bom in the year in which the battle of Badon was fought, and that he wrote forty-four years after.* According to the oldest Welsh annals, the battle of Badon was fought in the year 516, which would place the composition of the treatise in the year 560; and the Irish annals record the death of Gildas in 5^0, ten years after.
Only three MSS. of Gildas are known to have existed, and the oldest -of these has since perished. It was in the Cottonian Library (Vit. A. vi.), but fortunately the text of Josseline's edition of Gildas in 1568 was printed from it, and, according to Mr. Petrie, so correctly that it may be taken as represent- ing itt The other two MSS. are in the public library at Cambridge (Dd, i. 17 and Ff, i 27) — the one of the end of the fourteenth or beginning of fifteenth centuries^ and the other of the thirteenth century. The first is said to have belonged to the monks of Glastonbury, and the second to the monks of Durham. This latter MS. inserts various passages which are not to be found in the other MSS. Thus the other MSS. mention that the Saxons were invited '' superbo tyranno,'' and the Durham MS. inserts the words '* Gurthrigemo Britannorum duce." Again, where the ** Bede midentood this weU-known passage as implyisg tliat the battle of Badon was fought forty-four years after the airiyal of the Saxons; but it is now generally admitted that this is a mistaken eoDstmction of the passage, and that the true import is as above, to which I also give my adhesion.
t Josseline says it had belonged to Christ Cfhuich, Oanterbury, and wit 600 years old.
SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY. 35 other MSS. mention the ** Obsessio Badonici montifl^'' the Durham MS. inserts '' qui prope Sabrinum ostium habetur.^ The work'of Gildas had early found its way to the Northumbrian monks^ as Bede evidently uses it in his history, and they are probably answerable for the additions contained in this MS. It has been remarked that the account given by Oildas of the departure of the Romans from Britain, and the events which followed, are inconsistent with the statements of contemporary Greek and Roman authors; but this appears to me to arise solely from Oildas having misplaced the only document directly quoted by him, which has forced upon his narrative a chronology inconsistent with the true sequence of events, and which, unfortunately, has likewise influenced Bede's history. Oildas narrates two devastations by the Picts and Scots, after each of which they were driven back by the Roman troops; then he states the final departure of the Roman army, followed by the occu- pation of the territory between the walls by the enemy. Then he quotes this document^ which purports to be a letter by the Britons, addressed ** Actio ter consuli,^ imploring assistance against the ** Barbaric who drive them to the sea, while the sea throws them back on the Barhari/' He understands by these ** Barbari'' the Picts and Scots, and places after this latter the invitation to the Saxons, who first drive back the Picts and then unite with them to subjugate the Britons. Now the exact date when this letter must have been written can be at once ascertained, for Aetius was consul for the third time in \ 36 SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY.
446, and the dates of the other events have been fixed in accordance with this; but while this postdates these events when compared with the other authorities, the sequence is the same, with the single exception of the place occupied by this letter. We know from Zosimus that the Roman army really left finally in 409. We see, from Constantius' Life of St. Germanius that the Saxons had already, in alliance with the Picts, attacked the Britons in 429; and Prosper, a contem- porary authority, tells us that in 441 " Britanniae usque ad hoc tempus variis cladibus eventibusque lataa, in ditionem Saxonum rediguntur." It is impossible to mistake this language. The Saxons must have completed their conquest six years before the letter was written, and it follows that the ^'Barbari" to which it refers must have meant the Saxons, and that it was an appeal to the Romans to assist them against the Saxon invaders. The language of the letter, too, which seems exaggerated and inapplicable to the incursions of the Picts and Scots from the north, is much more natural if directed against the steady and permanent encroachment of the Saxons from the east. Take the letter from its present place, and place it after the narrative of the Saxons turning against the Britons and attacking them, and the ordpr of events at once harmonises with the other authorities^ while the necessity for postdating them in Gildas no longer exists. It was no doubt his misapprehending the meaning of this document^ and misplacing it, which led to the arrival of the Saxons being supposed to have ; SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY. 37 taken place after it, and to the date of 447, the succeeding year, being affixed to it by Bede.
