Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities 2503584705, 9782503584706

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Historiography and Identity II

CULTURAL ENCOUNTERS IN LATE ANTIQUITY AND THE MIDDLE AGES General Editor Yitzhak Hen, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Editorial Board Angelo di Berardino, Augustinianum, Rome Nora Berend, University of Cambridge Leslie Brubaker, University of Birmingham Christoph Cluse, Universität Trier Rob Meens, Universiteit Utrecht James Montgomery, University of Cambridge Alan V. Murray, University of Leeds Thomas F. X. Noble, University of Notre Dame Miri Rubin, Queen Mary, University of London

Previously published volumes in this series are listed at the back of the book. Volume 27

HISTORIOGRAPHY AND IDENTITY The six-volume sub-series Historiography and Identity unites a wide variety of case studies from Antiquity to the late Middle Ages, from the Latin West to the emerging polities in Northern and Eastern Europe, and adding a Eurasian perspective that includes the Islamic World and China. The series aims to develop a critical methodology to harness the potential of identity studies to add to the understanding of the construction and impact of historiography. Volume 2

Historiography and Identity II Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities

Edited by

Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Cover image by Dagmar Giesriegl, adapted from a fictional portrait of Paul the Deacon contained in Florence, Bib. Laurent. MS 65.35, fol 35r (tenth century).

© 2020, Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-2-503-58470-6 E-ISBN: 978-2-503-58471-3 DOI: 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.117387 ISSN: 1378-8779 E-ISSN: 2294-8511 Printed in the EU on acid-free paper D/2020/0095/56

Contents

Acknowledgements Historiography and Identity in the Post-Roman West: An Introduction HELMUT REIMITZ

Debating Ethnicity in Post-Roman Historiography WALTER POHL

Clinging to Empire in Jordanes’ Romana MAYA MASKARINEC

From Scythian, to Getan, to Goth: The Getica of Jordanes and the Classical Ethnographic Tradition RANDOLPH FORD

Two Tales — Two Peoples? Goths and Romans in Jordanes’ Works PHILIPP DÖRLER

Celtic Britain and Ireland: An Arena for Historical Debate T. M. CHARLES-EDWARDS

Genre and Identity in Merovingian Historiography HELMUT REIMITZ

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1 27 71

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121 147 161

Contents

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The Appropriation of History: The Austrasians, Gregory of Tours, and Fredegar ANDREAS FISCHER

History-Writing and Education in Late Antique and Early Medieval Iberia VICTORIA LEONARD and JAMIE WOOD

The Ties that Bind: Diagnosing Social Crisis in Julian of Toledo’s Historia Wambae MOLLY LESTER

Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica and Anglian Northumbria IAN WOOD

Historical Writing in the Lombard Kingdom: From Secundus to Paul the Deacon WALTER POHL

Index

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237

269 297

319 351

Acknowledgements

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his volume, and the series on Historiography of Identity of which it forms a part, originated in the research cluster ‘Visions of Community: Comparative Approaches to Ethnicity, Region and Empire in Christianity, Islam and Buddhism (400–1600 ce) (VISCOM)’, funded by the Austrian Research Fund (FWF) from 2011 to 2019.1 In this cluster, medieval historians, social anthropologists, and philologists worked together to compare the role of universal religions in the formation of particular communities in medieval Europe and Asia. We are very grateful to the FWF and to the cluster’s two host institutions, the University of Vienna and the Austrian Academy of Sciences, for their support. The Institute for Medieval Research of the Austrian Academy provided an excellent institutional hub for our work. We are grateful to both the staff and guests at the institute and its VISCOM partner institutions for their help in organizing the workshops and preparing the volumes for publication. Nicola Edelmann, Catherine Feik, Lena Kornprobst, Salvatore Liccardo, and Bojana Radovanović helped getting the manuscript ready, Christina Pössel corrected the English of some of the articles. We would also like to thank the fantastic team at Brepols, especially Guy Carney, Tim Barnwell, and Ruth Kennedy who helped in seeing this book through production. The project was developed and carried out in close cooperation with institutions and faculty at Princeton University; for financial support we should like to thank the Program of the Ancient World, the Department of History, the Committee for the Study of Late Antiquity, and the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies. Finally, we are very grateful for having been able to work with such a fine group of scholars on this volume, who we would like to thank for their participation, their contributions, and their patience with the inevitably lengthy publication process of such a large-scale undertaking. 1

The FWF (Fonds zur Förderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung in Österreich) funded the cluster as SFB (Spezialforschungsbereich) F 42-G 18.

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Acknowledgements

Forthcoming volumes in the series (all Turnhout: Brepols) Historiography and Identity iii: Carolingian Approaches, ed. by Helmut Reimitz, Rutger Kramer, and Graeme Ward Historiography and Identity iv: The Writing of History across Medieval Eurasia, ed. by Walter Pohl and Daniel Mahoney Historiography and Identity v: The Emergence of New Peoples and Polities, 1000–1300 CE, ed. by Walter Pohl, Francesco Borri, and Veronika Wieser Historiography and Identity, vi: Competing Narratives of the Past in Eastern Central Europe, 1200–1600 CE, ed. by Pavlína Rychterová, with the assistance of David Kalhous

Historiography and Identity in the Post-Roman West: An Introduction Helmut Reimitz*

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his is the second volume of the series on ‘historiography and identity’.1 While the first volume focuses on ancient and Christian models, this second one studies the relationship of history and identity in the quickly and constantly changing worlds of the late antique West. Taken together these volumes do not aim at a comprehensive study of historiography. Instead they provide starting points to problematize and historicize the relationship between writing history and constructing identity, from the ancient to the medieval world. They do not aim to constitute a new history of historiography, but rather to recover the potential that the writing of history developed for the construction of identities in the ancient and medieval world. With its focus on the Latin historiography in the late and post-Roman worlds of the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries, this volume studies what Peter Brown has called one of the great triumphs of early medieval culture: the

* I should like to thank Peter Brown, Merle Eisenberg, Gerda Heydemann, Jamie Kreiner, Walter Pohl, and Peter Van Nuffelen, who have all read earlier versions of this essay and have helped to improve it. The research leading to these results has received funding from the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) in the project VISCOM SFB F42-G18: Visions of Community. Comparative Approaches to Ethnicity, Region and Empire in Christianity, Islam and Buddhism (400–1600 ce). 1 In the first volume readers will find a longer introduction to the whole series by Walter Pohl, which discusses at greater length the aims of the series and its methodological profile, as it was developed over the years in several workshops and publications: Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’. Helmut Reimitz is Professor in the Department of History at Princeton University. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 1–26 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118559

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gradual creation by post-Roman and ‘barbarian’ societies of a sense of their own past.2 It was a remarkable cultural and cognitive achievement and it was, above all, facilitated by well-educated ‘Christian men of the pen’. These late antique and early medieval historians built upon narratives and models that derived from the Old Testament and from the historical traditions of the Roman world to create an ‘orderly and usable view of the origins of their own tribes’ and peoples.3 Newer studies have directed our attention to their vivid experimentation with models and genres, and to their originality and the sophistication. In so doing, these studies have also replaced older tendencies to explore early medieval histories primarily as ‘Volksgeschichten’ that transmitted ancient barbarian traditions, and in the process preserved them as the constitutive sources of identification among post-Roman communities and states.4 The emphasis on early medieval historians’ individual perspectives and interventions was certainly a crucial factor in replacing older scholarly notions about them as merely recording a past that had always been there. It has, however, also led to an increasing scepticism about the value of early medieval histories — scepticism about whether they adequately reflected ‘real’ communities (because the texts were too biased) and about whether they had any impact in creating or promoting identities (because they were idiosyncratic interventions with individual perspectives whose audience and influence are rarely attested).5 In the present volume, as well as in the series on Historiography and Identity to which it belongs, we hope to develop a more productive approach, based on several premises. First, most works of historiography do not construct a single identity, but balance a whole range of identifications; a narrative develops several options and explores their possibilities and limits. Second, each work reacts to other possible identifications, in the context of a polyphonic discussion from which most voices are lost, but which can be partially reconstructed through the reactions in our text. Third, many historiographic texts exhibit some degree of self-reflexivity, through their efforts to debate which ‘visions of community’ can be tested against historical events. And fourth, a study of the manuscript transmission provides an essential way to evaluate the potential of these visions of history, their salience and their impact on later histories, and the identifications they supported. Our research has to match the complexity 2

Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, pp. 7–9. Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, p. 8. 4 See the contribution of Walter Pohl, ‘Debating Ethnicity’, in this volume. 5 For a longer discussion, see Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’, and his contribution on ‘Debating Ethnicity’ in this volume. 3

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of any narrative we study, if we want to reconstruct its role in the social communication about identity and community of which it is a trace. In order to do so, it is also crucial to study the relationship of historiography and identity itself. As Walter Pohl reminds us in his introduction to the series, we should neither see history as a privileged medium to construct identities nor take this social function of historical writing for granted. The writing and practice of history has had diverse social functions and meanings in different cultures and societies, which is well documented in the comprehensive overview of the Oxford History of Historical Writings.6 Some of the forthcoming volumes in this series will also compare the writing of history in the Christian West with other regions and cultures such as the Byzantine Empire or the caliphate.7 These wider horizons and the alternative approaches to historical narratives will not only offer a better sense for the spectrum of possibilities. They can also help to remind us that we have to study the relationship of historiography and identity in every case based on its specific history. As we learn from the contributions in the first volume, this is equally true for ancient Greece: homeland of Herodotus, the ‘father of historiography’ in the Graeco-Roman tradition.8 As much as Herodotus stands at the beginning of historical reflections about how to define and study the history of Greece and the Greeks, it is only during the debates after Herodotus that we can observe the establishment of a historiographical genre. But it became only one among many ways to approach the past. As Hans-Joachim Gehrke shows, many of the ‘earlier’ histories were not so much created by the emerging field of historiography, as by their conversations with a much wider variety of media, orchestrations, rituals, or practices of cultural and collective memory in ancient Greek societies.9 The formation of the generic boundaries for history-writing was the result of this conversation and the increasing overlaps between these different historical media in the classical world. The emergence of the historiographical genre, however, did not replace these other media or forms of historical memory. As Nino Luraghi observed, historiography rather became a tool to reflect on these other forms of cultural memory.10 The writing of history made it possi6

Woolf, ed., The Oxford History of Historical Writing, 5 vols. Pohl and Mahoney, eds, Historiography and Identity, iv and Pohl and Borri, eds, Historiography and Identity, v. 8 Gehrke, ‘Intentional History’ and Luraghi, ‘Memory and Community’. 9 Gehrke, ‘Intentional History’. 10 Luraghi, ‘Memory’, p. 107: ‘Greek historiography tended to read collective memory against the grain’. 7

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ble to put these more affirmative orchestrations of collective memory (in public inscriptions or ceremonies, Greek theatres, or religious rituals) into perspective, and to suggest alternative ways of relating oneself to the past.11 In so doing, historians and their readers developed history as a forum that ‘made it possible to integrate this multiplicity into a web of historical claims to identity’.12 This fits well with Jörn Rüsen’s observation that claims to historiographical truth can be studied as a methodological principle that defines specific relationships and hierarchies between different perspectives.13 To study how such relationships could be created through the writing of history, it might be useful to take stock of some of the analytical tools developed by Rüsen’s Bielefeld colleague, Niklas Luhmann. In order to explore how societies reflect upon themselves, about their structure and their place in a larger social or political environment, Luhmann suggested distinguishing between first- and second-order observations. According to Luhmann, second-order observations are specific forms of reflection that allow people to compare, relate, and organize other observations or experiences which Luhmann classified as observations of the first order.14 In Luhmann’s definition, first-order observations assume differences without considering the difference itself: the differentiated subjects or objects that result from this form of observation are assumed to be definitive, without reflecting on the criteria for the distinction in the first place. One can, for instance, describe and enjoy certain rituals of a human society as enchanting historical performances or affirmative rituals of community and identity. In second-order observations, one not only observes those observations of the first order, but one also observes how observers observe. This means reflecting upon why a ritual or a social practice is regarded as human, or as part of a certain human culture — or asking what counts as a community’s distinct historical tradition, or as an expression of one’s individual or collective identity. Second-order observations reflect on how to define the boundaries or distinction between different objects that allow strategies of identification which firstorder observations just assume to be there. The formation of history as a genre 11

Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’, p. 14. Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’, pp. 14–15. 13 Rüsen, ‘Einleitung’, p. 23, cf. Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’, p. 31. 14 See Luhmann, ‘Deconstruction as a Second-Order Observation’, in part. pp.  764, 767–68, 773–76, and comprehensive discussion in Luhmann, Die Kunst der Gesellschaft. Here and at other places where Luhmann discusses first- and second-order observations he refers to the work of von Foerster; see his Observing Systems and also the references in the following footnotes. 12

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in the ancient world might well be linked to its function as a tool for secondorder observations. To be sure, the reference to Niklas Luhmann’s ideas is inevitably eclectic. Luhmann employed and further developed the concepts of first- and secondorder observations above all to study the dynamics of modern societies and even used the dynamics between certain forms of first- and second-order observations as criteria to define modern societies.15 Their employment in ancient and medieval contexts is therefore problematic.16 However, I think it might still be useful to operate with reference to Luhmann’s ideas, at least provisionally, since they help to clarify how meta-level observations were connected to the writing and reading of history.17 As provisional as the use of Luhmann’s terminology might be, it provides us with a language that allows us not only to conceptualize but also to historicize the relationship of first- and second-order observations in the writing of history. As the studies in the first volume show, and in particular the essays by Gehrke and Luraghi, historiography’s social function as a tool of observation came to be part of a shared set of expectations between writers and readers of history.18 But in establishing the function of historiography as a tool to observe other forms of historical performances and cultural memory, the writing of history became a conduit for both forms of observation at the same time: the observation of history itself and the observation of how history is observed as history. Luhmann’s distinction between these different forms of observations might help us to study how historians came to be expected to guide their readers on both levels. In order to study how the interplay between the social function of history and its generic boundaries developed in the classical and post-classical world, however, we also have to build on more recent and dynamic approaches to genre and generic choices.19 Instead of using genre to define texts as members or 15

Luhmann, Social Systems; Luhmann, Die Gesellschaft der Gesellschaft, pp. 997–1016; Luhmann, ‘Globalization or World Society’; Luhmann, Observations on Modernity; cf. also Koselleck, ‘“Space of Experience”’. 16 See Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’, p. 32 who suggests that ‘self-reflection’ or ‘metalevel observation’ may be easier to handle. 17 For an article in which Luhmann himself discussed history and culture as forms of second-order observations in premodern societies see Luhmann, ‘Kultur als historischer Begriff ’; for the rather experimental nature of these directions, see Burkert and Runkel, eds, Luhmann und die Kulturtheorie, and in particular the contribution of Burkert, ‘Niklas Luhmann’. 18 Luraghi, ‘Introduction’; Luraghi, ‘Memory and Community’; Gehrke, ‘Intentional History’, with further references. 19 See the discussion in Torgerson, ‘Isidore’s Chronicle’, pp. 72–74, with further references with the recent overview in Bawarshi and Reiff ’s, Genre, and Frow, Genre.

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outliers of strict genre categories, more recent approaches have theorized genres as historically fluid systems defined by communicative acts, which play on ‘pre-constituted horizons of expectations’ to orient readers’ understanding and to enable a qualifying reception.20 A genre choice is thus ‘a particular way texts and audiences work with and upon each other to create and modify patterns of reading’.21 In other words, genre choices enable an author to define a set of expectations that s/he shares with her or his readers, which provide orientation and guidance for the reception of the text. But the recognizable choice of a genre also confronts an author with a challenge: one of the expectations associated with genres is to transform these very expectations. Thinking about genre opens up the study of how historiography was employed as a tool of observation and reflection, and it allows us to trace how these different forms of observation and reflection were linked to the construction of identities. It is striking how well the current definitions of genre and genre boundaries fit with more recent approaches to the history of identities. As Walter Pohl remarked, the constructions of identities in historiographical texts are too often discussed in surprisingly straightforward terms, focusing on the identity behind a text or the actual identity of an author.22 In so doing, modern historians have often underestimated both the complexity of historical texts as well as the complexity of past identities. Just like genres, however, identities do not simply exist. We should rather explore them as processes of identification that had to be created and re-created in circuits of communication between self-identification (by and between individuals and groups) and outside perception.23 Using such a view, identities can be studied, like genres, as ‘communicative acts based on pre-constituted horizons of expectations’ — including the expectation of their further development or transformation. As Robert Flierman’s comprehensive and impressively concise study on the history of Saxon identities from the second to the ninth centuries shows, what the Saxons had been, what they were, or should have been was shaped by a variety of different and even competing ways of linking the name to different forms of observations.24 In the late Roman Empire the Saxons were observed as a people or gens belonging to the barbarian world of the gentes outside of the Roman Empire. In the early medieval world they came to be part of a social geography 20 21 22 23 24

Torgerson, ‘Isidore’s Chronicle’, p. 74, with further reference to genre-theory. Torgerson, ‘Isidore’s Chronicle’, p. 74. Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’, pp. 16–17. Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’. Flierman, Saxon Identities, and see also Reimitz, History, Frankish Identity.

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defined by a plurality of ethnically defined states. But they could also be subjected to the dichotomy between Christianity and paganism, regarded as a social class, an army, and even a new chosen people along the lines of biblical history.25 In so doing Flierman takes stock of new approaches to the history of identity in Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages that go beyond ‘groupism’, as Roger Brubaker has called the tendency to look for ‘discrete, sharply differentiated, internally homogeneous and externally bounded groups’ as the main objects of social and historical studies.26 As Walter Pohl has suggested in his fundamental essay on approaches to identity and ethnicity in early medieval history, instead of exploring groups with a rather positivistic approach we should try to study how the formation and transformation of identities took place over time as the result of communication and interaction. In order to explore these processes as specific histories, we have to reconstruct them as part of a series of different but connected identifications: the identifications of an individual with a group (which can be accepted by the group or not), identifications of the group as such (as a group or collective, in rituals, through representatives etc.) and identification of outsiders in their perception and recognition of an individuum or group. The success of a collective identity ‘rests on the interplay of these three forms of identification’. We should thus study the history of identities in trying to reconstruct the specific circuits of communication and interaction that shaped its formation.27 As Pohl also observes, in our efforts to reconstruct these circuits of communication, it becomes evident that various forms of social identity are usually not clearly separated from each other in our sources. The groups named and discussed by historians in their narratives had many possible associations, so even when they represented a group as having a certain profile, they were still making that choice against other available representations. The challenge for us is therefore to figure out what that the range of possible associations included, even when historians deliberately excluded them from their narratives. In order to understand if and if so, how these different forms of social identities impacted each other, we have to try to find ways to distinguish between them as clearly as possible.28 The distinction between first- and second-order obser25 For the corresponding definition of ethnicity, see Brubaker, Ethnicity without Groups. For the adoption of approaches to ethnicity in early medieval studies, see Pohl, ‘Introduction’. 26 Brubaker, Ethnicity, p. 164. 27 Pohl, ‘Introduction’, p. 3. 28 Pohl, ‘Introduction’, pp. 12–27 and 50–52.

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vations can help.29 In order to identify which form of social identity is represented by a socionym in our sources we have to try to reconstruct which second-order observation it is linked to by an author or in a text. Are the Saxons or Franks observed as a people in a world divided among peoples, or as a group belonging to a social world that is organized along religious distinction such as Christianity and paganism, or orthodoxy and heresy? Particularly in the period after the end of the Roman Empire, there were relatively large Spielräume for experimenting with definitions about the world and the place of individuals and communities in it.30 The meaning of a specific identity, such as an ethnic identity, or the identity of a Christian community,31 was shaped and constantly reshaped by the interaction and competition of these different ways of linking individuals and groups to a specific ordering or observation of the social world. The writing of history in the post-Roman West is one of our most important windows into such processes. Historians were actively shaping these views. Even if they just wanted to offer what many historians claimed to offer — a true image of the past — they were well aware that their readers would contextualize and complement their narratives with imaginations of a larger historical and social world, to bring their stories alive. As Umberto Eco has shown a long time ago, the dialogues of authors with their — real or imagined — readers and the readers with their — real or imagined — authors is one of the most fundamental preconditions for the creation and re-creation of any text.32 This is no less true for historical narratives, and historians in the past had no choice but to provide orientation and guidance for their readers. They might well have been able to direct the attention away from inconvenient views of the world and history, or even suppress them in their histories. But they could not escape the history of historiography. They needed to respond to the expectations of the readers that included some orientation on how to observe history. For the ancient and early medieval historians discussed in this volume, this situation could be both a challenge and an opportunity. In their histories, they responded to the fundamental changes of the social, religious, and political structures in the late Roman and post-Roman world. This was par29

Reimitz, History, Frankish Identity, pp. 6–8. A particularly good example are the many different ways to perceive and observe Roman identities in the post-Roman world. See now Pohl and others, eds, Transformations of Romanness. 31 Rebillard, Christians and their Many Identities; Brown, Through the Eye; Eisenberg, ‘Building Little Romes’. 32 For the cooperation of the reader as one of preconditions for the creation of a text in the most fundamental way, see Eco, Lector in fabula. 30

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ticularly true for the Western part of the Roman Empire. They wrote histories in a time when the Western provinces of the Roman Empire were reconfigured in smaller power-blocs that Peter Brown has recently described as ‘little Romes’.33 They were established by the cooperation of Roman generals and barbarian warlords with the local and regional Roman elites.34 For some members of the Roman and Christian elites the political dissolution of the Western Roman Empire might have been a loss of opportunities. But many members of the local and regional elites came to see the same process as opening up new opportunities.35 Historians of the time observed this shift from a central Romanness to local forms of Romanness, where social and political profiles were acquired ‘in more restricted areas of control’. And these historians themselves often belonged to the networks of ‘energetic little men’ who had ‘replaced and even helped to replace the grandees of the imperial ancien régime’.36 Their histories helped to develop new views of the world for a society whose members had to imagine their place in an increasingly distinctive post-Roman world.37 Gregory of Tours, who wrote his Ten Books of Histories at the end of the sixth century might well have come from an old Roman senatorial family.38 He might even have been able to claim an emperor among his ancestors.39 In his Histories, however, he presented himself as oblivious to the supposedly prestigious historical frame for the history of his family.40 He was much more interested in the long Christian past of his homeland. He avoided any triumphal perspectives that would take the history of the Roman Empire as the vessel of God’s grace. Instead, he built upon social, political, and ideological experiments that Christian communities had developed in southern Gaul in the fifth and sixth centuries, and he con33

Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, p. xxvi. For recent syntheses see, Wood, The Transformation of the Roman West; Brown, Rise of Western Christendom; Halsall, Barbarian Migrations; Pohl, Völkerwanderung; Wickham, Inheritance; Smith, Europe after Rome; Wolfram, Das Römerreich und seine Germanen. 35 Brown, Through the Eye, pp. 392–94. 36 Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, pp. xxvi–xxvii. 37 For the history and transformation of Roman identities, see now: Pohl and others, eds, Transformations of Romanness. 38 Heinzelmann, Gregory, but cf. Wood, ‘Individuality’ who also remarks that the family does not appear as particularly prominent in the extant letter collections of the sixth century. 39 Heinzelmann, Gregory, p. 25. 40 See my contribution on Merovingian historiography in this volume, with further references. 34

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nected them to the new scale of the Merovingian kingdom through a distinctly post-Roman ecclesiology and political theology.41 The sophistication and refinement with which late antique and early medieval historians employed new Spielräume has been underestimated for a long time in modern historiography. Like Gregory of Tours, many other historians that are discussed in this volume have long been regarded as narrators of barbarian history, as Walter Goffart has ironically labelled this perspective in his influential study.42 The irony is well justified. The ‘narrators of barbarian history’ (including those not discussed in Goffart’s study) wrote in and for a Latin audience. This, however, did not prevent older scholarship from classifying their works as products of an increasingly declining, even barbarian culture after the Fall of Rome. A good example of this previous paradigm are the comments on late antique and early medieval authors and texts in the first volume of Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter — the historical sources of Germany in the Middle Ages, by Wilhelm Wattenbach, Wilhelm Levison, and Heinz Löwe. For example, the modern authors suggested that the main intention of the compilers of a seventh-century chronicle (the so-called Fredegar Chronicle) was to provide their readers with a succinct overview of the history of the world in one volume for a small audience with limited resources and interests: Books were rare and expensive and the few people who were in the position to acquire a historical manuscript were interested in a comprehensive collection in order not to have to obtain a second historical handbook. […] thus Fredegar collected in his books all the historical material that he had happened to have at hand.43

To be sure, there was often an agenda behind such assessments. It allowed scholars to use the extant texts as quarries for facts or as sources for ‘authentic’ barbarian or Germanic attitudes and world views that were barely distorted by literary traditions from the Roman past. 41

Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, pp. xxv–xli; and Eisenberg, ‘Building Little Romes’. For the wider context, see also Brown, Through the Eye; and now Wood, The Transformation of the Roman West. 42 Goffart, Narrators. 43 ‘Bücher waren damals selten und teuer, und wer sich den Besitz einer historischen Handschrift verschaffte, dem lag viel daran nun auch kein zweites Werk der Art zu bedürfen; er dankte es dem Verfasser sehr, wenn er von der Schöpfung anhob, und darum bearbeitete Fredegar in seinem Buche alles geschichtliche Material, das ihm zur Hand war’ (Wattenbach, Levison, and Löwe, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen, i, 110).

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A number of recent studies have fundamentally altered our views of early medieval historians to recover the literary refinement and rhetorical sophistication of these late antique and post-Roman historians.44 The above mentioned study by Walter Goffart acted as a catalyst for the recovery of the originality and individuality of early medieval historians and histories.45 The contributions of the present volume are building upon these more recent studies. In bringing them together in one volume, we also hope to show that in all their diversity, these historians did not work in isolation. They were part of intellectual and social milieux that were all shaped by their late Roman foundations. The challenge for most of these historians was not the scarcity of resources, but rather the multiplicity of perspectives that historians inherited from the Roman world. The rich historiographical legacy from the Roman world did not provide an easily usable past for early medieval historians. Most of these older histories had developed their perspectives in view of a Roman imperial framework, defining the place of individuals and communities in a larger social whole through their relationship in and with the Roman Empire. This was also true for the historiographical projects of Christian historians, such as ecclesiastical histories and Christian world chronicles.46 The chronicles emphasized the fulfilment of God’s plan in the history of the Roman Empire, which guided the arrangement and structure of the narrative.47 This integration of an imperial and a Christian world view allowed the continuation of these chronicles into a post-Roman period. A number of extensions of Jerome’s chronicle from the 44

For an up-to-date overview see now Van Nuffelen and Van Hoof, eds, Clavis historicorum antiquitatis posterioris, and the corresponding database at [accessed 1 September 2019]. 45 For recent overviews and discussion see, Lifshitz, ‘The Vicissitudes’, and Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past, pp. 3–38, and the contribution of Walter Pohl, ‘Debating Ethnicity’, in this volume. 46 For a comprehensive overview of modern and ancient historiography see Inglebert, Le monde, part 2; O’Gorman, ‘Imperial History’; Whitby, ‘Imperial Christian Historiography’; Maier, ‘Dominion’; Burgess and Kulikowski, Mosaics, i, 119–31; Grafton and Williams, Christianity, pp. 133–77; McKitterick, Perceptions; Van Nuffelen, Orosius; see also the contributions of Andrew Feldherr (‘Love Stories’), Madeline McMahon (‘Polemic in Translation’), Veronika Wieser (‘Reading the Past’), and Peter Van Nuffelen (‘The Many and the One’) in the first volume (Pohl and Wieser, eds, Historiography and Identity, i); Momigliano, ‘The Origins of Ecclesiastical History’; see also Eigler, Lectiones vetustatis, who sees the changes in the educational system as one of the factors for the changing Spielräume of post-Roman historians, but he understands them largely as the result of cultural decline (‘Bildungsverfall’: p. 221). 47 Grafton and Williams, Christianity.

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fifth-, sixth-, and seventh-century West survive today.48 However, their authors continued the world chronicle with a much narrower focus on events and signs of the regions and places they lived. Although the horizons of their chronicles shrank, their efforts to link themselves to larger historical imaginations of Christianity and empire resulted in a diversification of continuities with the Christian Roman Empire. The transmission of the Eusebius/Jerome chronicle, however, might also help to illustrate the efforts of historians, scribes, and scholars, to emancipate themselves from these primarily Roman perspectives. In the Merovingian world, the last historian who added his own account to such a chain of chronicles was Marius of Avenches at the end of the sixth century.49 However, the chronicle does not seem to have been widely read in the following centuries. Only one manuscript copied in the later Carolingian period survives.50 On the other hand we have several manuscripts of the Eusebius/Jerome’s chronicle from the Merovingian period. None of them, however, transmits their text with a continuation.51 Their continued application to the present state of Merovingian Gaul came to be less and less attractive. What we observe is a growing understanding that it was necessary to write distinct histories for a distinct time — a time that was not ‘Roman time’.52 The historians of the early medieval West were well aware of the diversification of perspectives in post-Roman historiography. They learned not only how to respond to this challenge in their rewritings and reconfigurations but also how to take advantage of the new room to manoeuvre that it provided. At the end of the sixth century, Gregory of Tours, for instance, clearly oriented himself towards the model of Eusebius’s church history, organizing his narrative — like Eusebius had — in ten books.53 However, unlike other historians before him, 48

Kulikowski and Burgess, Mosaics, i, 129–33, 184–87. See Marius of Avrenches, La chronique, ed. and trans. by Favrod, pp. 49–52; and Wood, ‘Chains of Chronicles’; see also Gallische Chroniken, ed. and trans. by Kötter and Scardino, pp. 30–31; ‘Gallic Chronicle of 452’, ed. by Burgess, p. 63. 50 For a comprehensive discussion of the manuscript that seems to be a copy of a Merovingian exemplar, see Wood, ‘Chains of Chronicles’. 51 See the introduction to the edition of R. Helm, Eusebius/Jerome, Chronicon, pp. x–xi, xiii. 52 The trend seems to have started earlier in the Merovingian kingdoms than in other postRoman kingdoms. For the continuation of chronicles in Lombard Italy and in Visigothic Iberia see the contributions of Walter Pohl, Victoria Leonard, and Jamie Wood in this volume, with further references. 53 Halsall, ‘Preface’; Reimitz, History, Frankish Identity, pp. 44–50. For a more detailed 49

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he did not continue Eusebius’s church history, nor its Latin translation and continuation by Rufinus (which Gregory clearly knew and used).54 The new social, cultural, and political horizons of his post-Roman kingdom required a completely novel historical narrative, from beginning to end, as well as new forms to observe this history. And Gregory was the first to develop a comprehensive new historical perspective for his post-Roman Christian world. I discuss Gregory’s Histories at greater length in an essay in this volume, where I try to show how his literary manoeuvres and genre choices show an early medieval historian experimenting with new forms of presenting and observing a shared past. As the other contributions of the present volume show, Gregory is only one example among the historians of the post-Roman West who experimented with genre boundaries and forms of observation. However, such intensified experimentation with historical forms and narratives did not take place everywhere to the same degree. The recent comprehensive overview of late antique histories collected in the Clavis historicorum antiquitatis posterioris (ad 300–800), edited by Peter Van Nuffelen and Lieve Van Hoof, allows us to compare histories written in the post-Roman West with the writing of history in other regions and cultures once belonging to the late Roman ecumene. As the editors remark in their introduction, the comparison shows that historians of the Byzantine Empire were, perhaps unsurprisingly, much more conservative in their orientation to established genre boundaries and forms of historical writing.55 With the broader context in mind, the post-Roman Latin world appears as a particularly innovative cultural milieu for experimentation.56 As Randolph Ford shows in his contribution to this volume, this is true for the Gothic history of Jordanes written around the middle of the sixth centuries. To meet the discussion with some important new observations see now Rotman, ‘Miraculous History’, pp. 126–41. 54 See the introduction to the edition of the Decem libri historiarum, pp. xix–xx with reference to Gregory of Tours’s excerpts in book i. 55 See the introduction to Van Nuffelen and Van Hoof, eds, Clavis historicorum antiquitatis posterioris, forthcoming. I should like to thank the two authors for letting me read this substantial overview and discussion in advance, but cf. also the observations of Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, pp. 8–9 on similarities of Bede’s history with fifth-century Armenian historiography. An interesting milieu for a comparison with one of the post-Roman West might be the writing of history in Syriac. For this see now the major study of Debié, L’écriture de l’histoire en syriaque, cf. the review of Peter Brown, in Al-‘Usur al-Wusta. 56 For other post-Roman and late antique milieux, see now: Debié, L’écriture de l’histoire en syriaque, and Tannous, The Making of the Middle East. For a comparison of historians in Latin West and the Middle East, see Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, pp. xl, 9, and 349–54.

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expectations a title like De origine actibusque Getarum might have evoked, Jordanes builds on a great variety of ethnographic traditions, models, and genres, but transforms them in his mélange of Gothic, classical, and Roman history. The blending of different models and traditions might even be behind the presentation of himself and Cassiodorus as the authors of the text. At the end of this history, Jordanes identifies himself as a member of the Gothic community. ‘Let no one believe’, he writes at the end of the Getica, ‘that I have added anything in favour of the people (gens) discussed above except the things I have read or learned, as happens when one draws one’s origin from them’.57 And yet at the beginning, he presents his work as an abbreviated version of a longer history in twelve books written by the Roman senator and advisor to the Amal rulers of Italy, Cassiodorus.58 Cassiodorus’s history is unfortunately lost. We have, however, a brief description of it by Cassiodorus himself in a speech that he wrote for the grandson and successor of Theoderic the Great, Athalaric. In this speech Cassiodorus presents himself as what we might call a ‘cultural broker’.59 Through Athalaric’s mouth, Cassiodorus praises himself for having made ‘a Roman history from a Gothic lineage, gathering as it were, into one garland, flower buds that had previously been scattered throughout the fields of literature’.60 It will always remain debatable to what extent the text of Jordanes reflects portions of what Cassiodorus had originally written. However, as Philipp Dörler shows, Jordanes seems to have tried to continue Cassiodorus’s role as a cultural broker.61 At the end of 57

Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, 316, p. 138: ‘nec me quis in favorem gentis praedictae, quasi ex ipsa trahenti originem, aliqua addidisse credat, quam quae legi et comperi’. Engl. transl. follows the forthcoming translation by Van Nuffelen and Van Hoof, Jordanes, Getica and Romana. I should like to thank Peter Van Nuffelen and Lieve Van Hoof for their advice on the passage. 58 Jordanes, Getica, preface, p. 53; on the much-discussed authorship of the Getica, see now Van Hoof and Van Nuffelen, ‘The Historiography of Crisis’. 59 For a longer discussion, see Reimitz, ‘The Historian’. 60 Cassiodorus, Variae, ed. by Mommsen, ix.25, pp. 291–92: ‘Tetendit se etiam in antiquam prosapiem nostram, lectione discens quod vix maiorum notitia cana retinebat. iste reges Gothorum longa oblivione celatos latibulo vetustatis eduxit. iste Hamalos cum generis sui claritate restituit, evidenter ostendens in septimam decimam progeniem stirpem nos habere regalem. Originem Gothicam historiam fecit esse Romanam, colligens quasi in unam coronam germen floridum quod per librorum campos passim fuerat ante dispersum’. Engl. trans. by Barnish, p. 128, with slight changes following again the advice of Van Nuffelen and Van Hoof (cf. above, n. 58), and in regard to how to understand the translation of Gothic or Amal history see also Mortensen, ‘Goternes historie på romersk’. 61 Cf.  the contribution of Philipp Dörler in this volume; see also Van Hoof and Van Nuffelen, ‘The Historiography of Crisis’.

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the Getica, Jordanes even uses the same metaphor as Cassiodorus for the writing of his history: he had likewise woven together a few flowers from the broad meadows of their writings into one garland.62 Jordanes not only wrote a history of the Goths but also a Summa temporum vel de origine actibusque gentis Romanorum — a Summary of the Ages, or the Origin and Deeds of the Roman People. As Maya Maskarinec demonstrates in her contribution, here too, Jordanes, worked as a broker. He brings together different historiographical traditions to align Christian and imperial morals for a time in which it had become more and more uncertain how to separate what belonged to Caesar and what belonged to Christ.63 Reading through the three articles on Jordanes we can see how the juxtaposition and parallelization of the Getica and the Romana presents his readers with a quite unusual take on the Roman past for the middle of the sixth century.64 About 250 years later, Paul the Deacon adopted Jordanes’ parallelization and wrote a history of the Lombards (Historia Langobardorum) and a Roman history (Historia Romana). As Walter Pohl shows in his contribution on the writing of history in the Lombard kingdom, Paul not only built upon Jordanes’ model, but also on various historical experiments in the centuries between. As a leading scholar of the Carolingian period he was — like many of his contemporaries — masterfully re-arranging and blending these older traditions to respond to expectations and questions coming from different audiences and milieux in Italy and the Carolingian world.65 Because they focus on the history of post-Roman peoples, both Jordanes’ Getica and Paul’s History of the Lombards have long been regarded as representants of a new early medieval genre, the Volksgeschichten — or national histories. This label has been applied to many of the histories of the post-Roman and early medieval world that recount the history of the newly emerging, ethnically defined kingdoms of the West.66 But on such a general level, this label 62

Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, p. 130, ed. by Mommsen, 316, p. 138: ‘Haec qui legis scito me maiorum secutum scripta, ex eorum latissimims pratis paucos flores legisse, unde inquirenti pro captu ingenii mei corona contexta est’. 63 Momigliano, ‘The Origins of Ecclesiastical History’, p. 140. 64 For the Roman imperial context of Jordanes’ history see the contribution by Maya Maskarinec in this volume. 65 See Walter Pohl’s contribution ‘Paul the Deacon and the Writing of History in Italy’ in this volume as well as his and the other contributions to Kramer, Reimitz, and Ward, eds, Historiography and Identity, iii on the Carolingian and later Carolingian period. See further McKitterick, History and Memory; Reimitz, ‘The Art of Truth’. 66 For this and the related question of the study of ethnicity in early medieval histories, see the contribution of Walter Pohl, ‘Debating Ethnicity’, in this volume.

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is misleading at best. It suggests a shared interest in the history of peoples, without considering the experimental character of these histories. Instead of asking how these histories helped establish a shared social imagination, it assumes an already-established view of the world, as a world divided among peoples and a sense of one’s own past based on that division. This was, however, much more tentative and contested among historians like Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, Fredegar, or Paul the Deacon than the older scholars who lumped together their histories as Volksgeschichten had assumed. As my own contribution about the different histories of the Merovingian period tries to demonstrate, authors not only provided their readers with varying historical subjects and interpretations of history.67 The differences between these texts and their different genre choices were also used to promote various views of the world. It has long been observed that Gregory of Tours did not want to write a history of the Franks but instead wanted to promote a Christian vision of community.68 Less attention, however, has been paid to the efforts that Gregory devoted in his Histories to challenge alternative ways of observing history. While we cannot compare Gregory’s intervention into historical debates with any more comprehensive history of his time, the seventh-century Fredegar Chronicle, written about two generations after Gregory’s death, clearly took up Gregory’s debates. It is easy to see how, contra Gregory, the compilers of this chronicle emphasized the role of the Franks as a collective agent in the history of the world.69 It also seems to have been equally important to the compilers of the chronicle to reorganize the social imagination of the world as a world divided among peoples. If we take stock of its effort to promote a shared second-order observation of the world as a world divided among peoples, the Chronicle presents rather Völkergeschichten in the plural — a history of the early medieval peoples that came to live in the provinces of the former Western Roman Empire, rather than a history of a single people. Such an ethnic ordering of the world in the Chronicle, however, not only helped to reorganize the Roman past. It was also flexible enough to combine Christian views of the world with other forms of social and political identification. As Andreas Fischer shows in his essay on the chronicle’s portrayal of the Austrasians, the 67

See Reimitz, ‘Genre and Identity’, in this volume. See, for instance, Goffart, Narrators; Heinzelmann, Gregory; Wood, Gregory of Tours; Brown, ‘Gregory of Tours’. 69 For a longer discussion of Gregory’s anti-origo and the reaction of the compilers of the Fredegar Chronicle see Reimitz, History, Frankish Identity, pp. 52–72, and Coumert, Les origines, pp. 267–358. 68

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text provides us with an image of a ‘multilayered yet self-contained group on a territorial basis that was smaller than the regnum Austrasiorum which they ruled as a corporate entity in concerted action mainly exerted by their highstatus members’.70 It might be surprising that these Austrasian claims are not articulated in ethnic terms. Ethnicity is often mobilized by a marginalized group (or a group that presents itself as marginalized) to claim its ‘proper’ place in a larger social whole.71 This is actually precisely how the Chronicle employs Frankish identity to articulate the claims of the aristocracy vis-à-vis the Merovingian kings.72 This might well be the reason why it seemed unwise to the compilers of the Chronicle to present the Frankish consensus as divided between two peoples. The focus on both groups as elevated classes of a shared Frankish community, however, also impacted the meaning of Frankish identity in the Chronicle, because it also claimed an elevated place for Frankishness in the Merovingian commonwealth of peoples. Ian Wood’s contribution on Bede demonstrates how crucial it is to explore the specific interplay and interaction between different forms of social identities in the writing of history. In the title of the text alone, Bede brought church history together with the history of a people and provided his readers (or responded to their expectations) with a new melange of sources and genres. Particularly important for his Church History of the English People (Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum) was the use of Old Testament narrative models that Bede also studied in his exegetical works.73 In the context of the many different ways to define a people in Bede’s time, this was a consequential choice. Fusing the identity of an Anglian people with images of salvation history ‘became the standard ethnic descriptor for the peoples of the North of England’, and it laid the early medieval foundation of the long-term success of the English as a people.74 As we learn from Thomas Charles Edwards’s contribution, narrative models of the Old Testament provided important inspirations for the historical discourse in Celtic Britain and Ireland too. But here the historians gave those 70

See the contribution of Andreas Fischer, in this volume, and his forthcoming study Die Fredegar-Chronik. 71 See the discussion on approaches to ethnicity in Wimmer, ‘The Making and Unmaking of Ethnic Boundaries’. 72 See Reimitz, History, Frankish Identity, pp. 231–36. 73 See DeGregorio, ‘Bede and the Old Testament’, and Thacker, ‘Bede and History’, with further references. 74 See the contribution of Ian Wood, in this volume.

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models a different emphasis in relation to their own Irish traditions of legal culture and language. According to the ‘Primer of the Poet’, Irish was the most perfect language of the world. He claimed that after the division of mankind into many languages, Irish scholars collected the best elements of the diverse languages and brought them together in the Irish language.75 The idea is probably less Irish than it looks at first sight. In the 108 questions on the Old and New Testament, its author discusses the idea that after the fall of Babel Hebrew was reconstructed from the different languages as the original language that people spoke before the dispersion of languages and peoples.76 The intervention was part of a larger debate about the question of what the relation of Hebrew was to the original language of the world before the fall of the tower.77 There is no reason to assume that the learned Irish scholars and poets would not have known such discussions about the history of the language of Adam, Abraham, and Moses — or other reflections on the history of languages.78 As Thomas Charles-Edwards also shows, they were well connected to other intellectual centres on the British Isles and the Continent. The reception of Isidore’s historical works in Irish sources by the middle of the seventh century is just one example of this connectedness.79 The importation of Isidore’s work to Ireland indicates what were close connections to the intellectual milieux in Spain. As we learn from the contribution of Victoria Leonard and Jamie Wood, those connections also entailed being in conversation with a vivid culture of learning, in which history was an important subject of study. Iberian authors and readers explicitly linked their studies of historical texts and history to its role in observing the social world and its changes. Orosius provided an important basis for this thinking, not least with his overview of the continents and provinces of the world at the beginning of history. As he writes in his preface, he wanted to provide a view of the world from a new perspective that reconciled a Rome-centred view with a Christian understanding of the history of world.80 The attraction of such a view of history 75

See the discussion in the contribution of Thomas Charles Edwards, in this volume. Quaestiones Veteris et Novi Testamenti, ed. by Souter, no. 108, pp. 251–56, see Denecker, ‘Heber or Habraham?’, I should like to than Yuliya Minets who works on a larger project on late antique multilingualism (The Slow Fall of Babel) for bringing this text to my attention. 77 See Borst, Turmbau zu Babel, ii.1, 378–82, and the forthcoming study of Y. Minets, The Slow Fall of Babel. 78 See Borst, Turmbau zu Babel, ii.1, 465–71, 609–15. 79 See the contribution of Thomas Charles-Edwards, in this volume. 80 See the contribution of Victoria Leonard and Jamie Wood, in this volume, for social 76

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in a post-Roman world is obvious. Leonard and Wood, however, show that his inspiration was also important for a specific historical culture of learning in which many more texts were studied and compared — not only as different historical narratives but also as tools for observing history as a meta-level reflection. It is in this intellectual milieu which the production and reception of the Historia Wambae took place. Written by Julian of Toledo, who was one of the most impressive intellectuals of the seventh-century Visigothic kingdom, this work chronicled the history of the life and troubled reign of the Visigothic king Wamba and could have easily been entitled as Vita or Gesta Wambae.81 However, he decided to present his reflections about elements of social coherence in contemporary society as a historia, which helped his readers understand not only what but also how one could learn. As Molly Lester’s essay explains, Julian is not just sharing his views on what happened in the reign of Wamba. He uses his narrative to ‘diagnose social crisis’ and as a reflection on factors for or against social cohesion in his society. It is particularly exciting to learn from Lester how Julian uses his narrative to balance a whole range of possible interpretations and views to provide his readers with a history that allowed them to make up their own minds about the ‘ties that bind’ the Visigothic kingdom. Taken together, the histories in this volume present a remarkably diverse panorama. This, however, should not mislead us to examine them in isolation. Instead their diversity is a good starting point for looking at their commonalities, and for comparing the common Spielräume they used to write history to find order and orientation in a quickly changing world. These wiggle rooms were strongly defined by classical and Roman historical models and traditions, and increasingly by narrative models of the Old Testament. The transformation of the Roman world made it not only necessary to reconfigure older histories and adapt them to the new social and political circumstances of the postRoman world. It also provided new room to manoeuvre for writing history and constructing identities. It is certainly no coincidence that the historiographical works that have come down to us were composed by some of the most brilliant intellectuals and scholars of the post-Roman Latin West. Nor is it a coincidence that it was members of this group who took on the challenge in the first place. This volume’s different contributions impressively demonstrate the sophistication and reflexivity of early medieval historians, and their use of the Spielräume ordering of the world through geographical reflections in late ancient and early medieval histories, see also the excellent study of Merrills, History and Geography. 81 For the consistent use of historia as the title in the transmission of Julian’s Historia Wambae see the edition of Levison, p. 501.

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that were available to them — and at the same time their redefinition of those Spielräume to create ‘usable pasts’ for their societies. In so doing, they tried to help themselves and their readers study and re-imagine the relationship of different groups and groupings to each other after the dissolution of an imperial framework that had defined these relationships for centuries. In their different ways to respond to this challenge, most of the historians can be regarded, like Cassiodorus or Jordanes, as cultural brokers.82 They provided new perspectives for the integration of their socially and ethnically diverse societies but also maintained tensions and distinctions between different imagined and real groups, their traditions and histories. This resulted, probably not surprisingly, in very different histories, as they needed to correspond with social expectations in diverse environments in the quickly changing worlds of the sixth century in southern Gaul, Italy, and Constantinople, of seventh-century Spain, or of early eighth-century England. We should take these differences seriously. They allow us to study not only the originality and sophistication of their authors but also underline the continuing social function of history. As specific responses of authors to expectations of their readers, the diversity of the models, the generic choices, the blending of genres, the further development of literary and historical conventions can be explored as traces that allow us to move from authorial intent to its sociology, from the literary strategies and choices to the complex web of social and political strategies and positioning in which they were created. The essays in this volume provide ample examples of a vivid experimentation and the continuing social function of history as a tool to reflect on one’s or one’s community’s place in the larger social whole. It is the intensified and ongoing bricolage with which these historians tried to find a place for themselves and their societies in this transitional period that sets these Latin histories of the early Middle Ages apart from earlier Roman histories and from the contemporary historical projects of the Roman Empire of their present, the Byzantine Empire. It is hard to find a common label for the diverse historical projects that have come down to us from this transitional period. We probably should not try to find one. If we would have to distinguish it from other forms of writing history, we would have to define it rather with the help of their approach to history than as a new historical genre — the approach of a specifically post-Roman historical bricolage. We suggest reading the contributions of this volume with that difference in mind and also allowing for the possibility that early medieval historians were well aware of it. We hope that this collection of studies will also help readers to explore how the historians of the 82

Reimitz, ‘The Historian as a Cultural Broker’.

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early medieval West responded not only to the challenge of having to reconfigure history in a changing world. They should also help give a sense how historians reacted to each other, and to other possible interpretations, identifications, and first- and second-order observations of history. The essays on the different histories in this volume allow us to appreciate the impressive sophistication with which early medieval historians employed and changed the available literary and social Spielräume for the writing of history. The survival of these histories, however, attests to the appreciation of medieval historians in later centuries and the continuing interest in what they had to offer as historical accounts, as repertories of identification, and as strategies of distinction. As the manifold and rich transmission of the various histories throughout the Middle Ages shows, they offered a spectrum of possibilities that has shaped the set of expectations regarding the social function of history for the construction of identities for many centuries to come. This, however, is a history of historiography and identity that we shall further pursue in the following volumes of the series.

Works Cited Primary Sources Cassiodorus, Variae, ed. by Mommsen, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, xii (Berlin: Weidmann, 1894) —— , Cassiodorus: Variae, trans. by Sam  J.  B. Barnish (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1992) Eusebius/Jerome, Chronicon, in Eusebius Werke, vii: Die Chronik des Hieronymus, ed. by Rudolf Helm, Die griechischen christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten Jahrhunderte, 47 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1956) ‘The Gallic Chronicle of 452: A New Critical Edition with a Brief Introduction’, ed. by Richard W. Burgess, in Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul: Revisiting the Sources, ed. by Ralph Mathisen and Danuta Shanzer (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001), pp. 52–84 Gallische Chroniken, ed. and trans. by Jan-Markus Kötter and Carlo Scardino, Kleine und fragmentarische Historiker des Spätantike, G 7-8 (Paderborn: Schöningh, 2017) Gregory of Tours, Decem libri historiarum, ed.  by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, i.1 (Hanover: Hahn, 1951) Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, v.1 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1882), pp. 43–138 —— , The Gothic History of Jordanes, trans. by Charles C. Mierow (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1915)

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—— , Iordanis de origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Francesco Giunta and Antonino Grillone, Fonti per la storia d’Italia, 117 (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per il Medio Evo, 1991) Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae, ed. by Wilhelm Levison, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, v (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), pp. 500–35 Marius of Avrenches, La chronique de  Marius  d’Avenches: 455–581: texte, traduction et commentaire, ed. and trans. by Justin Favrod, 2nd edn (Lausanne: Section d’histoire, Faculté des lettres, Université de Lausanne, 1993) Quaestiones Veteris et Novi Testamenti, ed. by Alexander Souter, Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum, 50 (Vienna: Tempsky, 1907)

Secondary Works Bawarshi, Anis S., and Mary Jo Reiff, Genre: An Introduction to History, Theory, Research, and Pedagogy (West Lafayette: Parlor, 2010) Borst, Arno, Der Turmbau von Babel: Geschichte der Meinungen über den Ursprung und Vielfalt der Sprachen und Völker, 4  vols (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, 1995), ii.1 Brown, Peter, ‘Gregory of Tours: Introduction’, in The World of Gregory of Tours, ed. by Kathleen Mitchell and Ian  N. Wood, Cultures, Beliefs and Traditions, 8 (Leiden: Brill, 2002), pp. 1–28 —— , Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350–550 AD (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012) —— , The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, 200–1000, 3rd anniversary edn (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013) —— , Review of M. Debié, L’écriture de l’histoire en syriaque: Transmission interculturelles et constructions identitaires entre hellénisme et islam (Leuven: Peeters, 2015), in Al-‘Usur al-Wusta: The Journal of Middle East Medievalists 26 (2018), 225–31, online at: [accessed 1 September 2019] Brubaker, Rogers, Ethnicity without Groups (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004) Burgess, Richard  W., and Michael Kulikowski, Mosaics of Time: The Latin Chronicle Traditions from the First Century BC to the Sixth Century AD, 4  vols (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013–), i: Historical Introduction to the Chronicle Genre from its Origins to the High Middle Ages (2013) Burkert, Günter, ‘Niklas Luhmann: ein Theoretiker der Kultur?’, in Luhmann und die Kulturtheorie, ed. by Günter Burkert and Gunter Runkel (Stuttgart: Suhrkamp, 2003), pp. 11–39 Burkert, Günter, and Gunter Runkel, eds, Luhmann und die Kulturtheorie (Stuttgart: Suhrkamp, 2003) Coumert, Magali, Origines des peuples: les récits d’origine des peuples dans le Haut Moyen Âge occidental (550–850), Collection des études augustiniennes. Série moyen âge et temps modernes, 42 (Paris: Institut d’études augustiniennes, 2007)

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Debié, Muriel, L’écriture de l’histoire en syriaque: transmission interculturelles et constructions identitaires entre hellénisme et islam (Leuven: Peeters, 2015) DeGregorio, Scott, ‘Bede and the Old Testament’, in The Cambridge Companion to Bede, ed. by Scott DeGregorio (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 127–41 Denecker, Tim, ‘Heber or Habraham? Ambrosiaster and Augustine on Language and History’, Revue d’etudes augustiniennes et patristiques, 60 (2015), 1–32 Eco, Umberto, Lector in fabula (Milan: Bompiani, 1979) Eigler, Ulrich, Lectiones vetustatis: Römische Literatur und Geschichte in der lateinischen Literatur der Spätantike, ZETEMATA. Monographien zur klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, 115 (Munich: Beck, 2003) Eisenberg, Merle, ‘Building Little Romes: Christianity, Social Relations, and Governance in Late Antique Gaul’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Princeton University, 2018) Fischer, Andreas, Die Fredegar-Chronik: Komposition und Kontextualisierung (forthcoming) Feldherr, Andrew, ‘Love Stories: The Paradox of Pleasure in Roman Historiography’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 157–89 Flierman, Robert, Saxon Identities, AD 150–900 (London: Bloomsbury, 2017) Foerster, Heinz von, Observing Systems (Seaside, CA: Intersystems, 1981) Frow, John, Genre: The New Critical Idiom (London: Routledge, 2005) Gehrke, Hans-Joachim, ‘Intentional History and the Context of Remembrance in Ancient Greece’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed.  by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 95–106 Ghosh, Shami, Writing the Barbarian Past: Studies in Early Medieval Historical Narrative, Brill’s Series on the Early Middle Ages, 24 (Leiden: Brill, 2015) Grafton, Anthony, and Megan Williams, Christianity and the Transformation of the Book: Origen, Eusebius, and the Library of Caesarea (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008) Halsall, Guy, Barbarian Migrations and the Roman West, 376–568 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007) —— , ‘The Preface to Book  V of Gregory of Tours’ Histories: Its Form, Context and Significance’, English Historical Review, 122 (2007), 297–317 Heinzelmann, Martin, Gregory of Tours: History and Society in the Sixth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001) Inglebert, Hervé, Le Monde, l’histoire: essai sur les histoires universelles (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 2014) Koselleck, Reinhard, ‘“Space of Experience” and “Horizon of Expectation”: Two Historical Categories’, in Reinhard Koselleck, Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time, trans. by Keith Tribe (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), pp. 255–77 Lifshitz, Felice, ‘The Vicissitudes of Political Identity: Historical Narrative in the Barbarian Successor States of Western Europe’, in The Oxford History of Historical Writing, ed. by Daniel Woolf, 5 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12), ii: 400–1400, ed. by Sarah Foot and Chase F. Robinson (2012), pp. 368–90

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Luhmann, Niklas, ‘Deconstruction as a Second-Order Observation’, New Literary History, 24.4: Papers from the Commonwealth Center for Literary and Cultural Change (1993), 763–82 —— , Social Systems, trans. by John Bednarz Jr. with Dirk Baecker (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995) —— , Die Gesellschaft der Gesellschaft, 2 vols (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1997) —— , ‘Globalization or World Society: How to Conceive of Modern Society?’, International Review of Sociology, 7 (1997), 67–79 —— , Die Kunst der Gesellschaft (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1997) —— , Observations on Modernity, trans. by William Whobrey (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998) —— , ‘Kultur als historischer Begriff ’, in Gesellschaftsstruktur und Semantik, iv (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1999), pp. 31–54 Luraghi, Nino, ‘Memory and Community: Some Thoughts on the Greco-Roman Heritage’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 51–63 —— , ‘Memory and Community in Early Hellenistic Athens’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 107–31 Maier, Harry O., ‘Dominion from Sea to Sea: Eusebius of Caesarea, Constantine the Great and the Exegesis of Empire’, in The Calling of Nations: Exegesis, Ethnography and Empire in Biblical-Historical Present, ed.  by Mark Vessey and others (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2010), pp. 149–75 McKitterick, Rosamond, History and Memory in the Carolingian World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004) —— , Perceptions of the Past in the Early Middle Ages (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2006) McMahon, Madeline, ‘Polemic in Translation: The Fashioning of History in Jerome’s Chronicle’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 219–45 Merrills, Andrew H., History and Geography in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) Minets Yuliya, The Slow Fall of Babel: Conceptualization of Languages, Linguistic Diversity and History in Late Ancient Christianity (forthcoming) Momigliano, Arnaldo, ‘The Origins of Ecclesiastical Historiography’, in The Classical Foundations of Modern Historiography, ed. by Arnaldo Momigliano, Sather Classical Lectures, 54 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), pp. 132–56 Mortensen, Lars Boje, ‘Goternes historie på romersk’, Museum Tusculanum, 57 (1987), 169–82 O’Gorman, Ellen C., ‘Imperial History and Biography at Rome’, in The Oxford History of Historical Writing, ed. by Daniel Woolf, 5 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12), i: Beginnings to AD 600, ed. by Andrew Feldherr and Grant Hardy (2011), pp. 291–315

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Pohl, Walter, Die Völkerwanderung: Eroberung und Integration, 2nd edn (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2005) —— , ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification; A Methodological Profile’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann, Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 13 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 1–64 —— , ‘Historiography and Identity — Methodological Perspectives’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 7–50 Pohl, Walter, and others, eds, Transformations of Romanness in the Early Middle Ages: Regions and Identities (Munich: de Gruyter, 2018) Pohl, Walter, and Francesco Borri, eds, Historiography and Identity, v: The Emergence of New Peoples and Polities, 1000–1300 (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Pohl, Walter, and Daniel Mahoney, eds, Historiography and Identity, iv: The Writing of History across Medieval Eurasia (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Pohl, Walter, and Veronika Wieser, eds, Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019) Rebillard, Eric, Christians and their Many Identities in Late Antiquity: North Africa, 200–450 CE (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012) Reimitz, Helmut, ‘The Art of Truth: Historiography and Identity in the Frankish World’, in Texts and Identities in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Richard Corradini and others, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 13 (Vienna: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2006), pp. 87–104 —— , ‘The Historian as a Cultural Broker of a Common Past: History, Identity, and Ethnicity in Merovingian Historiography’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed.  by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 257–301 —— , History, Frankish Identity and the Framing of Western Ethnicity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) Reimitz, Helmut, Rutger Kramer, and Graeme Ward, eds, Historiography and Identity, iii: Carolingian Approaches (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Rotman, Tamar, ‘Miraculous History between East and West: Hagiography, Historiography and Identity in Sixth-Century Gaul’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, 2018) Rüsen, Jörn, ‘Einleitung: Geschichtsdenken im interkulturellen Diskurs’, in Westliches Geschichtsdenken: eine interkulturelle Debatte, ed. by Jörn Rüsen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999), pp. 13–28 Smith, Julia  M.  H., Europe after Rome: A New Cultural History, 500–1000 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005) Tannous, Jack, The Making of the Middle East: Religion, Society and Simple Believers (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018) Thacker, Alan T., ‘Bede and History’, in The Cambridge Companion to Bede, ed. by Scott DeGregorio (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 170–89

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Torgerson, Jesse  W., ‘Could Isidore’s Chronicle Have Delighted Cicero?’, Medieval Worlds, 3 (2016), 65–82 Van Hoof, Lieve, and Peter Van Nuffelen, ‘The Historiography of Crisis: Cassiodorus and Justinian in Mid-Sixth-Century Constantinople’, Journal of Roman Studies, 107 (2017), 275–300 —— , Jordanes, ‘Getica’ and ‘Romana’: Introduction, Translation and Commentary (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2019, forthcoming) Van Nuffelen, Peter, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, Oxford Early Christian Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) —— , ‘The Many and the One: Communities and Ecclesiastical Histories in the Age of Theodosius II’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 299–314 Van Nuffelen, Peter, and Lieve Van Hoof, eds, Clavis historicorum antiquitatis posterioris: An Inventory of Late Antique Historiography (ad 300–800) (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019, forthcoming) Wattenbach, Wilhelm, Wilhelm Levison, and Heinz Löwe, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter: Vorzeit und Karolinger, 6  vols (Weimar: Böhlau, 1952–90), i: Die Vorzeit von den Anfängen bis zur Herrschaft der Karolinger (1952) Whitby, Michael, ‘Imperial Christian Historiography’, in The Oxford History of Historical Writing, ed. by Daniel Woolf, 5 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12), i: Beginnings to AD 600, ed. by Andrew Feldherr and Grant Hardy (2011), pp. 346–69 Wickham, Chris, The Inheritance of Rome: A History from 400–1000, The Penguin History of Europe, 2 (London: Penguin, 2010) Wieser, Veronika, ‘Reading the Past into the Present in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 247–98 Wimmer, Andreas, ‘The Making and Unmaking of Ethnic Boundaries: A Multilevel Process Theory’, American Journal of Sociology, 113 (2008), 970–1022 Wolfram, Herwig, Das Römerreich und seine Germanen: Eine Erzählung von Herkunft und Ankunft (Cologne: Böhlau, 2018) Wood, Ian N., Gregory of Tours (Bangor: Headstart History, 1994) —— , ‘Chains of Chronicles: The Example of London, British Library ms. add. 16974’, in Zwischen Niederschrift und Wiederschrift: Historiographie und Hagiographie im Spannungsfeld von Edition und Kompendienüberlieferung, ed. by Richard Corradini, Max Diesenberger, and Meta Niederkorn-Bruck, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 15 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2010), pp. 68–78 —— , The Transformation of the Roman West (Kalamazoo: ARC Humanities Press, 2018) Woolf, Daniel, ed., The Oxford History of Historical Writing, 5  vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12)

Debating Ethnicity in Post-Roman Historiography Walter Pohl*

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his volume deals with a number of histories that responded to the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire and the often precarious development of post-Roman kingdoms. Among them are some of the bestresearched and in many respects most controversially debated historiographic texts in recent scholarship: Jordanes’ Getica, Gregory of Tours’s Historiae, the socalled Fredegar Chronicle, Bede’s Ecclesiastic History of the Angles, and Paul the Deacon’s History of the Lombards. In one way or another, these works focus on a particular polity, use ethnic terminology to describe collective agency, and place their narrative in a Christian frame that was in many ways still Roman. After half a millennium in which historians had written in an unquestionably Roman and imperial context, Latin authors of the sixth to eighth centuries had to adapt to a transformed political landscape. Their ‘visions of community’ differed considerably, but they all had to come to terms with a world of post-Roman kingdoms distinguished by ethnonyms: the regna of the Goths, Franks, Angles/Saxons, or Lombards. Many told the stories of the respective peoples, and referred to them in the title: De origine actibusque Getarum, Historia Langobardorum, Liber historiae Francorum, or Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum.

* Research for this article was supported by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF), Project F 42-G 18 — SFB ‘Visions of Community’ (VISCOM), and profited from the research environment at the Institute for Medieval Research of the Austrian Academy (ÖAW) and at the University of Vienna. Walter Pohl is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Vienna and director of the Institute for Medieval Research at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 27– 69 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118560

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Until recently, most of the texts discussed in this volume were classified as ‘national histories’ or Volksgeschichten, taking a ‘national’ or ‘ethnic’ character of these histories for granted.1 However, such an a priori classification would stand in the way of the methodological approach that we would like to propose here. We address histories focusing on larger, supra-regional communities and identities; and these are hardly ever only ethnic, political, territorial, or religious. We only use these distinctions in a second step to ask just what role such ethnic, political, territorial, or religious identifications play in a text. In what way were they entangled or juxtaposed, and what impact did their respective salience have?2 Rather than straightforwardly classifying these works as ‘ethnic’ or ‘national’ histories, we would like to show that the significance of ethnic identities varied, both within and between these works. What they have in common is that they dealt with large polities and the communities and networks that secured their agency, which they often described in ethnic terms.

‘National’ Histories? The histories addressed in the present volume may be seen as a mid-range category between histories with a local or regional focus, and those medieval works classed as ‘world chronicles’ or ‘universal histories’ by modern researchers.3 In spite of their universal outlook, they are not always easy to distinguish from histories of one people or realm.4 ‘Universal’ histories could build on ancient precedent; already Herodotus had covered both Greeks and barbarians in his work, to the extent that he was able to get sufficient information. Diodorus 1

Von den Brincken, ‘Mittelalterliche Geschichtsschreibung’, p. 240; overview (without a priori typological qualification): Wattenbach and Levison, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen, i, 47–118; Scharer and Scheibelreiter, eds, Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter; Kersken, ‘High and Late Medieval National Historiography’, p. 181: ‘a tradition of historiography that was bound formally and substantively to national criteria’; Plassmann, ‘Lateinische Stammes- und Volksgeschichtsschreibung’. 2 Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’. 3

Von den Brincken, Studien; Krüger, Die Universalchroniken; Croke, ‘The Origins of the Christian World Chronicle’; Allen, ‘Universal History 300–1000’; Liddel and Fear, eds, Historiae mundi; Vessey, ‘Reinventing History’; Campopiano and Bainton, eds, Universal Chronicles. For a critique of the concept of ‘chronicle’: Burgess and Kulikowski, Mosaics of Time, i. 4 Goetz, ‘On the Universality of Universal History’.

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stated that it had been the aspiration of such writers of history ‘to marshal all men, who, united to one another by their kinship, are yet separated by space and time, into one and the same orderly body’.5 Thus, he continued, they acted as ‘ministers of Divine Providence’, because providence had established order in the world. Of course, ‘recording the common affairs of the inhabited world (koinē oikoumenē) as though they were those of a single state (polis)’ provided a rather loose narrative frame.6 In a sense, only the Christian concept of a unified history of salvation gave these wide-ranging syntheses thematic and temporal coherence, structured by Creation, biblical history, the spread of Christianity, and, explicitly or implicitly, by the eschatological perspective of the end of times.7 Still, even Eusebius/Jerome were able to handle their heterogeneous material only by arranging the events that had taken place in different states or regions in parallel columns, ‘fila regnorum’. In reality, of course, medieval histories could never quite represent ‘the world’, so that universal histories displayed a curious east–west shift in the narrative from Middle Eastern biblical beginnings through the Greek and Roman Mediterranean and from there to often quite particular Latin European perspectives as they were drawing closer to the present. The different ranges of ‘histories of community’ from local to universal constituted a continuum, and often zoomed in or out in the course of their narratives. Roman history works, not normally considered ‘national histories’, provide a special case; for much of its course, the theatre of Roman history was coextensive with the Mediterranean orbis terrarum, and beyond. In the sixth century, Jordanes even formally emplotted his ‘Romana’ as world history by prefixing a summary of biblical and eastern history based on Eusebius/Jerome.8 Yet on the other hand, by juxtaposing this ‘De summa temporum’ (its seldom-cited main title) ‘vel [de] origine actibusque gentis Romanorum’ with his ‘De origine actibusque Getarum’ (the Getica), he also established an analogy with an explicitly ethnic history.9 Therefore, distinguishing between ‘national’ and other histories is difficult. One criterion of inclusion in the present volume surely was whether a work’s title (as in this case) and thematic range focus on a distinctive political, ethnic, or regional unit 5

Diodorus of Sicily, Library of History, ed. by Oldfather, i.1.3, pp. 5–7. Diodorus of Sicily, Library of History, ed. by Oldfather, i.1.3–4, p. 7. See also Näf, Antike Geschichtsschreibung, pp. 53–55; Sheridan, ‘Diodorus’s Reading’. 7 Cf. Haeusler, Das Ende der Geschichte; Wieser, ‘Reading the Past into the Present’. 8 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 6–86, pp. 3–10. 9 The titles are in the manuscripts; Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, p. 1; Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, p. 53. 6

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within a wider political landscape. In that sense, Jordanes’ and Paul the Deacon’s Roman histories fall within this volume’s remit.10 Many medieval works of history are more clearly related to specific communities: cities, churches, monasteries, dynasties, countries, states, or peoples. They all raise questions of identity, if on different scales. On the one hand, there were works focusing on small-scale, more or less face-to-face communities, such as monasteries or cities; they usually pose rather straightforward questions of identity construction. The texts usually called ‘national histories’ are often more contentious, and have always attracted particular scholarly attention.11 Famous ancient examples are the lost Babyloniaca by Berossus and the Egyptian History by Manetho, of which only fragments survive. Both authors were members of the indigenous priesthood who wrote in Greek for early Hellenistic rulers.12 Much more influential in the European Middle Ages was the work of Flavius Josephus, a high-status Jew in Roman service whose Antiquitates Judaicae were written after the destruction of the Second Temple.13 Similar histories of non-classical peoples written from a Roman perspective began to flourish again in Late Antiquity. This strand of major works of historiography that bridge the transition from ancient to medieval Europe includes the Gothic histories of Jordanes and of Isidore of Seville, Gregory of Tours’s Histories, the ‘Fredegar’ Chronicle, the Liber historiae Francorum, Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, the Historia Brittonum, and Paul the Deacon’s History of the Lombards. Around the turn of the millennium, Widukind wrote about the Saxons, Erchempert and the Chronicon Salernitanum about the south Italian Lombards, Dudo, Orderic Vitalis, and William of Jumièges about the Normans.14 In the eleventh to thirteenth centuries, the new kingdoms in Northern, Eastern Central, and Eastern Europe were featured in works such as the chronicles of Saxo Grammaticus for the Danes, Cosmas of Prague and Dalimil about the Bohemians/Czechs, of 10

See the contributions by Maya Maskarinec and Philipp Dörler, in this volume. Overview in Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter, ed. by Scharer and Scheibelreiter; Historiography, ed. by Deliyannis; see also Pizarro, ‘Ethnic and National History’; Lifshitz, ‘Vicissitudes’; with interesting comparative reflections about the role of ethnicity in post-900 historiography: Innes, ‘Historical Writing’. 12 Verbrugghe and Wickersham, Berossos and Manetho. See also Momigliano, Alien Wisdom. 13 Flavius Josephus, The Jewish War, ed. and trans. by Thackeray, Marcus, and Feldman. Unfortunately, a planned contribution about Flavius Josephus by Tessa Rajak was not submitted for publication in the first volume of this series on Historiography and Identity. But see Rajak, Josephus. 14 Pohl, ‘Historiography of Disillusion’. See also Pohl and Mahoney, eds, Historiography and Identity, iv, which looks at European histories of the period in comparison with works of Islamic and Chinese historiography. 11

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Gallus Anonymus and Kadłubek about the Poles, of the Anonymus (Magister P.) and Simon of Kéza about the Hungarians, in the Russian Primary Chronicle about the Rus’, or Saxo Grammaticus about the Danes.15 The Grandes chroniques de France and the works of Geoffrey of Monmouth and William of Malmesbury are among the best-known ‘national’ histories in France and England.16 In the later Middle Ages, Latin and vernacular histories described the fates of a large variety of communities; the sixth volume of our series will provide a broad overview of identity constructions in these often little-known works.17 That these large-scale histories of states and peoples received so much scholarly attention is hardly surprising. Premodern ‘national histories’ were easily absorbed into the master narratives of modern nations. As a result, they acquired a heavy ideological load and were the subjects of controversial debates between historians from different countries who wanted to lay claim to them for their nation’s past. These texts’ modern reception thus has to be taken into account when studying them.18 The histories of the centuries covered by this volume were particularly popular in the nationalist historiographies of the nineteenth and earlier twentieth centuries. In many nations in the western parts of Europe, the fifth to seventh centuries were regarded as a foundational period. In the new kingdoms in the north and east of Europe, twelfth- and thirteenth-century works of history played a similar foundational role.19 The most controversial case was the appropriation of ‘Germanic’ and so-called ‘Nordic’ histories by German nationalism. But even apart from modern ideological uses, identifications with a larger polity, a country, or people in historiographic texts present methodological challenges: they are usually more complex and often more ambivalent than those with a more or less face-to-face and certainly more tangible community, such as a dynasty, a monastery, an episcopal see or a city. Whether Jordanes or Paul the Deacon expressed what a Goth or a Lombard felt about his people is therefore much more difficult to establish than, say, what Bede felt about Wearmouth/Jarrow or Alcuin about York.20 15

See Garipzanov, ed., Historical Narratives; Pohl and Borri, eds, Historiography and Identity, v. For these and many further works from various European regions from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries, see Kersken, Geschichtsschreibung. The well-studied later medieval histories in Western Europe will not be addressed in this series. 17 Rychterová, ed., Historiography and Identity, vi. 18 Geary, The Myth of Nations. 19 See Historiography and Identity, v, ed. by Pohl and Borri. 20 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood; Alcuin, The Bishops, Kings, and Saints of York, ed. by Godman. 16

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Nineteenth-century scholars had assumed that works of historiography reflected the existence of real peoples and nations who were the main historical actors. Many went even further and believed that (similar to poetry, legends, customs, or other cultural forms) works of history directly expressed the collective spirit, Volksgeist, of a people. Inspired by the Brothers Grimm and other romantic enthusiasts, generations of scholars sought to detect the authentic Germanic spirit in Latin works of historiography.21 Thus medieval histories were deemed ‘national’ both in their subject, the national past, and in their approach, inspired by the cultural genius of a particular people; they were ‘true’ as far as they were in tune with the spirit of their nation. Historiography was therefore seen as ultimately bound to a transhistorical concept, people/nation, whether that was conceived of as a romantic spirit that persisted essentially untouched by the often tragic vicissitudes of history, or as a racial substance that needed to be defended against admixture. The fundamental character of a people was best expressed in its distant past; it was perhaps not immune to detrimental influences, but in essence hardly changed. Methodologically, this meant that basic cultural expressions of a people could be assumed to have remained the same over a long period. This was particularly marked in the case of the ancient Germans and their ‘authentic’ pagan culture. What Caesar and Tacitus wrote about the Germans of the first centuries bc and ad, and what Nordic sagas said about the Scandinavians in the thirteenth century, could both be claimed for ‘the’ ancient Germans. This was the approach traditionally used in the wide field of ‘Germanische Altertumskunde’. In German scholarship, the primacy of oral and vernacular traditions over erudite Latin historiography was maintained until the second half of the twentieth century. The lay-out of Herbert Grundmann’s influential textbook Geschichtsschreibung im Mittelalter, which was published in 1965 and repeatedly reprinted, is typical: after a brief reference to Latin historiography, the first chapter dealt with ‘volkssprachliche Geschichtsdichtung’, vernacular historical poetry, which he clearly regarded as the root of medieval historiography. The second chapter addressed ‘Volksgeschichte (Origo gentis)’, on which Grundmann acknowledged some influence of literate Latin models but privileged ‘native oral tradition’.22 Medieval annals were regarded as a newly devel21

Wiwjorra, Germanenmythos; von See, Deutsche Germanen-Ideologie; Pohl, Germanen; Evans and Marchal, eds, Uses of the Middle Ages; Leerssen, National Thought. 22 Grundmann, Geschichtsschreibung, pp. 7–17; esp. p. 16: ‘So sehr dabei literarische Traditionen wirksam sind, hat doch jede dieser Volksgeschichten ihr eigenes Gepräge, nimmt die heimische mündliche Überlieferung in sich auf und nährt daran den Stolz auf die eigene Geschichte’.

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oped and typically German form of historiography. For their editor Georg Heinrich Pertz, the annalists of the eighth century were the earliest authentic German historians. They might have borrowed their literate language from neighbouring countries; but, when compared to the faint traces of annalistic tradition in France and Italy, there could be no mistaking the innate drive of the German people towards the writing of history: truthful, concise, and devoid of artful rhetoric.23 All of this was the enduring echo of a romantic impulse to value the supposedly authentic expression of popular memory higher than the artificial writings of educated clerics. Put into our scholarly language (the term ‘identity’ was not used at the time), the implication was that early medieval ‘German/ic’ historiography, even though written in Latin, could still be an organic expression of a deep-seated ethnic identity. The latter did not need to be verified in detail in the texts; it spoke directly to the (German) scholars studying them. Until the second half of the twentieth century, therefore, transposing narratives from early medieval works of historiography to modern ones was generally regarded as a relatively straightforward procedure. It required some critical analysis and comparison of the available sources, for which advanced scholarly standards had been established in the course of the nineteenth century. Of course, the stories told in medieval chronicles lacked a modern scholarly approach, they were not Wissenschaft, but for the most part poorly written, badly informed, and incoherent accounts. However, their lack of style, coherence, and sophistication seemed to warrant their truthfulness. In fact, the less coherently arranged they were, the more authentic and credible they might be as direct testimonies of an unmediated popular memory of the past. However unreliable in detail, as accounts of past historical reality they were believed to represent a deeper truth. Historians of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries therefore considered medieval works of history accessible to a hermeneutic process that could lead to a deep understanding not only of the text, but also of its historical content and circumstances. Today, speaking of early medieval ‘national histories’ seems somehow anachronistic, even though the question whether and when there was a medieval nation or not remains debated.24 For the works produced in the post-Roman 23

On annals as the origins of German historiography and evidence for ‘die tiefe angeborne Richtung unseres Volkes auf Geschichte’ see Pertz, ‘Geschichtsschreiber’, p. 102. 24 For the debate on the medieval nation, see Bues and Rexhäuser, eds, Mittelalterliche nationes — neuzeitliche Nationen (European nations develop in the tenth century); Hastings, The Construction of Nationhood (nations develop in the late medieval/early modern period);

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centuries, the term ‘barbarian histories’ is also commonly used — though Felice Lifshitz more cautiously called her elegant survey ‘Historical Narratives in the Barbarian Successor States of Western Europe’.25 In Germany, another term sometimes used for early medieval histories of peoples/polities is ‘origo gentis’, but it, too, is misleading because the texts do not only deal with origins, but also with recent events.26 Neither can the texts be termed ‘ethnic histories’; Gregory of Tours’s and Bede’s histories mainly promote ecclesiastic identities, and the point of reference is not always one people or polity; Bede’s history covers several kingdoms and gentes. The focus of these histories fluctuates between the people, the polity, its territory, and its church. Authors do not necessarily distinguish between these forms of identification; in many texts, various identifications exist in apparent tension with each other. As I already showed in the introduction to the first volume of Historiography and Identity, it is important to note that modern classifications as ‘national histories’ do not reflect the authors’ intentions but rather modern ideas about the central role of peoples in the migration period or about emerging medieval nations.

Early Medieval Historiography and the Literary Turn Like many intuitive approaches and seeming certainties, the art of narrating the past ‘as it really was’ was eroded by a series of critical impulses from rather different angles in the course of the twentieth century. From the end of the nineteenth century onwards the primacy of historiography as a source for the reconstruction of the past was challenged by historical positivism, which regarded analytical approaches and documentary history as much more scientific and acceptable. Marxist historiography sought to uncover the hidden contradictions in a society’s ideologically distorted self-narratives. Between the two world wars, narratology and semiotics began to address the question of Breuilly, ‘Changes’ (no medieval nations); Smith, The Nation in History; Gat, Nations; and Reynolds, ‘Nations’ (medieval nations existed). Personally, I have no strong agenda in this debate, but tend to avoid the term for the earlier (and central) Middle Ages. The solution in Kersken, Geschichtsschreibung, to speak of ‘national histories’ but not of ‘medieval nations’ is pragmatic, but not very convincing. See Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’. 25 Lifshitz, ‘Vicissitudes’. However, this does not preserve the distinction between a more local focus and a broader perspective in the plot of these histories; and it only covers a limited chronological frame. 26 Grundmann, Geschichtsschreibung, p. 7; Plassmann, Origo gentis; used as ‘zweite wichtige Chronikgattung’ besides the universal chronicle in Wolf, ‘Einleitung’, pp. 9–12.

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how texts and narratives confer meaning, and to analyse their deep structures.27 Post-war structuralism further dissected societies and their myths into their building blocks. For a while, the flamboyant synthesis of the Annales school seemed to show ways in which a structural history based on analytical methods could still yield sweeping narratives about the Middle Ages. However, structuralist analysis proper never gained much ground in medieval studies, let alone in research about historiography. It was suited to the study of rather stereotypical texts such as myths or legends that could be broken down into their basic elements; their analysis yielded a stock of ‘elementary structures’ of which such narratives were typically constructed.28 Narratology developed instruments for a formal theory of narrative.29 Such approaches were, however, much more useful for anthropology, linguistics, or literary studies than for history. The tools for a formal analysis of texts and narratives that they provide can be applied to works of history with some benefit.30 However, historiography typically is much less stereotypical than other narrative genres, not least because it has to account in some way for the great variety of historical events. It is perfectly possible to establish a limited number of mythemes as basic constituent elements of myths;31 but it would be hard to do the same with ‘historiographemes’. Therefore, reducing historical accounts to their formal elements has only limited potential to answer historians’ questions in the study of their sources. However, there was a context in which a rather formal analysis of works of historiography as literary texts gave decisive impulses to their historical study, and that was the ‘literary turn’ of the 1980s and 1990s. The most influential literary scholar who inspired the ‘literary turn’ was Hayden White, who analysed historiography, premodern and modern alike, as ‘fiction of fact’.32 According to White, what created a sense of reality in a narrative was, in historiography as in fiction, not the ‘real’ content of the story, but narrative models familiar to the reader. This was a very perceptive critique of a common paradigm according to which narratives of events can be taken as direct reflections of past realities, 27

Propp, Morphology (Russian edn 1928, English trans. by Lawrence 1958); Peirce, Peirce on Signs, ed. by Hoopes. 28 Lévi-Strauss, Myth and Meaning. 29 See, for instance, Barthes, ‘Introduction’; Genette, Narrative Discourse, trans. by Levin; Altman, A Theory of Narrative. 30 Differences between a literary and a scientific text: Lotmann, Die Struktur literarischer Texte, pp. 352–54. 31 Lévi-Strauss, ‘La structure des mythes’. 32 White, The Content of the Form.

