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Guthorm-Æthelstan "Gurmund"; he held Cirencester
in 879-880. Here again we have no trace of a
pre-historic Viking, but only of history distorted and
antedated. The grains of truth in all these Celtic
legends must be looked for in the real events of the
ninth to the twelfth centuries.
Not only in folklore, but in well-meant historical
study the same tendency is visible. In the Annals of
the Four Masters under a.d. 743 occurs this entry:
"Arasgach, abbot of Muicinsi Reguil, was drowned."
A similar entry appears in the Ulster Annals for 747;
meaning that the abbot of the "Hog-island of St.
Regulus" (Muckinish in Lough Derg) so met his
death. But according to John O’Donovan’s note (ed.
1849) the former editor, Dr. O’Conor, had read for
"Reguil," "re gallaibh,"–the abbot of Muckinish
was drowned "by strangers," the Gaill or Vikings,
half a century before they were otherwise heard of.
Following this error, Moore in his history described
an attack on "Rechrain," meaning Lambey, and the
drowning of the abbot’s pigs by the Danes. "Thus,"
says O’Donovan, "has Irish history been
manufactured."
Thus, too, English history. Gaimar, to whom we
are often indebted for a bright touch on our early
annals, places the story of Havelock the Dane in the
days of Constantine, successor to King Arthur. Now
Havelock is the Cumbrian legendary form of Olaf
Cuaran, the tenth century king of York and Dublin
(see pp. 138, 139), and though the story is woven
from early traditions, the setting is antedated. Many
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