The second document is the work usually termed Nennius' History of the Britons^ and it is very neces- sary that we should form a right conception of this work, and a correct estimate of its authority. The Origines, of Lddorus of Seville, who died in 686, and which must have been compiled some considerable time earlier, soon became widely known, and led to works being written in many countries upon their early history, in which the traditions of the people were engrafted upon it. Either in the same century, or the beginning of the next, a work was compiled, in Britain, termed Historia Britonum. The author of it IB unknown, but the original work appears to have been written in Welsh and translated into Latin. It seems to have acquired popularity at once, and become the basis upon which numerous additions were made from time to time. The original work appears to have be- longed more to the North than to Wales, or at least the latter part of it, as the events of that part are mainly connected with the North, and it terminates with the foundation of the Anglic kingdom Of North- umbria by Ida. Soon after was added what is termed the Oenealogia, being the descent of the Saxon kings of the different small kingdoms; but here too North- umbria predominates, and most of the events men- tioned in it are connected with its history. It must have been compiled shortly after 738, as that is the latest date to which the history of any of the Saxon /• 38 SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY.
kingdoms is brought down; and it too bears the marks of being a translation into Latin fix)m Welsh. An edition of the Hisioria seems to have been made in 823, the fomrth year of Mervyn Frych, king of Wales, by Marc the Anchorite, when that part at least of the text which contains portions of the life of Germanus, and probably the legend of St Patrick, must have been inserted. Another edition in 858 bears the name of Nennius. The original work was very early attributed to Gildas, but latterly the whole work bore the name of Nennius.
The oldest MSS. are of the tenth century, and are three in number. They represent two different editions of the work. The Vatican MS. bears the name of Marc the Anchorite, and contains the date of 946, and the fifth year of King Edmund. It is remarkable enough that this was the year in which that king conquered Cambria, and made it over to Malcolm, king of Scots. It would seem as if this conquest had brought it first under the notice of the Saxons, and this conjecture is further strengthened by the fact that the Paris MS. ex- actly corresponds with this^ and that this MS. alone, of all the numerous MSS. which have come down to us, has the names of the Saxon kings in the Saxon and not in the Welsh form.
The MS. which represents the other edition is one in the British Museum (Harl. 3856). It contains in it tiie date of 796, but there are additions to it not found in any other MS., which must have been compiled in the year 977. These are, firsts a later chronicle of Welsh SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY. 39 events, fix)m the year 444, and though the last event corded is in 954, the *' anni " have been written down to • 977; the second is a collection of Welsh genealogies^ commencing with that of Owen, son of Howel dda, king of South Wales, who reigned from 946 to 985, — ^both in the paternal and maternal line, — ^&om which we may infer that the writer was connected with South Wales. The Chronicle was made the basis of two much later chronicles, in which the events are brought down to 1286 and 1288, and the whole have been edited under the name of Annales CanibricB, but the two later chronicles have in reality no claim to be incorporated with it^ as the differences are not various readings of one text, but later additions. The great value of this Chronicle arises from the fact that it was compiled a century and a half before the Bruts were written, and it detracts from that value to add to it later additions taken from chronicles compiled as many years after the Bruts^ and which are obviously derived from them. It is also the source from which many of the entries in the Welsh Brut y Saeson and Brut y Tywysogion have been translated. It is obvious that both the Chronicle and the Welsh genealogies were additions intended to illustrate tiie Oenealogta attached to the ffistoria Britonvm^ and to bring tiie Welsh history down to the date of the compiler. The Chronicle in- serts the events in the Oenedlogia in tiie very words of the latter; and when the OenecUogia enumerates four Welsh kings as fighting against one of the kings of Bemicia, the Welsh genealogies give the pedigree of these four kings in the same order.