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however faulty they might be. Therefore, what made a historiographic account sound plausible to medieval and modern readers was, according to White, not necessarily its adequate reflection of actual events, but its well-constructed narrative which was tailored to readers’ expectations. This was a lesson historians had to learn, and a reason to try and detect formal narrative structures in works of history — the construction of the plot, climax and anti-climax, parallelisms, juxtapositions, and bi-partite structures. What it told us was that many medieval works of history were deliberately constructed through the use of sophisticated narrative devices, and not at all chance compilations of whatever material happened to be available. In fact, this corresponds to what we know both about the uses of classical rhetoric in medieval historiography and about the extensive reflections by medieval writers on ‘verisimilitude and truth’. Medieval historians already distinguished between ‘the truth of what happened (veritas factorum) and the fidelity of the account with which it was relayed (fides relationis, fides dictorum)’.33 However, medievalists’ reactions to White’s approach were not universally enthusiastic, not least because his own treatment of medieval examples was unconvincing (for instance, his claim that annals did not contain proper narratives).34 Some scholars detected more structural devices in texts than their authors may have intended to use. And on the whole, medievalists using the approaches offered by the literary turn were perhaps too optimistic about what the analysis of historiography as fiction could yield, and too dismissive of the historical interpretation of the stories that the texts sought to tell.35 Hayden White’s ‘tropes’ provided a grid by which works of both ancient and modern historiography could be analysed through metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, or irony, and emplotted as romances, tragedies, comedies, or satires.36 It was surely important to make the point that scholarly history, too, employs fictional strategies. As far as medieval histories are concerned, employing White’s tropology may be an interesting exercise for literary critics, but making medieval texts fit his rather formal scheme did not prove very fruitful for a historical analysis. 33

Kempshall, Rhetoric, pp. 350–427, cited at p. 426. For a critique, see Mink, ‘Everyman’; Chartier, ‘Four Questions’; Partner, ‘Hayden White’; Foot, ‘Finding the Meaning of the Form’; Tyler and Balzaretti, eds, Narrative and History; Garipzanov, ‘History Writing’, pp. 4–5. 35 Although White argued at length for the applicability of literary theory to historical research, using the postmodern idea that the content of a historiographic discourse is indistinguishable from its discursive form: White, ‘Literaturtheorie’, esp. p. 73. 36 White, Metahistory. 34

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The second and more wide-ranging intellectual movement that sparked off the ‘literary turn’ was postmodernism, which pushed the deconstructivist spin to its limit.37 It proved a serious challenge to established scholarly practices, attacking grand narratives and key concepts that had hitherto served to anchor a narrative in some kind of consensual image of reality: the subject/person/ego, reality, humanity, truth, culture, or religion. It strove to uncover the unsaid, the unthinkable, and the power relations that controlled what could and should be said: in short, the formation of discourse. Texts that claimed to tell the truth became suspect. And in these texts, individuals and social groups endowed with agency and identity came to be regarded as fictions that only existed in, and for the purpose of, these texts. It was a fascinating new approach that allowed historians to rethink many basic assumptions that they had so far taken for granted. One postmodern (or poststructuralist) thinker whose work was particularly relevant for historians was Michel Foucault.38 His discourse theory is still a very valuable instrument to understand the ways in which discourses shape communication and thus social practice. Every society has its own order of truth: not ‘the ensemble of things that are true’, but ‘the ensemble of rules according to which the true and the false are separated and specific effects of power attached to the true’.39

A complex and largely implicit set of rules governs the way in which members of a given society can decide not only what is true or false, but also what is possible or impossible, what exists and what is an illusion, what can be said and what cannot, what is desirable and what should be rejected. Power shapes discourse, but is also limited by it, for the ‘order of discourse’ cannot be established by decree, but instead is formed by repetition that finally makes certain arguments, narrative models, or norms appear self-evident. Discourse thus represents a form of power in itself, and discourse analysis can uncover both power relations and the formation and exchange of knowledge in a society.40 A similar link between discourse and power is found in the work of Michel de Certeau, a more conservative French theoretician influenced by post37

A useful reader in German: Conrad and Kessel, eds, Geschichte schreiben in der Postmoderne. Foucault, Les mots et les choses; English trans.: The Order of Things; Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge. See also Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, pp. 29–30. 39 Foucault, ‘Truth and Power’, p. 132. 40 An introduction to the use of discourse analysis in the historical disciplines: Landwehr, Historische Diskursanalyse. 38

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modernism who directly addressed problems of historiography. De Certeau reflected on the ways historiography ‘inscribes itself into the real’, and found them in ‘determinations of a place’.41 Such ‘places’ — cities, nations, etc. — are created by a power, on which the writing of history ultimately relies.42 Works of history, on the one hand, authorize the force that wields such power; on the other hand, by sketching scenarios of the past that have implications for the future, they offer ‘lessons’ to those in power and contribute to defining their spaces of action. Such reflections are particularly relevant for research on ‘national histories’. Their authors did not just write ‘à l’abri des cloîtres’, in the shelter of the cloisters.43 Apart from Jordanes and ‘Fredegar’, whose relationship with the powers of their day we can only trace in their work, all early medieval authors of interest in this volume — Gregory of Tours, Isidore, Bede, Paul the Deacon — were themselves power brokers and had complex relations with the rulers who determined the very spaces in which their historical scenarios unfolded. Consequently, they all sought to shape these social spaces according to the lessons of the past in their texts. This means that we cannot eliminate author and context from our textual analysis and do need to think about ways in which historical discourse was related to power. In what ways did narratives about the past constitute a community, or communities? This involved constructing social identities, differences, boundaries, and affiliations to broader units. The ‘place’ in which the histories of early medieval kingdoms unfold is circumscribed by the actions of kings, bishops, and of the people, within a frame largely defined by political, ethnic, and regional categories. The postmodern challenge was slow to spread to early medieval studies. It needed interpreters, brokers of deconstruction whose jargon was more accessible than the brilliant francophone rhetoric of a circle of Parisian intellectuals, to show historians what the new approach might mean for their research. These brokers were mostly literary historians such as Gabrielle Spiegel.44 However, it should be emphasized that postmodernism and literary criticism in some respects had quite contradictory agendas. While literary studies mostly fore41

De Certeau, L’écriture de l’histoire, p. 25: ‘Le réel qui s’inscrit dans le discours historiographique provient des déterminations d’une place’. 42 De Certeau, L’écriture de l’histoire, p. 20: ‘L’historiographie s’appuie en dernier ressort sur un pouvoir qui se distingue effectivement du passé et de toute la société. Le “faire de l’histoire” s’arc-boute sur un pouvoir politique qui crée un lieu-propre (cité, nation, etc.)’. 43 This context for medieval historiography has been highlighted by Guenée, Histoire et culture historique, pp. 45–58. 44 Spiegel, ‘History, Historicism and the Social Logic’; Spiegel, The Past as Text.

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grounded the creative potential of the author, postmodernism deconstructed the conventional frame of interpretation in which the author was a key element. Postmodern authors proclaimed the ‘death of the author’ in the 1970s and focused on the dynamic of the text and its intertextual relations.45 The way in which this whole bundle of rather varied critical approaches to historiographic narratives filtered into medieval studies was the ‘literary turn’ (or ‘linguistic turn’) of the late 1980s and early 1990s. It opened up new horizons of exciting opportunities to rethink mainstream practices in historical research; it put theoretical thinkers such as Derrida, Foucault, and Bourdieu on the agenda; and it made clear that historiographic works have to be studied as texts in their own right and not only as sources. It spurred a wide range of valuable reassessments of historiographical texts and allowed historians to understand the degree to which the identity both of the author and of his community were constructed by texts and could not simply be taken for granted. However, as a ‘literary turn’ it was in essence a turn away from historical method to literary criticism. All these literary approaches — literary criticism, narratology, intertextuality, rhetoric, structural analysis, etc. — provided valuable tools for approaching works of historiography.46 Yet their use sometimes included the implication that this was all there was left for historians to work with, and that there was no world to explore ‘outside the text’. That, however, compromised the mainstay of historical scholarship, namely, the reconstruction of ever more complex and sophisticated images of the past. The differentiated messages of the pioneers of the literary turn soon gave way to rather reductionist versions of radical jargon. Increasingly, it seemed sufficient to say ‘there is no reality outside the text’, that ‘historiography creates an opaque barrier between us and the past’, which trumped every other argument. Gradually, deconstructivism turned rather stale, because it was often reduced to a rather predictable and self-referential rhetoric. That is a pity, because the deconstructivist impulse is still needed in many contexts, where text-mining for facts and a belief in traditional grand narratives are unbroken. Walter Goffart’s work about early medieval historiography appeared independently of postmodernism, but to an extent it was inspired by a similar deconstructive spirit and owes some of its success to the then fresh enthusiasm for such an approach. We owe to Goffart a ground-breaking article in which he showed 45 Barthes, ‘La mort de l’auteur’; the article first appeared in English in the journal Aspen, 5–6 (1967). 46 See, for instance, Cameron, Procopius; Cameron, ed., History as Text; Airlie, ‘“Sad Stories”; Kempshall, Rhetoric; Van Nuffelen, Orosius, with a critique by Goetz, ‘Orosius’.

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that Gregory of Tours had certainly not written a ‘History of the Franks’, as which it had later come to be regarded.47 In his 1988 book about the Narrators of Barbarian History — Jordanes, Gregory, Bede, and Paul the Deacon — Goffart pushed the point further. He forcefully argued that these writers were authors in their own right, not simply compilers who had assembled half-digested material that could then be processed further to be inserted into modern historical narratives.48 This was a major step forward compared to the dismissive assessment of much medieval historiography by many nineteenth- and twentieth-century historians who maintained that their authors were naive compilers who wrote bad Latin and simply assembled whatever source material they could get their hands on.49 This, in turn, allowed modern scholars to assume the authenticity of such accounts.50 Goffart’s deconstruction of this approach came at a fortunate moment and had an enormous impact in the field. Interestingly, in the preface to the 2005 edition of Narrators of Barbarian History, Goffart disclaimed any link to the ‘literary turn’ whose reception in early medieval studies he had inspired.51 Goffart borrowed much from the toolbox of literary studies, and made extensive efforts to analyse structural and narrative devices. Most importantly, he demonstrated that these works had been carefully constructed by authors who knew what they were doing. Not all of the structural devices detected by Goffart in The Narrators of Barbarian History were equally plausible, but this did not invalidate the significance of his efforts.52 In any case, the literary approach was 47

Goffart, ‘From Historiae to Historia Francorum’. Goffart, Narrators (1988), pp. 3–19. 49 However, some earlier scholars had already appreciated early medieval historians for their literary qualities. Goffart, Narrators, p. 17, mentions Erich Auerbach and Robert Hanning. Other examples would be Vinay, ‘Un mito per sopravvivere’, and other Italian authors on Paul the Deacon; see Mores, ‘Come lavorava Paolo Diacono’. 50 Wattenbach (Wattenbach and Levison, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen, ii, 224) canonized Hampe’s opinion of Paul the Deacon that the unprocessed compilation of his sources (‘das unverarbeitete Aneinanderfügen seiner Quellen’) still reflected the original narrative tone (‘ursprünglichen Erzählerton’) of ancient Lombard lore: Hampe, ‘Paulus Diaconus’, p. 398; still found in Brunhölzl, Geschichte, i, 264. See my contribution on Paul the Deacon, in this volume. 51 Goffart, ‘Preface to the Paperback Edition’, p. x. Clearly, Goffart never embraced postmodernism. Perhaps I also overstated the influence of Hayden White and of literary criticism in my review of Narrators (Pohl, ‘Review’, pp. 149–50). However, the main theoretical references at the end of his introduction (Narrators [1988], pp. 17–18) are Hayden White and Marcia Colish’s ‘Historical Writing Then and Now’. He also defined each of the histories according to White’s tropes, perhaps one of the less successful features of the book. 52 For a detailed critique, see Heath, The Narrative Worlds, e.g. pp. 133–34 and pp. 209–10. 48

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well-embedded in a sound analysis of the narrators’ historical circumstances. In that respect, the uneasiness with which the book was received by some scholars at the time (including myself ) was directed more at the ‘literary turn’ than at Goffart’s book in particular.53 Still, his approach raised general methodological issues. First, it seems to have been inspired by one of the tenets of the post-war ‘New Criticism’, which sought to establish the unity of the text and regarded it as a self-contained, self-referential aesthetic object.54 Goffart argued that the barbarian histories had both formal unity and unity of purpose, but this is often not appropriate for the way in which early medieval history books were crafted, with more than one axe to grind.55 He used methods of literary criticism for a reappraisal of the literary complexity of his ‘narrators’, but he allowed much less room for a complexity of their intentions and identifications. Second, the formal analysis and close reading of a text (both promoted by New Criticism) certainly are attractive tools for the study of medieval historiography. Goffart concluded that, like Jordanes, Paul the Deacon ‘yields his meaning more readily when approached from literary perspectives than if read with a historian’s preoccupation for isolated facts’.56 But there is more to historical approaches than a preoccupation with isolated facts. The experience of the literary turn seems to suggest that the structural and literary analysis of historiographic texts rarely yields much evidence pertinent to historical questions. Historians who embark on lengthy ventures into textual analysis using methods of literary studies, narratology, or structural analysis in the end sometimes revert to more traditional arguments to deliver their conclusions, returning to the hermeneutic circle between the author, the text, and the context to make sense of their analysis.57 Historical methods such as source criticism, 53 Scharer and Scheibelreiter, eds, Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter; see especially the rather (self-)ironical contribution by Geary, ‘Frühmittelalterliche Historiographie’, pp. 539–42. In hindsight, my claim that by rescuing Paul the Deacon as an author Goffart had sacrificed him as a historian was perhaps overly dramatic (Pohl, ‘Paulus Diaconus’, p. 381); this worry had, however, been triggered by Goffart’s equally exaggerated rhetoric, such as the statement that ‘truthful history survived the passage through his [ Jordanes’] hands only by accident’, and then defining the Getica as a ‘love story’ (Narrators, pp. 108–09); or his conclusion that ‘history was the medium of their writings, not its goal’ (Narrators, p. 433). 54 Lynn, Texts and Contexts. I owe this observation to Anton Scharer. 55 See my contribution on Paul the Deacon in this volume. Cf. also the remarks of Airlie, ‘“Sad Stories”’, p. 107. 56 Goffart, Narrators, p. 424. 57 For the distinction between hermeneutic and analytic methods in historical research, see Rüsen and Jaeger, ‘Historische Methode’, pp. 18–21.

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contextualization, hermeneutics, historical discourse analysis, or assessments of historical plausibility of a text remain important elements in studying medieval historiography. On the whole, Goffart’s treatment of his four ‘narrators’ encouraged an emerging scholarly attitude that works of historiography told us more about their authors than about the events that they recounted. This was very valuable as an antidote to the former practice of text-mining which sought to get maximum evidence out of a text without paying attention to a source’s context. However, it tended to produce a reductionist attitude in the other direction, leaving little room for addressing both the texts’ social/political background and their impact. Amongst other things, privileging a literary analysis drew attention away from the ways in which identities affected a text, and were in turn shaped by it.

Ethnogenesis and its Critics In research on early medieval historiography, a second movement away from reified ‘national history’ emerged in the 1960s. Here the issue was identity — to use an inclusive term that only appeared rather late in debates about early medieval history. The decades after 1945 saw a massive backlash against the notion of the stable existence, collective agency, and providential significance of peoples and nations. Much of this sprang from a very understandable reaction to nationalist appropriations of the past both in politics and scholarship. Scholars such as Eric Hobsbawm, Ernest Gellner, and Benedict Anderson maintained that the nation was just a passing phenomenon in history.58 Instead of glorifying peoplehood and the nation, ethnicity and national identity came to be regarded as unpleasantly atavistic matters, in politics as in research. Scholars of ancient and medieval history began to doubt that ethnicity was a major concern in the histories of the period, or that we could learn much about ethnic and other groups from them. This view was often based on a positivist insistence that our patchy sources were not sufficient to say anything about identities. For instance, the late Tim Reuter argued: In the first millennium, the definition of others does not appear to have much to do with the definition of self […]. We don’t know when or how Avar identity ceased to be meaningful to Avars, though it clearly must have done at some point, since there 58

Anderson, Imagined Communities; Gellner, Nations and Nationalism; Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism.

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aren’t any now. It’s far from clear that Avars thought they were Avars when they still were Avars, if you see what I mean.59

The case of the Avars may not be the ideal example to show that ethnic identity did not matter. The seventh-century historian Theophylactus Simocatta claimed that the Avars had only started to call themselves Avars because others called them that way: When the […] Hunnic peoples of the region saw that a part of the Uar and Chunni had fled into their districts, they became greatly afraid, since they assumed that the invaders were Avars. […] When the Uar and Chunni saw how successfully their flight had begun they made their own the error of those who had been sent to them and called themselves Avars. Among the Scythian peoples it is in fact said that the Avars are a people of great skill.60

Both the Turkish and the Byzantine authorities insisted that their enemies were only ‘Pseudo-Avars’, and in reality a hybrid group of ‘Varchonites’. This has been taken as proof for the fluidity and ambiguity of Avar identity; and indeed, it is quite likely that the European Avars were of rather mixed origin. However, that does not exclude a strong sense of subjective identity. The very insistence with which their enemies negated Avar identity in fact shows how much it mattered, and makes it very likely that the European Avar elite really claimed to be Avars. This claim had a strong political significance, because it legitimized the use of the sublime title ‘khagan’ that the Central Asian Rouran/Avars had employed, and which the Turks had appropriated; the argument was about ethnic continuity of the Central Asian and European Avars.61 Of course, it is hard to prove that Greek and Latin sources reflected actual self-identifications in every case; but to claim that the outside perception (in historiography) had little to do with ‘the definition of self ’ in the period is an even bolder claim. We should of course allow for a margin of error that is always present in the perception of foreigners. Nevertheless, Rome, Byzantium, or the Franks could not afford to ignore who their neighbours were; and it is unlikely that historiographers had no access to all that information about people beyond the frontiers. Late antique and early medieval historiography is full of ethnonyms and ethnic terminology. Avoiding the subject altogether because ‘it did not matter’ or ‘we do not know enough about it’ would leave all this material unexplored and unexplained. 59 60 61

Reuter, ‘Whose Race, Whose Ethnicity?’, p. 102. Theophylact Simocatta, History, trans. by Whitby and Whitby, vii.8, p. 259. Pohl, Avars, pp. 33–47.

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Therefore, the agenda was to dismantle the grandiose constructions of national histories without completely discarding ethnic identities as a field of research. This required getting rid of biological definitions of ‘ethnicity’, and accounting for the hybridity and ambiguity of ethnic groups and for the dynamic character of ethnic processes. That was the goal of a strand of scholarship that emerged in the 1960s in German-speaking countries.62 Its proponents operated in the context of Germanische Altertumskunde but challenged its basic assumptions. The pioneer in this line of research was Reinhard Wenskus, whose Stammesbildung und Verfassung was published in 1961. The core of the book is a systematic deconstruction of all objective criteria of ethnic identity (Wenskus called it Stammeszugehörigkeit, ‘tribal affiliation’; he avoided the term Volk, people, because of its ideological uses by the Nazis). Previous research in Germanische Altertumskunde had maintained that historical, archaeological, and linguistic evidence reflected objectively existing peoples and tribes, and that even if you had only one type of evidence, you could assume that the other criteria would coincide. A tribe/people had previously been seen as defined by common descent, law, settlement, language, culture, and political organization. Wenskus demonstrated that none of these features applied in all cases, concluding that no objective definition of a tribe was possible. In particular, the frequent changes in the composition of the migrating groups, which previous historians had hardly taken into account, precluded any actual common descent of the ‘Germanic tribes’. Wenskus argued that the decisive feature was a subjective sense of belonging, Stammesbewusstsein, which was mediated by a shared tradition that provided an origin myth and a set of norms, which Wenskus called Verfassung, constitution. A core group, for which he used the term Traditionskern, kernel of tradition, promoted this tradition and attracted followers who soon developed a sense of belonging: Stammesbildung, the formation of tribes, was essentially the emergence of Stammesbewusstsein. Wenskus never elaborated this model, which can be distilled from the six hundred pages of his book; he only rarely used the word Traditionskern, later the best-known (and most misunderstood) feature of his work. What mattered in the 1960s and 1970s was his decisive step away from the biological and racial models of ethnicity that had dominated research so far. In retrospect, it is easy to see that his work still relied in many respects on older concepts and paradigms.63 Among the weaknesses of his approach was, first, its limitation to the 62 The following is an English summary of the more extensive discussion in Pohl, ‘Von der Ethnogenese zur Identitätsforschung’. 63 I published a critique of Wenskus already in 1994: Pohl, ‘Tradition, Ethnogenese und

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ancient Germans, die Germanen; only later did Wenskus publish a fundamental critique of the misleading uses of the term ‘Germanen’.64 Second, Wenskus focused on ideas, and in his view the success of the Germans was based on their particular sense of community which he called Gentilismus, and which proved superior to the Romans’ allegiance to their empire. As a main cohesive force, traditions are pictured as time-resistant, a methodological problem already indicated by František Graus in his review of Stammesbildung und Verfassung.65 Third, the Traditionskern, the core group transmitting tribal traditions, is similarly conceptualized as rather immutable. That has an elitist touch, as it was current in ‘New German constitutional history’ of the period.66 Fourth, it was also a rather gendered concept, because it at least implicitly linked the diffusion of traditions and consequently of a sense of allegiance to males (kings, their retinue, judges, bards, and poets), without taking female agency into account.67 Fifth, it distinguished the period of Stammesbildung, the migration age when tribal formation took place, from the later Nationsbildung from the ninth century onwards. This corresponded to the old conceptual link between the ancient Germans and die Deutschen, the modern Germans: both had been constituted from their tribes. And sixth, the subjective sense of belonging is plausible as a defining feature of tribal affiliation, but hard to prove given the almost absolute lack of direct sources from the barbarians of the migration period. In practice, Wenskus and later Herwig Wolfram used the success and resilience of these groups and their consistent depiction in Latin sources as criteria, but without methodological explanation. Regarding the role of historiography in Wenskus’s model of ‘tribal formation’, his focus on the Germans and their traditions privileged whatever could be regarded as traces of authentic traditions: ‘genuine’ origin narratives, mainly those of the Goths as reconstructed on the basis of Jordanes, the Origo gentis Langobardorum, plus some Anglo-Saxon material; and those parts of the Leges that might be ancient.68 As most previous scholars, Wenskus did not conliterarische Gestaltung’, pp. 12–14; see also Pohl, ‘Ethnicity, Theory and Tradition’; and the harsher critique in Murray, ‘Reinhard Wenskus on “Ethnogenesis”’. 64 Wenskus, ‘Über die Möglichkeit’. 65 ‘Die logische Folge dieser Annahme ist dann, daß die Herkunftssagen, die in den überlieferten Quellen auftauchen, in ihrem Kern als “uralt” angesehen werden müssen’. Graus, ‘Rezension’, p. 188. 66 Pohl, ‘Staat und Herrschaft im Frühmittelalter’. 67 For female transmission of memory and identity, see van Houts, Memory and Gender; Pohl, ‘Gender and Ethnicity’. 68 Wolfram and others, ‘Origo gentis’, pp. 174–210.

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sider the Trojan origin legend of the Franks as genuine, and used only its latter parts (for instance, the mysterious Quinotaurus mentioned in the Fredegar chronicle).69 This was a rather narrow source base, and the origin narratives and their place in Latin historiography thus became a central element in later debates about Wenskus and ‘ethnogenesis theory’; Wenskus’s critics denied the relevance of the origines gentium for ethnic identities. Indeed, the limited evidence can hardly sustain the key role that ‘tradition’ played for Wenskus. We lack origin myths for Vandals, Burgundians, Suebi, and many others, and have discordant versions or traces of controversy in most cases where origin narratives have been preserved.70 Yet controversy is always a sign that something mattered. As Magali Coumert has argued, the diffusion of origin narratives in medieval Europe was not an inward-looking affair, in which each gens assured itself of its noble origins; rather, it was ‘a gigantic collective effort […] to arrive at an explanation for the diversity of early medieval kingdoms’.71 Literary interest in ethnic origin narratives took time to unfold and reached its peak after the period addressed in this volume. We thus know little about their significance among the wandering barbarians, but a lot about their appeal for the historians of the early medieval kingdoms. Herwig Wolfram, in his History of the Goths, which first appeared in German in 1979, used and modified Wenskus’s approach.72 Like Wenskus, he was much more interested in interpreting the sources than in creating general models. Instead of Stammesbildung, he used the term ethnogenesis, which he took from anthropology. He did not limit the use of the term to the distant origins of a people, but understood it as a long-term process in successive stages that never quite came to an end. More than Wenskus, Wolfram based his account on detailed and sophisticated source criticism. This meant that he read Jordanes (and Cassiodorus, explicitly named by Jordanes as his main source) in a sixthcentury context, and thus adopted the perspective of the text and not of the historical realities it might refer to. It was perhaps misleading that he labelled the Gothic origin narrative as found in Jordanes ‘origo Gothica’ (a term used in the Variae of Cassiodorus)73 and thus aligned it with Wenskus’s rather trans69

Hauck, ‘Carmina antiqua’; for a critique: Murray, ‘Post vocantur Merohingii’; a recent overview of the Troy legend can be found in Yavuz, ‘From Caesar to Charlemagne’. 70 Pohl, ‘Narratives’. 71 Coumert, Origines, p. 550 (my translation). 72 Wolfram, Goten; Wolfram, History of the Goths; for a first conceptual overview, see Wolfram, ‘The Shaping of the Early Medieval Kingdom’. 73 Cassiodorus, Variae, ed. by Fridh, ix.25, p. 379; Wolfram, Goten, pp. 15–16.

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historical concept of ‘tradition’. Still, he put the Goths (and other barbarian peoples) firmly into their late Roman environment, while Wenskus had contrasted the Roman and Germanic political systems.74 More than Wenskus in Stammesbildung, Wolfram was aware that the modern misuses of the migration period made its study difficult. Over the years, he developed and modified his approach in constant dialogue with his pupils and friends; most importantly, with Patrick Geary.75 The ensuing polemic about ‘ethnogenesis’ between Walter Goffart and Herwig Wolfram was unfortunate. Both Wolfram and Goffart are two of the most creative and productive scholars of their generation in the field; but the debate was much less fruitful.76 It started with a criticism of Goffart’s Narrators voiced by some contributors at a conference in Austria, the proceedings of which appeared in 1994. Goffart’s critical reply was published in the same year in Traditio — quite ironically, because the concept of tradition was a principal bone of contention.77 The exchange reached a first climax with a collaborative volume published by Andrew Gillett in 2002, which attempted an overall critique of ethnicity in the early Middle Ages, and to which I contributed a response.78 In his 2006 monograph Barbarian Tides, Goffart summed up what worried him: ‘A funny thing happened to the Later Roman Empire on its way to the twenty-first century: it ran into a wave of “ethnicity” and “ethnogenesis”’.79 Andrew Gillett described ‘ethnogenesis theory’ as offering an overall model of the transition from the Roman world to the early Middle Ages: a current explanatory model of the post-imperial West, one that locates the engine of change in the past of the Germanic World, rather than in Roman or Christian Antiquity […] [and] interprets the transition from classical to medieval culture as driven not by economics, religion or warfare, but by ethnicity.80 74

See, most recently, Wolfram, Das Römerreich und seine Germanen. Geary, ‘Ethnic Identity as a Situational Construct’; Geary, The Myth of Nations. 76 Overview in Pohl, ‘Von der Ethnogenese zur Identitätsforschung’. 77 Scharer and Scheibelreiter, eds, Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter; Goffart, ‘Two Notes’. 78 On Barbarian Identity, ed. by Gillett. 79 Goffart, Barbarian Tides, p. 1. 80 Gillett, ‘Ethnogenesis’, p. 242. See also Gillett, ‘Ethnogenesis’, p. 251: ‘Early medieval history is, in its essence, a continuation of Northern European proto-history, not of the Roman state that preceded the medieval kingdoms’. This sentence, and the entire paragraph, may be adequate as a critique of Otto Höfler’s insistence on Germanic continuity — Höfler, ‘Das germanische Kontinuitätsproblem’. In 2006, that approach had long been superseded; see Pohl, ‘Vom Nutzen des Germanenbegriffes zwischen Antike und Mittelalter’. 75

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This statement perhaps reflects Reinhard Wenskus’s position in 1961, but not that of Herwig Wolfram, and certainly not mine. The polemic against ‘ethnogenesis theory’ attacked what Wenskus wrote almost half a century ago, without realizing that ‘Traditionskern’, ‘Gentilismus’, or early medieval ‘Germanen’ had already been reviewed critically in Viennese publications.81 Increasingly, the polemic insinuated that behind a postmodern façade I still upheld Wenskus’s concept of ‘tradition’: ‘The vision of an unbroken, millennial, tradition-rich development of the Germanic/German peoples is conjured up’.82 In Barbarian Tides, Goffart characterized my book Die Germanen in the following way: ‘It shows extreme reluctance to sever ties with older scholarship. Pohl is, of course, committed to the existence of his subject, a coherent “Germanic” people foreshadowing the “Deutsche” of today’.83 This comment came as a surprise, because the first sentence of the book was: ‘A people that called itself “Germanen” perhaps never existed (Ein Volk, das sich Germanen nannte, hat es vielleicht nie gegeben)’.84 I had also argued that from the fifth century onwards, the term ‘Germanen’ fell out of use, and that it made little sense to define the post-Roman kingdoms as ‘Germanic’.85 Neither Herwig Wolfram nor I maintained an unbroken Germanic continuity, but had repeatedly rejected it; we did not assume that the Germans brought about the end of ancient culture; we never believed that ethnicity was a purely Germanic phenomenon (my monograph about the Avars dealt with Avar, Bulgar, and Slavic identities).86 In fact, I was criticized by other scholars for denying that pre-Roman Germanic (or barbarian) traditions shaped the post-Roman kingdoms and early medieval historiography.87 The misrepresentations of ‘ethnogenesis theory’ made it hard to engage in the polemic. The debate was not about the validity of new ideas, but only about possible traces of old ones in a new argument. This was a pity, because there would have been a lot of common ground to explore. Some points put forward by the critics were valid or worth discussing. 81

See Pohl, ‘Gentilismus’; Pohl, ‘Germanenbegriff ’. Goffart, ‘Does the Distant Past’, p. 36. 83 Goffart, Barbarian Tides, p. 274. 84 Pohl, Die Germanen, p. 1. The title Die Germanen had been set by the publisher, and I extensively problematized the term in the text. 85 Pohl, ‘Germanenbegriff ’. 86 Pohl, Awaren; Pohl, Avars; on Roman identities, see Gantner and others, eds, Transformations of Romanness. 87 Ward-Perkins, The Fall of Rome. Some scholars even claimed that I had doubted that the barbarians had played any role in Italy: Valenti, ‘Ma i barbari sono veramente arrivati in Italia?’. 82

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Andrew Gillett rightly argued that new groups joining a successful barbarian army were not necessarily assimilated in a new process of ethnogenesis.88 He also reassessed the use of the ethnonym in royal titles, which Wolfram had collected in his book Intitulatio.89 Gillett’s conclusion that ethnicity hardly mattered in these titles is exaggerated, but what emerges from the material is that it took time until the ethnic title was regularly used. The first use of rex Francorum by a Merovingian king is attested in the 580s.90 Lombard kings used rex gentis Langobardorum in their laws (addressed to the Lombard people), but flavius rex in their royal charters (mostly addressed to ecclesiastic institutions).91 In historiography, however, ethnonyms and ethnic titles are used quite frequently since the fifth century. There is a differentiated story to tell here, which is not always linear and unbroken. A basic problem raised by the critics of ethnogenesis theory is the use of oral sources by early medieval authors, which the critics treated rather dismissively.92 Recently, both Shami Ghosh and Christopher Heath have allowed for a considerable role of oral lore in Paul the Deacon’s Lombard History and other works.93 It is important to note that oral material used by Jordanes, Fredegar, or Paul the Deacon need not have been ancient, barbarian, or vernacular. On the other hand, it is unnecessary to confine our authors to a closed sphere of Latin literacy in order to deny the role of Wenskus’s ‘tradition’. There are cases in which vernacular oral material simply is the likeliest source for a passage in a Latin text, particularly if names and/or terms are given in the vernacular. This is what Wolfram has called ‘pre-ethnographic’ material, that is, names, words, motifs, or narratives connected with the barbarians and not otherwise attested in classical ethnography: the Amal genealogy, numerous ethnonyms in garbled form, the story of the Haliurunnae, the Gothic witches, and others. Critics of ‘ethnogenesis theory’ expended much effort to disprove that such information could derive from oral traditions.94 Indeed, Jordanes’ Amal genealogy was most likely 88

Gillett, ‘Ethnogenesis’, p. 248. Wolfram, Intitulatio; Gillett, ‘Was Ethnicity Politicized’. 90 Letter by Childebert II, dated by Gundlach to 584: Epistulae Austrasicae, ed.  by Gundlach, 37, p. 144; or by Rochais, p. 457. 91 Pohl, ‘Regnum und gens’. 92 ‘My own skepticism on this issue is notorious’, Goffart, ‘Preface to the Paperback Edition’, p. xvii. 93 Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past, p. 2 and pp. 222–56; Heath, The Narrative Worlds, p. 246 and p. 255. 94 Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’. 89

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fabricated by Cassiodorus, but it is unlikely that it was made up entirely on the spot, or derived from unknown material in classical literature.95 And how do we explain, for instance, that several authors mention pairs of brothers with alliterative and expressive Germanic names? These range from the second-century Vandal leaders Raos and Raptos mentioned in Cassius Dio,96 to the Lombards Ibor and A(g)io and their Vandal enemies Ambri and Assi in the Origo gentis Langobardorum of the seventh century97 to to Hengist and Horsa and Cerdic and Cynric, leaders of the migrating Angles and Saxons.98 Did the author of the Origo gentis Langobardorum with his modest Latin read Greek and have a copy of Cassius Dio at his disposal? It seems more plausible that in these and other rare cases, we get glimpses of some sort of Germanic mythology or poetic name-giving. Such traces should not be over-interpreted, but neither should they be obliterated from discussions in order to ban the ghosts of Germanische Altertumskunde. Perhaps the main flaw of the critiques of ethnogenesis by Goffart and his school was that they never transcended the binary divide between ‘Roman’ and ‘German/ic’ — on the contrary, they did everything to reinforce it in order to fade out what was not Roman from our picture. That also meant that classical literary historiography and ethnography remained the only form of cultural memory that was deemed acceptable as a source of early medieval historiography. In that sense as well, the polemic returned to the time when Wenskus wrote, and to a simplistic opposition between Roman classical heritage and Germanic ‘gentile’ traditions. Instead of purging any form of barbarian, oral, or mythical memory from the historical record, it would have been more productive to question the neat Roman–Germanic divide altogether. Most ‘barbarian’ histories from the post-Roman centuries were produced in some sort of middle ground, by authors with barbarian background writing under Roman rule ( Jordanes), or authors with Roman background writing in (and for) barbarian kingdoms (Cassiodorus, Isidore). Furthermore, these authors could draw on the experience of centuries of Roman–barbarian interaction. Debating whether aspects of their works can be classed as ‘Roman’ or ‘Germanic’ is hardly the most interesting question that can be raised about them. 95

Pohl, ‘Genealogy’. Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, ed. by Cary and Foster, lxxii.12, p. 15 (lxxi.12 in other editions); for the context, Steinacher, Vandalen, p. 23. 97 Origo gentis Langobardorum, ed.  by Bethmann and Waitz, 1, p.  2; see Haubrichs, ‘Amalgamierung’, pp. 75–76. 98 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. and trans. by King, i.15, i, 70; Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, trans. by Swanton, a. 495, p. 14. 96

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Ethnicity in Early Medieval Historiography — Recent Approaches The recent upsurge in studies and handbooks on historiography may be seen as a sign that its study has recovered from the attempts to confine it to the realm of the purely literary.99 However, the question of how exactly historical texts and identities related to each other essentially remains unsolved and, for some scholars, in itself of dubious validity. This is not least true for early medieval studies, which had been more deeply entangled with national ideologies than many other fields of historical study. It is easier to agree about identities that did not matter than about those that did. For instance, most scholars would agree that Jordanes did not promote ‘Germanic’ identity (his Goths were Scythians, not Germans); and that Gregory of Tours had no intention of affirming Frankish identity (and never called his History ‘Historia Francorum’).100 It is harder to find common ground in relating the constructions of Jordanes, Fredegar, or Paul the Deacon to any actual Gothic, Frankish, or Lombard identity. Nevertheless, the easiest solution — to assume that all these identities did not matter — is not necessarily the best, and certainly the least interesting one. ‘If we can’t prove it, it did not exist’ is a poor guideline for any historical inquiry. We should rather adopt Karl Popper’s methodological principle that as long as we cannot disprove something and there are reasonable arguments supporting it, it may be a valid hypothesis. As a consequence of all the adverse polemic, it seems that ‘identity’ and ‘ethnicity’ often have not been used in very productive ways in recent scholarship in the field. This is true of the very sober and valuable survey of ‘Ethnic and National History ca. 500–1000’ by Joaquín Martínez Pizarro (2012).101 In his theoretical introduction, Pizarro mainly argues that we cannot use notions of Germanic continuity to understand early medieval historiography (which nobody would doubt). In his concern to state what ethnic history is not, he says little about when and how we can in fact employ the concepts of ethnicity, identity, and the nation in studying medieval histories. I completely agree with Pizarro that the early medieval texts often classed as ‘national histories’ are very heterogeneous.102 Yet they deal with gentes and their polities. Of course 99 The Oxford History of Historical Writing, i and ii; The Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, ed. by Dunphy, i and ii; Burgess and Kulikowski, Mosaics of Time, i; Handbuch Chroniken des Mittelalters, ed. by Wolf and Ott. 100 Goffart, ‘From Historiae to Historia Francorum’; Reimitz, History. 101 Pizarro, ‘Ethnic and National History’. 102 Pizarro, ‘Ethnic and National History’, p. 47.

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the modern categories of ‘ethnicity’ or ‘identity’ should not simply be imposed on works of ancient or medieval history, for these are our terms. All the more should we reflect on when and how to use them. I would argue that there are no more suitable alternatives for the terms ‘identity’ and ‘ethnic/ity’ (I would be more cautious with ‘nation/al’) to describe aspects of the early medieval world that we should continue to address. We just should not take them for granted, but rather historicize them. Then they can be useful because, and not in spite of, the constant need to adapt them to the particular problems that a text poses.103 How could ancient or medieval historiography contribute to constructing or reaffirming identities? Many scholars still somehow take the historical identities on which the narratives focus for granted, even if they pay lip service to modern theories regarding their constructedness and fluidity in their introductions. Other studies collect instances of the othering of barbarians or pagans in order to make the perhaps rather obvious point that these served to reinforce Roman or Christian identities. It is hardly surprising that Christian chronicles tended to promote Christian values, or that histories of the Goths, Franks, or Lombards mostly offered positive identifications for the respective peoples. Neither, as Hans-Werner Goetz has shown in this series’ first volume, do we gain much by a wholesale claim that Christians had a Christian identity.104 Robert Markus has warned us not to assume that in Late Antiquity, ‘Christianity stood for a fixed quantity’: ‘the Lord’s call, “Come and follow me”, left much of what was involved in following Him unresolved’.105 This ‘crisis of identity’ was hardly overcome after the age of the ecumenical councils, and in many respects continued into the early Middle Ages. Several fruitful approaches to exploring the interrelationships between historiography and identity are currently being explored. Alheydis Plassmann’s arguments in her substantial and insightful study Origo gentis, which covers ‘origin narratives’ (Herkunftserzählungen) from Gregory of Tours and Bede to Dudo of St Quentin and Cosmas of Prague, builds on two key assumptions: first, these works as a whole, from mythical origins to the present, are ‘Herkunftserzählungen’ — ‘One can understand all narratives that in some form address the origins of their respective group as origin narratives in a wider sense’.106 Second, she sees no reason to doubt that the central function of these 103 104 105 106

See Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’. Goetz, ‘Creating a Past’. Markus, End of Ancient Christianity, p. xii. Plassmann, Origo gentis, p.  14: ‘Unter Herkunftserzählungen im weiteren Sinne

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narratives was ‘the creation and legitimation of identities’.107 Within her selection of ‘origin narratives’, Plassmann seeks to distinguish between authors whose work was ‘identitätsstiftend’, formative of identity, and those that were not. For example, in Plassmann’s view Bede does construct an Anglo-Saxon Christian identity, whereas Paul the Deacon does not create a Lombard identity: ‘Paul does not devote himself to the pointless venture of creating legitimacy or identity for a gens that he regards as vanished’.108 This binary logic regarding textual identity construction (a narrative does/does not create identity) seems too stark. Indeed, many medieval histories appear to reflect negotiations about what belonging to a group should entail or should have entailed. They do not offer straightforward affirmations of an identity, but suggest, model, and reframe it in various ways. It also remains one of the unresolved questions of identity research to what extent identities were intentionally created. There is a functional dimension to ‘constructing identities’, but, as Michel Foucault has shown, discourses cannot simply be designed deliberately.109 Magali Coumert published her six-hundred-page book, Origines des peuples, in 2007.110 In it she discusses some of the same authors as Plassmann, from Jordanes in the sixth to the Historia Brittonum in the ninth centuries. Unlike Plassmann, however, Coumert focuses only on the actual origin narratives of the peoples, not on their entire histories. She underlines the coexistence of several versions of origin myths in almost all cases, which also contradicts the old paradigm of an almost immutable oral tradition written down only later.111 As she concentrates on the ethnic origin narratives, Coumert has no problem to relate these texts to the corresponding ethnic groups and their efforts to consolidate their power over former Roman provinces. ‘The formation of a people kann man alle Erzählungen verstehen, die in irgendeiner Form die Herkunft ihrer je eigenen Bezugsgruppe in den Blick nehmen’. 107 Plassmann, Origo gentis, p. 13: ‘Identitätsstiftung und Legitimierung sind also die zentralen Angelpunkte, um die solche Erzählungen kreisen. Die Funktion von Herkunftserzählungen liegt auf der Hand und dürfte auch kaum umstritten sein’. 108 ‘[Paulus] gibt sich nicht dem sinnlosen Unterfangen hin, für eine gens, die er für untergegangen hält, Legitimität oder Identität zu stiften’. Plassmann, Origo gentis, p. 240. In fact, Paul’s view of the end of the Lombard kingdom was more complex than that, and certainly that of his contemporaries, otherwise Charlemagne would not have appropriated the title rex gentis Langobardorum (Pohl, ‘Gens ipsa peribit’). 109 Foucault, The Order of Things. 110 Coumert, Origines. Coumert avoids the term origo gentis because of its unwelcome overtones (Origines, p. 27). 111 Coumert, Origines, p. 538 and p. 548.

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and the organisation of power around an ethnic identity and a territory’, she concludes, ‘required such numerous interactions’ that it is hard to describe it in detail; origin narratives provided simple explanations for this complex process, which dominated opinions in the Latin West for more than a millennium: a major success of the early Middle Ages.112 According to Coumert, whilst we might find little of what these legends say believable, their long-term effect on ethnic identities in Europe was considerable. They were communicated far and wide, and condensed the complexity of identity formation into a simple narrative that was an important tool to create lasting allegiance to a people, and to give all peoples some sense of place in a multi-ethnic Christian world.113 Shami Ghosh, in his book Writing the Barbarian Past (2016), interestingly combines an analysis of early medieval ‘national’ histories ( Jordanes, Isidore, Gregory of Tours, Fredegar, Paul the Deacon) with historical epics (the AngloSaxon Beowulf, and the Latin Waltharius/OE Waldere) that were written slightly later but can be regarded as based on oral texts in a Germanic language.114 Unlike Goffart, Gosh allows for a significant role of ‘an oral tradition of historical narrative in Germanic languages’ in early medieval Latin works of history.115 He is convincing in his criticism of a schematic use of Roman/barbarian, pre-Christian/ Christian, and Latin/vernacular dichotomies: ‘The texts […] do not, for the most part, present the past in terms of such oppositions’.116 Ghosh is, however, both rather vague and very sceptical about whether these narratives about the past played any role in the construction or legitimation of identity: In terms of how and whether these texts actually fulfilled a function of creating or supporting some sense of political or national or ethnic identity, however, I must reiterate that we have little evidence on which any serious argument can be based. We cannot really use these texts as the basis for generalisations regarding ‘barbarian’ or early medieval ‘ethnic’ identity.117 112

Coumert, Origines, p. 552: ‘Les récits d’origines fournissent des explications simples, toujours admises, plus d’un millénaire après leur formulation, par la majorité de l’opinion occidentale. Leur élaboration fut l’une des plus grandes réussites du haut moyen âge’. 113 See also Pohl, ‘Narratives’. 114 Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past. 115 Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past, p. 18. 116 Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past, p. 7. 117 Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past, p. 260. Again, the problem is that the conceptual discussion of ‘ethnicity’ is limited to a longish but rather simplistic account of the ‘ethnogenesis’ debate (pp. 16–21), in which the author is overly cautious not to say anything objectionable about ethnicity.

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The point that I would like to make in this chapter is that indeed we should not use the texts for ‘generalisations’, particularly not about pre-Christian ‘Germanic’ societies. But that does not mean that we cannot base any ‘serious argument’ about identities on these texts. Identities, whether ethnic, political, or territorial, are always specific, not only in the sense of being ‘Gothic’ or ‘Frankish’, but also as to what ‘Gothic’ or ‘Frankish’ meant, and with which other identifications it was entangled. The present collection owes much to the approach taken in another recent book’s in-depth discussion of the construction of identities in historiography. Helmut Reimitz has studied Frankish historiography from c. 550 to c. 850 in order to explore how the uncertainties of the changing world after the fall of the Western Roman Empire led to the emergence of a particularly Latin European set of identities.118 This was certainly not the result of any continuous strand of Germanic identity, but the effect of diverse and controversial efforts to make sense of the social world. Reimitz presents aspects of his approach in his contribution to this volume. According to him, works of history can be read as one among several voices that attempted to give a particular spin to a set of shared assumptions. ‘Most historical texts did not construct a single identity. They balanced a whole range of possible identifications. Their narratives develop several options and explore their opportunities and limitations’.119 We have, for instance, too easily made Gregory of Tours our chief witness for the sixth-century Merovingian kingdoms; and it has often been assumed that because Frankish and Roman identities did not matter to him, they did not matter in the period full-stop. Reimitz, however, shows in detail how Gregory wrote Franks and Romans out of his narrative because he wanted to present Gaul as a country of saints, bishops, and holy places, the best foci for a Christian community, instead. Gregory’s position is so accentuated precisely because he responded to other options, in particular, a growing identification with the Frankish kingdom. Gregory’s friend Venantius Fortunatus was much less inhibited about promoting both Frankish and Roman identifications.120 Two generations later, ‘Fredegar’ emphatically wrote the Franks back in, not least in his epitome of Gregory’s History.121 Of course, the Fredegar Chronicle cannot be read as representing the only possible attitude to ethnicity at that time and 118

Reimitz, History. Reimitz, History, p. 19. 120 Buchberger, ‘Romans, Barbarians, and Franks’; Buchberger, Shifting Ethnic Identities, pp. 133–46. 121 Reimitz, History, pp. 167–74. 119

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place, either. In the eighth century, the Neustrian vision of Frankishness in the Liber historiae Francorum and the early Carolingian insistence on the agency of the Franci under the guidance of the new dynasty in the Continuations of Fredegar represent further specific aggregates of Frankish identity. Over time people became accustomed to living in a Christian world of gentes. At the beginning of the tenth century, Regino’s view of the social world as a world divided among peoples demonstrates a striking confidence of the former abbot of Prüm in a set of shared assumptions. […] We should not take this confidence for granted. Regino assumed a consent about the order of the social world that had slid more firmly into place only in the century before he wrote.122

Thus early medieval historiography was not about communities that were simply out there, unquestionable in their extent and political role. It was about ascertaining who these communities were and what they meant at a time when the rule over civilized countries in the name of a gens was still a challenging novelty.123

Conclusions How can we use the concepts of ‘identity’ and ‘ethnicity’ in research on early medieval historiography in productive ways? I would like to propose a few methodological points: 1. Texts first and foremost have to be studied as texts. This means employing the classical rules of source criticism and, where feasible, undertaking a structural and narratological analysis of the text. Furthermore, we should not turn the clock back to methodologies before the achievements of the ‘literary turn’ and of postmodern deconstructivism. The literary turn, and similarly, Walter Goffart, have put the author, his literary skills and political agenda at the centre, whereas postmodernism has sought to detach the analysis of the text from the author as its main ‘key of interpretation’. As methodological routines, these approaches are in many respects contradictory. However, taken together they offer a differentiated set of tools that provide perspectives from different angles, which need not be incompatible. Authors write 122 Reimitz, History, p.  444. See also Regino of Prüm, History and Politics, trans. by MacLean. 123 Pohl, ‘Christian and Barbarian Identities’.

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within established discourse formations which they cannot escape, but they can extend, modify, subvert, or use them for their own purposes. 2. Early medieval historiography is more sophisticated than traditionally assumed, and its authors were able to navigate between different options in many respects, both in form and in content. Yet treating these works as autonomous and homogeneous creations in the sense of modern literature neglects important differences. Often, there is no central message or agenda in these histories. They are rich in intertextual traces, rely on written and oral sources, and display classical and biblical references. They employ familiar narrative devices, motifs, and stories, and refer to differing opinions and contrasting narratives. It needs to be underlined that this approach has little in common with the older view that early medieval historians were mostly naive compilers of undigested material; we now appreciate that they modified and manipulated their sources in sophisticated ways.124 This polyphony of the text can be studied with an approach that is reminiscent of Foucault’s textual archaeology. Inner contradictions, paradox, breaks in the narrative, or a deployment of strategies of truth at a particular point are among the indicators that the author is reacting to a challenge to his version of the story. They provide clues to his narrative and argumentative strategies. 3. Discovering constructions of identity in a text therefore requires a similar ‘polyphonic’ approach. It is usually fairly easy to spot hegemonic identities in a text, and whether the author promotes them, or seeks to subvert or invalidate them. However, strategies of identification and distancing in historiography may be quite subtle. Gregory of Tours is quite obvious in his attempts to write Frankish identity out of his Histories. However, his silences about Roman and Gallic identities are much less visible. In Gregory’s case, his authorial intent as a bishop from a senatorial family offers a plausible hypothesis of interpretation. The spin behind the collection known as the Fredegar Chronicle is much harder to detect. Yet in this narrative it is clear that the Franks occupy centre stage, and that a wide horizon of gentes surrounds them.125 Uncovering identity constructions in our texts, then, requires complex hermeneutic strategies and discourse analysis; structural analysis or literary criticism are less helpful for this task.

124 125

See my contribution on Paul the Deacon, in this volume. See the contributions by Helmut Reimitz and Andreas Fischer, in this volume.

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4. The impact of such historiographic constructions of identity is not easy to assess. From the Carolingian period onwards, a growing number of manuscripts make it possible to study the early transmission of a text.126 The ways in which texts are arranged in manuscripts and their often subtle modifications in the copies can reveal important information on their impact. For the period addressed in this volume, up to the eighth century, few manuscripts are extant, although in some cases enough survive to shed some light on the reception of a work of history. For instance, the six-book version of Gregory’s Histories and the way in which Gregory’s text was reworked in the third book of the Fredegar Chronicle provide good evidence for the ways in which Gregory’s text was recast and read in the seventh century.127 5. Of course, the significance of an author’s ‘visions of community’ for the respective communities needs to be assessed in each case, and such an assessment may well remain hypothetical. While the impact of Jordanes on the Goths of his time may have been limited, Paul the Deacon’s significance for Lombard identities, especially in the south, is widely attested.128 In any case, a blanket assumption that early medieval historiography was irrelevant for group identities is unconvincing. A few cases that contradict it suffice to falsify its general validity. Given the extensive transmission of Carolingian historiographic manuscripts, and the presence of quite a few earlier ones, it seems unlikely that the messages of historiography did not matter at all in the period covered by the present volume. A claim that the barbarian kingdoms should be regarded as an exception among the many societies in which cultural memories mattered for social identities would need to be supported by strong evidence.129 Furthermore, it should also be kept in mind that the production of each historiographic text required a good number of sheep or calf skins — an unlikely investment if there was no message to convey. 6. Ethnicity was significant in late and post-Roman historiography in a number of ways. These histories relied on ethnic distinctions in their narrative: they are full of ethnonyms and ethnic terminology (gens, natio, genus, etc.). Gentes are the main collective actors in early medieval historical narratives, whereas the empire and the kingdoms have no agency: the early medieval 126 127 128 129

For an introduction, see Pohl, ‘History in Fragments’. See the contribution by Helmut Reimitz, in this volume. See my contribution on Paul, in this volume. J. Assmann, Cultural Memory and Early Civilization; A. Assmann, Erinnerungsräume.

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state was not represented as able to ‘do’ anything as such.130 I would define this general use of ethnic distinctions as ‘ethnicity’: a cognitive and practical principle to order the social and political world, which attributes agency to named groups. This use of ‘ethnicity’ does not automatically imply that all these groups had a strong ethnic identity; but it makes it highly unlikely that ethnic affiliations did not matter at all in the period. They were one of the main devices that provided orientation in the political landscape. Two pre-conceived notions are best avoided: the assumption that fixed and stable identities ‘out there’ can be taken for granted; and its opposite, that identities can only be flexible, infinitely malleable, and are merely present in texts. The task is to analyse explicit and implicit identifications in the texts as traces of a social communication about identity and group agency. Only on this basis can specific meanings and shapes of identity be reconstructed. 7. Most post-Roman kingdoms were ruled by a privileged caste of soldiers organized as a gens and by its king, and most were named after these gentes in works of history. However, this ethnic classification is a simplification for polities constituted by a conjunction of people (gens or populus), kingdom (regnum), territory (patria or provincia), and church (ecclesia). Ethnically they were all heterogeneous, and in most cases the name-giving people constituted a minority. As a polity, it was represented by kings, but had a share in the heritage of the Roman Empire. The territory became only gradually named after the gens, so that Gaul became Francia, and a part of Britain became England. As a ‘micro-Christendom’, as Peter Brown called it,131 it was part of a larger, Christian social whole. This aggregate of identities was flexible and specific in each case, and therefore not easy to pin down.132 These composite realms were the subject of the histories of Fredegar, Bede, or Paul the Deacon. What role ethnicity, political power, Christian beliefs and institutions, the patria, and perhaps further elements of identification played in each of these histories is not a matter for generalization. It is a complex research question that the present volume seeks to address.

130 131 132

See Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity’. Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom. Pohl, ‘Regnum und gens’.

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—— , ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification: A Methodological Profile’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann, Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 13 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 1–64 —— , ‘Genealogy: A Comparative Perspective from the Early Medieval West’, in Meanings of Community across Medieval Eurasia, ed.  by Eirik Hovden, Christina Lutter, and Walter Pohl, Brill’s Series on the Early Middle Ages, 25 (Leiden: Brill, 2016), pp. 232–69 —— , Die Awaren: Ein Steppenvolk in Mitteleuropa, 567–822 n. Chr., 3rd edn (Munich: Beck, 2015); Engl. trans. The Avars: A Steppe Empire in Central Europe, 567–822 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2018) —— , ‘Narratives of Origin and Migration in Early Medieval Europe: Problems of Interpretation’, Medieval History Journal, 21.2, Special Issue: Narratives of Ethnic and Tribal Origins: A Eurasian Perspective (2018), 192–221 —— , ‘Von der Ethnogenese zur Identitätsforschung’, in Neue Wege der Frühmittelalterforschung, ed. by Max Diesenberger, Walter Pohl, and Bernhard Zeller, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 22 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2018), pp. 9–34 —— , ‘Historiography and Identity — Methodological Perspectives’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 7–50 —— , ‘Historiography of Disillusion: Erchempert and the History of Ninth-Century Southern Italy’, in Historiography and Identity, iii: Carolingian Convergence and its Limits, ed. by Helmut Reimitz, Rutger Kramer and Graeme Ward (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Pohl, Walter, and Daniel Mahoney, eds, Historiography and Identity, iv: The Writing of History across Medieval Eurasia (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Pohl, Walter, and Francesco Borri, Historiography and Identity, v: The Emergence of New Peoples and Polities, 1000–1300 (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Propp, Vladimir, Morphology of the Folk Tale, trans. by Lawrence Scott (Russian edn, Leningrad 1928; English translation Bloomington: Research Center, Indiana University, 1958) Rajak, Tessa, Josephus: The Historian and his Society (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984) Reimitz, Helmut, History, Frankish Identity and the Framing of Western Ethnicity, 550–850 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) Reuter, Timothy, ‘Whose Race, Whose Ethnicity? Recent Medievalists’ Discussions of Identity’, in Timothy Reuter, Medieval Polities and Modern Mentalities, ed. by Janet L. Nelson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 100–09 Reynolds, Susan, ‘Nations, Tribes, Peoples, and States’, Medieval Worlds, 1.2 (2015), 79–88 Rüsen, Jörn, and Friedrich Jaeger, ‘Historische Methode’, in Fischer Lexikon Geschichte, ed. by Jörn Rüsen (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 2003), pp. 13–32 Rychterová, Pavlína, ed, Historiography and Identity, VI: Competing Narratives of the Past in Eastern Central Europe, 1200–1600 (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming)

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Rychterová, Pavlína, and David Kalhous, eds, Historiography and Identity, vi: Communities in Transition in Central and Eastern Central Europe (13th–16th Centuries) (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Scharer, Anton, and Georg Scheibelreiter, eds, Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 32 (Vienna: Oldenbourg, 1994) See, Klaus von, Deutsche Germanen-Ideologie: Vom Humanismus bis zur Gegenwart (Frankfurt am Main: Athenäum-Verlag, 1970) Sheridan, Brian, ‘Diodorus’s Reading of Polybius’s Universalism’, in Historiae mundi: Studies in Universal Historiography, ed. by Peter Liddel and Andrew Fear (London: Bloomsbury, 2010), pp. 41–55 Smith, Anthony D., The Nation in History: Historiographical Debates about Ethnicity and Nationalism (New York: Wiley, 2000) Spiegel, Gabrielle, ‘History, Historicism and the Social Logic of the Text in the Middle Ages’, Speculum, 65 (1990), 59–86 —— , The Past as Text: The Theory and Practice of Medieval Historiography (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997) Steinacher, Roland, Die Vandalen: Aufstieg und Fall eines Barbarenreichs (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2016) Tyler, Elizabeth M., and Ross Balzaretti, eds, Narrative and History in the Early Medieval West (Turnhout: Brepols, 2006) Valenti, Marco, ‘Ma i barbari sono veramente arrivati in Italia?’, in V Congresso Nazionale di Archeologia Medievale, ed.  by Giuliano Volpe and Pasquale Faria (Florence: All’Insegna del Giglio, 2009), pp. 25–30 Van Houts, Elisabeth, Memory and Gender in Medieval Europe, 900–1200 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999) Van Nuffelen, Peter, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) Verbrugghe, Gerald P., and John M. Wickersham, Berossos and Manetho Introduced and Translated: Native Traditions in Ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000) Vessey, Mark, ‘Reinventing History: Jerome’s Chronicle and the Writing of the PostRoman West’, in From the Tetrarchs to the Theodosians: Late Roman History and Culture, 284–450 CE, ed. by Scott McGill, Cristiana Sogno, and Edward Watts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 265–89 Vinay, Gustavo, ‘Un mito per sopravvivere: l’Historia Langobardorum di Paolo Diacono’, in Gustavo Vinay, Altomedioevo latino: conversazioni e no (Naples: Liguori, 1978; repr. 2003), pp. 125–49 Ward-Perkins, Bryan, The Fall of Rome: And the End of Civilization (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005) Wattenbach, Wilhelm, and Wilhelm Levison, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter: Vorzeit und Karolinger, 6 vols (Weimar: Böhlau, 1952–90), i: Die Vorzeit: Von den Anfängen bis zur Herrschaft der Karolinger (1952) and ii: Die Karolinger vom Anfang des 8. Jh. bis zum Tod Karls des Großen (1953)

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Wenskus, Reinhard, ‘Über die Möglichkeit eines allgemeinen und interdisziplinären Germanenbegriffs’, in Germanenprobleme in heutiger Sicht, ed.  by Heinrich Beck, Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde, 1 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1986), pp. 1–21 White, Hayden, Metahistory (Boston: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973) —— , The Content of the Form: Discourse and Historical Representation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978) —— , ‘Literaturtheorie und Geschichtsschreibung’, in Der Sinn des Historischen: Geschichtsphilosophische Debatten, ed.  by Herta Nagl-Docekal (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1996), pp. 67–106 Wieser, Veronika, ‘Reading the Past into the Present: Constructing Community, Identity, and Apocalyptic Thought in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 247–98 Wiwjorra, Ingo, Der Germanenmythos: Konstruktion einer Weltanschauung in der Altertumsforschung des 19. Jahrhunderts (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2006) Wolf, Gerhard, ‘Einleitung’, in Handbuch Chroniken des Mittelalters, ed. by Gerhard Wolf and Norbert H. Ott (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016), pp. 1–44 Wolf, Gerhard, and Norbert H. Ott, eds, Handbuch Chroniken des Mittelalters (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016) Wolfram, Herwig, Intitulatio, i: Lateinische Königs- und Fürstentitel bis zum Ende des 8. Jahrhunderts, Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, Ergänzungsbände, 21 (Graz: Böhlau, 1967) —— , ‘The Shaping of the Early Medieval Kingdom’, Viator, 1 (1970), 1–20 —— , Die Goten: Von den Anfängen bis zur Mitte des sechsten Jahrhunderts: Versuch einer historischen Ethnographie, 5th edn (Munich: Beck, 2009); Engl. trans. History of the Goths, trans. by Thomas J. Dunlap (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988) —— , Das Römerreich und seine Germanen: Eine Erzählung von Herkunft und Ankunft (Vienna: Böhlau, 2018) Wolfram, Herwig, and others, ‘Origo gentis’, in Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, 35 vols, 2nd edn (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–2008), xxii (2003), pp. 174–210 Woolf, Daniel, ed., The Oxford History of Historical Writing, 5 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12), i: Beginnings to AD 600, ed. by Andrew Feldherr and Grant Hardy (2011) and ii: 400–1400, ed. by Sarah Foot and Chase F. Robinson (2012) Yavuz, N.  Kıvılcım, ‘From Caesar to Charlemagne: The Tradition of Trojan Origins’, Medieval History Journal, 21.2, Special Issue: Narratives of Ethnic and Tribal Origins: A Eurasian Perspective (2018), 192–221

Clinging to Empire in Jordanes’ Romana Maya Maskarinec*

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n the early sixth century the Roman Empire, reduced to a fraction of its former expanse, could no longer be taken for granted. With a series of ambitious military campaigns the emperor Justinian (r. 527–65) sought to reconquer the empire; with a similarly ambitious programme of legal reform, he also attempted to strengthen the empire from within. Both efforts were underpinned by a highly articulated Christian imperial ideology that championed a more tightly-knit integration of Roman imperialism and Christianity than had ever been previously envisioned. Such circumstances correspondingly prompted a rethinking of the Roman past. This paper considers one attempt to articulate a model of a Christian Roman Empire suitable for the times, that of Jordanes’ mid-sixth-century Summary of the Ages or the Origin and Deeds of the Roman People (De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum) — hereafter referred to as the Romana.1 I focus on the motif of arms and laws, emphasized by Jordanes as key to the empire’s success, to demonstrate how, in line with contemporary Justinianic * I am grateful for the comments of Patrick Geary, Michael Maas, Walter Pohl, Gerda Heydemann, and Francesco Borri, which have improved this article. This article was completed in 2014. For a careful contextualization of Jordanes in mid-sixth-century Constantinople see now Van Hoof and Van Nuffelen, ‘The Historiography of Crisis’. 1

Throughout this article I follow the MGH edition by Theodor Mommsen, Romana (1882). The title, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, is attested to in ninthcentury manuscripts. For the identification of Jordanes’ sources I rely on Mommsen’s edition. Maya Maskarinec is assistant professor of History at the University of Southern California. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 71– 93 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118561

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imperial ideology, Jordanes’ conception of empire attempts to fit traditional Roman political ideals seamlessly into a world governed by Christian morality and Christian law. Jordanes was the author of two texts, the Romana and the more studied Origin and Deeds of the Goths (De origine actibusque Getarum), which begins with the mythic prehistory of the Goths and, like the Romana, continues through the reign of Justinian.2 Although these texts had different dedicatees, Jordanes, by his own account, interrupted work on the Romana to write the Getica and sent both texts to Vigilius to whom the Romana is dedicated; in the manuscript tradition the two texts are most often transmitted together.3 Accordingly, they may be read side by side as shedding light on Jordanes’ conception of Roman history, and so throughout this article I will at times also draw on the Getica. Jordanes’ self-proclaimed Gothic identity in the Getica notwithstanding, he was writing in Constantinople and steeped in Roman and late Roman histoSee also Girotti, Ricerche sui ‘Romana’ di Jordanes. Regarding ‘models’ of the Christian Roman Empire see Pohl, ‘Creating Cultural Resources for Carolingian Rule’. 2 Cf. the articles by Dörler, ‘Two Tales — Two Peoples?’ and Ford, ‘From Scythian, to Getan, to Goth’ in this volume. In addition to the older MGH edition by Mommsen there exists a new edition of the Getica: Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, which I use throughout the article. The bibliography on the Getica is vast: see Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 100–69. Regarding the Getica’s relationship to Cassiodorus’s lost Gothic history, see Søby Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths; Croke, ‘Cassiodorus and the “Getica” of Jordanes’. Regarding the historical value contrast Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 20–111, with Wolfram, Geschichte der Goten. See also Heather, Goths and Romans, pp. 34–67; Amory, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, pp. 291–307. For a more extensive bibliography on Jordanes see Buonomo, ‘Introduzione alla lettura delle opere di Giordane’. 3 Discussion of manuscripts: see Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, pp. xlvi–lxxiii. The Romana was addressed to a certain Vigilius, whom some scholars have argued to be Pope Vigilius (r. 537–55), see for example Luiselli, ‘Sul “De summa temporum” di Iordanes’, but there is no firm evidence other than the name to support this theory. For the relationship between the texts see Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, esp. pp. 21, 47–58, who divides the Romana into two parts, a universal history and a Roman history, which he regards as parts of a three-part set together with the Getica. The overarching aim of the Romana has been variously interpreted; contrast Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, with Giunta, Jordanes e la cultura dell’alto medioevo, the latter of whom interprets the text in pro-Byzantine terms, and O’Donnell, ‘The Aims of Jordanes’, who argues that the work is meant to ‘deny the significance of secular history’ (p. 240). Rather than focus on Jordanes’ purpose in writing the text, this article focuses on the presentation of empire in the text.

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riographical traditions.4 As a notarius Jordanes was presumably well-versed in bureaucratic procedures and may well have had a legal education.5 Meanwhile both the material he includes in the Romana and the structure of his work show a markedly Eastern bias; Jordanes was certainly working with earlier Constantinopolitan chronicles, in particular the Chronicle of Marcellinus, or perhaps its source.6 That the Romana is written in Latin is no counterargument. Latin was still the bureaucratic language of sixth-century Constantinople and likewise the Chronicle of Marcellinus, written shortly before in Justinian’s capital, was also in Latin.7 Thus it is with respect to this Constantinopolitan context that we should read his text.8 In his preface, Jordanes states that the aim of the Romana is to explain, ‘in what way the Roman republic began and ruled and how it subjugated nearly the entire world and even now, at least ostensibly, rules over it’.9 In the opening 4 Jordanes tells us about his identity as a Goth in two often quoted passages in the Getica: Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed.  by Giunta and Grillone, l.265, pp.  109–10; lx.315–16, pp. 129–30. For an introduction to later Byzantine chroniclers’ attitudes toward ancient history see Jeffreys, ‘The Attitudes of Byzantine Chroniclers towards Ancient History’. For sixth-century Byzantine attitudes to history see Brodka, Die Geschichtsphilosophie in der spätantiken Historiographie, and also the collected essays of Scott, Byzantine Chronicles and the Sixth Century. For discussion of the traditions of Roman and Christian historiography still fundamental is Momigliano, ‘Pagan and Christian Historiography in the Fourth Century A.D.’, esp. pp. 86–87. 5 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed.  by Giunta and Grillone, l.265, p.  110. Croke, ‘Jordanes and the Immediate Past’, p. 2, discusses the duties of a notarius. In this same passage Jordanes speaks of himself as agram(m)atus and mentions that he underwent some sort of conversatio, ‘conversion’, both descriptions which have been much disputed. Croke, ‘Cassiodorus and the “Getica” of Jordanes’, p. 4, emphasizes that ‘when Jordanes describes himself as agram(m)atus, […] he is not confessing ignorance and illiteracy but is simply implying that he had bypassed the conventional training in grammatice’. Regarding Jordanes’ ‘conversion’ see the relevant bibliography in Lawo, ‘Jordanes’, p. 76. 6 See Croke, ‘A.D. 476’. 7 See Cameron, ‘Old and New Rome’; Croke, Count Marcellinus and his Chronicle; Rapp, ‘Literary Culture under Justinian’. 8 Cf. Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 162–67, for a reading of the Getica with respect to its Constantinopolitan context. 9 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 2, p. 1: ‘quomodo Romana res publica coepit et tenuit totumque pene mundum subegit et hactenus vel imaginariae teneat’ (I follow Goffart’s translation of the unusual phrase ‘vel imaginariae’, Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, p. 53). O’Donnell, ‘The Aims of Jordanes’, p. 224 n. 4, notes that ‘imaginariae is adverbial: = imaginarie’ and translates the passage: ‘how the Roman empire began, how it grew, how it subjected virtually the whole world to its domin-

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lines of the Romana he further elaborates that the purpose of the text is to ‘collect in the form of a little story both the succession of years and also the deeds of those men who strove mightily in the state’.10 To do so Jordanes has pieced together earlier texts, both world chronicles and Roman histories, to provide his readers with a manageable introduction to Roman history. The resulting text is universal in its perspective, although it focuses on the Romans. It begins with Adam and proceeds all the way through to 552. Throughout the text Jordanes is very explicit about his reuse and simplification of earlier material.11 For example, when introducing the age of the Roman Republic he explains that: Since to write down the names and deeds of all the consuls is tedious for me and for you who read this, I have sought to avert this tedium, in that selecting certain [consuls] I have passed over many, since I know that this is discussed by others and this work is an abridgment.12

The advantage of Jordanes’ text, as he himself readily admits, is its simplicity and accessibility, not its theoretical or historical complexity. Rather than delve into the complexities of dull details, Jordanes wishes to provide his readers with the essentials they need to understand the Roman Empire. ion, and how it continues to hang on to its hegemony (at least in pretense) even now’. Reydellet, La royauté dans la littérature latine, pp. 291–93, discusses possible meanings of the very rare imaginarie. He notes that elsewhere it is found in the sense of simulate or per speciem, that is, the empire has become a fiction, but Reydellet considers this meaning unlikely in this context. Instead, he draws attention to the fact that the word occurs in theological contexts with the sense of allegorice, that is, allegorically or symbolically. Thus he translates it as ‘d’une manière symbolique’, that is, the empire continues to persist in a symbolic manner (p. 292). 10 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 6, p. 3: ‘in modum storiunculae tam annorum seriae quam etiam eorum virorum, qui fortiter in re publica laboraverunt, gesta strictim breviterque collegere’ (trans. by Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, p. 21 n. 5). 11 This is made clear in the preface: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 6, p. 3: ‘ex diversis voluminibus maiorum praelibans aliqua floscula pro captu ingenii mei in unum redigere’. 12 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 114, p. 14: ‘et quia omnium consulum nomina actosque conscribere et mihi tedium et tibi, qui legis, fastidio fore praecavi, aliqua exinde praelibans multa supersedi, quod pene a nonnullis iam ursurpatum esse breviatumque opus cognovi’; cf. Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 2, p. 1; chap. 86, p. 10.

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To simplify matters even further Jordanes begins the Romana by explaining, very straightforwardly, the rationale of Roman success: ‘The Romans, as Iamblicus says, employing arms (arma) and laws (leges), made the world their own: indeed if by arms they built [their empire], by laws they preserved it’.13 As suggested by Mommsen, the Iamblicus in question may have been a certain legal critic, referred to by another Justinianic jurist, Stephanos.14 This immediately alerts us to the Byzantine legal context as the lens through which Jordanes interprets Roman history. The trope of attributing Rome’s success to arms and laws was certainly nothing new in the sixth century; already in the Augustan Age, two of Rome’s literary giants expressed arms and laws as the cornerstones of Romanness. Virgil begins the Aeneid: ‘Arma virumque cano’; Livy in his Roman history relates that, ‘When Romulus had duly attended to the worship of the gods, he called the people together and gave them the rules of law (leges), since nothing else but rights (iura) could unite them into a single body politic’.15 Yet in the sixth century, as Justinian ambitiously sought to 13

Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 6, p. 3: ‘Romani, ut ait Iamblicus, armis et legibus exercentes orbem terrae suum fecerunt: armis si quidem construxerunt, legibus autem conservaverunt’. Throughout the Romana Jordanes rarely names his sources (in contrast to his practice in the Getica). 14 Mommsen, ‘Jamblichos bei Jordanes’. It has been argued that Jordanes’ quote is nothing more than a ‘Schulfloskel’, a textbook trope with which all school children would have been familiar: Kappelmacher, ‘Iordanis’, col. 1916. Given the frequency with which the phrase occurs in the prefaces to Justinianic legislation, this seems possible, but it is significant that Jordanes references an outside authority for the trope. On the basis of her interpretation that Jordanes’ text was dedicated to Pope Vigilius, Mastandrea, ‘Armis et legibus’ argues that this phrase is meant as a political damnation of Justinian. Although this contextualization is not convincing, as I discuss in the conclusion, Jordanes’ pessimistic view of the contemporary state of the empire certainly suggests that he was not convinced with regards to the success of the Justinianic restoration. 15 Livy, Ab urbe condita, ed. and trans. by Foster, i.8.1, p. 30: ‘Rebus divinis rite perpetratis vocataque ad concilium multitudine quae coalescere in populi unius corpus nulla re praeterquam legibus poterat, iura dedit’ (trans. by Foster, p. 31 with translation of ‘iura’ modified from ‘law’ to ‘rights’). Ius refers to un-enacted law or right, lex refers to enacted law. The difference is similar, for example, to the German distinction between Recht and Gesetz. See Barry, An Introduction to Roman Law, p. 14. Often (especially when quoting from earlier authors) Jordanes uses ius and lex consistently according to these standard meanings, but at times, such as in describing how in the early fifth century the province of Africa was lost to the Romans, ‘ius’ is used in the sense of domination/jurisdiction ( Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 330, p. 42: ‘Africana provincia per Bonifatium comitem Vandalis tradita et a Romano iure subtracta est’). This usage is consistent with other late antique authors. I am grateful to Walter Pohl for this observation.

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reconquer the former expanse of the empire and just as ambitiously undertook to reform the Roman legal code, these concepts acquired reinvigorated contemporary resonance. For example, the preface confirming Justinian’s Code begins: The safety of the state proceeds out of two things, the force of arms (arma) and the observance of laws (leges); for this reason, the fortunate race of the Romans, having established their own power, achieved precedence and control over all nations in former times, and will do so forever, if God is propitious.16

Similar statements are found in the prefaces to Justinian’s Digest and his Institutes, as well as in other contemporary authors, such as Cassiodorus.17 Similarly we may read Jordanes’ Romana as an extended demonstration of this model of empire (conquest by arms, fortification by laws) at work in Roman history. This is already apparent in Jordanes’ presentation of Rome’s origins. These passages are excerpted from Florus, a late first-/early second-century abridgement of Roman history, for the most part excerpted from Livy, which focuses on the wars waged by Rome. Using Florus’s account, Jordanes — in sharp contrast to other Christian historians such as Orosius, who described Roman history before Christ as a series of unmitigated disasters — presents the bloody origins of Rome in positive terms, as foretelling Rome’s future strength: ‘Being thus victorious in augury, he [Romulus] began to build the city, full of hope that it would prove warlike, for the birds, accustomed to bloody prey seemed to indicate this’.18 Concerning Romulus’s murder of Remus, we are told, while 16

Codex Iustinianus, Const. Summa, 7 April 529, ed. by Krüger, preface, p. 2: ‘Summa rei publicae tuitio de stirpe duarum rerum, armorum atque legum veniens vimque suam exinde muniens felix Romanorum genus omnibus anteponi nationibus omnibusque dominari tam praeteritis effecit temporibus quam deo propitio in aeternum efficiet’ (trans. by Pazdernik, ‘Justinianic Ideology and the Power of the Past’, p. 209 n. 55). 17 Institutiones, Const. Imperatoriam, 21 Nov. 533, ed.  by Krüger, preface, p.  xxiii: ‘Imperatoriam maiestatem non solum armis decoratem, sed etiam legibus oportet esse armatam’; see n. 34 below for the preface to the Digest; Cassiodorus, Variae, ed. by Mommsen, iiii.12, p. 119: ‘Propositi nostri est, ut provincias nobis deo auxiliante subiectas, sicut armis defendimus, ita legibus ordinemus’. Honoré, Tribonian, p. 35 n. 375, cites these and other examples. As Justinian also makes explicit in the prefaces to his law code, he considered his legal reforms parallel to his military reconquests; both are presented as restorative actions undertaken to buttress the Roman Empire. See also Dannenbring, ‘Arma et leges’. 18 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 89, p. 10: ‘sic victor augurio urbem excitat, plenus spei bellatricem fore: id assuetae sanguine et preda aves pollicebantur’, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Forster, i.1.1.7, p. 10; trans. by Forster, p. 11. Contrast Orosius, who emphasizes the lawless violence that Rome’s foundation portended: Orosius, Historiarum adversum paganos, ed. by Zangemeister, ii.4.1–4, p. 88:

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it is uncertain whether Remus was killed on the orders of his brother, his blood consecrated (‘consecravit’) the fortification of the new city.19 Although the city was born through the force of arms, Rome’s second king, Numa Pompilius (whom Orosius’s narrative omits) brought civil law to the warlike people.20 Again following Florus, Jordanes explains, ‘In a word, he [Numa Pompilius] induced a fierce people to rule with piety and justice an empire which they had acquired by violence and injustice’.21 From the beginning, the Romans’ strength lay both in their military prowess and in their ability to rule justly.22 Similarly, in narrating the rise of Rome Jordanes generally presents the Roman Empire as expanding through arms, but within its framework of law, while confronted with lawless and ferociously hostile barbarians.23 ‘urbs Roma in Italia a Romulo et Remo geminis auctoribus condita est. cuius regnum continuo Romulus parricidio imbuit, parique successu crudelitatis sine more raptas Sabinas, inprobis nuptiis confoederatas maritorum et parentum cruore dotauit. itaque Romulus, interfecto primum auo Numitore dehinc Remo fratre, arripuit imperium Vrbemque constituit; regnum aui, muros fratris, templum soceri sanguine dedicauit; sceleratorum manum promissa inpunitate collegit. primus illi campus ad bellum forum Vrbis fuit, mixta simul externa ciuiliaque bella numquam defutura significans’. Jordanes used Orosius’s history extremely rarely (and seldom for more than a sentence) among his sources for the period after Augustus. At times Jordanes does use Orosius to supplement the Roman history with Christian history, as with the emperor Maximinus, where he uses Orosius’s history to describe Maximinus’s actions against Christians ( Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 281, p. 36, based on Orosius, Historiarum adversum paganos, ed. by Zangemeister, vii.19.1, p. 477). 19 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 89, p. 10: ‘dubium an iussu fratris, occisus est. prima certe victima fuit munitionemque urbis novae sanguine suo consecravit’, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Forster, i.1.1.8, p. 10. 20 Florus/Jordanes refers to the Romans explicitly as barbarians (barbari) who are ‘civilized’ by Numa ( Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 95, p. 11, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Forster, i.1.2.3, p. 14). 21 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 95, p. 11: ‘eo denique ferocem populum redegit, ut quod vi et iniuria occuparat imperium, religione atque iustitia gubernaret’, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Forster, i.1.2.4, p. 14; trans. by Forster, p. 15. 22 This is true notwithstanding a few unfortunate incidents, as when, for example, early on Horatius, having won a crucial victory for the Romans, kills his sister because she is grieving for the enemy. Although a crime according to the laws (‘ut auderet leges, nefas’), this does not lead to punishment for Horatius, who is instead glorified for his military exploits: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 96, pp. 11–12, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Foster, i.1.3.6, p. 16, though Florus’s text reads slightly differently in this passage: ‘citavere leges nefas’. 23 A different type of law also contributes to expanding and integrating foreign territory into

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Much more detail describes how arms extended the Roman Empire than how laws maintained the state; nonetheless, throughout the text, (Roman) law serves its traditional Roman function as the dividing line between civilization and barbarism. When the Gallic Senones, a people said to be particularly uncivilized and ferocious, begin to attack Roman allies and the Romans protest in vain, Jordanes, quoting Florus, interjects indignantly: ‘Quod ius apud barbaros?’ (But what sense of law/justice is there among barbarians?).24 Implied, of course, is that there is none. Similarly, Jordanes (again following Florus) relates a tragic incident where the Romans suffer terrible losses because they are so attentive to observing treaties. Unwilling to go to war before they have lodged a complaint in the proper form (‘more legitimo’), the Romans watch helplessly as the Carthaginians massacre their allies.25 In turn, conquest by the Romans entails the acquisition of Roman law; in summarizing material in Festus, but in his own words, Jordanes tells how Augustus forced certain Germanic peoples (Germani, Galli, Brittoni, Spani, Hiberes, Austures, and Cantabres) ‘to live by Roman laws’ (‘coegit Romanisque legibus vivere’).26 The remarkable success of the Romans is due to their capacity for total military victory, followed by bringing those defeated under the umbrella of Roman law.27 the Roman Empire, that of inheritance (ius hereditarium). For example, the Romana describes how the Romans’ first territory in Asia was left to them by the testament of the King Attalus: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 222, p. 28, based on Festus, Breviarium, ed. by Eadie, x., p. 53. 24 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 131, p. 16, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Foster, i.7.13.6, p. 42. See also Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 180, p. 22, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Foster, i.11.5, p. 92. 25 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 182, p. 23, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Foster, i.2.6, p. 94. In particular, as Florus/Jordanes expresses it, ‘summa foedorum Romanis religio est’ (‘The highest reverence for the Romans is of their treaties’). 26 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 249, p. 32 (no direct source identified). 27 Throughout the Romana Jordanes emphasizes the completeness of Roman victory. For example, regarding the defeat of the Samnites, Florus/Jordanes remarks that they were so thoroughly subjugated that ‘today it is hard even to imagine how the territory could have provided booty for so many triumphs’: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 144, p. 17, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. by Foster, i.11.16.8, p. 52; describing the sea battle which concluded the Carthaginian war, Florus/ Jordanes stresses that the victory was so great that there was no point in demolishing the enemies’ walls: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen,

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The Romana contrasts Roman civilization and military might with the barbarism of its enemies. There are, however, two exceptions. One is the Jews, whom I discuss below; the second is the Goths — although only in the Getica, not in the Romana.28 Early on in the Getica, while still a young and uncivilized people, the Goths are made by their perspicacious leader, Dicineus, to live under their own laws, which, as Jordanes comments, they still maintain ‘usque nunc’ (to this day).29 The Goths also acquire from him ethics, logic, and further accoutrements of civilization. As with the Romans, we hear of how the Goths in conquering many peoples made them live by their (Gothic) laws.30 As presented in the Getica, the Goths are also a people who rival the Romans in their military prowess. The Getica describes that Caesar, ‘the first of all Romans to assume imperial power and to subdue almost the whole world […] was unable to prevail against the Goths, despite his frequent attempts’.31 Later Roman emperors rely on the Gothic troops for military support and are described as being unable to conquer without them.32 By endowing the Goths with the quintessential markers of Roman civilization, arms and laws, Jordanes’ Getica places the Goths on par with the Romans. Contrary to what one might expect, however, the Goths figure only marginally in the Romana and do not disrupt the overall picture of Roman conquest followed by a process of civilization.33 Roman exceptionality is not undermined chap. 176, p.  22, based on Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed.  by Foster, ii.18.2.37, p.  88. 28 Cf. Dörler, ‘Two Tales — Two Peoples?’ (in this volume). 29 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xi.69, p. 32: ‘nam ethicam eos erudiens barbaricos mores conpescuit; physicam tradens, naturaliter propriis legibus vivere fecit, quas usque nunc conscriptas “belagines” nuncupant; logicam instruens, rationis eos supra ceteras gentes fecit expertos’. Compare also Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, iv.40, p. 19, praising the wisdom of the Goths. 30 For example, regarding the ruler Hermanaric: Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xxiii.116, pp. 51–52: ‘Hermanaricus nobilissimus Amalorum in regno successit, qui multas et bellicosissimas arctoi gentes perdomuit suisque parere legibus fecit’. 31 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xi.68, p. 31: ‘Caesar vero, qui sibi primus omnium Romanum vindicavit imperium et pene omnem mundum suae dicioni subegit […] Gothos tamen crebro pertemptans nequivit subicere’ (trans. by Mierow, p. 70). 32 At the time of Constantine, Jordanes describes, ‘sine ipsos [Gothos] dudum contra quasvis gentes Romanus exercitus difficile decertatus est’ ( Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xxi.111, p. 49). The Goths’ efforts are described as particularly crucial in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains: Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xxxviii.–xli.197–217, pp. 82–89. 33 Polk, ‘“Getica” and “Romana” of Jordanes’, pp. 83–100, discusses Jordanes’ treatment of

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for the sake of promoting the Goths; rather it is stressed as something worth rivalling. Accordingly, the Romana retains a very traditional ethnography of the Roman Empire that would have seemed familiar to a Roman or late Roman historian — unsurprisingly, given that Jordanes’ account of Roman republican and early imperial history is, for the most part, a compilation of extracts from various Roman epitomes. In particular, as mentioned above, Jordanes’ account relies heavily on Florus’s summary of Roman history: less frequently used are the late fourth-century epitomes by Eutropius and Festus. All three of these texts provided panegyrical depictions of Rome from an insider perspective: Romans celebrating Rome, in particular Rome’s many military conquests. In excerpting from their texts, Jordanes retains their triumphalist outlook of Roman imperial history as a series of conquests only rarely interspersed with some setbacks. This narrative of triumph is, however, only part of Jordanes’ picture; equally critical for Roman success is Christianity. The preface confirming Justinian’s Code, quoted above, states explicitly that the Roman Empire, buttressed with arms and laws, will continue to be preeminent forever among peoples, granted God is propitious (‘deo propitio’). Justinianic ideology repeatedly harps on this sentiment; the preface to the Digest begins: Governing under the authority of God our empire, which was delivered to us by the Heavenly Majesty, we both conduct wars successfully and render peace honourable, and we uphold the condition of the state. We so lift up our minds toward the help of the omnipotent God that we do not place our trust in weapons or our soldiers or our military leaders or our own talents, but we rest all our hopes in the providence of the Supreme Trinity alone, from whence the elements of the whole world proceeded and their disposition throughout the universe was derived.34

The Roman Empire, past, present, and future, hinges on God’s will.35 the Goths in the Romana. He suggests Jordanes rarely goes out of his way to include Gothic history in the Romana and usually presents the Goths in at best a neutral, at worst, negative, light. 34 Digesta, Const. Deo Auctore, 15 Dec. 530, ed. by Mommsen and Krüger, preface, p. 8: ‘Deo auctore nostrum gubernantes imperium, quod nobis a caelesti maiestate traditum est, et bella feliciter peragimus et pacem decoramus et statum rei publicae sustentamus: et ita nostros animos ad dei omnipotentis erigimus adiutorium, ut neque armis confidamus neque nostris militibus neque bellorum ducibus vel nostro ingenio, sed omnem spem ad solam referamus summae providentiam trinitatis: unde et mundi totius elementa processerunt et eorum dispositio in orbem terrarum producta est’ (trans. by Watson, p. xlvi). 35 See Garnsey and Humfress, The Evolution of the Late Antique World, pp. 132–69, esp. 141–42. Regarding Justinian’s legislation on Christian doctrine see also Maas, Exegesis and Empire in the Early Byzantine Mediterranean, pp. 54–60.

