Britain, The Hunns, Lombards. and Ravennans

Britain

The Kings of Britain were, A.C. 407 or 408, Marcus, Gratian, and Constantine successively; A.C. 425 Vortigern, 466 Aurelius Ambrosius, 498 Uther Pendraco, 508 Arthur, 542 Constantinus, 545 Aurelius Cunanus, 578 Vortiporeus, 581 Malgo, 586 Careticus, 613 Cadwan, 635 Cadwalin, 676 Cadwallader.

The three first were Roman Tyrants, who revolted from the Empire. Orosius, Prosper and Zosimus connect their revolt with the irruptions of the Barbarians into Gallia, as consequent thereunto. Prosper, with whom Zosimus agrees, puts it in the year which began the day after that irruption. The just time I thus collect: Marcus reigned not many days, Gratian four months, and Constantine three years. He was slain the year after the taking of Rome, that is A.C. 411, 14 Kal. Octob.

Whence the revolt was in Spring A.C. 408. Sozomen joins Constantine’s expedition into Gallia with Arcadius’s death, or the times a little after; and Arcadius died A.C. 408 May the 1st. Now tho the reign of these Tyrants was but short, yet they gave a beginning to the kingdom of Britain, and so may be reckoned the three first Kings, especially since the posterity of Constantine, viz. his sons Aurelius Ambrosius, and Uther Pendraco, and his grandson Arthur, reigned afterwards. For from the time of the revolt of these Tyrants Britain continued a distict kingdom absolved from subjection to the Empire, the Emperor not being able to spare soldiers to be sent thither to receive and keep the Island, and therefore neglecting it; as we learn by unquestionable records.

Prosper tells us; A.C. 410, Variane Cos. Hac tempestate præ valetudine Romanorum, vires funditùs attenuatæ Britanniæ. And Sigebert, conjoining this with the siege of Rome, saith: Britannorum vires attenuatæ, & substrahunt se à Romanorum dominatione. And Zosimus lib. 6. The Transrhenane Barbarians invading all places, reduced the inhabitants of the island of Britain, and also certain Celtic nations to that pass, that they fell off from the Roman Empire; and being no longer obedient to the Roman laws, κατ’ ‛εαυτον βιατευειν, they lived in separate bodies after their own pleasure. The Britons therefore taking up arms, and hazarding themselves for their own safety, freed their cities from the imminent Barbarians.

In like manner all Brabant and some other Provinces of the Gauls imitating the Britons, freed themselves also, ejecting the Roman Presidents, and forming themselves into a sort of commonwealth according to their own pleasure. This rebellion of Britain and the Celtic nations happened when Constantine usurped the kingdom. So also Procopius, lib. 1. Vandal. speaking of the same Constantine, saith: Constantine being overcome in battle, was slain with his children: Βρεταννιαν μεν τοι Ρωμαιοι ανασωσασθαι ουκετι εχον· αλλ’ ουσα ‛υπο τυραννους απ’ αυτου εμενε. Yet the Romans could not recover Britain any more, but from that time it remained under Tyrants. And Beda, l. 1. c. 11. Fracta est Roma à Gothis anno 1164 suæ conditionis; ex quo tempore Romani in Britannia regnare cessaverunt. And Ethelwaldus: A tempore Romæ à Gothis expugnatæ, cessavit imperium Romanorum à Britannia insula, & ab aliis; quas sub jugo servitutis tenebant, multis terris. And Theodoret, serm. 9. de curand. Græc. affect. about the year 424, reckons the Britons among the nations which were not then in subjection to the Roman Empire. Thus Sigonius: ad annum 411, Imperium Romanorum post excessum Constantini in Britannia nullum fuit.

Between the death of Constantine and the reign of Vortigern was an interregnum of about 14 years, in which the Britons had wars with the Picts and Scots, and twice obtained the assistance of a Roman Legion, who drove out the enemy, but told them positively at their departure that they would come no more. Of Vortigern’s beginning to reign there is this record in an old Chronicle in Nennius, quoted by Camden and others: Guortigernus tenuit imperium in Britannia, Theodosio & Valentiniano Coss. [viz. A.C. 425.] & in quarto anno regni sui Saxones ad Britanniam venerunt, Felice & Tauro Coss. [viz. A.C. 428.] This coming of the Saxons, Sigebert refers to the 4th year of Valentinian, which falls in with the year 428 assigned by this Chronicle: and two years after, the Saxons together with the Picts were beaten by the Britons. Afterwards in the reign of Martian the Emperor, that is, between the years 450 and 456, the Saxons under Hengist were called in by the Britons, but six years after revolted from them, made war upon them with various success, and by degrees succeeded them. Yet the Britons continued a flourishing kingdom till the reign of Careticus; and the war between the two nations continued till the pontificate of Sergius A.C. 688.[2]