40 SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY.
The Historia Britonum was translated into Irish by GiolUicaoinhan, an Irish Sennachy, who died in 1072, and various Irish and Pictish additions were incorporated in the translation.
The work, therefore, as it existed prior to the twelfth century, may be said to consist of six parts: First, The original nucleus of the work termed Historia Britonum; second. The Oenedbgia, added soon after 738; third, The Memorahilia; fourth. The Legends of St Germanus and of St Patrick, added by Marc in 823, the latter being merely attached to his edition, and incorporated in that of Nennius; Jifth, The Chronicle and the Welsh genealogies, added in 977; and, sixth, The Irish and Pictish additions, by Giollacaomhan.* The MSS. of Nennius amount to twenty-eight in number; and of the later MSS. several seem to have been con- nected with Durham. To the monks of Durham many interpolations may be traced very similar to those in Gildas: in some MSS. they are written on the margin, and in others incorporated into the text Thus, when the Mare Fresicum is mentioned, the Durham commentator adds, ''quod inter nos Scotosque est* The result of my study of this work is to place its authority higher than is usually done; and, used with care and with due regard to the alterations made from * Hie original work will be quoted under the title of the Hiftma BriiWMtm, the second portion under lh«'i of the Gtnealogia, or both ge&endly as Kennius, and the fifth as the Chronicle and Genealogies of 977. The Irish Annals will be quoted fiom the Chnmida of the Picts amd 8eoU, recently published, being the first of the series of Scottish Reoori publications.
SOURCES OF THE EARLY HISTORY. 41 time to time, I believe it to contain a valuable sum- maiy of early tradition, as well as fragmentB of real history, which are not to be found elsewhere.
The third native authority prior to the twelfth . century is The Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales.
They were published by the Record Commission of England in 1841, and the oldest of them, the Laws of Howel dda, are of the tenth century.
Such are the native materials upon which, along • with the old Roman and Saxon authorities, any ati tempt to grasp the leading features of the early hisfany of Wales must be based.
I I < { <.
42 STATE OF OODMTRY IN SIXTH CENTURY.
CHAPTER IV.
STATE OP THE COUNTRY IN THE SIXTH CENTURY, AND ITS HISTORY PRIOR TO A.D. 660.
The state of Wales and the distribution of the Cymric population, between the termination of the Roman dominion and the sixth century, so far as we can gather it from these ancient authorities, does not accord with what we should expect from the ordinary conception of the history of that period, but contrasts in many respects strangely with it We are accustomed to regard the Cymric popu- lation as occupying Britain south of the waU between the Tjne and the Solway; as exposed to the incursions of the Picts and Scots from the country north of the wall, and inviting the Saxons to protect them from their ravages^ who in turn take possession of the south of Britain, and drive the native population gradually back till they are confined to the mountainous region of Wales and to ComwalL We should expect, there- fore, to find Wales the stronghold of the Cymry and exclusively occupied by them; the Saxons in the centre of Britain, and the country north of the wall between the T3me and Solway surrendered to the barbaric tribes of the Picts and Scots. The picture presented to us, when we can first survey the platform 8TATB OF COXTirrRY IN SIXTH CEMTURT. 43 of these contending races, is something very differenti We find the sea-board of Wales on the west in the occupation of the Owyddyl or Oael, and the Cymry J confined to the eastern part of Wales only, and placed between them and the Saxons. A line drawn fix>m Conway on the north to Swansea on the south would separate the two races of the Owyddyl and the Cymry, on the west and on the east In North Wales, the C3nnry possessing Powys, with the Gwyddyl in Gwyn- ned and Mona or Anglesea; in South Wales, the Cymry possessing Gwent and Morganwg, with the Gwyddyl in Dyfed; and Brecknock occupied by the mysterious Brychan and his family.