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Likewise, in an ambitious, if perhaps not quite successful, attempt, Jordanes transplants this key tenet of Justinianic ideology into his interpretation of history. In tandem with his presentation of Roman history in terms of arms and laws at work in their traditional Roman function of subjugating and civilizing, Jordanes attempts to subordinate Roman history to God’s providence.36 To do so Jordanes melds together Roman and Christian historiographical traditions. Although Jordanes’ accounts of specific events in Roman history are drawn from Roman epitomes, both the structure and the content of the Romana relies heavily on world chronicles, in particular Jerome’s continuation of Eusebius’s Chronicle. The opening section of the Romana is composed primarily of extracts from Jerome.37 These passages include the Romans, but do not discuss Roman history in depth; instead they tally the noteworthy events, primarily conquests, of the earlier kingdoms which preceded the Romans: the Assyrians, the Medes/Persians, and the Greeks. Jordanes indicates that following the prophecy of Daniel he interprets the Roman Empire as the last and final of this succession of empires.38 Only when Jordanes reaches the reign of Augustus, does he begin to discuss the Romans in greater depth and even disrupts the chronology of his narrative to jump back in time to tell of Rome’s infancy.39 From here on out Jordanes focuses more exclusively on the Romans. In this part of the Romana, Jordanes continues to align Roman and Christian history. In the reign of Augustus, described as conquering all peoples, north 36

Jordanes’ attitude may be compared to that of Procopius, who likewise has a Christian teleological view of history, but allows for an even greater degree of human agency: Brodka, Die Geschichtsphilosophie in der spätantiken Historiographie, pp. 14–151, 228–34. 37 Although Jerome’s Chronicle began with Abraham, Jordanes begins instead with the origin of the world (by quoting the relevant sections of Genesis). 38 This is made most explicit with Jordanes’ description of the transfer of power from the Greeks to the Romans under Augustus: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 84, p. 9: ‘regnumque eorum in Romanorum imperio devenit, ubi et usque actenus, et usque in finem mundi secundum Danielis prophetia regni debetur successio’. 39 Jordanes explains that since he had been asked to explain the origins and deeds of the Romans it is necessary for him ‘to revisit the beginnings of the city of Rome and to explain the origin of Romulus, its [Rome’s] founder and to demonstrate clearly the years and dates of the kings and consuls succeeding him’: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 86, p. 10: ‘et quia Romanarum rerum ordine actosque inquirere statuisti et nos breviter tuis percunctationibus respondere sumus polliciti, necessarium est ergo nobis ea interim, que ad tempora Augusti imperatoris dicuntur, omittere et rursus ad Romanae urbis primordia repedare originemque Romuli eius conditoris exponere simulque successorum eius regum consolumque annos actosque ad liquidum demonstrare, qui sunt hi’.

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to south, east to west, in the whole circumference of the ocean and establishing peace throughout all these lands, Jesus Christ is born.40 Thus the first Roman emperor and God’s incarnation on earth occur simultaneously. A similar synchronization takes place later in the text during the reign of Philip the Arab. Jordanes describes that: ‘He [Philip] was the first of all the emperors to be made Christian. In the third year of his reign he celebrated festivities for the city of Rome which had completed its 1000th year’.41 A thousand years of Rome and the first Christian emperor coincide. Jordanes’ description of Rome’s imperial history often also aligns Christian and Roman morals. Caligula both forces a husband to give him his wife and places a statue of Jupiter in the temple of Jerusalem.42 Emperors who are morally appalling (and often persecute Christians) are usually harmful to the state. Nero, who bathes himself in hot and cold perfumes and watches as Rome burns, persecutes Christians and is even responsible for the deaths of the apostles Peter and Paul. Unsurprisingly, he is of no profit to the state.43 Or Domitian, who for the first time commands that he as emperor be called lord (dominus), persecutes Christians, as well as killing and exiling Roman nobles, so much so that even the Romans cannot stand his cruelty and murder him.44 By correlating ‘bad’ emperors with the persecution of Christianity, Jordanes (usually following Jerome) also diminishes the impression of a ‘break’ in Roman history. Before and after the advent of Christianity good and, more often, bad emperors rule the empire. This picture of imperial continuity is accentuated by what may be an unusual coincidence: the surviving text, despite the generally good manuscript tradition, is missing any account of Constantine or the Christianization of the 40

This event is described twice; first it marks the point in the succession of empires when the empire of the Greeks passes to the Romans: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 85, pp. 9–10. Then the birth of Christ is retold, in similar terms, during the reign of the emperor Augustus: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chaps 255–56, p. 33. 41 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 283, p. 37: ‘ipseque [Philippus] primus omnium imperatorum Christianus effectus est tertioque anno imperii sui festivitatem Romanae urbis, millesimo anno quod expleverat, caelebravit’. 42 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 259, p. 33. 43 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chaps 261–62, p. 34. 44 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 265, p. 34.

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empire. As mentioned above, the mid-third-century emperor Philip the Arab is said to have been the first Christian emperor, but this is the text’s first and only mention of the empire’s conversion to Christianity. After telling of Diocletian’s persecutions against Christians, the text jumps to Constantius II’s death.45 We subsequently hear of Julian converting back from Christianity to pagan idolatry and persecuting Christians.46 Thus the fourth century is not portrayed as radically different from previous centuries. Nor, is there subsequently, where Jordanes’ text resumes, any qualitative shift in imperial rule. The success of the Roman Empire hinges on God’s providence, but this does not mean that a Christian empire need be successful. Indeed, Jordanes has a grim view of imperial history after Constantine. It is the Christian emperors of Late Antiquity who have caused the decline of the empire built up by Rome’s early, pagan, emperors. Christianity does not per se provide an answer to preserving empire; nor does Christianity in any way replace the category of empire. Military skill and good governance remain as critical as ever in a Christian empire. Jordanes’ appreciation for the traditional qualities of a ‘good’ emperor are readily apparent in the case of the pagan emperor Julian. Although, following Jerome, Jordanes tells of Julian’s idolatry, he also includes an excerpt from Eutropius praising Julian as a remarkable man (‘vir egregius’), indispensable to the republic (‘rei publicae necessarius’), in that he waged war against the Persians.47 Regarding the Christian emperor Valentinian, Jordanes, following Jerome, writes that he would have been a remarkable man (‘vir egregius’), in that he was similar to (the pagan emperor) Aurelian in character — except that his sternness and frugality were seen as cruelty and greed, vices which throughout the Romana cause the downfall of emperors.48 A similar line of reasoning 45

There is no lacuna in any of the manuscripts, although some scribes noted the gap in the margins. Cf. Amici, ‘Iordanes e la tradizione su Costantino’, who suggests that neither an ‘orthodox’ nor ‘Arian’ Constantine was appropriate to Jordanes’ narrative. This does not, however, explain the large extent of the gap. 46 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chaps 304–05, p. 39. 47 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 304, p. 39: ‘Iulianus apostata regnavit an. uno m. VIII, relictaque Christianitate ad idolorum cultura conversus est multosque blanda persecutione inliciens ad sacrificandum idolis conpulit. ipse si quidem vir egregius et rei publicae necessarius Parthis ingenti apparatu intulit bellum’, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 362 p. Chr., p. 242 and Eutropius, Breviarium, ed. by Santini, x.16, pp. 69–70. 48 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 307, p. 39: ‘ipse vero egregius et Aureliani similis moribus, nisi quod severitatem eius nim-

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is found in the Getica, where the Roman emperor Maximian, of Gothic parentage, is praised for his bodily strength and military skill: he is a successful emperor until his persecutions of Christians cause him to lose both his title and his life.49 Christian morality, in Jordanes’ Romana (as well as in the Getica), operates as a set of individual responsibilities, which, when exercised in official capacities, have consequences for the state. Good Christians tend to make good emperors. Theodosius is described as ‘shining forth exceedingly as a devout propagator of the Church and an excellent defender of the republic’.50 With him Christian piety and military conquests go hand in hand. Likewise, it is ‘with divinely inspired forethought’ (‘divina provisione’) that Marcian conducts wars and makes peace treaties that restore what his effeminate (‘delicati’) predecessors had lost.51 But individuals like Theodosius are exceptional; most leaders are morally corrupt, bringing further ruin upon the empire. As a general under the emperor Leo, Basiliscus is driven by greed to sell off the city of Carthage to the Vandals.52 So too, in the Getica, it is Roman avarice (avaritia), combined with Roman treachery, that provokes the Goths to rebel against the Roman emperor Valens. 53 It is in the context of such corruption that Jordanes, in the Romana, like Marcellinus, interprets Odovacer’s deposition of Romulus iam et parcitatem quidam crudelitatem et avaritiam causabantur’, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 365 p. Chr., p. 244. 49 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xv.83–88, pp. 38–40. 50 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 315, p. 40: ‘ammodumque religiosus ecclesiae enituit propagator rei publiceque defensor eximius’. 51 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chaps 332–33, p. 41. 52 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 337, p. 43: ‘Basiliscum cognatum suum, id est fratrem Augustae Verinae Africam dirigens cum exercitu, qui navali proelio Chartaginem saepe adgrediens ante ea victus cupiditate pecuniis vendidit regi Vandalorum, quam in Romanorum potestatem redigeret’. 53 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xxvi.134–37, pp. 58–60. In the Romana Valens is portrayed negatively, but not so explicitly as in the Getica. In the Romana, Valens, swayed by Arianism, persecutes the orthodox and even passes a law that commands monks to fight; he is cremated in the Battle of Adrianople by the Goths whom he had infected with heresy: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 302, pp. 38–39; chap. 312, p. 40; chap. 314, p. 40. Jordanes offers a much more explicit interpretation of this event in the Getica: Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Giunta and Grillone, xxvi.138, p. 60.

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Augustulus in 476 as marking the end of the Western Empire.54 And the decline continues. Concerning Anastasius (495–518), who is generally harmful to the state, Jordanes, in the Romana, adds: ‘nor did he serve the laws of the church’ (‘ecclesiae iura’).55 Or, more specifically, sins committed by Justinian’s army on the day of Holy Saturday lead to the Romans’ stinging defeat against the Persians.56 For the most part, this Christian slant to Roman history derives from Jordanes’ close adherence to his sources. However, one example in which Jordanes differs slightly from the Chronicle of Marcellinus makes clear his interest in highlighting how the lack of Christian values has undermined the Roman state. Regarding the usurpation of the Nestorian Basiliscus against the late fifth-century emperor Zeno, the Chronicle of Marcellinus reports: He [Basiliscus] boasted loudly before he could stand repentant. When Zeno was restored to his former empire Basiliscus was sent into exile with his son and his wife Zenonis, and in a village called Limnis in Cappadocia he wasted away with hunger and died.57

Jordanes’ account reads: But by the will of God (volente deo), he [Basiliscus] boasted loudly before he could stand repentant. For when Zeno returned again to his own kingdom, he arranged for his [Marcus’s (Basiliscus’s son’s)] exile and that of his father and mother, in a village, Lemnis, in Cappadocia. For since the love of god (caritas dei) and their neighbors had frozen in them, they were consumed by cold and lost their lives with their kingdom.58 54

Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 345, p. 44: ‘sic quoque Hesperium regnum Romanique populi principatum, quod septingentesimo nono urbis conditae anno primus Augustorum Octavianus Augustus tenere coepit, cum hoc Augustulo periit anno decessorum regni imperatorum quingentesimo vicesimo secundo’. 55 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 359, p. 47: ‘sicut nec ipse ecclesiae iura servavit’. 56 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 363, p. 47: ‘postea vero facientibus peccatis in die sabbati sancti paschae inito certamine, exercitui et non ducis instinctu in fluvio Eufrate, fugiens Parthos, Romanus numerosus ruit exercitus’. 57 Marcellinus, Chronicon, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 476, p. 91: ‘ante inflatus crepuit quam paenitens stare potuerit. Basiliscus cum filio suo et cum Zenonida uxore sua, iam Zenone pristinum ad imperium remeante, in exilium missus est atque in oppidulo, quod Limnis in provincia Cappadociae dicitur, trusus fame extabuit’ (trans. by Croke, p. 26). 58 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen,

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With only slight modifications to Marcellinus’s account, Jordanes subtly adds a Christian interpretation. What happened was God’s will and demonstrates that Christian morality is at work in the progression of events in Roman history — even if the consequences of that are a shrinking empire brought about by incompetent and immoral Christian rulers. In addition to its impact on the ‘arms’ of the empire, however, Jordanes’ introduction of Christianity also required him to add complexity to the meaning of law in the text. Although the term ‘law’ in the Romana most frequently refers to Roman law, Jordanes’ narrative also tells of the origins of Christian, that is, Jewish, law.59 This involves, on the one hand, the incorporation of the Jews as a people into the Roman Empire and, on the other, the appropriation of Jewish texts into Christianity. Throughout the Romana Jordanes presents the Romans as confronted with lawless barbarians at their borders. The notable exception is the Jewish people, who are characterized as a political entity, complete with their own laws, the quintessential marker of civilization. For example, a series of entries taken from Jerome, although very abbreviated, pertaining to Moses’ role among the Jews, may be compared to those describing the role of Numa Pompilius for the Romans. Moses is described as leading the Hebrew people (‘populum Hebraeum’) out of Egypt and laying down the law for them (‘legem exponit’) in the reign of Astacades.60 That the Jews lived by their established laws is made explicit again later when we are told how Antiochus acts ‘contra legem Iudaeorum’ (against the law of the Jews) in the reign of Ptholomeus.61 chaps 342–43, p. 44: ‘sed volente deo ante inflatus crepuit quam penitens stare potuerat. nam revertens Zenon rursus in regno proprio et eum et patrem et matrem in exilio oppidi Lemni provinciae Cappadociae destinavit. Ubi quia caritas dei et proximi in illos refrixerat, frigore consumpti sunt vitaque cum regno amiserunt’ (following the translation of Croke above). 59 The issue of Christianity’s relationship to Jews and Jewish law in particular is complex. While the church fathers were often dismissive of Jewish law, many, such as Tertullian and Origen, simultaneously expressed more positive attitudes. For Augustine, among other theologians, the Jews were necessary vestiges for Christianity: Fredriksen, Augustine and the Jews; cf. Boustan, ‘Augustine as Revolutionary?’; see also Dumézil, Les racines chrétiennes de l’Europe, pp. 110–20. For Christian concern with Jewish law in the context of the development of ‘canon law’, see Humfress, Orthodoxy and the Courts in Late Antiquity, pp. 196–213, esp. 200–02. For the legal position of Jews in the Roman world (a combination of tolerating Jewish worship and persecuting Jews) see Rabello, ‘The Legal Condition of the Jews in the Roman World’. 60 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 28, p. 5, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 1513 a. Chr., p. 43a. 61 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 78, p. 9, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 169 a. Chr., p. 139.

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The Jews continue to function as a political unit, a persistent undercurrent, throughout the reigns of the Assyrians, the Medes, and the Greeks, until finally, right before Augustus takes control, they are subsumed into the Roman Empire. While Cleopatra is ruling in Egypt, Jordanes reports that ‘the Jews joining themselves in friendship with the Romans now live by their laws (legibus)’.62 This phrase is particularly interesting in that, although Jordanes’ narrative follows that of Jerome’s Chronicle, the reference to Roman law is Jordanes’ own.63 At this crucial juncture of history, when Augustus rules all peoples in a time of peace and Christ is born, Jewish history comes to an end; Christianity has superseded Judaism and the Jewish people cease to exist as a political entity. As well as describing how Christ appeared on earth to fulfil Jewish scripture, Jordanes also indicates how Jewish scripture, in its concrete physical sense, became available for incorporation into Christianity. Throughout the Romana, both before and even after Augustus, Jordanes shows a particular interest in the composition and translation of Jewish scripture. Jordanes notes when the book of Esther and the book of Wisdom were composed.64 He tells of how Aristobolus, a Jewish philosopher, wrote commentaries on the books of Moses.65 Then, in no less than six passages, Jordanes records the translation of Scripture from Hebrew into Greek or the mysterious discovery of scriptures.66 62

Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 84, p. 9: ‘Cleopatra ann. XXII. qua regnante Iudaei in amicitias Romanorum se sociantes eorum iam legibus vivent, quia Pompeius regnum ab Aristobolo sublato Hircanum fratrem eius praefecerat’. The latter part of this phrase (regarding Pompey and Aristobulus) follows Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 67 a. Chr., p. 153. 63 For 46 bc under the reign of Cleopatra, Jerome reports a senate decree confirming an alliance with the Jews: Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 46 a. Chr., p. 156: ‘Decretum senatus, et Atheniensium ad Judaeos mittitur, qui per legationem amicitiam postularant’. Already for 159 bc Jerome had reported that the Jewish king Judas Macabaeus sent legates to Rome and that the Roman senate had decreed the Jews to be friends and allies of the Romans: Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 159 a. Chr., pp. 141–42: ‘legatos Romam dirigit; decrevitque senatus Judaeos amicos et auxiliatores Romanorum habendos’. 64 Book of Esther: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 68, p. 8, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 405 a. Chr., p. 117; book of Wisdom: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 75, p. 9, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 232 a. Chr., p. 133. 65 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 78, p. 9, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 176 a. Chr., p. 139. 66 The first of these, taken from Jordanes’ usual source, Jerome’s Chronicle, records how the high priest of the Jews (pontifex Iudaeorum), Eleazarus, had the divine scriptures translated from Hebrew into Greek with the aid of seventy translators: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel orig-

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Five of these examples occur after the reign of Augustus and are taken from the Greek text of the fourth-century bishop Epiphanius, On Measures and Weights (Περὶ μέτρων καὶ σταθμῶν) — which Jordanes uses nowhere else in the Romana.67 Again, Jordanes’ interest in the language of Scripture reflects contemporary concerns; in 553 (shortly after Jordanes had completed the Romana) Justinian even intervened in Jewish disputes regarding the question whether Jews could read their holy scriptures in Greek rather than Hebrew.68 To conclude: Jordanes’ Romana attempts to project the political-religious landscape of the Age of Justinian back into the past. Roman arms and law are presented as the means by which Rome’s enemies were subjugated and civilized, but the overarching framework is that of Christianity. Jordanes strives to create a Roman identity that has synthesized Jewish history and internalized Christian law; Christian and Roman pasts are manoeuvred into harmonious alignment. Yet unlike the confident outlook of Justinianic propaganda, Jordanes has a much gloomier outlook on the future of the Roman Empire. The preceding centuries of Christian emperors have weakened the empire. Although Jordanes presents Justinian as an emperor striving to maintain the empire and describes his military conquests in favourable terms, Jordanes remains sceptical as to whether Justinian can stem the tide of decline.69 He concludes by remarking: ine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 74, p. 8, based on Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, a. 283 a. Chr., p. 129. 67 Jordanes describes how a certain Aquila and a certain Symmachus, a Jewish proselyte (proselitus Iudeorum), made translations of the divine scriptures from Hebrew to Greek: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 270, p. 35; chap. 276, pp. 35–36. Another individual, Theodotion, compiles an edition of scripture, and two further editions of scripture are mysteriously found in jars: Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 277, p. 36; chap. 280, p. 36. Epiphanius’s text describes each of these translations in greater depth: Epiphanius, Περὶ μέτρων καὶ σταθμῶν (De mensuris et ponderibus), ed. by Dindorf: Aquila: 13, p. 16; 15–16, pp. 18–19; Symmachus: 16, pp. 19–20; Theodotion: 17, pp. 20–21; translations found in wine jars: 18, pp. 21–23. Cf. the Syriac version Epiphanius, De mensuris et ponderibus (syr.), ed. by Dean: Aquila: 13, p. 29; 15–16, pp. 31–32; Symmachus: 16, pp. 32–33; Theodotion: 17, pp. 33–34; translations found in wine jars: 18, pp. 34–36. 68 Justinian concluded that the texts could and should be read in any language understandable to those assembled: Novellae, ed. by Schöll and Kroll, cxlvi., pp. 714–18. For an introduction to these disputes see De Lange, ‘Jews in the Age of Justinian’, pp. 417–18. 69 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by

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These are the calamities of the Roman Republic in addition to the daily threats of the Bulgars, the Antes, and the Sclavi/Sclavini. Whoever wishes to know about them [the threats], let him unroll the annals and the consular list without scorn, and he will find the republic of our time worthy of a tragedy (tragydiae). He [the reader] will know whence it [the Republic] began, in what way it grew, the manner in which it subjugated all lands to itself, and in what way it lost them again at the hands of ignorant rulers.70

Through imperial ideology the Romans still ‘ostensibly’ rule over an empire; the Christian framework of empire with its arms and laws is still in place, but what this actually means on the ground is more uncertain.

Mommsen, chaps 363–87, pp. 47–52. In general it seems from Jordanes’ presentation that the responsibility for the empire’s decline does not rest with Justinian, but with his predecessors. A similar logic is found as part of Justinian’s imperial ideology where Justinian faults earlier emperors for their failure to keep the empire together and notes the confusion of law before him. See Pazdernik, ‘Justinianic Ideology and the Power of the Past’. 70 Jordanes, De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 388, p. 52: ‘Hi sunt casus Romanae rei publicae preter instantia cottidiana Bulgarum, Antium et Sclavinorum. que si quis scire cupit, annales consulumque seriem revolvat sine fastidio repperietque dignam nostri temporis rem publicam tragydiae. scietque unde orta, quomodo aucta, qualiterve sibi cunctas terras subdiderit et quomodo iterum eas ab ignaris rectoribus amiserit’.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Cassiodorus, Variae, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15  vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xii: Cassiodori Senatoris Variae (1894; repr. 1981) Corpus iuris civilis, 3 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1872–95), i: Institutiones/Digesta, ed. by Theodor Mommsen and Paul Krüger (1872), ii: Codex Iustinianus, ed. by Paul Krüger (1877) Digesta, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, trans. by Alan Watson, The Digest of Justinian, 4 vols (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985) Epiphanius, Περὶ μέτρων καὶ σταθμῶν (De mensuris et ponderibus), ed. by Wilhelm Dindorf, in Epiphanii episcopi Constantiae opera, 5 vols (Leipzig: Weigel, 1859–63), iv.1: De mensuris et ponderibus, De gemmis (Leipzig: Weigel, 1862), pp. 3–34 —— , De mensuris et ponderibus (syr.), ed.  by James  E. Dean, Treatise on Weights and Measures: the Syriac Version, Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization, 11 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1935) Eutropius, Breviarium ab urbe condita, ed.  by Carlo Santini, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Leipzig: Teubner, 1979; repr. 1992) Festus, Breviarium, ed. by John W. Eadie, The Breviarium of Festus, University of London Classical Studies, 5 (London: Athlone, 1967) Florus, Epitomae de Tito Livio, ed. and trans. by Edward  S. Forster, Epitome of Roman History, The Loeb Classical Library, 231 (London: Heinemann, 1929; repr. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1947), pp. 2–351 Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Rudolf Helm, rev. by Ursula Treu, in Eusebius Werke, vii: Die Chronik des Hieronymus, Die Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten drei Jahrhunderte, 47, 3rd edn (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1984) Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, trans. by Charles C. Mierow, The Gothic History of Jordanes (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1915) —— , De origine actibusque Getarum, ed.  by Francesco Giunta and Antonino Grillone, De origine actibusque Getarum, Fonti per la storia d’Italia, 117 (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per il Medio Evo, 1991) —— , De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, ed.  by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), i: Iordanis Romana et Getica (1882; repr. 1982), pp. 1–52 Livy, Ab urbe condita, ed. and trans. by Benjamin O. Foster, The Loeb Classical Library, 14 vols (London: Heinemann, 1919–59) Marcellinus, Chronicon, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xi: Chronica minora saec. IV. V. VI. VII. (ii) (1894; repr. 1981), pp. 37–108 —— , Chronicon, trans. by Brian Croke, The Chronicle of Marcellinus, Byzantina Australiensia, 7 (Sydney: Australian Association for Byzantine Studies, 1995)

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Novellae, ed.  by Rudolf Schöll and Wilhelm Kroll, Corpus iuris civilis, 3  vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1872–95), iii (1895) Orosius, Historiarum adversum paganos libri vii, ed. by Karl Zangemeister, Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum, v (Vienna: Gerold, 1882)

Secondary Works Amici, Angela, ‘Iordanes e la tradizione su Costantino’, Bizantinistica, 5  (2003) (= Costantino il Grande nell’età bizantina: atti del Convegno Internazionale di Studio, Ravenna, 5–8 Aprile 2001, ed. by Giorgio Bonamente and Antonio Carile (Spoleto: Centro italiano di studi sull’alto medioevo, 2003)), 189–204 Amory, Patrick, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, 489–554, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, 4th ser., 33 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) Barry, Nicholas, An Introduction to Roman Law (Oxford: Clarendon, 1962) Borchardt, Frank L., German Antiquity in Renaissance Myth (Baltimore: John Hopkins Press, 1971) Boustan, Ra’anan, ‘Augustine as Revolutionary? Reflections on Continuity and Rupture in Jewish-Christian Relations in Paula Fredriksen’s “Augustine and the Jews”’, The Jewish Quarterly Review, 99 (2009), 74–87 Brodka, Dariusz, Die Geschichtsphilosophie in der spätantiken Historiographie: Studien zu Prokopios von Kaisareia, Agathias von Myrina und Theophylaktos Simokattes, Studien und Texte zur Byzantinistik, 5 (Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 2004) Buonomo, Luigi Maria, ‘Introduzione alla lettura delle opere di Giordane’, in Mutatio rerum: letteratura, filosofia, scienza tra tardo antico e altomedioevo: atti del convegno di studi (Napoli, 25–26 novembre 1996), ed.  by Maria Luisa Silvestre and Marisa Squillante, Il pensiero e la storica, 37 (Naples: Città del Sole, 1997), pp. 115–69 Cameron, Averil, ‘Old and New Rome: Roman Studies in Sixth-Century Constantinople’, in Transformations of Late Antiquity: Essays for Peter Brown, ed. by Philip Rousseau and Emmanuel Papoutsakis (Farnham: Ashgate, 2009), pp. 15–36 Croke, Brian, ‘A.D. 476: The Manufacture of a Turning Point’, Chiron, 13 (1983), 81–119 —— , ‘Cassiodorus and the “Getica” of Jordanes’, Classical Philology, 82 (1987), 117–34 —— , Count Marcellinus and his Chronicle (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001) —— , ‘Jordanes and the Immediate Past’, Historia, 54 (2005), 473–93 Dannenbring, Rolf, ‘Arma et leges: Über die justinianische Gesetzgebung im Rahmen ihrer eigenen Zeit’, Acta classica: Verhandelinge van die Klassieke Vereniging van SuidAfrika, 15 (1972), 113–37 Dumézil, Bruno, Les racines chrétiennes de l’Europe: conversion et liberté dans les royaumes barbares, Ve–VIIIe siècle (Paris: Fayard, 2006) Fredriksen, Paula, Augustine and the Jews: A Christian Defense of Jews and Judaism (New York: Doubleday, 2008) Garnsey, Peter, and Caroline Humfress, The Evolution of the Late Antique World (Cambridge: Orchard, 2001)

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Girotti, Beatrice, Ricerche sui ‘Romana’ di Jordanes, Studi di storia, 15 (Bologna: Pàtron, 2009) Giunta, Francesco, Jordanes e la cultura dell’alto medioevo: contributo allo studio del problema gotico (Palermo: Manfredi, 1952) Goffart, Walter, The Narrators of Barbarian History (A.D. 550–800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988) Heather, Peter J., Goths and Romans: 332–489, Oxford Historical Monographs (Oxford: Clarendon, 1991) Honoré, Tony, Tribonian (London: Duckworth, 1978) —— , ‘Roman Law AD 200–400: From Cosmopolis to Rechtstaat?’, in Approaching Late Antiquity: The Transformation from Early to Late Empire, ed.  by Simon Swain and Mark Edwards (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 109–32 Humfress, Caroline, ‘Law and Legal Practice in the Age of Justinian’, in The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian, ed.  by Michael Maas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 161–84 —— , Orthodoxy and the Courts in Late Antiquity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007) Jeffreys, Elizabeth, ‘The Attitudes of Byzantine Chroniclers towards Ancient History’, Byzantion, 49 (1979), 199–238 Kappelmacher, Alfred, ‘Iordanis’, in Paulys Realencyclopädie der classichen Alterstumswissenschaft, ed. by Georg Wissowa, Wilhelm Kroll, and Karl Mittelhaus, 83 vols (Stuttgart: Metzler, 1894–1980), ix.2: Hyaia–Iugum (1916; repr. 1988), cols 1908–29 Lange, Nicholas de, ‘Jews in the Age of Justinian’, in The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian, ed. by Michael Maas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 401–26 Lawo, Mathias, ‘Jordanes’, in Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde, ed.  by Heinrich Beck, Dieter Geuenich, and Heiko Steuer, 35  vols, 2nd edn (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–2008), xvi: Jadwingen–Kleindichtung (2000), pp. 76–77 Luiselli, Bruno, ‘Sul “De summa temporum” di Iordanes’, Romanobarbarica, 1  (1976), 83–134 Maas, Michael, Exegesis and Empire in the Early Byzantine Mediterranean: Junillus Africanus and the ‘Instituta regularia divinae legis’, Studien und Texte zu Antike und Christentum, 17 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003) Mastandrea, Paolo, ‘Armis et legibus: Un motto attribuito a Iamblichus nei “Romana” di Iordanes’, Il calamo della memoria. Riusi di testi e mestiere letterario nella tarda antichità. Incontri triestini di Filologia Classica, 5 (2005/06), 315–28 Merrills, Andrew  H., History and Geography in Late Antiquity, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, 4th ser., 64 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) Momigliano, Arnaldo, ‘Pagan and Christian Historiography in the Fourth Century A.D.’, in The Conflict between Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century, ed. by Arnaldo Momigliano, Oxford-Warburg Studies (Oxford: Clarendon, 1963), pp. 79–99 Mommsen, Theodor, ‘Jamblichos bei Jordanes’, Neues Archiv der Gessellschaft für ältere deutsche Geschichtskunde, 8  (1883), 352 (repr. in Theodor Mommsen, Gesammelte

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Schriften, 8  vols, 2nd edn (Berlin: Weidmann, 1965), vii: Philologische Schriften, pp. 519–20) O’Donnell, James J., ‘The Aims of Jordanes’, Historia, 31 (1982), 223–40 Pazdernik, Charles, ‘Justinianic Ideology and the Power of the Past’, in The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian, ed.  by Michael Maas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 185–214 Pohl, Walter, ‘Creating Cultural Resources for Carolingian Rule: Historians of the Christian Empire’, in The Resources of the Past in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Clemens Gantner and others (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), pp. 15–33 Polk, Matthew, ‘“Getica” and “Romana” of Jordanes: History and Ethnogenesis’ (unpublished master’s thesis, Baylor University, 2002) Rabello, Alfredo Mordechai, ‘The Legal Condition of the Jews in the Roman Empire’, in Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung, ed. by Hildegard Temporini and Wolfgang Haase, 37 vols (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–98), ii.13: Principat, Recht: Normen, Verbreitung, Materien (1980), pp. 662–762 (repr. in Alfredo Mordechai Rabello, Ebraismo e diritto: studi sul diritto ebraico e gli ebrei nell’impero Romano, 2 vols, Studi giuridici, 1.1–2 (Soveria Mannelli: Rubbettino, 2009), i: Sezioni A, B, C, pp. 249–349) Rapp, Claudia, ‘Literary Culture under Justinian’, in The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian, ed. by Michael Maas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 376–97 Reydellet, Marc, La Royauté dans la littérature latine de Sidoine Apollinaire à Isidore de Séville, Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome, 243 (Rome: École française de Rome, 1981) Scott, Roger, Byzantine Chronicles and the Sixth Century, Variorum Collected Studies Series, 1004 (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012) Søby Christensen, Arne, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths: Studies in a Migration Myth (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2002) Suerbaum, Werner, Vom antiken zum frühmittelalterlichen Staatsbegriff: über Verwendung und Bedeutung von res publica, regnum, imperium und status von Cicero bis Jordanis, Orbis antiquus, 16/17 (Münster: Aschendorff, 1961) Van Hoof, Lieve, and Peter Van Nuffelen, ‘The Historiography of Crisis: Jordanes, Cassiodorus and Justinian in Mid-Sixth-Century Constantinople’, Journal of Roman Studies, 107 (2017), 275–300 Wolfram, Herwig, Geschichte der Goten: Von den Anfängen bis zur Mitte des sechsten Jahrhunderts: Entwurf einer historischen Ethnographie (Munich: Beck, 1979)

From Scythian, to Getan, to Goth: The Getica of Jordanes and the Classical Ethnographic Tradition Randolph Ford

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uch of the scholarship produced on the Getica in recent decades has been concerned with questions pertaining to the identity of Jordanes himself, the degree to which the work may be a faithful representation of Cassiodorus’s history written for the Ostrogothic court in Ravenna decades earlier, whether or not Jordanes’ text contains genuine Gothic tribal traditions, and, therefore, the extent to which the Getica may reliably inform us as to the origins or ethnogenesis of the Gothic people.1 Considerably less attention has been paid to the chapters of the Getica that are indisputably fabricated in terms of their historical content, i.e., passages where the author has obviously appropriated material found in the works of classical authors and devoted to the deeds of peoples known of and described in antiquity, centuries before the appearance of the Goths on the Roman frontier.2 Nevertheless, various explanations for the purpose and function of these textual borrowings have 1

For an overview of scholarship on these issues see Goffart, ‘Jordanes’s “Getica”’, pp. 379–98; Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 100–14. Authorship of the Getica will be attributed to Jordanes throughout rather than to Cassiodorus. As Merrills has put it, ‘The Getica as it stands is indisputably the work of Jordanes, whatever his debts to his luminous predecessor’ (p. 113). 2 An important exception to this general pattern is Goffart’s analysis of the role of the Amazons in the Getica, Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 80–81. Randolph Ford is an instructor in ancient and pre-modern history at the State University of New York, Albany. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 95–119 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118562

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been offered in passing. Peter Heather, assuming that these passages are attributable to Cassiodorus, has proposed that the aim of the author was to ‘give the Goths cultural respectability, showing that they belonged to the mainstream of Graeco-Roman history’ and that ‘the Graeco-Roman material also gave the Goths a more glorious past: defeating Egyptian kings, and, under the rule of Telephus, a son of Hercules, waging war upon the Greeks’.3 Herwig Wolfram has suggested that the appropriated texts cause Gothic history to become ‘part of classical ethnography with its preconceived explanatory models and stock phrases’.4 Walter Goffart has argued that ‘the Scythian sequel’ to the Gothic immigration from Scandza has ‘very limited bearing on any later part of the book’ and that ‘most of their Scytho-Getic adventures are colourful but inconsequential’, preferring instead to focus on the role played by the Amazons and how a Gothic association with this people informs our reading of the text.5 Based on his assumption that ‘nothing in the first third of Jordanes’ Getica has anything whatsoever to do with a history of the Goths’, Arne Christensen has raised the question whether this section of the text significantly conditions the reader’s understanding of the Gothic past at all or whether it merely offers a collection of trans-Danubian exotica for his/her edification or entertainment.6 I argue that the former is in fact the case: these appropriations from classical authors, while they do not present a factually convincing historical account of early Gothic history, nevertheless do serve to frame thematically the author’s presentation of actual Gothic history, which begins in the early third century ad, the point when the Goths entered the Roman sphere. Moreover, an analysis of the ways in which the passages derived from, or influenced by, classical ethnographic texts are manipulated will show that Jordanes’ methodology was neither clumsy nor random. In his analysis of conceptions of the barbarian in Late Antiquity, Andrew Gillett notes that there has been little dialogue between scholars of classical ethnography and historians of the later Roman Empire, and he suggests that a consideration of the impact of earlier Greco-Roman traditions on texts which treat barbarian peoples may provide a fruitful approach to our understanding of the composition of these later works.7 This chapter aims to help address this 3 4 5 6 7

Heather, Goths and Romans, p. 54. Wolfram, The Roman Empire and its Germanic Peoples, p. 29. Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, p. 75. Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes, and the History of the Goths, pp. 318, 234. Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, p. 393.

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interdisciplinary gap and will, accordingly, consider certain passages in the Getica alongside the ethnographic precedents of these passages as they appear in the works of Herodotus, Strabo, and Justinus/Pompeius Trogus. A fundamental problem that faced the Getica’s author was how to reconcile canonical ethnographic descriptions of different peoples who, in the Getica, are made to represent a single gens, i.e., the Goths themselves in an earlier period. While the Amazons are widely represented in classical literature as closely associated with the Scythians, the Getae are not; in fact, as will be demonstrated below, these two peoples are presented in works of classical historiography and geography in terms that are markedly incompatible with one another. Given the inherent contradictions in constructing a narrative that presents the Scythians and Getae as one and the same people, it is not surprising that, upon closer scrutiny, Jordanes may be shown to have made purposeful decisions as to which material he would appropriate from his sources. Similar care was necessary in the arrangement of this material in order to minimize any cognitive dissonance experienced by the reader, who sees discrete cultural entities, Scythians and Getae, placed in the same genealogical line culminating in the Gothic kingdoms of the former Western Empire. For the received literary tradition carried with it a set of expectations for the qualities and behaviours associated with these different ethnonyms, traits that will be shown below to be incompatible with one another in significant ways. This chapter will therefore consider the ethnographic representation of the ancient ‘Goths’ in the Getica, appearing in the guise of both Scythians and Getae in chapters 5–11, and the author’s careful manipulation of his literary precedents. The study will demonstrate that, far from being a random miscellany of barbarian history from north and east of the Danube, these appropriations perform specific rhetorical and thematic functions in Jordanes’ narrative. Moreover, it will offer some sense of the ways in which paradigmatic representations of certain alien groups as they were codified in the classical period were perpetuated even when the political and demographic landscape of the fifth and sixth centuries had witnessed such dramatic upheaval and change.

The Goths as Scythians Jordanes’ historical narrative begins with the emigration of the Goths from Scandinavia in 1490 bc under the leadership of their king Berig.8 Their arrival 8

For a discussion of Gothic origins in Scandza and the narrative functions of this origin myth, see Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 117–27, 154–55.

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on the continent in a land they name Gothiscandza is followed by fighting with the Ulmerugi and Vandal peoples, over whom the Goths are victorious. Filimer, roughly the fifth king in the line descended from Berig, then leads the Goths to Scythia, as their numbers have grown too great to be supported by the land of Gothiscandza. Jordanes claims that the Goths gave the name Oium to Scythia, a toponym only attested in the Getica.9 It is here, after a lengthy geographical digression, that the portion of Gothic history containing material appropriated from classical authors begins: Vt ergo ad nostrum propositum redeamus, in prima sede Scythiae iuxta Meotidem commanentes praefati, unde loquimur, Filimer regem habuisse noscuntur. in secunda, id est Daciae, Thraciaeque et Mysiae solo Zalmoxen, quem mirae philosophiae eruditionis fuisse testantur plerique scriptores annalium. nam et Zeutam prius habuerunt eruditum, post etiam Dicineum, tertium Zalmoxen, de quo superius diximus. nec defuerunt, qui eos sapientiam erudirent. unde et pene omnibus barbaris Gothi sapientiores semper extiterunt Grecisque pene consimiles. (In order that we may return to the subject of our discussion, [the Goths] remaining as mentioned already in their first abode near Maeotis in Scythia, are known to have had Filimer as their king. In their second one, that is in the land of Dacia, Thrace, and Mysia they had Zalmoxis, whom most writers of annals attest to have been a man possessed of wondrous philosophical knowledge. And even before him they had the learned Zeuta and then Dicineus, Zalmoxis being the third whom I have noted already. Nor were those lacking who would teach them wisdom. Whence the Goths always stood out as wiser than nearly all other barbarians and were almost on par with the Greeks.)10

By sketching this broad geographical area, the author has made it possible to associate the Goths first with the ancient Scythians and then with the Getae in the regions north and south of the lower Danube. Lastly, he situates them north of the Black Sea where they are thought to have had their home when the first 9

Oium has been understood as a ‘dative plural used for a place-name’ of the word ‘*aujōor *auwō-, widespread in Germanic and ranging in meaning from “island” to “well-watered meadow”’. See Green, ‘Linguistic Evidence’, p. 14. Yet given the obvious reliance on classical authors displayed by Jordanes in his treatment of early Gothic history — indeed he himself avows his preference for written sources rather than oral traditions, saying ‘nos enim potius lectioni credimus quam fabulis anilibus consentimus’ (for we trust rather to reading than to go along with old wives’ tales) — it is surprising that the possibility that Oium may be an adaptation of an otherwise unattested mountain mentioned in Strabo, Ogyium/Ὠγύιον has not, to my knowledge, yet been suggested. Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.38, p. 64; Strabo, Geographica, ed. by Meineke, vii.3.6, p. 411. 10 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.39–40, p. 64.

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reliable reports of the Goths became known to Greek and Roman writers in the early to mid-third century ad. In the following chapters, Jordanes recounts episodes taken from earlier historians who wrote about the peoples inhabiting these regions, while implicitly and explicitly indicating that the Scythians and Getae of earlier centuries were in fact the Goths at an earlier stage of their history.11 As has often been pointed out, Jordanes was not the first to make this equation between the Goths and either of these two peoples.12 But what he proceeds to do in this first ethnographic section devoted to the Goths in Scythia in chapter 5 is not to present the Gothic connection to one people or the other, but rather to explain how the Goths are actually both in a later form. This begins his rationalizing account of Gothic history, which reconciles the various ethnonyms that had been applied to the Goths by earlier authorities. Having begun with a list of earliest Gothic abodes, Jordanes then names teachers of the Goths who made them ‘wiser than nearly all other barbarians and almost on par with the Greeks’. However, these teachers and their students’ appetite for 11

The equation between Goths and Getae is obvious both from the title of the work and in Jordanes’ frequent use of the ethnonym ‘Getae’ to denote the Goths of his own age. As for the Gothic association with the Scythians, after noting that the Egyptian king Vesosis ‘waged war upon the Scythians’, Jordanes claims that ‘we clearly prove that he fought against the Goths at that time’ (‘Vesosis Scythis […] intulit bellum […] cum Gothis eum tunc dimicasse evidenter probamus’): Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.44, p. 65. The Scythians and the Goths are thus shown to be one and the same people. An attempt to equate the Getae with the Scythians is exhibited by Jordanes’ decision to incorporate Justin’s account of Cyrus the Great’s campaign against the Scythians, ‘Pompeio Trogo testante’ (with Pompeius Trogus as an authority): Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, x.61, p. 71. While Justin mentions only the Scythians as the object of the Persian campaign, Jordanes says that the campaign was led against the Getae, or rather against ‘Getarum reginae Thomyre’ (Tomyris the queen of the Getae): Justin, Epitoma historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi, ed. by Seel, i.8, pp. 11–12; Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, x.61, p. 71. However, in Herodotus the campaign of Cyrus is led not against the Scythians but rather the Massagetae, a people living to the north-east of the Persian Empire, and their queen Tomyris. Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, i.205, pp. 128–29. Jordanes’ conflation of the Goths with not only the Scythians and Getae but also the Massagetae — whose name obviously suggests an association with the Getae — indicates further familiarity with Herodotus, either directly or indirectly. 12 As discussed by Christensen, the third-century Athenian historian Dexippus had called the Goths Scythians Σκύθαι, and Orosius had identified the Goths with the Getae in the early fifth century. Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes, and the History of the Goths, pp. 232–34. Before Orosius, Claudian had exclusively used the term ‘Getae’ for the Goths in his Bellum Geticum; the closest he comes to calling them Scythians is when he celebrates the sword plunging into the throat of Scythia: ‘in iugulum Scythiae’: Claudian, Bellum Geticum, ed. by Hall, 602, p. 261.

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learning belong, as will be discussed below, to traditional accounts not of the Scythians but of the Getae. The effect produced by placing the Getan receptivity to teachers of Hellenistic learning at the beginning of this section, and, especially, prior to Herodotean-derived descriptions of Scythian religion and the centuries of Scythian history that follow, is to emphasize the Gothic-Getan connection before proceeding on to material that is derived from classical historical accounts of the Scythians. For Jordanes immediately follows his statement about the scholastic aptitude of the Goths with a quotation from Virgil that depicts ‘Gradivus/Mars the father who rules over the Getan fields’.13 He then comments on the pre-eminence of the god’s cult among the Goths: ‘quem Martem Gothi semper asperrima placavere cultura (nam victimae eius mortes fuere captorum), opinantes bellorum praesulem apte humani sanguinis effusione placandum’ (This Mars the Goths always worshipped with the harshest devotion; the deaths of captives were his sacrifices, for the Goths considered that the patron of their wars ought to be soothed with the spilling of human blood).14 Despite Jordanes’ citation from Virgil with its reference to Getan fields, this bloody worship of Mars is not a feature of the ethnographic portrayals of the Getae in classical authors such as Herodotus and Strabo but rather of the Scythians. According to the Herodotus, it is only amongst the Scythians that the god of war receives such singular devotion: ἀγάλματα δὲ καὶ βωμοὺς καὶ νηοὺς οὐ νομίζουσι ποιέειν πλὴν Ἄρῃ. […] ὅσους δ’ ἂν τῶν πολεμίων ζωγρήσωσι, ἀπὸ τῶν ἑκατὸν ἀνδρῶν ἄνδρα ἕνα θύουσι15 (They do not have a custom of making either statues or altars or temples except those for Ares. […] However many of their enemies they take prisoner, they sacrifice one out of every hundred [to Ares]). That is not to say, however, that there was not a precedent for associating the Getae with the cult of Mars. There are several poetic examples from the first century ad that indicate a perception amongst Romans that the Getae worshipped Mars.16 Yet only Herodotus links the cult with human sacrifice (but he does not mention the cult in his discussion of the Getae; nor does Strabo). Therefore its insertion into an ethnographic section that begins with a foregrounding of Getan traditions serves to prepare the reader to accept the author’s assertion that the traditionally discrete Scythians and Getae — the former known for their worship of Ares and practice of human sacrifice, the latter 13 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.41, p. 64: ‘gradivumque patrem, Geticis qui praesidet arvis’; Virgil, Aeneid, ed. by Mynors, iii.35, p. 154. 14 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.41, p. 64. 15 Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.59, p. 384; lxii.3, p. 386. 16 Eliade and Trask, ‘Zalmoxis’, p. 298.

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for their patronage of teachers of wisdom — should be accepted as different names referring to the same people.17 Though he himself does not explicitly profess reliance on Herodotus, there is reason to infer that Jordanes made use of Herodotus’s history in light of the date proposed by Jordanes for the Gothic departure from Scandinavia and, hence, their entrance into the known world.18 After finishing his account of the initial fall of the Gothic kingdom in 540, the two thousand and thirtieth year of the people’s history, Jordanes sets the reign of King Berig in 1490 bc. It has been suggested that such a date is significant in that it corresponds to the period during which Cassiodorus and Jordanes believed Moses led the Jews in the wilderness.19 Nevertheless, as has been pointed out by Charles Mierow, the source of the date 1490 bc is actually derived from the text of Herodotus, who cites the belief of the Scythians that the reign of their first king Targitaos took place no more than one thousand years before Darius’s failed invasion of Scythia sometime between 522 and 486 bc.20 Herodotus’s influence, therefore, seems to be present from the first ethnographic description of the Goths in Scythia in chapter 5 to the final chapter of the entire work. In order to present the Scythians as credible ancestors of the Goths, it was also necessary for Jordanes to include certain ethnographic details that the Getica’s audience would have recognized as particular to the Scythians. Greg Woolf has argued that the representation of a barbarian, or even formerly barbarian, people must be accompanied by a minimum of the familiar signposts (i.e., ethnographic tropes) that indicate the people’s identity; he draws an analogy to the perpetu17 Herodotus does offer an account of a Getan religious practice that, it would seem, often resulted in the death of a participant; however, he avers that they worship no god but their own whom they name Salmoxis Σάλμοξις or Βeleizis Βελέιζις (Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.94, p. 404). 18 It is not proven that Jordanes had the text of Herodotus in front of him. Nevertheless, it has been argued that Herodotus’s work was widely read in Late Antiquity (‘some 900 references by Greek authors between the second and seventh centuries ad are listed in the Thesaurus linguae Graecae’) and that ‘frequent citations attest consciousness of Herodotus as a weighty literary model and source of information, however outdated’ (Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, p. 408). Even if Jordanes did not quote him, Herodotus’s work was enormously influential on later ethnographic writers in both Greek and Latin, and the ethnographic tropes he established are attested at least through the sixth century. 19 Wolfram, The Roman Empire and its Germanic Peoples, p. 29; Heather, Goths and Romans, p. 54 n. 58. 20 Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.7, p. 356. Jordanes, The Gothic History of Jordanes, trans. by Mierow, p. 38 n. 1.

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ation of mythical traditions where, despite whatever changes may be made in details of the story, Medea, in the end, must always kill her children and Troy must always fall to the Greeks.21 Accordingly, if an audience is to be presented with a narrative in which the Scythians are to figure with some prominence, there are certain features of their culture or behaviour that must be included in order for the account to be convincing. In a work which represents the Scythians and Getae as being one and the same people, therefore, Jordanes presents each group in its recognizable clothes while at the same time repeatedly emphasizing their shared origin by arranging these traditionally discrete characterizations in close proximity to one another. Accordingly, he first refers to Getan fondness for teachers and Hellenistic wisdom before proceeding to description of Scythian mores. The result is an intentional blurring of the boundaries established in the classical period that facilitates Jordanes’ efforts to present the Goths of his own day as bearers of both Scythian and Getan tradition alike. A second effort to merge Scythian and Getan ethnographic profiles appears soon thereafter, when Jordanes supports his claim that the Goths were the first among all their neighbouring peoples to take up the art of archery22 with a quotation taken from Lucan: ‘bend Armenian bows with Getan strings’.23 Although this quotation refers to the Getae, the ethnographic tradition primarily associates the art of archery not with the Getae but rather with the Scythians.24 For not only does Herodotus claim that the Scythians, ‘carrying their homes with them, […] are all mounted archers’, but he also relates a Scythian origin myth in which the bow plays a central role.25 In this origin myth, Heracles, 21

Woolf, Tales of the Barbarian, p. 114. Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.43, p. 65: ‘Quorum studium fuit primum inter alias gentes vicinas arcum intendere nervis’. 23 Lucan, Bellum civile, ed. by Shackleton Bailey, viii.221, p. 202: ‘Armeniosque arcus Geticis intendite nervis’. 24 The association of the Scythians with archery was widespread. For example, Xenophon claims, φανερὸν δ’ ὅτι Λακεδαιμόνιοι οὔτ’ ἂν Θρᾳξὶ πέλταις καὶ ἀκοντίοις οὔτε Σκύθαις τόξοις ἐθέλοιεν ἂν διαγωνίζεσθαι (it is clear that the Lacedaimonians would neither wish to contend with the Thracian peltasts and spear-throwers nor with Scythian archers): Xenophon, Memorabilia, ed. by Hude, iii.9.2, p. 123. The association of the Thracians with the spear as their weapon of choice goes back as far as Homer who presents them Θρήïκες ἀκρόκομοι, δολίχ’ ἔγχεα χερσὶν ἔχοντες (holding long spears in their hands): Homer, Iliad, ed. by West, iv.533, p. 137. Skinner notes the presence of the bow and quiver as indicators of ‘Scythianness’ in pictorial representations: Skinner, The Invention of Greek Ethnography, p. 72. Thucydides, however, claims that Scythians and Getae both fight as mounted archers. Thucydides, Historiae, ed. by Jones and Powell, ii.96.1. 25 Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.46, p. 378: ἀλλὰ φερέοικοι πάντες ἔωσι, ἐόντες ἱπποτοξόται. 22

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having had three sons with a woman whose body was that of a serpent from the waist down, prepares to leave and tells her that when the boys have come of age, whichever one can string the bow he has left behind should be made the inhabitant (οἰκήτορα) of the country.26 Fittingly, the son who manages to string the bow and gird himself with the belt of his father is named Skythes, and it is he from whom the Scythian kings, and the name of the country, are said to derive. The prominence of the cult of Mars/Ares alongside the wellattested Scythian pursuit of archery are further indications of the influence of Herodotus on Jordanes’ ethnographic description of the early ‘Goths’, and the inclusion of this material allows Jordanes to recount the deeds and events from the Scythian past in his account of an otherwise non-existent Gothic early history with a degree of verisimilitude. Yet there are problems here to which the author of the Getica would have had to respond. For along with the aforementioned practices of the Scythians, there are other more ideological traits by which this people had been characterized in classical ethnography that mark them as distinct from the Getae to such an extent that the most consistently appearing features in accounts of the two peoples are nearly antithetical to one another. For Herodotus portrayed the Scythians as a people inhabiting an extreme on the barbarian–civilized continuum, the outermost point in ‘a symmetrical world in which normality and balance at the centre are surrounded by the fantastic, the threatening and the beautiful’.27 Francois Hartog has noted the perceived cultural backwardness of the ‘peoples of the Black Sea, among whom not a single “learned man” (logion) is to be found and who, like the Scythians, claim to be the youngest of men’.28 The Scythians in antiquity, and the land they inhabit, are situated beyond the pale of the Graeco-Roman world. However, this essential distance of the Scythians from the cultural sphere of the Mediterranean presents problems if the Scythians are to be equated with the Getae. As quoted above, Jordanes calls the reader’s attention to the second abode of the Goths (in Dacia, Thrace, and Mysia) where they were taught by Zalmoxis, Dicineus, and Zeuta, under whose tutelage ‘the Goths stood out as being wiser than nearly all other barbarians and almost on par with the Greeks’. As he was about to invoke the Scythian cultivation of Mars/ Ares and the practice of human sacrifice, it was necessary to first establish that 26

Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.9, p. 358. Gould, Herodotus, p. 94. 28 Hartog quoting Herodotus (Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.46.1, pp. 377–78), The Mirror of Herodotus, p. 280. 27

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the Goths-Scythians are the same as the Goths-Getae who embrace the fruits of Hellenistic civilization. Yet such a merging of the Scythian and Getan traditions was not at all straightforward. For a cardinal characteristic of Scythian culture was their outright hostility to, and implicit incompatibility with, the refinements of Greek culture. While Herodotus concedes that the Scythians have such wisdom that they have grasped the effectiveness of steppe military tactics (though beyond this fact he has no love for them),29 he makes clear that ‘they shun to a great extent the use of foreign customs, those of other lands and those of the Greeks most of all’.30 In fact, this theme runs throughout the tales then recounted by Herodotus of Anacharsis and Skyles, Scythian men who in each case had come into contact with Greek learning or custom. As Anacharsis is executed by his people, ‘since he had travelled abroad to Greece and had adopted foreign ways’, 31 the Scythian king Skyles, who likewise favours Greek customs and cult practices, is driven into exile among the Thracians (among whom the Getae are traditionally numbered).32 Negotiations ensue between the Thracian king Sitalkes and the Scythians, and a Thracian refugee held by the Scythians is traded for Skyles. Herodotus notes that on being received back by the Thracians, their returned refugee is led away, but that the Scythians immediately cut off Skyles’ head. Herodotus concludes the episode by saying : ‘Thus do the Scythians uphold their own customs, and they give such penalties for those who prefer foreign practices’.33 There is, perhaps, no other people to be found in classical ethnography that is so doggedly averse to the adoption of Greek ways. As shown above, emphasis on the primal, unpolished, even savage, nature of the Scythians occurs frequently in Herodotus’s treatment of this people — aspects of the ethnographic tradition that Jordanes was compelled to attenuate in incorporating the Scythian past in an ancient Gothic historical narrative. Though no ethnographic description of the Thracians is offered in the Herodotean episodes above, their king Sitalkes, who in fact appears as a Gothic king in the Getica 29

Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.46, p. 378. Herodotus, Historiae, ed.  by Rosen, iv.76, p.  393: Ξεινικοῖσι δὲ νομαίοισι καὶ οὗτοι φεύγουσι αἰνῶς χρᾶσθαι, μήτε γέων ἀλλέων, Ἑλληνικοῖσι δὲ καὶ ἥκιστα. 31 Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.76, p. 394: διὰ τοῦτο, ὅτι ἐξεδήμησέ τε ἐς τὴν Ἑλλάδα καὶ ξεινικοῖσι ἔθεσι διεχρήσατο. 32 Herodotus, Historiae, ed.  by Rosen, iv.93, p.  403: οἱ δὲ Γέται […] Θρηίκων ἐόντες ἀνδρειότατοι καὶ δικαιότατοι (The Getae […] being the bravest and most just of the Thracians). 33 Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.80, p. 397: οὕτω μὲν περιστέλλουσι τὰ σφέτερα νόμαια Σκύθαι, τοῖσι δὲ παρακτωμένοισι ξεινικοὺς νόμους τοιαῦτα ἐπιτίμια διδοῦσι. 30

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warring against the Macedonian king Perdiccas II,34 exhibits a marked contrast to the rigid intolerance and xenophobia of the Scythians. It is therefore not surprising that Jordanes should be at pains, before entering in on the Scythian portion of his Gothic history, to prefigure with his description of Getan receptivity to Greek learning the way in which the Goths would come to embrace the very attributes to which the Scythians were described as being so diametrically opposed in classical ethnography. Moreover, while adopting some elements of the traditional Scythian ethnographic portrait, he is careful throughout not to represent the characteristic Scythian antipathy towards foreign, and especially Greek, culture. Jordanes thereby confirms that the Scythians were proto-Goths while still leaving room for the eventual Gothic entrance into the sphere of Hellenistic culture and, ultimately, into the empire itself. Jordanes likewise exercised considerable editorial discretion in his treatment of another of his sources for Scythian history, Justin’s Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus.35 As indicated by Mommsen, the account of the war in the Getica between the Egyptian king Vesosis and the Scythian king Tanausis loosely follows the narrative found in Justin’s epitome;36 Jordanes also follows Justin in claiming that the Scythians are the founders of the Parthian people.37 However, while Jordanes wished to incorporate Justin’s chronological narrative of Scythian res gestae, the ethnographic portion of the Epitome would have posed significant problems for Jordanes were it to be incorporated in the latter’s Scythian section of the Gothic history. For Justin presents the Scythians as a people untouched and uncorrupted by the pursuits of civilization. Reminiscent of Tacitus’s famous phrase regard34

Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, x.66, p. 73. The problems regarding the relationship between author and epitomator of this text are in many ways similar to those pertaining to Cassiodorus’s lost history and the Getica of Jordanes. For the sake of convenience, I will simply refer to the text as the production of Justin. For a discussion of the relationship between Justin and Pompeius Trogus, see Levene, ‘Pompeius Trogus in Tacitus’ Annals’, pp. 295–98. 36 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, vi.47, p. 66 n. 4. 37 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, vi.48, p. 66: ‘ex quorum nomine vel genere Pompeius Trogus Parthorum dicit extitisse prosapiem’. Cf. Justin, M. Iuniani Iustini Epitoma historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi, ed. by Seel, ii.1, p. 16. In a fashion imitated by Jordanes, Justin also supplies the etymology of the Parthian ethnonym claiming that it means exules ‘exiles’ in the Scythian speech (in contrast to Jordanes’ preferred term fugaces ‘fugitives’. Cf. Justin, M. Iuniani Iustini Epitoma historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi, ed. by Seel, xli.1, p. 276; and Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, vi.48, p. 67. 35

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ing the Germani that ‘good morals are more effective there than good laws are elsewhere’,38 Justin remarks that prorsus ut admirabile videatur, hoc illis naturam dare, quod Graeci longa sapientium doctrina praeceptisque philosophorum consequi nequeunt, cultosque mores incultae barbariae conlatione superari. Tanto plus in illis proficit vitiorum ignoratio quam in his cognitio virtutis. (In short, it would seem remarkable for nature to have given to them what the Greeks with the long teaching of wise men and the instructions of philosophers have been unable to achieve, and that refined [i.e., Greek] customs should fail in comparison to uncultivated barbarism. So much greater value among the Scythians does the ignorance of vice have than does the knowledge of virtue among the civilized.)39

This opposition between specifically Greek culture and learning on the one hand, and native virtue on the other, is far more consistent with the depiction of the Scythians in Herodotus than it is with their representation as proto-Goths in the Getica. Reliant as he was upon the Epitome as a source, Jordanes avoids the isolated and culturally inverse characteristics of the Scythians in his choice of material to borrow. Once having adopted enough ethnographic detail from the Herodotean tradition to establish a recognizable image of the Scythians, Jordanes was free to leave behind the rest of the qualities ascribed to them by Justin while going on to appropriate Justin’s narrative of their exploits. Yet the complete absence of any characteristics of the Scythian ethos as it appears in Justin, nevertheless, indicates Jordanes’ awareness of the fragility of the genealogy he sought to construct. The Geographica of Strabo receives similarly careful treatment. Jordanes borrowed from this text, alongside those of other classical authors, in multiple sections of the Getica in a way that indicates not a clumsy cutting and pasting of the materials at hand but rather a meticulous treatment of his sources.40 In accordance with their appearance in the works of other classical writers, Strabo’s Scythians are characterized by a noble simplicity. He claims that even the Greeks of his own day have a positive impression of Scythian character: 38

Tacitus, De origine et situ Germanorum, ed. by Winterbottom and Ogilvie, chap. 19.2, p. 47: ‘plusque ibi boni mores valent quam alibi bonae leges’. 39 Justin, M. Iuniani Iustini Epitoma historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi, ed. by Seel, ii.2, p. 19. 40 Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, p. 139, observes the ‘deliberate function of Jordanes’s intuitive geographical technique’ in his discussion of the interplay Jordanes creates between Strabo’s text and those of other geographical authorities.

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αὕτη δ’ ἡ ὑπόληψις καὶ νῦν ἔτι συμμένει παρὰ τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἁπλουστάτους τε γὰρ αὐτοὺς νομίζομεν καὶ ἥκιστα κακεντρεχεῖς εὐτελεστέρους τε πολὺ ἡμῶν καὶ αὐταρκεστέρους καίτοι ὅ γε καθ’ ἡμᾶς βίος εἰς πάντας σχεδόν τι διατέτακε τὴν πρὸς τὸ χεῖρον μεταβολήν, τρυφὴν καὶ ἡδονὰς καὶ κακοτεχνίας καὶ πλεονεξίας μυρίας πρὸς ταῦτ’ εἰσάγων. (This same judgment remains among the Greeks even now: we consider them to be the most simple, least mischievous people, and much more thrifty and self-reliant than ourselves. And yet the way of life among us has extended to pretty much all of them, importing a change for the worse: delicacy, pleasures, fraud, and infinite avarice for these things.)41

Here, as seen above in the example from Justin, the image of the Scythians is of a simple but pure people, untouched and unpolluted by contact with the vices of the Greeks. This characterization is only underscored by the admission that, in Strabo’s own day, the Scythians had begun to lose their honest nature due to their interactions with other peoples. Such an observation indicates a fundamental cultural incompatibility in that the eventual contact between the Greeks and Scythians has caused the latter to adopt only the vices of the former — the Scythians cannot learn and be improved by their exposure to the ways of the civilized world. The common theme in all of these depictions of the Scythians in the sources used by Jordanes is that they are a people who belong outside the world of Mediterranean culture and custom. As he wished to recruit the Scythians as proto-Goths in the Getica, Jordanes therefore attenuated this essential Scythian alterity as it appears in the very materials upon which he based his account. The general impression left to the reader is that the author of the Getica sought to dilute the representation of the Scythians as they were known in classical ethnography, taking just enough of their stereotypical characteristics to make them recognizable while appropriating the centuries of their history and military successes for the Goths. In this process, he not only skips over passages detailing the peripheral and uncultivated nature of the Scythians in the classical ethnographic tradition, but he also emphasizes the connection they shared with a people who dwelt closer, both geographically and culturally, to the borders of the empire: the Getae.

41

Strabo, Geographica, ed. by Meineke, vii.3.7, p. 413.

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The Goths as Getae The Getica’s first section of Gothic ethnography following their crossing over from Scandza is followed by centuries of Gotho-Scythian history before Jordanes arrives at the point where the Goths are dwelling in Thrace.42 Prior to this point in the text, Jordanes had taken care to edit the received knowledge of the Scythians in order to make them more compatible with the Getae; he provides only just enough ethnographic colouring to assure the reader that the Scythians he is describing are in fact the same people who repelled the kings of Egypt and Persia. A comparable degree of manipulation is also visible in the way in which he goes on to embellish the classical accounts of the Getae found in Herodotus and Strabo in order to bring the Goths even further out of barbaricum and into the Graeco-Roman cultural sphere. Herodotus’s account of the Getae revolves around the obscure figure Salmoxis, the Zalmoxis of the Getica, and offers little information about the people themselves beyond the author’s observation that although their resistance to the invading Darius was crushed, the Getae are, nevertheless, ‘the bravest and most just of the Thracians’.43 Herodotus supplies two accounts of the identity of Salmoxis: he is either a god worshipped with an elaborate ritual, or he was a native Getan who had once been a slave of the philosopher Pythagoras on the island of Samos. The latter account describes a scenario that indicates a cultural receptiveness of the Getae towards Greek culture that contrasts starkly with the conservatism of the Scythians: ἅτε δὲ κακοβίων τε ἐόντων τῶν Θρηίκων καὶ ὑπαφρονεστέρων, τὸν Σάλμοξιν τοῦτον ἐπιστάμενον δίαιτάν τε Ἰάδα καὶ ἤθεα βαθύτερα ἢ κατὰ Θρήικας — οἷα Ἕλλησί τε ὁμιλήσαντα καὶ Ἑλλήνων οὐ τῷ ἀσθενεστάτῳ σοφιστῇ Πυθαγόρῃ — κατασκευάσασθαι ἀνδρεῶνα, ἐς τὸν πανδοκεύοντα τῶν ἀστῶν τοὺς πρώτους καὶ εὐωχέοντα ἀναδιδάσκειν, ὡς οὔτε αὐτὸς οὔτε οἱ συμπόται αὐτοῦ οὔτε οἱ ἐκ τούτων αἰεὶ γινόμενοι ἀποθανέονται, ἀλλ’ ἥξουσι ἐς χῶρον τοῦτον, ἵνα αἰεὶ περιεόντες ἕξουσι τὰ πάντα ἀγαθά. (Since the Thracians lived wretchedly and ignorantly, [the Greeks say] that this Salmoxis understood the Ionian way of life and customs that were more advanced than those of the Thracians — things enjoyed by the Greeks and one of their greatest sages, Pythagoras. [They say that] he prepared a banqueting hall and that, acting as a host and entertaining them, he taught the best men of the city that neither he himself nor his drinking companions nor their children should ever die, but that 42 Specifically in the city of Odessus. Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed.  by Mommsen, x.65, pp. 72–73. 43 See above, n. 32.

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they should come to a place where they should have all good things while living on forever.)44

There are several aspects of this account worth commenting on. First, the Thracians are shown to live in a state of cultural inferiority when compared with the Greeks; there is no sense of their being a people who inhabit the inverted or parallel world of the Scythian periphery. Unlike the Scythians, the Getae do not profit from their distance from the civilized centre. On the contrary: in accordance with their greater proximity to it, the Getae recognize Greek superiority and welcome a teacher from the Greek world — significantly, a slave of a Greek philosopher, whose unfree status further emphasizes the sense that the Getae are a part of the Greek world but merely occupy the lowest rung on the cultural ladder. Salmoxis then transmits philosophical or divine learning for the improvement of his own barbarous people. The contrast with the Scythians’ violent reaction against any who dare to cross the cultural divide or presume to import foreign custom could not be more apparent. Moreover, in place of more conventional ethnographic descriptions of economy or warfare, the Getae’s defining characteristic for Herodotus is their reception and worship of this civilizing figure.45 Salmoxis also appears in Strabo, though modern editions render the name Zamolxis.46 Strabo adds several details to his account of this figure, which Jordanes in the Getica actually attributes not to Zalmoxis himself, but rather 44

Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.95, pp. 404–05. Although this paragraph refers only to the Thracians by name, it figures in a passage devoted to the Getae that explains their religious practices devoted to the figure Salmoxis. 45

I know of only two instances where Salmoxis/Zamolxis and his worship are associated with the Scythians, and one of these appears in Lucian, The Scythian or the Consul, ed. by Henderson, trans. by Kilburn, chap. 1, pp. 240–41. Interestingly, Lucian nevertheless prefers traditional distinctions by referring to the Thracian Zamolxis in parallel to the Scythian Anacharsis in Lucian, A True Story, ed. by Henderson, trans. by Harmon, ii.17, pp. 318–19. Lucian also represents the Getae as a Scythian people in his Parliament of the Gods, although he elsewhere refers to them as Thracians, as noted by Harmon. See Lucian, Parliament of the Gods, ed. by Henderson, trans. by Harmon, chap. 9, pp. 430–31 n. 1. The only other author I know of to associate Zamolxis with the Scythians, and not with the Getae or Thracians, is Celsus as quoted in Origen. Origen, Contra Celsum, trans. by Chadwick, ii.55, p. 109. 46 The orthography of this name varied in antiquity. Manuscripts of both Herodotus’s Histories (Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, iv.94–95, p. 404) and the Getica ( Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, v.39, p. 64) show a number of variant spellings for this name: Ζάλμοχιν, Σάμολξιν, Σάλμοξιν, Ζάμολξιν; and zalmoxen, zalmosen, zalmonen, zalmozen, dalmoxen, zalimoxem, respectively.

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to a similar figure, Dicineus, who will be discussed below. Regarding Zamolxis, Strabo gives the following account: Λέγεται γάρ τινα τῶν Γετῶν ὄνομα Ζάμολξιν δουλεῦσαι Πυθαγόρᾳ καί τινα τῶν οὐρανίων παρ’ ἐκείνου μαθεῖν, τὰ δὲ καὶ παρ’ Αἰγυπτίων πλανηθέντα καὶ μέχρι δεῦρο· ἐπανελθόντα δ’ εἰς τὴν οἰκείαν σπουδασθῆναι παρὰ τοῖς ἡγεμόσι καὶ τῷ ἔθνει προλέγοντα τὰς ἐπισημασίας, τελευτῶντα δὲ πεῖσαι τὸν βασιλέα κοινωνὸν τῆς ἀρχῆς αὐτὸν λαβεῖν ὡς τὰ παρὰ τῶν θεῶν ἐξαγγέλλειν ἱκανόν. (For it is said that among the Getae there was a certain man named Zamolxis, who was a slave of Pythagoras and who learned things about the heavens from him, along with other things even from the Egyptians since he had wandered so far as that. On returning to his home, he was made much of among both leaders and the people as he could predict changes of the weather; he managed to convince the king to make him co-ruler, since he was capable of proclaiming the messages of the gods.)47

In this case, the former slave of Pythagoras has learned astronomy and other wisdom from Egypt and is given a place of political and religious authority among the Getae. As in Herodotus, the civilizing figure is central to Strabo’s account of the Getae; his relationship to the Getae, and their willingness not just to tolerate but to venerate him, is again presented as the most noteworthy feature of this people. Strabo goes on to claim that the practice of venerating wise men is even in his own day a custom of the Getae and that these sage figures are addressed as gods by their people.48 Strabo also tells of another teacher who comes to subsume the role of Zalmoxis in the Getica as a teacher of celestial and philosophical wisdom. Jordanes’ account of the reign of the Gothic king Buruista has long been identified with Strabo’s Burebistas,49 who ‘lifted up [his people] through discipline and sobriety and attendance to his instructions such that, in a space of few years, he won a great empire and subjugated most of his neighbours to the Getae’ and ‘was even a source of fear to the Romans’.50 Crucial to this ascent of the Getae to a position of dominance on the middle Danube is the service of the sage advisor Dekaineos: 47

Strabo, Geographica, ed. by Meineke, vii.3.5, p. 409. Strabo, Geographica, ed. by Meineke, vii.3.5, p. 409. 49 Jordanes, The Gothic History of Jordanes, trans. by Mierow, p. 155. 50 Strabo, Geographica, ed. by Meineke, vii.3.11, p. 417: ἐπῆρεν ἀσκήσει καὶ νήψει καὶ τῷ προσέχειν τοῖς προστάγμασιν, ὥστ’ ὀλίγων ἐτῶν μεγάλην ἀρχὴν κατεστήσατο καὶ τῶν ὁμόρων τοὺς πλείστους ὑπέταξε τοῖς Γέταις· ἤδη δὲ καὶ Ῥωμαίοις φοβερὸς ἦν. 48

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πρὸς δὲ τὴν εὐπείθειαν τοῦ ἔθνους συναγωνιστὴν ἔσχε Δεκαίνεον ἄνδρα γόητα, πεπλανημένον κατὰ τὴν Αἴγυπτον καὶ προσημασίας ἐκμεμαθηκότα τινάς, δι’ ὧν ὑπεκρίνετο τὰ θεῖα·καὶ δι’ ὀλίγου καθίστατο θεός, καθάπερ ἔφαμεν περὶ τοῦ Ζαμόλξεως διηγούμενοι. τῆς δ’ εὐπειθείας σημεῖον ἐπείσθησαν γὰρ ἐκκόψαι τὴν ἄμπελον καὶ ζῆν οἴνου χωρίς. ([Boirebistas] had the man Dekaineos, a sorcerer, as an aid to procuring the obedience of the people; he had wandered to Egypt and mastered certain omens through which he expounded divine matters. And soon he was deified in the same way as I said when giving an account about Zamolxis. This is a proof of their obedience: for they were persuaded to chop down their vineyard and to live without wine.)51

Like Zamolxis, this semi-divine teacher and political advisor is a great boon to the Getae and a civilizing force. It may be objected here that the abstention from wine may in fact indicate a reversion to barbarian custom, as it is a commonplace that production and consumption of wine was a symbol of civilization in the ancient Mediterranean world.52 However, what was considered to be stereotypically barbaric practice was not the unwillingness to drink wine but rather the inability to cultivate it or restrain oneself in the enjoyment of it. Herodotus recounts two instances where nomads (Massagetae in one case and Scythians in another) are overcome by intoxication and thus defeated.53 When considered in the light of other barbarian stereotypes (i.e., excessive consumption of alcohol, lack of discipline, lack of any central authority, etc.), it is clear that Dekaineos is a figure whose function is to raise the Getae out of their barbarous condition and grant them a degree of social cohesion and organization that separates them from other barbarians and poses a unique threat to the Romans.54 In general, the picture of the Getae presented thus far is one that stands in marked contrast to that of the Scythians. Whereas the latter are wholly intoler51

Strabo, Geographica, ed. by Meineke, vii.3.11, p. 417. For example, see Bonfante, ‘Classical and Barbarian’, p. 23. 53 See Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, i.207–12, pp. 129–34; and i.106, p. 71, respectively. See Herodotus, Historiae, ed. by Rosen, vi.84, pp. 123–24, for the origins of the expression ‘Scythian pour’, a marker of Scythian intemperance. 54 The accounts of Zamolxis and Dekaineos in Strabo have a further significance in that they demonstrate that categories of barbarism and civilization were not nearly so black and white as some scholars have presented them. As one scholar has put it regarding the peoples inhabiting territories beyond the northern frontiers, ‘the men from these regions could never learn to control themselves, and hence never learned to live in cities, govern themselves by laws or to control their emotions. They had no education’ (Amory, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, p. 20). Such an assessment hardly applies to the Getae. 52

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ant and ignorant of Greek culture and learning, the former show themselves to be eager students of the Greeks and even of the Egyptians. Far from being an event that weakens and enervates their native virtue, contact with the Greek world raises up the Getae to a state where they not only embrace the speculative wisdom of foreigners but also learn to restrain themselves with practical military discipline. Such a contrast should give us pause in light of the recent assertion that ‘it was a convention of classical authors, from Herodotus onwards, to ignore the individual names and identities of peoples successively inhabiting these regions [Thrace, Dacia, and Scythia]’.55 On the contrary, a closer reading of texts treating the peoples being discussed here indicates that these names, and the associations which accompanied them, continued to carry force even into the sixth century. Jordanes builds on this inherited characterization of the Getae and portrays the Goths, now made the descendants of his less barbaric Scythians, as a people whose capacity to embrace the cultural achievements of the Mediterranean is rivalled only by their military prowess. Dekaineos, or Dicineus as he appears in the Getica, is the facilitator of this process, and his role is even more transformative in Jordanes’ work than in Strabo’s. As he appears in chapter 11 of the Getica, Dicineus is not only an important counsellor to the king but, as in Strabo, he is also a semi-divine advisor. Under Dicineus’s guidance, the Gothic king Buruista reaches the apogee of his power, laying waste the lands of the Germani and defying Roman efforts to subjugate them.56 Indeed, he becomes so crucial that for the Goths ‘it was their well-being, their benefit, and their wish that they should, in any way possible, accomplish whatever their advisor Dicineus should instruct’.57 Of the three figures mentioned in chapter 5 of the Getica (Zeuta, Dicineus, Zalmoxis), Dicineus is the only one given extensive treatment, and in this single figure Jordanes also includes the characteristics attributed to the Salmoxis/ Zamolxis of Herodotus and Strabo.58 For example, Dicineus is a teacher of phi55 Liebeschuetz, ‘Making Gothic History’, p. 200. Amory, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, pp.  20–21, has similarly argued that ‘since geography determined the characteristics of gentes, the same regions kept pouring forth barbarians with the same characteristics. Even though these barbarians bore a different name, they were essentially the same and might even be given the same name, the so-called “doctrine of transference”’. 56 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.67–68, p. 73. 57 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.69, pp. 73–74: ‘quibus hoc erat salubre, hoc adcommodum, hoc votivum, ut, quidquid Dicineus eorum consiliarius precepisset, hoc modis omnibus expetendum’. 58 No known literary precedent has as yet been identified for first of the three teachers of

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losophy, an attribute clearly derived from the tradition of Salmoxis/Zamolxis, who served as a slave to Pythagoras before teaching the Getae: ‘omnem pene phylosophiam eos instruxit […] logicam instruens rationis eos supra ceteras gentes fecit expertes’ (He taught them nearly the entirety of philosophy […] instructing them in the logic of reasoning he rendered them more skilled than other peoples).59 Like the Zamolxis of Strabo, Dicineus is skilled in the interpretation of the heavens. However, whereas Strabo had contented himself with a vague statement that Zamolxis ‘learned things about the heavens’ from Pythagoras and that, among the Getae, he was engaged in ‘predicting changes of the weather’, Jordanes goes into far greater detail about the astronomical instruction imparted by Dicineus: theoreticen demonstrans signorum duodecem et per ea planetarum cursus omnemque astronomiam contemplari edocuit, et quomodo lunaris urbis augmentum sustinet aut patitur detrimentum, edixit, solisque globum igneum quantum terreno orbe in mensura excedat, ostendit, aut quibus nominibus vel quibus signis in polo caeli vergente et revergente trecentae quadraginta et sex stellae ab ortu in occasu precipites ruant, exposuit. (Teaching them the art of observation of the twelve signs, he instructed them through these to contemplate the courses of the planets and all of astronomy; he explained how the lunar orb maintains its increase or endures its reduction; he showed how much the fiery ball of the sun exceeds the terrestrial orb in measure; he set forth either by which names or which signs the three hundred forty-six stars rush headlong from their rising to their falling along the inclining and declining axis of heaven.)60

One is struck here by how far Jordanes has gone in his elaboration of the wisdom imparted to the Getae by their teacher. By presenting such a detailed description of their astronomical observations, he demonstrates the manner in which they indeed ‘stood out as wiser than nearly all other barbarians and almost on par with the Greeks’.61 Jordanes has chosen not to emphasize the magical or mystical qualities of Dicineus as he appears in Strabo (described there as a ‘sorcerer’ whose knowledge stems only from his travels in Egypt and is, therefore, somewhat the Goths listed by Jordanes, Zeuta. See Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes, and the History of the Goths, p. 244. 59 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.69, p. 74. 60 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.69, p. 74. 61 See above, n. 10.

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exotic), but rather the sage’s expertise in natural philosophy. Nor is the Goths’ curiosity limited to scrutiny of the heavens: Jordanes marvels at what a joy it was for such ‘viri fortissimi’ not only to follow the courses of the heavenly bodies but also ‘to explore the natures of shrubs and vegetation’.62 That such investigations were the chosen employment of the Goths ‘when free for the shortest while from their weapons’ shows how drastically different, according to Jordanes, these barbarians are from the idle, gambling Germani of Tacitus.63 The Goths are satisfied not by the fulfilment of their physical needs but rather of their intellectual curiosity; when faced with phenomena in the natural world, they are ‘at peace when they have grasped the reason’.64 Whereas Jordanes attenuates and edits his sources in crafting his depiction of the Goths as Scythians, he expands and embellishes accounts of the Getae to push the Goths even further inwards from the liminal space inhabited by the Getae in the ethnographic tradition. Jordanes also emphasizes the Gothic willingness to submit to the authority of a teacher who introduces foreign customs, a distinctive feature of the Getae that separates them from the Scythians. For a prerequisite to Dicineus’s instruction of the Goths in the Getica is that he ‘perceived their minds to heed him in all things’.65 In addition to this receptivity towards foreign instruction, the Goths adopt an institution not only unmentioned in earlier accounts of the Getae but also, as has now become a familiar pattern, contradictory to the nature of Scythian society: ‘nam ethicam eos erudiens barbaricos mores conpescuit; fysicam tradens naturaliter propriis legibus vivere fecit’ (For educating them in moral philosophy, he curbed their barbarian ways; teaching them physics, he caused them to live under their own laws according to nature’).66 62

Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.70, p. 74: ‘herbarum fruticumque explorare naturas’. 63 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.70, p. 74: ‘quando ab armis quantolumcumque vacassent’; Tacitus, De origine et situ Germanorum, ed. by Winterbottom and Ogilvie, chaps 22–24, pp. 48–49. 64 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.70, p. 74: ‘ratione accepta quiescere’. Jordanes may well have intended here an allusion to Virgil’s famous axiom, ‘felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas’ (happy is he who has been able to understand the causes of things): Virgil, Georgica, ed. by Mynors, ii.490, p. 61. Interestingly, this line in the Georgics follows a similar scene of natural contemplation that ranges from celestial to terrestrial phenomena; the reference to the ‘coniurato descendens Dacus ab Histro’ (Dacian swooping down from the plotting Ister) soon after in line 497 of the Georgics offers further suggestion of a Virgilian influence on this passage of the Getica. 65 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.69, p. 74: ‘cernens eorum animos sibi in omnibus oboedire’. 66 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.69, p. 74.