The Hunns

The Kings of the Hunns were, A.C. 406 Octar and Rugila, 433 Bleda and Attila. Octar and Rugila were the brothers of Munzuc King of the Hunns in Gothia beyond the Danube; and Bleda and Attila were his sons, and Munzuc was the son of Balamir. The two first, as Jornandes tells us, were Kings of the Hunns, but not of them all; and had the two last for their successors. I date the reign of the Hunns in Pannonia from the time that the Vandals and Alans relinquished Pannonia to them, A.C. 407.

Sigonius from the time that the Visigoths relinquished Pannonia A. C. 408. Constat, saith he, quod Gothis ex Illyrico profectis, Hunni successerunt, atque imprimis Pannoniam tenuerunt. Neque enim Honorius viribus ad resistendum in tantis difficultatibus destitutus, prorsus eos prohibere potuit, sed meliore consilio, animo ad pacem converso, fœdus cum eis, datis acceptisque obsidibus fecit; ex quibus qui dati sunt, Ætius, qui etiam Alarico tributus fuerat, præcipue memoratur.

How Ætius was hostage to the Goths and Hunns is related by Frigeridus, who when he had mentioned that Theodosius Emperor of the East had sent grievous commands to John, who after the death of Honorius had usurped the crown of the Western Empire, he subjoins: Iis permotus Johannes, Ætium id tempus curam palatii gerentem cum ingenti auri pondere ad Chunnos transmisit, notos sibi obsidiatûs sui tempore & familiari amicitiâ devinctos—And a little after: Ætius tribus annis Alarici obses, dehinc Chunnorum, postea Carpilionis gener ex Comite domesticorum & Joannis curopalatæ. Now Bucher shews that Ætius was hostage to Alaric till the year 410, when Alaric died, and to the Hunns between the years 411 and 415, and son-in-law to Carpilio about the year 417 or 418, and Curopalates to John about the end of the year 423.

Whence ’tis probable that he became hostage to the Hunns about the year 412 or 413, when Honorius made leagues with almost all the barbarous nations, and granted them seats: but I had rather say with Sigonius, that Ætius became hostage to Alaric A.C. 403. It is further manifest out of Prosper, that the Hunns were in quiet possession of Pannonia in the year 432. For in the first book of Eusebius’s Chronicle Prosper writes: Anno decimo post obitum Honorii, cum ad Chunnorum gentem cui tunc Rugila præerat, post prælium cum Bonifacio se Ætius contulisset, impetrato auxilio ad Romanorum solum regreditur. And in the second book: Ætio & Valerio Coss. Ætius depositâ potestate profugus ad Hunnos in Pannonia pervenit, quorum amicitiâ auxilioque usus, pacem principum interpellatæ potestatis obtinuit.

Hereby it appears that at this time Rugila, or as Maximus calls him, Rechilla, reigned over the Hunns in Pannonia; and that Pannonia was not now so much as accounted within the soil of the Empire, being formerly granted away to the Hunns; and that these were the very same body of Hunns with which Ætius had, in the time of his being an hostage, contracted friendship: by virtue of which, as he sollicited them before to the aid of John the Tyrant A.C. 424, so now he procured their intercession for himself with the Emperor. Octar died A.C. 430; for Socrates tells us, that about that time the Burgundians having been newly vext by the Hunns, upon intelligence of Octar’s death, seeing them without a leader, set upon them suddenly with so much vigour, that 3000 Burgundians slew 10000 Hunns. Of Rugila’s being now King in Pannonia you have heard already. He died A.C. 433, and was succeeded by Bleda, as Prosper and Maximus inform us. This Bleda with his brother Attila were before this time Kings of the Hunns beyond the Danube, their father Munzuc’s kingdom being divided between them; and now they united the kingdom Pannonia to their own. Whence Paulus Diaconus saith, they did regnum intra Pannoniam Daciamque gerere.

In 441, they began to invade the Empire afresh, adding to the Pannonian forces new and great armies from Scythia. But this war was presently composed, and then Attila, seeing Bleda inclined to peace, slew him, A.C. 444, inherited his dominions, and invaded the Empire again.

