Henry of Huntingdon quotes
When he was at the height of his ascendancy, he ordered his chair to be placed on the sea-shore as the tide was coming in. Then he said to the rising tide, "You are subject to me, as the land on which I am sitting is mine, and no one has resisted my overlordship with impunity. I command you, therefore, not to rise on to my land, nor to presume to wet the clothing or limbs of your master."
Henry of Huntingdon
Around this time Siward, the mighty earl of Northumbria, almost a giant in stature, very strong mentally and physically, sent his son to conquer Scotland. When they came back and reported to his father that he had been killed in battle, he asked, "Did he receive his fatal wound in the front or the back of his body?" The messengers said, "In the front." Then he said, "That makes me very happy, for I consider no other death worthy for me or my son."
Henry of Huntingdon
Siward, the stalwart earl, being stricken by dysentery, felt that death was near, and said, "How shameful it is that I, who could not die in so many battles, should have been saved for the ignominious death of a cow! At least clothe me in my impenetrable breastplate, gird me with my sword, place my helmet on my head, my shield in my left hand, my gilded battle-axe in my right, that I, the bravest of soldiers, may die like a soldier." He spoke, and armed as he had requested, he gave up his spirit with honour.
Henry of Huntingdon
In the twelfth year of his reign, when Edward was feasting at Windsor, where he often used to stay, his father-in-law, the traitor Godwine, was lying next to him, and said, "It has frequently been falsely reported to you, king, that I have been intent on your betrayal. But if the God of heaven is true and just, may He grant that this little piece of bread shall not pass my throat if I have ever thought of betraying you." But the true and just God heard the voice of the traitor, and in a short time he was choked by that very bread, and tasted endless death.
Henry of Huntingdon