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This adoption of laws and the curbing of native custom stand in opposition to the claim of Justin — an author on whom Jordanes relied heavily for the Scythian centuries of Gothic history — that the Scythians achieve a higher standard of moral behaviour in their ignorance than do the Greeks with their philosophical teaching. Jordanes has not only marked how far out of the barbarian world the Goths have travelled; he has also demonstrated that they have now acquired cultural institutions that assimilate them ever more closely to the norms and customs so evident in the history of the Romans themselves. For like the Romans, the Goths too have added intellectual pursuits to their prowess in battle; under the tutelage of Dicineus, they have learned reverence for the rule of law and submission to authority. This last development receives special attention in the Getica when Jordanes supplies the name of the laws in the Gothic language: belagines. That Jordanes provides this term, along with the assertion that they continue to be so called even in his own day,67 further suggests an implied parity with the Roman tradition. In step with this decisive transition into the Graeco-Roman sphere, Jordanes smooths over a significant ethnographic lacuna: the determined resistance to Mediterranean influence, in earlier accounts so characteristic of the Scythians, which Jordanes took pains to leave out.

Conclusions It was suggested above that the representation of foreign peoples in ethnographic literature is similar to the retelling of myths: there is considerable flexibility in the details and colour of the presentation, but there are certain fundamental features that must be preserved, a sort of mythic core that is essential for the readers’ orientation.68 The negotiation of this process, the selection of certain paradigmatic features from the ethnographic tradition followed by the manipulation and reworking of this material, is clearly on display in the Getica. This was the only way in which Jordanes was able to fulfil one of the objectives of his project: to gloss over the inherent contradictions and antitheses inherent in the received descriptions of Scythians and Getae in order to combine them into one convincing historical account of a single Gothic gens. But what purpose did such a project serve? And how might it have conditioned a reading of the text? Andrew Gillett has argued that an interpretation of the Getica must give due weight to the inheritance of classical ethnography, 67 Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed. by Mommsen, xi.69, p. 74: ‘quas usque nunc conscriptas belagines nuncupant’. 68 See above, n. 21.

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but that the conclusion to be drawn from such a reading is that Jordanes uses this inheritance to ‘alienate the audience from his barbarous subject’ and that the text ‘exploit[s] the potent, alienating concept of the barbarian Other’.69 This analysis, while acknowledging the ethnographic tradition that provides much of the narrative structure for Jordanes’ early Gothic history, needs to go further. If the author of the Getica had lifted his material from his sources indiscriminately and with no effort to reconcile the inconsistencies that would result from such a method, then indeed we would be left with a text that has simply parroted the ancient tropes and, along with them, the attitudes towards, and qualities ascribed to, the ‘barbarian’ as he was conceived in the classical period — if such a simple conceptual figure may even be identified outside of the modern imagination. However, that is clearly not what Jordanes did. Far from appropriating ethnographic tropes wholesale, Jordanes sought to dilute the alterity of the Scythians, on the one hand, and to embellish and extend the Getae’s receptivity and capacity for the fruits of civilization on the other. Rather than employ a rhetoric of exclusion that might belong to an age secure behind its barriers of either geography or armies, the narrative presented by Jordanes between chapters 5 and 11 of the Getica serves to pull the Goths progressively into the Graeco-Roman world — in an age which had already witnessed the political and military boundaries of the past collapse. Such a project could respond to a new need to ‘classify, rationalize and normalize a changing and uncertain world’.70 Moreover, such selective use of his sources allowed Jordanes to grant the Goths a cultural progression: the Goths are not fixed in an eternal present of ethnography but change to an unprecedented degree, perhaps one of the most significant aspects of the work in light of emerging new world views in Late Antiquity. The Scythians had always been hostile towards, and kept themselves apart from, the Graeco-Roman world, and they were corrupted when they finally became influenced by Mediterranean civilization. The Getae had risen to great heights under Dekaineos but, as shown in their early patronage of Salmoxis/ Zamolxis, they had ever been distinct from the Scythians in their willingness to adapt to and accept foreign teachings. In either case, things had always been thus in the historical imagination. By constructing a narrative that illustrates the gradual transition of the Goths from Scythian alterity to an increasingly civilized Geto-Gothic ethos, the journey of a people on a trajectory to rule the heartland of the Western Empire (however briefly and tenuously), Jordanes 69 70

Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, p. 405. Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, p. 163.

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reconfigures the received ethnographic knowledge of antiquity in order to, with as much verisimilitude as possible, explain a new people in the terms of a most ancient past. Viewed in this light, Jordanes had a greater purpose before him in the construction of this ethno-genealogy than merely to ‘give the Goths a proper classical history in no fewer than twelve books’.71 Irrespective of what one concludes about the ultimate aims of the Getica, whether it is a work to glorify the Gothic rule of Italy or an ironic satire of barbarian presumption, the text presents a fundamental innovation in the ethnographic discourse on northern peoples inherited from antiquity. For if nothing else, Jordanes, and probably Cassiodorus before him, has abandoned the rhetorical strategy of ‘denial of coevalness’ to an unprecedented degree72 — the eternal present of barbaricum in the Graeco-Roman imagination has been replaced with a chronology of cultural change, however flawed in its historical accuracy.

71

Liebeschuetz, ‘Making Gothic History’, p. 199. Fabian, Time and the Other, p. 31, defines the ‘denial of coevalness’ as ‘a persistent and systematic tendency to place the referent(s) of anthropology in a Time other than the present of the producer of anthropological discourse’. 72

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Works Cited Primary Sources Claudian, Bellum Geticum, ed. by John B. Hall, Claudii Claudiani Carmina, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Stuttgart: Teubner, 2010), pp. 240–62 Herodotus, Historiae, ed.  by Haiim  B. Rosen, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana, 2 vols (Leipzig: Teubner, 1987) Homer, Ilias, ed. by Martin L. West, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana, 2 vols (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1998) Jordanes, De origine actibusque Getarum, ed.  by Theodor Mommsen, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin and Hanover, 1877–1919), v.1: Iordanis Romana et Getica (Berlin: Weidmann, 1882) —— , The Gothic History of Jordanes: In English Version with an Introduction and a Commentary, trans. by Charles C. Mierow (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1915) Justin, Epitoma historiarum Philippicarum Pompei Trogi: accedunt prologi in Pompeium Trogum, ed. by Otto Seel, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1985) Lucan, De bello civili libri X, ed. by David R. Shackleton Bailey, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1997) Lucian, A True Story, ed.  by Jeffrey Henderson, trans. by A.  M. Harmon, in Lucian, i, The Loeb Classical Library, 14 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1913), pp. 247–357 —— , The Parliament of the Gods, ed. by Jeffrey Henderson, trans. by A. M. Harmon, in Lucian, v, The Loeb Classical Library, 302 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1936), pp. 417–41 —— , The Scythian or the Consul, ed. by Jeffrey Henderson, trans. by K. Kilburn, in Lucian, vi, The Loeb Classical Library, 430 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959), pp. 239–57 Origen, Contra Celsum, trans. by Henry Chadwick (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980) Strabo, Geographica, ed.  by August Meineke, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana, 3 vols (Leipzig: Teubner, 1877; repr. 1969) Tacitus, De origine et situ Germanorum, ed.  by Michael Winterbottom and Robert  M. Ogilvie, in Cornelii Taciti opera minora, Scriptorum classicorum bibliotheca Oxoniensis (Oxford: Clarendon, 1975), pp. 37–62 Thucydides, Historiae, ed. by Henry S. Jones and J. Enoch Powell, Scriptorum classicorum bibliotheca Oxoniensis, 2 vols (Oxford: Clarendon, 1942) Virgil, Aeneid, ed. by Roger A. B. Mynors, in P. Vergili Maronis opera, Scriptorum classicorum bibliotheca Oxoniensis (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969), pp. 103–422 —— , Georgica, ed. by Roger A. B. Mynors, in P. Vergili Maronis opera, Scriptorum classicorum bibliotheca Oxoniensis (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969), pp. 29–101

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Xenophon, Memorabilia, ed.  by Karl Hude, Xenophontos Apomnēmoneumata  = Xenophontis Commentarii, Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1985)

Secondary Works Amory, Patrick, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, 489–554 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) Bonfante, Larissa, ‘Classical and Barbarian’, in The Barbarians of Ancient Europe, ed. by Larissa Bonfante (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 1–36 Christensen, Arne Søby, Cassiodorus, Jordanes, and the History of the Goths: Studies in Migration Myth (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2002) Eliade, Mircea, and Willard R. Trask, ‘Zalmoxis’, History of Religions, 11 (1972), 257–302 Fabian, Johannes, Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983) Gillett, Andrew, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes: Concepts of the Barbarian, Then and Now’, in A Companion to Late Antiquity, ed. by Philip Rousseau (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2009), pp. 392–408 Goffart, Walter, The Narrators of Barbarian History (AD 550–800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988) —— , ‘Jordanes’s “Getica” and the Disputed Authenticity of Gothic Origins from Scandinavia’, Speculum, 80 (2005), 379–98 Gould, John, Herodotus (New York: St. Martin’s, 1989) Green, Dennis  H., ‘Linguistic Evidence for the Early Migration of the Goths’, in The Visigoths from the Migration Period to the Seventh Century: An Ethnographic Perspective, ed. by Peter J. Heather (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1999), pp. 11–32 Hartog, Francois, The Mirror of Herodotus: The Representation of the Other in the Writing of History, trans. by Janet Lloyd (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988) Heather, Peter J., Goths and Romans: 332–489 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1991) Levene, David S., ‘Pompeius Trogus in Tacitus’ Annals’, in Ancient Historiography and its Contents: Studies in Honor of A.J. Woodman, ed. by Christina S. Kraus, John Marincola, and Christopher Pelling (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 294–311 Liebeschuetz, John H. W. G., ‘Making Gothic History: Does the Getica of Jordanes Preserve Genuinely Gothic Traditions?’, Journal of Late Antiquity, 4 (2011), 185–216 Merrills, Andrew H., History and Geography in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) Skinner, Joseph E., The Invention of Greek Ethnography: From Homer to Herodotus (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) Wolfram, Herwig, The Roman Empire and its Germanic Peoples, trans. by Thomas Dunlap (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997) Woolf, Greg, Tales of the Barbarian: Ethnography and Empire in the Roman West (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011)

Two Tales — Two Peoples? Goths and Romans in Jordanes’ Works Philipp Dörler*

J

ordanes is one of the most controversial and probably also most exciting scholars of the sixth century.1 He wrote two histories, telling the stories of two different peoples: the Goths and the Romans, respectively. Even though these works have been the subject of much scholarly discussion, the relationship between the two peoples in these texts has yet to be investigated, despite the fact that Jordanes was uniquely placed to teach us something about their relationship. Seen as an author of — however distant — Gothic origins writing in Constantinople, Jordanes can be regarded as an archetypal cultural broker.2 By carefully comparing and contrasting Jordanes’ descriptions of Goths and Romans, I will show that Jordanes did not only plead for the equality of the two groups, but also showed a keen interest in maintaining the differences between them. Jordanes’ portrayal of Goths and Romans in both works will be investigated in order to elucidate his view of their commonalities and differences. For this purpose, I will start with a brief discussion of Jordanes as an author, as well as * Gerda Heydemann, Walter Pohl, and Ian Wood read drafts of this article. I am grateful for the comments. The research leading to these results received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007– 2013) / ERC grant agreement No. 269591. 1 Cf. Swanson, ‘Re-Inventing the Goths’. 2 Reimitz, ‘The Historian as Cultural Broker’, p. 54; cf. Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, pp. 405–06.

Philipp Dörler worked as a researcher in the ERC-funded project ‘Social Cohesion, Identity and Religion in Europe, 400–1200’ at the University of Vienna from 2012–16. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 121–146 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118563

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of the relationship between his two works. Second, I will examine the most significant categories that Jordanes used to describe the groups: ancestry, trade relations, military activities, culture, and his characterizations of particular individuals, such as rulers or military leaders. I will conclude with some general observations on the conception of Goths and Romans in Jordanes’ texts. Little is known about Jordanes’ life. Most scholars think it likely that he worked for a Roman official of barbarian origin who served at the imperial court at Constantinople. He traced his own descent from the Gothic gens and was working as notarius in the Roman army before his conversio.3 He probably died shortly after 552. Two of Jordanes’ texts are extant and will concern us here. His best-known work is the so-called Getica, named by Jordanes ‘De origine actibusque Getice gentis’ (The Origin and Deeds of the Getic People).4 The other, nowadays usually known as the Romana, mainly focuses on Roman history and is — as Jordanes himself put it — an ‘Adbreviatio chronicorum’ (Abbreviation of the Chronicles)5 that provides an account of ‘the trials of the present world or when it began or what has been endured up to our time’.6 The names Getica and Romana do not appear in the manuscripts, but go back to Theodor Mommsen’s MGH edition of 1882.7 3

Jordanes, Getica, ed.  by Mommsen, l.266, p.  126: ‘Cuius Candacis Alanoviiamuthis patris mei genitor Paria, id est meus avus, notarius, quousque Candac ipse viveret, fuit, eiusque germanae filio Gunthicis, qui et Baza dicebatur, mag. mil., filio Andages fili Andele de prosapia Amalorum descendente, ego item quamvis agramatus Iordannis ante conversionem meam notarius fui.’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 127: ‘Paria, the father of my father Alanoviiamuth (that is to say, my grandfather), was secretary to this Candac as long as he lived. To his sister’s son Gunthigis, also called Baza, the Master of the Soldiery, who was the son of Andag the son of Andela, who was descended from the stock of the Amali, I also, Jordanes, although an unlearned man before my conversion, was secretary.’) Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, lx.316, p. 138: ‘Nec me quis in favorem gentis praedictae, quasi ex ipsa trahenti originem, aliqua addidisse credat, quam quaelegi et comperi’. (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 142: ‘Let no one believe that to the advantage of the gens of which I have spoken – though indeed I trace my own descent from it – I have added aught besides what I have read or learned by inquiry’.) To consider ‘ex ipsa trahenti originem’ just as ‘distant’ ancestry, as Gillett (‘Jordanes and Ablabius’, p. 483) suggests, is rather bold — in my opinion, this statement represents a clear Gothic self-identification. Cf. Liebeschuetz, ‘Making a Gothic History’, p. 168. 4 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 4, p. 2; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 5 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, 1, p. 53; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 51. 6 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 2, p. 1: ‘mundi erumnas […] aut quando coepit vel quid ad nos usque perpessus est’ (Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes). 7 Mommsen, Iordanis Romana et Getica, p. iii. The titles vary in the manuscripts, ‘De origine mundi et actibus Romanorum ceterarumque gentium. De origine vel actibus Romanorum liber’

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Even though the date and political background of both texts’ production have been discussed extensively,8 scholarly debate has mostly focused on the Getica, in particular on the extent and nature of its dependence on an earlier, now lost, work of Cassiodorus. The latter was a high official at the court of the Ostrogothic king Theoderic the Great, on whose behalf he wrote a Gothic history that has not survived. It has often been assumed that the Getica is merely an epitome of this lost history.9 Ian Wood suggests that the arguments collected by Arne Christensen indicate that Jordanes did create more than an abbreviated copy of Cassiodorus’s work, even though Christensen does not allow Jordanes a voice of his own.10 Nevertheless, the Getica might largely be based on Cassiodorus’s work.11 There has been a similar discussion regarding the Romana, in which Wilhelm Ensslin thought to have detected Symmachus’s lost Roman history; a theory that Brian Croke disproved in 1983.12 Jordanes is, however, still frequently considered a mere copyist or epitomator. Only in recent years has Jordanes come to be appreciated as an author who made his own narrative choices based on his ideas of history and views on the world around him.13 (Paris, BnF, lat. 4860) is only one title of the Romana. Nonetheless, the parallelism to ‘De origine actibusque Getice gentis’ is quite noteworthy. 8 For the dating of the Getica cf. Heather, The Goths, pp. 47–49; Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, p. 98, as well as Barnish, ‘The Genesis and Completion of Cassiodorus’ Gothic History’. For the discussion of historiography under Justinian cf. Goltz, Barbar – König – Tyrann, pp. 86–116; Bjornlie, Politics and Tradition between Rome, Ravenna and Constantinople, pp. 82–123. 9 The form ‘Cassiodorus-Jordanes’ is used to refer to the close relationship between the two texts. For his dependence on Cassiodorus cf. Mommsen, Iordanis Romana et Getica, pp. xxx– xliv; Momigliano, ‘Cassiodorus and Italian Culture of his Time’; Weißensteiner, ‘Cassiodor/ Jordanes als Geschichtsschreiber’; others plead for his independence, cf. Bradley, ‘Composition of the Getica’; Várady, ‘Jordanes-Studien’; Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 58–62; Croke, ‘Cassiodorus and the Getica of Jordanes’. A short discussion can be found at Goffart, ‘Jordanes’s Getica and the Disputed Authenticity of Gothic Origins from Scandinavia’, pp. 383–85. 10 Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths; Wood, ‘Arne Søby Christensen’. 11 Cf. Barnish, ‘The Genesis and Completion of Cassiodorus’ Gothic History’, p. 337: ‘we should consider how clumsy and inadequate is Jordanes’ abbreviation of the History’; Heather, ‘Theoderic, King of the Goths’, p. 146, highlights Cassiodorus’s influence on the example of the Amal genealogy; Heather, ‘The Historical Culture of Ostrogothic Italy’, pp. 341–44. 12 Ensslin, Des Symmachus Historia Romana als Quelle für Jordanes; Croke, ‘A.D. 476’, p. 95. 13 Cf. Croke, ‘Jordanes and the Immediate Past’, p. 473.

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The interest in Jordanes and his works derives not least from his reference to Gothic ancestry. Jordanes’ origin is occasionally called into question, as are his geographical location and self-identification. The idea of a Gothic author writing in Constantinople has also led historians to debate his likely perspective on events. Some scholars assume that Jordanes’ works represent a Gothic point of view and that it was his aim to characterize the Gothic people as equal to the Romans.14 Others have argued the opposite, that he intended to legitimize Justinian’s policies and wars against the Goths in Italy.15 As I will show, Jordanes’ position cannot be characterized simplistically as either pro-Gothic or pro-Roman. He mediated between the different viewpoints by arguing for the importance of both groups. Neither Romans nor Goths can develop their full potential without the other. Most recent discussion has focused on how much of a traditional Gothic narrative might have been preserved in Jordanes’ texts, particularly the Getica. To retell the Gothic past, Jordanes used mostly Greek and Roman texts that were not primarily concerned with the Goths. It is likely that he did so intentionally, so that ‘the Goths can participate in well-known events from the Graeco-Roman past’.16 We should not, therefore, read the Getica as representing an authentically ‘Gothic’ understanding of their own history.17 Jordanes does not propagate a simple Roman or Gothic identity. The Getica does not only tell us the story of the Goths: the Romans and the Roman Empire play a major role within the text. Yet in modern research this role is often reduced to the Roman people serving as the ideal towards which the Goths are to strive. Due to the overwhelming focus on the Getica, the Goths, and Gothic history, the role of the Romana and the relationship between Goths and Romans in Jordanes’ works was for a long time neglected by scholars.18 We have to take 14

Cf. Momigliano, ‘Cassiodorus and Italian Culture of his Time’. Cf. Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 42–46, Croke, ‘Latin Historiography and the Barbarian Kingdoms’, pp. 363–67. Other historians particularly emphasized Jordanes’ theological concept (see footnote 21 below). According to Ratti, who bases his arguments on the Romana, Jordanes represents a position in between (Ratti, ‘Les Romana de Jordanès et le Bréviaire d’Eutrope’, p. 175). 16 Heather, ‘Cassiodorus and the Rise of the Amals’, p.  109; Heather, ‘The Historical Culture of Ostrogothic Italy’, pp. 317–26. 17 Cf. Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, pp. 405–06. 18 In 1913, Wilhelm Martens characterized the Romana as follows: ‘This book […] is, with some exceptions, […] worthless to us, since the sources that Jordanes used have been preserved’ (own translation; Martens, ‘Einleitung’, p. 9: ‘Dieses Buch […] ist für uns mit Ausnahme weniger Stücke […] wertlos, da die Originale erhalten sind, aus denen Jordanis geschöpft hat’). 15

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into account that Jordanes’ (extant) works consist of two texts and that these two texts belong together. Scholars’ interpretations of the narratives’ combined meaning, furthermore, have differed widely. Thus Walter Goffart, approaching the text using methods drawn from literary studies, pleads for a ‘happy ending’. In his interpretation, Jordanes’ ‘narrative culminates in a blessed event: the birth of a child of mixed Roman and Gothic blood [Germanus Postumus], symbolizing the assimilation or fusion that would take place once the emperor Justinian had suppressed Gothic independence’.19 James O’Donnell, by contrast, proposed that ‘the Getica shows the mightiest German race brought low by a Roman conqueror, while the Romana shows the fading of Roman glory’. Thus ‘Goths and Romans alike are left without an earthly patria’.20 With reference to the preface of the Romana, O’Donnell claims that Jordanes, who speaks of his own religious conversio, has a theological message to proclaim: the patria common to all men is the Kingdom of Heaven.21 However, the Getica does not fit into this model, as Jordanes’ statement in the preface of the Romana clearly represents a subsequent reinterpretation of the Getica.22 The work’s content also contradicts this interpretation. Goffart is right when he states that the Getica does not present a negative outlook on Gothic history, despite O’Donnell’s efforts to prove otherwise. The structure of the Getica, unlike that of the Romana, does not reflect a Christian conception of history, even though Peter Heather has detected some biblical allusions.23 19

Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, p. 22. Concerning the ‘happy ending’ see pp. 68–84; cf. Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xlviii.251, pp. 122–23; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 122. 20 O’Donnell, ‘The Aims of Jordanes’, p. 233. 21 O’Donnell, ‘The Aims of Jordanes’, pp. 232–33; Liebeschuetz, ‘Why Did Jordanes Write the Getica?’; Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, l.266, p. 126: ‘ego item quamvis agramatus Iordannis ante conversionem meam notarius fui’. (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 127: ‘I also, Jordanes, although an unlearned man before my conversion, was secretary’.) What Jordanes exactly meant by conversio is uncertain. According to Johann Weißensteiner, contemporary sources used the term to denote a retreat from political life into religious seclusion. It did not refer to entering a monastery, changing confession, or converting to Christianity. Cf. Weißensteiner, ‘Cassiodor/Jordanes als Geschichtsschreiber’, pp. 314–15. 22 In the introduction to the Romana Jordanes describes the Getica’s purpose: Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 4, p. 2: ‘quatinus diversarum gentium calamitate conperta ab omni erumna liberum te fieri cupias et ad deum convertas, qui est vera libertas’. (Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes: ‘so that, learning of the disaster of various peoples, you might desire to become free of all trouble and turn to God, who is true freedom’.) 23 Heather, ‘Cassiodorus and the Rise of the Amals’, especially pp. 113 and 125.

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Recent research, however, tends to regard Jordanes as an intermediary between two worlds. Wolf Liebeschuetz, for instance, speaks of Jordanes as an ‘imperial patriot’ who ‘at the same time […] identified with his Gothic ancestors and took pride in their past’. Helmut Reimitz goes even further by defining Jordanes as a cultural broker between different interests. Instead of drawing a sharp boundary between Goths and Romans, this concept — taken from modern anthropology — opens up the analysis to include much more complex forms of contact, influence, and interaction.24 Seeing Jordanes as a cultural broker allows us to abandon the attempts to characterize his attitudes as either pro-Roman or pro-Gothic and instead enables us to explore his role as an agent who facilitates communication between the two groups and mediates between Gothic and Roman positions. It allows us to examine which concepts of identities Jordanes uses, re-uses, and possibly also constructs in new ways. The way Jordanes handles the relationship between the two groups in his texts can possibly also permit insights into the political context of the texts’ composition.25 Jordanes clearly tries to integrate the Gothic history in a Roman world, which can be seen from the compilation of the Getica. As Christensen has demonstrated, the sources on which the Getica is based are mostly Greek or Roman. In the first chapters, Jordanes quotes Orosius, Livy, Caesar, Strabo, and Cassius Dio.26 According to Andrew Merrills, the Getica exhibits many of the characteristics of classical ethnography.27 By combining geography and history, Jordanes closely connects his history to Graeco-Roman traditions. Crucially, by writing two texts — a history of a gens as well as a somewhat more chronological text focusing on Roman history — Jordanes developed 24 Liebeschuetz, ‘Making a Gothic History’, pp.  207–08; Reimitz, ‘The Historian as Cultural Broker’, pp. 44–49. For the origin of the term ‘cultural broker’ cf. Szasz, ‘Introduction’. 25 Cf. Goltz, Barbar – König – Tyrann, pp. 267–98; Barnish, ‘The Genesis and Completion of Cassiodorus’ Gothic History’; Bjornlie, Politics and Tradition between Rome, Ravenna and Constantinople, pp. 110–13. 26 Whether and to what extent these quotations originate from Cassiodorus’s outline is the subject of much scholarly discussion. Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths, pp. 22–40; Borst, Der Turmbau von Babel, p. 443; cf. Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, pp. 402–03. 27 Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, p. 169. Some scholars have questioned whether Jordanes really read all of the works he mentioned, or possibly just used references and names he found in Cassiodorus. This idea may be supported by the fact that he quoted few authorities in the Romana. There he used authors that neither name authorities (Baldwin, ‘Sources for the Getica of Jordanes’, p. 142). In an exemplary analysis of Jordanes’ sources for the Getica, Gautier-Dalché proved that Jordanes was indeed familiar with the works to which he referred (Gautier-Dalché, ‘Cassiodore, Jordanès et les Getica’, pp. 283–86).

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a new method to integrate ‘his’ gens into the historiographical model of the Roman world.28 His model was later also used by other post-Roman authors: Isidore of Seville and Bede both wrote a world chronicle in addition to a history of their ‘own’ groups (gentes) — the Historia Gothorum and the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, respectively — and Paul the Deacon the Historia Langobardorum along with the Historia Romana. The conception of the texts hints at the position in which the author places ‘his’ gens within world history. Each author created an interdependent and complementary pair of texts that represented his conception of world history and explored the relation between the gens and the Romans. In the following I will compare the portrayals of Romans and Goths in Jordanes’ texts with regard to the main themes Jordanes uses to characterize the two groups he portrays and thereby reifies.

Ancestry The Romana begins with a short biblical excerpt on Adam and his descendants based on the book of Genesis (Genesis 5 and 11) before turning to the chronicle of Eusebius/Jerome for an account from the birth of Abraham to the reign of Augustus. In chapter 87 Jordanes begins a new chronological narrative that focuses on Roman history and starts with the founding of Rome. These chapters are predominantly based on two classical Roman historians, Rufius Festus and Florus. At first sight, the Romana merely represents a patchwork of different wellknown texts. However, the seemingly small addition of the short biblical excerpt at the start of the text signals a crucial conceptual difference between Jordanes’ work and the chronicle of Eusebius-Jerome. By prefixing his text with the biblical events from Adam to Abraham, Jordanes breaks with Jerome’s historical concept based on Daniel’s visions of the four world kingdoms (Daniel 2 and 7). Instead, he extends the text to include the infantia and pueritia of human history and thus introduces Augustine’s concept of the aetates mundi in his historiography.29 The Romana therefore does not present a model uniquely 28

Liebeschuetz, ‘Making a Gothic History’, p. 168. Cf. Goffart, Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 20–22; Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 107–08; Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, pp. 406–07. 29 Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm; Augustine, De civitate Dei, ed. by Dombart, xvi.43, pp. 458–59; xxi.16, p. 835; xxii.30, pp. 862–66. For the interpretation of the aetates mundi in Isidore’s Chronicle see Wood, ‘Heretical Catholics and Catholic Heretics’.

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focused on Roman history or one in which the Roman Empire is represented as the last biblical empire. In Jordanes’ Roman history the Romans lose their special position in world history. By contrast, the Getica focuses on the Goths right from the start. Jordanes recounts the origins of the Getae, and by equating the Goths with them30 he links the latter with barbarian typologies. Andrew Gillett argued that this resulted in a ‘pseudo-history of the Goths’ that ‘function[s] to alienate the audience from his barbarous subject’.31 However, Jordanes also immediately establishes a link between the Goths and the Bible by mentioning their descent from Magog. Jordanes’ Goths, therefore, have a mixed classical and biblical origin.32 Connecting contemporary barbarian peoples with those familiar to his readers from ancient historiography hardly serves to ‘alienate’ the audience, but rather to reassure them by using well-known, time-honoured models. It places the Goths in the cultural matrix of the Roman world while asserting their difference. The first confrontation between the two groups in both the Getica and the Romana occurs in the context of military conflict. The first mention of the Goths’ alleged ancestors, the Scythians, in the Romana is Jordanes’ report on Marcus Lucullus’s military expeditions in Thrace in which the latter ‘demonstrated Roman power to the Scythians’.33 In the Getica the Romans are mentioned for the first time in the context of Caesar’s conquest of Britannia.34 Interestingly, in both cases the Romans are introduced at moments of military victory over other peoples. However, the portrayal of the triumphant Roman army will undergo a significant change in the course of the work, as I will show later.

Trade Relations Jordanes writes that after Caesar’s conquest Britannia became accessible to many through trade. The existence of such economic contacts was clearly significant to him in his narrative; he also mentions the trade in skins and furs 30

Cf. Ford, ‘From Scythian, to Getan, to Goth’, in this volume, pp. 108–15. Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, pp. 403–05. 32 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, iv.29, p. 61; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 58; cf. Smalley, Historians in the Middle Ages, p. 50. 33 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 221, p. 28: ‘Scythis ostendit Romanorum virtutem’ (Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes). 34 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, ii.10, p. 56; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 53. 31

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that both the Thuringians and the Suehans, who lived on the isle of Scandza, conducted with the Roman Empire. Even the Goths themselves initially make contact with the Graeco-Roman world by trading. The Graeco-Roman cultural area becomes relevant to Gothic history at a very early point in the Getica, and it is significant that Jordanes represents this as taking the form of trade, not armed conflicts. In the fifth chapter of the Getica, Jordanes tells us that ‘These towns the wild Scythian tribes [that is: the Gothic ancestors] allowed the Greeks to build to afford them means of trade’.35 Jordanes here clearly emphasized that agency lay with the Gothic people. Without the Goths’ request and acceptance, Greek colonization would not have taken place or been possible. The Greeks do not act of their own initiative, but rather react to, and comply with, the will of the Goths. This vision of a peaceful coexistence represents the ideal relationship between the peoples — which, however, disappears in the course of the narrative. The importance of trade is also demonstrated by another paragraph, but this time, it is a story of trade going wrong and the Romans provoking a military confrontation. During the reign of the Emperor Valens, the Goths settle as foederati in the Roman Empire. Soon after, a conflict arises that culminated in the Battle of Adrianople in 378. According to Jordanes, famine leads the Goths to ask the Roman commanders to open a market (‘negotiationem expetere’). But the Roman commanders, motivated by greed, exploit the Goths’ situation: Coeperunt duces [Lupicinius and Maximus, author’s note] avaritia compellente non solum ovium bovumque carnes, verum etiam canum et inmundorum animalium morticina eis pro magno contradere, adeo, ut quemlibet mancipium in uno pane aut decem libris carne mercarent. Sediam mancipiis et supellectile deficientibus filios eorum avarus mercator victus necessitate exposcit. (The generals, swayed by avarice, sold them at a high price not only the flesh of sheep and oxen, but even the carcasses of dogs and unclean animals, so that a slave would be bartered for a loaf of bread or ten pounds of meat. When their goods and chattels failed, the greedy trader demanded their sons in return for the necessities of life.)36

Only after the Romans have made peaceful coexistence impossible, do the Goths take up arms to fight for survival. 35

Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, v.32, p. 62: ‘quas (oppidas) indomiti Scytharum nationes Grecis permiserunt condere, sibimet commercia prestaturos’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 59). 36 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xxvi.134–37, pp. 93–94; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 89–90.

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Military Activities While Jordanes mentions that Emperor Maximinus Thrax is of Gothic origin,37 the term ‘Gothi’ appears in the Romana for the first time in the description of the reign of Decius, whom Jordanes characterizes as a bad emperor who took up arms against both Christians and Goths, and was ultimately cruelly murdered.38 The next passage in which the Goths are mentioned is very similar to the first. Valerian persecuted Christians, and Gallienus, despite making peace with them, is also characterized poorly. As a result, the Goths invade Greece.39 Jordanes subsequently reports on further Gothic invasions of the empire and Roman campaigns against the Goths several times without expressing value judgments.40 The passage on Theodosius I, however, mirrors Jordanes’ treatment of Decius and Gallienus by showing what happens in the inverse case: whereas the pagan emperors suffer defeat at the hands of the Goths, the Christian emperor is able to defeat them successfully. After reporting on Theodosius’s baptism, Jordanes describes the emperor’s subsequent achievements as follows: ammodumque religiosus ecclesiae enituit propagator rei publiceque defensor eximius. Nam Hunnos et Gothos, qui eam sub Valente defetigassent, diversis proeliis vicit atque a prava vastatione conpescuit. ([He] greatly distinguished himself as a religious propagator of the Church and an exceptional defender of the Empire. For in various battles he conquered the Huns and Goths who had exhausted it under Valens, and checked them in their criminal devastations.)41

In the Romana, then, military success or failure against the Goths is linked to an emperor’s attitude towards Christianity. Much like the Persians in Isidore of Seville’s chronicle,42 the Goths appear in the Romana as an instrument of divine 37

Cf. Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 281, p. 36; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. See also the next section for a more extensive discussion. 38 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 284, p. 37; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 39 Jordanes, Romana, ed.  by Mommsen, 287, p.  37; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes; cf. Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xx.107–09, pp. 85–86 (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 81–82) where the Goths actively react to the emperor’s excesses. 40 Cf. Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 288 and 290 (p. 37), 313 and 314 (p. 40); Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 41 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 315, p. 40; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 42 Isidore of Seville, Chronica maiora, ed. by Mommsen, 312, p. 463: ‘Valerianus Christianis persecutionem movens a rege Persarum captus ibi in dedecore vitae consenuit’ (Engl. trans.

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punishment. Other than that, however, they do not play a major role in Roman history and are portrayed in the same way as other peoples living outside the empire. In the following passages, Jordanes mostly reports on constantly changing coalitions and military confrontations mainly caused by the Romans. In the Getica, too, it is the Romans who are the aggressors when it comes to military confrontations between them and the Goths. The latter only take up arms in order to defend themselves or fight for their rights — with a single exception. Chapter 56 describes another famine, as a result of which the Goths invade Illyria under the Amal king Thiudimer in 473: Gothis victus vestitusque deesse et hominibus, quibus dudum bella alimonia prestitissent, pax coepit esse contraria, omnesque cum magno clamore ad regem Thiudimer accedentes Gothi orant, quacumque parte vellit, tantum ductaret exercitum. (The Goths began to lack food and clothing, and peace became distasteful to men for whom war had long furnished the necessaries of life. So all the Goths approached their king Thiudimer and, with great outcry, begged him to lead forth his army in whatsoever direction he might wish.)43

This quote shows that also the Gothic ideal is not an absolute ideal worth striving for. Obviously, the famine is insufficient reason to justify military actions against the Roman troops. Jordanes here uses the stereotype of the bellicose Gothic people to explain the raids under King Thiudimer.

Culture But not only economic ties and military confrontations are important to Jordanes; he is equally interested in culture. Interestingly, Jordanes describes the process of Gothic acculturation from a Roman perspective. As Andrew Gillett points out, Jordanes uses a systematic catalogue of ethnographic ‘barbarian’ typologies and stereotypes to outline the Gothic past.44 Whilst Jordanes clearly represents Graeco-Roman culture as the civilized ideal that barbarians should strive towards, the Romans do not remain unchallenged in his work. by Koon and Wood, Chronica maiora: ‘Valerian, stirring up a persecution of Christians, was captured by the king of the Persians and grew old there in the disgrace of his life’); cf. Wood, ‘Heretical Catholics and Catholic Heretics’, p. 47; on the Goths as divine punishment see: Cannone, ‘Storia ed esegesi biblica nell’ “Historia Gothorum” di Isidoro di Siviglia’, pp. 14–15. 43 Jordanes, Getica, ed.  by Mommsen, lvi.283, p.  131; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 133. 44 Gillett, ‘The Mirror of Jordanes’, p. 405.

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For example, in the Getica’s fifth chapter the ancestors of the Goths, in this case the Dacians, are said to ‘have ever been wiser than almost (pene) all other barbarians and were nearly (pene) like the Greeks’.45 Jordanes refers to Cassius Dio when he states that the Dacians have learned from various Greek teachers.46 It is the Getae/Goths’ outstanding cultural education that enables King Philipp of Macedonia, the father of Alexander the Great, to form an alliance with them later in the narrative to secure his power. Jordanes explicitly states that Philipp’s reign was strengthened by such a connection.47 However, due to lack of money Philipp rescinds his alliance with the Goths and tries to plunder a city ruled by them. In what follows, the Goths’ actions are not those of a ‘barbarian’ people: they do not respond with military force. Instead, the Gothic priests open the city’s gates and come forth to meet the Macedonians. Bearing harps and clad in snowy robes, they chant to their gods that they might repel the enemy. As a result the Macedonians refrain from destroying the city and make a truce.48 This episode demonstrates something which can be noted throughout the text several times: that Graeco-Roman culture is considered as an ideal by Jordanes, an ideal which can also be attained by the ‘barbarian’ Goths (here in contrast with the Macedonians’ abandonment of it). Nevertheless, he represents the Graeco-Romans as having two weak points. Firstly, they depend on the Goths for their military strength and secondly, they constantly break alliances in order to advance their own interests. The second episode, however, differs from the first. Chapter 11 of the Getica deals with events from Sulla’s reign in the late Roman Republic up to the time of Emperor Tiberius. It includes a passage on Dicineus teaching the Goths: Quibus hoc erat salubre, hoc adcommodum, hoc votivum, ut; quidquid Dicineus eorum consiliarius precepisset, hoc modis omnibus expetendum […]. Qui cernens eorum animos sibi in omnibus oboedire et naturalem eos habere ingenium, 45 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, v.40, p. 64: ‘Unde et pene omnibus barbaris Gothi sapientiores semper extiterunt Grecisque pene consimiles’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 61). 46 Cassius Dio, Roman History, ed. by Cray, lxviii.9, p. 374: ὅτι ὁ Δεκέβαλος ἐπεπόμφει μὲν καὶ πρὸ τῆς ἥττης πρέσβεις, οὐκέτι τῶν κομητῶν ὥσπερ πρότερον, ἀλλὰ τῶν πιλοφόρων τοὺς ἀρίστους (Decebalus had sent envoys even before his defeat, not the long-haired men this time, as before, but the noblest among the cap-wearers; p. 375). 47 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, x.65, p. 72: ‘tali affinitate roboratus’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 69: ‘more secure by the help of this marriage’). 48 Cf.  Jordanes, Getica, ed.  by Mommsen, x.65, p.  72; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 69.

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omnem pene phylosophiam eos instruxit: erat namque huius rei magister peritus. Nam ethicam eoserudiens barbaricos mores conpescuit. […] Haec et alia nonnulla Dicineus Gothis sua peritia tradens mirabilis apud eos enituit, ut non solu mediocribus, immo et regibus imperaret. (Their safety, their advantage, their one hope lay in this, that whatever their counsellor Dicineus advised, should by all means be done […]. And when he saw that their minds were obedient to him in all things and that they had natural ability, he taught them almost the whole of philosophy, for he was a skilled master of this subject. Thus by teaching them ethics he restrained their barbarous customs. […] These and various other matters Dicineus taught the Goths in his wisdom and gained marvellous repute among them, so that he ruled not only the common men but their kings.)49

This paragraph could be interpreted as conforming to ethnographic stereotypes: the Goths need a foreign teacher to become a cultivated people.50 However, it appears in a different light when we take the Romana into account, too. The reported incidents occur in the context of change. The Goths flourish under Dicineus during the unstable times of the dictator Sulla’s reign. Thus, whilst this passage again expresses the superiority of Graeco-Roman culture, its superiority remains restricted to cultural and educational aspects. In terms of political and military power, the Goths compare favourably with the Romans, as is, for example, apparent in the following passage: Quem Dicineum suscipiens Buruista dedit eipene regiam potestatem. […] Caesar vero, […] nec nomen Romanorum auditu qui noverant, eos Romanis tributarios faceret, Gothos tamen crebropertemptans nequivit subicere. Gaius Tiberius iam tertius regnat Romanis: Gothitamen suo regno incolume perseverant. (Buruista received Dicineus and gave him almost royal power. […] Then came Caesar, […] made tributary to the Romans those that knew not the Roman name even by hearsay, and yet was unable to prevail against the Goths, despite his frequent attempts. Soon Gaius Tiberius reigned as third emperor of the Romans, and yet the Goths continued in their kingdom unharmed.)51 49 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xi.67–71, pp. 73–74; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 69–71. 50 Again the relationship between Jordanes’ text and Cassiodorus’s possible model remains unclear. Reimitz, ‘The Historian as Cultural Broker’, pp. 44–45. Cf. Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 101–08. 51 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xi.67–71, pp. 73–74; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 69–71.

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Despite Caesar’s or Tiberius’s military successes elsewhere, neither is able to defeat and subjugate the Goths. It is Dicineus who achieves what they could not through his cultural brokerage: he gains quasi-royal power over the Goths as a teacher instead of by military might.52 The Goths agree to be educated because they know that they can benefit from the foreign teacher and increase their ability to remain independent of the empire. This is what Jordanes calls ‘their safety, their advantage, and their wish’.

Jordanes’ Characterization of Key Individuals The mention of Caesar and Tiberius leads us to another important aspect of Jordanes’ complex construction of both similarities and contrast between Goths and Romans. He does so not only through his portrayal of the two groups as a whole, but also of significant individuals from each. However, the characterization of individuals is closely connected to the portrayal of their specific group because the individuals serve to exemplify their group’s character, in particular its morality. Caesar, for instance, is portrayed negatively by Jordanes who claims that the Roman fought solely for the sake of glory.53 Other emperors are criticized by Jordanes because of their attitudes towards Christians, such as Decius, Valerian, and Gallienus.54 And, interestingly, not only the Getica but also the Romana (here based on Jerome) mentions General Maximus’s greed.55 The unfavourable portrayal of these Roman emperors and leaders stands in stark contrast to Jordanes’ positive descriptions of Theodosius I and Zeno. After Gratian has formed an alliance with the Goths, Theodosius invites the Gothic king, Athanaric, to Constantinople. Athanaric stays in Constantinople and after his death is honoured with a worthy funeral. His army continues in the service of Theodosius, forming ‘as it were one body with the imperial soldiery’.56 Similarly, after Theoderic the Great is appointed king, Zeno gladly invites him to Constantinople and arranges a triumph for him. Theoderic is also made consul, which, according to Jordanes, is the highest honour in the 52

On the role of Dicineus as cultural broker see also Reimitz, ‘The Historian as Cultural Broker’, p. 132 n. 34. 53 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, ii.10, p. 56; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 53. 54 Maskarinec, ‘Clinging to Empire’, in this volume, p. 82. 55 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 313, p. 40; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 56 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xxviii.145, p. 96: ‘cum milite velut unum corpus effecit’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 91).

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world.57 However, the episode also shows that receiving Roman honours is not the only resource of authority for a Gothic king. Jordanes indirectly denigrates the Romans for their attempt to subject Theoderic to imperial power. He emphasizes the Gothic king’s political independence by stating that Theoderic ‘elegit potius solito more gentis suae labore querere victum quam ipse otiose frui regni Romani bona et gentem suam mediocriter victitare’ (chose rather to seek a living by his own exertions, after the manner customary to his gens, rather than to enjoy the advantages of the Roman Empire in luxurious ease while his tribe lived apart).58 Jordanes’ underlying conception is clear: Roman emperors who live in peace with the Goths and are Christian59 appear in a positive light; bad Roman emperors or generals fight the Goths out of greed or because their own military weakness leads to political instability within the empire. Jordanes’ narrative implies that an alliance with the Goths is essential to maintaining peace within the Roman Empire as well as beyond its borders. Thus the emperors Gallus and Volusianus succeed in keeping peace once they enter into a strategic alliance with the Goths;60 regarding the reigns of Diocletian and Maximian, the Getica reports that it had long been very difficult for the Roman army to fight any nations without the support of the Goths.61 Indeed, according to Jordanes, the Goths are even involved in the founding of Constantinople after the emperor Constantine asks for their help.62 For their part, the Gothic kings perform greater works and seek friendship with the Romans. They only take up arms if forced to do so by their allies’ breaking treaties or refusing to provide aid in case of famines; Gothic kings only attack the empire if there is no other way to ensure their survival. In the Getica Jordanes provides such legitimatizations for the majority of Gothic military actions. After the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains in which the Romans temporarily repel the Huns thanks to help from the Goths, the Visigothic king Thorismund offers 57

Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, lvii.289, p. 132: ‘quod summum bonum primumque in mundo decus edicitur’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 134–35: ‘which is well known to be the supreme good and highest honor in the world’). 58 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, lvii.290, p. 133; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 135. 59 See the contribution by Maya Maskarinec in this volume, pp. 81–84. 60 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xix.104–06, pp. 84–85; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 80–81. 61 Jordanes, Getica, ed.  by Mommsen, xxi.111, p.  86; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 82–83. 62 Jordanes, Getica, ed.  by Mommsen, xxi.112, p.  87; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 83.

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to attack the Huns again in order to defeat them once and for all.63 However, the Roman patricius Aëtius fears that if the Huns are utterly destroyed the Roman Empire will be overwhelmed by the Goths, and therefore orders Thorismund to return home. Jordanes comments on this as follows: ‘Sic humana fragilitas dum suspicionibus occurrit, magna plerumque agenda rerum occasione intercepit’ (Thus while human frailty rushes into suspicion, it often loses an opportunity of doing great things).64 In another passage, however, we can see the boundaries between the two peoples blurring: the emperor Maximinus Thrax65 is often referred to as the first so-called soldier emperor. Because the so-called crisis of the third century includes several military confrontations involving the Goths and other peoples, the Roman Empire and its rulers figure more prominently in the Getica. The paragraph’s narrative is based on Jerome’s chronicle; in addition, Jordanes uses Orosius’s Historiae adversum Paganos in his characterization of Maximinus. In the chronicle of Jerome, Maximinus is said to be ‘chosen by the army from the military, without the authorization of the Senate’, and Orosius also states that he was elected not by the will of the senate but by the army. Jordanes, however, takes a different view from his two sources. He omitted the missing approval of the senate: the Romana simply states that Maximinus was appointed ‘solely through the choice of the soldiers’.66 This suggests that the acclamation through the army was to Jordanes the constitutive aspect of a legitimate inauguration. His omission might also have been caused by the old senatorial families’ loss of influence in sixth-century Italy as 63

Although Jordanes already mentioned the Ostrogothic involvement earlier in the text (cf. Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xxxviii.199, p. 109; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 107), in this paragraph he conceals the fact that they were the military allies of the Huns. In the later part of the text, which mainly focuses on the Ostrogoths ( Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xlviii.246 et seq., p. 121; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 120) Jordanes only briefly recurs to the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains by stating that the Ostrogoths ‘must even have committed parricide at their lord’s [Attila’s] command. There was no way whereby any Scythian tribe could have been wrested from the power of the Huns, save by the death of Attila, – an event the Romans and all the other nations desired’ ( Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xlviii.253, p. 123; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 122–23). 64 Jordanes, Getica, ed.  by Mommsen, xli.217, p.  113; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 111–12. 65 Cf. Arnold, Theoderic and the Roman Imperial Restoration, p. 142 n. 1. 66 Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Helm, 2252, p. 298. ‘ex corpore militari, sine senatus auctoritate, ab exercitu imperator electus est’ (Engl. trans. by Pearse, Chronicle of St. Jerome); Orosius, Historiarum libri septem, ed. by Migne, vii.19, col. 1111: ‘nulla senatus uoluntate […] ab exercitu’ (Engl. trans. by Fear, Seven Books of History, p. 352: ‘by the army, though the Senate opposed him’); Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 281, p. 36: ‘sola militum voluntate’ (Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes).

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a result of Theoderic’s reliance on new up-and-coming families in the region of Ravenna.67 It also fits the context of the 550s, when the remaining Western senatorial class’s power was abolished through Justinian’s sanctio pragmatica in 554.68 As a result, Jordanes probably saw authorization by the senate no longer as a necessary prerequisite of an inauguration in accordance with the law. Whereas the Romana merely adds that Maximinus was Gothic by birth (‘genere Gothico’),69 the Getica gives a much more detailed account of Maximinus.70 Similarly to the Historia Augusta, the Getica discusses his bodily strength and military skills, and it is implied that the latter are the main reason for his elevation to emperor. Jordanes describes the emperor’s rise to power in detail. Maximinus came from a humble family in Thracia, his father was a Goth, his mother an Alan. Emperor Septimius Severus takes notice of the young ‘semibarbarus’ (semi-barbarian), who addresses him in Latin and successfully challenges his soldiers to a duel.71 After having served in various military functions 67

Cf. Wickham, Early Medieval Italy, pp. 15–17; Schäfer, Der weströmische Senat als Träger antiker Kontinuität unter den Ostgotenkönigen, pp. 134–47 and 180–84. 68 Cf. Goltz, Barbar – König – Tyrann, p. 299. 69 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 281, p. 36; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 70 The Gothic origin of Emperor Maximinus is disputed by historians. The claim is first found in the Historia Augusta, which was probably composed at the turn of the fourth and fifth century, but is generally not regarded as very trustworthy. Historia Augusta, ed. by Magie, Maximini Duo, i.5–ii.7, pp. 316–18: ‘Hic de vico Thraciae vicino barbaris, barbaro etiam patre et matre genitus, quorum alter e Gothia, alter ex Alanis genitus esse perhibetur. […] Innotescendi sub Severo imperatore prima haec fuit causa: natali Getae, filii minoris, Severus militares dabat ludos propositis praemiis argenteis, id est armillis, torquibus et balteolis. Hic adulescens et semibarbarus et vix adhuc Latinae linguae, prope Thracica imperatorem publice petiit, ut sibi daret licentiam contendendi cum iis qui iam non mediocri loco militarent. magnitudinem corporis Severus miratus primum eum cum lixis conposuit, sed fortissimis quibusque, ne disciplinam militarem conrumperet. Tunc Maximinus sedecim lixas uno sudore devicit sedecim acceptis praemiis minusculis non militaribus iussusque militare’ (He was born in a village in Thrace bordering on the barbarians, indeed of a barbarian father and mother, the one, men say, being of the Goths, the other of the Alani. […] It was in the following way that he first came into prominence in the reign of Severus. Severus, on the birthday of Geta, his younger son, was giving military games, offering various silver prizes, arm-rings, that is, and collars, and girdles. This youth, half barbarian and scarcely yet master of the Latin tongue, speaking almost pure Thracian, publicly besought the Emperor to give him leave to compete, and that with men of no mean rank in the service. Severus, struck with his bodily size, pitted him first against sutlers — all very valorous men, nonetheless — in order to avoid a rupture of military discipline. Whereupon Maximinus overcame sixteen sutlers at one sweat, and received his sixteen prizes, all rather small and not military ones, and was commanded to serve in the army; pp. 317–19). 71 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xv.83–85, pp. 78–79; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, pp. 74–75.

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under subsequent emperors, eventually Maximinus himself becomes emperor ‘by a vote of the army, without a decree of the senate. But he marred all his good deeds by persecuting the Christians in accordance with a false vow’. With reference to the lost history of Symmachus, Jordanes adds that his aim is ‘to show that the gens of which we speak attained to the very highest station in the Roman Empire’.72 Although Maximinus is clearly characterized as exceptional, this does not contradict his qualification as an emperor. Jordanes refrains from attributing Roman virtues to him, and Maximinus is clearly in possession of the military skills lacking in most other emperors. At this point, Jordanes’ key issue and his role as cultural broker becomes very clear: being a Goth and being a good Roman emperor are not mutually exclusive. Maximinus’s only weakness is that he is not an orthodox Christian. Whereas the example of Maximinus demonstrates that Goths can have a highly successful career in the Roman Empire, the description of Theoderic goes one step further. Jordanes represents him as the legitimate successor to power in the West, in contrast to Odoacer whose reign Jordanes characterizes as an illegitimate interlude. The Romana comments on the Emperor Romulus Augustulus’s dismissal by Odoacer as follows: Sic quoque Hesperium regnum Romanique populi principatum, quod septingentesimo nono urbis conditaeanno primus Augustorum Octavianus Augustus tenere coepit, cum hoc Augustulo periit anno decessorum regni imperatorum quingentesimo vicesimo secundo: Gothorum dehinc regibus Romam tenentibus. (Thus too the Western empire and the lordship of the Roman people which, in the seven hundred and ninth year after the foundation of the city, Octavian Augustus began to hold as the first of the Augusti, perished with this Augustulus, in the five hundred twenty-second year of the succeeding emperors of the realm, Gothic kings thenceforth holding Rome.)73

Interestingly, Jordanes calls Odoacer a ‘Torcilingorum rex’ who is ‘genere Rugius’.74 To Jordanes Odoacer is neither a Goth nor a legitimate successor of the Roman emperors, and he discredits him as a tyrant in order to portray the 72

Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xv.88, p. 80: ‘exercitus electione absque senatus consultu effectus est imperator, qui cuncta bona sua in persecutione Christianorum malo voto foedavit. […] Quod nos idcirco huic nostro opusculode Symmachi hystoria mutuavimus, quatenus gentem, unde agimus, ostenderemus adregni Romani fastigium usque venisse’ (Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 76). 73 Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 345, p. 44; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes. 74 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, xlvi.242, p. 120; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 119; Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 344, p. 44; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes.

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Gothic kings as the legitimate successors of the Western Roman emperors.75 But there is even more that is of interest in this passage. It derives from the chronicle of Marcellinus Comes, where it reads as follows: Hesperium Romanae gentis imperium, quod septingentesimo nono urbis conditae anno primus Augustorum Octavianus Augustus tenere coepit, cum hoc Augustulo periit, anno decessorum regni imperatorum quingentesimo vigesimo secundo, Gothorum dehinc regibus Romam tenentibus. (With this Augustulus perished the Western empire of the Roman people, which the first Augustus, Octavian, began to rule in the seven hundred and ninth year from the foundation of the city. This occurred in the five hundred and twentysecond year of the kingdom of the departed emperors, with Gothic kings thereafter holding Rome.)76

As we can see, Jordanes did not simply copy the passage. Whereas Marcellinus Comes speaks of the ‘Hesperium Romanae gentis imperium’, Jordanes changes this to ‘Hesperium regnum Romanique populi principatum’. The changes are striking and significant. First, the term ‘imperium’ is replaced by ‘regnum’, and instead of the empire of the ‘gens Romana’, Jordanes speaks of a kingdom and a ‘principatus’ of the ‘populus Romanus’. These changes could be interpreted in three different ways. First, they could indicate a greater emphasis on the West as only one part of the much larger empire.77 Second, to consider 476 as a date 75

Jordanes emphasizes the illegitimacy of Odoacer’s rule also in Theoderic’s conversation with the emperor Zeno in advance of his expedition, in which he has the Gothic king say: ‘Hesperia […] plaga, quae dudum decessorum prodecessorumque vestrorum regimine gubernata est, et urbs illa caput orbis et domina quare nunc sub regis Thorcilingorum Rogorumque tyrranide fluctuatur? Dirige me cum gente mea’ ( Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, lvii.291, p. 133; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 135: ‘The western country, long ago governed by the rule of your ancestors and predecessors, and that city which was the head and mistress of the world — wherefore is it now shaken by the tyranny of the Torcilingi and the Rugi? Send me there with my people’). See also the Romana’s description of the encounter: ‘Zenon imperator cernens iam gentes illam patriam possidere, maluit Theodorico ac si proprio iam clienti eam committi quam illi quem nec noverat’ ( Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 348, p. 45; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes: ‘Emperor Zeno, realizing that now the tribes held that land, he preferred to entrust it to Theoderic as though to a man already his own client rather than to someone whom he did not know’). 76 Marcellinus Comes, Chronicon, ed. by Mommsen, 476, p. 91; Engl. trans. by Croke, Chronicle of Marcellinus, p. 27. 77 Cf. the use of the terms ‘imperium’ and ‘regnum’: Arnold, Theoderic and the Roman Imperial Restoration, pp.  117–41; Sauerbaum, Vom antiken zum frühmittelalterlichen Staatsbegriff, pp. 268–78; Fanning, ‘Odovacer rex’, pp. 45–54.

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of particular importance could be interpreted as proof of Jordanes’ East Roman point of view.78 And third, the changes could also imply that the Western Roman Empire is just a kingdom among others and therefore its take-over by Gothic kings actually does not signal a revolutionary transformation. In any case, Jordanes’ reformulations express a significant change in the underlying concept of empire.79 As to the other changes Jordanes made to the terminology of this passage, the term ‘gens’ implies a common descent of the group, while the term ‘populus’ might refer to a community established by law and thus also open to other ethnic groups. By using the more neutral term ‘principatus’, Jordanes also reduces the opposition between kingdom and empire. Whereas Marcellinus Comes describes Theoderic as a hostile aggressor,80 the Romana does not follow Marcellinus’s depiction and instead uses phrases taken from the Getica. In both Getica and Romana, Jordanes writes that Theoderic went to Italy at Zeno’s behest. The Getica states that Zeno ‘magnis ditatum muneribus dimisit a se, senatum populumque ei commendans Romanum’ (sent him forth enriched by great gifts and commended to his charge the Senate and the Roman People).81 Jordanes’ appraisal of Theoderic’s reign is generally posi78

Cf. Croke, ‘A.D. 476’, pp. 114–15: ‘However, as it appears in Marcellinus and Jordanes the significance of 476 represents the viewpoint of Constantinople. It was felt and said and recorded in the imperial capital that in 476 the Hesperium Imperium, as it was called in the east, had ceased to be and had not thus far been re-established. The historiographical significance of 476 does not derive from and represent the ideology of the Roman senate at all. It was, at least as it appears in Marcellinus and Jordanes, a Byzantine perspective. This being the case we might expect to find similar statements noting the end of the western empire in 476 in other Byzantine records, just as Marcellinus’ information on other events is clarified by comparison with other Byzantine sources, particularly the chronicles’. Cf. Amory, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, pp. 112 and 192–93. 79 Cf. Amory, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, p. 291. 80 ‘Theodoricus rex Gothorum Zenonis Augusti numquam beneficiis satiatus cum magna suorum manu usque ad regiam ciuitatem et Melentiadam oppidum infestus accessit plurimaque loca igne cremata ad Nouensem Moesiae ciuitatem, unde aduenerat, remeauit. […] Idem Theodoricus rex Gothorum optatam occupauit Italiam’ (Marcellinus Comes, Chronicon, ed. by Mommsen, 487 and 489, p. 93; Engl. trans. by Croke, Chronicle of Marcellinus, pp. 29 and 30: ‘Theoderic, king of the Goths, was never satisfied by the favours of Zeno Augustus and made a hostile advance with a large force of his own as far as the royal city and the town of Melantias. When most places had been engulfed by fire he went back to Novae, the city in Moesia whence he had come. […] This Theodoric, king of the Goths, occupied Italy as he desired’). 81 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, lvii.292, p. 133; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 136. In the Romana, he writes: ‘Secumque ita deliberans, ad partes eum [Theuderi— cum, author’s note] Italiae mandans, Romanum illi populum Senatumque commendat’

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tive. He praises Theoderic as ‘prudens’ and ‘pacificus’,82 suggests that Zeno and Theoderic rule by mutual consent, and represents Theodoric as the legitimate ruler of the Western kingdom and leader of the Roman people: Tertio, ut diximus, anno ingressus sui in Italia Zenonemque imp. consultu privatum abitum suaeque gentis vestitum seponens insigne regio amictu, quasi iam Gothorum Romanorumque regnator, adsumit. (It was in the third year after his entrance into Italy, as we have said, that Theodoric, by advice of the Emperor Zeno, laid aside the garb of a private citizen and the dress of his race and assumed a costume with a royal mantle, as he had now become the ruler over both Goths and Romans.)83

Conclusion What do Jordanes’ two works, seen as complementary narratives, tell us about the relationship between the Goths and Romans, and how do they construct their similarities and differences? First, Jordanes uses ethnographical stereotypes for both the Goths and the Romans. One could simply attribute this to Jordanes’ reliance on Roman sources where such stereotypes are abundant. As I have shown, however, Jordanes does not follow his sources without reflecting on their implied message. Jordanes plays with the stereotypes provided by his sources. He makes use of established descriptions from Roman historiography when characterizing the Goths, praising their military skills and calling them barbarous. His representation of the Roman cultural achievements is also stereotypical. However, in Jordanes’ narratives neither Goths nor Romans fully live up to the established stereotypes; he constantly challenges the picture he draws. What is more, the two groups do not simply represent an ideal striven for and its dramaturgical opposite: both groups have their strengths and weaknesses, their moral superiorities and shortcomings, they share similarities but are also ( Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 348, p. 45; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes: ‘And thinking thus, ordering him to the regions of Italy, he committed the Roman people and Senate to his care’). 82 ‘Regnum gentis sui et Romani populi principatum prudenter et pacifice per triginta annos continuit’. ( Jordanes, Romana, ed. by Mommsen, 349, p. 45; Engl. trans. by Regan, Jordanes: ‘He wisely and peacefully maintained the kingship of his own tribe and the overlordship of the Roman people for thirty years’). 83 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, lvii.295, p. 134; Engl. trans. by Mierow, Gothic History, p. 136.

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separated by differences. Thus we can neither assume that Jordanes wrote his texts to ‘alienate’ his audience from his subject, nor that he wanted to tell a story in which Goths and Romans are represented simply as equals. He maintains differences between the two groups by affirming traditional stereotypes, but he also uses them to craft a new perspective, showing that the two peoples can actually profit from each another. Jordanes’ ideal conception is clear: peace between the two groups. Consequently we cannot examine Jordanes’ portrayals of the two peoples separately: he presents their history as inevitably intertwined — the Goths play a role in the Romana and the Romans in the Getica. Jordanes’ descriptions of the two groups’ rulers clearly demonstrate this point. The Romana’s portrayals of Valerian and Theodosius I as dependent on the Goths is but one example. Roman and Gothic complementarity becomes most obvious in the Getica’s characterization of the relationship between Zeno and Theoderic the Great, in which Jordanes praises their cooperation but at the same time has Theoderic emphasize his independence. Yet Jordanes’ construction of the complex connection between Romans and Goths is not limited to his depiction of relationships between individuals. As has been discussed above, trade, culture, and military strength are all important elements in Jordanes’ portrayal of the two groups. In the Romana, despite its main, generally favourable focus on the Romans, Jordanes also tries to portray the Goths in a positive light; and his effort to reconcile the two groups’ histories becomes even more obvious in the Getica. The Goths, according to Jordanes, are a cultivated gens, like the Romans. Jordanes blurs the boundaries between Romanness and Gothicness in his narratives. This is particularly evident in his portrayal of the semibarbarus Maximinus Thrax, a ruler who combines the best qualities of both groups. The complementarity of the two groups’ virtues are why Jordanes wants to maintain the differences between them. His status as mediator and cultural broker may seem to fit particularly well into the context of the Gothic Wars in which Justinian’s army defeated the Goths. Jordanes positions himself between the two groups, either to ensure his own political survival or in order to propose an approach towards the political realities in Italy that would enable a cooperation between the Roman forces, the remaining people of the Gothic ruling class, and the Italian population. Jordanes claims that there should be room for a Gothic identity in a Roman world by reminding us of Gothic skills and showing that the Goths are not strangers to the Roman world. He thus becomes a builder of bridges between Romans and Goths. Jordanes tells us two tales of two peoples who complement each other perfectly.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Augustine, De civitate Dei, ed. by Bernhard Dombart and Alfons Kalb, Aurelii Augustini opera: De civitate Dei: Libri XI–XXII, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 48 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1955) Bede, Chronica maiora and Chronica minora, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15  vols (Berlin, 1877–1919), xiii: Chronica minora saec. IV. V. VI. VII. (III) (Berlin: Weidmann, 1898), pp. 223–354 —— , Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. by Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969) Cassius Dio, Roman History, ed. and trans. by Ernest Cray, Dio Cassius: Roman History, The Loeb Classical Library, 32, 37, 53, 66, 82, 83, 175, 176, 177, 9 vols (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1914–27), viii: Books 61–70 (1925) Historia Augusta, ed. and trans. by David Magie, The Loeb Classical Library, 139, 140, 263, 3 vols (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1921–32), ii: Caracalla. Geta, Opellius Macrinus. Diadumenianus. Elagabalus. Severus Alexander. The Two Maximini. The Three Gordians. Maximus and Balbinus (1924) Isidore of Seville, Chronica maiora, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15  vols (Berlin, 1877–1919), xi: Chronica minora saec. IV. V. VI. VII. (II) (Berlin: Weidmann, 1894), pp. 391–481 —— , Historia Gothorum Wandalorum Sueborum, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xi: Chronica minora saec. IV. V. VI. VII. (II) (1894), pp. 267–303 —— , The History of the Kings of the Goths, trans. by Kenneth Baxter Wolf, in Conquerors and Chroniclers of Early Medieval Spain, Translated Texts for Historians, 9, 2nd edn (Liverpool: University Press, 1999), pp. 79–110 —— , The ‘Chronica maiora’ of Isidore of Seville, trans. by Sam Koon and Jamie Wood [accessed 22 April 2015] Jerome, Chronicon, ed. by Rudolf Helm, Eusebius Werke, vii: Die Chronik des Hieronymus, Die Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten Jahrhunderte, 47, 2nd edn (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1956) —— , The Chronicle of St.  Jerome, trans. by Roger Pearse [accessed 22 April 2015] Jordanes, Jordanes: De la succession des royaumes et des temps et de l’origine et des actes des Goths, French trans. by August Savanger (Paris: Panckoucke, 1842) —— , Getica (De origine actibusque Getarum), ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), v.1: Iordanis Romana et Getica (1882), pp. 53–138 —— , Romana (De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum), ed.  by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), v.1: Iordanis Romana et Getica (1882), pp. 1–52

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—— , Jordanis de origine actibusque Getarum, ed.  by Francesco Giunta and Antonino Grillone, Fonti per la storia d’Italia, 117 (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per il Medio Evo, 1991) —— , The Gothic History of Jordanes, trans. by Charles Christopher Mierow, Christian Roman Empire Series, 2 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1915; repr. Merchantville: Evolution, 2006) —— , Jordanes: De summa temporum vel origine actibusque gentis Romanorum, trans. by Brian T. Regan [accessed 22 April 2015] Marcellinus Comes, Chronicon, ed.  by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xi: Chronica minora saec. IV. V. VI. VII. (II) (1894), pp. 37–108 —— , The Chronicle of Marcellinus, trans. by Brian Croke, Byzantina Australiensia, 7 (Sydney: Australian Association for Byzantine Studies, 1995) Orosius, Historiae adversum paganos libri VII, in Patrologiae cursus completus: series latina, ed. by Jacques-Paul Migne, 221 vols (Paris, 1844–64), xxxi (1846), cols 663–1174B —— , Seven Books of History against the Pagans, trans. by Andrew  T. Fear (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010) Paulus Diaconus: Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Ludwig Bethmann and Georg Waitz, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum et Italicarum (Hanover: Hahn, 1878), pp. 12–219 —— , Historia Romana, ed. by Hans Droysen, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi, 81  vols (Hanover et al., 1871–2016), xlix: Pauli Historia Romana (Berlin: Weidmann, 1879)

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Christensen, Arne Søby, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths: Studies in a Migration Myth (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2002) Croke, Brian, ‘A.D. 476. The Manufacture of a Turning Point’, Chiron, 13 (1983), 81–119 —— , ‘Cassiodorus and the Getica of Jordanes’, Classical Philology, 82 (1987), 117–34 —— , ‘Latin Historiography and the Barbarian Kingdoms’, in Greek & Roman Historiography in Late Antiquity: Fourth to Sixth Century A.D., ed.  by Gabriele Marasco (Leiden: Brill, 2003), pp. 349–89 —— , ‘Jordanes and the Immediate Past’, Historia, 54 (2005), 473–94 Ensslin, Wilhelm, Des Symmachus Historia Romana als Quelle für Jordanes, Sitzungsberichte der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 3 (Munich: Biederstein, 1949) Fanning, Steven, ‘Odovacer rex. Regal Terminology, and the Question of the End of the Western Roman Empire’, Medieval Prosopography, 24 (2003), 45–54 Ford, Randolph, ‘From Scythian, to Getan, to Goth: The Getica of Jordanes and the Classical Ethnographic Tradition’, in this volume, pp. 95–119 Gautier-Dalché, Patrick, ‘Cassiodore, Jordanès et les Getica’, Revue d’Histoire des Textes, 4 (2009), 277–87 Gillett, Andrew, ‘Jordanes and Ablabius’, in Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History, x, ed. by Carl Deroux (Brussels: Latomus, 2000), pp. 479–500 —— , ‘The Mirror of Jordanes: Concepts of the Barbarian, Then and Now’, in A Companion to Late Antiquity, ed. by Philip Rousseau and Jutta Raithel (Chichester: WileyBlackwell, 2009), pp. 392–408 Goffart, Walter, The Narrators of Barbarian History (A.D. 550–800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988) —— , ‘Jordanes’s Getica and the Disputed Authenticity of Gothic Origins from Scandinavia’, Speculum, 80 (2005), 379–98 Goltz, Andreas, Barbar – König – Tyrann: Das Bild Theoderichs des Großen in der Überlieferung des 5. bis 9. Jahrhunderts (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2008) Heather, Peter, ‘Cassiodorus and the Rise of the Amals: Genealogy and the Goths under Hun Domination’, Journal of Roman Studies, 79 (1989), 103–28 —— , ‘The Historical Culture of Ostrogothic Italy’, in Teoderico il Grande e i Goti d’Italia: atti del XIII Congresso internazionale di studi sull’Alto Medioevo (Milano 2–6 novembre 1992), Settimane di studio del Centro italiano di studi sull’alto medioevo, 13.1 (Spoleto: Centro italiano di studi sull’alto medioevo, 1993), pp. 317–54 —— , ‘Theoderic, King of the Goths’, Early Medieval Europe, 4 (1995), 145–73 —— , The Goths (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996) Liebeschuetz, John  H.  W.  G., ‘Making a Gothic History: Does the Getica of Jordanes Preserve Genuinely Gothic Traditions?’, Journal of Late Antiquity, 4 (2011), 185–216 —— , ‘Why Did Jordanes Write the Getica?’, Antiquité Tardive, 19 (2011), 295–302 Martens, Wilhelm, ‘Einleitung’, in Jordanis Gotengeschichte: Nebst Auszügen aus seiner ‘Römischen Geschichte’, ed. by Alexander Heine, Historiker des deutschen Altertums, 2nd edn (Essen: Phaidon, 1986), pp. 5–14 Maskarinec, Maya, ‘Clinging to Empire in Jordanes’ Romana’, in this volume, pp. 71–93

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Merrills, Andrew, History and Geography in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) Momigliano, Arnaldo, ‘Cassiodorus and Italian Culture of his Time’, in Studies in Historiography, ed.  by Arnaldo Momigliano (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1966), pp. 181–210 Mommsen, Theodor, ed., Iordanis Romana et Getica, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, v.1 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1882) Moorhead, John, Theoderic in Italy (Oxford: Clarendon, 1992) O’Donnell, James J., ‘The Aims of Jordanes’, Historia, 31 (1982), 223–40 Ratti, Stéphane, ‘Les Romana de Jordanès et le Bréviaire d’Eutrope’, L’Antiquité Classique, 65 (1996), 175–87 Reimitz, Helmut, ‘The Historian as Cultural Broker in the Late and Post-Roman West’, in Western Perspectives on the Mediterranean: Cultural Transfer in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, 400–800 AD, ed. by Andreas Fischer and Ian Wood (London: Bloomsbury, 2014), pp. 41–54 Sauerbaum, Werner, Vom antiken zum frühmittelalterlichen Staatsbegriff: Über Verwendung und Bedeutung von res publica, regnum, imperium, und status von Cicero bis Jordanis, Orbis antiquus, 16/17 (Münster: Aschendorff, 1961) Schäfer, Christoph, Der weströmische Senat als Träger antiker Kontinuität unter den Ostgotenkönigen (490–540 n.Chr.) (St. Katharinen: Scripta-Mercaturae, 1991) Smalley, Beryl, Historians in the Middle Ages (London: Thames and Hudson, 1974) Swanson, Alan, ‘Re-Inventing the Goths. The Trajectory of an Idea’, in Building the Past: Konstruktion der eigenen Vergangenheit, ed.  by Rudolf Suntrup and Jan  R. Veenstra (Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 2006), pp. 167–85 Szasz, Margaret, ‘Introduction’, in Between Indian and White Worlds: The Cultural Broker, ed. by Margaret Szasz (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001), pp. 3–20 Várady, László, ‘Jordanes-Studien. Jordanes und das “Chronicon” des Marcellinus Comes – Die Selbständigkeit des Jordanes’, Chiron, 6 (1976), 441–87 Weißensteiner, Johann, ‘Cassiodor/Jordanes als Geschichtsschreiber’, in Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter, ed. by Anton Scharer and Georg Scheibelreiter, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 32 (Vienna: Oldenbourg, 1994), pp. 308–25 Wickham, Chris, Early Medieval Italy: Central Power and Local Society, 400–1000 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1981) Wood, Ian, ‘Arne Søby Christensen: Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths. Studies in a Migration Myth. Museum Tusculanum Press, København 2002, 392 s. 298 kr.’, Historisk Tidsskrift, 103 (2003), 465–84 Wood, Jamie, ‘Heretical Catholics and Catholic Heretics: Isidore of Seville and the Religious History of the Goths’, in From Orosius to the ‘Historia Silense’: Four Essays on the Late Antique and Early Medieval Historiography of the Iberian Peninsula, ed. by David Hook (Bristol: HiPLAM, 2005), pp. 17–50

Celtic Britain and Ireland: An Arena for Historical Debate T. M. Charles-Edwards

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he historiography of the early medieval British Isles is dominated by Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum. This is only just: the scale and quality of his work is outstanding. Yet Bede has a context, not just in the monastery of Jarrow in Northumbria, but a literary context in the other historians of Britain and Ireland. It is important to gauge what he made of Gildas, whom he calls ‘their historian’, that is, the historian of the Britons; and important, also, to appreciate what later writers made of them both.1 A difficulty arises when discussing my first main author, Gildas. He claimed to be writing history when he composed his epistola, so it is not surprising that Bede thought of him as the historian of the Britons.2 Modern historians have sometimes dismissed this notion as absurd: he was not a historian, so they say, 1 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen; ed. and trans. by Williams; ed. and trans. by Winterbottom. References are to chapter nos which are common to these three editions; quotations are from Winterbottom’s text. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. by Plummer; also ed. and trans. by Colgrave and Mynors; ed. by Lapidge, trans. by Chiesa, i, 22: ‘historicus eorum Gildus’. 2 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 37, p. 48: ‘Hic sane vel antea concludenda erat, uti ne amplius loqueretur os nostrum opera hominum, tam flebilis haec querulaque malorum aevi huius historia’ (Engl. trans. by Winterbottom, p. 36: ‘Here, or even earlier, I should have finished this tearful history, this complaint on the evils of the age, so that my lips should not any longer have to speak of the actions of men’).

T. M. Charles-Edwards is Emeritus Jesus Professor of Celtic and Professorial Fellow at Jesus College, Oxford University. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 147–160 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118564

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but a preacher denouncing the evils of the contemporary Britons.3 The assumption is that Gildas could not have been both preacher and historian. Our modern historians feel themselves able to make this assertion before they have inquired at all deeply into what Gildas thought he was doing, and why Bede might have agreed with him. The assumption hidden behind much of this is that, if Gildas’s notion of history was not our kind of history, his text was not any kind of history; and that refusal to shift outside contemporary categories seems to me to be an example of a dogmatic limitation of outlook — the elevation of contemporary ideas into a standard by which the past should be judged — for which history ought to be the remedy. One way to bring out the very particular and deeply interesting approach to history taken by Gildas is to pursue the connection between history and law as well as history and scripture. Gildas’s De excidio Britanniae is divided into three sections: chapter 2 is a list of the contents of the first section and demonstrates that the division between the first and second is authorial. Parallels between the opening of the second and third confirm that all three were part of the structure of the work from the beginning and justify the explicit division into three books found in an Avranches manuscript.4 The portion of the text which is most often read consists of book i and the first part of book ii. At chapter 37, however, Gildas invokes the testimony of the Jewish prophets, the sancti vates. From that point, most of the text is a series of exempla and testimonia which Gildas uses to condemn the fortiores of Britain, those whose status places them among the ordines of kings and judges, public and private persons in the world, of bishops and other sacerdotes and mere clerici in the Church.5 Gildas’s exempla are instances in the Bible and in Rufinus’s translation and continuation of Eusebius, which were taken as illustrating a general rule. Biblical persons or events belonged to the historical sense of scripture, but to interpret them as illustrating a rule of behaviour one needed to explain the moral sense of the text or texts in which these persons or events are mentioned.6 One might be tempted to think that Gildas’s sense of himself as an historian related to the historical or literal sense of scripture, but the temptation should be resisted: what mattered here was the moral sense. Similarly, the texts, testimonia, were 3 English Historical Documents, ed. by Whitelock, i, 588 (1979: p. 640): ‘This is not a history, but a denunciation of the sins of his countrymen’. 4 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 15, p. 33. 5 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 26, pp. 40–41, chap. 63, pp. 60–61, chap. 65, pp. 61–62. 6 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 63, pp. 60–61, chap. 92, pp. 76–77.

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understood, not by confining them to their original context, but as stating general laws incumbent on Christians. Here the intellectual process seems closer to what our lawyers do with precedents and early authorities than to history as we understand it. In book i of the De excidio Gildas directs his fire at Britannia, the people of Britain as a whole. He excludes, of course, ‘the transmarine peoples’ who have settled in Britain, the Picts and the Irish. The Picts are seen as recent invaders of Britain, because they were not part of the ethnic map of Britain in the early Romano-British period; and so, in Gildas’s eyes, they must have come across the sea from the north and taken land in Britain by force. One may argue that the Picts were simply a confederation of Britons on the outside of the Roman frontier, who gradually became sufficiently distinct from the Britons under Roman rule and sufficiently hostile to Roman Britain to be seen as part of the barbarian world outside the empire. The important thing is that that seems not to have been a possible thought for Gildas. Similarly, the Irish, the Scotti, had invaded from the west, and here Gildas is usually thought to have been correct in his understanding of the Irish in Britain. When Gildas wants to refer to the Britons themselves, he most often uses Britannia or cives. The latter term binds together the Britons with the other inhabitants of the former empire: often the term refers to the Britons, but sometimes, on the contrary, to other cives outside Britain.7 The sense of the word, for Gildas, is not ethnic, even though the reference often is. An inscription contemporary with Gildas shows a further use of the term, for those belonging to a particular civitas, a use that is not attested in Gildas’s De excidio.8 Finally, Gildas also uses more ethnic language, when he refers to the Britons as a gens; but then he also refers to the Romans as a gens.9 He also refers to the Britons as praesens Israhel.10 He is not consistently ethnic or consistently non-ethnic in his language. Books ii and iii, however, are not directed at the Britons as a whole, but at particular ordines within British society. The targets of book ii are secular ordines, kings and judges, of book iii their ecclesiastical counterparts, bishops, priests, and deacons. The approach of the two books is somewhat different: book ii is divided between an initial section in which Gildas denounces 7

Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 4, p. 29, chap. 26, pp. 40–41. Edwards, A Corpus of Early Medieval Inscribed Stones and Stone Sculpture in Wales, iii: North Wales, Ffestiniog 1, pp. 385–89: ‘CANTIORI HIC IACIT | VENEDOTIS CIVE FVIT | [C]ONSOBRINO || MA[G]LI | MAGISTRATI’. Dated to the first half of the sixth century. 9 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 25, p. 40: ‘Romanae gentis’. 10 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 26, pp. 40–41. 8

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five contemporary kings in his own words and a second section in which he denounces these kings and also judges by applying to them exempla and testimonia from scripture. Saul, for example, was condemned by God through the mouth of the prophet Samuel for a relatively minor act of disobedience, but contemporary kings have plunged much deeper into iniquity.11 In book iii, directed at the orders of the Church, almost the whole text is taken from the Bible or from the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius/Rufinus. Gildas also makes a distinction according to ordo, rank: the more powerful the ordo, the greater the responsibility and the harsher the punishment: ‘fortioribus autem fortior instat cruciatio’ (A stronger torture awaits the stronger).12 And kings are the most powerful. The translation of a crucial passage on the ordines poses, however, a difficulty. For ‘ob hoc reges, publici, privati, sacerdotes, ecclesiastici, suum quique ordinem servarunt’, Michael Winterbottom has ‘That was why kings, public and private persons, priests and churchmen, kept to their own stations’.13 ‘Priests’ is one difficulty, since sacerdotes for Gildas undoubtedly includes both priests and bishops; but the more serious problem is what Gildas meant by ‘suum quique ordinem servarunt’. The translation suggests a very conservative outlook on society: if everyone keeps to the rank into which they were born, all will be well. Yet that interpretation does not accord with the argument of books ii and iii. That was that each rank in society had its own moral duties, duties, moreover, owed to a God who was a judge and would punish sinners. Ordinem servare should, therefore, mean ‘sustain one’s rank’ in the sense of fulfilling the moral demands of one’s status in society. Gildas was certainly not a revolutionary, but neither was he interested in maintaining the social distance between social ranks as such. The privileges attached to rank were not his concern at all. Biblical exempla and testimonia, and also to a lesser extent those of ecclesiastical history, were, for Gildas, sources of law; and it was this law that his kings and judges, bishops, priests, and clerics had violated. It is here that he was particularly influential, not just in Britain but in Ireland. His approach to sacred history as a source of law was what made possible the great early eighth-century Collectio canonum Hibernensis.14 He was a named source for that work,15 but his importance goes much deeper: for us, and also it seems for the compilers of 11

Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 38, p. 49. Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 63, p. 61. 13 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 26, p. 40–41 (Engl. trans. by Winterbottom, p. 28). 14 Die irische Kanonensammlung, ed. by Wasserschleben; ed. R. Flechner, The Hibernensis. 15 Sharpe, ‘Gildas as Father of the Church’. 12

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the Hibernensis, he was the first writer who systematically scrutinized sacred history for exempla and testimonia which bore on particular issues of law, and Gildas also worked out a hierarchy of authority among his sources. There remains a gap between Gildas and the Hibernensis. The latter is a work of Christian law; nobody could claim that it was history. Yet Gildas did very similar things with his authorities and called it history; and, moreover, parts of his Epistola look like history even to us. I shall take one example to illustrate what he was doing. Of the destruction of towns and countryside by the Saxon onslaught Gildas wrote: in hoc ergo impetu Assyrio olim in Iudaeam comparando completur quoque in nobis secundum historiam, quod propheta deplorans ait: ‘incenderunt igni sanctuarium tuum in terra, polluerunt tabernaculum nominis tui’. (So it was that in this assault, comparable with that of the Assyrians of old upon Judaea, there was fulfilled according to history for us also what the prophet said in his lament: ‘They have burned with fire your sanctuary on the ground, they have polluted the dwelling-place of your name.’)16

The prophet cited is, in fact, Psalm 73. The sense of ‘history’ here is closely allied with the use of the term in exegesis. Later in the text Gildas wrote: ‘velim quidem haec scripturae sacrae testimonia huic epistolae inserta vel inserenda, sicut nostra mediocritas posset, omnia utcumque historico vel morali sensu interpretari’ (I should certainly like, so far as my feeble talents allow, to interpret, in the historical and moral sense, all these testimonies from holy scripture).17 Here, ‘the historical sense’ means the literal sense of the biblical text. Similarly, what Gildas is saying about Psalm 73 is that its prophecy found a literal fulfilment in the disasters that befell Britain: Britain fulfilled in history, actual historical events, what the psalmist lamented. Gildas is arguing that the Old Testament assault on Judaea by the Assyrians, and the Saxon onslaught on Britain, can be combined as two fulfilments of the one prophecy contained in the psalm. Earlier I argued that Gildas’s notion of himself as an historian was not related to the historical sense of scripture. It could not be, so I maintained, because what was important was the moral not the historical sense. That is indeed entirely true of what the Hibernensis took from Gildas. But the example of his thinking just given shows that, for understanding Gildas himself rather 16 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 24, p. 39 (Engl. trans. by Winterbottom, p. 27). 17 Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 93, pp. 77–78 (trans. by Winterbottom, p. 70).