At length, after various great wars with the Romans, Attila perished A.C. 454; and his sons quarrelling about his dominions, gave occasion to the Gepides, Ostrogoths and other nations who were their subjects, to rebel and make war upon them. The same year the Ostrogoths had seats granted them in Pannonia by the Emperors Marcian and Valentinian; and with the Romans ejected the Hunns out of Pannonia, soon after the death of Attila, as all historians agree. This ejection was in the reign of Avitus, as is mentioned in the Chronicum Boiorum, and in Sidonius, Carm. 7 in Avitum, which speaks thus of that Emperor.

——Cujus solum amissas post sæcula multa

Pannonias revocavit iter, jam credere promptum est.

Quid faciet bellis.

The Poet means, that by the coming of Avitus the Hunns yielded more easily to the Goths. This was written by Sidonius in the beginning of the reign of Avitus: and his reign began in the end of the year 455, and lasted not one full year.

Jornandes tells us: Duodecimo anno regni Valiæ, quando & Hunni post pene quinquaginta annos invasa Pannonia, à Romanis & Gothis expulsi sunt. And Marcellinus: Hierio & Ardaburio Coss. Pannoniæ, quæ per quinquaginta annos ab Hunnis retinebantur, à Romanis receptæ sunt: whence it should seem that the Hunns invaded and held Pannonia from the year 378 or 379 to the year 427, and then were driven out of it. But this is a plain mistake: for it is certain that the Emperor Theodosius left the Empire entire; and we have shewed out of Prosper, that the Hunns were in quiet possession of Pannonia in the year 432. The Visigoths in those days had nothing to do with Pannonia, and the Ostrogoths continued subject to the Hunns till the death of Attila, A.C. 454; and Valia King of the Visigoths did not reign twelve years.

He began his reign in the end of the year 415, reigned three years, and was slain A.C. 419, as Idacius, Isidorus, and the Spanish manuscript Chronicles seen by Grotius testify. And Olympiodorus, who carries his history only to the year 425, sets down therein the death of Valia King of the Visigoths, and conjoins it with that of Constantius which happened A.C. 420. Wherefore the Valia of Jornandes, who reigned at the least twelve years, is some other King. And I suspect that this name hath been put by mistake for Valamir King of the Ostrogoths: for the action recorded was of the Romans and Ostrogoths driving the Hunns out of Pannonia after the death of Attila; and it is not likely that the historian would refer the history of the Ostrogoths to the years of the Visigothic Kings.

This action happened in the end of the year 455, which I take to be the twelfth year of Valamir in Pannonia, and which was almost fifty years after the year 406, in which the Hunns succeeded the Vandals and Alans in Pannonia. Upon the ceasing of the line of Hunnimund the son of Hermaneric, the Ostrogoths lived without Kings of their own nation about forty years together, being subject to the Hunns. And when Alaric began to make war upon the Romans, which was in the year 444, he made Valamir, with his brothers Theodomir and Videmir the grandsons of Vinethar, captains or kings of these Ostrogoths under him. In the twelfth year of Valamir’s reign dated from thence, the Hunns were driven out of Pannonia.

Yet the Hunns were not so ejected, but that they had further contests with the Romans, till the head of Denfix the son of Attila, was carried to Constantinople, A.C. 469, in the Consulship of Zeno and Marcian, as Marcellinus relates.

Nor were they yet totally ejected the Empire: for besides their reliques in Pannonia, Sigonius tells us, that when the Emperors Marcian and Valentinian granted Pannonia to the Goths, which was in the year 454, they granted part of Illyricum to some of the Hunns and Sarmatians. And in the year 526, when the Lombards removing into Pannonia made war there with the Gepides, the Avares, a part of the Hunns, who had taken the name of Avares from one of their Kings, assisted the Lombards in that war; and the Lombards afterwards, when they went into Italy, left their seats in Pannonia to the Avares in recompence of their friendship. From that time the Hunns grew again very powerful; their Kings, whom they called Chagan, troubling the Empire much in the reigns of the Emperors Mauritius, Phocas, and Heraclius: and this is the original of the present kingdom of Hungary, which from these Avares and other Hunns mixed together, took the name of Hun-Avaria, and by contraction Hungary.

Lombards

Before they came over the Danube, they were commanded by two captains, Ibor and Ayon.

After their death, they had Kings, Agilmund, Lamisso, Lechu, Hildehoc, Gudehoc, Classo, Tato, Wacho, Walter, Audoin, Alboin, Cleophis, &c.