On the other hand, from the Dee and the Humber to the Firths of Forth and Clyde, we find the country almost entirely possessed by a Cymric population, where ultimately a powerful Cymric kingdom was formed; but this great spread of the Cymric popula- ) tion to the north not entirely unbroken. On the north ^^1 of the Solway Firth, between the Nith and Lochiyan, was Galloway with its Oalwydel; in the centre the great wood, afterwards forming the forests of Ettrick and Selkirk and the district of Tweeddale, extending firom the Ettrick to the range of the Pentland Hills, and north of that range, stretching to the river Carron, was the mysterious Manau Gododin with its Brithwyr. .On the east coasts from the Tyne to the Esk, settle- ments of Saxons gradually encroaching on the Qjuajk A very shrewd and sound writer, the Rer. W.
. Basil Jones, now Archdeacon of York, struck with this I 44 STATE OP CX)UNTRY IN SIXTH CENTURY.
strange distribution of the population in Wales^ has, in his essay, Vestiges of the Oael in Gwynedd, revived a theory first suggested by Edward Lhuyd that the Gael preceded the Cymry in the occupation of the whole of Britain, and that these Gael in the western districts of Wales were the remains of the original population, seen, as it were, in the act of departing from the coimtry before the presence of the Cymry; but, though maintained with much ingenuity, it runs counter both to the traditions which indicate their presence and to the real probabilities of the case. Till the year 360 the Roman province extended to the northern wall which crossed the isthmus between the Forth and the Clyde, and the Cymric population was no doubt co-extensive; but in that year barbarian tribes broke into the pro- vince, which tiie Roman authors tell us consisted of the Picts^ Scots, and Saxons, and, though driven back, renewed their incursions from time to time. The Saxons, of course, made their descents on the east coasts and Gildas teUs us that the Picts came ab aquilone, the Scots a circione, implying that they came from different directions; while all authorities concur in making Ireland the head-quarters of the latter. The Saxons made their descents on the east coast^ the Picts from the north, and the Scots from the west Gildas tells us that the Picts finally occupied the country up to the southern wall pro indigents, and settled down in the northern regions; and Nennius, in his account of the arrival of the Scots in Ireland, adds STATE OF COUNTRY IN SIXTH OfiNTURT. 45 four settlements of them in regiontbiu Britannia^ one of which he expressly says was in Demetia^ or South Wales^ and terms the people expelled by Cunedda and his sons, Scotti. The Scots^ therefore^ probably effected a settlement on the west coast <^ Wales, as they did on that of Scotland; and these foreign settlements in the heart of the Cymric popu- lation of Wales and the North seem more probably to have been permanent deposits remaining from the frequent incursions of the so-called barbaric tribes on ^ the Roman province, than vestiges of an original population.
Relieved from the erroneous chronology applied by Bede to the events narrated by Gildas, into which he was led by the false place occupied by the letter to Aetius, the statements of Gildas harmonise perfectly with the facts indicated by contemporary Roman and Greek authors. The barbaric tribes who broke into the province in 360 were driven back by Theodosius in 368, and the province restored to the northern wall. Then follows the usurpation of the tide of Imperator by Maximus in 383, who takes the Roman troops over to Gaul. This is succeeded by the first devastatio by the Picts and Scots, when the Britons apply to the Romans for assistance. Stilicho sends a single legion, who drive them back and recon- struct the northern walL Claudian records the de- feat of the barbarian tribes, which he names Picls» Scots, and Saxons, the fortifying the wall, and the return of the legion, which was recalled in 402^ 46 STATE OF COUNTRY IN SIXTH CENTURY.
Then follows the second devastatio by the Plots and Scots, and the second appeal for assistance, and a larger force is sent^ by whom they are again driven back. The Roman troops then elect Marcus, affcer him Gratian Municeps, and finally Constantine, as Imperator, who likewise passes over to Gaul with the troops in 409, after having repaired the southern wall. Then follows the third devastatio by the Picts and Scots, and Honorius writes to the cities of Britain that they must protect themselves. The Picts settle down in the region north of the wall, the Scots return to Ire- land, soon to reappear and again effect settlements on the western sea-board. The Saxons are appealed to for help, but unite with the Picts to attack the Britons, and finally bring the greater part of the country under their subjection in 441, and the Britons vainly appeal to Aetius for assistance in 446.