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than what lawyers took from Gildas, what I argued earlier is not entirely correct. The psalm gave the moral sense of events both in the history of Judaea and in the history of Britain. Scripture was itself the exegete both of what lay within scripture — the Assyrian attack on Judaea — and what lay outside scripture, namely a pattern of events in recent history, the Saxon attacks on Britain. This approach to history has its implications for an ethnic understanding of the history of the Britons. Their history can be lined up in parallel with the history of Israel and Judah. Israel was a populus rather than a gens, even for a Gildas who was quite ready to call the Romans a gens;18 and Israel was thus distanced from the Gentiles, the gentes. Yet, the voice of God might speak to both Judah and Britain with just one sentence from the psalms. Gildas influenced later historians in Britain and Ireland as well as lawyers. Bede borrowed part of his text, and Bede’s anxiety that God might condemn eighth-century Northumbria was partly stimulated by Gildas’s earlier anxiety that God would condemn the Britons, an anxiety that Bede believed had been entirely justified.19 The significance of Gildas for later writers was that what he feared came to pass: for the ninth-century Life of St Paul of Léon, Gildas’s work recounted the Ormesta Britanniae, where ormesta is likely to be a Latin version of the vernacular gormes, an intrusion onto land belonging to another:20 English conquest had now become the central theme of the text, which thus assumed the status of a commentary on the subsequent fate of the Britons. The ninth-century Historia Brittonum alludes to Gildas’s De excidio, but, as we shall see, took a very different line with the history of the Britons. Before we get to the Historia Brittonum, we need to take a detour via Ireland and consider two approaches to the ethnic identity of the Irish that shared many particular assumptions and yet flatly contradicted each other. The first was a text in Irish called ‘The Primer of the Poets’ or ‘The Primer of the Scholars’, dated to c. 700 on the basis of the stage to which the language of the text had evolved.21 It was directed at vernacular poets who claimed to possess a learning that drew from both Latin and vernacular traditions. In that sense, they were both poets and scholars, which is why the title of the work is translated as both ‘The Primer of the Poets’ and ‘The Primer of the Scholars’. It is a 18

Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 38, p. 49. Charles-Edwards, ‘Bede, the Irish and the Britons’. 20 Wrmonoc, Vita S. Pauli Aureliani, ed. by Cuissard, chap. 8, p. 413; see also the notes by Cuissard and Henri Gaidoz, pp. 458–60; Charles-Edwards, Early Irish and Welsh Kinship, p. 296. 21 Auraicept na nÉces, ed. by Ahlqvist. 19

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combination of a grammar of Irish and an origin legend of the Irish language. The grammar is constantly looking over its back to Latin grammar, especially the works of Donatus. The origin legend of Irish is constructed in terms of the story of the Tower of Babel in Genesis. At the beginning of the eighth century it was still possible to think of an Irish people of diverse ethnic origins. 22 The unity of the Irish, claimed ‘The Primer of the Poets’, lay in a unity of language not a unity of race.23 Indeed, this language was peculiarly excellent among the languages of the world: the rest were the fruits of pride, agents of division to punish the sin of the Tower of Babel. Although Irish was invented at the Tower, its origins were ten years after the dispersal of peoples which took place when God divided the human race into many languages. Irish, then, did not originate in the sin of pride which led to the building of the Tower. It was not part of God’s plan to confound the presumption of the human race. Irish was invented by Fénius Farrsaid in a school; and the method of its invention was this: Fénius extracted what was best from the existing languages of the world. Moreover, not only was Irish, therefore, the best of languages but it was invented in a school and for a school: when a teacher called Fénius was living by Nimrod’s Tower, identified with the Tower of Babel and placed in Egypt, he was asked by his school ‘to extract a language out of the many languages’. The Auraicept is a notable enemy of racialism: when the dispersal took place from the Tower of Babel, ‘is cach combérlaid do·chuaid a suidiu dochum a chríche ₇ ni cach comcheniúil’ (it was everyone who spoke the same language that went from there to his own territory, and not everyone of the same descent).24 The origin of Irish national identity was declared to be a language, indeed the best of languages, an invented language of a school. Since Fénius was a student of many languages, and since the subject of the Auraicept was grammar, the school in question was that of the grammarian. Irish identity was a matter of the letters of the ogham alphabet, of genders and declensions. Since the Irish, in spite of their passion for genealogy, were not yet universally thought to be descended from one ancestor, there could be distinct cenéla — here ‘races’ in the sense of peoples thought to be unified by common descent. In the eighth-century ‘Saga of Fergus mac Léti’ there were said to be three ‘free races’ in Ireland: the Ulstermen, the Leinstermen, and the Féni.25 The Féni were in both cultural and political terms dominant: the native law, 22 23 24 25

Charles-Edwards, Early Christian Ireland, p. 580. Auraicept na nÉces, ed. by Ahlqvist, i.4, p. 47. Auraicept na nÉces, ed. by Ahlqvist, i.4, p. 47. ‘The Saga of Fergus mac Léti’, ed. and trans. by Binchy.

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Fénechas, was their law; and in the Auraicept, the fictional inventor of that peculiarly excellent Irish language was Fénius (the Féni given a Latin singular ending -us to dress him up as a grammarian of the remote past).26 Moreover, the two most powerful ruling dynasties, Connachta (here including the Uí Néill) and Éoganachta, both belonged to the Féni. Excluded from the Féni, however, were not just the other two ‘free races’, the Ulstermen and the Leinstermen, but also all the unfree peoples of Ireland. Political status was crucial. From no earlier than 650 and probably in the late seventh century a quite different account of Irishness was being developed. This was based on descent. It drew partly on native sources but also on Orosius and Isidore. The ancestor figure was one Míl Espáne, Míl of Spain, a scholarly invention based on the phrase miles Hispaniae, ‘soldier of Spain’.27 The link with Spain is thought to be a development from Isidore’s account of the proximity of Ireland to Spain.28 When first composed, this origin legend appears to have applied solely to the most powerful of the ‘three noble races’, the Féni, who were divided between the southern Féni and the northern Féni, and so Míl, the ancestor, duly had two sons, one the ancestor of the southern Féni and the other the ancestor of the northern Féni; but already by the date of the earliest version of the Historia Brittonum, 829 × 830, a third son had been added and Míl was on his way to becoming the ancestor of all the Irish.29 By then there were two incompatible accounts of Irish ethnicity: one openly denied the relevance of descent to Irish identity and sought it in the language; the other claimed that descent was the bond, initially between the Féni and then between all the Irish. Both accounts survived into the later Middle Ages. It is possible to fill in some of the context of this argument. The background to ‘The Primer of the Poets’ was the power and status enjoyed by the poets and lawyers and their use of the vernacular. The bilingual aspect of early Irish culture — Latin for material that was not intrinsically Irish, the vernacular for material that was — is foreshadowed by the practice among the Irish settled in Britain in the fifth and sixth centuries by which they often commemorated 26

On Fénius, see Carey, ‘The Ancestry of Fénius Farsaid’. Carey, The Irish National Origin-Legend, p. 10; Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 13, p. 155; ed. by Faral (Chartres, as far as it goes, in parallel with Harleian). Faral’s Harleian text is reprinted with a translation in Nennius, British History, and the Welsh Annals, ed. and trans. by Morris, chap. 13, p. 20. On this text see Dumville, ‘“Historia Brittonum”’. 28 Isidore of Seville, Etymologiarum sive originum libri xx, ed. by Lindsay, xiv.6.6. 29 Historia Brittonum, ed.  by Mommsen, chap. 13, pp.  154–56. O’Rahilly, Early Irish History and Mythology, pp. 195–96. 27

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the dead by a bilingual inscription, Irish in the ogham alphabet for an Irish onlooker, Latin for a British onlooker. These inscriptions place Irish on the same level as Latin, as a fit language for the commemoration of great men; until much later, the Britons never gave the same status to the British language. The Irish language that is attested from the seventh century to the ninth was without dialect divisions; also, there is epigraphic evidence that the Féni, although dominant in southern as well as northern Ireland from the sixth century, had only very recently achieved such a wide power. The likelihood is that the dialect-free Old Irish language began as the dialect of the Féni in the sixth century but was spread by military conquest. That dialect is likely to have belonged to north-west Ireland, the area for which we have good evidence that it was the prime object of St Patrick’s mission; and with the rise of the Féni came the rise of their missionary to be ‘our papa’, namely ‘the papa of the Irish’, as well as their dialect to be the native language of the Irish.30 All this is at a period when the Irish were not generally thought to be one race, and yet the language they used in writing was now the language of the Féni; the poets and lawyers were not themselves all Féni, but they used the language of the dominant people. In such a situation the doctrine of ‘The Primer of the Poets’ about the linguistic nature of Irishness would make excellent sense. From Gildas to Bede to the Historia Brittonum, origin legends were increasingly in vogue as a way to understand ethnicity. Gildas has just one, and then only by implication, when he claims that the Picts came to Britain over sea from the north. Bede, at the beginning of the Historia ecclesiastica, has stories about the settlements of the Britons and the Picts, as well as the Irish settlement in Dál Riata and the English settlement in the south-east. The division between those origin tales which he attributes to hearsay (‘ut ferunt’, ‘ut fertur’) and those which he does not qualify in this manner places the Britons and the Picts on the hearsay side and the Irish of north-west Britain and the English on the other. The Pictish legend appears to have an Irish origin;31 the claim that the Britons came to Britain from Armorica looks as though it were an earlier counterpart to Widukind’s claim that the Saxons originated in Britain and conquered Saxony after sailing across from Britain. In any case, it refutes any British claim that they were the autochthonous inhabitants of Britain. Finally, the Historia Brittonum is rich in origin legends: it has a version of the descent of the Irish from Míl and of the migration of the Picts from the north. The ancestry of the Britons is derived from Troy, presumably a borrowing from 30 31

Cummian, De controversia paschali, ed. by Walsh and Ó Cróinín, ll. 208–09. Wallace-Hadrill, Bede’s ‘Ecclesiastical History of the English People’, pp. 8, 208.

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Francia via Brittany; and it also has a version of the Frankish Table of Nations; this, according to Walter Goffart, is derived in the first place from Italy, then from Francia, and finally from Byzantium.32 As one might expect from a ninth-century text about the history of Britain, there are textual echoes of Gildas and Bede. Gildas had accused the Britons of being unwarlike: ‘imbellemque populum, sed infidelem non tam ferro igne machinis, ut alias gentes, quam solis minis vel iudiciorum concussionibus, in superficie tantum vultus presso in altum cordis dolore sui oboedientiam proferentem edictis subiugavit’ (The people, unwarlike but untrustworthy, were not subdued, like other races, by the sword, fire and engines of war, so much as by mere threats and legal penalties).33 For Gildas, this lack of military fortitude was pre-eminently exemplified by the inability of the Britons to withstand the Irish and the Picts other than by the help of the Romans and, when the Romans failed, by hiring Saxons. The Historia takes this scenario back into the pre-Roman period and perceives it not so much as a lack of courage as a lack of weapons: ‘sine armis utebantur Brittones’ (the Britons were not making use of arms).34 The effect of this rearrangement of Gildas’s views is that the period of Roman rule is now seen as an interval in a longer story: the Britons were the earliest inhabitants of Britain, arriving in the third age of the world, but in subsequent ages the Irish and the Picts arrived and allied together to mount repeated attacks on the Britons. Another response to Gildas was to the accusation that the Britons were lamentably assiduous in sin and thus deserved condemnation at the hands of God. Already by the time of Bede, this accusation had gathered extra weight. In Gildas, the sins of the Britons might lead to a wholesale Saxon conquest, but there was still time for repentance. For Bede, the wholesale conquest had happened and, therefore, there had been no repentance on the part of the Britons and they had been justly condemned by God to lose most of Britain. The Historia Brittonum, however, is sceptical about the theology of history underlying Gildas’s argument. At barbari reversi sunt magno opere, cum Guorthigirnus amicus illis erat propter uxorem suam et nullus illos abigere audacter valuit, quia non de virtute sua Brittanniam occupaverunt, sed de nutu dei. contra voluntatem dei quis resistere poterit et nitatus? sed quomodo voluit dominus fecit et ipse omnes gentes regit et gubernat. 32

Goffart, ‘The Supposedly “Frankish” Table of Nations’. Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 5, p. 30 (trans. by Winterbottom, p. 18) (and cf. chap. 6, p. 30, chap. 18, pp. 34–35); cf. Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 15, pp. 156–58. 34 Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 15, p. 158. 33

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(But the barbarians returned in force, for Vortigern was their friend because of his wife, and no one was strong enough boldly to drive them out; for they occupied Britain not because of their strength, but because it was the will of God. Who is able to resist the will of God having attempted to do so? But as the Lord wished, so he did, and it is he who rules and governs all the nations.)35

To Gildas’s analogy with Israel and Judah attacked by Assyrians and Babylonians, the Historia Brittonum opposed another tradition, that of the inscrutability of the mind of God. The Historia Brittonum also had an answer to the accusation that the Britons were assiduous in sin. It was not so much the Britons as a people but one man, Vortigern; and Vortigern was the friend of the English.36 Treachery brought the Britons low, the treachery of Vortigern towards his own people, and the treachery of Hengest towards his allies. For Bede, there was one further sin committed by the Britons, in addition to all those catalogued by ‘their historian’, Gildas: they never preached the Gospel to their neighbours in Britain, the English.37 Here also the Historia Brittonum had an answer. Not only was the Briton, Patrick, the apostle of the Irish, but as for the baptism of Edwin, king of Northumbria, and his daughter Eanfled, subsequently the wife of Oswiu, also king of Northumbria, ‘si quis scire voluerit, quis eos baptizavit, Rum map Urbgen baptizavit eos et per quadraginta dies non cessavit baptizare omne genus ambronum et per praedicationem illius multi crediderunt Christo’ (if anyone should wish to know who baptized them, Rhun ab Urien baptized them, and for forty days he did not cease to baptize all the kindred of the Northerners [Northumbrians], and by his preaching many believed in Christ).38 Naturally enough, not everyone who read the Historia Brittonum was prepared to accept this bold assertion against the authority of Bede. In a later version, the name Rhun ab Urien is glossed ‘id est, Paulinus Eboracensis archiepiscopus’.39 History in Britain and Ireland was a vehicle for argument: about the moral responsibility of a whole nation, as in Gildas, Bede, and the Historia Brittonum, and about the nature of a people, as in Ireland between ‘The Primer of the Poets’ and the ‘Book of the Settlement of Ireland’. These arguments were fed by 35 36 37 38 39

Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 45, p. 188. Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chaps 36–39, pp. 176–81, chap. 47, pp. 190–91. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. by Plummer, i.22, p. 42. Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 63, p. 206. Historia Brittonum, ed. by Mommsen, chap. 63, p. 206.

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the Bible and other texts from outside the British Isles, but the Insular writers responded to what they read with ideas of their own; and these were responses not just to what they read but to the different historical contexts they faced in Britain and Ireland and how much they knew about their history. How different would Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica have been if he had known about the British missionary, Patrick?40

40

The tenth-century English version, the ‘Vatican’ recension, culminated with St Patrick: The Historia Brittonum, iii: The ‘Vatican’ Recension, ed. by Dumville, 28, pp. 105–07.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Auraicept na nÉces, ed.  by Anders Ahlqvist, The Early Irish Linguist: An Edition of the Canonical Part of the Auraicept na nÉces with Introduction, Commentary and Indices, Commentationes humanarum litterarum, 73 (Helsinki: Societas Scientiarum Fennica, 1982) Bede, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. by Charles Plummer, in Venerabilis Baedae opera historica, 2 vols (Oxford: Clarendon, 1896), i: Prolegomena et textum continens —— , Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. and trans. by Bertram Colgrave and Roger Mynors, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969) —— , Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. by Michael Lapidge, trans. by Paolo Chiesa, Beda: Storia degli Inglesi, Scrittori greci e latini, 2 vols (Milan: Mondadori, 2008–10) Cummian, De controversia paschali, ed.  by Maura Walsh and Dáibhí Ó Cróinín, Cummian’s Letter ‘De controversia paschali’ and the ‘De ratione conputandi’, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Studies and Texts, 86 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1988) English Historical Documents, ed. by David Charles Douglas, 12 vols (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1953–56), i: c. 500–1042, ed. by Dorothy Whitelock (1955; 2nd edn, 1979) Gildas, De excidio Britanniae, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15  vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xiii: Chronica minora saec. iv. v. vi. vii., (iii) (1898), pp. 1–85 —— , De excidio Britanniae, ed. and trans. by Hugh Williams, Gildae De excidio Britanniae, Fragmenta, Liber de paenitentia, Lorica Gildae, Cymmrodorion Record Series, 3 (London: Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, 1899) —— , De excidio Britanniae, ed. and trans. by Michael Winterbottom, Gildas: ‘The Ruin of Britain’ and Other Works, Arthurian Period Sources, 7 (London: Phillimore, 1978) The Hibernensis, ed. Roy Flechner, 2 vols (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2019). Historia Brittonum, ed.  by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xiii: Chronica minora saec. iv. v. vi. vii. (iii) (1898), pp. 111–222 Historia Brittonum, ed. by Edmond Faral, in La légende arthurienne: études et documents, première partie: les plus anciens textes, 3 vols, Bibliothèque de l’Ecole des Hautes Études, Sciences historiques et philologiques, 255–57 (Paris: Honoré Champion, 1929), iii: Documents, pp. 4–62 (repr. and trans. by John Morris, Nennius, British History, and the Welsh Annals, Arthurian Period Sources, 8 (London: Phillimore, 1980)) Historia Brittonum: The ‘Vatican’ Recension, ed.  by David  N. Dumville, in The Historia Brittonum, iii (Cambridge: Brewer, 1985)

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T. M. Charles-Edwards

Die irische Kanonensammlung, ed.  by Hermann Wasserschleben, 2nd edn (Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1885; repr. Aalen: Scientia, 1966); see also The Hibernensis Isidore of Seville, Etymologiarum sive originum libri xx, ed. by Wallace M. Lindsay, 2 vols (Oxford: Clarendon, 1911; repr. 1957) ‘The Saga of Fergus mac Léti’, ed. and trans. by Daniel Anthony Binchy, Ériu, 16 (1952), 33–48 Wrmonoc, Vita S. Pauli Aureliani, ed. by Charles Cuissard, ‘Vie de S. Paul de Léon en Bretagne d’après un manuscrit de Fleury-sur-Loire conservé à la Bibliothèque Publique d’Orléans’, Revue celtique, 5 (1881–83), 413–59

Secondary Works Carey, John, ‘The Ancestry of Fénius Farsaid’, Celtica, 21 (1990), 104–12 —— , The Irish National Origin-Legend: Synthetic Pseudo-History, Quiggin Pamphlets on the Sources of Mediaeval Gaelic History, 1 (Cambridge: Department of AngloSaxon, Norse, and Celtic, 1994) Charles-Edwards, Thomas, ‘Bede, the Irish and the Britons’, Celtica, 15 (1983), 42–52 —— , Early Irish and Welsh Kinship (Oxford: Clarendon, 1993) —— , Early Christian Ireland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) Dumville, David N., ‘“Historia Brittonum”: An Insular History from the Carolingian Age’, in Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter, ed. by Anton Scharer and Georg Scheibelreiter, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 32 (Vienna: Oldenbourg, 1994), pp. 406–34 Edwards, Nancy, A Corpus of Early Medieval Inscribed Stones and Stone Sculpture in Wales, 3 vols (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2007–13), iii: North Wales (2013) Goffart, Walter, ‘The Supposedly “Frankish” Table of Nations: An Edition and Study’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien, 17 (1983), 98–130 (repr. in Walter Goffart, Rome’s Fall and After (London: Hambledon, 1989), pp. 133–65) O’Rahilly, Thomas  F., Early Irish History and Mythology (Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1946) Sharpe, Richard, ‘Gildas as Father of the Church’, in Gildas: New Approaches, ed.  by Michael Lapidge and David N. Dumville, Studies in Celtic History, 5 (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 1984), pp. 191–205 Wallace-Hadrill, John Michael, Bede’s ‘Ecclesiastical History of the English People’: A Historical Commentary, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 1988)

Genre and Identity in Merovingian Historiography Helmut Reimitz*

O

ne of the main characteristics of the extant histories that have come down to us from the Merovingian kingdoms is their diversity. The chronicle of Marius of Avenches compiled in the last decades of the sixth century continues what Ian Wood has called a ‘chain of chronicles’.1 It begins with Jerome’s world chronicle and, after using existing continuations of the Jerome Chronicle, such as the one of Prosper of Aquitaine, Marius began his own addition with the year 455. In doing so, he grounded his chronicle firmly in the past of the Christian Roman Empire. Marius’s contemporary Gregory of Tours wrote a very different history. In his comprehensive Ten Books of History he oriented himself towards the model of Eusebius’s church history, which he probably knew mainly through its Latin translation and continuation by Rufinus.2 Our oldest extant redaction of a world chronicle, which received its name, the Chronicle of Fredegar, only in the sixteenth century dates from about

* Peter Brown, Gerda Heydemann, Walter Pohl, and Peter Van Nuffelen read earlier drafts of this essay and I would like to thank them for their time, suggestions, and comments. The research leading to these results has received funding from the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) in the project VISCOM SFB F42-G18: Visions of Community. Comparative Approaches to Ethnicity, Region and Empire in Christianity, Islam and Buddhism (400–1600 ce). 1

Wood, ‘Chains of Chronicles’; Marius of Avrenches, La chronique, ed. and trans. by Favrod. 2 Gregory of Tours, Historiae; for the model of Eusebius, see below with n. 166–67. Helmut Reimitz is Professor in the Department of History at Princeton University. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 161–211 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118565

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three generations after Gregory.3 The anonymous compilers built, like Marius, in large part on the existing historiographical building blocks of late Roman chronography and chronicle-writing.4 Unlike Marius, however, the chroniclers did not just arrange and continue these building blocks. They also reworked them substantially to adapt them to the needs and interests of an increasingly confident and self-conscious post-Roman society and culture. Three generations later, in 726/27, another anonymous author finished his Book on the History of the Franks. He again followed a very different model for the writing of history employing biblical motifs, style, and patterns to present the history of the Franks as the history of the new chosen people.5 Composing history in the late and post-Roman West meant to write history for a quite uncertain future in a quickly and constantly changing world.6 It was a true challenge even for highly sophisticated and well-educated authors. When Sidonius Apollinaris was asked by his friend Leo to write a history in the year 476 ad, even the highly cultivated member of a senatorial family, former prefect of the city of Rome and bishop of Clermont, Sidonius Apollinaris declined.7 The choice to write a history at the time of Sidonius and the centuries after the end of the Western Roman empire demanded a much higher degree of sophistication, expertise, and education than older scholarship has been willing to allow for a period that has long been seen as a dark age of cultural decline and depravation. However, the main problem for historians was not the scarcity of literature that they happened to have at hand. It was rather the multiplication of opportunities.8 Gregory of Tours, for instance, collected different and discordant reports about the early history of the Franks and their kings, compared them to information from hearsay reports only to conclude that nothing conclusive can be 3

On the early modern history of the name, see Wattenbach and Levison, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen, i, 109. 4 On late antique chronicles see now Burgess and Kulikowski, Mosaics of Time, i; on Marius’s chronicle, Wood, ‘Chains of Chronicles’; Marius of Avrenches, La chronique, ed. and trans. by Favrod. 5 Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, see Gerberding, The Rise, and the introduction in the new translation of Lebecq, La geste. 6 See the introduction to this volume. 7 Sidonius Apollinaris, Ep. iv.22, Poems and Letters, ed. by Anderson, ii, 145–50, see now Pohl, ‘The Identities of Sidonius Apollinaris’. 8 For a longer discussion of the challenges and opportunities of post-Roman historians, see the introduction, pp. 8–12.

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said about the early history of the Franks.9 In his Histories, Gregory also argued about different historical and exegetical views of the Israelites’ crossing of the Red Sea10 and complained with a quote from Sallust about the popular mistrust toward historians’ impartiality.11 More than a century after Gregory of Tours, the author of the early eighth-century Liber historiae Francorum found so many different accounts of the death of Clovis II (d. 657) that he decided not to report on it at greater detail.12 The most obvious evidence for Merovingian historians’ awareness of alternatives is the use of Gregory’s narrative in the two later histories, the Fredegar Chronicle and the Liber historiae Francorum. At the time of the composition of the two texts Gregory’s Histories already circulated in at least two versions: the Ten Books of Histories that Gregory had written and another, shorter sixbook version.13 Compilers had cut the last four books and many chapters of the first six books to adapt Gregory’s Histories to the changed circumstances of the seventh-century Merovingian kingdoms.14 This version seems to have been very popular in the Merovingian kingdoms as the unusually high number of five extant manuscripts from the period suggests. The authors of the Fredegar Chronicle and the Liber historiae Francorum also used the six-book version. The two historians, however, fundamentally rewrote the text to integrate Gregory’s historical narrative into their own historical perspective.15 In so doing the authors of the two later historical texts from the Merovingian period were well aware of the differences between their historiographical projects and Gregory’s. The Fredegar-chroniclers built upon Gregory’s authority to integrate it into a chronicle (a form that Gregory decided not to choose for his Histories). The author of the Liber historiae Francorum transformed Gregory’s narrative into a biblical narrative presenting the Franks as a new chosen people (which Gregory deliberately avoided).16 As I will try to show in this article it is important for our understanding of these texts to take these decisions as con9

Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, ii.9, pp. 52–58; cf. Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 54–55. 10 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, i.10, pp. 11–13. 11 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, iv.13. p. 145. 12 Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 44, p. 316. 13 Reimitz, ‘The Early Medieval Editions’, with further literature. 14 For a longer discussion see Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 127–65. 15 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, chaps 7 and 8. 16 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 260–61.

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scious choices seriously. They do not represent the desperate clinging of ‘dark age’ historians to genres in their deficient efforts at history-writing. These decisions should rather be seen as part of a carefully developed approach to employ genres as a way to provide orientation for their readers that were based on ‘preconstituted horizons of expectations’ to guide readers’ understanding and to enable a qualifying reception. The adoption and adaptation of the genre was thus part of the anticipated cooperation between authors and readers that helped both authors and their audiences ‘create and modify patterns of reading’.17 As discussed at greater length in the introduction to this volume, such a dynamic view of genre and generic choices might also help to establish a more dynamic approach to histories as sources for the study of identities in historical texts. The approach fits well with recent sociological, anthropological, and historical studies which suggest to explore identities as an open-ended process of identification that had to be created and re-created in circuits of communication between self-identification (by and between individuals and groups) and outside perceptions.18 In such a view, identities could be studied like genres as ‘communicative acts based on pre-constituted horizons of expectations’ which also include the expectation of their further development.19 These parallels might also help to shift our attention from the singularity of specific literary choices and authorial decisions to the discursive and social realities in which they took place. They lead us from the author who constructed his narrative to the author as a member of a society ‘with certain expectations and conventions, certain memories and ways of remembering’.20 This is particularly true for historians whose decision to write history always involved a decision to choose specific forms and ways of remembering the past. Such decisions never take place in a vacuum. Generic frames, strategies of identification, the employment of literary models, references, and devices were choices made in view of a whole range of possibilities. To understand their respective significance we have to study them in view of the horizons of expectations or the spectrum of possibilities that were shared by authors and audiences at a given time. To be sure, the extant texts and their choices present only a section 17

See the introduction to this volume, pp. 5–6. See Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, p. 6. 19 See the longer discussion in the introduction to this volume, and the contribution by Walter Pohl on debating ethnicity, in this volume. 20 Brown, ‘Gregory of Tours’, p. 24; Wickham and Fentress, Social Memory; Assmann, ‘Kollektives Gedächtnis’; on imagined readers and authors as one of the essential preconditions for the (re)production of texts see Eco, Lector in fabula. 18

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of this spectrum. But we can try to reconstruct it at least in part through the debates the extant texts were engaged in or through the reactions and responses to alternatives in them.21 In this regard, Gregory of Tours has left us a particularly rich source to explore the multiplicity of voices of his time. He not only appears in his text as an author, but from the beginning of book v onwards also as an acting and speaking figure in his own stories. In many of these episodes he appears as one of the most eminent spiritual authorities of his time, which in turn legitimated him in his role as the author of the Histories. Gregory might well have regarded such additional efforts at presenting himself as actor, auctor, and auctoritas necessary since he was well aware that as a historian he was developing something new. As much as he knew that he and his contemporaries were living in a society that was still strongly shaped by Roman traditions, culture, and institutions, he also recognized that they had become something different in the postRoman Merovingian kingdom. In his highly varied case stories, he explored the new perspectives and opportunities of a Christian vision of community in the new circumstances of the post-Roman Merovingian kingdom. In doing so he had to balance a whole range of options in order to explore their possibilities and limits in his narrative and to react to alternatives and challenges. In what follows I would like to focus on three aspects that might help to reconstruct the changing horizons of expectations that defined the meaning and practice of history and its function for the construction of identities in the world of Gregory of Tours. First, I would like to discuss approaches to Roman history and historiography which allow us to observe an increasing consensus that it was necessary to write distinct histories for a time that was no longer Roman.22 This confronted Merovingian historians not only with an opportunity, but also with the challenge to redefine the relations of different groups and groupings to each other and balance and arrange a whole range of possible identifications in the constantly changing post-Roman world. I will then briefly discuss how Gregory responded to that challenge in his Histories and how he reacted to identifications he feared as influential alternative foci of social integration to his Christian vision of community. In order to study Gregory’s Histories as part of the circuits of communication in which social identities, their relation to each other, their role and salience in society were 21 For a longer discussion of this approach to historiography and identity, see the introduction to this volume and the introduction to the whole series by Walter Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identities — Methodological Perspectives’. 22 Cf. the introduction, p. 12.

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defined and redefined, we will also explore the channels of communication and communicative frameworks that defined the Spielräume for such debates. We will then pursue the history of these literary and social Spielräume into the times of Gregory’s successors as historians in the seventh- and eighth-century Merovingian kingdoms. We will first explore the milieu of the seventh-century compilers who reworked his Ten Books into a six-book version and then compare their work with those of the two later Merovingian historians — the Chronicle of Fredegar and the Liber historiae Francorum. As we shall see, the two new histories were written in a world in which many of the communicative structures and channels of Gregory’s time were still maintained. The different forms and messages of these histories should be seen as different interventions and perspectives on history and identity within the same historical discourse, which was the main reason for their differences. Finally, I will conclude in returning to the question of genre and generic choices and their connections to identity and strategies of identification in Merovingian historiography.

The Transformation of the Roman Past in Gregory of Tours’ Histories Gregory of Tours and his contemporaries inherited a rich and varied historiographical legacy from the Roman world.23 As different as these histories were, many situated the history of the world within an imperial framework, defining the place of individuals and communities in a larger social whole through their distinctly Roman relationships.24 The historiographical projects Christian historians of the fourth century embarked upon were no exception.25 The influential works of Eusebius, who presented himself as the first person to write a history of the Christian church in his Ecclesiastical history, were strongly shaped by the context of its origins, when the church and the Christian people had emerged victorious in the Roman Empire under Constantine. As Arnaldo Momigliano observed some time ago: ‘With all his gifts, Eusebius could not shape his historiography in such a way as to envisage a situation in which it would be impossible to separate what belonged to Caesar from what belonged to Christ’.26 Two 23 For a comprehensive overview and synthesis see Inglebert, Interpretatio Christiania (part 2). 24 Potter, ‘The Greek Historians’; O’Gorman, ‘Imperial History’, with further references. 25 For an overview see Whitby, ‘Imperial Christian Historiography’, with further references. 26 Momigliano, ‘Origins of Ecclesiastical Historiography’, p. 140. On ecclesiastical histo-

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and a half centuries after Eusebius, when Gregory of Tours wrote his Histories, things were different. Gregory lived in a time when the growing interdependence between Christianity and the empire had been reconfigured in smaller power-blocs that Peter Brown has recently described as ‘little Romes’.27 They had been established by the cooperation of Roman generals and barbarian warlords with the local and regional Roman elites. Some of them would evolve into the post-Roman kingdoms of the Latin West that replaced Roman rule in the former Western Roman Empire. As Peter Brown and Ian Wood have shown in recent studies, the Christian church and Christian communities played a crucial role in this fundamental transformation of Roman society and state.28 For some members of the Roman and Christian elites the erosion of the Western Roman Empire might have been a true loss of opportunities. But many members of the local and regional elites came to see the same process as an expansion of opportunities. Particularly leaders of Christian communities increasingly understood it as a chance to realize their Christian visions in a new world.29 The new frameworks inspired Christians to develop a distinctly postRoman political theology. To be sure, Gregory was well aware that, like Eusebius before him, he needed to deal with the duality of the church as a divine institution and its less ethereal relationships with other social and political institutions.30 Unlike Eusebius, however, he did not carve out the history of Christianity from older histories and chronicles after the covenant between Abraham and the people of Israel.31 As Gregory states at the beginning of book ii he wanted to report on the deeds of the saints and the slaughters of the people ‘mixte confuseque’.32 Such a topsyturvy history of saints and sinners, however, presented an ecclesiology in what is assumed to be a largely Christian society. This might be a reflection of the Augustinian idea of a corpus permixtum, a world that was not divided until ries, see now: Van Nuffelen, ‘The Many and the One’; and the discussion and further references in Van Nuffelen and Van Hoof, eds, Clavis historicorum antiquitatis posterioris (forthcoming). 27 Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom, pp. xxv–xli; and Eisenberg, ‘Building Little Romes’. On the formation of the post-Roman kingdoms see also Halsall, Barbarian Migrations; Pohl, Völkerwanderung; Wickham, Inheritance; Smith, Europe after Rome. 28 Brown, Eye of the Needle; Wood, The Transformation of the Roman West. 29 Brown, Eye of the Needle. 30 Heinzelmann, Gregory, with p. 94; Heinzelmann, ‘La réécriture hagiographique’. 31 On Eusebius see now Johnson, Eusebius and the collection of essays in Eusebius of Caesarea, ed. by Johnson and Scott. 32 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, ii. preface, p. 36.

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the last judgement.33 Gregory, however, built upon these Augustinian ideas to put into action a historical ecclesiology that was very different from the one Augustine developed roughly two centuries before him. Gregory’s pastoral vision should help to understand the potency and superiority of the Christian church and the importance of its pastoral function to guide a largely Christian society towards another world. As much as Gregory was inspired by the model of Eusebius’s church history,34 he had no intention of building upon ecclesiastical histories which tied the history of the church so closely to that of the Roman Empire. The focus on providence and fulfilment of Christianity in Gregory’s historiographical project was the same as that of Eusebius, but the distinct social and political horizons of his post-Roman kingdom required a completely novel historical narrative, from beginning to end. The emancipation from the boundaries set by the historical genre and the Roman Empire in which they had been created was crucial for Gregory’s historiographical project. It enabled Gregory to develop a truly post-Roman vision of Christianity in which the relations of the divine church with worldly social and political institutions needed to be imagined in ways very different from how they had been organized in the Roman world.35 Gregory’s efforts at emancipation from the Roman foundations of history can also be observed in his reception of other histories. At the very beginning of his Histories, Gregory mentions Christian world chronicles, in particular Eusebius, Jerome, Sulpicius Severus, and Orosius as comprehensive chronological overviews and guides.36 His selective employment of these chronicles and histories in his first book is actually a quite radical reconfiguration of their chronological grid based on Roman history, politics, and institutions into an alternative Christian chronology. Before Constantine Gregory does not present a succession of Roman emperors, but lists the persecutors of the Christian church: Trajan, for example, was the third since Nero to order the persecution of Christians.37 After Trajan, only Gallienus, Diocletian, and later selected 33

See Brown, Augustine, pp. 312–29. Heinzelmann, ‘La réécriture hagiographique’; Heinzelmann, Gregory, p. 94; Halsall, ‘Preface to Book V’; Reimitz, History, Frankish Identity, pp. 44–50; for a detailed discussion with some important new observations see now Rotman, ‘Miraculous History’, pp. 126–41; for Gregory’s use of Rufinus’s translation and continuation see also the introduction to the edition of Krusch and Levison, Gregory of Tours, Historiae, pp. xix–xx. 35 See, Reimitz, ‘After Rome, before Francia’; Reimitz, ‘Historicizing Rome’. 36 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, i. praefatio, p. 5. 37 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, i.27, p. 21. 34

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Christian emperors are mentioned as rulers of the imperium Romanum. The history of Roman rule and rulers appears only as a pale background to the history of Christian saints, martyrs, and bishops.38 Gregory’s perspective on the Roman past was probably seen by contemporaries as one of the more controversial aspects of his Histories. As the reception of Roman historians by Gregory and his contemporaries, many bearing ‘classical names’, amply documents, the rich legacies of Roman history and mythology were still widely known and read in Merovingian Gaul at the end of the sixth century. Names like Didon, Hector, Patroclus, Orestes, Virgil, Cicero, and Cato are well documented, not least of all in Gregory’s Histories.39 Gregory’s protégé and friend Venantius Fortunatus used Roman myth and history again and again in his eulogies for the members of the governing class of the Merovingian kingdom.40 The dux Lupus of Champagne, a prominent member of the court of the Austrasian kings, is compared to Scipio, Cato, and Pompey.41 In a poem dedicated to King Charibert (d. 567), Venantius writes that the king embodies the clemency and wisdom of the biblical kings David and Solomon in addition to the dutifulness of the Roman emperor Trajan.42 In his poem to celebrate the marriage of Charibert’s brother, the Austrasian king Sigibert, Venantius compares the king to Caesar, Mars, and Achilles and his union with the Visigothic princess to that of Aeneas to Lavinia — one of many quotations from the Aeneid.43 As Michael Roberts has recently shown, however, the poet did not simply reproduce and combine older literary models. He also developed ‘a new form of praise-poetry well suited to the conditions of reception in Merovingian Gaul’.44 Like Gregory, Venantius was a man of the new post-Roman age. But there is no sign that Venantius regarded the cultural inheritance of the Roman past and the adoption of its models and resources as all that problematic. This is very different from Gregory’s take on romanitas after Rome. Gregory was well versed in Roman rhetoric and literature and knew his Roman myths.45 In Gregory’s use of this rich legacy in his Histories, however, he appears to argue 38

Mitchell, ‘Marking the Bounds’, p. 296. Riché, Education and Culture, pp. 207–08. 40 Roberts, The Humblest Sparrow; George, Venantius; Ehlen, Venantius- Interpretationen. 41 Venantius, Carmina, ed. by Leo, vii.7, p. 159. 42 Venantius, Carmina, ed. by Leo, vi.2, pp. 131–34. 43 Venantius, Carmina, ed. by Leo, vi.1, pp. 124–29; cf. George, Venantius, pp. 40–45. 44 Roberts, The Humblest Sparrow, p. 38, for Venantius’s cultural and political agenda see also Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 89–97. 45 See now Bourgain, ‘The Works of Gregory of Tours’; and still Meyers, ‘Les citations’. 39

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against the unbroken utilization of Roman myth and history in his new age. In his Histories he uses a Virgilian phrase three times to condemn the ‘accursed hunger for gold’ of some of his contemporaries (he might, however, have taken the phrase from Jerome’s Life of Paul).46 With another quote from Virgil Gregory compares the Averni — citizens of his hometown of Clermont — to the Trojan heroes. This may echo a passage in the letters of Sidonius Apollinaris, written about a century earlier, in which Sidonius drew the same comparison in the context of a fight between the people of Clermont and the Visigoths.47 In Sidonius’s letters, with which Gregory was most likely familiar, we even hear that on a lake near his country villa in the Auvergne, games were held that reenacted the contest of Drepanum in Virgil’s Aeneid.48 Gregory’s re-telling of Virgil is hardly a heroic portrayal of the citizens of Clermont. Because of their naiveté or even stupidity, they manoeuvre themselves into a devastating defeat: like the Trojans in the river Simois, the Arverni perished in the Rhône. Those who survived returned to their patria, Clermont, ‘stripped of all their equipment, deprived of their horses and thoroughly ashamed of themselves’.49 In the passage, Gregory both demonstrated to his readers that he knew his Virgil and made clear that he was not willing to present themes and motifs of the Roman epic as attractive resources for identification through a subtle association of two historically vanquished peoples. Gregory’s disapproval of the use of cultural resources and political models of the Roman imperial past is more obvious when he writes about the politics of his own times, especially in his account of Gregory’s bête noir, King Chilperic (d. 584). In his many disputes with Chilperic, Gregory presents the king as an archetype of a bad king, or as Martin Heinzelmann put it, he serves as Gregory’s antithesis of a good king.50 In so doing, Gregory, the member of an old senatorial family, does not describe Chilperic as an uncontrollable barbarian or Frank. It is above all Chilperic’s adoption and cultivation of the Roman imperial models that Gregory used to present Chilperic as a corrupt and unChristian king. Chilperic appears in the Histories as actively engaged in theological debates, building programmes, and educational reforms like the Roman 46

Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, vi.46, p. 181, for the quote see also the note in the German translation by Buchner, p. 191 n. 4. 47 Cf. Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistulae, ed. Anderson, vii.7.2, ii, 324–26. 48 Cf. Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistulae, ed. by Anderson, ii.2.19, i, 435, see now Pohl, ‘The Identities of Sidonius Apollinaris’. 49 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, iv.30, p. 163. 50 See Heinzelmann, Gregory, pp. 146–52.

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Christian emperors and their Byzantine successors.51 The image that Gregory gives us might actually fit with the self-fashioning of the king. In the eulogies written by Gregory’s friend Venantius Fortunatus, the poet also highlights the king’s Latin education and eloquence,52 and a poem written by Chilperic himself seems to have survived.53 Chilperic is an excellent example for the continuity and significance of Roman models and culture in the Merovingian world. In Gregory of Tours’s text, however, it is through these stories that the bishop of Tours criticizes Chilperic.54 According to Gregory the expensive self-representation forced Chilperic to demand many new and unjust taxes. In so doing he squandered the money that belonged to the Church and the poor.55 Compared to the poems of Venantius Fortunatus (and the expectations of the dedicatees that the poems reveal), Gregory’s emphasis on discontinuities with Roman history and models seems exceptional. But we should not limit our understanding of attitudes to the Roman past to these two contrasting positions. A more responsible approach may view them as evidence for different opinions in a wider spectrum of possibilities and ways of dealing with the historiographical resources the Roman Empire left behind. Most of the members of the Merovingian governing class belonged to families whose ancestors had been members of the local and regional elites in Gaul.56 Many of them owed their prominent positions at the end of the sixth century to the decision these ancestors made to cooperate with the new rulers. They played an influential role in the reorganization of the social and political structures of the late Roman Empire into the smaller power-blocs of a post-Roman world.57 For many of them, the discontinuity with the Roman past was not necessarily neg51

For a longer discussion see Reimitz, ‘Contradictory Stereotypes’. Venantius, Carmina, ed. by Leo, ix.1, p. 203. 53 Ymnus in solemnitate sancti Medardi episcopi, ed. by Strecker, p. 455, see now the comments of Glatthaar, ‘Der Edictus Chilperichs I.’, pp. 3–7. 54 Wood, Merovingian Kingdoms, p. 68. 55 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.17, p. 216; Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.44, p. 254, and the ‘obituary’ of Chilperic in Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, vi.46, pp. 319–20. 56 Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom, pp. xxvi–xxvii. 57 For studies on the elites in Gaul and their transformation see the essays in Diefenbach and Müller, eds, Gallien in Spätantike und Frühmittelalter; Mathisen, People; Mathisen and Shanzer, eds, Society and Culture; Jussen, ‘Liturgy and Legitimation’; Heinzelmann, Bischofsherrschaft; Brown, ‘The Study of Elites’ and Eisenberg, ‘Building Little Romes’. 52

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ative. Whether they embraced or eschewed discontinuity can be understood by exploring the contexts in which they linked themselves and their history to this past. Discontinuity with Rome was important both in renewing the Roman past and in moving away from the Rome of the present, the Byzantine Empire. In the constant competition amongst Gregory’s contemporary Merovingian kings, good relations with the Byzantine Empire seemed to have played an increasingly important role in their efforts to legitimate their claims and positions.58 With Merovingian elites going to Byzantium and Byzantine envoys coming to the Merovingian court, Gregory might have observed or feared an increasing prestige of imperial models that he regarded as inappropriate for a historical vision of his Christian regnum. And he was probably even more concerned about the consequences of this trend for the present and future of society. Gregory and many of his fellow bishops tracked the intensified importation and reception of Byzantine histories, cults, and theology with great unease. Greater dependence on the Byzantine church was as unappealing as the posture of the Byzantine emperor as a theological authority.

Lector in historia: Christianity and History as Lived Experience Gregory’s emancipation from the Roman past was also linked to the articulation of his Christian vision of community. It was not the power and history of the Roman Empire that defined the history of Christianity and the Spielräume for its unfolding. The realization of Christianity was built on continual decisions in favour of a Christian morality that Gregory outlines in his narrative with the example of pious individuals, saints, and prophets. Gregory developed a historical drama, which amounted to a continual definition of identity. The decisive criterion for Gregory’s Christian vision of community was not a oneoff decision. It was a continual striving toward the morals and values of his Christendom. In this pastoral agenda of the Histories, Gregory seems to have built on an epistemological shift in fourth-century Christian discourse through which Christian authors increasingly expected their readers’ cooperation in the interpretation of their texts in common epistemological projects.59 Gregory like58

See Reimitz, ‘Pax inter utramque gentem’, with further literature. For a comprehensive study of the changes in epistemology, see the dissertation of Mark Letteney, Christianizing Knowledge: A New Order of Books in the Theodosian Age (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Princeton, 2020). I should like to thank Mark for allowing me to read the dissertation in advance of his defence. 59

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wise expected his readers to work with him, offering his many case stories as observations and guides for reflections upon how exactly a Christian world might be realized. In this way, the practice of writing and reading the Histories itself became part of the continual process of striving for a truly Christian life. Joining Gregory in this project, by reading the Histories and to try to find their meaning, was a way of choosing to embrace the Christian identity the Histories sought to construct. Such a complex interaction of author, audience, and subject was, of course, a vulnerable project especially as it took place in a post-Roman state whose cultural and social centres of gravity were more diverse and notably less centralized and hierarchical than its Roman predecessor’s. On the one hand these circumstances motivated Gregory the pastor to write his Histories to promote his vision of community. But it also confronted Gregory the historian with a fundamental problem. In writing a new church history, he offered a highly attractive historical framework for a number of real or imagined communities that had come to live in Gaul. In this respect, he also had to reconcile the histories of these social groupings by inevitably furnishing them with a historical profile and identity, even though Gregory did not want to provide contemporary individuals and groups with a past that could legitimate their positions as independent from their Christian identity. He, therefore, worked to counteract this potential. His aim was to destabilize the historical grounding of social roles and identities that might emerge as alternative instruments of identification to Christianity in (his) history. The Roman past and narratives of that past provided Gregory’s contemporaries with ample opportunities for such alternatives. In Gregory’s post-Roman world, however, the myriad meanings of Roman identity no longer aligned quite as cleanly as they did before the sixth century. In his Histories Gregory took stock of the fact that the various interpretations of romanitas ‘no longer fit together so neatly’.60 Gregory’s emphasis on discontinuities with the Roman past also helped him to demarcate the new world of Christian Gaul from the vestiges of the Roman Empire. This constituted an essential part of Gregory’s effort to prevent the emergence of an overarching framework of Roman history and identity that might absorb his formation of Christendom in Gaul.61 60

Maskarinec, ‘Who Were the Romans?’, See Pohl and others, eds, Transformations of Romanness with his introduction on ‘Early Medieval Romanness – A Multiple Identity’, pp. 3–40. 61 See Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 51–73; and for similar strategies regarding monastic communities, see Diem, ‘Gregory’s Chess Board’.

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In his Histories we see Gregory in conversation with loci of identification that had emerged more prominently after the end of the Roman Empire. Of these post-Roman identities, one of the most important seems to have been Frankish identity. As I have argued elsewhere at greater length, it was precisely during Gregory’s time that we observe an increasing use of the Frankish identity as an instrument of the social and political legitimation of a new governing class establishing itself around the various centers of royal power.62 Gregory tried to counter this process with a complementary strategy to his deconstruction of Roman identity. As has been noted long ago, the Franks do not play an important role in Gregory’s Histories. In many cases he even avoids ascribing agency to the Franks in their earlier history, which becomes particularly obvious in comparison to other historical sources of his period such as Marius of Avenches, John of Biclaro, and the Chronica Caesaraugustana. We find many instances in which Gregory describes the deeds and wars of the Merovingian kings without mentioning the name of the Franks, and yet the corresponding entries in other chronicles do ascribe agency to the Franks. To give just a few examples: whereas Gregory’s text documents that Childebert I and his brother Chlothar I invaded Hispania and attacked the city of Caesaraugusta ‘cum exercitu’, the Chronicle of Caesaraugusta reports that the city was besieged by the ‘reges Francorum’.63 Gregory’s identification of agency also contrasts with other texts written within the Merovingian kingdoms including the Life of Caesarius of Arles (written c. 550)64 and the chronicle of Gregory’s contemporary Marius of Avenches. In particular, in his account of the conquest of the Burgundian kingdom (to which Avenches had belonged) by the sons of Clovis I, Marius stresses in his chronicle their identity as reges Francorum.65 62

Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 98–123. Cf. Chronicle of Caesaraugusta, ed. by Mommsen, a. 541, p. 223, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed.  by Krusch, iii.29, p.  125; other examples; John of Biclaro, Chronica, ed.  by Mommsen, a. 585, p. 217, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, viii.30, p. 396; John of Biclaro, Chronica, ed. by Mommsen, a. 587, p. 218, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, viii.45, p. 411; John of Biclaro, Chronica, ed. by Mommsen, a. 589, p. 218, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, ix.31, p. 450; Chronica Gallica a. 511, ed. by Mommsen, p. 665, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, ii.37, p. 88. 64 See Vita Caesarii, ed. by Krusch, i.28, p. 467, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, ii.37, p. 85. 65 Marius of Avrenches, Chronica, ed. by Mommsen, a. 523, p. 235: ‘Hoc consule Sigimundus rex Burgundionum a Burgundionibus Francis traditus est in Francia in habitu monachale perductus’, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, iii.6, p. 102; Marius of Avrenches, 63

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Gregory, however, could not outpast the Franks and Frankish identity completely. Alongside his efforts to disentangle different ideas of romanitas from the conception of an overarching Roman identity, Gregory’s Histories subtly differentiate between various displays of Frankishnesses. In the instances where Gregory explicitly uses the name of the Franks, he describes a great variety of social experiences, all of which he portrays as distinct (i.e. never overlapping) social realities.66 Neither in the more distant Roman past nor in his own Merovingian period did Gregory allow for any sort of ‘Frankish’ experience to cohere, since any such coherence might provide the building blocks for a shared Frankish identity. The primary link should be the same as all other groups and individuals in the regnum — their commitment to a shared Christendom. Here Gregory was probably the first truly post-Roman historian due to his work in defining the role of Christianity and the Christian church as the main focus for the social coherence of his society. Yet, he was certainly not a lone voice in the wilderness of the Merovingian kingdom (as he presented himself sometimes). He built in fact upon ecclesiological reflections and experiments of more than two centuries.67 Particularly from southern Gaul, where Gregory’s family was from and he grew up and was trained, we have ample evidence for the constant work to define and redefine the relations between Christianity and the Christian church to the rapidly changing political and social institutions. Gregory’s pioneering contribution was his ability to connect these experiments in ecclesiology to the larger scale of the Merovingian kingdom. With this integration of various ecclesiological experiments in his Histories, Gregory hoped to provide a shared focus for the expectations and experiences of members of Christian communities in Gaul. With the moral framing of his Christendom he held himself to high standards not only as an actor in his Histories but also as their author. Participation in this joint venture, however, demanded that other members of his society commit themselves to the same standards. This was particularly true for the readers and audiences of his Histories. If his manifold and varied case studies could succeed in ascertaining Chronica, ed.  by Mommsen, a. 534, p.  235: ‘reges Francorum Childebertus, Chlotarius et Theudebertus Burgundiam obtinuerunt’, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, iii.11, p. 107; Marius of Avrenches, Chronica, ed. by Mommsen, a. 539, p. 236: Theudebertus rex Francorum, with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, iii.32, p. 128. 66 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 57–65. 67 For recent studies on the religious and spiritual experiments and experiences on which Gregory built, see now Eisenberg, ‘Building Little Romes’. Brown, Through the Eye, and Wood, Transformation.

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the limits and opportunities available to members of his society in developing a truly Christian society, the cooperation of his readers was key to his success. In this hope for his Histories Gregory must have had quite high expectations for the cultural competences and skills of his audience or imagined reader. Such expectations, however, have often been dismissed as overly optimistic by modern scholarship. Even in Walter Goffart’s discussion of Gregory’s text and the fine-grained interpretation of the bishop’s agenda, one often gets the impression of a Gregory who was engaged in an internal dialogue with himself. This reflects in many ways the outdated image of the decline of literary culture in the Merovingian kingdoms.68 According to this image, Gregory might still have received a sufficient dose of classical training, but he was increasingly surrounded by a world that did not share this classical training.69 This image, however, fits neither the more recent research on Merovingian culture70 nor the evidence of the Histories. The stories he recounts in his Histories and hagiographical texts provide us with ample evidence of a wider public sphere in which Gregory expected his works to be circulated and read. Many of these episodes recount events of his own times as a bishop of Tours and clearly built on experiences Gregory had as a member of the governing classes of the Merovingian kingdoms. The reconstruction of the public sphere that Gregory envisaged for his Histories might thus help us to link his literary strategies to the historical realities they describe, and to connect the literary Spielräume he employed to the social circumstances that defined these rooms of manoeuvre. This in turn is key to the question of how we may explore the writing of history as a window into the history of social identities.

‘I Only Repeated What I Heard’: Communicative Frameworks and Public Dispute in the Sixth Century Gregory’s notion of a public sphere is well documented in the Histories. They provide us with ample evidence for literary exchange and public communi68

Cf. my introduction to this volume, pp. 10–11. Riché, Education and Culture, pp. 206–11. 70 See the contributions in Diefenbach and Müller, eds, Gallien in Spätantike und Frühmittelalter; Wood, ‘Culture’; Wood, ‘Why Collect Letters?’; Wood, ‘Administration’; Hen, Culture and Religion; Hen, Roman Barbarians; Kreiner, Social Life; and the shorter studies of Gioanni, ‘La langue du pourpre’; Dumézil, ‘Gogo et ses amis’; Dumézil, ‘Les vrais-faux messages’; Williard, ‘Letter-Writing’; Ganz, ‘In the Circle’; Ganz, ‘Fragmentierung’; Kreiner, Social Life, pp. 125–55 and the forthcoming collections of essays in Effros and Moreira, eds, Oxford Handbook of the Merovingian World; and Esders and others, eds, East and West. 69

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cation in the Merovingian world through sermons and public speeches, legal negotiations in court, councils, letter exchanges, and more formal messages to kings, officials, and nobles.71 In a highly stratified society these exchanges could be well monitored and could have severe consequences if sensitive information was handled carelessly. When the bishops Salonious and Sagitarrius circulated their opinion that the sons of King Guntram could not succeed their father as kings because their mother had once been a servant, Guntram had them immediately imprisoned.72 Even Gregory had to face a trial at the royal court of Chilperic. The charge was that the bishop of Tours had spread rumors accusing Queen Fredegund of having committed adultery with Bishop Bertram of Bordeaux.73 Gregory denied he had ever said such a thing. He had only heard others talking about it. In his long account, Gregory presents his case mainly as a question of what had been said in the public sphere and enumerates in detail the different reports about who said or told what to whom and when.74 It was a difficult situation for the bishop, and it might well be that even his archives in Tours were searched for incriminating material.75 The episcopal assembly ultimately found Gregory innocent. The bishops in turn threatened Chilperic and Bertram with excommunication for having brought false charges against a bishop. Chilperic, however, defended himself successfully with the same strategy that Gregory had used: ‘“Non”, inquit, “nisi audita narravi”’. He had not brought up anything, he had only repeated what he had heard.76 Another story about Gregory’s altercation with Felix, the bishop of Nantes, presents us with vivid insights into the methods and channels of public disputes in the Merovingian kingdoms and how Gregory might have envisaged his Histories to operate in the communicative frameworks of his time. As Gregory tells us, Felix had sent him a letter, in which the bishop of Nantes accused Gregory’s brother, Peter, of having killed the appointed bishop of Langres to become bishop himself.77 Felix had sent the letter to Gregory directly (as Gregory mentions), but it also seems that Gregory assumed the message had been spread more widely and he needed to respond to it. Gregory mentions 71

See above, n. 70. Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.20, pp. 227–28. 73 For how adultery became one of the heaviest charges against a bishop from the fifth to the sixth centuries, see Eisenberg, ‘Building Little Romes’. 74 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.48–50, pp. 257–63. 75 See Dailey, Queens, Consorts, Concubines, p. 153. 76 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.49, p. 261. 77 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.5, pp. 200–03. 72

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that he responded with a letter to Felix which he also uses to mock the bishop of Nantes. He was glad the bishop was the head of the church in Nantes and not in Marseille. If he were, Felix’s foul mouth would require him to buy a boatload of papyrus to libel him and Felix’s desire to drag honest people into the mud would have no limits.78 Gregory appears to have liked this joke so much that he presented it wordfor-word from his letter. It is very likely, however, that Gregory had sent the letter to Felix long before he finished his Histories. He would not have waited until the final publication of his Histories to present it to people who may have found it funnier than Felix. He might well have sent it out in letters to a wider audience, which was probably largely the same group of people that had received the letter from Felix. The episode about the letter exchange between Gregory and Felix (and maybe other members of the literary network) reveals a cultural milieux where literary exchange and letter writing continued to present important means of creating and maintaining social and political ties.79 It was within the communicative frameworks and channels of this culture in which Gregory must have imagined his Histories to circulate and be read as well. A member of Gregory’s own literary network was Venantius Fortunatus, one of Gregory’s protégés and friends. His poetry is our best evidence of the importance of literary exchange as social positioning in the later sixth century. Soon after his move from Italy to Gaul, Venantius gained a permanent place in the Merovingian upper class, ending his life as bishop of Poitiers.80 Members of Gregory’s family and network were among Venantius’s first supporters, and Gregory remained his patron until the end of his life.81 But in the decade after Venantius’s arrival in Gaul, he was on good terms with Felix too. In his poems, Venantius praises Felix’s exemplary piety and his unmatched guardianship of romanitas, and he mentions having received a number of letters from the bishop of Nantes.82 Gregory and Felix themselves may have been close for some time (which probably made his accusations even more dangerous for Gregory). 78

Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.5, p. 200. For an excellent discussion of this see Mratschek, ‘Letter Collection’; for the post-Roman and Merovingian period see Dumézil, ‘Gogo et ses amis’; Mathisen, ‘Desiderius’; Müller, ‘Freundschaften’; Williard, ‘Letter-Writing’; Wood, ‘Why Collect Letters’, for the seventh century see also below pp. 182–84. 80 George, Venantius Fortunatus. 81 For Gregory and Venantius see now Roberts, ‘Venantius Fortunatus’. 82 George, Venantius, pp. 114–23; Roberts, The Humblest Sparrow, pp. 139–64; Roberts, ‘Venantius Fortunatus’, pp. 37–47. 79

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From his Gloria confessorum, we know that Gregory was at least for some time in close contact with the bishop of Nantes. Felix himself was the source of a story regarding a chaste bishop who had been seen with a radiant lamb on his breast while asleep (by his wife who intended to seduce the bishop).83 Taken together Gregory’s interactions with Felix present us a world of stories, both pious and polemical, which their narrators expected to circulate by word of mouth and in writing. Whether Venantius fell out with the bishop of Nantes as Gregory did, we do not know. If the poet maintained a good relationship with Felix it may well have been that he received letters from both bishops, Gregory and Felix, each with a different version of the story about Gregory’s brother Peter. However, the exchange of letters and other literary works between Venantius and Gregory of Tours are best documented in the poet’s writings. The correspondence between the two friends continued until the end of Gregory’s life. In one poem, Venantius thanks Gregory for a book with ‘carmina divina’ that Gregory had written. He also praises Gregory the pastor for sharing them not only with him but with his flock.84 Unfortunately, we do not have the letters and poems that Gregory wrote, and it is impossible to reconstruct Gregory’s literary social network any more precisely. Presumably there were strong overlaps with the network in Venantius’s poetry, since dedicatees of Venantius’s poems also appear repeatedly as positive figures in Gregory’s Histories.85 Of course the two social networks did not overlap entirely. Nevertheless, their close connections can give us an idea of the literary and social networks in which Gregory imagined the circulation and distribution of his Histories. This does not mean that Gregory saw the reception of the Histories as limited by the boundaries of a specific in-group. Just like Gregory, many members of his familial and social network were deeply involved in the political and social fabric of the kingdom. The communicative frameworks this network created and re-created provided Gregory with ample opportunities to imagine them as channels for further distribution in the ‘meshwork of culture and structure’ of a heterogeneous and highly stratified society.86 This might also explain Gregory’s dramatic appeal to his successors at Tours to protect his literary legacy by keeping it ‘intact and unchanged’ just as he has 83

Gregory of Tours, De gloria confessorum, ed. by Krusch, 77, p. 344. Venantius, Carmina, ed. by Leo, v.8b, p. 119. 85 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 92–93; Williard, ‘Letter-Writing’. 86 For networks as meshworks of culture and structure see Preiser-Kapeller, ‘Luhmann in Byzantium’, p. 2, with further references to recent network theory. 84

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left them.87 The appeal at the end of his Histories has often been understood as evidence that Gregory did not imagine a wider circulation of his Histories. It was only the keepers of the shrine of Saint Martin who were supposed to have them. But we could also read it as evidence that Gregory anticipated a wider distribution and just hoped his successors at Tours were the most trustworthy. It was precisely the anticipation of such a wider distribution of the Histories that made such precautions necessary. The wider they would be successfully distributed beyond the communicative channels of Gregory’s network, the more uncertain was the question of who would reproduce copies and how they would do so. A broader distribution required members of Gregory’s familial and ecclesiastical network to keep his works ‘intact and complete just as he had left them’. After all, Gregory had provided members of his family with a venerable and prestigious history in the long past of Christian Gaul.88 The same was true for his successors at the episcopate of Tours whom Gregory probably expected to come from his family as well. After all, as Gregory mentions in his Histories, with the exception of five bishops, all his predecessors at Tours had been members of his family.89 Whether Gregory’s successors as bishop were members of Gregory’s family or whether they did or did not adhere to his Histories, we do not know. What we know is that his predictions regarding the dissemination of his works were accurate. The unusually high number of extant Merovingian manuscripts makes clear that the Histories were widely copied soon after Gregory’s death. The manuscript record also shows that the text circulated exactly as Gregory had feared: Merovingian and Carolingian historians and copyists compiled different versions, omitting not only chapters but even entire books.90 However, Gregory does seem to have succeeded in preserving an authoritative version. Most of the heavily edited manuscripts of his text have survived with traces that demonstrate that the complete version of Gregory was available to the copyists and readers. In some instances, the complete text was used to check, or sometimes even to complement, the versions compilers, who had ‘selected some parts and omitted others’, made.91 Later copyists, compilers, and readers of his 87

Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, x.31, p. 536. See Heinzelmann, Gregory, pp. 7–22, for the reconstruction of the family; and cf. Wood, ‘Individuality’, for its promotion by Gregory. 89 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.49, p. 262. 90 Reimitz, ‘The Early Medieval Editions’, with further literature. 91 Krusch, ‘Die handschriftlichen Grundlagen’, pp. 772–73; Heinzelmann and Bourgain, ‘L’oeuvre’, pp. 274–75; Hilchenbach, Das vierte Buch, i, 41–50, 79. 88

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text obviously were not only aware of several versions of the text but also that a version closer to Gregory’s original than others existed.

Persistence and Proliferation: Alternatives to Gregory from the Sixth to the Eighth Centuries For a long time, modern scholars have viewed the decision of early medieval compilers and editors of the Histories to disregard Gregory’s last will as evidence for his failure to firmly establish his own Christian vision of community. According to such an interpretation, his ‘failure’ is particularly evident in the Merovingian six-book version which was probably compiled within a generation of Gregory’s death.92 The compilers omitted the last four books, ending their narrative with the death of Chilperic I in 584, as well as completely reworking Gregory’s narrative by removing certain chapters from the first six books. At first glance, the compilers seem to have mainly excluded stories concerning bishops, clerics, and churches. Consequently, the genesis of the six-book version and its subsequent success has often been explained in terms of a deliberate effort to erase or reduce clerical and ecclesiastical content. The six-book recension appealed to an audience who wanted to read a history of the Franks and their kings, rather than a narrative driven by a Christian world view.93 However, comparing the Merovingian six-book version with Gregory’s text shows that at no point in the manuscript tradition of the six-book recension are the Franks or their kings given a firmer place in the regnum than Gregory had originally allowed them.94 As I have suggested at greater length elsewhere, later redactors did not work against Gregory’s vision of community, but tried to build on and adapt it to the changed circumstances of their own times. Though far from how Gregory wanted his Histories transmitted, future Merovingian and Carolingian compilers nevertheless continued his historiographical project within the framework he had constructed. They seem to have understood Gregory’s historiographical choices, aims, and literary strategies better than most modern scholars might believe. Their reconfiguration of the Histories aimed at releasing the text from what it represented: an outdated spiritual 92

Heinzelmann, Gregory, pp. 192–201; Heinzelmann and Bourgain, ‘L’oeuvre’; Bourgain, ‘The Works’. 93 This has already been suggested by Ruinart, ‘In novam editionem’; for more nuanced approaches in the same direction, cf. however the newer and more differentiated discussions in Goffart, ‘From Historiae to Historia Francorum’; and Heinzelmann, Gregory, p. 191. 94 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 133–40.

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topography that defined Merovingian Christendom mainly through the cults and saints of Gregory’s familial network in southern Gaul and the obsolete political constellation to which Gregory’s history of the ecclesia Galliarum was connected. The compilers of the six-book version were living in a very different world from Gregory. The redacted version was produced and copied in a period during which changes to the social imagination occurred, leading to the ‘emergence of a new world’ after the ‘end of Ancient Christianity’.95 These changes went hand in hand with the reorganization and redistribution of social, political, and religious resources after Chlothar II became the sole ruler of the whole Merovingian kingdom.96 One of the main catalysts of these changes was certainly the rise of a new form of monasticism inspired by the Irishman Columbanus.97 In its many manifestations, this new monastic culture provided members of the Merovingian elite new opportunities to solidify and demonstrate their place within the upper levels of society at both regional and supraregional levels.98 The rich and diverse hagiographical literature impressively illustrates the promotion of new spiritual ideals, religious networks, and political connections.99 At the same time, Chlothar II created a new centre of political gravity in Merovingian Gaul at his new capital of Paris. The royal court also provided and promoted new opportunities for the formation of a court elite, organizing the education and training of future court members.100 The task was delegated to ‘appropriate households’ all over the kingdom, but there was also a junior academy at the palace itself, which provided an excellent formation for those interested in a career at court.101 While the Merovingian kingdom’s social, political, and spiritual topography fundamentally changed in the first half of the seventh century, the channels of communication and exchange remained similar to 95

Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom, pp. 219–21. Wood, Merovingian Kingdoms, pp. 140–58; Esders, Römische Rechtstradition. 97 Diem, Das monastische Experiment; Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom; and see now the introduction to Jonas of Bobbio, Life of Columbanus, trans. by O’Hara and Wood. 98 Fox, Power and Religion; Le Jan, ‘Timor’; Le Jan, ‘Convents’. 99 Heinzelmann, ‘L’hagiographie mérovingienne’; Kreiner, The Social Life; Fouracre and Gerberding, eds, Late Merovingian France, pp. 1–78, for the ‘Columbanian’ hagiographer Jonas and his conversation with other authors, see now the introduction to the new translation by Ian Wood and Alex O’Hara, Jonas of Bobbio, Life of Columbanus, esp. pp. 78–83. 100 Wood, ‘Administration’, p. 74; Hen, Roman Barbarians, pp. 94–123. 101 Riché, Education and Culture, pp. 236–46. 96

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those of the sixth century. More than two generations after Gregory’s altercation with Felix of Nantes, one of his successors as bishop of Tours, Chrodobert (d. 682), a member of the court circle, was involved in another literary feud with an episcopal colleague in Paris, Importunus. 102 The extant letters use partly quite drastic vocabulary and scholars have discussed whether they are evidence of an actual argument between the two bishops or rather a fictitious letter exchange. In any case, in regard to the communicative structures and channels these letters imagine, they bear striking resemblances to those of Chrodobert’s predecessor. The exchange starts with a letter from Chrodobert to Importunus with sarcastic comments and complaints about the bad quality of the grain that Importunus had sent to the bishop of Tours.103 Importunus’s response consists of two letters full of serious accusations against Chrodobert including heresy, sexual misconduct, and promiscuity along with the advice that the bishop should castrate himself. Both authors seem to have expected some public knowledge of their conflict, since both mention a wider public as letter recipients. Importunus’s letters are addressed to Chrodobert but one of them states that it was circulated ‘per patrias multas’.104 Chrodobert’s responses were equally expected to reach a wider audience, addressing the general public and people of his own diocese. Like his predecessor, Gregory of Tours, Chrodobert was a well-connected and important figure in the Merovingian world. He belonged to the circle educated at the royal court whose members stayed in close contact with each other even after the end of their secular career.105 Chrodobert’s pen pals included one of the most prominent and powerful members of this group, Audoin of Rouen. Audoin even sent Chrodobert his account of the Life of another member of this group, Eligius, who had been a close friend of Audoin and bishop of Noyon until his death in 660. Before becoming bishop, Eligius had worked with Audoin at the court and had become the royal treasurer for Chlothar II and his son Dagobert I.106 After Audoin had finished his work on the life and afterlife of Eligius, probably shortly before 680, he sent his account to Chrodobert 102

Hen, ‘Changing Places’; Shanzer, ‘The Tale’; Walstra, Les cinq epîtres rimées. Additamentum, ed. by Zeumer, p. 221. 104 Additamentum, ed. by Zeumer, p. 223. 105 Wood, ‘Administration’; Hen, Roman Barbarians. 106 Heinzelmann, ‘Eligius monetarius’, on Audoin’s Life of Eligius see Heinzelmann, ‘L‘hagiographie mérovingienne’, and Bayer, ‘Vita Eligii’, pp. 466–75; Meriaux, ‘Du nouveau sur la Vie de saint Éloi’. 103

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asking him to make up for the inadequacies and shortcomings of the text.107 Chrodobert responded that he had not been able to find anything to correct in Audoin’s Life of Eligius. Instead of correcting the exemplar, he ordered the production of more copies of the text for himself and for further distribution.108 It seems that the communicative frameworks and channels had not changed significantly since Gregory of Tours’s time. The Life of Eligius that Audoin sent to Chrodobert, however, provides us with interesting insights into how these channels were used to develop an alternative spiritual topography to that which Gregory’s Histories promoted. The Life of Eligius shows Audoin and Eligius promoting an alternative or complementary history of the long Christian past in Gaul with a strong focus on the northern parts of Gaul such as Rouen, Noyon, Soissons, and Beauvais. As Audoin emphasizes in his narrative, these regions had their own distinguished Christian past, which however, had been largely forgotten in the seventh century. The search of this lost past was one of Audoin’s and Eligius’s main projects. After comprehensive historical studies and archaeological surveys, Eligius even found the body of St Quentin under the pavement of the basilica at a place ‘which no one had suspected’.109 It is in these northern and north-eastern parts of the kingdom where interest in the abbreviated version of Gregory’s Histories is best documented. In fact, three of the five extant manuscript-witnesses from the Merovingian period were copied in cultural centres of the northern and north-eastern parts of the kingdom around 700.110 The differences between these manuscripts suggest several stages of their transmission between the first compilation of the six-book version and the production of the extant manuscripts. They indicate a lively transmission and exchange of this version of Gregory’s Histories in the different parts of the Merovingian kingdoms.111 However, as far as we can tell from the extant manuscripts, Gregory’s text, or what remained of it in the six-book versions never incorporated new stories about martyrs and saints from the northern or eastern regions. 107

Epistola Dadonis ad Rodobertum, ed. by Krusch, p. 741; on the composition, see Bayer, ‘Vita Eligii’, pp. 466–75. 108 Rescriptum ad domnum Dadonem a Rodoberto, ed. by Krusch, p. 741. 109 Audoin, Vita Eligii, ed. by Krusch, ii.6, p. 699; on Quentin see now Gaillard and Sapin, ‘Autour de la tombe de saint Quentin’; on the creation of an alternative spiritual topography in the Rictiovarus cycle see Meriaux and Meijns, ‘Le cycle de Rictiovar’. 110 Heinzelmann and Bourgain, ‘L’oeuvre’, pp. 282–83, and cf. now the discussion of the manuscripts in Licht, Die Halbunziale, Paris, Bnf, 17654: pp. 320–23, 331, Paris, BnF, lat. 17655: pp. 333–36; Cambrai, BM, 684 (624): pp. 305–07. 111 Cf. the detailed stemma of the six-book version in Hilchenbach, Das vierte Buch, i, 79.

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The success of Gregory’s history as a historical authority and model, however, is not only attested in the wide distribution of his Histories. It is also well documented in responses to and even debates with Gregory in later histories. The oldest extant version of the Chronicle of Fredegar, whose anonymous compilers included excerpts of the six-book version into their chain of chronicles, dates from approximately two generations after Gregory’s death. It was organized as its own book and presented as a ‘liber quod est scarpsum de chronica Gregorii episcopi’ — excerpts from the chronicle of bishop Gregory.112 The chronicle also refers to Gregory in the prologue to its independent continuation of the narrative. The author had tried to summarize as efficiently as he could the works of earlier historians. However, when mentioning the excerpts from Gregory’s Histories, the chronicler also admits that he had continued to complement Gregory’s narrative through written or oral sources about the deeds of the kings and the wars of the peoples.113 As has been shown at greater length elsewhere, what the prologue presents as a work of extension was, in fact, a fundamental revision of Gregory’s views and often a straightforward argument with the bishop of Tours.114 A good example is the report on the trial against the bishop of Rouen Praetextatus who had been accused of high treason by Gregory’s bête noir, King Chilperic.115 In his comprehensive narrative of the trial, Gregory is a fearless defender of the innocent Praetextatus. But he also uses the trial in his Histories to discuss fundamental questions regarding the social and political foundations of the kingdom, the limits and legitimation of secular and ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and the responsibility of ruler and bishops for their orientation towards the divine law. The Fredegar Chronicle summarizes Gregory’s long chapter and defence of Praetextatus in one short sentence: Chilperic sent Praetextatus into exile accusing him of conspiring with Brunhild (the Austrasian queen and widow of Chilperic’s half-brother) against the king. After this brief summary the chronicle ends its report with a lapidary comment: ‘quod veritate subsistebat’ (which 112

Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii., p. 89. Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv. prologue, p. 123; cf. Lake, ‘Rethinking Fredegar’s Prologue’. 114 Reimitz, ‘Konkurrenz’; Coumert, Origines des peuples, pp. 295–324; Plassmann, Origo gentis, pp. 151–55. 115 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, v.18, pp. 216–25; for discussions of the trial from different perspectives see: Stüber, ‘Der inkriminierte Bischof ’; Glatthaar, ‘Der Edictus Chilperichs’; Reimitz, ‘Historicizing Rome’, but cf. already: Esders, Römische Rechtstradition, pp. 443–47; Jussen, Patenschaft, pp. 177–98; but cf. Buc, The Dangers of Ritual, pp. 88–106. 113

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was indeed true).116 The short passage illustrates the efficiency with which the chronicle operates. Not only did it contradict Gregory’s account, it was also part of a comprehensive revision of Gregory’s positive portrayal of his patron, the Austrasian queen Brunhild.117 This example is only one of many points where the chronicler turns Gregory’s narrative and perspective upside down. As has been discussed at greater length elsewhere, the chronicle also took up Gregory’s discussion about the lack of sources for the early Frankish past. As the chronicle argues, there were enough sources about the origins of the Franks, among them prestigious authors such as Virgil and Jerome. Their reports show that the Franks — just like the Romans — were descendants of the Trojan heroes.118 To substantiate these claims, the Fredegar Chronicle also included excerpts from other chronicles, most importantly Jerome’s, and fundamentally reworked them. There are a number of passages and even stories interpolated into these excerpts through which the compilers integrated Roman and Frankish myth and history.119 The choice of the historical genre was part of the argument with Gregory’s Histories. The bishop of Tours mentions chronicles — chronicae — as his source but presents them as merely guides for chronology. 120 He would probably not have been too pleased to see his own historiographical project labelled as a chronica (as the Fredegar Chronicle did).121 The seventh-century compilers, however, appreciated this historiographical model much more than Gregory. In their careful arrangement of the different building blocks they also referenced the authorities they used and thus emphasized their history as connected to the tradition of the Latin Christian world chronicle and Christian chronography. The alterations, selections, and additions to the individual texts that were chosen, however, clearly indicate that the new ‘chain of chronicles’ was a history for a post-Roman time too. This is also true for the reworking of the building blocks’ overall structure. The Chronicle did not just augment the prestige of Frankish history and identity. Its compilers also developed a new view of the world for a post-Roman period. They fundamentally reorganized their texts 116

Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.78, p. 114. Heydemann, ‘Zur Gestaltung’. 118 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.2, p. 93. Ewig, ‘Trojamythos’; Coumert, Origines des peuples, pp. 295–324; Plassmann, Origo gentis, pp. 151–55; Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 166–74. 119 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 199–222, with further references. 120 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch, i. preface, p. 5. 121 Cf. above, p. 168. 117

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to provide a narrative in which stories about the Franks became part of a multifaceted vision of a world divided among different peoples. In the Chronicle of Eusebius and Jerome, the fulfilment of God’s plan was made visible through a synoptic presentation of biblical history and the history of other kingdoms and empires.122 The history of the world was organized into different columns called fila or tramites regnorum sketched out over a double page. Each filum presented the succession of prophets, kings, or rulers of different peoples, beginning with the biblical peoples but then juxtaposing them with a series of the rulers of other peoples, such as columns of the Athenians, the Argives, the Latins, and the Macedonians, and so on. Over the course of history, however, one column after the other either terminated or was absorbed into the Roman world and the history eventually collapsed into one single column of a Christian Roman world.123 The compilers of the Chronicle of Fredegar did not want to depict such a process. Jerome’s text in the Chronicle does not appear as a synoptic presentation of the columns of peoples and their realms; rather, from the beginning it was organized as a linear text. In such a presentation, every story about a community or a people could be considered as a discrete history or ‘file’ and was presented as part of the history of the world just like the peoples, kingdoms, and empires that had been assigned a column in the Chronicle of Eusebius/Jerome.124 The compilers thereby organized world history as a series of peoples and kingdoms, which Roman imperial history never absorbed. Instead, the Frankish kingdoms became part of a world that had always been divided among peoples. A new social and political ordering of the world had replaced the old order that the Roman Empire had represented in the former Western Roman Empire. The wider Mediterranean horizons of the Chronicle of Fredegar clearly helped to reorganize the imagination of a larger social whole and to define the place of various groups, peoples, kingdoms, and empires and their relationship with each other. These wider horizons might have also corresponded to the 122

Burgess and Kulikowski, Mosaics of Time, i, 119–31; Grafton and Williams, Christianity, pp. 133–77; McKitterick, Perceptions. 123 See the facsimile of the oldest extant manuscript of the Jerome Chronicle, The Bodleian Manuscript, ed.  by Fotheringham, online at [accessed 1 September 2019]; cf. CLA, ii, 233a and the corresponding entry in the Earlier Latin Manuscripts database: [accessed 1 September 2019]. That the chroniclers were indeed working with such an exemplar: Krusch, ‘Die Chronicae’, pp. 472–75; see also the discussion of the Merovingian manuscripts in Helm ‘Einleitung’, pp. x–xi, xiii. 124 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 222–31, with illustrations.

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social and political footprint through which those Frankish elites, for whom the Chronicle had been compiled, identified themselves. It is very likely that the extant version of the chronicle was compiled in one of the cultural centres of the Pippinid network after the failed attempt to create familial bonds between the Pippinids and the family of the Merovingian kings in Austrasia — the so-called Grimoald coup.125 Whether Grimoald managed to put his son on the Austrasian throne as Childebert or he adopted the king as his own son, the coup failed and Grimoald was imprisoned and executed by the king of the Neustroburgundian kingdom, Clovis II. As Ian Wood has observed, there are several characteristics of the narrative that fit well with the situation of the family around 660. Not only does the text have a critical portrayal of many of the Merovingian kings, it also stresses the importance of the Frankish elites for the stability and future of the kingdom particularly for the members of the Pippinid network such as Pippin I, Arnulf of Metz, Kunibert of Cologne.126 While there are traces of the Austrasian-Pippinid network at work in the rewriting of Gregory’s Histories and the independent continuation of the narrative up to the 640s, earlier layers shine through as well. A number of passages focus on the long past of the Burgundian regions and the important role performed by elites in the Burgundian parts of the Merovingian kingdom. These traces let us understand the extant redaction of the Chronicle as an effort to appropriate an older historical view or views and integrate the Pippinid network into it.127 In the difficult circumstances of the 660s the members of this network reached back to a shared past with the elites of the powerful Austrasian-Burgundian regnum as an alternative to present political circumstances that were mainly dominated by people closely connected to the political and cultural centres of the north-western parts of the kingdom. The broad horizons of a chronicle with its imperial past and its actualization in a post-Roman ‘Mediterranean perspective’ might also have represented the political expertise and experience of this distinctive Austrasian-Burgundian governing class during the decades before and after 600. They had acted as ambassadors and military leaders for missions across the whole Mediterranean, and they had successfully governed the ethnically and socially diverse regions of the Merovingian kingdoms. The ethos and the sense of a shared responsibility for the greater good of 125

Becher, ‘Der sogenannte Staatstreich Grimoalds’; Wood, ‘Fredegar’s Fables’; Offergeld, Reges pueri, pp. 253–57; Hamann, ‘Zur Chronologie’. 126 Wood, ‘Fredegar’s Fables’; Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 231–36; Fischer, ‘Rewriting History’ and Fischer, Die Fredegar-Chronik. 127 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 195–97.

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the entire kingdom as well as the experience and prestige of this Frankish elite was to guarantee stability and the future of the Merovingian state.128 The extant version of the Fredegar Chronicle articulated this conception of Frankish identity in a moment when some descendants of the once powerful members of the Austroburgundian governing class felt increasingly uncertain about their status and future in the Merovingian kingdom. As Walter Pohl has remarked, the articulation of identity becomes particularly important when people fear its dissolution as a focus for collective identification and solidarity.129 This could also apply to the third Merovingian history, written about two generations later, albeit in reverse. When the author of the Liber historiae Francorum — the book on the history of the Franks — finished his texts in 726/27, the political constellation and power balance had changed fundamentally in the Merovingian kingdoms since the compilation of the oldest redaction of the Chronicle of Fredegar in the 660s. The descendants of Pippin I and Arnulf of Metz had established themselves as the most powerful family in the Merovingian world, ruling with, and increasingly on behalf of, the Merovingian kings.130 The anonymous author of the Liber was probably a monk or a nun in Soissons (probably Saint Medard or the convent of Notre Dame) and responded to the changes in the topography of power in the Merovingian kingdoms from a distinctly western Frankish perspective.131 In the Liber, the ‘real’ Franks were identified as the elites of the north-western regions of the kingdom, around Paris and along the Seine and Oise. The importance of members of this elite for the political stability and success of the Frankish kingdom was emphasized repeatedly in the text.132 Like the compilers of the Fredegar Chronicle, the author of the Liber historiae Francorum still had to respond to Gregory’s Histories and rewrote his own version of the abridged Merovingian six-book version. He also picked up the argument with Gregory on the impossibility of finding reliable informa128

For the care of the greater good of Frankish elites in the Fredegar Chronicle, see Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp.  176–90; and in general: Kreiner, Social Life; for the importance of Mediterranean connections and connectivity in the chronicle see Fischer, ‘Rewriting History’; and Fischer, Die Fredegar-Chronik. 129 Pohl, ‘Identität und Widerspruch’, p. 23. 130 Fischer, Karl Martell; Fouracre, The Age of Charles Martel; and Wood, The Merovingian Kingdoms, pp. 270–87. 131 See Gerberding, The Rise, pp.  146–72; Nelson, ‘Gender and Genre’, pp.  194–95; Hartmann, ‘Die Darstellung der Frauen’. 132 Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 248–52; with further references.

