[2] There are no less than seven full contemporary, or nearly contemporary, Lives of Becket, besides fragments, legends, and "Passions." Dr. Giles has reprinted, and in some respects enlarged, those works from the authority of MSS. I give them in the order of his volumes. I. Vita Sancti Thomæ. Auctore Edward Grim. II. Auctore Roger de Pontiniaco. III. Auctore Willelmo Filio Stephani. IV. Auctoribus Joanne Decano Salisburiensi, et Alano Abbate Teuksburiensi. V. Auctore Willelmo Canterburiensi. VI. Auctore Anonymo Lambethiensi. VII. Auctore Herberto de Bosham. Of these, Grim, Fitz-Stephen, and Herbert de Bosham were throughout his life in more or less close attendance on Becket. The learned John of Salisbury was his bosom friend and counsellor. Roger of Pontigny was his intimate associate and friend in that monastery. William was probably prior of Canterbury at the time of Becket's death. The sixth professes also to have been witness to the death of Becket. (He is called Lambethiensis by Dr. Giles, merely because the MS. is in the Lambeth Library.) Add to these the curious French poem, written five years after the murder of Becket, by Garnier of Pont S. Maxence, partly published in the Berlin Transactions, by the learned Immanuel Bekker. All these, it must be remembered, write of the man; the later monkish writers (though near the time, Hoveden, Gervase, Diceto, Brompton) of the Saint. [3] Brompton is not the earliest writer who recorded this tale; he took it from the Quadrilogus I., but of this the date is quite uncertain. The exact date of Brompton is unknown. See preface in Twysden. He goes down to the end of Richard II. [4] Mons. Thierry, Hist. des Normands. Lord Lyttelton (Life of Henry II.) had before asserted the Saxon descent of Becket: perhaps he misled M. Thierry. [5] The anonymous Lambethiensis, after stating that many Norman merchants were allured to London by the greater mercantile prosperity, proceeds: "Ex horum numero fuit Gilbertus quidam cognomento Becket, patriâ Rotomagensis .... habuit autem uxorem, nomine Roseam natione Cadomensem, genere burgensium quoque non disparem."--Apud Giles, ii. p. 73. [6] See below. [7] "Quod si ad generis mei radicem et progenitores meos intenderis, cives quidem fuerunt Londonienses, in medio concivium suorum habitantes sine querelâ, nec omnino infimi."--Epist. 130. [8] Grim, p. 9. Pontiniac, p. 96. [9] Grim, p. 8. [10] "Eo familiarius, quod præfatus Gilbertus cum domino archipræsule de propinquitate et genere loquebatur: ut ille _ortu Normannus_ et circa Thierici villam de equestri ordine natu vicinus."--Fitz-Stephen, p. 184. Thiersy or Thierchville. [11] Roger de Pontigny, p. 100. [12] Fitz-Stephen, p. 185. [13] According to Fitz-Stephen, Thomas was less learned (minus literatus) than his rival, but of loftier character and morals.--P. 184.