…

Sear

King Canute and the

tide
Canute Rebukes His Courtiers by Alphonse-Marie-
Adolphe de Neuville

The story of King Canute and the tide is an

apocryphal anecdote illustrating the piety
or humility of King Canute the Great,
recorded in the 12th century by Henry of
Huntingdon.
In the story, Canute demonstrates to his
flattering courtiers that he has no control
over the elements (the incoming tide),
explaining that secular power is vain
compared to the supreme power of God.
The episode is frequently alluded to in
contexts where the futility of "trying to
stop the tide" of an inexorable event is
pointed out, but usually misrepresenting
Canute as believing he had supernatural
powers, when Huntingdon's story in fact
relates the opposite.

The episode
Henry of Huntingdon tells the story as one
of three examples of Canute's "graceful
and magnificent" behaviour (outside of his
bravery in warfare),[1] the other two being
his arrangement of the marriage of his
daughter to the later Holy Roman Emperor,
and the negotiation of a reduction in tolls
on the roads across Gaul to Rome at the
imperial coronation of 1027.

In Huntingdon's account, Canute set his

throne by the sea shore and commanded
the incoming tide to halt and not wet his
feet and robes. Yet "continuing to rise as
usual [the tide] dashed over his feet and
legs without respect to his royal person.
Then the king leapt backwards, saying: 'Let
all men know how empty and worthless is
the power of kings, for there is none
worthy of the name, but He whom heaven,
earth, and sea obey by eternal laws.' " He
then hung his gold crown on a crucifix, and
never wore it again "to the honour of God
the almighty King".[2]

Later historians repeated the story, most

of them adjusting it to have Canute more
clearly aware that the tides would not obey
him, and staging the scene to rebuke the
flattery of his courtiers. There are also
earlier parallels in Celtic stories of men
who commanded the tides, namely Saint
Illtud of Glamorgan, Maelgwn, king of
Gwynedd, and Tuirbe, of Tuirbe's Strand in
Brittany.[3]

Proverbial reference
Proverbial reference to the legend in
modern journalism or politics usually
casts the story in terms of "Canute's
arrogance" of "attempting to stop the tide".
It was cited, for example, by Stacy Head as
typifying the New Orleans city council's
response to Hurricane Katrina (2005), or
by Mark Stephens in reference to Ryan
Giggs as "the King Canute of football" for
his attempts of stopping "the unstoppable
tide of information" on the internet in the
2011 British privacy injunctions
controversy. This, and many other popular
representations, are a misrepresentation
of Huntingdon's account, in which Canute
uses the tide to demonstrate his precise
inability to control the elements and his
deference to the greater authority of
God.[4]
Theodore Dalrymple refers to the story,
without misattributing motives of
arrogance to Canute, in the context of the
British reaction to the Ukraine crisis
(2014), saying

Political power or office often

gives those who possess it the
illusion that they control events.
That, after all, is the reason why
the story of King Canute retains,
and will always retain, its
 relevance to the current political
situation.[5]

Warren Burger, the Chief Justice of the

United States, mentions Canute in the
1980 decision Diamond v. Chakrabarty
(447 U.S. 303), stating the denial of a
patent for a micro-organism "is not likely
to put an end to genetic research".[6]
Burger likens doing so to Canute
commanding the tides.

Historicity and possible

location
The contemporary Encomium Emmae has
no mention of the episode, which has been
taken as indicating its ahistoricity, as it
would seem that so pious a dedication
might have been recorded there since the
same source gives an "eye-witness
account of his lavish gifts to the
monasteries and poor of St Omer when on
the way to Rome, and of the tears and
breast-beating which accompanied
them".[7]
Goscelin, writing later in the 11th century,
instead has Canute place his crown on a
crucifix at Winchester one Easter with no
mention of the sea and "with the
explanation that the king of kings was
more worthy of it than he". Nevertheless,
there may be a "basis of fact, in a planned
act of piety" behind this story.[7]

On the other hand, Malcolm Godden says

the story is simply "a 12th Century
legend... and those 12th Century historians
were always making up stories about
kings from Anglo-Saxon times".[4]
The site of the episode is often identified
as Thorney Island (now known as
Westminster), where Canute set up a royal
palace during his reign over London.[8][9]
Conflictingly, a sign on Southampton city
centre's Canute Road reads, "Near this
spot AD 1028 Canute reproved his
courtiers".[10][11] Bosham in West Sussex
also claims to be the site of this episode,
as does Gainsborough in Lincolnshire. As
Gainsborough is inland, if the story is true
then Canute would have been trying to turn
back the tidal bore known as the aegir.
Possibly the strongest site for this episode
is what is now Leasowe Castle on the
northern end of the Wirral. At that time it
was part of Mercia.

See also
Cultural depictions of Cnut the Great
Xerxes I's whipping of the Hellespont

References
1. Enimvero extra numerum bellorum,
quibus maxime splenduit, tria gessit
eleganter & magnifice
2. Henry of Huntingdon, The Chronicle, p.
199.
3. Lord Raglan: "Cnut and the Waves ":
Man, Vol. 60, (January 1960), pp. 7–8.
4. Is King Canute misunderstood? BBC
news story
5. Theodore Dalrymple, Droning over the
Caucasus , The Salisbury Review, 4
March 2014.
6. "Diamond V. Chakrabarty | Findlaw" .
Caselaw.findlaw.com. Retrieved
2016-11-25.
7. Lawson, M. K., Cnut – England's Viking
King, Stroud: Tempus (2nd ed. 2004),
p. 125.
8. The Palace of Westminster Factsheet
G11, General Series, Revised March
2008
9. Parliament of the United Kingdom of
Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Living Heritage. History of the
Parliamentary Estate: Anglo-Saxon
origins
10. "Canute Castle Hotel" . Archaeological
Sites. Southampton City Council.
January 2001. Archived from the
original on 28 April 2012. Retrieved
21 March 2012.
11. "Google Maps, Canute Road
Southampton" . Retrieved 11 March
2012.

External links
J. P. Sommerville, King Canute (= Cnut)
and the waves
Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=King_Canute_and_the_tide&oldid=935303784"

Last edited 24 days ago by Elbmek

Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0 unless

otherwise noted.