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tion on the ancient history of the Franks. However, he developed a very different Frankish history from these prestigious origins. Unlike the Chronicle of Fredegar, the author of the LHF presented an uninterrupted line of kings ruling over the Franks from the destruction of Troy up to the author’s own lifetime, including an early king Faramundus (Pharamond), who did not appear in the Chronicle.133 The author of the LHF also gave a very different account of the conquest of Gaul, strongly emphasizing the establishment of Frankish rule in the north-western parts of Gaul. Whereas in the Chronicle of Fredegar, the Franks arrived at the regions along the Rhine and expanded their rule from these regions westwards, the LHF carefully orchestrated the crossing of the Rhine as an important event in Frankish history comparable to the crossing of the Jordan by the people of Israel.134 The conquest of the regions along the Seine and Oise, which became the heartlands of the future Frankish kingdom, was also embellished with biblical motifs and allusions. Like the biblical people, for instance, the Franks extinguished the inhabitants of the conquered lands, the Roman population of Gaul, before taking it over. The author of the LHF used this motif to underline the antagonistic relationship of Franks and Romans in history.135 These obvious differences in the origin narratives have often been regarded as an indication that the author of the LHF was not familiar with the Chronicle of Fredegar.136 Yet, there are some conspicuous commonalities that indicate that historians have underestimated the historiographical horizons of the LHF’s author.137 As more recent studies on Merovingian culture, and particularly late Merovingian culture, have made clear, there is enough extant evidence from Merovingian scriptoria and cultural centres, particularly in the first decades of the eighth century, to show that the LHF came from a vibrant cultural world of well-informed and connected historiographical activity.138 For her or his intervention into these debates, the author of the LHF chose a form of historical writing that was strongly inspired by the narrative of the most important historia of the Christian world: the biblical history of the chosen people.139 This history had already played an important role in 133 134 135 136 137 138 139

Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 4, p. 244. Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 5, pp. 245–46. Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 258–63; Dörler, ‘The Liber historiae Francorum’. Anton, ‘Origo gentis’, p. 192; Gerberding, The Rise, p. 17. Coumert, Origines des peuples, pp. 330–32; Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 251–58. Wood, ‘Culture’ and above, pp. 182–84. Heydemann, ‘Biblical Israel’; O’Loughlin, Early Medieval Exegesis; Wood, ‘Who Are the

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Gregory’s Histories and the Chronicle of Fredegar. Both texts, albeit in very different ways, begin with a sketch of Old Testament history. Gregory developed important typologies in his first book that he returned to later in his narrative.140 The compiler of the Chronicle of Fredegar did not just juxtapose biblical history with other histories available in the Eusebius/Jerome chronicle, but also started the chain of chronicles with extensive lists of biblical prophets, kings, and peoples alongside non-biblical kings and emperors (with the Liber generationis).141 With their historical-exegetical beginnings, these two works articulated very different imaginings of the social world. Gregory’s Histories presented biblical history as a prefiguration of a Christian world that was organized along the distinctions between Christianity and paganism, orthodoxy and heresy. The synchronization of biblical with other histories provided the Fredegar-chronicler with the historical foundations needed to illustrate a more pluralistic world-view. The author of the LHF took a different approach to biblical historia: he rewrote it as a history of the Franks. In employing biblical motifs, style, and narrative patterns, this history presented the Franks as the new chosen people; a history that mirrored the biblical chosen people as a history full of failures, errors, and efforts to find the right paths to attain God’s support once more.142 This providential perspective is worked into Frankish history from early on. When the Franks under Chlodio were still living east of the Rhine, the king sent exploratores across the river to the city of Cambrai. The passage would have reminded any early medieval churchgoer of the story of Joshua, who sends exploratores across the Jordan to scout out Jericho.143 The episode is already mentioned in the two earlier histories,144 but the Liber stages the crossing of the Rhine in much more detail: Philistines?’; Hen, ‘The Uses of the Bible’; Buc, L’ambiguïté du livre; Van Uytfanghe, Stylisation biblique, and still De Lubac, Exégèse medieval, see also the forthcoming article by Heydemann, ‘The People of God’. 140 Heinzelmann, Gregory of Tours, pp. 139–45. 141 Fredegar, Chronicle, book i, ed. by Krusch, pp. 18–42, cf. the edition by T. Mommsen in MGH AA 9, pp. 78–140. 142 For a longer discussion see: Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 258–59, 275–76, and Dörler, ‘The Liber historiae Francorum’. 143 Joshua 2. 1. 144 For a more detailed comparison with Gregory and the Fredegar Chronicle that illustrates the differences of the use of biblical motives and language between the two earlier texts and the Liber historiae Francorum, see Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 258–61.

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Chlodio autem rex misit exploratores de Disbargo castello Toringorum usque ad urbem Camaracum. Ipse postea cum grande exercitu Renum transit, multo Romanorum populo occidit atque fugavit. Carbonaria silva ingressus, Turnacinsem urbem obtenuit. Exinde usque Camaracum civitatem veniens, illicque resedit pauco temporis spacio; Romanos quos ibi invenit, interficit. Exinde usque Sumnam fluvium occupavit.145

Given the biblical background that the Rhine crossing evokes, the ‘barbarian’ actions of the Franci against Romani look more biblical than barbarian. Just as the Franks attacked all the Romans they found in Cambrai, Joshua’s Israelites did the same against the Canaanites of Jericho: ‘et interfecerunt omnia quae erant in ea’.146 The story might help to illustrate how the Liber’s author intertwined Frankish and biblical history through images, motifs, and quotations, and this appears in the text again and again. Not least, it surfaces prominently in some of the epic stories that the author recounts in his history. One of them recounts an episode about Chlothar II marching from his sedes Paris to the east to help his son Dagobert in a campaign against the Saxons. Soon after Dagobert had been established as king of the eastern kingdom, Austrasia, he had to combat a rebellion of the Saxons. Dagobert and his army met with great distress: a sword swipe against the king only barely missed its target, cutting off a few of Dagobert’s hairs. When the king saw that his people were perishing, he took the hair that had been cut off his head and sent an envoy with them to his father. Until help arrived, Dagobert retreated into the Ardennes.

Chlothar set out as soon as he got the message, leaving that very night and did so very much in the style of a biblical king under the din of the war trumpets — ‘cum strepitu tubarum de nocte consurgens’.147 He quickly crossed the Rhine in a rush to help his son. After both armies had united, they jubilantly moved together toward the Saxons, up to the Weser. On the other side of the river, Berthoald, the dux of the Saxons, heard the commotion and asked about it. The Franks told him that they were rejoicing because Chlothar had arrived. Berthoald did not believe them and derided the Franks whereupon Chlothar who was already standing on the other bank, in full armour and helmet, he took off his helmet to reveal his long whitened hair. Berthoald recognized the 145 146 147

Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 5, p. 246. Joshua 6. 21. Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 41, p. 312.

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Frankish king immediately.148 After that, the king took the entire campaign against the Saxons into his own hands and ‘devastated all of the land of the Saxons, wiped out the whole people, and spared the life of no man who was bigger than his sword, called spata’.149 In these passages the author of the Liber not only decided to employ the Old Testament’s wording exactly.150 He brought this language together with themes that are also transmitted in a ‘carmen publicum iuxta rusticitatem’ — the song of Faro and presented a real synthesis of these different narrative traditions and their ideals into a new history.151 The author of the Liber was not alone in experimenting with the integration of biblical historia and the writing of the history of post-Roman societies. About five hundred miles north-west of the monastery in Soissons, in which the author of the Liber historiae Francorum finished her or his text in 726/27, the Anglo-Saxon monk Bede was working on the Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Bede, who finished his history in 731, also exploited analogies between the kingdom of Israel and his own time to provide a shared past for the Saxons in Britain.152 To be sure, the two histories were very different historiographical projects and responded to different social, religious, and political challenges. Nevertheless, there are also striking parallels. Like Bede, the author of the Liber historiae Francorum added elements from epic traditions to their merging of biblical and ethnic history. In doing so the author of the LHF made — like the authors of the Chronicle of Fredegar — a distinct generic choice linking the history of the Franks to a biblical and providential vision of history. This choice did not only present the heroes of Frankish history as ‘avatars of a militant Israel’.153 It also helped to mark the difference of this specific historical vision from those of earlier historians of the Merovingian world. The parallels with Bede’s History of the English People illustrates well that the world of the Liber historiae Francorum was much larger and more complex than 148

For the famous episode, see Diesenberger and Reimitz, ‘Zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft’, pp. 215–19, with further references. 149 Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 41, p. 314. 150 For other examples, see Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, chap. 36, p. 305, line 4; chap. 36, p. 305, line 17; chap. 41, p. 312, line 13 f. 151 See Haubrichs, ‘Emotionen’, who also discusses the use of some elements of the story on Chlothar’s Saxon campaign in the Old-Saxon biblical epos Heliand (pp. 74–81). 152 Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom, pp. xl, 9, and 349–54; McClure, ‘Bede’s Old Testament Kings’; DeGregorio, ‘Bede and the Old Testament’; Thacker, ‘Bede and History’; Goffart, Narrators, pp. 296–307; and see the contribution of Ian Wood in this volume. 153 Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom, p. 279.

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it seems at first sight. Obviously its author had a discrete western elite in mind, which tried to assert and maintain its position at the centre of Merovingian politics and power. In order to do so, however, the history built on ideas about the religious and social integration of society that were not exclusive to their circle. Theologians and politicians had experimented with Old Testament models and language for the characterization, organization, and demarcation of their societies in the post-Roman world for centuries. As I have argued elsewhere at greater length, such efforts were intensified in the Merovingian kingdoms in order to forge social and political cohesion after Chlothar II had taken over the monarchia in all three kingdoms.154 The experiments with biblical models and identities in the seventh century had thus a much wider perspective than their particular application in the Liber reflects. Its concepts of identity directly engaged and competed with other perspectives on history and social imaginations of the larger whole in the post-Roman world. Once we understand the articulation of Frankish history in the Liber as engaging in a wider debate about its role and function, it becomes obvious that neither the specific construction of identities, nor the use of biblical models, was something that the author took for granted. As familiar as the synthesis of Frankish and biblical identities may seem as a result of their prominence in the Middle Ages and beyond, they were by no means inevitable developments in the Merovingian period. It was the product of specific competitions and concurrences with other models of identity proposed for social integration in the kingdom. The question of which groups should actually belong to the new chosen people was not the only contested issue in historiographical debates about identity. In fact, this inflection of Frankish identity was only one option among a range of possibilities for the ‘uses of the Bible’ in the early Middle Ages: Old Testament history provided a wide spectrum of social models for almost every possible social constellation in the history of a community. In rewriting the Histories of Gregory of Tours, the author of the Liber was responding directly to one such alternative use of biblical history.

Conclusion: Genre and Identity About 150 years separated the composition of Gregory’s Histories and that of the Liber. Even though the Merovingian kingdoms had changed substantially, when it came to prevailing conceptions of history and identity, it was not a 154

Reimitz, Frankish Identity, pp. 265–81, with further literature.

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simple matter of one historical imagination replacing another in the course of time. Just like Gregory, the author of the Liber had to establish his vision of history in competition with alternative views on history. For the author of the Liber, for instance, one of the most influential sources of competition was still the vision created by Gregory of Tours. This is evident not only in the Liber’s rewriting of his text and in the frequent use of Gregory’s authority in the titles of extant manuscripts. That Gregory’s historiographical vision was widely read at the time of the Liber’s composition is also documented in the unusually high number of extant Merovingian manuscripts of the six-book version copied shortly before or after 700. One of the oldest exemplars of this group, a manuscript kept today in Cambrai, is a particularly good example of the continuing interest in Gregory’s historical work. The copy of the Merovingian six-book version dates from about 700 ad. Before the middle of the eighth century, even possibly at the time when the Liber was beginning to be circulated and revised, the missing books vii–x were added to the manuscript.155 Not only Gregory’s Histories (and its many redactions) belonged to the world of the Liber. The same can be said of alternative historical conceptions that developed Frankish or Merovingian history from a Christian-Roman past through chains of chronicles. The Fredegar Chronicle is the most important example of this. Its oldest extant manuscript was copied by a certain Lucerius about a decade before the composition of the Liber. As with the Liber, the Chronicle’s reaction to Gregory’s provocation is more than clear. However, the two historiographical ripostes to Gregory were much less independent from each other than is usually assumed. Though its relationship to the Fredegar Chronicle is less obvious than its argument with Gregory’s text, there are indications that the Liber was competing with concepts of Frankish history and identity that the Chronicle had promoted. This evidence should of course not be overstretched to argue for textual dependencies, but it does clearly demonstrate historiographical exchange illustrating a vibrant and urgent debate about history and identity in the late Merovingian period. Evidence for such debates has not only come down to us in historiographical texts. In particular work on hagiographical texts has intro155

Cambrai, BM 684 (624), cf. Heinzelmann and Bourgain, ‘L’oeuvre’, p. 282; CLA, vi, 742a and 742b ( [accessed 1 September 2019]); and the digital reproduction in the Bibliothèque virtuelle des manuscrits médiévaux of the Institute de réchérche et d’histoire des textes at [accessed 4 August 2018], see also now the discussion of Licht, Die Halbunziale, pp. 305–07.

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duced us to a world where the authors of saints’ lives were engaged in a lively conversation about history, Christianity, and the conception of a public community in post-Roman society. The debate even heated up in the late Merovingian period.156 In the politically unstable circumstances toward the end of the seventh century, more and more hagiographical texts addressed the urgent question of the social and political coherence of the Merovingian regnum. As is well documented by overlaps with and references to historical texts, the hagiographers knew their history well. Their texts can therefore help us imagine the lively debates about history and identity, and about the past and its meaning for the present in historiographical texts. In this respect, the author of the Liber himself has left us an interesting comment about such historiographical debates when he explains why he did not want to go into any more detail about Clovis II’s death because of the great number of divergent accounts on the death of the king.157 There are no alternative accounts about Clovis in the extant histories, but different portrayals of Clovis have rather come down to us in a number of hagiographical texts.158 As regards the interaction between authors of historical and hagiographical texts (as well as with other genres and sources) modern scholarship has rather connected them through their coincidences. But there is much to learn from the differences too, if we are able to identify them as conscious choices and different interventions into public reflections and disputes. Understanding the extant texts as part of wider conversations and reflections brings us back to the significance of generic choices. In their awareness of alternative versions and interpretations of the past and present we might understand the contribution of historians and their works better if we take their generic choices more seriously than we usually do. This is already true for the decision to write a history. The choice certainly enabled authors to build upon ‘pre-constituted horizons of expectations’ as a shared baseline for the communication between authors and readers (imagined or real). Such horizons of expectations were mainly defined by earlier histories and forced authors to link themselves to these existing historical narratives as well as their respective approach to and imagination of the past. The authors of new histories, however, also knew that it belonged to the expectations of their audiences to move on. While the choice to write a history was based on a grid of expectations, its 156

See now the introduction to Jonas of Bobbio, Life of Columbanus, trans. by O’Hara and Wood, part. pp. 78–83. 157 Cf. above, n. 12. 158 See Gerberding and Fouracre, Late Merovingian France, p. 89, but cf. now Kreiner, The Social Life.

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realization also meant to infringe this grid and to provide modified or new patterns of reading and interpretation. As we have seen, this was also true for the historians of the Merovingian period. In his use of the Eusebian model of ecclesiastical history, Gregory of Tours built upon generic preconception to define the subject of the historical inquiry, while attempting to transform the horizons of expectations regarding a history of the church in a post-Roman world. We might also speculate that the generic choice of the Christian world chronicle by the Fredegar-chroniclers was the most suitable form for meeting the expectations held by social and political elites in the once so powerful Austro-Burgundian regnum. The generic choice might also have created new Spielräume by avoiding the expectations Gregory’s Histories had established. With the two most prominent genres of Christian history already taken by Gregory and the Chronicle of Fredegar, the author of the Liber historiae Francorum decided to employ the model of biblical history. As I have tried to show in this article, such observations on the meaning of generic choices are not only important for the history of historiography. They were also closely related to a spectrum of possibilities that defined the strategies of distinction and identification in the Merovingian world and thus provide us with an important window into the social frameworks and Spielräume for the circuits of communication in which the formation and transformation of identities took place.

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Pohl, Walter, ‘Identität und Widerspruch: Gedanken zu einer Sinngeschichte des Frühmittelalters’, in Die Suche nach den Ursprüngen: Von der Bedeutung des frühen Mittelalters, ed. by Walter Pohl, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 8 (Vienna: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2004), pp. 23–36 —— , Die Völkerwanderung: Eroberung und Integration, 2nd edn (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2005) —— , ‘Christian and Barbarian Identities in the Early Medieval West: Introduction’, in Post-Roman Transitions: Christian and Barbarian Identities in the Early Medieval West, ed.  by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann, Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 14 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 1–46 —— , ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification; A Methodological Profile’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann, Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 13 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 1–64 —— , ‘Introduction: Early Medieval Romanness — a Multiple Identity’, in Transformations of Romanness: Early Medieval Regions and Identities, ed. by Walter Pohl and others (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2018), pp. 3–40 —— , ‘Historiography and Identities — Methodological Perspectives’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Christian Models, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 7–50 —— , ‘The Identities of Sidonius Apollinaris’, in Transforming the Early Medieval World: Studies in Honour of Ian  N. Wood, ed. by N.  Kıvılcım Yavuz and Richard  Broome (Leeds, forthcoming) Pohl, Walter, and others, eds, Transformations of Romanness: Early Medieval Regions and Identities (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2018) Potter, David  S., ‘The Greek Historians of Imperial Rome’, in The Oxford History of Historical Writing, ed.  by Daniel Woolf, 5  vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12), i: Beginnings to AD 600, ed. by Andrew Feldherr and Grant Hardy (2011), pp. 316–44 Preiser-Kapeller, Johannes, ‘Luhmann in Byzantium: A Systems Theory Approach for Historical Network Analysis’, working paper for the international conference ‘The Connected Past: People, Networks and Complexity in Archaeology and History’, Southampton, 24–25 April 2012 [accessed 12 August 2018] Reimitz, Helmut, ‘Die Konkurrenz der Ursprünge in der fränkischen Historiographie’, in Die Suche nach den Ursprüngen: Von der Bedeutung des frühen Mittelalters, ed. by Walter Pohl, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 8 (Vienna: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2004), pp. 191–209 —— , History, Frankish Identity and the Framing of Western Ethnicity, 550–850 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) —— , ‘Transformations of Late Antiquity: The Writing and Re-writing of Church History at the Monastery of Lorsch’, in The Resources of the Past in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Clemens Gantner and others (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), pp. 262–81

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—— , ‘The Early Medieval Editions of Gregory of Tours’ Historiae’, in A Companion to Gregory of Tours, ed. by Alexander C. Murray (Leiden: Brill, 2016), pp. 519–66 —— , ‘After Rome, before Francia: Religion, Ethnicity, and Identity Politics in Gregory of Tours’ Ten Books of Histories’, in Making Early Medieval Societies, ed. by Kate Cooper and Conrad Leyser (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), pp. 58–78 —— , ‘Contradictory Stereotypes: “Barbarian” and “Roman” Rulers and the Shaping of Merovingian Kingship’, in Evil Lords: Theory and Representations from Antiquity to the Renaissance, ed. by Hester Schadee and Nikos Panou (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), pp. 81–98 —— , ‘Historicizing Rome. Gregory of Tours and the Construction of a Roman Past’, in Transforming the Early Medieval World: Studies in Honour of Ian Wood, ed. by N. Kıvılcım Yavuz and Richard Broome (Leeds, forthcoming) —— , ‘Pax inter utramque gentem: The Merovingians, Byzantium and the History of Frankish Identity in the Last Decades of the Sixth Century’, in East and West in the Early Middle Ages: The Merovingians in a Mediterranean Perspective, ed.  by Stefan Esders and Yitzhak Hen (Cambridge, forthcoming) Riché, Pierre, Education et culture dans l’Occident barbare: VIe–VIIIe siècle, 4th edn (Paris: Seuil, 1962; repr. 1995) —— , Education and Culture in the Barbarian West: From the Sixth through the Eighth Century, trans. by John Contreni (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1976) Roberts, Michael, The Humblest Sparrow: The Poetry of Venantius Fortunatus (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2009) —— , ‘Venantius Fortunatus and Gregory of Tours: Patronage and Poetry’, in A Companion to Gregory of Tours, ed. by Alexander C. Murray (Leiden: Brill, 2016), pp. 35–61 Rotman, Tamar, ‘Miraculous History between East and West: Hagiography, Historiography and Identity in Sixth-Century Gaul’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, 2018) Rousseau, Philip, ‘Gregory’s Kings, the Theatre of the Modern and the Endurance of Romanitas’, in Motions of Late Antiquity: Essays on Religion, Politics and Identity in Honour of Peter Brown, ed. by Jamie Kreiner and Helmut Reimitz (Turnhout: Brepols, 2016), pp. 209–30 Ruinart, Thierry, ‘In novam editionem sancti Gregorii episcopi Turonensis’, in Patrologiae cursus completus: series latina, ed. by Jacques-Paul Migne, 221 vols (Paris, 1844–64), lxxi (1879), cols 9–114 Scholz, Sebastian, Die Merowinger (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2015) Shanzer, Danuta, ‘The Tale of Frodebert’s Tail’, in Colloquial and Literary Latin, ed. by Eleanor Dickey and Anna Chahoud (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 377–405 Shaw, Richard, ‘Chronology, Composition and Authorial Conception in Gregory of Tours’ Miracula’, in A Companion to Gregory of Tours, ed. by Alexander C. Murray (Leiden: Brill, 2016), pp. 102–40 Smith, Julia  M.  H., Europe after Rome: A New Cultural History, 500–1000 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005)

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Stüber, Till, ‘Der inkriminierte Bischof: Verratsvorwürfe und politische Prozesse gegen Bischöfe im westgotischen und fränkischen Gallien (466–687)’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Freie Universität Berlin, 2017) Thacker, Alan, ‘Bede and History’, in The Cambridge Companion to Bede, ed.  by Scott DeGregorio (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 170–89 Torgerson, Jesse  W., ‘Could Isidore’s Chronicle Have Delighted Cicero?’, Medieval Worlds, 3 (2016), 65–82 Van Nuffelen, Peter, ‘Theology versus Genre? The Universalism of Christian Historiography in Late Antiquity’, in Historiae mundi: Studies in Universal Historiography, ed. by Peter Liddel and Andrew Fear (London: Bristol Classical Press, 2010), pp. 148–61 —— , Orosius and the Rhetoric of History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) —— , ‘The Many and the One: Communities and Ecclesiastical Histories in the Age of Theodosius II’, in Historiography and Identity, i: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed.  by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (Turnhout: Brepols, 2019), pp. 299–314 Van Nuffelen, Peter, and Lieve Van Hoof, eds, Clavis historicorum antiquitatis posterioris: An Inventory of Late Antique Historiography (AD 300–800) (Turnhout: Brepols, forthcoming) Van Uytfanghe, Marc, Stylisation biblique et condition humaine dans l’hagiographie mérovingienne (600–750) (Brussels: AWLSK, 1987) Vessey, Mark, ‘Reinventing History: Jerome’s Chronicle and the Writing of the PostRoman West’, in From the Tetrarchs to the Theodosians: Later Roman History and Culture, 284–450 CE, ed. by Scott McGill, Cristiana Sogno, and Edward J. Watts, Yale Classical Studies, 34 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 261–85 Walstra, Gerardus  J.  J., Les cinq epîtres rimées dans l’appendice des formulas de Sens: la querelle des évêques Frodobert et Importun (an 665/666) (Leiden: Brill, 1962) Wattenbach, Wilhelm, and Wilhelm Levison, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter: Vorzeit und Karolinger, 6 vols (Weimar: Böhlau, 1952–90), i: Die Vorzeit: Von den Anfängen bis zur Herrschaft der Karolinger (1952) and ii: Die Karolinger vom Anfang des 8. Jh. bis zum Tod Karls des Großen (1953) Whitby, Michael, ‘Imperial Christian Historiography’, in The Oxford History of Historical Writing, ed. by Daniel Woolf, 5 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011–12), i: Beginnings to AD 600, ed. by Andrew Feldherr and Grant Hardy (2011), pp. 346–69 Wickham, Chris, The Inheritance of Rome: A History from 400–1000, The Penguin History of Europe, 2 (London: Penguin, 2010) Wickham, Chris, and James Fentress, Social Memory: New Perspectives on the Past (Oxford: Blackwell, 1992) Williard, Hope D., ‘Letter-Writing and Literary Culture in Merovingian Gaul’, European Review of History: Revue européenne d’histoire, 21 (2014), 691–710 Wood, Ian  N., ‘Administration, Law and Culture in Merovingian Gaul’, in The Uses of Literacy in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Rosamond McKitterick (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), pp. 63–81

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The Appropriation of History: The Austrasians, Gregory of Tours, and Fredegar Andreas Fischer*

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istory formed an integral part of Frankish identity in the early Middle Ages. Among other elements, the shared, collective memories of the gens culminating in a genealogical, quasi–natural self-understanding represented one cornerstone for the construction of the community, its cohesiveness, and its place in a biblically inspired view of a world of peoples.1 Historiographical works such as the Decem libri historiarum by Gregory of Tours (538–94) and the so-called Fredegar Chronicle, a world chronicle composed and written around 660, attest to history’s share in contemporary thoughts and narratives on Frankish identity.2 Each text, however, treated the Franks’ past in a different way, using it as an instrument to mould Frankish identity according to its respective world view and to appropriate it in line with * The research leading to these results received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013) / ERC grant agreement No. 269591. The article is a short version of thoughts that will be expanded in my forthcoming book on the Fredegar Chronicle. 1 Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, pp. 9–12 and 32–38; Pohl, ‘Introduction: Ethnicity, Religion and Empire’, pp. 9–10. 2 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison. On Gregory of Tours and his writings see now the contributions in Murray, ed., A Companion to Gregory of Tours; Heinzelmann, Gregor von Tours. — Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch. On the Fredegar Chronicle see the

Andreas Fischer is Professor of Medieval History at the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 213–236 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118566

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current political needs. As recent research has shown, Gregory of Tours did so by giving little room to the Franks as protagonists in his Historiae; he also described his futile search for Frankish kings in his sources in order to underline that for him Frankish history started with Clovis and his conversion to Christianity. All this was meant to draw his readers’ attention away from the possible identification with the Franks and towards a Christian identity. This larger social whole should, in Gregory’s view, in its transcendence outshine the petty secularity of an ethnic identification like the Frankish one.3 The unknown author labelled as ‘Fredegar’ from the sixteenth century onwards (the name will be used in this article as a convenient shorthand), however, despite in large parts relying on Gregory of Tours’s work, gave ample space to the Franks and made them and their supposed Trojan origin figure prominently in the text.4 Fredegar’s narrative brought the Franks and their past more intensely to the fore than Gregory of Tours’s Historiae did. As different as the texts were in their view and use of Frankish history, both had to grapple with a phenomenon closely connected to the issue of ‘Frankishness’: the existence of the Austrasians and Neustrians, Frankish subgroups located in the eastern and north-western parts of the Merovingian kingdom, respectively. Whilst both Gregory of Tours and the Fredegar Chronicle mention the Austrasians, the Neustrians only appear in the latter. Both works ascribe historical agency to them; though in the Fredegar Chronicle they figure even more prominently as actors in both past and contemporary Frankish politics. This article focuses on the Austrasians as a group known and described in both texts. In the same way as for the ethnic discourse on the Franks, the question arises to what extent the description of the Austrasians and their actions has been adapted to fit the current views and needs of the authors, particularly in the Fredegar Chronicle. It is clear that the chronicle’s narrative construction of the subgroup, like that of the Franks, cannot be taken at face value. Rather than being a straightforward description of political and social reality, the Austrasians’ depiction in the text echoes the author’s view on the memrecent publications by Collins, Fredegar; Collins, Die Fredegar-Chroniken. See also the studies by Goffart, ‘The Fredegar Problem Reconsidered’, and Scheibelreiter, ‘Fredegar – Chronist einer Epoche’. 3 Reimitz, History, pp. 52–65 and 115–16. 4 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, ii.4–6, 8–9 and iii.2 and 9, pp. 45–47 and 93–94. On the Fredegar Chronicle and its presentation of the Franks see now Reimitz, History, pp. 166–90, esp. pp. 168–74 and 180, and 198–203, 222–36. From the vast literature on the supposed Trojan origin see Ewig, ‘Trojamythos und fränkische Frühgeschichte’, pp. 1–30, esp. pp. 3–9 and 12–15; cf. also Ewig, ‘Zum Geschichtsbild der Franken’; Barlow, ‘Gregory of Tours’.

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bers of this community. The group was imagined by the chronicler in a creative manner: he did not invent it, but shaped its characteristics and actions, which nevertheless were related to real life.5 How and to what end Fredegar did so remains an open question.6 At the same time, the chronicler’s description of the Austrasians has to be seen in relation to the group’s presence in Gregory of Tours’s Historiae: neither the way in which the seventh-century author of the Fredegar Chronicle appropriated the bishop’s view of the Austrasians nor its underlying rationale have been analysed so far. This chapter will shed light on the changed perspective on the group on the one hand, but will also offer insight into the connection between the subgroup and its ethnic superstructure, the Franks, in the narrative: what did it — in Fredegar’s eyes — mean to be Austrasian in a world of gentes in general and in relation to the Frankish identity in particular? In the Fredegar Chronicle, which in its modern edition is divided into four books, the Austrasians figure prominently in two sections of the text. They are mainly dealt with in the work’s contemporary parts in the fourth book.7 They were, however, already introduced in the third book. Here they appear in two passages dedicated to events taking place in the second half of the sixth century. In the first passage, they are presented as the body electing initially Chrodinus, then Gogo to the office of maior domus in the eastern Frankish realm. This event, according to the chronicle, took place when Sigibert I, who ruled between 561 and 575, was still in his infancy.8 The second time the Austrasians enter the stage is in the description of Sigibert I’s military campaign against his brother Chilperic I (561–84) and the Neustrians (Neptresiae). Crucially, the Austrasians appear in this passage as rather demanding followers of the Merovingian king, refusing to return to their homeland (patria) if Sigibert was not willing to grant them the opportunity to benefit from the war and to fight.9 Both passages presented the Austrasians as the politically dominant group in the eastern part of the Frankish realm accordingly named Austrasia or Auster 5

Reimitz, History, esp. pp.  4–20; Reimitz, ‘Cultural Brokers’; cf.  Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, pp. 10–11 and 43; see also Anderson, Imagined Communities, p. 6. 6 But see now Stegeman, ‘Growth’. 7 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv, pp. 118–68. 8 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.58 and 59, p. 109; on further additions to the text of the chronicle which referred to Chrodinus, portraying him most favourably, see also ibid., ed. by Krusch, iii.88, p. 117. 9 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.71, p. 112.

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in the seventh century.10 These passages were part of the third book in the ‘chain of chronicles’ making up Fredegar’s work, that is, of the section containing excerpts of an abbreviated redaction of Gregory of Tours’s Histories usually called the six-book version by historians.11 These excerpts did not just serve as a link between the texts referring to older events in the first two books and contemporary impressions gathered in the fourth book that dealt with events between 584 and 659/60;12 rather, the chronicler seems to have regarded them as an important contribution to his own narrative in the fourth book. In the prologue to book iv, he explicitly emphasized the importance of Gregory’s Historiae among the sources he had at hand and highlighted the work as an authority to which the readers could refer to in order to verify the statements made in his own chronicle.13 However, if his readers had tried to do so, they would have been disappointed: the passage on Chrodinus was not part of Gregory’s work at all. It cannot be found either in the complete (ten-) or in the six-book version.14 And the passages dedicated to the Austrasians’ conflict with Sigibert and their ensuing fight against the Neustrians had been considerably modified in comparison with Gregory’s work and the six-book redaction: the Austrasians as a group simply do not appear in the passages from the Histories that formed the textual basis for Fredegar’s writings.15 10

For a history of the terms Austrasia or Auster/Austrasians and their counterparts Neustria or Neuster/Neustrians see Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp. 200–07; Cardot, Espace, esp. pp. 182–84; Le Jan, ‘Austrasien’; Reimitz, ‘Neustria’, pp. 126 and 129; Dumézil, ‘L’Austrasie’, p. 14. See also Stegeman, ‘Growth’, esp. p. 11. 11 On the six-book redaction see the edition by Henri Omont: Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont; cf. Heinzelmann, Gregor von Tours, pp. 171–75 (with the table on p. 168); Reimitz, History, pp. 133–59, esp. the table on pp. 145–54; Reimitz, ‘The Early Medieval Editions of Gregory of Tours’ Histories’, pp. 520–40. See also Woodruff, ‘Historia epitomata’. On the general structure of the work as a ‘chain of chronicles’ see Wood, ‘Chains of Chronicles’, p. 69; as well as Wood, ‘Universal Chronicles’, pp. 48–49 and 53. 12 Collins, Fredegar, pp.  5–6; Collins, Fredegar-Chroniken, p.  27; Reimitz, History, pp. 174–76. 13 Gregory of Tours is the only author and source mentioned twice in the prologue; Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, prologue, p. 123 ll. 6–7 and 22–23. On the origin of the denomination ‘Fredegar’ and its history see Collins, Fredegar-Chroniken, pp. 16–18; on the prologue to the fourth book see now Lake, ‘Rethinking Fredegar’s Prologue’. 14 Chrodinus is mentioned only in Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, vi.20, pp. 288–89; cf. also the index on p. 264 l. 18: ‘De obito Chrodini ducis’. Both the entry in the index and the chapter were copied in the six-book version; see Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont, vi.13 (20), p. 212. 15 Cf.  Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed.  by Krusch and Levison, iv.27–28 and 49–51,

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At the same time, the chronicle left out references to the Austrasians that were actually present in both Gregory of Tours’s original text and its abbreviated six-book redaction: the bishop and his redactors used the term Austrasii twice as a collective denomination in other parts of his Histories, and did so for the first time in any text at all.16 Although the sections in question were part of the six-book redaction, the Fredegar Chronicle does not mention the Austrasians in the passages that built on those in which the later redactors of Gregory’s work had named them as protagonists. In one case the chapter from the six-book version was left out completely, while in the other case it was drastically shortened.17 If it was Fredegar who was responsible for the abbreviation and modification of the already shortened six-book redaction, the changes to the Histories’ earlier entries on the Austrasians deserve our attention,18 even more so because one of the passages deleted dealt with the Austrasians’ reluctance to help Merovech and Brunichilde. Given her role in one of the Fredegar Chronicle’s overarching narrative strands — the vilification of the Merovingian queen and her allies — this section would have offered an opportunity to draw a favourable picture of the Austrasians.19 The decision to excise the Austrasians from these passages proves that they had been reworked in line with a different pp. 160–61 and 185–90 and Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont, iv.20–21 (27–28) and 34–36 (49–51), pp. 122–23 and 138–41 with Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.58–59 and 71, pp. 109 and 112. 16 Both times the bishop of Tours referred to the Austrasians’ involvement in the marriage alliance between Brunichilde and Merovech, the son of Chilperic I; Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, v.14 and 18, pp. 213 l. 10 and 224 l. 4. Cf. the entries in the six-book redaction; Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont, v.8 (14) and 12 (18), pp. 156–60 (with the reference to the Austrasii on p. 160) and 162–68 (with the reference to the Austrasii on p. 168). For further implications of this see below, pp. 230–31, and my study on the Fredegar Chronicle (forthcoming). Gregory of Tours also mentioned the denomination of the territory as Austria once in his hagiographical works; De virtutibus Martini, ed. by Krusch, iv.29, p. 206 l. 24: ‘in Austria’. Cf. Cardot, Espace, p. 9. 17 Cf. the entries in Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.75–76 and 78, pp. 113–14 (with the references to Gregory of Tours, Historiae v.14 and 18 on the margins of the text) with Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont, v.8 (14) and 12 (18), pp. 156–60 and 162–68. 18 Who abbreviated and excerpted the six-book version to the extent it has been in the third book of the Fredegar Chronicle is a problem usually not expounded in research and one actually difficult to address and to resolve. There are, however, some indications that the obliterations and the amendments applied to Gregory of Tours’s text cited above were Fredegar’s work. On this issue see my forthcoming Habilitationsschrift; cf. Collins, Fredegar-Chroniken, p. 34; Reimitz, History, p. 168; Halfond, ‘Endorsement’, pp. 4–6. 19 For this narrative strand see Wood, ‘Fredegar’s Fables’, pp. 362 and 366.

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conception than Gregory’s. We therefore have to consider that these adjustments were made to fit the excerpts to Fredegar’s general argument on the Austrasians. It is exactly because of these authorial interventions in Gregory of Tours’s text that the passages referring to the Austrasians gain in importance. The changes provoke questions about the way Fredegar handled his source, particularly with regards to the presentation of the Austrasians as protagonists in his text, but also about Fredegar’s vision of this specific community. So far, his reasons for introducing and presenting the Austrasians only in the aforementioned passages and at those very points in his narrative timeline have not been scrutinized. The question why the Austrasians were obliterated from the chronicle’s source by a simple change of the wording of Gregory of Tours’s authoritative text also needs to be addressed. Particularly the latter aspect gains in importance against the backdrop of the statement in the prologue to the fourth book in which Fredegar admitted that he had abridged his sources, although he claimed that this procedure resulted only in minor omissions.20 The author, however, did not mention that modifying the passages he had copied into his own work was part of his efforts to shorten the underlying texts collected in the first three books. Rather, he referred to a congruentia that determined the texts’ integration into his chronicle.21 This (admittedly opaque) expression bespeaks more than a certain attentiveness in the treatment of sources. It seems to suggest a rendering of the texts that, despite being abridged, remained true to the original.22 Since Fredegar also emphasized his eagerness to gather information and assured his audience of his commitment to the truth in another part of the prologue, he intended to communicate to his readers that his sources were abridged, but nevertheless authentic and verifiable reports of past events.23 That the Austrasians made their first appearance in book iii of the chronicle means that the author deliberately used the authority of Gregory of Tours to support his claims, and that he appropriated the bishop’s Histories for his own purpose. An analysis of the passages in question shall reveal how and to what ends Fredegar did so. A connection with his contemporary experience and motivation will also shed light on the reasons for the introduction of the Austrasians in the context of Chrodinus’s election and Sigibert’s campaign against the 20

Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, prologue, p. 123. Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, prologue, p. 123. 22 On the problems of the translation of congruentia see Lake, ‘Rethinking Fredegar’s Prologue’, pp. 9–14. 23 On this see also Lake, ‘Rethinking Fredegar’s Prologue’, p. 27. 21

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Neustrians in the 570s. All in all, the author’s vision of the Austrasian community and its narrative representation should eventually become clear, and with it his view of the group’s status and nature that remains a subject of debate in modern research. That Fredegar was describing an actually existing group widely known under the label Austrasians not just in his times, but even decades before is demonstrated by the fact that both he and Gregory of Tours did not consider it necessary to explain the meaning of the term to their readership. They obviously assumed their readers were familiar with the name and its meaning. The group therefore must have taken shape as a discernible social entity already in the second half of the sixth century, before it was mentioned in contemporary texts.24 Fredegar never made use of the singular form of the term, but always applied the plural form in order to label a community, thus bestowing a collective identity to the group he addressed.25 He represented the Austrasians as the politically dominant group in the eastern part of the Frankish realm accordingly called Austrasia or Auster. In doing so, the historiographer echoed their importance when he added them to Gregory of Tours’s text. A simple numerical record shows the degree of prominence the Austrasians and Austrasia have attained in the Fredegar Chronicle. The text mentions the eastern part of the Merovingian realm as Auster or Aoster twenty-four times, the Austrasians as Austrasii or Austriae thirty-one times.26 This evidence can be 24

Stegeman, ‘Growth’, p.  144; Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp.  200–01 n.  74; cf.  Ewig, ‘Teilungen und Teilreiche’, pp.  151–52 and 156–57; Ewig, ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein’, pp. 267–68. On the chronological distance between group formation (including their denotation) and the earliest textual evidence in general see Wolfram, ‘Terminologisches’, pp. 788–89. 25 Stegeman, ‘Growth’, pp. 143–44 who assumes this identity included a certain ‘regional awareness’ or even an ‘austrasitas’. For this notion and its implications see ibid., pp. 11–14, 177–78, 184–85, 210, and 221. 26 Austrasia: Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.58, iv (Index).16, 38, 40, 41, 42, 43, 52, 54, 56, 58, 59, 75, 76, 83, 85, pp. 109 ll. 4 and 5, 119 l. 18, 120 ll. 5 and 7, 121 l. 14, 127 l. 26, 140 ll. 3, 4 and 12, 141 ll. 4 and 9, 142 ll. 7 and 16, 146 ll. 14 and 17, 147 l. 18, 148 l. 24, 150 ll. 12 and 22, 158 l. 30, 159 l. 11, 163 l. 20, 164 l. 15. Austrasians: ibid., ed. by Krusch, iii.58, 71, 72, iv (Index).19, 35, 37, 38, 42, 47, 53, 61, 68, 74, 75, 76, 85, 87, 88, pp. 109 l. 1, 112 ll. 9, 12 and 28–29, 121 ll. 15 and 24, 128 l. 10, 134 ll. 9 and 14, 138 l. 10, 139 l. 7, 141 ll. 12 and 20, 144 l. 12, 147 ll. 4 and 10–11, 151 l. 15, 155 ll. 2, 8 and 16, 158 l. 14, 159 ll. 4, 8–9, 13, 15 and 17, 163–64 ll. 31–1, 164 ll. 4, 9 and 25, 165 l. 28. The numbers include the references from the index to book iv, but not the ones from the addition extant in one manuscript mentioned on p. 159 n. * to iv, 76 in the edition. The Austri of iv.85 have been perceived as Austrasians and added to this list, although the term was later also read and understood as a local reference to

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related to the number of direct references to the Neustrians, the Austrasians’ counterpart located in the western part of the Merovingian kingdom, respectively called Neustria. The Neustrians as a group are mentioned eleven times in the chronicle, while the western region is labelled Neustria ten times.27 On the whole there is a relation of two to one with respect to the mention of Austrasia compared to the number of references to Neustria and even a relation of three to one with regards to the naming of Austrasians versus the mention of Neustrians. Regarding the work’s content, about one third of the fourth book is dedicated to Austrasia and the Austrasian kings.28 All this clearly indicates that the emphasis Fredegar put on Austrasia and the Austrasians represents the importance of the eastern part of the Merovingian realms and the Austrasians for his perspective on Frankish history. As the terminological evidence demonstrates, the existence of the group is closely connected and intertwined with the area in which the Austrasians were living. In the Fredegar Chronicle, however, Austrasia had a twofold status. It was part of the Frankish realm, and an area that potentially stretched beyond this: Austrasia could serve as an area of expansion to the east.29 According to Fredegar it was at the eastern rim of Austrasia that the border of the Frankish realm, the limes Francorum, was defended against the repeated raids of the Slavs and Avars, and it was from here that the Merovingian domain could be expanded farther east. This is at least what the peoples, the gentes, living at the borders to the Slavs and Avars suggested to King Dagobert I. They were convinced that the Merovingian could subject the Avars, Slavs, and the nationes gentium up to the frontiers of the Roman Empire to his rule.30 Auster; see p. 164 l. 9 with n. f. Cf. the slightly varying numbers in Stegeman, ‘Growth’, p. 143, who restricted his counting to the fourth book. 27 Neustria: Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.42, 47, 55, 56, 57, 60, 74, 76, 79, 80, pp. 141 ll. 25, 144 l. 13, 148 ll. 12 and 25, 149 l. 5, 150 l. 24, 158 l. 16, 159 l. 10, 161 l. 21, 162 l. 1. Neustrasians: Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.71, iv (Index).56, 62, 74, 76, 90, pp. 112 l. 22, 120 l. 28, 148 l. 27, 151 l. 20, 158 l. 20, 159 ll. 7 and 16, 161 ll. 25–26, 166 l. 25, 167 ll. 6 and 11. Here the numbers also include one reference from the index to book iv, but not the ones from the addition extant in one manuscript mentioned on p. 159 n. * to iv.76 in the edition. The ‘citiris primatebus Neustreci’ of ibid., ed. by Krusch, iv.80, p. 161 ll. 25–26 have been added to the list of evidence for Neustrians. Cf. Stegeman, ‘Growth’, p. 143. 28 Stegeman, ‘Growth’, p. 68. 29 Cf. Stegeman, ‘Growth’, pp. 71–72; Esders, ‘Herakleios’, pp. 299–308; Pohl, Awaren, pp. 256 and 259. See also the map in Lienhard, ‘Partages mérovingiens’, p. 22. 30 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.58, p. 150.

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However, Fredegar’s report of the following years of Dagobert’s reign shows that reality turned out different. Rather than expanding beyond the eastern border of Austrasia and the Frankish realm, the eastern edges of the realm remained exposed to the incursions of the Slavs ruled by Samo, a leader of supposedly Frankish origin.31 Moreover, the constant threat and warfare at the borders also led to upheavals on the Frankish side. Radulf, the dux of Thuringia, defied the Merovingian claim to suzerainty and strove for more independence by seeking alliances with neighbouring Slavic groups.32 Both in the fight against the Slavs and the attempt to suppress Radulf ’s ambitions, Merovingian politics failed because the Austrasian contingent was crushed in battle. Fredegar describes the defeats the Austrasians suffered as painful, causing the mourned loss of many noblemen, particularly in the fight against Radulf.33 The chronicle’s account also implies that the Merovingians felt the results of the military setbacks at the eastern frontier. Whilst Dagobert could not prevent a group of Sorbs from defecting after having been defeated by Samo, losing control over their land, the young King Sigibert III, his son, had to accept the loss of control over the Thuringian duchy in the aftermath of the lost battle against Radulf.34 In Fredegar’s view, Austrasia had shrunk due to the defeats suffered by the Austrasian army. The straight linkage between a gens like the Sorbs and the land it inhabits represents one specific narrative strand in the Fredegar Chronicle. The aforementioned proposal by the people living close to Austrasia’s eastern border to subjugate the nationes gentium from the Merovingian realm all the way up to the Byzantine frontier is just one example of Fredegar’s mental map connecting land and people. That he structured the world according to the people who lived in certain areas is in evidence also in other parts of the text.35 Austrasia, however, was different. For Fredegar it was not only the land of the Austrasians, as the name might have suggested. It was also inhabited by other peoples.36 The 31

On Samo’s origin and ascent to power see Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.48, pp. 144–45, on the incursions see ibid., ed. by Krusch, iv.68, p. 155. From the vast literature on Samo see Pohl, Awaren, pp. 256–61; Fritze, Untersuchungen, pp. 86–102; Eggers, ‘Samo’. 32 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.77 and 87, pp. 159 and 164–65. 33 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.68 and 87, pp. 155 and 165. 34 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.87, p. 165; cf. also ibid. iv.68 p. 155 where Fredegar writes about the Austrasians dementacio caused by Dagobert’s ill-willed regime. 35 On this and the following see Fischer, ‘Fredegars Welt’ (with further literature). 36 Fritze, Untersuchungen, pp. 265–67; Stegeman, ‘Growth’, pp. 71–72, 144; cf. on this issue also Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, p. 16.

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chronicler refers to the Alemanni, the Bavarians (although this only in one passage in the whole text), and the unnamed gentes living close to the Avars and Slavs who had been part of the areas east of the Rhine that belonged to Austrasia and thus to the Frankish realm.37 Despite its clear-cut denomination, Austrasia obviously was a multi-ethnic area in Fredegar’s view. This is apparent, for example, in the description of Sigibert III’s campaign against Radulf of Thuringia. According to Fredegar, the young Merovingian first called up ‘all Austrasian leudes’ to bring Radulf to terms.38 After he had crossed the Rhine, however, the king gathered further people in order to add to his army: ‘peoples from everywhere, from all districts (pagi) across the river which belonged to his realm’ united with his Austrasian troops.39 Fredegar’s account of this mobilization process illustrates how he interweaved spatial and ethnic dimensions in his narrative. West of the Rhine, the Austrasian leudes gathered around the king, while on the eastern bank of the river the gentes from the local pagi joined the troops. Obviously Fredegar regarded the area west of the Rhine as the proper territory of the Austrasians, whereas the lands in the east near the frontier with the Avars and Slavs were part of the Austrasian kingdom, but inhabited by other peoples.40 That the Austrasians located in the territory west of the Rhine, however, dominated this multi-ethnic region in Fredegar’s view becomes clear when we take the term regnum Austrasiorum into consideration. It expresses the political hegemony the Austrasians exerted in a territory beyond the limits of their own settlement area.41 This analysis is confirmed by other passages in the text in which the author distinguishes between different military groups forming a larger army. Theudebert II, for instance, first went to war against his brother Theuderic II 37 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.68, 72 and 58, pp. 155 (Alemanni, who appear more often in the text), 157 (Bavarians), and 150 (gentes at the eastern border). For other groups and regions belonging, though controversially, to Austrasia see ibid., ed. by Krusch, iv.37, pp. 138–39. 38 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.87, p. 164 ll. 24–25: ‘omnes leudis Austrasiorum in exercitum gradiendum banniti sunt’. 39 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.87, p. 164 ll. 26–27: ‘gentes undique de universis regni sui pagus ultra Renum cum ipsum adunati sunt’. On the pagi as an organizational unit for military campaigns in the seventh century see Esders, ‘Zur Entwicklung der politischen Raumgliederung’, esp. p. 201. 40 Cf.  Stegeman, ‘Growth’, p.  209; Fritze, Untersuchungen, pp.  245 and 267; Wood, ‘Frontiers’, pp. 231–32. 41 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.53, 68, 74, 76, and 88, pp. 147 ll. 4 and 10–11, 155 l. 2, 158 l. 14, 159 l. 13, and 165 l. 28. Cf. Fritze, Untersuchungen, p. 245 with n. 1496 on p. 413.

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with an Austrasian contingent (the Austrasiorum exercitus) in 611/12, only to gather ‘the Saxons, Thuringians and other gentes from across the Rhine and everywhere else’ after suffering a crushing defeat in battle. 42 Again, a Merovingian king had mobilized first the Austrasians and then the gentes from across the Rhine. Shortly after this incident, Brunichilde, the two rival kings’ grandmother, tried to call up the peoples from east of the Rhine as well as the Austrasians to prepare for the ensuing conflict with Chlothar II.43 This time, however, some of the latter sided with the enemy, prompting the whole army’s retreat from the battlefield.44 In doing so, they prevented further bloodshed in Fredegar’s view. The nature and character of the Austrasian group as it emerges from these passages deviates from the one presented in recent research which assumes that the name ‘Austrasians’ served as an umbrella term to unify the gentes east of the Rhine with the Frankish group living on its western bank, and that it was therefore meant to be an option for identification and integration.45 Fredegar’s use of the term indicates a different meaning. His chronicle drew on the term to display the difference between the Austrasians, the other gentes, and their diverse identities in a nevertheless coherent political space. According to his text, the Austrasians were the predominant group in a larger area, but territorially confined to a smaller region, with the rest of their dominion inhabited by other peoples.46 Despite the pre-eminence of the military aspect in the description of the Austrasians and their actions in the chronicle, Fredegar’s view of the group was not restricted to the image of a functional elite dedicated to warfare alone.47 To be sure, the Austrasians were the ones who elected the maior domus. They also asked for a king and gave advice to the queen, and were thus presented as a body 42

Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.38, p. 139 ll. 18–20: ‘Theudebertus cum Saxonis, Thoringus vel ceteras gentes, que de ultra Renum vel undique potuerat adunare, contra Theudericum Tholbiaco perrexit’. 43 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.40, pp. 140–41. 44 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.42, p. 141. 45 Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp. 202 and 208. 46 Cf. on a similar view Ewig, ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein’, pp. 267 and 269, who underlines the territorial basis of the group, ranks the Austrasians among the ‘regional collectives’ (Regionalverbände) of the ‘Teilreiche’ which were the result of a ‘regionalization of Frankishness’ (‘Regionalisierung des Frankentums’). On the process of ‘territorialization’ reflected in the terminology see also Goetz, ‘Gens’, pp. 50, 55–57, 59, and 61, and Fischer, ‘Fredegars Welt’. 47 Cf. on this position Stegeman, ‘Growth’, p. 144.

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corporate with political and military power of decision.48 Scholars therefore saw the term as denoting only the leading group, that is, those leudes Fredegar mentioned when he was writing about Sigibert mobilizing his Austrasian army against Radulf: the freeborn male members of the group who had sworn an oath of allegiance to the king and therefore owed him military service.49 However, as Fredegar used the term leudes to denote this elite, it is unlikely that he employed Austrasii to mean the same. Indeed, he seems to have regarded the Austrasians as a socially stratified group, not just as the magnates of the Merovingian Teilreich, as has been suggested:50 when Fredegar had Chrodinus decline the offer of the Austrasians to become maior domus, he made him pass on the office because most of the noblemen with children in Austrasia were his relatives.51 Assuming that — given the political importance of the terminology — the choice of words was deliberate, the formulation bespeaks a differentiation between the Austrasians and the nobility in Austrasia, which seems to have comprised a smaller group — otherwise Fredegar could have used the name Austrasii here. This said, the latter could not be identified with the nobility of the kingdom as a whole in Fredegar’s view, but represented a larger group. All in all, the chronicle draws a consistent picture of the Austrasians. According to Fredegar they were a multilayered yet self-contained group on a territorial basis that was smaller than the regnum Austrasiorum which they ruled as a corporate entity in concerted action mainly exerted by their high-status members. Against this backdrop one wonders whether Fredegar deemed the Austrasians a gens like the others living in the eastern Frankish realm. They were explicitly named as such only once, in a saint’s life written a few decades after the chronicle.52 Indeed, Fredegar ascribes several qualities to them which are shared by other peoples in the text: they lived in a geographically marked-off territory, they were socially differentiated, they had the power and willingness 48

Cf. Stegeman, ‘Growth’, pp. 28 and 33. See the quotation above in n. 38. Cf. also Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.56, p. 148 ll. 23–24: ‘Dagobertus cernens genitorem suum fuisse defunctum, universis leudibus, quos regebat in Auster, iobet in exercito promovere’. On the leudes see Reichert and von Olberg, ‘Leudes’. 50 See Ewig, ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein’, pp. 267–68; cf. also Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp. 206–08. 51 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.58, p. 109 ll. 4–5. On Chrodinus and his background see Selle–Hosbach, ‘Prosopographie’, pp.  71–72 no.  62; see also Reimitz, History, pp. 92–93. 52 Vita Audoini episcopi Rotomagensis, ed. by Levison, chap. 13, p. 562. Cf. Ewig, ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein’, p. 269. 49

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to govern over an area and over other peoples, and they formed a distinctive military contingent.53 The chronicle’s description of the group certainly echoed the self-perception of the Austrasian elite who saw themselves in a binary opposition to their western counterpart, the Neustrians, and thus as an autonomous entity.54 Correspondingly, Fredegar referred to a regnum Austrasiorum and did not, like Jonas of Bobbio, a contemporary author whose text the chronicler knew and excerpted, term their counterparts Neustrii Franci.55 Fredegar never added the Frankish denotation when he mentioned the Austrasians or Neustrians. He might, of course, not have felt the need to do so because their Frankishness was known to his readers. However, Fredegar’s choice of words seems to have rested on more than his readership’s presumed knowledge. The chronicle suggests that in Fredegar’s perspective the Austrasians were no independent gens like the other groups living in the area outlined as Austrasia. They were a subgroup of the Franks rather than an ethnic community on its own. The text contains some indications for this specific vision of community. First of all, the Frankish, not the Austrasian origin seems to have been the vanishing point of ethnic ascriptions. Phrases such as ex genere Austrasiorum or Neustrasiorum do not appear in the text at all, whereas Frankish, Roman, Burgundian, and even Saxon origins were worth being mentioned.56 Secondly, according to the chronicle the Frankish origins could be traced back to the Trojan War,57 whereas the Austrasians were not endowed with similar historical depth. They appeared in Fredegar’s narrative all of a sudden without their roots being explained, or even mentioned at all. This evidence should be read against the backdrop of the assertions made by modern scholars about the origins of the terms Austrasii and Neustrii/Neustrasii. To be sure, both names carry a geographical meaning : the Austrasians must be understood as the eastern group, the Neustrians as their western counterpart. However, the naming could also have served as a tool used by contemporaries to imbue their nomenclature with a chronological, that is historical, dimension. In this sense, the name of the Neustrian Franks in particular can be translated and understood not only 53

On the existence of itemized lists of criteria in the contemporaries’ views and the problems connected with them see Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, pp. 5–8. 54 Cardot, Espace, pp. 47 and 200. 55 Jonas of Bobbio, Vita Columbani, ed. by Krusch, i.24, p. 206 l. 25. On this passage see Jonas of Bobbio, Vita Columbani, trans. by O’Hara and Wood, p. 152 with n. 310. 56 See for instance Fredegar, Chronicae, ed.  by Krusch, iv.78, p.  160 ll.  3–4; cf.  Ewig, ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein’, p. 268. 57 See above n. 4.

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as denoting the ‘Western’, but also the ‘New’ Franks.58 If so, Fredegar’s use of the terms could be interpreted as an effort to actively deny the self-proclaimed autonomous status of the two antagonistic groups by reminding his readers of their common Frankish past. This argument is supported by the fact that Fredegar invokes the Franks as an entity, and one imbued with agency at key moments when the rulers of the Merovingian kingdoms appear (and quarrel) as the representatives of the different subgroups. Thus, when Dagobert argued with his father Chlothar about the extension of his Austrasian realm, the issue — which basically concerned the territorial integrity of Austrasia — was, according to the chronicle, delegated to a specific number of Franks.59 In this way, Fredegar presented the quarrels as internal ones, not as conflicts between two distinct and autonomous groups. In addition, the fight against the Slavs at the eastern border of Austrasia was also presented as an all-Frankish affair: it concerned the defence of the frontiers of the regnum Francorum — not just the kingdom of the Austrasians.60 In the chronicle it was the Franks who represented the overarching reference for identification in ethnic terms that included Neustrians as well as Austrasians. The latter terms lacked the decisive characteristic that qualified the Franks as an ethnic unit in Fredegar’s view. Neustrians and Austrasians had no mythical descent or history stretching deep into the past that could have turned them into genealogically traceable ethnic units. With this general image of the Frankish subgroups in mind, the Austrasians’ appearance at a specific point in Fredegar’s history comes into focus. A closer look at the changes in the passages referred to at the beginning of this paper should tell us more about the reasons for the insertion of the passages from Gregory of Tours’s text in book iii of the Fredegar Chronicle and, finally, about the appropriation of history that took place during the modification of the bishop’s text. When Fredegar reported the rebellion of the Austrasians against Sigibert and their ensuing fight against his brother Chilperic for the sake of plundering, he ended the episode with the Neustrians’ submission to the victor at Vitry.61 58

Ewig, ‘Teilungen und Teilreiche’, pp. 155–56; Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp. 206–07 with n. 89 and pp. 209–10 with n. 93; Reimitz, ‘Neustria’, p. 129. 59 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.53, p. 147. Cf. also ibid., ed. by Krusch, iv.37 and 40, pp. 138 and 140 on the same procedure. Cf. Ewig, ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein’, p. 268 n. 205; Reimitz, History, pp. 181–82. 60 Cf. Fritze, Untersuchungen, pp. 139 and 243–44. 61 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.71, p. 112 ll. 21–22: ‘Cumque Victuriaco accessisset, omnes Neptresiae ad eum venientes, se suae dicione subiaecerunt’ (When he arrived at Vitry, all Neustrians came to him and subjected themselves to his rule).

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Gregory of Tours’s account of the events (and that of the redactors of the Histories’ six-book version) differed from Fredegar’s in a number of respects. Gregory first described the changing alliances between the three brothers, and mentioned that the peoples from across the Rhine whom Sigibert had assembled for his campaign lusted for booty. He also reported that after Sigibert’s victory, the opposing host (Chilperic’s exercitus) lifted him on a shield at Vitry and in that way acclaimed him king.62 Fredegar’s modifications are striking. Firstly, he not only shortened the account, but he replaced the peoples from across the Rhine with the Austrasians, and turned the symbolic ritual of elevation to kingship into an act of submission. Secondly, he named the Neustrians (‘omnes Neptresiae’) in lieu of the exercitus of Chilperic as the protagonists of the scene and thus introduced them into his historical account. The Vita Columbani of Jonas of Bobbio and Fredegar’s Chronicle are the oldest extant texts that mentioned them at all.63 The reasons for these textual changes become clearer against the backdrop of Fredegar’s view of the Austrasians and their relation to the other gentes living in Austrasia. It seems clear that the chronicler replaced the latter with the former in his account to suit the contemporary image of the Austrasians as the dominant group in the eastern part of the Frankish realm. They represented the most important part of the Austrasian king’s contingent which gathered around their ruler first, before the gentes from across the Rhine also joined the royal army. Fredegar’s changes meant that it was the Austrasians who were represented as ravening looters. It is likely that Fredegar not only approved of this consequence of his rewriting, but deliberately created it. In contrast to Gregory of Tours’s account (and the six-book version), the Austrasians were now intentionally given the responsibility for plundering, indeed for causing the war between Sigibert and Chilperic. Fredegar further elaborated Gregory’s account by adding a conversation between the Austrasians and Sigibert in direct speech in which the Austrasians insisted on an opportunity for plunder before returning home.64 Fredegar thus characterized the Austrasians as responsible for caus62

Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, iv.49–51, pp. 185–190; Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont, iv.34–36 (49–51), pp. 138–41. On Gregory’s deprecation of the actions of the gentes from across the Rhine in his account see Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp. 202–03. 63 Grahn-Hoek, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert’, pp. 205–06. 64 On this and the following see Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.71, p. 112. For the concept of patria see Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification’, pp. 16–17; Eichenberger, Patria, pp. 53–54.

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ing a fratricidal war with Neustria, Chilperic’s realm, for material motives. That Fredegar mentions the Austrasians’ advice not to fight against King Guntram of Burgundy (561–92), Sigibert’s brother, because the latter was obliged to him by an oath, does little to redress the impression of their greedy disregard of values. In Gregory’s version Sigibert had been able to appease the grumbling gentes from across the Rhine; he finally even punished some of their members for their behaviour.65 In the Fredegar Chronicle, there is no evidence of this. Instead, even the wording of the Austrasians’ demands further condemns their motives: according to Fredegar, they asked Sigibert for an opportunity to get rich and to fight — in this order.66 In the same passage the Neptresiae are represented as the equivalent to the Austrasian array coming from the east: Fredegar turned Chilperic’s exercitus into a Neustrian contingent. By doing so, he certainly had contemporary politics in mind. As in the case of other motifs in the chronicle, the events taking place in the decades around 650 seem to have shaped the description of the military conflict between the two brothers Sigibert and Chilperic in general, and the negative image of the Austrasians in particular. There are some striking similarities between the past events described and Fredegar’s own time which deserve to be considered here. First of all, the conflicts between the Austrasians and the Neustrians about territorial issues were a major theme in the chronicle’s fourth book. Both sides were conceived of as wrongdoers driven by base motives in the respective passages of the Fredegar Chronicle, the Austrasians as much as the Neustrians. The author also carefully described the border disputes concerning the northern parts of the common boundary which intensified during the conflict between 65 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, iv.49, p. 186 and Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Omont, iv.34 (49), p. 139 clearly are the source for this part of Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.71, p. 112. The author remodelled the phrases used by Gregory and his later redactors, but used the general motifs of the passage such as the lust for violence and plunder based on the peoples’ furore and the element of ‘returning to the patria’ — the latter, however, being turned upside down, since the Historiae presents Sigibert as a patient king until he returned home and punished the troublemakers, whereas in Fredegar’s version the Austrasians threatened not to return home if they were not given the chance to loot. Cf. Reimitz, History, p. 184. — For this and other cases of an active remodelling of Gregory’s account (or rather that of the six-book version) in the Fredegar Chronicle see Fischer, Die Fredegar-Chronik (forthcoming). 66 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.71, p. 112: ‘Sicut promisisti, da nobis, ubi rebus ditemur aut preliemur, alioquin ad patriam non revertimur’ (Give us the opportunity to get rich and to fight, as you promised, otherwise we will not return to the homeland).

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Chilperic and Sigibert I.67 The conflict carried on into the next generations, when Theuderic II, Theudebert II, and Chlothar II, the grandsons of Sigibert and the son of Chilperic, were fighting each other.68 One particular bone of contention between them seems to have been the so-called duchy of Dentelinus which remained disputed even in the days the Fredegar Chronicle was composed and written. This controversial subject, which appears and reappears at different points of the timeline in Fredegar’s text, shows how a particular sixthcentury conflict could still matter generations after it began.69 It seems to have played a role in the conflict caused by Dagobert when he established a subkingdom for his son Sigibert III, cutting off Austrasian territory, very much to the dismay of the local magnates. Fredegar stresses the fact that the Austrasians had to give up the duchy of Dentelin they had earlier taken into possession iniquiter.70 They grudgingly accepted the territorial division the king imposed on them. According to Fredegar they kept the agreement, at least during the reigns of Sigibert III (d. 656) and his brother Clovis II (d. 657), but, as one might assume from the author’s chosen wording, not afterwards. Territorial conflicts between the two groups therefore seem to have re-emerged while Fredegar wrote his work, and they were closely connected to Sigibert III’s rule — and this probably not just in the author’s view. Secondly, there is a conspicuous analogy in terms of the names of the kings on the Austrasian side. While Sigibert I was the king pushed by the Austrasians to fight with his brother in the 570s, Sigibert III was the last Austrasian king mentioned in the Fredegar Chronicle. Even though the narrative continued beyond the king’s death in 656, there is no mention of his successor Childebert the Adopted. Did Fredegar introduce the Austrasians in his historical account in the context of Sigibert I to establish an analogy which underlined the way in which a king could be driven by his Austrasian followers’ interests? The chronicler might have established a loose end in his narrative that his readers could easily connect with their own contemporary experiences. Even if we do not precisely know what the story was meant to evoke in the readers’ minds, this possibility could explain why Fredegar inserted the 67

Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.55 and 71, pp. 107–08 and 112. Cf. on the civil wars Wood, Merovingian Kingdoms, pp. 89–91; Ewig, Merowinger, pp. 42–44. 68 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.27 and 37–39, pp. 131–32 and 138–40. 69 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.20, 37–38 and 76, pp. 128, 139–40 and 159. Cf. Cardot, Espace, 130–31, 174, 178, 190; Mériaux, Gallia irradiata, pp. 57–59. 70 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.76, p. 159 with the quote in l. 15. Cf. Wood, ‘Fredegar’s Fables’, p. 364.

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Austrasians in this passage of Gregory of Tours’s work but omitted them in his reworking of Gregory’s account of Merovech and Brunichilde. Fredegar used narrative patterns such as analogy and juxtaposition in his text, such as when he embedded his description of the Byzantine emperor Heraclius’s fate in his report on King Dagobert’s behaviour in order to make his readers compare both rulers and their respective ends.71 This instrument of reader guidance and reference might well have motivated Fredegar’s placing of the Austrasians in his chronological narrative. It probably also led to the insertion of the Chrodinus-episode, including the alleged chronological error that Fredegar committed when dating the story to the infancy of Sigibert I: it has recently been suggested that the events described in the chronicle actually took place during the minority of Sigibert’s son, Childebert II.72 As in the contemporary Vita Columbani which replaced Childebert II with his father Sigibert in the account of the Irish monk’s arrival, this was likely a deliberate modification rather than merely a mistake on the part of the author.73 For most of the chronicle’s narrative, King Sigibert III was also a minor, guided by his advisors — all members of the Austrasian nobility — just like Sigibert I happened to be in Fredegar’s interpolated episode on Chrodinus’s election. And there might be a further twist. According to the chronicle, the preeminent figure among the nobles around Sigibert III was Grimoald, who supported the young king in the crucial battle against Radulf of Thuringia.74 His striving for the office of maior domus formerly held by his father Pippin was contested by Otto, who took care of Sigibert for many years. According to Fredegar, the conflict was caused by Otto’s superbia. It finally led to Otto’s murder at the behest of Grimoald, whom the chronicle nevertheless presents as loved by many Austrasians.75 The description of the conflict between the two claimants stands in stark contrast to Chrodinus’s renunciation of his promotion to maior domus: rather than exhibiting dignified magnanimity by retiring from the contest in favour of another, more appropriate person, Grimoald and Otto chose to brawl, with 71

See Fischer, ‘Rewriting History’, pp. 65–66. Dumézil, ‘Gogo et ses amis’, p. 555 with n. 17. 73 The modification is documented in most of the manuscripts. See Jonas of Bobbio, Vita Columbani, ed. by Krusch, i.6, p. 162 (with n. 3). Cf. also Jonas of Bobbio, Vita Columbani, trans. by O’Hara and Wood, p. 107 with n. 107 on pp. 107–08 and the introduction pp. 20–21; see also the comment on i.18, ibid. p. 132 n. 220. 74 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.87, p. 165. 75 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iv.86 and 88, pp. 164 and 166. On the author’s relation to Grimoald see also Wood, ‘Fredegar’s Fables’, p. 365. 72

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the latter as the main culprit in the chronicle’s view. In Fredegar’s idealized picture of Chrodinus, the latter refused the office of the maior domus because of his relationship with many of the Austrasian noblemen, and instead recommended Gogo as a suitable candidate; the chronicler also praised him for other virtues in further additions to Gregory of Tours’s text. Was Fredegar’s account of Chrodinus supposed to furnish a striking contrast to the quarrel between the two seventh-century claimants in general and Otto’s stance in particular?76 All in all, there seem to be enough clues to assume that the chronicler intentionally introduced the Austrasians in his account of the minority and the reign of Sigibert I. The author of the crucial passages inserted in book iii seems to have exploited apparent similarities with his own times in order to point to the conflicts that took place under Sigibert III. In retrospect they found their equivalent, if not their starting point, during the minority of Sigibert I. Fredegar used motifs that allowed his audience to draw parallels between sixthcentury and contemporary events, such as the minority of the kings and even their homonymy. Insertions like the ones in the chronicle’s third book were probably meant to encourage readers to compare the chronicle’s accounts to contemporary events. Since the audience was likely to focus on the Austrasians’ first appearance in the text more than on subsequent ones, the obliteration of their earlier appearances in Fredegar’s source, the six-book redaction of Gregory of Tours’s Histories, certainly intensified the impact the author wanted to make. It remains unclear whether the author responsible for making the Austrasians enter the stage at this point was also responsible for the deletion of the earlier entries dedicated to them. But if so, one person seems to have refashioned Gregory of Tours’s narrative to establish a connection in the deep structure of his text that was important enough to set aside the Austrasians’ reluctance to help Merovech and Brunichilde, Fredegar’s nemesis. These modifications resulted in a text that also differed in substance from its source. In doing so, Fredegar obviously wanted to put forward a particular interpretation. What mattered to him was bringing the inner and outer conflicts of the Austrasians, as well as the base motives underlying them, to the fore. To present the Austrasians as greedy warmongers who did not refrain from compelling their king to conduct a fratricidal war was a narrative strategy which formulated a code of conduct. But the story also conveyed a social message referring to the very shape of the group. Fredegar does not explicitly highlight the question ‘what is a gens?’. But he interspersed his narrative with refer76

On the favourable portrait of Chrodinus in the Fredegar Chronicle see the passages cited above, n. 8.

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ences to the characteristics of the Austrasians in order to prompt the reader to read between the lines. This way he not only drew the readership’s attention to the matter of forming or representing a gens, but presumably also stressed the issue of the significance of history for a group being or becoming part of a world of gentes. This appears to be exactly where Franks and Austrasians differed in Fredegar’s view. While the former did have a history told in his chronicle, the latter did not. This turned the Franks into a gens, but left the Austrasians on the level of a subgroup, despite the fact that it owned some of the characteristics that Fredegar attributed to the peoples that populated the world he described. The identity Fredegar granted to the Austrasians therefore was quite different to that of the Franks, and the groups’ history (or lack of it) was at the very core of this difference. In Fredegar’s view the Franks as an ethnic entity represented the overarching framework to which the political powers and groups of his days were supposed to refer. In contrast to modern research, which has argued that the term Austrasii was an instrument of integration, for Fredegar it represented a description of a territorially grounded, political community. To him it was not the denomination of an ethnic group like the others who inhabited his world. His work appears to have been an appeal to the Austrasians and the Neustrians to remember their ethnic superstructure and the common origin it preserved, especially in times of conflict. The reference to the Franks in the description of the efforts to reconcile both groups clearly points towards this sore spot. The chronicler appropriated history as an instrument to illustrate his concern if not convince his readership of his position. There are several indicators that his chronicle was just one among several historiographic texts which could well have dealt with the same issues, and if the conclusions drawn so far are correct, it might also have been one voice in a seventh-century discourse that centred on the people’s self-perception. It was about being a Frank rather than being Austrasian or Neustrian, and it concerned the cohesion of the Frankish realm which was on the edge of being torn apart by diverging interests. But Fredegar appropriated history also in another respect. On the one hand, the fact that he inserted and introduced the Austrasians in the third book of his chronicle was meant to convey his interpretation. On the other hand, however, Fredegar suggested that Gregory of Tours was the author even of those passages which he had strongly modified. In doing so, he piggybacked on the bishop’s reputation and authority as a historiographer. This also adds to the impression that Fredegar tried to assert his position in a choir of dissonant voices. With Gregory of Tours as back-up, he wanted to communicate his vision of a united Frankish community.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Bruno Krusch, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), ii: Fredegarii et aliorum Chronica (Hanover: Hahn, 1888), pp. 1–168 Gregory of Tours, Grégoire de Tours: Histoire des Francs, Livres I–VI: texte du manuscrit de Corbie, Bibliothèque nationale, ms. Lat. 17655, ed. by Henri Omont, Collection de textes pour server à l’étude et à l’enseignement de l’histoire, 2 (Paris: Alphonse Picard, 1886) —— , Historiae, ed. by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), i.1: Gregorii Turonensis opera: Libri historiarum x, 2nd edn (Hanover: Hahn, 1951; repr. 1992) —— , Libri I–IV de virtutibus sancti Martini episcopi, ed. by Bruno Krusch, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), i.2: Gregorii Turonensis opera: Miracula et opera minora, 2nd edn (Hanover: Hahn, 1969), pp. 134–211 Jonas of Bobbio, Vita Columbani abbatis discipulorumque eius libri II, ed. by Bruno Krusch, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi, 81  vols (Hanover, Leipzig, and Berlin, 1871–2016), xxxvii: Ionae Vitae sanctorum Columbani, Vedastis, Iohannis (Hanover and Leipzig: Hahn, 1905), pp. 1–294 —— , Vita Columbani, ed. and trans. by Alexander O’Hara and Ian Wood, ‘Life of Columbanus’, ‘Life of John of Réomé’, and ‘Life of Vedast’, Translated Texts for Historians, 64 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2017), pp. 85–239 Vita Audoini episcopi Rotomagensis, ed. by Wilhelm Levison, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), v: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici (iii) (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), pp. 536–67

Secondary Works Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006) Barlow, Jonathan, ‘Gregory of Tours and the Myth of the Trojan Origins of the Franks’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien, 29 (1995), 86–95 Cardot, Fabienne, L’espace et le pouvoir: étude sur l’Austrasie mérovingienne, Série histoire ancienne et médiévale, 17 (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 1987) Collins, Roger, Fredegar (Aldershot: Variorum, 1996) —— , Die Fredegar-Chroniken, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Studien und Texte, 44 (Hanover: Hahn, 2007) Dumézil, Bruno, ‘Gogo et ses amis: écriture, échanges et ambitions dans un réseau aristocratique de la fin du vie siècle’, Revue historique, 309 (2007), 553–93

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—— , ‘L’Austrasie, Grandeur et Oubli’, in Austrasie: le royaume mérovingien oublié, ed. by Virginie Dupuy (Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 2016), pp. 12–21 Eggers, Martin, ‘Samo – “Der erste König der Slawen”. Eine kritische Forschungsübersicht’, Bohemia, 42 (2001), 62–83 Eichenberger, Thomas, Patria: Studien zur Bedeutung des Wortes im Mittelalter (6.–12. Jahrhundert), Nationes. Historische und philologische Untersuchungen zur Entstehung der europäischen Nationen im Mittelalter, 9 (Sigmaringen: Thorbecke, 1991) Esders, Stefan, ‘Herakleios, Dagobert und die “beschnittenen Völker”. Die Umwälzungen des Mittelmeerraums im 7. Jahrhundert in der Chronik des sog. Fredegar’, in Jenseits der Grenzen: Beiträge zur spätantiken und frühmittelalterlichen Geschichtsschreibung, ed.  by Andreas Goltz, Hartmut Leppin, and Heinrich Schlange-Schöningen, Millennium Studies in the Culture and History of the First Millennium C.  E., 25 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2009), pp. 239–311 —— , ‘Zur Entwicklung der politischen Raumgliederung im Übergang von der Antike zum Mittelalter – Das Beispiel des Pagus’, in Politische Räume in vormodernen Gesellschaften: Gestaltung – Wahrnehmung – Funktion, ed.  by Ortwin Dally and others, Menschen – Kulturen – Traditionen. Studien aus den Forschungsclustern des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, 6 (Rahden: Leidorf, 2013), pp. 195–211 Ewig, Eugen, ‘Die fränkischen Teilungen und Teilreiche (511–613)’, in Eugen Ewig, Spätantikes und Fränkisches Gallien: Gesammelte Schriften (1952–1973), ed. by Hartmut Atsma, Beihefte der Francia, 3, 3  vols (Munich: Artemis, 1976–2009), i (1976), pp. 114–71 —— , ‘Volkstum und Volksbewusstsein im Frankenreich des 7. Jahrhunderts’, in Eugen Ewig, Spätantikes und Fränkisches Gallien: Gesammelte Schriften (1952–1973), ed. by Hartmut Atsma, Beihefte der Francia, 3, 3  vols (Munich: Artemis, 1976–2009), i (1976), pp. 231–73 —— , ‘Trojamythos und fränkische Frühgeschichte’, in Die Franken und die Alemannen bis zur ‘Schlacht bei Zülpich’ 496/97, ed.  by Dieter Geuenich, Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, 19 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1999), pp. 1–30 —— , ‘Zum Geschichtsbild der Franken und den Anfängen der Merowinger’, in Mediaevalia Augiensia: Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, ed. by Jürgen Petersohn, Vorträge und Forschungen, 54 (Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2001), pp. 43–58 —— , Die Merowinger und das Frankenreich, 6th edn (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2012) Fischer, Andreas, ‘Rewriting History: Fredegar’s Perspectives on the Mediterranean’, in Western Perspectives on the Mediterranean: Cultural Transfer in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, 400–800 AD, ed. by Andreas Fischer and Ian N. Wood (London: Bloomsbury, 2014), pp. 55–75 and 135–43 —— , ‘Fredegars Welt: die gentes und ihre Territorien’, in Der Ostalpenraum im Frühmittelalter: Herrschaftsstrukturen, Raumorganisation und archäologisch-historischer Vergleich, ed.  by Maximilian Diesenberger, Katharina Winckler, and Stefan Eichert, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 23 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2020), pp. 245–58 Fritze, Wolfgang, Untersuchungen zur frühslawischen und frühfränkischen Geschichte bis ins 7. Jahrhundert, Zum Druck befördert sowie durch ein Nachwort, einen Nachruf

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und durch ein Verzeichnis der Veröffentlichungen von Wolfgang  H. Fritze ergänzt durch Dietrich Kurze, Winfried Schich und Reinhard Schäfer, Europäische Hochschulschriften, Reihe 3: Geschichte und ihre Hilfswissenschaften, 581 (Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 1994) Goetz, Hans-Werner, ‘Gens. Terminology and Perception of the “Germanic” Peoples from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages’, in The Construction of Communities in the Early Middle Ages: Texts, Resources and Artefacts, ed.  by Richard Corradini, Maximilian Diesenberger, and Helmut Reimitz, The Transformation of the Roman World, 12 (Leiden: Brill, 2003), pp. 39–64 Goffart, Walter, ‘The Fredegar Problem Reconsidered’, Speculum, 38 (1963), 206–41 (repr. in Walter Goffart, Rome’s Fall and After (London: Hambledon, 1989), pp. 319–54) Grahn-Hoek, Heike, ‘Franci und Francia im 6. Jahrhundert. Zu den historischen Ursachen einer sprachlichen Entwicklung’, in Name und Gesellschaft im Frühmittelalter: Personennamen als Indikatoren für sprachliche, ethnische, soziale und kulturelle Gruppenzugehörigkeit ihrer Träger, ed. by Dieter Geuenich and Ingo Runde, Deutsche Namenforschung auf sprachgeschichtlicher Grundlage, 2 (Hildesheim: Olms, 2006), pp. 173–218 Halfond, Gregory I., ‘The Endorsement of Royal-Episcopal Collaboration in the Fredegar Chronica’, Traditio, 70 (2015), 1–28 Heinzelmann, Martin, Gregor von Tours (538–594): “Zehn Bücher Geschichte”: Historiographie und Gesellschaftskonzept im 6. Jahrhundert (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1994) Lake, Justin, ‘Rethinking Fredegar’s Prologue’, The Journal of Medieval Latin, 25 (2015), 1–27 Le Jan, Régine, ‘Austrasien. Versuch einer Begriffsdefinition’, in Die Franken: Wegbereiter Europas: Vor 1500 Jahren: König Chlodwig und seine Erben (Katalog der Ausstellung im Reiss-Museum Mannheim 8. September 1996 bis 6. Januar 1997), ed. by Alfried Wieczorek (Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 1996), pp. 222–26 Lienhard, Thomas, ‘Partages mérovingiens et frontières de l’Austrasie’, in Austrasie: le royaume mérovingien oublié, ed. by Virginie Dupuy (Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 2016), pp. 22–23 Mériaux, Charles, Gallia irradiata: saints et sanctuaires dans le nord de la Gaule du haut moyen âge, Beiträge zur Hagiographie, 4 (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2006) Murray, Alexander Callander, ed., A Companion to Gregory of Tours, Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition, 63 (Leiden: Brill, 2016) Pohl, Walter, Die Awaren: Ein Steppenvolk in Mitteleuropa 567–822  n. Chr., 2nd edn (Munich: Beck, 2002) —— , ‘Introduction: Strategies of Identification: A Methodological Profile’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann, Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 13 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 1–64 —— , ‘Introduction: Ethnicity, Religion and Empire’, in Visions of Community in the PostRoman World: The West, Byzantium and the Islamic World, 300–1100, ed. by Walter Pohl, Clemens Gantner, and Richard Payne (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), pp. 1–23 Reichert, Hermann, and Gabriele von Olberg, ‘Leudes’, in Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, 35  vols, 2nd edn (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–2008), xviii (2001), pp. 292–98

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Reimitz, Helmut, ‘Neustria’, in Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, 35  vols, 2nd edn (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–2008), xxi (2002), pp. 126–31 —— , ‘Cultural Brokers of a Common Past: History, Identity, and Ethnicity in Merovingian Historiography’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed.  by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann, Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 13 (Turnhout: Brepols 2013), pp. 257–301 —— , History, Frankish Identity and the Framing of Western Ethnicity, 550–850, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, 4th ser. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) —— , ‘The Early Medieval Editions of Gregory of Tours’ Histories’, in A Companion to Gregory of Tours, ed.  by Alexander Callander Murray, Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition, 63 (Leiden: Brill, 2016), pp. 519–65 Scheibelreiter, Georg, ‘Fredegar – Chronist einer Epoche’, in The Medieval Chronicle: Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on the Medieval Chronicle, Driebergen/ Utrecht 13–16 July 1996, ed. by Erik Kooper (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1999), pp. 251–59 Selle-Hosbach, Karin, ‘Prosopographie merowingischer Amtsträger in der Zeit von 511 bis 613’ (published doctoral thesis, Bonn: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität, 1974) Stegeman, Hans, ‘The Growth of an Austrasian Identity. Processes of Identification and Legend Construction in the Northeast of the Regnum Francorum, 600–800’ (published doctoral thesis, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, 2014) Wolfram, Herwig, ‘Terminologisches’, in Nomen et fraternitas: Festschrift für Dieter Geuenich zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. by Uwe Ludwig and Thomas Schilp, Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, 62 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2008), pp. 787–802 Wood, Ian N., ‘Fredegar’s Fables’, in Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter, ed. by Anton Scharer and Georg Scheibelreiter, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 32 (Vienna: Oldenbourg, 1994), pp. 359–66 —— , The Merovingian Kingdoms, 450–751 (Harlow: Longman, 1994) —— , ‘The Frontiers of Western Europe: Developments East of the Rhine in the Sixth Century’, in The Sixth Century: Production, Distribution and Demand, ed. by Richard Hodges and William Bowden, The Transformation of the Roman World, 3 (Leiden: Brill, 1998), pp. 231–53 —— , ‘Chains of Chronicles: The Example of London, British Library ms. add. 16974’, in Zwischen Niederschrift und Wiederschrift: Frühmittelalterliche Hagiographie und Historiographie im Spannungsfeld von Kompendienüberlieferung und Editionstechnik, ed.  by Richard Corradini, Max Diesenberger, and Meta Niederkorn-Bruck, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 18 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2010), pp. 67–77 —— , ‘Universal Chronicles in the Early Medieval West’, Medieval Worlds: Comparative and Interdisciplinary Studies, 1 (2015), 47–58 Woodruff, Jane Ellen, ‘The Historia epitomata (Third Book) of the Chronicle of Fredegar: An Annotated Translation and Historical Analysis of Interpolated Material’ (published doctoral thesis, University of Nebraska, Lincoln and Ann Arbor: UMI, 1987)

History-Writing and Education in Late Antique and Early Medieval Iberia Victoria Leonard and Jamie Wood Historiae gentium non inpediunt legentibus in his quae utilia dixerunt. Multi enim sapientes praeterita hominum gesta ad institutionem praesentium historiis indiderunt, siquidem et per historiam summa retro temporum annorumque supputatio conprehenditur, et per consulum regumque successum multa necessaria perscrutantur. (Histories of peoples are no impediment to those who wish to read useful works, for many wise people have imparted the past deeds of humankind in histories for the instruction of the living. Through history they handle a final reckoning back through seasons and years, and they investigate many indispensable matters through the succession of consuls and kings.)1

As so often in his works, Isidore of Seville, writing in the 620s, draws our attention in this passage from the Etymologiae to a tradition that stretched far back 1

Isidore, Etymologiae, ed. by Lindsay, i.43 (this edition does not include page numbers); Engl. trans. by Barney and others, Etymologies, p. 67. Victoria Leonard is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Late Ancient History, as part of the ERCfunded project ‘Connected Clerics. Building a Universal Church in the Late Antique West (380–604 ce)’, at Royal Holloway, University London and the Austrian Centre for Digital Humanities (ACDH-ÖAW), Austrian Academy of Sciences (Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften). She is a Research Associate at the Institute of Classical Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London, and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Jamie Wood is an Associate Professor of History in the School of History and Heritage at the University of Lincoln. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 237–267 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118567

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into antiquity: historical writing was an appropriate medium for instruction.2 This was a common feature of both Christian and non-Christian historical writing in Late Antiquity.3 Christian complaints about having to learn the histories and fables of the pagans also indicate the widespread use of historical writings — and texts about past events and people more generally — in education. 4 Research into education in late antique Iberia and elsewhere has traditionally focused on the extent to which classical schools and other means of formal education survived the end of the Roman Empire.5 In this context, emphasis is often placed on the survival of ‘classical learning’ and Latin or Greek as an index of post-Roman continuity or decline. More recent research has sought to take a less Romano-centric and value-laden view of the early Middle Ages and to understand the educational practices of the late and post-Roman period on their own terms, rather than as degraded versions of an earlier system.6 This chapter argues that history played a key role in the educational imagination of the writers of Visigothic Iberia in the seventh century and that historians of the period aimed to achieve educational objectives when writing history. We must consider the educational writings of the Visigothic kingdom as ‘imaginative’ because they are largely normative in nature, meaning that they lay down rules and guidelines for what should happen. We lack a rich body of narrative material that can help to confirm whether or not the many rules that were inscribed by bishops, church councils, and kings were ever enacted successfully, or whether they reflect little more than the desires of a disconnected elite.7 In this chapter ‘education’ is conceived broadly to incorporate learning or developmental activities that take place in homes, schools, workplaces, or other social situations. Education encompasses edification, moral instruction, and guidance, as well as teaching in formal situations such as the schoolroom. Education plays a pivotal role in identity formation; it is one of the primary means by which individuals come to understand their place in the world, con2

Grant, Greek and Roman Historians, pp.  85–87, and Rohrbacher, Historians of Late Antiquity, p. 151. 3 Hays, ‘Tales out of School’, pp. 23, 25, 32. 4 E.g. Augustine, Confessiones, ed. by O’Donnell, i.13.22, p. 11. 5 Valverde Castro, Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder, p. 186; Riché, ‘Les écoles, l’eglise et l’etat’, pp. 35–36; Thompson, Literacy of the Laity, pp. 3–4, 17–18; Albert, ‘De fide catholica contra Judaeos’, p. 309; Collins, ‘Literacy and the Laity’, pp. 115–19. 6 E.g. Cribiore, Gymnastics of the Mind; Chin, Grammar and Christianity in the Late Roman World; Ruys, Ward, and Heyworth, eds, The Classics in the Medieval and Renaissance Classroom. 7 On the sources for Visigothic Iberia, see Collins, Visigothic Spain, pp. 1–3.