Such is a rapid sketch of the events which brought about the destruction of the Roman province, when the statements of Gildas are brought into harmony with those of the classical writers^ and which produced the relative position of the different races presented to us soon after the final departure of the Romans.
Passing over the legends connected with Grortigem, as involving an inquiry into lus real period and history, which has no direct bearing upon our immediate object^ and woidd lead us beyond the limits of this sketch, the first event that emerges from the dark* ness which surrounds the British history at this period, and which influenced the relative position STATE OF COUNTRY IN SIXTH CEMTUBT. 47 of the different races constituting its population, is the appearance of Cunedda^ his retreat fix>m the north, and the expulsion of the Gael from Wales hy his descendants. We are told in the Etstaria Britanum that the Scots who occupied D3rfed and the neigh- bouring districts of Gower and Cedgueli ** expuld sunt a Cuncda et a filiis ejus;'' and in the Oenealogia that "Maelcunus Magnus rex apud Brittones regnabat^ id est^ in regione Ouenedote, quia atavus illius, id est, Cunedag, cum filiis suis, quorum numerus oeto eraty venerat prius de parte sinistrali, id est, de regione que vocatur Manau Ouotodin, centum quadraginta sex annis antequam Mailcun regnaret^ et Scottos cum ingentissima clade expulerunt ab istis regionijbuB.* As Mailcun was the first king to reign in Owynodd after the Scots were driven out, and he was fourth in descent from Cunedda, it is clear that the expression, that they were expelled '' a Cuneda cum filiis ejus^'* is used somewhat loosely, and that the actual expulsion must have been effected by his descendants. In point of fact, we know from other documents that the real agent in the expulsion of the Scots from Owynedd was Caswallawn Law Hir, the great-grandson of Cunedda and father of Mailcun. K four generations existed between Cunedda and Mailcun, this interval is well enough expressed by a period of 146 years; but an unfortunate date in the Chronicle of 977 has per- plexed the chronology of this period, and led to Cunedda being placed earlier than is necessary. The Chronicle has, under the year 647, **Mortali« 48 STATE OF COUNTRY IN SIXTH CENTURY.
tas magna in qua pausat Mailcun rex Guenedote;" and if Mailcun died in 54 7, a period of 146 years from the beginning of his reign would take us back to the fourth century, and place Cimedda to- wards the end of it; but we know from GUdas that Mailcun did not die in 547, as he was aUve and rapidly rising to power when Gildas wrote in 560, and the date in the chronicle seems to be a purely arti- ficial date, produced by adding the period 146 years to the beginning of the century. Gildas mentions that Maglocunus or Mailcun had, some time previously, retired into a monastery, from whence he emerged not long before he wrote, and this is probably the true com- mencement of his reign. A period of 146 years prior to 560 brings us to 414; and some years before that must be considered the true era of the exodus of Conedda, with his sons, from Manau Guotodin. It thus coincides very closely with the period of the occu- pation of territory between the walls by the Picts on the final withdrawal of the Roman troops in 409.
