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[Footnote A: Modern research has shown that forks were not so entirely unknown as was imagined when the above was written. In vol. xxvii. of the "Archaeologia," published by the Society of Antiquaries, is an engraving of a fork and spoon of the Anglo-Saxon era; they were found with fragments of ornaments in silver and brass, all of which had been deposited in a box, of which there were some decayed remains; together with about seventy pennies of sovereigns from Coenwolf, King of Mercia (A.D. 796), to Ethelstan (A.D. 878, 890). The inventories of royal and noble persons in the middle ages often name forks. They were made of precious materials, and sometimes adorned with jewels like those named in the inventory of the Duke of Normandy, in 1363, "une cuiller d'or et une fourchette, et aux deux fonts deux saphirs;" and in the inventory of Charles V. of France, in 1380, "une cuillier et une fourchette d'or, où il y a ij balays et X perles." Their use seems to have been a luxurious appendage to the dessert, to lift fruit, or take sops from wine. Thus Piers Gaveston, the celebrated favourite of Edward III., is described to have had three silver forks to eat pears with; and the Duchess of Orleans, in 1390, had one fork of gold to take sops from wine (
Converted pagans received always a new name, in those days, when baptized; and our common phrase, the Christian name, has arisen from the circumstance. Guthrum's Christian name was Ethelstan. Alfred was his godfather.
These foes of England could live easily for years on oatmeal, sour milk, and cod's heads, while the fighting clothes of a whole regiment would have been a scant wardrobe for the Greek Slave, and after two centuries of almost uninterrupted carnage their war debt was only a trifle over eight dollars. Edmund, the brother of Ethelstan, at the age of eighteen, succeeded his brother on the throne.
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