Agilmund was the son of Ayon, who became their King, according to Prosper, in the Consulship of Honorius and Theodosius A.C. 389, reigned thirty three years, according to Paulus Warnefridus, and was slain in battle by the Bulgarians.

Prosper places his death in the Consulship of Marinianus and Asclepiodorus, A.C. 413. Lamisso routed the Bulgarians, and reigned three years, and Lechu almost forty. Gudehoc was contemporary to Odoacer King of the Heruli in Italy, and led his people from Pannonia into Rugia, a country on the north side of Noricum next beyond the Danube; from whence Odoacer then carried his people into Italy. Tato overthrew the kingdom of the Heruli beyond the Danube.

Wacho conquered the Suevians, a kingdom then bounded on the east by Bavaria, on the west by France, and on the south by the Burgundians.

Audoin returned into Pannonia A.C. 526, and there overcame the Gepides. Alboin A.C. 551 overthrew the kingdom of the Gepides, and slew their King Chunnimund: A.C. 563 he assisted the Greek Emperor against Totila King of the Ostrogoths in Italy; and A.C. 568 led his people out of Pannonia into Lombardy, where they reigned till the year 774.

According to Paulus Diaconus, the Lombards with many other Gothic nations came into the Empire from beyond the Danube in the reign of Arcadius and Honorius, that is, between the years 395 and 408. But they might come in a little earlier: for we are told that the Lombards, under their captains Ibor and Ayon, beat the Vandals in battle; and Prosper placeth this victory in the Consulship of Ausonius and Olybrius, that is, A.C. 379. Before this war the Vandals had remained quiet forty years in the seats granted them in Pannonia by Constantine the great.

If these were the same Vandals, this war must have been in Pannonia; and might be occasioned by the coming of the Lombards over the Danube into Pannonia, a year or two before the battle; and so have put an end to that quiet which had lasted forty years.

After Gratian and Theodosius had quieted the Barbarians, they might either retire over the Danube, or continue quiet under the Romans till the death of Theodosius; and then either invade the Empire anew, or throw off all subjection to it. By their wars, first with the Vandals, and then with the Bulgarians, a Scythian nation so called from the river Volga whence they came; it appears that even in those days they were a kingdom not contemptible.

The Romans

The residue of the Western Empire was the Beast itself.

This part is the horn. Its reign may be dated from the translation of the imperial seat from Rome to Ravenna, which was in October A.C. 408.

For then the Emperor Honorius, fearing that Alaric would besiege him in Rome, if he staid there, retired to Millain, and thence to Ravenna: and the ensuing siege and sacking of Rome confirmed his residence there, so that he and his successors ever after made it their home. Accordingly Macchiavel in his Florentine history writes, that Valentinian having left Rome, translated the seat of the Empire to Ravenna.

Rhætia belonged to the Western Emperors, so long as that Empire stood; and then it descended, with Italy and the Roman Senate, to Odoacer King of the Heruli in Italy, and after him to Theoderic King of the Ostrogoths and his successors, by the grant of the Greek Emperors. Upon the death of Valentinian the second, the Alemans and Suevians invaded Rhætia A.C. 455.

But I do not find they erected any settled kingdom there: for in the year 457, while they were yet depopulating Rhætia, they were attacked and beaten by Burto Master of the horse to the Emperor Majoranus; and I hear nothing more of their invading Rhætia.

Clodovæus King of France, in or about the year 496, conquered a kingdom of the Alemans, and slew their last King Ermeric. But this kingdom was seated in Germany, and only bordered upon Rhætia: for its people fled from Clodovæus into the neighbouring kingdom of the Ostrogoths under Theoderic, who received them as friends, and wrote a friendly letter to Clodovæus in their behalf: and by this means they became inhabitants of Rhætia, as subjects under the dominion of the Ostrogoths.

When the Greek Emperor conquered the Ostrogoths, he succeeded them in the kingdom of Ravenna, not only by right of conquest but also by right of inheritance, the Roman Senate still going along with this kingdom.

Therefore, this kingdom continued in the Exarchate of Ravenna and Senate of Rome: for the remainder of the Western Empire went along with the Senate of Rome, by reason of the right which this Senate still retained, and at length exerted, of chusing a new Western Emperor.

Notes to Chap. VI.

[1] Apud Bucherum, l. 14. c. 9. n. 8.

[2] Rolevinc’s Antiqua Saxon. l. 1. c. 6.