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struct their identities as subjects, and relate to the broader community (or communities) to which they belong. Educational experiences can also play important roles in establishing an individual’s sense of opposition to those groups to which they do not belong. In the past, as in the present day, history has often played a central role in the efforts of elites to inculcate particular identities and dispositions in their subjects and often this has been accomplished through the school system.8 There are two elements to the argument proposed in this chapter. First, the bishops that laid down rules for the education of clergy, monks, and others in the Visigothic kingdom thought that history could play an important role in the development of professional and confessional identities, as priests, monks, or the ‘right kind’ of Christian. Second, the historians of Visigothic Iberia, presumably because they had learned to value history and because the histories that they had read were intended to serve educational purposes, adopted tactics in their writing that were designed to aid learning. In addition, the histories of Isidore of Seville and others were designed to communicate and inculcate very specific messages about historical and contemporary identities. Educational writers sought to construct contemporary identity through reference to history at the same time as historians, who belonged to the same highly-educated elite group, used educational approaches to put across similar messages about past identities. History and education were thus, in theory and in practice, mutually reinforcing in Visigothic Iberia. This chapter begins with an examination of the educational features of Paulus Orosius’s Historiae adversus paganos. Orosius was a Christian presbyter from the Iberian Peninsula writing in the early fifth century, predominantly in North Africa.9 At the request of Augustine, he composed an apologetic Christian history in seven books.10 The enormous impact of Orosius’s work on the historiography of later centuries is of direct relevance to understanding the development of history-writing in Visigothic Iberia in the sixth and seventh centuries.11 The 8 For the use of history to promote particular identity models in modern nation states, see Anderson, Imagined Communities; Smith, The Nation in History. 9 For further details of Orosius’s biography, see Orosius, Seven Books of History, trans. by Fear, pp. 1–7; Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, i, pp. xv–xx; Leonard, ‘The Origin of Zealous Intolerance’, pp. 261–71; Vilella, ‘Biografía crítica de Orosio’. 10 Orosius suggests that the work was commissioned by Augustine in the preface to the Historiae. Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, i.1.1–3 and 8–12, pp. 6–8. 11 For the influence of the Historiae in Spain see: Hillgarth, ‘The “Historiae” of Orosius in the Early Middle Ages’. For Orosius’s later impact more generally, see Mommsen, ‘Orosius and Augustine’, p. 348: ‘we find that most medieval universal histories set forth ideas and judgments and reflect a philosophy of history […] which rightly could be called Orosian’.

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Historiae therefore serves as a crucial reference point from which we can chart the later relationship between history and education.12 The next section examines the influence of Orosius’s work and that of other late antique historians and theologians in late sixth- and seventh-century Iberia. Finally, this chapter explores the intersection of history and education in texts that were produced in Visigothic Spain. Monastic rules and instructional manuals for the clergy are particularly useful here because they often promote history as a key element of pedagogic practice. It is also likely that certain technical and stylistic elements of historical writings were deployed with educational objectives in mind. Here we focus on the works of Isidore of Seville, usually considered as the kingdom’s most important bishop in the early seventh century.

Orosius and the Moral Value of History-Writing Orosius’s Historiae has been much maligned by historians. J.  B. Bury condemned the text as the first and worst attempt at a universal history, while John Matthews described the author as an ‘embarrassment to the profession’ of history.13 But the recent resurgence of Orosian studies indicates a timely and refreshing shift in critical direction.14 The Historiae has not traditionally been valued as an educational text, but in recognizing the forceful polemical nature of the work this chapter demonstrates that the text was underpinned by a desire to influence the religious identity of its audience, which some modern scholars have assumed were Roman and Italian refugees arriving in Sicily and North Africa after having fled Alaric’s invading Goths.15 Peter Van Nuffelen 12 See Lozovsky, ‘The Uses of Classical History’, pp. 78–82, for her argument that a manuscript of Orosius’s Historiae, St Gall, Stiftsbibliothek, MS 621 produced at St Gall in the late ninth century and with glosses dating from the late ninth to the eleventh centuries, was used as an educational tool. 13 Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire, i, 306; Matthews, The Roman Empire of Ammianus, p. 6. 14 See Orosius, Seven Books of History, trans. by Fear; Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History; Deen Schildgen, Divine Providence; Brandt, ‘Historia magistra vitae’; Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 35–99; Formisano, ‘Grand Finale’; and Ward, ‘All Roads Lead to Rome?’. 15 Pocock, Barbarism and Religion, iii, 79; Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, p. 16. Although the topic has been subject to scholarly debate, no consensus has been reached on the issue of the audience of the Historiae. Various critical voices have concluded the readership to be pagan (Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, p. 40; Mommsen, ‘Orosius and Augustine’, p. 336), wavering between Christianity and paganism (Van Nuffelen,

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has argued that Orosius was the product of a traditional classical education, citing as evidence the writer’s allusions to Virgil, his engagement with classical exempla, and the exploitation of historical literature used by students in rhetorical schools.16 However, as much as the Historiae was determined by the education that Orosius is conventionally thought to have received, it also reacts against that tradition.17 Orosius contests the idealized image of the GraecoRoman past specifically through literature and education, directing his challenge towards pagan writers who manipulated history into a version of the past that glorified warfare, violence, and empire-building. Orosius holds these writers directly responsible for falsifying the past, or at least not telling the whole story. He targets texts that would have had the most cultural currency with his readership, having been studied as part of an ancient education. In composing the Historiae, Orosius followed a moral imperative to reveal the true reality of the past as miserable and the present as much improved, exposing the deceptive presentation of history by earlier pagan authors.18 Orosius therefore uses his learning to subvert what he perceives as the morally dubious ideology that underpinned the educational and cultural system of the Roman Empire. Through the intervention of divine providence, the political entity of empire is sanctified and history is Christianized, enabling the promotion of a model of Christian identity firmly within the traditions of a classical past, but in a version not recognizable as conventional classical history. The Orosian attitude towards the pagan misrepresentation of the past is most starkly demonstrated by the overtly critical summary of Homer’s Iliad in book i: At uero ante Vrbem conditam CCCCXXX anno raptus Helenae, coniuratio Graecorum et concursus mille nauium, dehinc decennis obsidio ac postremo famosum Troiae excidium praedicatur. In quo bello per decem annos cruentissime gesto quas Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, pp. 17–18), both Christian and pagan (Kempshall, Rhetoric and the Writing of History, 400–1500, p. 71), and Christian but having to live in a pagan society (Lacroix, Orose et ses idées, p. 48). 16 Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, esp. pp. 11, 41–44. See Hays, ‘Tales out of School’, pp. 30, 33, for the point that educational experiences are often reproduced in writings. 17 Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, p. 41, understands Augustine’s description of Orosius as ‘paratus eloquio’ in Epistula 166 to Jerome as an indication of Orosius’s formal rhetorical training. Augustine, Epistula 166 ad Hieronymum, ed. by Goldbacher, ii.5, p. 547. 18 Deen Schildgen, Divine Providence, p. 72 understands the function of the Historiae in educational and moralistic terms: ‘Orosius […] reads the Bible, particularly Daniel and the histories, as well as his other authorities literally, making history a source of lessons, for, he argues, it provides education about what causes human misery’.

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nationes quantosque populos idem turbo inuoluerit atque adflixerit, Homeros poeta in primus clarus luculentissimo carmine palam fecit, nec per ordinem nunc retexere nostrum est quia et operi longum et omnibus notum uidetur. Verumtamen qui diuturnitatem illius obsidionis, euersionis atrocitatem caedem captiuitatemque didicerunt, uideant si recte isto qualiscumque est praesentis temporis statu offenduntur. (However, four hundred and thirty years before the founding of the City, there took place the rape of Helen, the conspiracy of the Greeks, and the assembling of a thousand ships, then the ten years’ siege, and finally the famous destruction of Troy. The pre-eminent poet Homer has made clear in his brilliant poem the nations and peoples this storm swept up and destroyed in that most bloody of wars, lasting ten years. It is not our task now to set out these events in order, as this is a long task and the story is commonly known. But those who have learnt of the length of that siege, and the massacre, atrocities, and enslavement that occurred with the fall of Troy, should see if they are justified in their anger at the present times.)19

The destruction of Troy is approached chronologically as another historical detail, facilitating the more critical representation of events rather than perpetuating the traditional understanding of the Iliad embodying ideals of glory and fame achieved through martial violence. The glorious or brilliant song (‘luculentissimo carmine’) of Homer is perceived in wholly negative terms, as describing a cruel war that lasted for ten years before Troy was finally destroyed. Orosius considers the nations involved and the number of peoples ‘this storm swept up and destroyed’ (‘quas nationes quantosque populos idem turbo inuoluerit atque adflixerit’). Once the reader has realized the Orosian perspective on the epic, which emphasizes the horror of the length of the siege and the atrocious slaughter and bondage entailed, they should consider the condition of the present times and understand which is worse. The purpose of Orosius’s diatribe against the texts of antiquity is revealed: to disprove the accusations against Christianity motivated by the sack of Rome, that the present is much worse than the past, and that the Christian religion is to blame. Orosius treats Virgil’s account of Aeneas’s arrival in Italy similarly, not as a foundation myth for the glorious beginnings of the Roman Empire, but as a further example of how past events have been distorted by their retelling in pagan texts: Paucis praeterea annis interuenientibus, Aeneae Troia profugi aduentus in Italiam quae arma commouerit, qualia per triennium bella exciuerit, quantos populis inplicuerit odio excidioque adflixerit. 19

Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed.  by Arnaud-Lindet, i.17.1–3, i, 67–68; own translation.

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(Furthermore, in the few intervening years, came Aeneas’ arrival in Italy from Troy as a fugitive, the strifes he aroused, the wars he stirred up over a period of three years, the many peoples he involved in hatred and afflicted with destruction.)20

Aeneas is represented not as a celebrated hero but as a fugitive, an exile from Troy, who brought conflict, war, and death to Italy. Kempshall has observed that Orosius exploits Virgil’s Aeneid as an opportunity for an extended meditation on the importance of the passing of time for an understanding of the significance of the present.21 The choice of authors and texts as a target for criticism is explained by their familiarity to Orosius’s reader: Virgil’s narrative is burned (inurere) into the mind, and Homer’s epic ‘omnibus notum uidetur’ (seems known to all).22 It has been argued that by the beginning of the second century ad the system of formal education in the Mediterranean world was fixed within fairly well-defined limits, and the authors that were to be studied had hardened into a standardized list, topped by Homer in Greek and Virgil in Latin.23 Augustine discusses his literary training in Greek and Latin through the texts of Virgil and Homer, as does Paulinus of Pella, who was born around ad 375.24 Van Nuffelen understands that Virgil ‘was the shared cultural baggage of 20

Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.18.1, i, 68; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 38. 21 Kempshall, Rhetoric and the Writing of History, 400–1500, p. 77. 22 Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.18.1, i, 68: ‘inurere’. Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.17.2, i, 67: ‘omnibus notum uidetur’; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 38. 23 That Homer and Virgil were essential reading for a student in the ancient world is confirmed by Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, trans. by Butler, i.8.4–6, i, 148–49. Farrell, ‘Roman Homer’, p. 266: ‘From what we know of Roman schools, Homer offered a central place in the curriculum’. Marrou, A History of Education in Antiquity, p. 278: ‘First and foremost, of course, came Virgil, the Latin Homer, the poet par excellence, study of whom must be the benefit of any liberal culture’. See also Bonner, Education in Ancient Rome, pp. 212–13; Cameron, The Last Pagans, pp. 567–68; Clark, ‘City of God(s)’, pp. 84–85; Joyal, McDougall, and Yardley, Greek and Roman Education, p. 231; Van Nuffelen, ‘On Moral Ends’, p. 131: ‘Given his paramount place in contemporary education, Vergil was the most common intertext in late ancient Latin literature’. 24 Augustine, Confessiones, ed.  by O’Donnell, i.13–14, pp.  10–12. Paulinus of Pella, Eucharisticon, ed. and trans. by Evelyn White, pp. 73–75: ‘dogmata Socratus et bellica plasmata Homeri | erroresque legens cognoscere cognor Ulixis; | protinus et libros etiam transire Maronis’ (I was compelled to read and learn the beliefs of Socrates and the martial fictions of Homer and the wanderings of Ulysses; and then straightaway I was compelled to traverse the books of Virgil too). For Augustine and Paulinus on their education, see Osgood, ‘The Education of Paulinus of Pella’.

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the educated elite of his [Orosius’s] age and would remain the bedrock of education for a long time in the Christian West’.25 Orosius expected his readers’ education to facilitate their participation in his intertextual deconstruction. The Historiae builds on a shared assumption of cultural familiarity, aimed not at glorifying Orosius’s text but at persuading the reader to follow his superior understanding of the past, which invested a moral quality in familiar narratives. Orosius understands that these narratives become familiar and develop a warped moral value in an educational context: ‘ludi litterarii disciplina nostrae quoque memoriae inustum est’ (all these have been imprinted in our minds by the instruction of the elementary school).26 Orosius assumes a shared educational experience between author and reader whilst simultaneously blaming schooling in the ludus litterarius for blinding the reader to the truth of history, of the inescapable horror and violence caused by Roman expansionism and hegemony.27 Throughout the work, Orosius re-evaluates the pagan perception of the past, juxtaposing his overwhelming sense of horror and grief at misfortune, slaughter, and death, with the frivolous fiction of fabula: Ecce paruissima pagina uerbisque paucissimus quantos de tot prouinciis populis atque urbibus non magis explicui actus operum quam inplicui globos miseriarum: ‘quis enim cladem illius’ temporis, ‘quis fando funera explicet aut aequare lacrimis possit dolores’? Verumtamen haec ipsa, quia multo interiectu saeculorum exoleuerunt, facta sunt nobis exercitia ingeniorum et oblectamenta fabularum; quamquam si quis intentius adhibeat animum sesque toto mentis adfectu ipsis paene causis bellisque permisceat ac rurus uelut in arce spectaculi constitutus utrumque in suis qualitatibus tempus permetiatur, facile dixerim eum iudicaturum neque illa nisi irato atque auersato Deo posse tam infeliciter perturbari ac permisceri, neque ista sic nisi propitio et miserante conponi. (Behold, how many actions involving so many provinces, peoples, and cities I have set forth […] how I have involved masses of misfortunes. For who will unfold the slaughter of that time, who the deaths in words, or who can equal the grief with tears? Yet these very misfortunes, because they have grown dim by the passing of many centuries, have become exercises for our talents and delightful topics for stories. And yet if anyone applies himself completely with the entire force of his mind to wars and their causes, and furthermore, as if placed in a watchtower, measures 25

Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, p. 42. Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.18.1, i, 68; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 38. 27 A ludus litterarius was a school or grammar school where a teacher would train children in early literacy and perhaps numeracy. See Bloomer, The School of Rome, p. 15. 26

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both ages as to their conditions, I would easily say that he would judge that these affairs could not be so unfortunately confused and mixed up except by a God angry and estranged, and that present times cannot be composed without a gracious and merciful God.)28

Orosius argues that the pagan comprehension of history is flawed; the ‘masses of misfortunes’ are not understood according to their true emotional value but have instead ‘grown dim by the passing of many centuries’, assuming a warped moral sense. Instead of causing shock and distress, the slaughters of the past provide ‘exercitia ingeniorum’ (exercises for our talents), presumably within an educational context, and ‘oblectamenta fabularum’ (delightful topics for stories). The Orosian polemic argues against the pagan division of history into fabula or exempla, moralizing tales or illustrative stories; instead the misery and horror of the past should provoke tears, shuddering and grief, as dramatically demonstrated by the narrator.29 Orosius appeals to the reader through logic and reason, exhorting them to pay close attention to conflict and its causes, and to compare the conditions of the past and the present (‘qualitatibus tempus permetiatur’) as if from a watchtower (‘arce’). Orosius can with ease expect the reader to conclude that the troubles and confusion of the past were caused by the anger and hostility of God (‘irato atque auersato’), and that the composition of the present is due to God’s kindness and mercy (‘propitio et miserante’). Orosius exhorts the reader to revalue the past in an ethical sense, reconfiguring the meaning of history. The appropriate emotional reaction of grief and tears is exemplified by the narrative voice, and his outline of the disorder of the past and harmony of the present deliberately leads the reader to conclude that the state of both ages is preordained by divine providence.30 Orosius persistently works hard to denigrate pagan educational texts like Homer and Virgil, demonstrating to his reader the distorted and damaging version of the past they present. This is part of a wider campaign against pagan 28

Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet ii.18.4–6, i, 124; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 74. 29 Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet iii.10.1, i, 150: ‘At uero paruo exim tempore interiecto horresco referre quod gestum est’. Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 90: ‘But I truly shudder to relate what took place a short time after this’. There are various points in the text where the emotional narrative voice interjects, for example iii.20.5. For a discussion of exempla see Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, pp. 63–92. 30 The rhetorical art of emotional appeal is discussed by Quintilian in book vi of his Institutio oratoria. See Kennedy, Quintilian; Katula, ‘Quintilian on the Art of Emotional Appeal’, pp. 5–15.

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authors, by which gentiles historici are shown to be blind and false, and the knowledge they propagate to be based on lies: sed de uarietate discordiantium historicorum aliquanta iam diximus; quorum sufficiat detecta haec et male nota mendaciorum nota, quia parum credendum esse in ceteris euidenter ostendunt qui in his quoque, quae ipsi uidere diuersi sunt (but we have already spoken somewhat about the different opinions of disagreeing historians, and let it suffice that these have been detected and that what is falsely known is the knowledge of lies, because they clearly show that they must receive little credence on other matters, who, in those things which they themselves have seen, are contrary).31

But within the polarized presentation of earlier pagan writers as deceitful and the Historiae as a text to be trusted, Orosius simultaneously exploits pagan writing, particularly Virgil, through frequent allusion. Virgil appears in the emotive narrative of the Gallic sack of Rome in 390 bc, bolstering Orosius’s account with imagery to evoke the horror and trauma of the invasion (ii.19.10–12). Orosius quotes directly from the Aeneid in book vi, describing Virgil simply as ‘poeta’ (the poet), in refutation of pagan complaints that the prohibition of holy rites, ceremonies, and divination prevents the prediction of future catastrophes.32 The function of these allusions is simultaneously to denigrate paganism and to generate meaning, increasing the significance of Orosius’s polemic with reference to the very literature he is disputing. Orosius’s habit of allusion reveals the assumption that his reader is capable of understanding these intertextual references, with little reliance on available Christian models such as Scripture or Augustine’s De civitate Dei, despite the signposting of the latter text at the opening of the Historiae.33 Orosius mentions in the prologue that the 31 Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, i.3.6, i, 43: ‘gentiles historici’. Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, v.3.4, ii, 88; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 178. 32 Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, vi.15.13, ii, 207; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 260. 33

This is in contrast to the contemporary Historia sacra of Sulpicius Severus which reconstructs events from the Old Testament into a Christian history, as the prologue to the work makes clear: ‘Res a mundi exordio sacris litteris editas breuiter constringere et cum distinctione temporum usque ad nostram memoriam carpitam dicere aggressus sum.’ (I address myself to give a condensed account of those things which are set forth in the sacred Scriptures from the beginning of the world and to tell of them, with distinction of dates and according to their importance, down to period within our own remembrance.) Sulpicius Severus, Historia sacra, ed. by Halm, i.1, p. 3; Engl. trans. by Roberts, ‘The Sacred History of Sulpicius Severus’, p. 71.

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rays of the first ten books of Augustine’s great work have risen high and shone over the whole world, and yet Orosius chooses not to use the text to endorse his argument.34 Instead he contests the attacks of pagans on Christianity with their own weapons, peppering his Christian history with a diversity of pagan writing, relying almost exclusively on the argument of interference by divine providence to make pagan history Christian.

The Historiae as an Educational Text Despite the intertextuality evident in the Historiae, the text implicitly presents itself as an alternative model for knowing and learning, replacing previous pagan literature that was, from the Orosian perspective, fundamentally flawed. Before beginning the geographical excursus with which the text opens, Orosius hints at the purpose of the text: it is to be useful, so that any reader who is interested can understand the neatly categorized world he presents and the contextualized historical narrative: Necessarium reor ut primum ipsum terrarum orbem quem inhabitat humanum genus sicut est a maioribus trifarium distributum, deinde regionibus prouinciisque determinatum, expediam; quo facilius, cum locales bellorum morborumque clades ostentabuntur, studiosi quique non solum rerum ac temporum sed etiam locorum scientiam consequantur. (I shall describe the world itself which the human race inhabits, as it was divided by our ancestors into three parts and then established by regions and provinces, in order that when the locale of wars and the ravages of diseases are described, all interested may more easily obtain knowledge not only of the events of their time, but also of their location.)35

The construction of the text is in some aspects comparable to that of a breviarium or epitome. With the exception of the apologetical passages, the work Van Andel, The Christian Concept of History in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus, pp. 7, 12, sees the Historia sacra as partly an epitome of the Old Testament, and that the Old Testament interested Severus more than any other work. For similar observations see Williams, ‘The Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus’, p. 284, and Trompf, Early Christian Historiography, p. 284. 34 The narrative voice addresses Augustine in the second person at various points, either to limit the scope of the work in reaction to Augustine’s own writings (Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, iii.4.6, i, 145), or to exceed them (Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, vi.1.12, ii, 164). 35 Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.1.15–17, i, 12; Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 7.

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is designed to convey information about events but with a limiting style that does not allow for any discussion of causation.36 This conforms to Benoît Lacroix’s interpretation of the text, that Orosius followed the examples of Florus, Eutropius, and Justin’s epitome of Pompeius Trogus, in producing not simply apologetic or history but a text with a wider purpose to inform, and composed what was essentially a rewriting of secular and political history from a Christian perspective in competition with earlier breviarii.37 The purpose of the Historiae extends beyond usefulness; an illuminating passage reveals that the author expected the text to engage its audience in the transaction of belief, converting the faithless reader to the Orosian, deeply Christian, world view: Sed haec quoniam, etsi uerissime fortissimeque dicuntur, fidelem tamen atque oboedientem requirunt, mihi autem, uidero an aliquando credituris, certe nunc cum incredulis actio est, promptius ea proferam quae ipsi etsi probare noluerint, inprobare non possint. (But since, although these arguments are presented very truthfully and strongly, they nevertheless require a faithful and obedient listener; moreover, my present audience [I shall see whether or not they will believe at some time] certainly at present does not believe, and I shall now bring forward rather quickly arguments which they themselves, although they are unwilling to approve them, cannot disapprove.)38

The issue of the envisioned reader is particularly complex and potentially intractable, and beyond the scope of this chapter.39 However, at various points the text gives conflicting indications as to who the audience was expected to be, and the rhetorical juxtaposition of pagan and Christian that pervades 36 For Orosius’s Historiae as epitome, see Momigliano, Terzo contributo alla storia degli studi classici e del mondo antico, i, 95–97. 37 Lacroix, Orose et ses idées, p. 39: ‘C’est ainsi que peu à peu l’Historia adversus Paganos remplace et supplante bientôt les textes traditionnels, les Histoires de Trogue Pompée, de Justin, de Florus et même d’Eutrope. Orose devient l’historien chrétien officiel des temps païens et chrétiens d’autrefois, l’écrivain rapide à la portée de tous les talents, l’autorité qui a le mieux résumé toute l’histoire de l’humanité depuis Adam jusqu’en 416, soit plus de cinq mille ans d’histoire. Toutes les vielles cultures ont eu leurs digestes. Reste à savoir, maintenant, si l’Historia adversus Paganos a été pire que les autres’. 38 Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet vii.1.5, iii, 15; Engl. trans by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 284. See Van Nuffelen, Orosius and the Rhetoric of History, p. 42: ‘the Historiae are a work that clearly wishes to engage its audience (not to say convert it) and repeatedly and explicitly addresses it’. 39 This issue has been briefly touched upon above (pp. 240–41).

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the Historiae is unhelpful when considering this issue. This is recognized in a broader context by Averil Cameron: What may seem now to be distinct and separate sets of issues — Christianity versus Judaism, Christianity in relation to polytheism, and true as opposed to ‘false’ belief within Christianity — were close together in the minds of early Christians and approached in very similar ways. Naturally the edges became blurred.40

Although an absolute division between Christians and pagans echoes Orosius’s apologetic discourse, it misses (potentially deliberately) the more fluid religious boundaries of the late fourth and early fifth centuries, where lax Christians, recent converts to Christianity, those pagans prepared to convert, those operating under the pretence of Christian conversion, the unbaptized, those considered to be heterodox, and those Christians still practising pagan traditions and rituals, could all be considered target audiences for the Historiae.41 But what is evident is that the Historiae presents a tendentious version of history in reconsidering the past through the lens of Christianity, and that, at least according to the text itself, the purpose of the Historiae was proselytizing. History, or rather a Christian reconsideration of history combined with a relentless apologetic, was the educational tool for initiating or fortifying that conversion.42 Every his40

Cameron, ‘Jews and Heretics’, p. 350.

41

The diversity of belief in the early fifth century is indicated by Orosius’s reference to ‘false’ Christians, Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.8.14, i, 52: ‘Quamobrem non est mirandum, si nunc quoque aliqui reperiuntur, qui cum “a ceruicibus suis inpedentem gladium” praetento Christiano nomine auerterint, ipsum nomen Christi, quo solo salui sunt, aut dissimulent aut infament grauarique se eorum temporibus adserant, quorum meritis liberantur’. (Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, pp. 27–28: ‘Therefore, it is not surprising if now also some are found who, when they would remove the sword hanging over their necks by pretending to be Christians, either conceal the very name of Christ by which alone they are saved, or make accusations against Him and assert that they are oppressed in the time of those through whose merits they are liberated’). 42

Despite the rhetorical style of the Historiae which constantly directs its invective against an opponent or ‘detractor’, the identity of the reader or intended audience of the work is opaque. Orosius makes only one clear statement on the reader of the text: ‘Sed haec quoniam, etsi uerissime fortissimeque dicuntur, fidelem tamen atque oboedientem requirunt, mihi autem, uidero an aliquando credituris, certe nunc cum incredulis actio est, promptius ea proferam quae ipsi etsi probare noluerint, inprobare non possint’. Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet vii.1.5, iii, 15 (Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 284: ‘But since, although these arguments are presented very truthfully and strongly, they nevertheless require a faithful and obedient listener; moreover, my present audience [I shall see whether or not they will believe at some time] certainly at present does not believe, and I

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torical detail, where possible, is manipulated to demonstrate that divine providence is active within all of time and space, not simply in the more recent past following the birth of Christ, as might be expected from a Christian author. The result, a Christian work immersed in secular history, was unique for its time and had a considerable influence in later centuries.43 Although later writers built on Orosius’s work by extending and excerpting the Historiae, Orosius’s contribution was never surpassed; the text arguably became the main instrument for the transmission of history from antiquity in a Christianized form throughout the Middle Ages and into the early modern period.

History and Education in Texts Circulating in Visigothic Spain The preceding section has demonstrated that history was deeply integrated into the educational system that produced Orosius and found reflection in the style and contents of his Historiae. He encouraged his readers to develop a very specific perspective on the past and present that privileged a Christian world view over one that followed classical examples. Orosius’s historical model was particularly well-received by the writers of Visigothic Iberia. In the early seventh century Isidore of Seville included Orosius in the Versus, a short poem on the contents of the library at Seville, and made extensive use of him in both the Historia Gothorum and the Etymologiae.44 Later in the seventh century writers such as Braulio of Saragossa and Julian of Toledo used Orosius as a source, modelled their histories on the Historiae, and praised his work.45 The Orosian perspective on history found a ready audience among the Visigothic elite. The following section demonstrates that other late antique texts that stressed the integration of history and education were circulating in Visigothic shall now bring forward rather quickly arguments which they themselves, although they are unwilling to approve them, cannot disapprove’). Orosius expects to have a current reader, one that is defined by faith; it is unambiguous that they currently ‘do not believe’, that they are not Christian, but that Orosius hopes to induce them to Christian belief and to abandon their presumed paganism. 43 The perception of the Historiae as a unique creation has been critically interpreted positively and negatively, Van Nuffelen, ‘Theology versus Genre?’, p. 164; Whitby, Review of D. Rohrbacher, The Historians of Late Antiquity, p. 389: ‘the oddball Orosius’. 44 Isidore, Versus, ed. by Sánchez Martín, 12, p. 223; Hillgarth, ‘The “Historiae” of Orosius in the Early Middle Ages’, p. 166. 45 Hillgarth, ‘The “Historiae” of Orosius in the Early Middle Ages’, pp. 166–67; Martín, ‘La biblioteca cristiana de los padres hispanovisigodos’, p. 273.

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Spain. For example, in the De doctrina Christiana, a text about education in Christian Scripture that was composed at the very end of the fourth century, Orosius’s erstwhile mentor, Augustine of Hippo, states that history, even that which had been learned outside the church, could be a useful aid to learning about Scripture.46 In De catechizandis rudibus Augustine discusses the best method for inculcating Christian learning in an audience. He advises his correspondent Deogratias, who was probably responsible for catechizing those who wished to join the Church in Carthage, about how best to perform the salvation narrative in order to engage the audience. This included thoughts on when to begin and end the narratio of salvation history, how much detail to include, and how best to address members of the audience with different educational levels. Similarly, Augustine emphasizes three areas in which historiography can prove useful in improving the knowledge and understanding of Scripture: first, the need to establish an accurate chronology; second, the value of eyewitness testimony; and third, the importance of textual criticism. For Augustine, historical knowledge was essential for understanding, interpreting, and explaining Scripture, and therefore to Christian education as a whole.47 Numerous scholars have stressed the high esteem in which Augustine was held in the Visigothic kingdom and the extensive circulation of his works in Iberia.48 Isidore’s respect for Augustine is made clear in the Etymologiae: ‘Horum tamen omnium studia Augustinus ingenio vel scientia sua vicit. Nam tanta scripsit ut diebus ac noctibus non solum scribere libros eius quisquam, sed nec legere quidem occurrat.’ (Augustine, with his intelligence and learning, overcomes the output of all these, for he wrote so much that not only could no one, working by day and night, copy his books, but no one could even read them.)49 Augustine’s influence on Isidore was considerable, including the decision to organize the later redactions of the Chronica according to the system of the six ages of the world laid down in De civitate Dei.50 46

Augustine, De doctrina Christiana, ed. by Martin, ii.42, p. 62. For Augustine’s ideas about education see Topping, St. Augustine; Press, ‘The Subject and Structure of Augustine’s De doctrina christiana’, pp. 101–07. 47 Kempshall, Rhetoric and the Writing of History, p. 93. 48 For a comprehensive list of the huge number of works of Augustine that were circulating in Visigothic Spain and the authors who made use of him see Martín, ‘La biblioteca cristiana de los padres hispanovisigodos’, pp. 260–63; see also Orlandis, Historia del reino visigodo español, pp. 359–60; Rubio ‘Presencia de San Agustín’; García Rodríguez, El Culto de los Santos, p. 342. 49 Isidore, Etymologiae, ed. by Lindsay, vi.7.3; Engl. trans. by Barney and others, Etymologies, p. 139. 50 Wood, Politics of Identity, p. 124.

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No other writer matched Augustine for density of citation or level of overall influence in Visigothic Iberia. There were, however, other channels by which the idea that history and education were mutually reinforcing was transmitted to the Visigothic intelligentsia. Cassiodorus, who wrote in sixth-century Italy, is a good illustration of this point. His Institutiones was one of the main sources for Isidore’s Etymologiae and there is a clear alignment between his and Isidore’s ideas on the moral value of Christian histories and chronicles. According to Cassiodorus, Christian historians ‘qui cum res ecclesiasticas referant, et vicissitudines accidentes per tempora diversa describant, necesse est ut sensus legentium rebus caelestibus semper erudiant’ (who when telling the history of the Church and describe changes happening through different periods, inevitably instruct the minds of the readers in heavenly matters).51 Cassiodorus also states that chronicles edify their readers.52 For Cassiodorus, as for Augustine and Orosius, history provided a powerful means of promoting Christian moral education, and his work had a significant influence on Isidore and other thinkers in seventh-century Iberia.53

The Role of History in Education in Visigothic Iberia Many of the texts of the period formerly known as the ‘Isidorian Renaissance’ of seventh-century Iberia were produced with a pedagogical purpose in mind, often for the training of the clergy so that they could better instruct the population. King Sisebut (r. 612–21), in particular, has been credited with playing a key role in supporting this drive to educate the clergy.54 The production of texts was accompanied by legislative activity at church councils, much of which was directed at improving standards within the contemporary Church.55 For exam51

Cassiodorus, Institutiones, ed.  by Mynors, i.17.1, p.  55, Engl. trans. by Halporn, Institutions, p. 149. 52 Cassiodorus, Institutiones, ed. by Mynors, i.17.2, p. 56. For Cassiodorus and Isidore see Fontaine ‘Cassiodore et Isidore’; Stettner ‘Cassiodors Enzyklopädie eine Quelle Isidors’. 53 Martín, ‘La biblioteca cristiana de los padres hispanovisigodos’, p. 266. Hillgarth, ‘The “Historiae” of Orosius in the Early Middle Ages’, p.  163: Cassiodorus mentioned Orosius too and may have played a role in his positive reception in Iberia. See Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, p. 151, for a brief discussion of Cassiodorus’s use of Orosius. 54 Hen, ‘A Visigothic King in Search of an Identity’, pp. 90–92. 55 Stocking, ‘Martianus, Aventius, and Isidore’; Stocking, Bishops, Councils and Consensus; Koon and Wood, ‘Unity from Disunity’.

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ple, the Fourth Council of Toledo legislated in 633 that bishops should ensure that their priests were able to tend to their flocks more effectively so ‘ut ad ecclesias sibi deputatas instructi succedant, ne per ignorantiam in ipsis diuinis sacramentis offendant’ (that the learned succeed to the churches assigned to them, lest through ignorance they offend the divine sacraments).56 Efforts to train the clergy and, through them, to evangelize the population of Iberia were not wholly successful, possibly because the starting level of clerical skill and popular knowledge was low. A letter by Licinianus of Cartagena, a bishop from the Byzantine-controlled area in the south, to Pope Gregory I, written towards the end of the sixth century, stated that if Licianus were to follow Gregory’s injunction not to appoint or to remove unqualified candidates to the priesthood there would be no one left to administer the sacraments.57 Another text from the second half of the sixth century but originating from the Suevic kingdom in the north-west of the Iberian Peninsula, Martin of Braga’s De correctione rusticorum was written as a letter to a fellow bishop, Polemius, with advice on how to correct the unorthodox practice and beliefs of the rural population.58 Although these examples derive from areas outside of Visigothic control, both the Byzantine and the Suevic territories had been conquered by the mid-620s and there is little doubt that the episcopal hierarchy within the Visigothic kingdom was similarly concerned about the training of the clergy and the Christianization of the country.59 History played a key role in this campaign to instruct the population. Augustine’s De catechizandis rudibus, a text which, as we have seen, acknowledged the importance of history to Christian instruction, was well known in Iberia, and strongly influenced Martin of Braga’s De correctione rusticorum, for example.60 Importantly, both of these works include historical accounts. Augustine incorporated a model catechetical address that provided a short overview of biblical history and the six ages of the world. Martin wrote in response to an inquiry from a fellow ecclesiastic, Bishop Polemius of Astorga, with advice about how to preach to the ‘rustics’ concerning idolatry. In the first chapter he notes that ‘necesse me fuit ingentem praeteritorum temporum gesto56

Fourth Council of Toledo, ed. by Martínez Díez and Rodríguez, canon 26, p. 216. Orlandis, Historia del reino visigodo español, p. 309. 58 Barlow, Iberian Fathers, pp. 10–11. 59 McKenna, Paganism and Pagan Survivals; Hillgarth, ‘Popular Religion in Visigothic Spain’; Salisbury, Iberian Popular Religion. 60 Martín, ‘La biblioteca cristiana de los padres hispanovisigodos’, p. 261. 57

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rumque silvam breviato tenuis compendii sermone contingere’ (I had to touch upon a vast forest of past times and events in a treatise of very brief compass) and he goes on to offer a very brief narrative of world history from Creation to the present day (chapters 3–9) in his attempt to persuade the rustics of the error of their ways.61 Under Augustine’s influence, history formed a central element of the resource that Martin developed for Polemius to use in his efforts to correct the rural population. Engaging with the Christian past — through Scripture, Christian histories, and chronicles — was a fundamental part of the ideal Christian education and a primary means by which Christians developed their knowledge about history.62 This was especially true in the monasteries of Visigothic Iberia, at least as they were envisaged by the writers of monastic rules. Elite ecclesiastics such as Leander63 and Isidore of Seville and Fructuosus of Braga produced texts about monastic living which state that accounts of the past — martyr narratives, Christian biographies, and histories — should be used to instruct the faithful within a monastery. For example, the preface to Isidore’s Rule, written in the early seventh century, stresses that the text derived from the guidelines laid down by earlier writers on ascetic and monastic living: Plura sunt praecepta uel instituta maiorum qua sanctis patribus sparsim prolata reperiuntur. Quaeque etiam nonnulli altius uel obscurantis posteritati tradiderunt, ad quorum exempla haec pauca nos uobis eligere ausi sumus us sermone plebeio uel rustico quam facillime intellegatis quo ordine professionis uestrae uotum retineatis. 61 Orosius also defines pagans as rustics and the Historiae as a ‘dense forest’, see Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.12.1, i, 59: ‘At ego nunc cogor fateri me prospiciendi finis commodo de tanta malorum saeculi circumstantia praeterire plurima, cuncta breuiare. Nequaquam enim tam densam aliquando siluam praetergredi possem, nisi etiam crebris interdum saltibus subuolarem.’ (Engl. trans. by Deferrari, Seven Books of History, p. 32–33: ‘But now I am forced to confess that for the purpose of anticipating the end of my book, I am passing over many details concerning the circumstances of the numerous evils of the age and am abbreviating everything. For in no way could I have at any time passed through so dense a forest of evils unless I were able at times to hasten my progress by frequent leaps.’) See also Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet i.6.1–4, i, 47–48, for the construction of paganism more generally. For the modern discussion, see Cameron, The Last Pagans, pp. 14–33. 62 Kempshall, Rhetoric and the Writing of History, pp. 44–45, 89–90, 101, 118, 152–57, 160, 164–65, 484–85, 510–11, 546. 63 Leander actually wrote a letter of advice on ascetic living in a community to his sister that, though it cannot be considered as a monastic rule per se, shares an emphasis on the role of history in education within the community with contemporary monastic texts.

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(There are many rules or precepts of our ancestors which are found, published here and there by the holy fathers. Some of these have been handed down rather wordily or obscurely to posterity. We have ventured to select these few as examples for you and to use rustic or common language so that you might understand as easily as possible how you should keep the vow of your profession.)64

There is clearly a certain amount of self-fashioning going on here; Isidore presents himself as a plain-speaking author producing useful works for his audience.65 Nonetheless, his stated aim is to ensure that the basic tenets of the monastic life, as established in the past by the church fathers, are available and comprehensible to his readers. Chapter 8 of Isidore’s Rule makes a cognate point about the need to maximize the accessibility of the lessons read to the monks, mandating that the abbot should publicly explain any of the readings that members of the community have not understood.66 All monastic rules from Visigothic Iberia also make clear that the monks and nuns were meant to read about or otherwise receive information about the biblical past regularly. On occasion, monastic writers made the connection between learning and reflecting on history even more explicit. For example, in the De institutione virginum, written in the late sixth century, Leander of Seville advises the addressee, his sister, to ‘learn temperance and parsimony from the prayer and the examples of ancients’.67 The Regula communis, written in the province of Gallaecia in northwestern Spain in the mid-sixth century,68 encourages abbots to ‘inquire into and study the past sayings of the Fathers’ so that they can learn by and imitate their example. Such reading will also help them to develop ‘a mind full of eyes, lest they fall into some kind of heresy — heaven forbid — and perish’.69 The need for vigilance, informed by written precedent and reflection, was paramount, both individually and collectively. At about the same time as the Regula communis stated 64

Isidore, Regula, ed. by Campos Ruiz and Roca Meliá, preface, p. 90; Engl. trans. by Godfrey, ‘The Rule of Isidore’, p. 8. 65 Auerbach, Literary Language and its Public, pp. 25–82. 66 Isidore, Regula, ed. by Campos Ruiz and Roca Meliá, 8, p. 103. 67 Leander, De institutione virginum, ed. by Campos Ruiz and Roca Meliá, 13, p. 52: ‘Tu ergo temperantiam et parsimoniam, seu oraculo seu exemplis, disce, maiorum’; Engl. trans. by Barlow, ‘The Training of Nuns’, p. 208. 68 Díaz, ‘Regula communis’. 69 Regula communis, ed. by Campos Ruiz and Roca Meliá, 10, pp. 189–90: ‘retroacta sanctorum patrum per scripturas sciscitantes reuoluant, ut ab ipsis facere debeant agnoscant, et intus ac foris ante et retro plenam mentem oculis habeant. Ne quod absit in aliquam haeresem deuoluantur et pereant’; Engl. trans. by Barlow, ‘General Rule for Monasteries’, p. 192.

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that monks in Gallaecia should reflect on the sayings of the fathers, collections of the sayings of Greek and Egyptian ascetics and monks were being translated into Latin, by Martin of Braga and Paschasius of Dumium.70 The stress that the monastic rules laid on learning about past examples was paralleled by the production of texts about ascetic living for the edification of monks in north-west Iberia. It was not only biblical precedent that could serve an educative function and it was not only monks who might be instructed by such examples. In the Etymologiae Isidore says that ‘the martyrs are to be honoured for the sake of imitation’, while in the Sententiae he notes that the kings can also serve as examples: Reges vitam subditorum facile exemplis suis vel aedificant, vel subvertunt, ideoque principem non oportet delinquere, ne formam peccandi faciat peccati eius inpunita licentia. Nam rex qui ruit in vitiis cito viam ostendit erroris. (Kings either improve or overturn the life of their subjects easily by their examples, and for that reason it is necessary that the leader is not found wanting, lest with the unpunished licence of his sin he establishes a pattern of sinning. For the king who runs into vices quickly reveals the way of error.)71

Elsewhere, Isidore makes the same point about bishops.72 The various redactions of Isidore’s Chronicle and the Histories are structured according to the reigns of rulers: emperors in the former, and both emperors and kings in the latter. They provide powerful examples of the good and bad actions of rulers, and their positive and negative results.73 In a letter of 649 or 650 to Taio of Saragossa, who was later to succeed him as bishop of the city, Braulio of Saragossa states that ‘You read them [= great men] constantly yourself as befits your age, you are always searching them for knowledge, and their words are, if I may use the phrase, nested in your heart’.74 Reflection on history was envis70

Barlow, Iberian Fathers, pp. 5–7, 113–15. Isidore, Sententiae, ed. by Cazier, iii.50.6, p. 302 (authors’ translation). 72 Isidore, Sententiae, ed. by Cazier, iii.47.3, p. 296 and ii.11.7, p. 116; Isidore, Etymologiae, ed. by Lindsay, i.43; Isidore, De ecclesiasticis officiis, ed. by Lawson, ii.5, pp. 56–64; Cazier, Isidore de Séville et la Naissance de l’Espagne Catholique, pp. 247–48; Mullins, The Spiritual Life According to Saint Isidore, pp. 154–57. 73 Furtado, ‘From “gens” to “imperium”’. 74 Braulio, Epistola 42 (To Taio of Saragossa), ed. by Riesco Terreno, pp. 154–62, at p. 154: ‘Quid enim aut quantulum in me est, ut imago tantorum taliumque uirorum a nobis a te expectetur, quum et eorum lectio pro etate a te habeatur uisitata et intelligentia rim.etur adsidua adque in pectore tuo, ut ita dixerim, nidauerint ipsorurn eloquia?’; Engl. trans. by Barlow, ‘Letter 42’, p. 89. 71

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aged as playing a pivotal role in the education of monks and, according to the Sententiae and other works, a broader section of the population in Visigothic Spain. Reflecting on Christian history, encompassing the Bible, the examples of the martyrs, the sayings of the fathers, and the deeds of bishops and rulers enabled learners to absorb the positive and negative examples of the past and to improve their conduct in the present and future.

Rhetoric, Style, and Technique as Pedagogic Tools in the Writings of Isidore of Seville As we saw above, late antique Christian historians such as Orosius were deeply influenced by classical rhetorical traditions. Such writers were often educated in schools that followed a traditional curriculum and this found ready expression in their writings, even when they claimed to reject the classical inheritance. There are strong indications that Isidore, even though he was writing two centuries after Orosius, was similarly influenced by the classical tradition, although probably more indirectly than Orosius, via epitomes, compilations, and earlier Christian writings.75 Historical epitomes, such as those of Eutropius and Festus, circulated in Visigothic Spain and Isidore made ready use of them when composing his various historiographical works.76 We should also recognize that Isidore and other Visigothic writers were influenced by the well-established Christian discourse of ‘sermo humilis’, a rhetorical claim — not often realized in practice — to avoid overblown rhetorical speech because of its association with classical learning.77 A good example of Isidore’s deployment of classical rhetorical techniques, as modified by the late antique Christian tradition, is in his use of the brevity trope in his writings.78 This was especially prevalent in his histories, particularly the Chronicle, a feature that was noted by his earliest biographer, Braulio of Saragossa, who described the Chronicle as being composed with ‘excessive brevity’, and by the earliest copyists of the work. Later historians have also noted the lack of narrative detail 75

For Isidore’s deep level of engagement with the classical past more generally, see the foundational study of Fontaine, Isidore de Séville et la culture classique. 76 Hillgarth, ‘Historiography in Visigothic Spain’, p. 292; Wood, Politics of Identity, pp. 115–21. 77 Cameron, Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire, pp.  111–13; Auerbach, Literary Language and its Public, pp. 25–66; Banniard, Viva voce, pp. 38–43, 67–79. 78 It is worth noting here that Orosius makes similar claims to brevity in Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos, ed. by Arnaud-Lindet, iii. praefatio, i, 134–35, and vii.43.19, iii, 131–32.

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in his Historia Gothorum.79 Isidore wrote briefly to ensure that his historical writings were useful and memorable and so that they would serve a moral purpose. Brevity allowed Isidore to make his works user-friendly in a practical and a moral sense: readers could better understand, retain, and learn his message because it was presented concisely. Other Visigothic-era historians, notably Julian of Toledo, who wrote in the second half of the seventh century, were similarly concerned about brevity as the best means for communicating with their audience.80 A number of Isidore’s other writings were written in an accessible style and with brevity and that this seems to have been inspired, at least in part, by a desire to maximize their accessibility.81 Isidore’s Etymologiae was underpinned by educational objectives and this found expression in the way in which the text was presented.82 The etymological method was well integrated into late antique school curricula and was, like brevity, understood to aid memory.83 Isidore stated that: Etymologia est origo vocabulorum, cum vis verbi vel nominis per interpretationem colligitur. […] Nam dum videris unde ortum est nomen, citius vim eius intellegis. Omnis enim rei inspectio etymologia cognita planior est. (Etymology is the origin of words, when the force [vis] of a verb or noun is inferred through interpretation. […] for when you have seen whence a word has originated, you understand its force more quickly. Indeed, one’s insight into anything is clearer when its etymology is known.)84

Brevity and etymology aided memory and helped authors and their readers to discover and understand the very essence of the issue under consideration: both aided learning.85 Andrew Merrills has recently argued that the four separate geographical sections of the Etymologiae were designed by Isidore to 79 See Wood, ‘Brevitas in the Historical Writings of Isidore of Seville’ for more on this point and references to Isidore’s use of brevity as a trope and in practice. 80 Wood, ‘Brevitas in the Historical Writings of Isidore of Seville’, pp. 47–50. 81 See Di Sciacca, Finding the Right Words, pp. 30, 33–34 for Isidore’s Synonyma and Allies, ‘The Sermo plebeius’ for the Regula. 82 Martín, ‘La langue de la Chronique universelle d’Isidore de Séville’. 83 Hays, ‘Tales out of School’, p. 26; Carruthers, The Craft of Thought, p. 157. 84 Isidore, Etymologiae, ed. by Lindsay, i.29; Engl. trans. by Barney and others, Etymologies, pp. 54–55. 85 Wood, Politics of Identity, p. 106. For encyclopaedic knowledge as an aid to learning in the later Middle Ages see: Franklin-Brown, Reading the World, pp. 254 and 257–58.

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serve a mnemonic purpose. According to Merrills, Isidore’s etymologizing and pseudo-etymologizing represented the kinds of wordplay and puns that ancient and medieval theorists judged would facilitate memory.86 References to colours, to violent and vivid imagery, and the inclusion of unusual and seemingly anachronistic details were all designed to aid memorization. The geographical sections therefore functioned as detailed lists that lent themselves readily to memory, while their repetitive content and structure was also conducive to the organization and memorization of information.87 The geographical sections identified by Merrills are also historical in design, because etymology is historical in its efforts to trace the origins of words and their development over time. These sections are also historical in content; they contain historical information in order to explain the etymological origins of geographical terminology. As a historically oriented discourse, etymology moves from the present word to its past origins, while history moves from the past towards the present. Isidore deployed both history and etymology in order to explain relationships between past and present phenomena and to facilitate memorization and learning by his audience.88 Therefore, if Merrills is right and the geographical sections are meant to function as learning aids, these parts of the text also configure the historical information within them mnemonically. Isidore’s vision of the educative purpose of history was in line with late antique traditions, both Christian and non-Christian. He deployed a number of rhetorical tactics in order to teach moral messages through history. His chronicles, narrative histories, and grammatical writings were written with brevity, in accessible language, and often included explanations of the origins of words. Brevity and etymology were used to organize texts in order to aid memory and learning and to better put across moral messages about the past and the present. They were designed not only to enable the reader — and presumably the listener, too, in cases when the material was delivered orally — to access the core of whatever was being discussed at the time they were reading or listening, but also to remember and to reproduce such information later on. The use of mnemonic devices and other literary tactics to promote learning suggest that, as his normative writings on the topic would suggest, educational goals underpinned Isidore’s historical compositions and, under his influence, those of later writers in Visigothic Iberia. 86 87 88

Merrills, ‘Geography and Memory’, pp. 60–64. Merrills, ‘Geography and Memory’, pp. 58–60. Diesner, Isidor von Sevilla, pp. 84–107.

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Conclusion Theoretical writings about education from antiquity emphasize that history plays a fundamental role in the formation of individuals and communities. Although this chapter has focused primarily on Orosius and Isidore, it is clear that the tendency for education and history to reinforce one another extends to other historical works and to writings about the role of history in education across Iberian Late Antiquity. Iberian historians engaged with texts — Christian and non-Christian, historical and non-historical — that stressed the moral and educational potential of history. Normative texts provide strong evidence that history was imagined to play an integral role in the formation of individuals within institutions such as monasteries. For example, monastic rules from sixth- and seventh-century Iberia stress the importance of reflecting on examples taken from the past for learning about present conduct as an ascetic living within a community. Like Orosius, whose history was a clear manifestation of his rhetorical education, Visigothic-era writings about the past, the moral messages they promoted, and the identities they sought to construct, were at the same time enmeshed in and produced by an educational imagination in which history played a pivotal role. Education, which must necessarily be conceived broadly given the nature of the evidence for late antique Iberia, is one of the primary means by which identities are inculcated in individuals and groups, and through which the relationship between individuals and the group(s) to which they belong is negotiated. The interpenetration of history and education that this chapter has argued for thus requires further analysis in different texts and contexts.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Augustine, Epistula 166 ad Hieronymum, ed. by Alois Goldbacher, in S. Aureli Augustini Hipponiensis episcopi epistulae, iii: Ep. CXXIV–CLXXXIV A., Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum, 44 (Vienna: Tempsky, 1904), pp. 545–85 —— , De doctrina Christiana, ed. by Joseph Martin, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 32 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1962) —— , Saint Augustine: Confessions, trans. by Henry Chadwick (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991) —— , Confessiones, ed. by James J. O’Donnell, Confessions, 3 vols (Oxford: Clarendon, 1992) Braulio of Saragossa, Vita Sancti Aemiliani, ed. by Luis Váquez de Parga, Sancti Braulionis caesaraugustani episcopi: Vita S. Emiliani: edición crítica (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, 1943) —— , ‘Letter 42’, trans. by Claude W. Barlow, in Iberian Fathers, ii: Braulio of Saragossa and Fructuosus of Braga, The Fathers of the Church, 63 (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1969), pp. 88–95 —— , Epistola 42, ed.  by Luis Riesco Terreno, in Epistolario de Braulio de Zaragoza: Introducción, edición crítica y traducción (Seville: Universidad de Sevilla, 1975), pp. 154–62 —— , ‘The Life of St Aemilian the Confessor, Called the Hooded’, trans. by Andrew T. Fear, in Lives of the Visigothic Fathers, Translated Texts for Historians, 26 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1997), pp. 15–43 Cassiodorus, Institutiones, ed. by Roger A. B. Mynors, Cassiodori Senatoris Institutiones (Oxford: Clarendon, 1937) —— , Expositio psalmorum, ed. by Marc Adriaen, Cassiodorus: Expositio psalmorum, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 97–98, 2 vols (Turnhout: Brepols, 1958) —— , Institutions of Divine and Secular Learning and on the Soul, trans. by James  W. Halporn, Translated Texts for Historians, 42 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2004) Fourth Council of Toledo, ed. by Gonzalo Martínez Díez and Félix Rodríguez, in La colección canónica hispana, v: Concilios Hispanos: segunda parte (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, 1992), pp. 161–274 ‘General Rule for Monasteries’, trans by Claude W. Barlow, in Iberian Fathers, ii: Braulio of Saragossa and Fructuosus of Braga, The Fathers of the Church, 63 (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1969), pp. 176–207 Isidore of Seville, Etymologiae, ed.  by Wallace  M. Lindsay, Isidori Hispalensis episcopi Etymologiarum sive originum libri XX, 2 vols (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1911) —— , Regula, ed. by Julio Campos Ruiz and Ismael Roca Meliá, in Santos Padres Españoles, ii: San Leandro, San Isidoro, San Fructuoso: reglas monásticas de la España visigoda: los tres libros de las ‘Sentencias’, Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 321 (Madrid: La Editorial Catolica, 1971), pp. 90–125

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—— , ‘The Rule of Isidore’, trans. by A. W. Godfrey, Monastic Studies, 18 (1988), 7–29 —— , De ecclesiasticis officiis, ed.  by Christopher  M. Lawson, Sancti Isidori Episcopi Hispalensis: De ecclesiasticis officiis, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 113 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1989) —— , Sententiae, ed. by Pierre Cazier, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 111 (Turnout: Brepols, 1998) —— , trans. by Stephen  A. Barney and others, The ‘Etymologies’ of Isidore of Seville (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006) —— , Versus, ed.  by José María Sánchez Martín, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 113a (Turnhout: Brepols, 2000); Engl. trans. by Stephen A. Barney and others, The ‘Etymologies’ of Isidore of Seville (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 16–17 —— , De ecclesiasticis officiis, trans. by Thomas L. Knoebel, Ancient Christian Writers, 61 (New York: Newman, 2008) Leander of Seville, ‘The Training of Nuns and the Contempt of the World’, trans. by Claude  W. Barlow, in Iberian Fathers, i: Martin of Braga, Paschasius of Dumium, Leander of Seville, The Fathers of the Church, 62 (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1969), pp. 183–228 —— , De institutione virginum, ed. by Julio Campos Ruiz and Ismael Roca Melia, in Santos Padres Españoles, ii: San Leandro, San Isidoro, San Fructuoso: reglas monásticas de la España visigoda: los tres libros de las ‘Sentencias’, Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 321 (Madrid: La Editorial Catolica, 1971), pp. 21–76 Martin of Braga, De correctione rusticorum, ed. by Claude W. Barlow, in Martini Episcopi Bracarensis opera omnia, Papers and Monographs of the American Academy in Rome, 12 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1950), pp. 183–203 —— , ‘Reforming the Rustics’, trans. by Claude W. Barlow, in Iberian Fathers, i: Martin of Braga, Paschasius of Dumium, Leander of Seville, The Fathers of the Church, 62 (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1969), pp. 71–85 Orosius, The Seven Books of History against the Pagans, trans. by Roy  J. Deferrari, The Fathers of the Church, 50 (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1964) —— , Historiae adversus paganos, ed.  by Marie-Pierre Arnaud-Lindet, Orose: Histoires (Contre les Païens), 3 vols (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1990) —— , Seven Books of History against the Pagans, trans. by Andrew T. Fear, Translated Texts for Historians, 54 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010) Paulinus of Pella, Eucharisticon, ed. and trans. by Hugh  G. Evelyn White, in Ausonius, ii: Books 18–20: Paulinus Pellaeus, Eucharisticus, The Loeb Classical Library, 115 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1921), pp. 293–352 Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, ed. and trans. by Harold  E. Butler, The ‘Institutio oratoria’ of Quintilian, The Loeb Classical Library, 124–26, 4 vols (London: Heinemann, 1920–22) Regula communis, ed.  by Julio Campos Ruiz and Ismael Roca Meliá, in Santos Padres Españoles, ii: San Leandro, San Isidoro, San Fructuoso: reglas monásticas de la España

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visigoda:los tres libros de las ‘Sentencias’, Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 321 (Madrid: La Editorial Catolica, 1971), pp. 172–211 Sulpicius Severus, Historia sacra (Chronica), ed. by Karl Halm, in Sulpicii Severi libri qui supersunt, Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum, 1 (Vienna: C.  Geroldi Filium Bibliopolam Academiae, 1866), pp. 3–105 —— , ‘The Sacred History of Sulpicius Severus’, trans. by Alexander Roberts, in A Select Library of Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, xi: Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1995), pp. 71–126

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Hays, Gregory, ‘Tales out of School: Grammatical Culture in Fulgentius the Mythographer’, in Latin Grammar and Rhetoric: From Classical Theory to Medieval Practice, ed.  by Carol Dana Lanham (London: Continuum, 2002), pp. 22–47 Hen, Yitzhak, ‘A Visigothic King in Search of an Identity – Sisebutus Gothorum gloriossisimus princeps’, in Ego Trouble: Authors and their Identities in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Richard Corradini and others, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 15 (Vienna: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2010), pp. 89–99 Hillgarth, Jocelyn  N., ‘Historiography in Visigothic Spain’, Settimane di Studio, 17 (1970), 261–311 —— , ‘Popular Religion in Visigothic Spain’, in Visigothic Spain: New Approaches, ed. by Edward James (Oxford: Clarendon, 1980), pp. 3–60 —— , ‘The “Historiae” of Orosius in the Early Middle Ages’, in De Tertullien aux Mozarabes: mélanges offerts à Jacques Fontaine, à l’occasion de son 70e anniversaire, par ses élèves, amis et collègues, ed. by Louis Holtz and Jean-Claude Fredouille, 2 vols (Paris: Institut d’études augustiniennes, 1992), ii, 157–70 Joyal, Marl, Iain McDougall, and John Yardley, Greek and Roman Education: A Sourcebook (London: Routledge, 2009) Katula, Richard A., ‘Quintilian on the Art of Emotional Appeal’, Rhetoric Review, 22 (2003), 5–15 Kempshall, Matthew, Rhetoric and the Writing of History, 400–1500 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2011) Kennedy, George, Quintilian (New York: Twayne, 1969) Koon, Sam, and Jamie Wood, ‘Unity from Disunity: Law, Rhetoric and Power in the Visigothic Kingdom’, European Review of History, 16 (2009), 793–808 Lacroix, Benoît, Orose et ses idées (Paris: Librairie philosophique, 1965) Leonard, Victoria, ‘The Origin of Zealous Intolerance: Paulus Orosius and Violent Religious Conflict in the Early Fifth Century’, Vigiliae Christianae, 71 (2017), 261–84 Lozovsky, Natalia, ‘The Uses of Classical History and Geography in Medieval St. Gall’, in Mapping Medieval Geographies, ed.  by Keith Lilley (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), pp. 65–82 Matthews, John, The Roman Empire of Ammianus (London: Duckworth, 1989) Marrou, Henri-Irénée, A History of Education in Antiquity, trans. by George Lamb (London: Sheed and Ward, 1956) Martín, José Carlos, ‘La langue de la Chronique universelle d’Isidore de Séville’, Helmántica, 56 (2005), 211–51 Martín, José Carlos, ‘La biblioteca cristiana de los padres hispanovisigodos (siglos VI– VII)’, Veleia, 30 (2013), 259–88 McKenna, Stephen, Paganism and Pagan Survivals in Spain up to the Fall of the Visigothic Kingdom (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1938) Merrills, Andrew H., History and Geography in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) —— , ‘Geography and Memory in Isidore’s Etymologies’, in Mapping Medieval Geographies: Cartography and Geographical Thought in the Latin West and Beyond: 300–1600, ed. by Keith Lilley (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), pp. 45–64

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Momigliano, Arnaldo, Terzo contributo alla storia degli studi classici e del mondo antico, 2 vols (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1966) Mommsen, Theodor  E., ‘Orosius and Augustine’, in Medieval and Renaissance Studies, ed. by Eugene F. Rice (New York: Cornell University Press, 1959), pp. 325–48 Mullins, Jerome Patrick, The Spiritual Life According to Saint Isidore of Seville, Catholic University of America Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Latin Language and Literature, 13 (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1940) Orlandis, José, Historia del reino visigodo español (Madrid: Ediciones Rialp, 1988) Osgood, Josiah, ‘The Education of Paulinus of Pella’, in From the Tetrachs to the Theodosians: Later Roman History and Culture, 284–450 CE, ed. by Scott McGill, Cristiana Sogno, and Edward Watts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 135–53 Pocock, John G. A., Barbarism and Religion, iii: The Decline and Fall (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) Press, Gerald  A., ‘The Subject and Structure of Augustine’s De doctrina christiana’, Augustinian Studies, 11 (1980), 99–124 Riché, Pierre, ‘Les écoles, l’eglise et l’etat en Occident du Ve au XIe siècle’, in Eglise et enseignement: actes du Colloque du Xe anniversaire de l’Institut d’Histoire du Christianisme de l’Université Libre de Bruxelles, Université libre de Bruxelles, Faculté de philosophie et lettres, 67 (Brussels: Editions de l’Université de Bruxelles, 1977), pp. 33–45 Rohrbacher, David, The Historians of Late Antiquity (London: Routledge, 2002) Rubio, Luciano, ‘Presencia de San Agustín en los escritos de la Espana romana y visigoda’, La Ciudad de Dios, 200 (1987), 477–506 Ruys, Juanita Feros, John O. Ward, and Melanie Heyworth, eds, The Classics in the Medieval and Renaissance Classroom: The Role of Ancient Texts in the Arts Curriculum as Revealed by Surviving Manuscripts and Early Printed Books (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013) Salisbury, Joyce, Iberian Popular Religion, 600 B.C. to 700 A.D.: Celts, Romans, and Visigoths (New York: Mellen, 1985) Smith, Anthony D., The Nation in History: Historiographical Debates about Ethnicity and Nationalism (Hanover: Brandeis University Press/Historical Society of Israel, 2000) Stettner, Thomas, ‘Cassiodors Enzyklopädie eine Quelle Isidors’, Philologus, 82 (1927), 241–42 Stocking, Rachel L., ‘Martianus, Aventius, and Isidore: Provincial Councils in SeventhCentury Spain’, Early Medieval Europe, 6 (1997), 169–88 —— , Bishops, Councils and Consensus in the Visigothic Kingdom, 589–633 (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2000) Thompson, James Westfall, The Literacy of the Laity in the Middle Ages (New York: Burt Franklin, 1963) Topping, Ryan S., St. Augustine, Continuum Library of Educational Thought, 17 (London: Continuum, 2010) Trompf, Gary W., Early Christian Historiography: Narratives of Retributive Justice (London: Continuum, 2000) Valverde Castro, María R., Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real en la monarquía visigoda: un proceso de cambio, Acta Salmanticensia: estudios históricos y geográficos, 110 (Salamanca: Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca, 2000)

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Van Andel, G. K., The Christian Concept of History in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus (Amsterdam: Hakkert, 1976) Van Nuffelen, Peter, ‘Theology versus Genre? The Universalism of Christian Historiography in Late Antiquity’, in Historiae mundi: Studies in Universal History, ed. by Peter Liddel and Andrew T. Fear (London: Duckworth, 2010), pp. 148–62 —— , Orosius and the Rhetoric of History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) —— , ‘On Moral Ends: Orosius and the Circle of Life in History’, in Von Platon bis Fukuyama: biologistische und zyklische Konzepte in der Geschichtsphilosophie der Antike und des Abendlandes, ed. by David Engels (Brussels: Latomus, 2015), pp. 123–35 Vilella, Josep, ‘Biografía crítica de Orosio’, Jahrbüch für Antike und Christentum, 43 (2000), 94–121 Ward, Graeme, ‘All Roads Lead to Rome? Frechulf of Lisieux, Augustine and Orosius’, Early Medieval Europe, 22 (2014), 492–505 Whitby, Michael, Review of David Rohrbacher, The Historians of Late Antiquity, The Classical Review, 53 (2003), 389–91 Williams, Michael Stuart, ‘Time and Authority in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus’, in The Western Time of Ancient History: Historiographical Encounters with the Greek and Roman Pasts, ed. by Alexandra Lianeri (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 280–97 Wood, Jamie, ‘Brevitas in the Historical Writings of Isidore of Seville’, in Early Medieval Spain: A Symposium, ed. by Alan Deyermond and Martin Ryan, Papers of the Medieval Hispanic Research Seminar, 63 (London: Medieval Hispanic Research Seminar, Queen Mary, University of London, 2010), pp. 37–53 —— , The Politics of Identity in Visigothic Spain: Religion and Power in the Histories of Isidore of Seville, Brill’s Series on the Early Middle Ages, 21 (Leiden: Brill, 2012)

The Ties that Bind: Diagnosing Social Crisis in Julian of Toledo’s Historia Wambae Molly Lester*

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istorians, both medieval and modern, have been known to choose their objects of inquiry with an agenda in mind. The famous Visigothic bishop Julian of Toledo was no different. In his earliest known text, the Historia Wambae regis, Julian composed a dramatic narrative reflecting upon the elevation of the noble Wamba to the Visigothic throne in 672 and an attempted usurpation by the king’s formerly loyal dux, Paul.1 The text is heavily indebted to the Iberian bishop’s classical education, but it is also deeply informed by his views on contemporary society. One of Julian’s most pressing concerns was the nature of Paul’s betrayal of Wamba and its implications for Visigothic society as a whole. The author’s nuanced approach to disloyalty and treachery is deftly captured in his depiction of Paul’s public surrender to Wamba after the king soundly defeated the usurper’s armies in the city of Narbonne.2 The scene represented a deeply personal moment, as one man came * I am very grateful to Peter Brown, Helmut Reimitz, William Chester Jordan, and especially Chris Florio for their helpful comments and feedback. 1

Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, reprinted and ed. by Hillgarth. The Historia and its accompanying texts have been recently translated in Martínez Pizarro, The Story of Wamba. Unless otherwise noted, all translations in this article are my own. 2 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 25, pp. 520–21. Molly Lester is Assistant Professor of Medieval European History at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, MD. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 269–296 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118568

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face to face with another who had broken his trust, and the king even lamented the seemingly senseless nature of his former commander’s actions. Yet Paul’s betrayal of Wamba was, of course, much more than a rupture between individuals: his usurpation had amplified an ongoing rebellion in Visigothic territory in southern Gaul (an area which Julian consistently refers to as ‘Gallia’) and had threatened institutional, spiritual, and material aspects of Visigothic society as well. The interplay between the breaking of interpersonal bonds and widespread civil war, so poignantly rendered in this literary tableau, was central to Julian’s exploration of questions stemming from the experience of civil war: how does a society fall apart, and when this happens, what can be done to put it back together? Scholars have used the Historia Wambae to explore questions about Visigothic ideologies of kingship, ritual, and community — but in this text, Julian was also interested in questions of social cohesion and social fracture. We should not underestimate Julian’s level of concern regarding the political, social, and religious problems unique to rebellion and usurpation. Political factionalism and rebellion against kings were common in the sixth- and seventh-century Visigothic kingdom, but by the time Julian wrote the Historia Wambae in the 670s, Paul’s usurpation seems to have been the first recorded rebellion against a king since the noble Froia challenged the previous king Recceswinth’s rulership in 653. In addition, although the initial rebellion and, ultimately, Paul’s attempt to seize the throne appear to have been largely confined to the province of Gallia, Julian did not dismiss their significance for Visigothic society as a whole. The rebellion may have taken place in a relatively small and contained corner of the kingdom, but it is quite likely that Julian used this microcosm as a metonym for the macrocosm, identifying areas of breakdown and gleaning lessons for the future that could apply to the entire polity. Sporadic references to the spiritual, diplomatic, and institutional crimes of the rebels worked to highlight the usurper and rebels’ bad behaviour and malign their characters, but such references also served to illustrate the damage their actions inflicted upon Visigothic society. To borrow a metaphor so popular with Visigothic authors, if we imagine the kingdom as a body, a corpus, Julian was not only interested in the immediate wound dealt by usurpation: he was also interested in the subsequent threat of decay in other parts of the social corpus. What is most striking about the Historia Wambae is the way in which Julian envisioned the discord that the usurpation created and the language he used to illustrate its more menacing implications for the entire Visigothic community. To articulate his anxieties over social fracture and disorder within the Visigothic kingdom, Julian tapped into a set of existing ideas and assumptions centring on

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the power of individual and communal bonds created and maintained by particular rituals, customs, and attitudes. In his seminal review of the literature on American progressivism, the historian Daniel T. Rodgers delineated the ideas that his historical actors drew upon to express their own social visions as ‘social languages’.3 Applying Rodgers’s conceptualization of social languages to the Historia Wambae, Julian’s focus on social bonds and the activities that maintained them provided him with a social language both to identify and discuss ‘irresponsible, antisocial act[s]’ and to express his desire for ‘consciously contrived harmony’.4 Far from offering a static image of Visigothic society, Julian knew that his community was a community in motion, a kingdom that needed to be bound together and to survive both in mundane day-to-day life and in times of heightened political or religious tension. The many customs and rituals described in the Historia Wambae, from humble votive offerings to saints to solemn coronation rites for a new monarch to powerful oaths of loyalty sworn to the Visigothic king, not only established and reinforced communities and identities: they also linked individual Visigothic subjects in self-perpetuating and dependent relationships to their king, to God and the saints, and to each other both in the extraordinary and the everyday. If these rituals were compromised, Julian argued, the web of social and spiritual relationships they created would be threatened. In approaching the Historia Wambae with an eye toward how Julian envisioned the organization and everyday workings of his society, as well as his exploration of social breakdown, I do not intend to propose a structuralist or functionalist interpretation either of the Historia Wambae or of Visigothic society.5 Nor do I wish to suggest that Julian would have understood his world in modern structuralist terms. But rejecting this particular interpretation of the Historia Wambae does not mean scholars should disregard the implication that Julian was meditating upon the ideas and customs that shaped, guided, and circumscribed his community. I also do not want to imply that Julian’s attention to the social language of communal bonds was his only, or even his primary, concern in this text. The Historia Wambae was an opportunity for Julian to address multiple issues and anxieties that he perceived in the wake of a failed usurpation. In addition to meditating upon social thought, Julian simultane3

Rodgers, ‘In Search of Progressivism’, pp. 124–25. Rodgers, ‘In Search of Progressivism’, p. 124. 5 Although I do not wish to approach the Historia Wambae from these modern interpretive frameworks, William H. Sewell’s argument for a dynamic theory of structure was influential in shaping my approach to the text. See Sewell, Logics of History, pp. 124–51. 4

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ously smeared the memory of the usurper Paul, legitimated and praised the king Wamba, provided rich commentary on Visigothic royal ritual, constructed aspects of Gothic identity, and explored or referenced many other themes that have captured historians’ attention. This seemingly straightforward story of a failed rebellion and its aftermath spoke on multiple registers that were deeply interconnected and masterfully harmonized, and in drawing out one tone in this article, I do not intend to silence the others. In examining Julian’s interest in the mechanics of social breakdown and social restoration, I hope to extend and amplify scholarship of medieval community and identity that has done immense and important work in illuminating how medieval actors and authors understood their own identities and how they organized and defined internal and external communities. Rather than exploring how historical authors constructed their communities, in this article I want to bring scholarly attention to how these authors hoped to animate their communities through right practice. Early medieval intellectuals such as Julian understood that stability did not come from creating a static image of community, but from ordering it according to routine through normalized practice. By bringing focus to historiographical interpretations of how authors understood their society to work — or not — modern historians can better appreciate how medieval people conceptualized social cohesion and, perhaps, how they attempted to create and regulate cohesion outside of texts.

The Author and his Work Julian was born in Toledo, probably in the early 640s and, according to the Mozarabic chronicle of 754, was of possible Jewish descent.6 He attended the cathedral school of Toledo in the 650s and studied theology, grammar, and liturgy under the bishop and poet Eugenius II.7 According to a biography written by Felix of Toledo, Julian’s successor, Julian became a deacon around 670 and he probably became a priest shortly afterwards.8 He was elevated to the bishopric of Toledo in 680, and went on to become one of the most important theological and political figures in the kingdom until his death in 690. Many of his later works are lost, but surviving texts include the influential Prognosticum 6

Crónica Mozárabe de 754, ed.  by López Pereira, 38, p.  56. See also García Moreno, Prosopografía, no. 251. 7 For more on Julian’s education, see Collins, ‘Julian of Toledo and the Education of Kings in Late Seventh-Century Spain’, pp. 8–11. 8 Felix of Toledo, S. Juliani Toletani episcopi vita, ed. by Migne, 4, cols 446–47.

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futuri saeculi, a treatise on Christian eschatology, and De comprobatione sextae aetatis, a text outlining an interpretation of the six ages of the world and directed against Jews. Julian’s voice also comes through clearly in the Visigothic church councils of the 680s, and he had a lasting influence on the Visigothic and later Old Hispanic liturgy.9 Julian was most likely still a young priest in Toledo when he wrote the Historia Wambae, the second of a set of four separate documents consistently transmitted together in the manuscript tradition.10 The Historia Wambae is usually prefaced by a challenging and insulting letter addressed to Wamba supposedly written by the usurper Paul. Following the Historia Wambae is the Insulatio, Julian’s vicious and rhetorical condemnation of the province of Gallia and the treachery it nurtured against the Visigothic kingdom.11 The last text in the series is the Iudicium, a brusque narrative of Paul’s rebellion and punishment that complements and supplements the same events Julian described in his Historia.12 In contrast to the Historia, the Iudicium was much more interested in the legal and juridical aspects of Paul’s treachery; the climax of the piece is the trial of Paul and his allies, and Paul’s disregard of his oath of loyalty is the central cause for concern and judgment. Julian’s authorship of the Iudicium has been a cause for scholarly debate since the early twentieth century: many have suggested that the Iudicium was composed by a member of the Gothic elite present at Paul’s trial, and that Julian subsequently used the text as a source for his Historia and revised it for inclusion in the textual dossier.13 Whether or not Julian composed or revised the Iudicium, its focus on the legal aspects of oath-breaking provided crucial commentary on the practical aspects of treachery and betrayal that so concerned Julian throughout the other texts. Most historians agree that the texts were written in the 670s, shortly after the events described. 14 The Historia Wambae itself narrates the events of a single year, September 672 to September 673. In brief, the Historia opens 9

Felix of Toledo, S. Juliani Toletani episcopi vita, ed. by Migne, 11, col. 450. For the manuscript tradition of the Historia Wambae, see Levison, ‘Einleitung’, pp. 493–99. 11 Julian of Toledo, Insulatio in tyrannidem Galliae, ed. by Levison. 12 Iudicium in tyrannorum perfidia promulgatum, ed. by Levison. 13 Levison’s opinion, also adopted by Martínez Pizarro, is that Julian probably revised the Iudicium instead of writing it. See Levison, ‘Einleitung’, p. 491, and Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 78–81 and 163–67. 14 See, for example, Levison, ‘Einleitung’, p.  491; Hillgarth, ‘Introduction’, p.  vii; and Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, p. 56. For a dissenting argument dating the Historia to the 680s, see García López, ‘La cronología de la “Historia Wambae”’. 10

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with Wamba’s election to the throne after the death of the Visigothic king Recceswinth in 672 and Wamba’s subsequent coronation and royal anointment in Toledo. It continues with a rebellion against Wamba in the province of Gallia and the usurpation of the dux Paul, once a loyal supporter of the king who was sent to quell the revolt. After narrating the course of the civil war and Paul’s defeat, Julian ended his work with Wamba’s restoration of Gallia and his judgment and punishment of Paul. Julian’s immediate reasons for writing the text are unclear: at least one scholar has speculated that the Historia might have been commissioned by Wamba himself, while others stress the panegyrical nature of the text and suggest that it was written to confirm Wamba’s rule.15 Whatever his immediate reasons for writing the Historia Wambae, Julian was doubtlessly influenced by the presence of the royal court in Toledo, and the text likely attracted Wamba’s attention, forming a relationship that might have contributed to Wamba’s decision to appoint Julian as bishop of Toledo in 680.16 Besides rendering an account of the rebellion favourable to Wamba and blackening the memory of the usurper Paul and his supporters, the Historia Wambae allowed Julian to reflect upon numerous issues brought into focus by this challenged royal succession and civil war. One such concern was Visigothic kingship. Through the character of the good king Wamba, Julian explored imperial, ecclesiastical, and biblical ideologies of kingship, he defined what constituted royal legitimacy, and he outlined a reciprocal relationship between the king and his people.17 By contrasting Wamba, the idealized monarch, with his antithesis, the evil usurper Paul, Julian sketched a portrait of the ideal sovereign to serve as an exemplum for his readers.18 He also sought to use the Historia Wambae to forge a vision of Gothic political identity, and through the hostile relationship of the province of Gallia to the rest of ‘Spain’ he exalted the superiority of the Gothic kingdom against the Franks.19 15

Hillgarth, ‘Introduction’, p. viii, speculates that the Historia Wambae might have been commissioned by the king. Suzanne Teillet, among others, has argued that the text has a panegyrical tone in ‘L’Historia Wambae’. 16 Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, p. 56. 17 For a few examples, see Teillet, ‘L’Historia Wambae’; Teillet, Des Goths à la nation gothique, pp. 585–621; Velázquez, ‘Wamba y Paulo’; and García Herrero, ‘Julián de Toledo y la realeza visigoda’. For a classic work on Visigothic monarchs and the aristocracy, see Claude, Adel, Kirche und Königtum. 18 For the classical and contemporary sources of the Historia Wambae and its accompanying texts, see Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 85–98. For literary depictions of kings and tyrants, see Castillo Lozano, ‘La figura del tyrannus’, pp. 91–95, and Guiance, ‘Rex perditionis’. 19 See Teillet, Des Goths à la nation gothique, pp. 621–36. For a critique of Teillet’s emphasis

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Ritual was another prominent concern of Julian’s. Unsurprisingly, the most famous ritual described in the Historia Wambae is the anointing of Wamba as king, the earliest surviving account of royal unction in Western Europe.20 Yet in addition to royal unction, Julian was also interested in other kinds of ritual, such as the process of royal election, the appointment of Visigothic bishops, and the methods of condemning and punishing a usurper to the throne.21 In particular, Mayke de Jong has argued that ritual was essential to Julian’s ‘image of a unified Christian gens and its king’ portrayed in the Historia Wambae. 22 Ritual, De Jong continues, was an important tool in crafting the new Israel of the Visigothic kingdom, and Julian placed great emphasis on knowing good ritual and identifying and correcting its bad counterpart. The order and purity of the Visigothic community was dependent on this good ritual, and Julian sought to portray a world of Gothic rightness and order threatened by alien, corrupting forces.

