost beneath criticism, and fit only for the attention of an antiquary. Harding may be pronounced to be the most impotent of our metrical historians, especially when we recollect the great improvements which English poetry had now received. I will not even except Robert of Gloucester, who lived in the infancy of taste and versification. The chronicle of this authentic and laborious annalist has hardly those more modest graces, which could properly recommend and adorn a detail of the British story in prose.

—Warton, Thomas, 1778–81, History of English Poetry, sec. xxv.    

5

  John Harding, whose “chronicle” is beneath criticism in point of composition, and can only be an object of curiosity to the antiquary.

—Ellis, George, 1790–1845, Specimens of the Early English Poets, vol. I, p. 291.    

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  He left a “Chronicle of the History of England,” which possesses an incidental interest from his having been himself a witness to some of the scenes which he records; for he lived in the family of the Percys, and fought under the banners of Hotspur; but from the style of his versified “Chronicle,” his head would appear to have been much better furnished for sustaining the blows of the battle, than for contriving its poetical celebration.

—Campbell, Thomas, 1819, An Essay on English Poetry.    

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  Hardyng’s “Chronicle” occupied his leisure for very many years. His relations with the Percy family and with persons of influence in the first half of the fifteenth century give much value to his later chapters, although his information is usually meagre. The earlier chapters which begin with Brute are useless. The “Chronicle” is in English verse which is hardly better than doggerel; each stanza consists of seven lines rhyming a b a b b c c. Although his name is often mentioned in early lists of English poets, his work has no literary merit. The extant manuscripts of the “Chronicle” differ in important respects, and show that Hardyng was constantly rewriting it to adapt it to new patrons.

—Lee, Sidney, 1890, Dictionary of National Biography, vol. XXIV, p. 363.    

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