Cunedda is termed in all Welsh documents Oule- dig, a name derived from the word OuJad, a coimtry, and signifying Buler. The same term is applied to Maximus, who is called in Welsh documents, Maxim Ovledig. It is therefore equivalent to the title and position of Imperator conferred upon him by the troops in Britain. After Maximum and before the Roman troops left Britain, they elected three Impe- ratores^ the last of whom, Constantine, withdrew the army to OauL We know from the Notitia Imperii STATE OF COUKTBY IK SIXTH CEMTUEY.. 49 that the Roman legionary troops were mainly stationed at the Roman wall and on the Saxon shore, to defend the province fix)m inroads of the barbarian tribes; and when the Roman army was finally withdrawn, and Honorius wrote to the cities of Britain that they must defend themselves, the Soman troops were probably replaced by native bodies of warriors^ and the functions of the Roman Imperator continued in the British Guledig. If this view be correct^ the real fact con- veyed by Nennius' intimation, that Cunedda had left the regions in the north called Manau Ouotodin 146 years before the reign of Mailcun, is that in 410, on tiiie Picts conquering the land up to the southern wall, the Guledig had withdrawn from the northern to within the southern wall In the Welsh documents there is also frequent mention of the Oosgordd or retinue in connec- tion with the Guledig, which appears to have usually consisted of 300 horse. It was certainly a body of men specially employed in the defence of the bordei^ as the Triads of Arthur and his warriors — a document not subject to the same suspicion as the Historical Triads — ^mentions the ** three Gosgordds of the passes of the island of Britain," and the Gosgordd mur or Grosgordd of the wall, is also mentioned in the poems. It seems to' be equivalent to the body of 300 cavalry attached to the Roman legion; three times that number, or 900 horse, forming the horse of the auxiliary troops attached to a legion.
The next Guledig mentioned is the notice by Gildas, in a part of his narrative that indicates a time VOL. I. X « 60 8TATB OF COUNTRY IN SIXTH CENTURY, somewhat later, that the Britons took anns ^'duce Ambrosio Auerliano/' a man of Roman descent whose relations had borne the purple. The term ^ Aurelianus " is Gildas' equivalent for Guledig, as he afterwards mentions Aurelius Conanus, and both are known in Welsh documents by the names of Emmrys Ouledig and Cynan GuUdig; and Ambrosius must have been connected by descent with prior *" Impera- tores'' created by the Roman troops. Oildas then adds that after this '' nunc cives^ nimc hostes, vince- bant usque ad annum obsessionis Badonici mentis/' and the date of this event is fixed by the chronicle attached to NenniuSy which places it in the year 516, in which year Gildas was bom.
The period between the success of Ambrosius and the siege of Badon Hill is filled up in the Historia Britonum with the account of twelve battles fought by Arthur, of which that of Badon Hill is the last In the oldest form of the text he is simply termed Arthur, and the title only of ^* dux bellorum'' is given him. It says, ''Tunc Arthur pugnabat contra illos (i.e. Saxones), in illis diebus cum regibus Britannorum, sed ipse dux erat bel- lorum." He was not "dux" or "rex Britannorum," but "dux bellorum," a title which plainly indi* Gates the Guledig. That he bears here a very different character from the Arthur of romance is ^ plain enough. That the latter was entirely a fictitious person is difficult to believe. There is always some substratum of truth on which the wildest legends are STATE OF OOUNTBT IN SIXTH OEMTUBY. 61 basedy though it may be so disguised and perverted hardly to be recognised; and I do not hesitate to re- ceive the Arthur of Nennius as the historic Arihiir, ^ the events recorded of him being not only consiBteat with the history of the period, but connected with localities which can be identified, and with most of which his name is still associated. That the events here recorded of him are not mentioned in the Saxon Chronicle and other Saxon authorities, is capable of explanation. These authorities record the struggle between the Britons and the Saxons south of the Humber; but there were settlements of Saxons in the north even at that early period,* and it is with these settlements that the war narrated in the fftstaria Britonum apparently took place.
The Historia Britonum records among the various bodies of Saxons who followed Hengist to Britain one led by his son Octa and his nephew Ebissa, to whom he promises ** regiones que sunt in aquilone juxta murum qui vocatur Gual*' — ^the name given by Nennius to the northern wall. They arrive with forty ^hips^ and after ravaging the Orkneys and circumnavigating the Picts, they occupy '' regiones plurimas usque ad con- finia Pictorum." The Harleian MS. inserts the words '' ultra Frenessicum Mare,'' to which the Durham MSS. add, ** quod inter nos Scotosque est,'' to show that the