What Went Wrong: Broken Promises Given his interest in the relationship between individual and communal social bonds, Julian displayed a profound interest in treason, disloyalty, and usurpation. His work drew heavily on ancient and late antique models of usurpers to describe Paul and his rebellion, leading some historians to question how much the events of the Historia Wambae simply reused older tropes. Yet treason was a pressing contemporary concern for Visigothic leaders.23 Julian alternately described the Gallic rebellion and Paul’s usurpation as perfidia, seditio, and rebellio, words that echo debates about treason and disloyalty in the Visigothic church councils.24 Numerous councils had passed canons attempting to solve on the birth of nationalism, see Hillgarth, ‘Review of Suzanne Teillet, Des Goths à la nation gothique’. 20 It is impossible to list all significant works on and debates about Visigothic royal unction, so a very brief generalization must suffice. For royal unction, see Nelson, ‘Symbols in Context’. For a good summary and treatment of unction in the Visigothic context, see Valverde Castro, Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real, pp. 204–10. 21 For Visigothic ritual punishment of usurpers, see McCormick, Eternal Victory, pp. 297–327. 22 De Jong, ‘Adding Insult to Injury’, p. 375. 23 See Martínez Pizarro’s emphasis on tropes in ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 50–51. 24 Perfidia ( Julian’s favourite word for treason in the Historia Wambae) and seditio appear in numerous church canons, and perfidia appears in at least one law addressing treason. After

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the problem of treason and rebellion: beginning in 633, canon 75 of the Fourth Council of Toledo discussed extensively the problem of those who were disloyal to their own kings.25 Later canons variously condemned treasonous subjects within and outside of the kingdom, attempted to protect the king, his family, and his reputation from seditious harm, laid out religious punishments for those who dared to plot against the ruling prince, and (occasionally) sought to rehabilitate and reintegrate those deemed guilty of treason into Visigothic society.26 Some Visigothic kings also passed laws identifying treason and punishing traitors.27 In the 670s, Wamba himself passed what has been called ‘the most comprehensive treason law’ of the Visigothic law code, perhaps in response to the rebellion and usurpation he faced at the outset of his reign.28 In this law, the king proclaimed that all Visigothic subjects, regardless of background, who were either near or within one hundred miles of an enemy attack should respond immediately to offer their military service in defence of their country and people. After addressing the kingdom’s defence against external enemies, Wamba then applied the same principle to internal conflicts as well. He decreed that, if anyone within the boundaries of the Visigothic kingdom attempted to provoke scandal (scandalum), those who did not immediately rush to the defence of the current king would be condemned to exile and their property would be forfeit to the king.29 perfidia, Julian’s second favourite word for treason was tyrannus. For ‘tyranny’ in the Visigothic context more generally, see Orlandis, ‘En torno a la noción visigoda de tiranía’, and García Herrero, ‘Julián de Toledo y la realeza visigoda’, pp. 217–19. 25 Toledo IV, canon 75, ed. by Martínez Díez and Rodríguez, La colección canónica Hispana, v, 248–59 . 26 Unless otherwise noted, all citations are from La colección canónica Hispana, ed. by Martínez Díez and Rodríguez. For condemning treason, see Toledo v, canon 4 (v, 282–83); Toledo vii, canon 1 (v, 338–47); Toledo x, canon 2 (v, 521–22); and Toledo xvi, canon 10 (Concilios Visigóticos e Hispano-Romanos, ed. by Vives, pp. 505–07). For protection of royalty, see Toledo v, canons 2, 5 (v, 278–81 and 283–84); Toledo vi, canon 18 (v, 327–28); Toledo xiii, canons 4, 5 (vi, 235–38); Toledo xvi, canon 8 (Concilios Visigóticos e Hispano-Romanos, ed. by Vives, pp. 509–12). For religious punishments, see Toledo iv, canon 75 (v, 248–59) and Toledo vii, canon 1 (v, 338–47). For rehabilitation, see Toledo viii, canon 2 (v, 386–412) and Toledo xiii, canon 1 (vi, 228–30). 27 For example, see Leges Visigothorum, ed. by Zeumer, ii.1.8, pp. 53–57: ‘De his, qui contra principem vel gentem aut patriam refugi sive insulentes existunt’. 28 Leges Visigothorum, ed. by Zeumer, ix.2.8, pp. 370–73: ‘Quid debeat observari, si scandalum infra fines Spanie exsurrexerit’. For the quote, see Lear, Treason in Roman and Germanic Law, p. 149. 29 Leges Visigothorum, ed. by Zeumer, ix.2.8, pp. 370–73.

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Given the extensive royal and episcopal attention to treason and its causes in legal texts, Julian was surprisingly vague in his analysis of the initial outbreak of rebellion in the province of Gallia. After introducing the theme of treason in the letter from the ‘Traitor’ Paul (‘Pauli perfidi’), Julian opened his narrative of Gallic rebellion in the Historia Wambae by characterizing the province as a ‘nurse of treachery (altrix perfidiae)’ and painted an image of a land teeming with conspiracies, marked by a sign of treachery (perfidiae signum), and rife with corruption, deceit, and blasphemous Jews.30 He would later flesh out this condemnation of the treacherous province in the Insulatio, which sought to assign guilt and blame to the province of Gallia, personified as a mother who nursed deadly traitorous children at her breast.31 In the Historia Wambae, however, Julian quickly shifted his attention from the general poisonous atmosphere of the province to the individual rebels themselves: Hildericus, the count of Nîmes, Gumildus, the bishop of Maguelone, and Ranimirus, an abbot, conveniently representing three of the most important and influential groups of Visigothic society.32 Although Julian remained vague about the acts leading to their treachery and the ultimate goals of their rebellion, he found it particularly repugnant that these rebels worked actively to spread their disloyalty to as many men as possible. Hildericus, in particular, ‘adopted not only the name but also the reputation and the work of treason (infidalitatis)’, encouraging faithlessness in various men and attempting to draw those loyal to the king into betrayal (perfidiae).33 In explicitly linking individual treason and disloyalty with actively recruiting more to the treasonous cause, one of Julian’s biggest concerns with the Gallic rebellion was not the specific actions that led to rebellion, but rather the fact that it spread. The usurper Paul, however, was the primary vehicle for Julian’s illustration of the mechanics of treachery; indeed, Julian probably intended the Historia to be as much a story about Paul and his treachery as it was about Wamba and his legitimacy.34 When speaking of Paul’s betrayal of Wamba and his usurpa30

The entire incipit of the letter reads as follows: ‘Incipit Epistola Pauli Perfidi, Qui Tyrannice Rebellionem in Gallias Fecit Wambani Principis Magni’, Julian of Toledo, Epistula Pauli ad Wambam, ed. by Levison, p. 500. For the description of Gallia, see Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 5, p. 504. 31 Julian of Toledo, Insulatio in tyrannidem Galliae, ed. by Levison, 2–4, pp. 526–27. For a summary and literary analysis of the Insulatio, see Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 153–63. 32 Respectively, see García Moreno, Prosopografía, nos 84, 555, and 560. 33 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 6, pp. 504–05: ‘non solum nomen, sed titulum et opus sibimet infidelitatis adsciuit’. 34 Julian ended the Historia Wambae by noting ‘Finit de Paulo Storia’: ‘Here ends the story

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tion, Julian chose to be much more specific in describing the events surrounding Paul’s decision to turn against Wamba. In particular, Paul’s specific crimes included breaking the oath of loyalty he had sworn to Wamba, an act only implied in the case of the rebels, and his subsequent misappropriation and perversion of the Visigothic rituals of royal election and coronation. Both of these actions took customs that were intended to create harmony and used them to promote discord. For decades, the oath was considered an important tool of social cohesion in Visigothic society, binding all free Visigothic subjects to the king and theoretically ensuring a relationship of mutual loyalty and respect between the ruler and the ruled.35 Most likely descended from late Roman military oaths, early medieval oaths of loyalty both symbolized the importance of the Roman legacy for early medieval kingdoms and exemplified the early medieval reworking of late antique notions of statehood.36 As a holy sacrament that would herald heavenly as well as earthly punishments if broken, oaths personally linked subjects with new rulers and were intended to sweep aside all pre-existing allegiances and relationships that might impede complete loyalty to the new king.37 For our purposes, the custom of Visigothic oaths of allegiance was first discussed in detail in the above-mentioned canon 75 of the Fourth Council of Toledo in of Paul’. Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 30, p. 526. For Paul, see García Moreno, Prosopografía, no. 111. 35 For oaths in the Visigothic context, see Claude, ‘The Oath of Allegiance’, and Valverde Castro, Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real, pp.  215–25. For oaths as cohesive bonds of mutual dependence, see Valverde Castro, Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real, pp. 221–23, and Barbero and Vigil, La formación del feudalismo, pp. 105–07, 126–54, and 170–72. For the ‘contractual allegiance’ of post-Roman oaths, see Lear, Treason in Roman and Germanic Law, pp. 123–35, and Esders, ‘Rechtliche Grundlagen frühmittelalterlicher Staatlichkeit’. Despite the theoretically contractual nature of the king/subject relationship, royal violation of obligations promised to their subjects did not usually lead to royal deposition. See Valverde Castro, Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real, p. 217, and King, Law and Society, pp. 41, 46–51. 36 Esders, ‘Rechtliche Grundlagen frühmittelalterlicher Staatlichkeit’. Many scholars, including Dietrich Claude and Floyd Seward Lear, maintained that early medieval oaths of loyalty were derived from Germanic models. Others, such as Maria R. Valverde Castro, P. D. King, and Claudio Sánchez-Albornoz, have supported a Roman origin, the position accepted in this article. Recently, in the article cited above, Stefan Esders has compellingly argued that postRoman oaths were derived from late Roman military oaths. 37 See Toledo VIII, canon 2, ed. by Martínez Díez and Rodríguez, La colección canónica Hispana, v, 386–412, for an ecclesiastic consideration of the sacramental aspects of oaths. Also, see Prodi, Il sacramento del potere. For oaths and loyalties, see Esders, ‘“Faithful Believers”’, p. 359.

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633, and was frequently invoked and debated in subsequent church councils.38 The earliest references to such oaths suggest that they might have contained the famous Visigothic political formulations of gens and patria, but according to Dietrich Claude, the most important emphasis of the oath was loyalty (fides) to the king.39 Upon a royal succession, all free men were asked to take such an oath of loyalty to the new king, swearing either verbally or (eventually) in writing to the king himself or to a royal representative.40 Visigothic kings were also required to swear oaths to their people upon their ascension, and although the exact content of the royal oaths is unknown, they theoretically outlined royal responsibilities and afforded a king’s subjects his complete devotion to their well-being and protection from unjust rule.41 In the Historia Wambae, for example, Wamba himself had sworn such an oath to his people at his coronation.42 According to Julian, Paul had taken such an oath of allegiance to Wamba upon the latter’s ascension to the throne. Julian related that Paul had been sent by Wamba to stop the Gallic rebellion, indicating that Wamba must have placed some measure of trust in Paul. The usurper’s erstwhile support of Wamba made his betrayal all the more painful and all the more shocking. On his deliberately slow journey to fight the rebels, Julian declared that Paul, ‘lured by ambition for royal power, was suddenly stripped of his faith (fide). He dishonour[ed] the love of the pious king he had promised, [forgot] his duty to the country’, and secretly sought to join the rebellion that he had been sent to quell.43 He ultimately declared himself king in Gallia and compelled the 38

See n. 26. As Pablo C. Diaz and M. C. Valverde Castro note, frequent conciliar legislation on oaths and disloyalty is a testament to the difficulty of obtaining their desired result. See Diaz and Valverde, ‘The Theoretical Strength and Practical Weakness’, pp. 87–89. 39 For example, Toledo IV, canon 75, ed. by Martínez Díez and Rodríguez, La colección canónica Hispana, v, 252: ‘sacramentum fidei suae, quod pro patriae gentisque Gotorum statu uel conseruatione regiae salutis pollicitus est’. For more on these terms and their importance for Visigothic political ideology, see Velázquez, ‘Pro patriae gentisque Gothorum statu’. For Claude’s arguments, see Claude, ‘The Oath of Allegiance’, p. 6. 40 Claude, ‘The Oath of Allegiance’, p. 8, argues that while early councils presumed that all free men were obligated to take the oath, later canons and laws were much more explicit. See Leges Visigothorum, ed. by Zeumer, ii.1.7, pp. 52–53. For oaths in writing, see the Iudicium in tyrannorum perfidiam promulgatum, ed. by Levison, 6, pp. 533–34. 41 For speculation on the responsibilities implied in the king’s oath, see Valverde Castro, Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real, pp. 216–17. 42 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 4, pp. 503–04. 43 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 7, p. 506: ‘Regni ambitione illectus, spoliatur subito fide. Promissam religiosi principis maculat caritatem, praestationis oblibiscitur patriae’.

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rebels to swear oaths to him.44 In doing so, Paul had committed the ultimate act of treason — he betrayed and broke the oath of loyalty he had sworn to Wamba as king, forwent a religious promise he had made in God’s name, and severed the most basic bond between king and subject. What is more, like the Gallic rebels, Paul’s crime was not solely an individual act: Julian wanted to demonstrate once again that disloyalty, specifically an elite breaking his oath of loyalty, had a ripple effect.45 Having broken his oath, Paul proceeded to dissolve the loyalty of others. Working in secret, he attracted Ranosindus, the military head of the province of Tarraconensis, and Hildigisus, a gardingus, to his cause.46 Now the rebellion had affected the region south of Gallia, and had even reached into the king’s inner circle by recruiting a man of the gardingus rank.47 Later, on the cusp of making his plans public, he corrupted the faith (fidem) of the people of Gallia with deceptions and convinced them to turn against Wamba.48 What was originally a personal fissure, an individual break between Paul and Wamba, increasingly and organically grew into social fissure among elites and subjects alike. Paul’s oath-breaking was also the central focus of the Iudicium, the fourth and final document included in the textual compendium accompanying the Historia Wambae. In its opening lines, the Iudicium called for the punishment of traitors who had threatened their king and country by ‘[breaking] the bond of the voluntary oath’.49 After tersely narrating Paul’s oath-breaking, the events of the rebellion, and Paul’s defeat, the text provided a detailed description of the public trial of Paul and his followers in front of Wamba, the Visigothic political elite, and Wamba’s army.50 At the trial, written documents containing voluntary oaths that Paul and his followers had sworn to Wamba were read aloud 44

Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 8, p. 507. See Martínez Pizzaro, ‘Introductory Essay’, p. 100. 46 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 7, pp. 506–07. 47 To quote P. D. King’s definition, a gardingus was ‘a man of importance, who had the ear of the king [… and whose] character is best accounted for in terms of personal loyalty and military service’. King, Law and Society, pp. 57–59. 48 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 8, p. 507. 49 Iudicium in tyrannorum perfidiam promulgatum, ed. by Levison, 1, p. 530: ‘Spontaneum enim promissionis foedus inrumpit novuumque sponsionis iusiurandum constituit, quo, voluntaria fidei promissione discissa’. I have chosen to use Martínez Pizarro’s translation, Judgement Pronounced against the Treachery of Usurpers, trans. by Martínez Pizarro, p. 232. 50 Iudicium in tyrannorum perfidiam promulgatum, ed.  by Levison, 5–7, pp.  533–35. Interestingly, the trial described in the Iudicium is glossed over in the Historia Wambae. 45

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and evaluated by those present; the political elite also scrutinized the content of the oaths of loyalty which Paul had demanded from his supporters following his usurpation. After confirming that Paul and his supporters had indeed broken their oaths of loyalty to Wamba, those assembled consulted Visigothic law and canon law on oath-breaking and condemned Paul and his associates to death.51 Scholars have offered various explanations for Julian’s retention of a document that repeated several narrative elements of his Historia: popular arguments maintain that the Iudicium supplemented the events of the Historia Wambae or provided a legal rationale for Wamba’s legitimacy and for the rebels’ punishment.52 I would suggest, however, that Julian might have attached this text to the Historia to reinforce his focus on the severity and centrality of oathbreaking in the rebellion, and to provide a legal gloss on this specific treacherous decision that precipitated a crisis of civil war. By breaking his oath and betraying his king, Paul had, in Julian’s view, unglued a crucial relationship that maintained a fragile balance of social and political order. As Stefan Esders has suggested, ‘promissory oaths gain most of their importance by offering an instrument to create new social bonds based on a religious idea of trust’.53 Invoking God in what was widely regarded as a religious sacrament, such oaths linked members of this society in common support of one king and in tacit peace and solidarity with one another. Since the oath of subjects was taken when a new king came to the throne, it was also intended to be a powerful check against political dissent at a time of power transition, and the web of relationships created by the reciprocal oaths of loyalty between king and subjects was one method of ensuring that Visigothic society continued to function smoothly and cohesively. By detailing Paul’s oath-breaking at the beginning of his usurpation, and including the Iudicium’s account focusing on the legal evaluation of this oath-breaking, Julian indicated that he was not thinking about usurpation, treason, and social and political instability in solely abstract terms.54 He specifically identified individual and collective broken social bonds as the root of Paul’s treason, and pinpointed the usurper’s disregard for one of the most basic filaments joining the kingdom together and reinforcing the continuation of the Visigothic polity. This particular form of disloyalty was both horizontal, as Paul destroyed a relationship that bound his 51

Iudicium in tyrannorum perfidiam promulgatum, ed. by Levison, 7, pp. 534–35. See Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 164–67. 53 Esders, ‘“Faithful Believers”’, p. 358. For more on the social importance of oaths, see Hirsch, ‘Über die Gesellschaftsbezogenheit des Eides’. 54 As opposed to Martínez Pizzaro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 98–102. 52

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society together, and vertical, as he betrayed his king, defied his God in whose name he took the oath, and upset the divinely ordained organization of the Visigothic Christian world.

What Went Wrong: Replicated Rituals Paul’s betrayal of his oath of loyalty to Wamba was not his only attack on the tools of social cohesion in Visigothic society — Julian also lambasted the pretender for appropriating and corrupting Visigothic rituals for a royal election and coronation. The theoretically elective nature of Visigothic kingship was first outlined in canon 75 of the Fourth Council of Toledo in 633, the same canon that necessitated oaths of loyalty to a new monarch and condemned endemic rebellion. In an attempt to control and regulate political instability, the bishops asserted that ‘the heads of all peoples, with the bishops, should decide the king’s successor in a universal council, so that as long as harmonious unity is upheld by us, no discord among the country or peoples should arise from force and ambition’.55 Julian considered such elective acts, and their correct performance, as essential for legitimating a new king, confirming God’s will, and preserving the spiritual unity of the Visigothic kingdom. Although elected royal succession was intended to prevent political discord by allowing the church and the nobility a say in the selection of a new monarch, the principle almost never worked in practice. The powerful and influential Visigothic aristocracy rarely respected the elective process when it countered their own interests, and Visigothic royal succession was more often determined by contemporary power dynamics rather than an established institutional principle.56 Indeed, Wamba’s election in 672 was only the second elected royal succession since the system was first proposed in 633, the first being Chintila’s election in 636. The election described in the Historia Wambae, although admittedly idealized, represented a unique moment in Visigothic political history, and Julian seized upon the opportunity to bring theory and circumstance together and to highlight its social as well as its political implications.57 55 Toledo IV, canon 75, ed. by Martínez Díez and Rodríguez, La colección canónica Hispana, v, 251: ‘primatus totius gentis cum sacerdotibus successorem regni consilio communi constituant, ut dum unitatis concordia a nobis retinetur, nullum patriae gentisque discidium per uim atque ambitum oriatur’. 56 Diaz and Valverde, ‘Theoretical Strength and Practical Weakness’, pp. 86–87. 57 For a discussion of late antique panegyrics layering theories of election over actual circumstance, and vice versa, see MacCormack, Art and Ceremony, pp. 164 and 170–73.

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According to Julian, a proper royal election involved not just the secular nobility, but all sectors of Iberian society. Initially chosen by God and subsequently proclaimed ruler by Visigothic elites, Wamba was eventually anointed by the episcopacy and welcomed and approved by the entire kingdom. 58 Although the exact nature of popular acclaim for Wamba was vague in this account, Julian probably intended to be as inclusive as possible when he stated that Wamba had been chosen ‘by God and subsequently by the eager wish and compliance of the people’, and that he was ‘compelled’ to accept the throne by ‘the urging of the entire people’.59 For Julian, an ideal election was not supposed to be an exclusive process: ultimately, all members of society worked together in harmony to give voice to the selection, which of course mirrored God’s will. Moreover, a successful royal election and subsequent coronation ceremony illustrated, as well as created and displayed, consensus within the community whose members were willing to participate in and attend such rituals.60 Once the will of God and the people was made manifest, no one, not even Wamba himself, should resist.61 As has been pointed out by other scholars,62 Julian also maintained that a newly elected king should be extremely careful to follow the proper ritual procedures governing a coronation. The ceremony of coronation, as well as the election that prefaced it, was an important step in ensuring a functional and legitimate transition of power in the eyes of God, the church, and the Iberian people. To use the words of Sabine MacCormack, ‘consensus, both human and divine, [could] be registered and documented by precise ceremonial actions which had to be commonly agreed upon’.63 The correct performance of Wamba’s coronation, then, was just as important as its occurrence. After his election, according to Julian, Wamba prudently waited to be crowned king until he had travelled to the royal city of Toledo.64 In order to avoid accusations of usurpation, he also had to be anointed by a bishop and to receive ‘the consent of those 58

Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 2, pp. 501–02. Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 3, p. 503: ‘Nam eundem virum quamquam divinitus abinceps et per hanelantia plevium vota et per eorum obsequentia regali cultu iam circumdederant magna officia’; 4, p. 504: ‘totius etiam gentis coactus inpulsu’. 60 Many thanks to Peter Brown for this astute observation. 61 For the refusal of power as a late antique trope and its relation to Julian’s description of Wamba’s refusal, see Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 114–25. 62 See, for example, De Jong, ‘Adding Insult to Injury’. 63 MacCormack, Art and Ceremony, p. 184. 64 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 3, pp. 502–03. 59

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living far away for his election’.65 At the moment of unction itself, Wamba was rewarded for his circumspection with signs of divine favour, such as smoke and a bee appearing around his head at the moment of royal unction.66 Paul’s election and usurpation in Gallia, on the other hand, was particularly dangerous to Julian, not in the least because his election disturbingly mirrored Wamba’s. After renouncing Wamba as king and withdrawing from his service, Paul appealed to those gathered to ‘choose a head of government from amongst yourselves, to whom the whole multitude may submit and who may appear to rule over us’.67 The request drew upon some of the basic elements at work in a royal election, emphasizing the importance of the people’s choice and of the perceived suitability of a candidate to rule. Such noble sentiments, however, appeared to be mere lip service; Julian scornfully described how Ranosindus, one of Paul’s accomplices, chose Paul as king, strongly implying that the election results were more likely the result of plotting beforehand than a spontaneous, religiously inspired decision. Upon immediately accepting this responsibility (an alacrity which was no doubt intended to contrast unfavourably with Wamba’s humble refusal), he compelled his men to swear oaths of loyalty to him. As for a potential abuse of Visigothic coronation rituals, Julian did not describe a coronation after Paul’s election, but earlier references to Paul as unctus and later descriptions of the usurper throwing aside a ‘royal garment’ were probably intended to imply that some sort of coronation ritual might have taken place.68 It was bad enough that these deceitful rituals of election were clumsy and compromised, perhaps even contributing to the nature and outcome of Paul’s usurpation, but for Julian, there was more at stake in this false election and coronation than bad people misappropriating ritual and doing it poorly.69 Strongly 65 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 3, p. 503: ‘et longe positorum consensus ob praeelectionem sui patientissime sustinere’. For ‘longe positorum’, I have chosen to use Martínez Pizarro’s translation, Julian of Toledo, The Book of the History of Gallia, trans. by Martínez Pizarro, p. 182 n. 24. 66 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 4, pp. 503–04. For the symbolism of a bee, see Julian of Toledo, The Book of the History of Gallia, trans. by Martínez Pizarro, p. 184 n. 29. 67 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 8, p. 507: ‘Caput regiminis ex vobis ipsis eligite, cui conventus omnis multitudo cedat, et quem in nobis principari appareat’. See Julian of Toledo, The Book of the History of Gallia, trans. by Martínez Pizarro, p. 189. 68 Julian of Toledo, Epistula Pauli ad Wambam, ed.  by Levison, and Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 20, p. 518: ‘regalia indumenta’. 69 For late antique opinions about usurpation and the perversion of ceremony, especially that of Ammianus Marcellinus, see MacCormack, Art and Ceremony, p. 202.

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implicit in Julian’s description of Wamba’s legitimate election is the idea that these particular rituals, like the oath of allegiance, were crucial in creating reciprocal relationships that bound Visigothic society together and helped it along in a fragile moment of transition. As only the second successful royal election since the theory’s inception in 633, in Julian’s mind, Wamba’s elevation managed to successfully give voice to all elements of Visigothic society, creating social and political harmony and uniting the entire kingdom together in allegiance to God’s chosen ruler. In addition to disregarding the harmony of Wamba’s election and corrupting the election ritual for his own devices, Paul took what was meant to be a tool of cohesion and used it to promote fracture — it was this flawed assumption of sovereignty, after all, that allowed Paul to draw the Gallic rebels to his cause and thoroughly transform all of Gallia into a mass of traitors. For Julian, then, an election done rightly served (among other things) as a fulcrum allowing Visigothic society to pivot smoothly to a new ruler with minimal dissent; an election done and used wrongly amplified discord and led to social breakdown.

The Ripple Effect Paul’s breaking of his oath of loyalty and his defiance and perversion of a true election procedure were the rebellion’s most blatant attacks on the customs maintaining Visigothic social order, but Julian was anxious to prove to his readers that the usurpation’s damage was insidious as well as overt. Once these checks against social disorder and rebellion had ceased to do their job, Julian implied, other rituals, institutions, and norms that guided the everyday workings of Visigothic society were threatened as well. One of the first victims of the civil war was the institution of the Iberian church, as divisions between bishops opposed to and bishops in support of Wamba split the church of Gallia (and perhaps Tarraconensis) along party lines. Gumildus, bishop of Maguelone, was one of Hildericus’s initial recruits for the Gallic rebellion, and the rebels made a concerted effort to attract other powerful bishops, such as Aregius of Nîmes, to their cause.70 Although episcopal solidarity was more of an ideal than a reality, and Visigothic bishops were influential political players, Julian viewed such naked fracture between God’s ministers as a cause for alarm. Yet the breakdown of the ecclesiastical structure went beyond bishops choosing sides in a civil war: political factionalism degraded the integrity of the church’s ecclesiastical structure as well. For example, after the initial outbreak 70

García Moreno, Prosopografía, no. 559.

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of rebellion in Gallia, Julian stated that the trio of rebel leaders conducted an illegal episcopal election, appointing the rebel abbot Ranimirus to the see of Nîmes, and that ‘no order was attended’.71 They did not seek the approval of the king or the metropolitan for this election, and even worse, Ranimirus was ordained by two foreign bishops. Paul and the insolent rebels also disrespected and deposed bishops who remained loyal to Wamba: in particular, Aregius was unceremoniously dragged from his see and handed over to the Franks in chains.72 Julian also mentioned the rebel bishop Gumildus’s fearful flight from his see of Maguelone upon seeing Wamba’s approach, with the implication that he abandoned his congregation in the midst of a military siege.73 This behaviour stood in sharp contrast to the loyal bishop Argebadus of Narbonne’s concern for his own flock in warfare: anxious to protect his people, Argebadus planned to hinder Paul’s advance by blocking the road to Narbonne, a scheme that Paul managed to frustrate with a speedy entry into the city.74 These incidents suggested that the rebels held a complete disregard for the customary values and rituals that usually defined the Iberian episcopacy. If this powerful institution spun out of control, there was no telling what the effects would be on the spiritual, economic, and even local political workings of Iberian society. With the integrity of their episcopacy under attack, Julian insinuated, the damage to the general spiritual health of the population of Gallia and Tarraconensis was not long to follow. Interspersed with his descriptions of the battles of the civil war, Julian traced the rebels’ various assaults on the religious customs and traditions that defined Christians’ expression and understanding of their religion. During the course of the civil war, Witimirus, a rebel commander, ran into a church and, ‘from behind the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary, showed that he would defend himself not with the reverence due to the place, but with his avenging sword’.75 Although Julian did not explore this inci71

Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 6, p. 505: ‘nullus ordo adtenditur’. Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 6, pp. 504–06. 73 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 13, pp. 513–14. 74 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 7, pp. 506–07. For Argebadus, see García Moreno, Prosopografía, no. 529. 75 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 12, p. 513: ‘Ubi dum Wittimirus armata adhuc manu ecclesiam peteret, accessu nostrorum turbatus, post aram beatae virginis Mariae se vindicaturum non reverentia loci miser, sed ultore gladio testabatur, dextra tenens gladium et mortem minitans singulorum’. For ‘reverentia loci’, I have chosen to use Martínez Pizarro’s translation, Julian of Toledo, The Book of the History of Gallia, trans. by Martínez Pizarro, p. 199. For Witimirus, see García Moreno, Prosopografía, no. 170. 72

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dent extensively, readers would have recognized a clear violation of Christian and Visigothic concepts of sanctuary.76 Julian also darkly mentioned that Paul had committed sacrilege when he seized liturgical instruments and votive offerings from churches and saints’ shrine to fund his campaign. In his madness, he had even dared to take a votive crown dedicated to St Felix by King Reccared and placed it upon his own ‘insane (insano)’ head.77 These stolen gifts had linked the Christian faithful with their spiritual protectors and guides, and with Paul’s disruption of this practice, the relationships between believers and saints were in jeopardy. What was the world coming to when such sacred customs were not respected? Julian’s message was clear: rebellion and political fracture violated society in more ways than one, and its effects went beyond corrupting rituals that maintained social cohesion to threatening the essential scaffolding of Christian faith itself. Julian also disapprovingly mentioned the rebels’ recruitment of foreign troops, specifically the Franks and the Basques, in their fight against Wamba; this time, however, the implicit critique focused on the creation of an undesirable social bond instead of the violation of existing, desirable communal relationships. The Visigoths had a traditionally fractious relationship with the Franks and Basques: several Visigothic monarchs, including Wamba himself, experienced Basque insurgencies throughout the late sixth and seventh centuries, while sporadic military conflict and ongoing political competition with the Franks contributed to a typically tense diplomatic relationship between the Visigoths and their neighbours to the north.78 Julian was clearly scornful of Paul’s strategic move, and he characterized the alliance as yet another example of Paul’s perfidious treachery.79 What is more, Julian frequently portrayed Franks as inferior to the Goths in courage and fighting prowess, a useful char76

Using older legal definitions of sanctuary, the Liber iudiciorum stated that anyone who claimed sanctuary in a church could not be removed from the church unless they retained their arms. See Leges Visigothorum, ed. by Zeumer, ix.3.1–2, p. 379. Chindaswinth added a subsequent law modifying the older concept of sanctuary (Leges Visigothorum, ed. by Zeumer, vi.5.16, pp. 281–82). See Shoemaker, Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages, 400–1500, pp. 47–77. 77 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 26, pp. 521–22. 78 For Wamba’s conflict with the Basques, see Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 9–10, pp. 507–10. For basic information on and characterizations of the traditionally hostile Visigothic relationship with the Franks and the Basques, see Barbero and Loring, ‘The Catholic Visigothic Kingdom’, pp. 347, 349, 350–53, 361, and Fouracre, ‘Francia in the Seventh Century’, pp. 379–80. 79 See, for example, Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 8, p. 507.

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acterization for establishing Gothic identity against a foreign other.80 But in a different fashion, here the readers of the Historia Wambae were supposed to see another inversion of a social norm. Julian implied that the typical relationship with the Franks should be one of hostility, and inviting them in as allies could be viewed as a violation of the correct relationship that must exist between the two. Unlike the perversions of social relationships within Visigothic society, where the rebels and Paul introduced discord and distance instead of harmony and closeness, here they approached a relationship properly seen as antagonistic and hostile and transformed it into one of alliance and mutual dependence. In the end, Julian sought to demonstrate that Paul and the rebels’ quest to break and perversely redefine social relationships necessary for the perpetuation of the Visigothic kingdom, as well as their disregard for the structures and norms defining Visigothic spirituality and diplomacy, turned back to bite them. Julian’s treatment of Paul and the rebellion’s inglorious end admittedly relied heavily upon descriptions of the fall of usurpers in ancient and late antique historiography, but his meticulous and detailed narrative of the collapse of trust among the rebels also reinforced his focus on the dangerous effects of introducing social discord for personal gain.81 In the final battle of the civil war, after Wamba’s army forced Paul and his men to retreat to the amphitheatre of Nîmes, the rebel army descended into chaos as the men of Gallia suspected members of their own group of treason. The rebel army fell upon itself savagely, and anarchy reigned as men of Gallia slaughtered each other throughout the city. What is more, the usurper who claimed the right to govern and defend Visigothic society had lost any authority he might have possessed. Paul was insulted by his troops, he could not protect his own servant from being put to death by his partisans, and amidst the chaos he ‘was despised by his own men, so that you would have thought he was begging them rather than commanding them’.82 In despair, Paul threw off the royal regalia that he had donned after his false election and resigned his claim to royal power. No doubt this inglorious end was Julian’s way of illustrating the ultimate fall of an overambitious man, and he explicitly intended Paul’s defeat to be a harsh lesson to future ambitious noblemen.83 Yet it also served as an ironic comment 80

Julian frequently grouped foreign Frankish troops together with the residents of Gallia, a deliberate slippage intended to reinforce Julian’s discourse on ‘Gothic’ identity. 81 See Martínez Pizarro, ‘Introductory Essay’, pp. 134–46, for Julian’s classical models. 82 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 19, p. 517: ‘Iam tamen et ipse exsanguis ac tremebundus effectus, a suis ipsis contemnitur, ut obsecrare illum potius quam imperare ceteris extimares’; and 20, p. 518. 83 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 25, pp. 520–21.

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on the rewards for those who encourage disorder over harmony: once the rituals and customs that bound society together and helped it operate on a daily basis were disregarded, cohesion (even among rebels) slipped dangerously towards crisis and, ultimately, dissolution.

Restoration By dissecting and examining Gallia’s rebellion and Paul’s usurpation, Julian attempted to understand both what joined his society together and how it could have fallen apart. The potential for widespread crisis in the Historia may be intentionally jarring, but it is smoothly conceptualized: Julian presented the harmful repercussions of the usurpation and civil war as expected outcomes. Such a deep exploration of social dissonance was a means of coming to terms with the civil conflict that had shaken this society (or at least certain portions of this society) so badly. Yet it was also a useful precursor for examining the methods of restoring social harmony. To use another bodily metaphor, sometimes when a bone has been very badly broken, a doctor needs to completely rebreak it in order for it to heal properly. In his Historia, Julian was refracturing Visigothic society, meditating upon the breaks to understand them, and fitting the broken pieces back together to mend the social corpus. Julian offered two methods of guarding against social disorder. The first was respecting and enacting the customs, rituals, and relationships that managed both momentous events, such as royal successions, and mundane activity. Demonstrating the damages of Paul and the rebels’ disregard for social custom was a move that was calculated to call the reader’s attention to the importance of maintaining these customs, of performing community instead of fomenting disunion. Moreover, Julian ended his narrative with the wish that Wamba and Paul’s story might be a joy to the faithful and a torment to the disloyal, so that either side on inspection deriving some lesson from [these events], the one who follows straight paths may escape the danger of falling, and the one who has already fallen may always recognize his plight in their condemnation.84 84 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 30, p. 526: ‘fidelibus ad gaudium, infidis ad tormentum, ut utraque pars in contuitu quodam sese lectionis huius inspiciens, et quae rectis semitis graditur, prolapsionis casus effugiat, et quae iam cecidit, in horum se hic semper proscriptionibus recognoscat’. For this sentence, I have chosen to use Martínez Pizzaro’s translation. See Julian of Toledo, The Book of the History of Gallia, trans. by Martínez Pizarro, p. 221.

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Given that Paul’s treachery largely consisted of his misuse and disregard of ritual and customary norms, the ‘straight path’ that Julian implored his readers to follow doubtlessly included honouring and respecting what Paul had not. Besides encouraging his readers to shun treachery and to respect the actions and relationships that shaped and guided Visigothic society, Julian also suggested that a second check against social disorder was a king who scrupulously maintained correct social practice. Julian’s initial description of Wamba’s attention to sacred ritual during his election and coronation certainly established him as a good king, but it also spoke to some of the responsibilities of a new king: a keen awareness of the customs of Visigothic society and a determination to follow and protect them at all costs. In his subsequent descriptions of the civil war, Julian periodically highlighted Wamba’s concern to adhere to correct moral and social order throughout his campaign. The best example of the king’s conscientiousness is a longish scene that took place on the campaign trail, after some of Wamba’s soldiers committed the crime of rape. Wamba immediately responded with harsh punishment. Consciously echoing the story of Eli from the Old Testament, Wamba ordered the men circumcised, claiming that if he failed to punish these crimes, he would be shackled by his inaction before he even set out to war. As long as they remained ‘pure (purgati)’, Wamba assured his men, they would emerge victorious.85 In addition to envisioning Wamba as an important guardian of social and moral order, Julian also suggested that the king should hold a central role in orchestrating restoration and restitution in the wake of war and social conflict. After narrating the rebels’ surrender to the king at Nîmes, Julian depicted Wamba’s immediate attention to restoring institutional, economic, spiritual, and diplomatic order. In Nîmes, Wamba rebuilt the material and economic structures of the shattered city, and his care eventually encompassed and purified the entire province of Gallia. With material recompense and wise rule, he quashed all remnants of rebellion, so that the land ‘debauched by so much filth [and] cleansed by the new baptism of judgment may be restored to favour’.86 Wamba also appointed ‘more merciful governors’ to rule the cities of Gallia, men who were no doubt loyal to the king and would provide closer supervision of the restless province.87 85

Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 10, pp. 509–10. Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 28, p. 524: ‘constuprata tantis sordibus terra, novo iudiciorum baptismate depurgata, remitteretur ad veniam’. 87 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 28, p. 524: ‘clementiores urbibus rectores’. 86

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Wamba also rectified the rebels’ perversion of normal Visigothic relations with the saints and with the Franks. ‘Stirred by divine love [rather than] lured by the profit of avarice’, he returned the votive and liturgical treasures that Paul had stolen to their rightful shrines and churches, mending harm done to Visigothic spiritual life.88 He also treated Frankish captives courteously, keeping some as hostages and sending others home with gifts. Julian reassured his readers, however, that Wamba was no lover of Franks: in fact, Wamba was impatient for an opportunity to make war on the Franks, but was held back from such folly by his own heart and by his wise counsellors. The ‘proper’ Visigothic relationship with the Franks (a healthy dislike tempered with sage counsel and diplomacy) was duly restored. And finally, Wamba condemned Paul and his cronies and punished them in a fitting manner, trying them before his own supporters and forcing them to endure a ritually humiliating procession.89 It is not surprising that Julian chose Wamba as a guardian of social order, given long traditions of socially responsible kingship in the Visigothic realm and Wamba’s centrality to the text at hand.90 What is surprising in this text, however, is the king’s almost exclusive monopoly on the activities of social restoration after civil war. In much of official Visigothic political and religious discourse, bishops were important partners in caring for the Visigothic people, working in unison with the king to put God’s will into action.91 Although Julian asserted that many bishops supported Wamba and opposed the actions of the rebels, he made no mention of the church taking a leading role in social healing after the war was over, and in fact described a scene in which Wamba asserted his authority over a bishop in matters of pardon and clemency.92 Such a silence on the episcopal role in restoration is particularly striking in a work coming from a clergyman. Was it the text’s clear focus on Wamba that placed the king at the centre of restoration? Had rebel Gallic bishops compromised the episcopacy, making them dubious partners in Wamba’s endeavours? There is no obvious solution to the conundrum of clerical absence in the restoration 88 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 26, p. 522: ‘non avaritiae quaestu inlectus, sed amore divino provocatus’. 89 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed.  by Levison, 25, pp.  520–21 and 27, pp. 522–24 for the Franks, 30, pp. 525–26 for the punishment of Paul. 90 For example, see Isidore of Seville’s famous discussion of royal power and the responsibilities and limits involved in Sententiae, ed. by Cazier, iii.47–53, pp. 295–304. 91 For an analysis of earlier expressions of this rhetoric at the Third and Fourth Councils of Toledo, see Stocking, Bishops, Councils, and Consensus. 92 Julian of Toledo, Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Levison, 21–22, pp. 518–19.

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of Gallia, but whatever Julian’s reason, the king’s centrality to his visions of social healing must have made a significant impression on readers.

Conclusion Julian’s choice to write a complex work of historiography on the events of a single year and to attach legal and literary commentaries to his history represents a unique approach to historical writing in the early medieval West, yet the decision to limit the scope of his work allowed Julian to focus on the troubling and traumatic experience of civil war. Using such a concise and specific series of events, Julian could identify what knitted individuals and groups together into a stable kingdom by exploring a moment when social cohesion was shattered. By emphasizing oath-breaking and the perversion of election and coronation rituals at the outbreak of Paul’s usurpation, Julian highlighted the usurper’s disregard and misuse of customs intended to be instruments of harmony in fragile moments of political transition. By mentioning wider institutional, spiritual, and diplomatic problems stemming from the rebellion and usurpation, Julian hinted at the potential secondary effects of rebellion on other types of social bonds and relationships. And finally, by concluding with restoration and describing Wamba’s patient efforts to repair the damage done by the civil war, Julian offered a concise and encouraging solution to the problem of how a broken society could mend itself. In demonstrating the importance of social bonds and the actions that created and maintained them, Julian provided his textual vision of Visigothic society with a system to sustain it in daily life and to allow it flexibility in times of crisis. Julian might have cast his narrative of the recent civil war and usurpation in a classical mould, but he was also deeply invested in his own contemporary context, and he used the Historia Wambae to present a fairly concrete set of ideas as to what bound his community together, and how and why it fell apart. Through their texts, both historiographical and otherwise, early medieval authors discussed how their societies were structured and perpetuated through time, but they were not using modern ideas to do so. They had ideas of their own.

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Works Cited Primary Sources La colección canónica hispana, ed. by Gonzalo Martínez Díez and Felix  Rodríguez, Monumenta Hispaniae sacra, serie canónica, 6  vols (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Instituto Enrique Flórez, 1966–2002), v: Concilios hispanos 2 (1992); vi: Concilios hispánicos 3 (2002) Concilios visigóticos e hispano-romanos, ed.  by José Vives, España cristiana: textos, 1 (Barcelona: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1963) Crónica mozárabe de 754, ed. and trans. by José Eduardo López Pereira, Textos medievales, 58 (Zaragoza: Anubar, 1980) Felix of Toledo, S. Juliani Toletani episcopi vita seu elogium, in Patrologiae cursus completus: series latina, ed. by Jacques-Paul Migne, 221 vols (Paris, 1844–64), xcvi (1862), cols 445A–452D Isidore of Seville, Sententiae, ed. by Pierre Cazier, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 111 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1998) Iudicium in tyrannorum perfidia promulgatum, ed. by Wilhelm Levison, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), v: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici et antiquiorum aliquot, ed.  by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), pp.  529–35 (repr. with revised notes and references in Sancti Iuliani Toletanae sedis episcopi opera, ed.  by Jocelyn  N. Hillgarth, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 115.1 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1976), pp. 250–55) Judgment Pronounced against the Treachery of Usurpers, trans. by Joaquín Martínez Pizarro, in The Story of Wamba: Julian of Toledo’s ‘Historia Wamba regis’ (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005), pp. 231–40 Julian of Toledo, Epistula Pauli ad Wambam, ed.  by Wilhelm Levison, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), v: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici et antiquiorum aliquot, ed.  by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), p.  500 (repr. with revised notes and references in Sancti Iuliani Toletanae sedis episcopi opera, ed. by Jocelyn N. Hillgarth, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 115.1 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1976), p. 217) —— , Historia Wambae regis, ed. by Wilhelm Levison, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7  vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), v: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici et antiquiorum aliquot, ed.  by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), pp. 501–26 (repr. with revised notes and references in Sancti Iuliani Toletanae sedis episcopi opera, ed. by Jocelyn N. Hillgarth, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 115.1 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1976), pp. 218–44) —— , Insulatio in tyrannidem Galliae, ed.  by Wilhelm Levison, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7  vols (Hanover and Leipzig,

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1884–1937), v: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici et antiquiorum aliquot, ed.  by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), pp.  526–29 (repr. with revised notes and references in Sancti Iuliani Toletanae sedis episcopi opera, ed.  by Jocelyn  N. Hillgarth, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 115.1 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1976), pp. 244–49) —— , The Book of the History of Gallia, trans. by Joaquín Martínez Pizarro, in The Story of Wamba: Julian of Toledo’s ‘Historia Wamba regis’ (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005), pp. 178–221 —— , The Humble Historian’s Invective against the Usurpation of Gallia, trans. by Joaquín Martínez Pizarro, in The Story of Wamba: Julian of Toledo’s ‘Historia Wamba regis’ (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005), pp. 222–30 —— , ‘The Letter of Paul the Traitor’, trans. by Joaquín Martínez Pizarro, in The Story of Wamba: Julian of Toledo’s ‘Historia Wamba regis’ (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005), pp. 175–77 Leges Visigothorum, ed. Karl Zeumer, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Leges nationum Germanicarum, 5  vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1892–), i: Leges Visigothorum (Hanover: Hahn, 1894)

Secondary Works Barbero, Abilio, and Marcelo Vigil, La formación del feudalismo en la Península Ibérica (Barcelona: Editorial Crítica, 1978) Barbero, Abilio, and Maria Isabel Loring, ‘The Catholic Visigothic Kingdom’, in The New Cambridge Medieval History, ed. by David Abulafia and others, 7 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991–2005), i: c. 500–c. 700, ed.  by Paul Fouracre (2005), pp. 346–70 Castillo Lozano, José Ángel, ‘La figura del tyrannus, del rebelde, en la tradición visigoda a través de las obras de Julián de Toledo’, Herakleion, 7 (2014), 85–101 Claude, Dietrich, ‘The Oath of Allegiance and the Oath of the King in the Visigothic Kingdom’, Classical Folia, 30 (1976), 4–26 —— , Adel, Kirche und Königtum im Westgotenreich (Sigmaringen: Thorbecke, 1971) Collins, Roger, ‘Julian of Toledo and the Education of Kings in Late Seventh-Century Spain’, in Law, Culture and Regionalism in Early Medieval Spain (Aldershot: Variorum, 1992), III (pp. 1–22) Diaz, Pablo C., and Maria R. Valverde, ‘The Theoretical Strength and Practical Weakness of the Visigothic Monarchy of Toledo’, in Rituals of Power: From Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Frans Theuws and Janet L. Nelson, The Transformation of the Roman World, 8 (Leiden: Brill, 2000), pp. 59–93 Esders, Stefan, ‘Rechtliche Grundlagen frühmittelalterlicher Staatlichkeit: der allgemeine Treueid’, in Der Frühmittelalterliche Staat: Europäische Perspektiven, ed.  by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 16 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2009), pp. 423–32

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—— , ‘“Faithful Believers”: Oaths of Allegiance in Post-Roman Societies as Evidence for Eastern and Western “Visions of Community”’, in Visions of Community in the PostRoman World: The West, Byzantium, and the Islamic World, 300–1100, ed. by Walter Pohl, Clemens Gantner, and Richard Payne (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), pp. 357–74 Fouracre, Paul, ‘Francia in the Seventh Century’, in The New Cambridge Medieval History, ed.  by David Abulafia and others, 7  vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991–2005), i: c. 500–c. 700, ed. by Paul Fouracre (2005), pp. 371–96 García Herrero, Gregorio, ‘Julián de Toledo y la realeza visigoda’, in Arte, sociedad, economía y religión durante el Bajo Imperio y la Antigüedad Tardía: homenaje al Profesor Dr. D. José Ma. Blázquez Martinez al cumplir 65 años, ed. by Antonino González Blanco and others, Antigüedad y cristianismo, monografias sobre la antigüedad tardia, 8 (Murcia: Universidad de Murcia, 1991), pp. 201–55 García López, Yolanda, ‘La cronología de la “Historia Wambae”’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 23 (1993), 121–39 García Moreno, Luis A., Prosopografía del Reino Visigodo de Toledo, Acta Salmanticensia: filosofia y letras, 77 (Salamanca: Universidad de Salamanca, 1974) Guiance, Ariel, ‘Rex perditionis: la caracterización de la tiranía en la España visigoda’, Cuadernos de Historia de España, 77 (2001), 29–41 Hillgarth, Jocelyn N., ‘Introduction’, in Sancti Iuliani Toletanae sedis episcopi opera, ed. by Jocelyn N. Hillgarth, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 115.1 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1976), pp. viii–lxxiv —— , ‘Review of Suzanne Teillet, Des Goths à la nation gothique’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 39 (1988), 578–81 Hirsch, Ernst  E., ‘Über die Gesellschaftsbezogenheit des Eides’, in Festschrift für Ernst Heinitz zum 70. Geburtstag, ed.  by Hans Lüttger (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972), pp. 139–58 Jong, Mayke de, ‘Adding Insult to Injury: Julian of Toledo and his “Historia Wambae”’, in The Visigoths from the Migration Period to the Seventh Century: An Ethnographic Perspective, ed.  by Peter Heather, Studies in Historical Archaeoethnology, 4 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1999), pp. 373–89 King, Paul D., Law and Society in the Visigothic Kingdom, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, 3rd ser., 5 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972) Lear, Floyd Seyward, Treason in Roman and Germanic Law: Collected Papers (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1965) Levison, Wilhelm, ‘Einleitung’, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7  vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), v: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici et antiquiorum aliquot, ed. by Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levison (Hanover: Hahn, 1910), pp. 486–99 MacCormack, Sabine, Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity, The Transformation of the Classical Heritage, 1 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981) Martínez Pizarro, Joaquín, ‘Introductory Essay’, in Joaquín Martínez Pizarro, The Story of Wamba: Julian of Toledo’s ‘Historia Wamba regis’ (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005), pp. 3–171

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McCormick, Michael, Eternal Victory: Triumphal Rulership in Late Antiquity, Byzantium, and the Early Medieval West, Past and Present Publications (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986) Nelson, Janet L., ‘Symbols in Context: Rulers’ Inauguration Rituals in Byzantium and the West in the Early Middle Ages’, in The Orthodox Churches and the West: Papers Read at the Fourteenth Summer Meeting and the Fifteenth Winter Meeting of the Ecclesiastical History Society, ed. by Derek Baker, Studies in Church History, 13 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1976), pp. 97–119 Orlandis, José, ‘En torno a la noción visigoda de tiranía’, Anuario de Historia del Derecho español, 29 (1959), 5–43 Prodi, Paolo, Il sacramento del potere: il giuramento politico nella storia costituzionale dell’Occidente, Collezione di testi e di studi: storiografia (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1992) Rodgers, Daniel T., ‘In Search of Progressivism’, Reviews in American History, 10.4 (1982), 113–32 Sewell Jr., William H., Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation, Chicago Studies in Practices of Meaning (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005) Shoemaker, Karl, Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages, 400–1500 (New York: Fordham University Press, 2011) Stocking, Rachel L., Bishops, Councils, and Consensus in the Visigothic Kingdom, 589–633, History, Languages, and Cultures of the Spanish and Portuguese Worlds (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000) Teillet, Suzanne, Des Goths à la nation gothique: les origines de l’idée de nation en Occident du Ve au VIIe siècle, Collection d’études anciennes (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1984) —— , ‘L’Historia Wambae est-elle une oeuvre de circonstance?’, in Los Visigodos: historia y civilización, Antigüedad y cristianismo, monografias sobre la antigüedad tardia, 3 (Murcia: Universidad de Murcia, 1986), pp. 415–24 Valverde Castro, Maria R., Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real en la monarquía visigoda: un proceso de cambio, Acta Salmanticensia: estudios históricos y geográficos, 110 (Salamanca: Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca, 2000) Velázquez, Isabel, ‘Pro patriae gentisque Gothorum statu’, in Regna and gentes: The Relationship between Late Antique and Early Medieval Peoples and Kingdoms in the Transformation of the Roman World, ed.  by Hans-Werner Goetz, Jörg Jarnut, and Walter Pohl, with collaboration of Sören Kaschke, The Transformation of the Roman World, 13 (Leiden: Brill, 2003), pp. 161–217 Velázquez Soriano, Isabel, ‘Wamba y Paulo: Dos personalidades enfrentadas y una rebelión’, Espacio, Tiempo y Forma, 2nd ser., Historia Antigua, 2 (1989), 213–22

Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica and Anglian Northumbria Ian Wood

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he centrality of Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica to the development of Anglo-Saxon identity has long been the subject of a discussion that has taken the story way beyond the eighth century, up to Alfred and 1 beyond. In what follows I will not go so far in time, nor even in place. Rather, like others before me, I want to emphasize those traditions present in Bede’s own day, which challenged the notion that Northumbria — let alone the rest of England — was Anglian.2 It is only by recognizing the strength of those traditions that we can understand quite how significant Bede’s writings were in ensuring that ‘Angle’, rather than ‘Saxon’, came to be the preferred identifier for the supposedly Germanic population of the British Isles.3 It is also only by looking closely at the context in which ‘Angle’ emerged as Bede’s preferred term, that we can begin to speculate on the possible reasons for its adoption. Denis Bethell wanted to read Bede’s English Church, the Ecclesia gentis Anglorum, as the Church of Northumbria, and he was of the view that the Ecclesiastical History was basically a Northumbrian history. Enough has been

1

Foot, ‘The Making of Angelcynn’; Brooks, Bede and the English; Brooks, Anglo-Saxon Myths; Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’; Reynolds, ‘What Do We Mean by “Anglo-Saxon”’; Yorke, ‘Anglo-Saxon Origin Legends’. 2 See especially Brooks, Bede and the English. See also Cramp, ‘The Northumbrian Identity’. 3 Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 20–22. Ian Wood is Emeritus Professor of Early Medieval History at the University of Leeds. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 297–318 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118569

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written, not least by Michael Richter, to undermine this argument.4 Certainly Bede’s narrative is not exclusively Northumbrian: one might argue that Wessex, Mercia, and East Anglia get rather less attention than they deserve, and than Bede could have provided, but Kent, at least in the opening books of the Historia ecclesiastica, attracts attention. Bede’s History is undoubtedly selective, and deliberately so, but for much of the time when he talks about the gens Anglorum he means something close to ‘Anglo-Saxons’. Right at the start of the History Bede provides a geographical account which suggests that he is interested in the whole of the island of Britain.5 This he follows with his reading of the Romans in Britain, which is partly a history of persecution and then of heresy, Arian and Pelagian, followed by rebellions against Rome. This period of independence was met with attacks from the Picts and the Scots, leading to an appeal to Aëtius, a brief moment of British resurgence, and then to the recruitment of Angles and Saxons, their rebellion, and a first victory against the Angles. After this, Bede places (or rather misplaces) the visit of Germanus to drive out Pelagianism, followed by the decline of the Britons during a period of civil war.6 Most of book i is thus about the Britons, or at least Britannia, but at this point Bede switches suddenly to the arrival of Augustine, sent by Gregory the Great to convert the kingdom of Kent. The majority of the History, from book ii onwards, is essentially an account of the Northumbrian Church through the seventh century, and it actually comes close to supporting Bethell’s reading. Bede’s narrative of the sixth and seventh centuries helped to create a model of English history that came to be set in aspic in the ninth and tenth centuries, despite the attempt in the late 820s by the Welsh author of the Historia Britonnum to present a very different view of the island of Britain,7 and despite the early narrative of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, of the early 890s, which placed much more stress on the creation of the south English kingdoms, and above all Wessex — something which was, of course, inspired by the Alfredian origins of the Chronicle and the need to address the Viking threat. In fact in many ways the established narrative of early Anglo-Saxon history is an uneasy combination of this ‘tribal’ reading in the Chronicle and the ecclesiastical reading provided by Bede. 4

Richter, ‘Bede’s Angli’; Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 290–307. Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity, pp. 249–73. 6 On the oddity of Bede’s ordering of events, Wood, ‘Augustine and Aidan’, pp. 162–67. By misplacing the event Bede turns the moral failings condemned by Gildas into theological ones. 7 Higham, King Arthur. 5

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In what follows I will leave the ninth-century readings of English identity entirely to one side, and concentrate instead first on the Historia ecclesiastica and its immediate context,8 and then on the context in which Bede’s preference for ‘Angle’ first becomes apparent. In thinking about this, it is important to remember that Bede’s History is addressed to a king: Ceolwulf. It is easy to read the address as merely formal, but to do so is, I think, to fail to note a number of important issues. Ceolwulf was king from 729 until 737, but in 731/32 he was briefly deposed, only to be re-instated almost immediately. This was the moment at which Bede addressed his History to him — although, if we accept Walter Goffart’s argument, as I think we must, that the date of 731 given by Bede for the composition of the History is almost certainly too early, Bede was deliberately writing as if the king’s reign had never been interrupted.9 Bede comes back to Ceolwulf in his letter of 734, addressed to Ecgfrith, bishop, soon to be archbishop, of York.10 Here the monk urges the bishop and king to work together for the safety and salvation of the kingdom. It is at least partly in the light of this vision of religious and secular co-operation that one needs to read the Historia ecclesiastica. This is a work whose official addressee is a king, who (as we learn from the letter to Ecgbert) Bede hopes will turn out to be a reformer. To address an Ecclesiastical History to that king was entirely appropriate. In considering the History as a didactic text addressed to the court we need to remember that Bede was not writing from some isolated place, nor was he isolated from the king. In 681/82 Jarrow was a royal foundation, intended as a pro anima foundation of King Ecgfrith.11 Because he died in Pictland in 685, and was buried in Iona, Jarrow was never the mausoleum that the king seems to have envisaged. Nor did Ecgfrith’s immediate successors encourage the notion that Jarrow was his intended burial site. His half-brother, Aldfrith, who may have been hostile to him, joined Jarrow to Wearmouth, making it a secondary house, and demoting its royal connections.12 But those connections were still there. Jarrow was adjacent to what is now called Jarrow Slake, but what was known in the ninth century as the portus Ecgfridi — the harbour of Ecgfrith — and it was the best harbour in the northern English world. Across the harbour was a nunnery called the minster Ecg fridi. In all probability this nunnery had once been a male house, and the men had been transferred to Jarrow at the time 8

On this see, most recently, Higham, (Re-)Reading Bede. Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 242, 273–74, 295. 10 Bede, Epistola ad Ecgbertum episcopum, ed. by Grocock and Wood, pp. 124–61. 11 Wood, The Origins of Jarrow. 12 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. xxv–xxxii. 9

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of Jarrow’s foundation: Ecgfrith and his memory dominated this landscape. On the hill above the minster Ecg fridi was the great Roman fort of Arbeia — certainly ruined, or robbed, to an extent, for some of its stones had been used for the building of Jarrow13 — but part of it apparently still being used as a royal residence. There are archaeological finds which could support the early-renaissance tradition that Urfa, apparently the Old English name for the site, had been a house of Northumbrian kings.14 Directly across the Tyne was the equally royal monastery of Tynemouth, in all probability the burial place of at least one Northumbrian king, Oswine.15 Under these circumstances the royal origins of Jarrow would not be forgotten. The endlessly repeated notion that Jarrow was a daughter/sister-house of Wearmouth, and that from Jarrow’s foundation they were intended to be a combined pair, was a legal fiction that Bede knew to be false, even though he stated it frequently: the two houses were put together perhaps after the death of Ecgfrith, perhaps after that of the founder of Wearmouth, Benedict Biscop. The community of Wearmouth-Jarrow had its share of men with close connections to the court established before they became monks. In addition to Benedict Biscop, and the second abbot Eosterwine,16 there is the shadowy figure of Witmer.17 Although Bede himself was a child oblate, there are reasons for thinking that his parents had been associated with the royal court.18 Members of Wearmouth-Jarrow, quite apart from the abbots, continued to have such links. There is a shadowy group within the combined community that appears to have had inside knowledge of the murder of King Osred in 716. This at least seems to be implied by a passage in Bede’s Commentary on the Book of Samuel.19 And the episode of Osred’s murder seems to have been central in leading Bede’s mentor and abbot, Ceolfrith, to retire to Rome in 716 (not that he got that far — he died in Langres).20 13 Turner, Turner, and Semple, Wearmouth and Jarrow, p. 157. Stone was also probably taken from Segedunum/Wallsend. 14 Bidwell and Speak, Excavations at South Shields Roman Fort, i, 42. 15 Wood, The Origins of Jarrow, pp. 23–24. 16 Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chaps 1, 8, pp. 22–25, 40–43. 17 Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 15, pp. 56–61. 18 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. lxi–lxii. 19 Thacker, ‘Bede, the Britons and the Book of Samuel’, p. 146. 20 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. xxxix–lxiii.

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Returning to the 730s, King Ceolwulf may well have been regularly resident at Arbeia/Urfa. If this were the case, Bede as an inmate of the community of Jarrow would have lived within sight of one of the principal royal residences of the kingdom. He was, therefore, writing for a king, and the king was not a distant figure, but a man that he thought he could influence, just as he could influence his bishop, Ecgbert. These connections with the centre of power mean that Bede’s depiction of England, and more particularly Northumbria, is not that of an outsider, thinking in isolation. And since, as we will see, there seems to have been disagreement over the ‘ethnic’ identity of the Northumbrian kingdom, we must envisage Bede as being involved in a high-status debate on the matter. In chapter 15 of book i of his Historia ecclesiastica Bede famously talks about three gentes, or as he calls them in this particular passage populi, migrating to England: ‘Advenerant autem de tribus Germaniae populis fortioribus, id est Saxonibus, Anglis, Iutis’.21 Most traditional accounts of the origins of the Anglo-Saxons derive from this. Of course the list is problematic: Bede himself immediately complicates it: of Jutish origin are the Cantuari and Uictuarii: of Old Saxon (Antiqui Saxones) origin, the Orientales Saxones, the Meridiani Saxones, and the Occidui Saxones: and of Anglian origin, the ‘Orientales Angli, Mediterranei Angli, Merci, tota Nordanhymbrorum progenies, id est illarum gentium quae ad boream Humbri fluminis inhabitant, ceterique Anglorum populi’. This list is made even more problematic later on in Bede’s account. In the ninth chapter of book v he claims that the Continental peoples from whom the Anglo-Saxons were drawn ‘sunt autem Fresones, Rugini, Danai, Hunni, Antiqui Saxones, Boructuarii’.22 This second list is not easy to square with the first: and one should perhaps not try to do so. The first, tripartite, division of the English comes in Bede’s expansion of Gildas’s account in the De excidio Britonum, according to which the Saxons came to Britain in three ships.23 The second list comes in the list of the Continental peoples related to the Anglo-Saxons that the Northumbrian monk Ecgbert, resident in Ireland, intended to evangelize. It surely originates in traditions associated with Ecgbert’s pupil Willibrord.24 The lists have different origins and different functions in Bede’s narrative.

21 22 23 24

Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, i.15, p. 50. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, v.9, p. 476. Gildas, De excidio Britonum, ed. by Winterbottom, chap. 23.3, p. 97. Wood, ‘Before and after the Migration to Britain’, pp. 41–45.

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One should also note a quite separate representation of the peoples of Britain, reflecting Bede’s own research, which comes at the start of book i of the Historia ecclesiastica, where he talks initially not of peoples, but of ‘quinque gentium linguae: […] Anglorum videlicet Brettonum Scottorum Pictorum et Latinorum’, though when in the same chapter he goes on to talk of the early peoples of Britain he talks of only three groups, Britons, Picts, and Irish.25 The evidence, then, suggests a very fluid ‘ethnic’, or perhaps one should say ‘gentile’, terminology in late seventh- and early eighth-century England. Even if we stick with the evidence just for Northumbria we can complicate the matter yet further. As Peter Hunter Blair noted, quite apart from talking of the Northumbrians as Angli, Bede (and others) also described them by reference to the river Humber. Indeed they start as a Humbrian people, and only gradually become Northumbrian as they lose control of Lindsey and Southumbria to Mercia. We thus have a shift from Humbrenses, to Transhumbrenses and Nordhumbrenses.26 But this is not the only vocabulary used by Bede, or indeed by other early writers, including the Welsh poets, for the peoples of the territory north of the Humber, which divide into at least two groups, the Deiri and Bernicii: the men of the region round York (or perhaps Malton) and a group living closer to the Tyne and Hadrian’s Wall.27 Hunter Blair tried to identify the border between the provinces of these two groups,28 though the frontier between the Bernicii and Deiri in Bede is actually fluid, and sometimes the Bernicii can be found as far south as the Tees. Perhaps importantly, Bede never uses the territorial terms Bernicia or Deira: instead he talks of peoples, Bernicii and Deiri, and their provinces: what we are looking at is zones of influence associated with particular powerful families and their followings, rather than clearly demarcated regions.29 Should we attempt to derive any information about early Northumbria from this varying terminology? The answer is probably yes, though it should not be taken to have any biological significance. Archaeologically early Northumbria is problematic. There are a few ‘Anglian’ cemeteries on the Humber, so we can infer a certain influx of Continentals in the fifth century.30 If we move a little further north we find rather fewer such cemeteries. If we turn to the burials 25 26 27 28 29 30

Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, i.1, p. 16. Hunter Blair, ‘The Northumbrians and their Southern Frontier’, pp. 100–04. Breeze, ‘The Origin of the Name “Deira”’; Breeze, ‘The Name of Bernicia’. Hunter Blair, ‘The Boundary between Bernicia and Deira’. Wood, ‘Monasteries and the Geography of Power in the Age of Bede’, pp. 11–13. Eagles, The Anglo-Saxon Settlement of Humberside.

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from West Heslerton, a settlement on the River Derwent to the north-east of York and Malton, the current assessment of the population, based on stable isotope analysis, is that 60 per cent was indigenous, 20 per cent did come from across the North Sea, but an equal percentage came from across the Pennines.31 Information of this sort, of course, is problematic in many ways: but clearly, even a mere few miles in from the North Sea there were not large numbers of incomers in what would be part of the central zone of Northumbria. If we move further north still, to the land of the Bernicii, there is a comparative absence of early Germanic cemeteries.32 The cemetery evidence from Bamburgh, moreover, suggests a yet more diverse population than was found at West Heslerton, which no doubt reflects the importance of the site as a royal centre, adjacent to a major religious foundation. It is no more indicative of a major influx from the traditional homelands of the Anglians.33 And it is worth noting that there is no Germanic origin legend for Northumbria. The Historia Brittonum, compiled in the Welsh kingdom of Gwynedd in the late 820s, gives us genealogies for the kings of the Bernicians and Deirans, but provides no indication of where the dynasties originated.34 It also claims that Ida, the son of Eobba, took over Bamburgh, an event that is dated to 547 in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which is the nearest that the Alfredian text comes to giving the Northumbrians an origin story,35 but there is no telling whether there is any truth in the information. Even if the tradition is genuine, we do not learn where Ida originated. Moreover, Bernicii and Deiri are both Celtic names, as indeed are other such names of tribal units in the Northumbrian area: we hear, for instance of the territory of Rheged and of Elmet, two British kingdoms incorporated into Northumbria in the course of the seventh century. Elmet, the centre of which probably lay marginally to the east of modern Leeds, must have set the early western boundary to the power of the Deiri, although it was taken over by its 31

Budd and others, ‘Investigating Population Movement by Stable Isotope Analysis’, pp. 135–36. 32 For the distribution of Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in England (as known in 2000), see Lucy, The Anglo-Saxon Way of Death, p. 2. For an analysis of the Northumbrian cemeteries, Lucy, ‘Changing Burial Rites in Northumbria’. 33 Groves and others, ‘Mobility Histories’. Here, out of a sample of seventy-eight bodies, seven were local, nine were from northern England or southern Scotland, twenty-three were from western Scotland or Ireland, twenty-eight were from southern England or Northern Europe: twelve might have been from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, southern Germany, the Alpine region, and, in two instances, the Mediterranean or North Africa. 34 Historia Brittonum, ed. by Morris, chaps 61–65, pp. 78–80. 35 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. and trans. by Whitelock, Douglas, and Tucker, s.a. 547, p. 12.

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eastern neighbours as early as the 630s:36 Rheged, further to the north-west, bordered the Bernicii, although its total extent is unknown,37 as indeed is the process of its incorporation into Northumbria.38 In the light of the recent archaeology of Hadrian’s Wall, and especially of Birdoswald, where a sequence of rebuilding took place over the fifth and sixth centuries, converting the granary area of the Roman fort to a large timber hall,39 it is perfectly possible that the Bernicii were primarily the indigenous population, which would include descendants of limitanei of the Wall zone,40 a percentage of whom were already Germanic by the third century, to judge from the surviving inscriptions of the region.41 It is certainly possible that rather than being primarily the creation of a fifth- or sixth-century migration from the Continent, whether or not the ruling dynasties came from abroad, Northumbria grew out of two Roman military zones, around York/ Malton and around the Wall — zones which had Celtic names.42 For the territory of the Bernicii we get possible indications of this in the archaeology, above all of Birdoswald, but also of Arbeia. It is important, however, to note that the evidence does not prove absolute continuity, but rather the intermittent post-Roman exploitation of surviving Roman material.43 And we can also see a recourse to British traditions at the palace site of Yeavering.44 For Deiran exploitation of Roman resources we have the, admittedly ambiguous, evidence from York,45 and we also have an intriguing cluster of material in 36

Historia Brittonum, ed. by Morris, chap. 63, p. 79. McCarthy, ‘Rheged’. 38 Orton, Wood, and Lees, Fragments of History, pp. 121–24. 39 Wilmott, ‘The Late Roman Transition at Birdoswald and on Hadrian’s Wall’. 40 Dark, ‘The Late Roman Transition in the North’; O’Brien, ‘The Emergence of Northumbria’; Roberts, ‘Northumbrian Origins and Post-Roman Continuity’. 41 Orton, Wood, and Lees, Fragments of History, p. 114. For the possibility that there were Germanic-language-speakers in the Wall zone during the empire, see Roberts, ‘Northumbrian Origins and Post-Roman Continuity’, p. 133, following Oppenheimer, Origins of the British, fig. 7.1a. 42 How this change might have taken place is the subject of much theorizing : see Wilmott, ‘The Late Roman Transition at Birdoswald and on Hadrian’s Wall’; Dark, ‘The Late Roman Transition in the North’; Esmonde Cleary, ‘Summing up’; O’Brien, ‘The Emergence of Northumbria’; Roberts, ‘Northumbrian Origins and Post-Roman Continuity’; Wood, ‘Concluding Remarks’. 43 Dark, ‘The Late Roman Transition in the North’: Esmonde Cleary, ‘Summing up’. 44 Hope-Taylor, Yeavering. 45 Phillips and Heywood, From Roman Fortress to Norman Cathedral. 37

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and around Hovingham, the site of what was unquestionably a major Roman villa, which seems from its place name (boasting the Germanic element ‘hof ’) to have become the site of an Anglo-Saxon royal residence, and one moreover that came to be surrounded by a group of royal monasteries.46 It is worth remembering these hints of an underlying Roman past when looking at Bede’s Romanizing picture of the Deiran king Edwin.47 In considering this RomanoCeltic background one should probably also note that joining the territories of the Bernicii and the Deiri was a Roman road known already in the ninth century as Dere Street: the road of the Deiri. 48 It was along this route that most of the major battles of the pre-Viking North took place: at Catraeth (between the men of Gododdin and a mixed group including Saxons, according to Aneirin),49 Hæthfelth, Deniseburn, and the Winwaed (the last three between the Northumbrians and a Welsh–Mercian alliance).50 In addition battle was prepared at Wilfaræsdun, again near Catterick (Catraeth), between the Bernician and Deiran kings, Oswiu and Oswine, albeit the encounter never took place.51 When considering the Northumbrians as people who came to define themselves not by the British names Deiri and Bernicii but as Anglians in the course of the seventh century, there may be an interesting parallel to be drawn with the situation in Wessex, where we find a shift from the use of the term Gewissae to West Saxon, noted by Bede.52 If Gewissae is a British rather than Germanic term — and the question is much debated53 — there may here be evidence of a deliberate re-presentation of a mixed Germano-British polity as specifically Saxon. In fact, when considering this shift of terminology we should pause before saying that the peoples of Wessex saw themselves as Saxon. That may be how 46

Wood, ‘Monasteries and the Geography of Power in the Age of Bede’, pp. 16–18. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, ii.16, p. 192. 48 Schütte, Our Forefathers, ii, 228. 49 Aneirin, Gododdin, ed. and trans. by Koch, pp. xxxv–xlii. 50 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed.  by Colgrave and Mynors, ii.20, pp.  202–07; iii.1, pp. 212–15; iii.24, pp. 288–95. For the identification of Hæthfelth, Breeze, ‘633 and the Battle of Hatfield Chase’; for the Winwaed, Breeze, ‘The Battle of the Uinued and the River Went’. Deniseburn is traditionally identified as Rowley Burn, just south of the crossing of the Tyne, near Hexham. 51 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, iii.14, pp. 254–61. 52 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, iii.7, pp. 232–37. 53 At present a Germanic origin for the word seems to be preferred: Coates, ‘On Some Controversy surrounding Gewissae/Gewissei, Cerdic and Ceawlin’. 47

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they come to be depicted in the Ecclesiastical History, and in the Chronicle, but in Ine’s Law of the seventh century they are English (Englisc).54 Moreover, as Patrick Wormald pointed out in 1983, the West Saxon Boniface understood the term English, Angli, to encompass the whole Anglo-Saxon population:55 only once does he talk about ‘gens Anglorum et Saxonum in Britannia insula’,56 while in his letters the term ‘Saxon’ on its own is almost limited to the Continental Saxons.57 The one exception is that in describing the Northumbrian missionary Willibrord (who we might have expected to be described as an Angle) Boniface calls him ‘presbiter quidam mirae abstinentiae et sanctitatis generis Saxonum’.58 This same question of ‘Angle’ or ‘Saxon’ also crops up in Northumbria. Bede, as we have noted, sees the population of Northumbria (like those of East Anglia and Mercia) as Anglian, distinguishing them from the Saxons of the South — though ‘Angle’ is also his preferred term for the whole population group of what we would call the Anglo-Saxons, and this is true not only in the Ecclesiastical History, but also in some other earlier works, such as the Historia abbatum.59 The Chronica maiora, which constitutes the sixty-sixth chapter of the De temporum ratione, written around 725, modifies this slightly in that talking of the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons in Britain Bede refers to the incomers as coming from the ‘gens Anglorum sive Saxonum’.60 Yet since he is here following, and modifying, Gildas, who talks only of Saxons, the introduction of and priority given to the Angles is surely significant. Moreover this is the only appearance of the Saxons in the Greater Chronicle: when Augustine arrives in Kent he comes to convert the Angli, as in Bede’s main source, the Register of Gregory the Great, as well as the Ecclesiastical History.61 In his earlier work on time, the De temporibus of 703, however, Bede in describing the Gregory mis54

Ine’s Law, ed. by Attenborough, 24, 46.1, 54.2, 74. Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, p. 122. See Boniface, Epistolae, ed. by Tangl, nos 33, 46, 73, 74, 78, pp. 56–58, 74–75, 147–56, 161–70. 56 Boniface, Epistolae, ed. by Tangl, no. 80, pp. 172–80. 57 Boniface, Epistolae, ed. by Tangl, nos 46, 47, 60, 101, pp. 74–75, 120–25, 224–25. 58 Boniface, Epistolae, ed. by Tangl, no. 109, pp. 234–36. 59 Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chaps  1, 5, 6, 23, pp. 22–25, 32–37, 72–75. 60 Bede, De temporum ratione, ed. by Jones, 61, p. 517; see the comments of Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 15. 61 Bede, De temporum ratione, ed. by Jones, 61, p. 523: Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, ii.1, pp. 122–35. 55

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sion had talked of the conversion not of the Angles, but of the Saxons: ‘Saxones in Brittania fidem Christi suscipiunt’.62 Bede is not the only monk of Wearmouth-Jarrow to describe the Northumbrians as Angles. For instance, the anonymous author of the Vita Ceolfridi, written shortly after Bede’s History of the Abbots (arguably with the intention of putting a slightly different gloss on the history of the monastery of Wearmouth-Jarrow), 63 uses the same terminology. 64 Perhaps the most notable of the occasions on which Angli is used in the Vita Ceolfridi comes in the author’s transcription of the dedicatory poem inscribed into the Codex Amiatinus, which describes Ceolfrith as ‘Anglorum extremis de finibus abbas’.65 Since the manuscript in question was the pandect of the Bible that the retiring abbot intended to present to the Holy See, it would appear that Ceolfrith himself, like his hagiographers, Bede and the Anonymous, preferred ‘Angle’ to ‘Saxon’. We find the same preference in another source of the same period, the anonymous Life of Gregory the Great, written at Whitby in the first years of the eighth century, less than a dozen years earlier than the Historia abbatum. It is also in the Life of Gregory that we first hear the story that the pope saw Anglian boys for sale in the market in Rome: on asking who they were, and discovering that they were Angles, he supposedly commented that they were not Angles but angels.66 The same story is told in Bede, albeit with slight differences.67 It is, therefore, clear that there were those in Northumbria who, like Bede, regarded the population as Anglian.68 It has even been suggested that Bede was deliberately borrowing the vocabulary used by the Whitby hagiographer.69 The author of the Life of Gregory, coming from Whitby, lived in the heart of the land of the 62

Bede, De temporibus, ed. by Jones, chap. 22, p. 611; see the comments of Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 18–19. For the date of the De temporibus (and for the De temporum ratione) I have followed Darby, Bede and the End of Time, pp. 17, 20. 63 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. lxi–lxiv. 64 Vita Ceolfridi, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 27, pp. 106–07. 65 Vita Ceolfridi, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 37, pp. 116–19. 66 Vita Gregorii, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, chap. 9, p. 90; Thacker, ‘Memorialising Gregory the Great’, p. 62; Dailey, ‘The Vita Gregorii and Ethnogenesis in Anglo-Saxon Britain’. 67 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, ii.1, pp. 122–35. 68 Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 17, downplays the extent to which the term ‘Angle’ was used, wrongly to my mind: he rather underestimates the cumulative evidence of the Vita Gregorii, the Vita Ceolfridi, and the dedication to the Codex Amiatinus. 69 Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 19–20.

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Deiri (whilst Ceolfrith, his hagiographer, and Bede lived among the Bernicii). Moreover, the Life of Gregory is very largely concerned to promote the memory of King Edwin,70 who was a member of the Deiran dynasty, rather than the Bernician dynasty which dominates the pages of Bede. We can, thus, be sure that the notion that the Northumbrians were Anglians was held in both the main zones of the kingdom, regions dominated initially by different leading dynasties — and that this was the case even before Bede wrote the Historia abbatum and the Historia ecclesiastica. Yet while Bede and the anonymous author of the Life of Gregory chose to talk of the Northumbrians as Angles, this was not the choice of Stephen of Ripon in his Life of Wilfrid, a choice, one might argue, that is all the more surprising given the pro-Roman attitudes of the saint — Stephen was intent on presenting Wilfrid as the most Roman of all the Northumbrian churchmen of his generation, and it is probable that this was also the impression intended by Wilfrid.71 One might have expected Stephen to have adopted the terminology associated with Gregory the Great72 — or indeed that of Pope Agatho, whose reference to the ‘Anglorum et Brittonum necnon Scottorum et Pictorum gentes’ he transcribes.73 Far from it: the word ‘Angle’ scarcely appears in the Vita Wilfridi. Although it is not certain that Stephen knew the Life of Gregory, it would appear that he (and perhaps Wilfrid before him) deliberately chose the term ‘Saxon’, even if in so doing he ignored standard papal vocabulary. For Stephen of Ripon the northern kingdom was a Saxon one and not Anglian (and one might note that one pope, Vitalian, agreed).74 Nor can we dismiss Stephen as being out on a limb.75 The anonymous Life of Cuthbert — a text against which, it has been suggested, Stephen was reacting76 — states that the saint was forcibly elected to the see of Lindisfarne ‘ab Egfrido rege et episcopis Saxorum [sic] omnique senatu deposcenti’.77 Thus, even in the oldest ecclesiastical centre of the Bernicii, at the end of the seventh and the 70

Karkov, ‘Whitby, Jarrow and the Commemoration of Death’. Stephanus, Vita Wilfridi, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, chap. 47, pp. 94–99. 72 Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, p. 124. 73 Stephanus, Vita Wilfridi, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, chap. 53, p. 114. 74 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, iii.29, pp. 318–23; for an explanation of Vitalian’s choice, Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 17. 75 Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 17. 76 Goffart, The Narrators of Barbarian History, pp. 281–85; Stancliffe, ‘Dating Wilfrid’s Death and Stephen’s Life’. 77 Vita Cuthberti, ed. and trans. by Colgrave iv.1, p. 110; Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 16. 71

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start of the eighth century the Northumbrian Church was regarded as Saxon. It is a detail that Bede leaves out entirely in his version of Cuthbert’s Life. More surprising is the evidence to be found in another of his own works, which is supported by the anonymous Life of Ceolfrith. When Ceolfrith, the founding abbot of Jarrow, and the first abbot of the combined house of Wearmouth and Jarrow, decided to relinquish his position and to retire to Rome, he set off for the papal see with a letter of recommendation from his successor Hwaetbert. In his History of the Abbots of Wearmouth-Jarrow Bede transcribes the first part of this letter, in which Hwaetbert describes himself as ‘the abbot of the community of St Peter in the land of the Saxons’.78 The same portion of the letter is included in the Life of Ceolfrith.79 When we put this evidence alongside that of the dedicatory poem to the Codex Amiatinus, it would appear that, in 716 at least, Abbot Ceolfrith preferred the term ‘Angle’ while his successor, Hwaetbert, preferred ‘Saxon’.80 The fact that Bede and the anonymous author of the Vita Ceolfridi did not alter Hwaetbert’s language when copying out the abbot’s letter to the pope, despite their own preference for the term ‘Angle’, is scarcely surprising. The Historia abbatum was probably written within months of Ceolfrith’s departure, during the winter of 716–17,81 while the anonymous Life of the abbot was apparently written soon after: Hwaetbert was very much alive. The two authors could scarcely have done anything other than copy out their abbot’s terminology. And just as Ceolfrith could be presented to a pope as Saxon and not as an Angle, so too Boniface, we might remember, described another Northumbrian visitor to the Holy See, Willibrord, as a Saxon.82 Despite the divergence between Ceolfrith and Hwaetbert in their use of terminology, it may not be surprising that the latter used the term ‘Saxon’: indeed it may be that we should regard the verbal choice made by the Whitby author of the Life of Gregory, Bede, the anonymous author of the Vita Ceolfridi, and the abbot himself in his dedication to the Codex Amiatinus, as the more remarkable. Ceolfrith, the master of both Hwaetbert and Bede, had himself been a pupil of Wilfrid.83 To find the same terminology in a letter of Hwaetbert as one 78

Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 19, pp. 66–69; Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 17. 79 Vita Ceolfridi, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 30, pp. 108–11. 80 Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 20. 81 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. xviii–xxii. 82 Boniface, Epistolae, ed. by Tangl, no. 109, pp. 235–36. 83 Vita Ceolfridi, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 3, pp. 80–81.

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finds in Stephen of Ripon suggests that there was a strong opinion throughout Northumbria that the kingdom was not Anglian, but Saxon. Moreover, that opinion was clearly held by men who were very close to court circles. Wilfrid may have fallen out with a series of kings, but he was unquestionably well connected at court.84 And, as we have seen, the council that appointed Cuthbert to the see of Lindisfarne is also presented in the first Life of the saint as Saxon rather than Anglian.85 In addition, as we have already noted, Bede himself had used the term ‘Saxon’ in his De temporibus of 703.86 Thus the sources for Northumbria present us with a very interesting division of opinion within the highest levels of Northumbrian society. On the one side we have Wilfrid, Stephen, Hwaetbert, and, to judge by the Vita Cuthberti, the Northumbrian Church in council (that is the king and his bishops), apparently regarding the people of the kingdom as Saxon; and on the other there are Ceolfrith, the anonymous author of the Life of Gregory the Great (probably together with the leading figures of the community of Whitby, which included members of the ruling dynasty),87 the equally anonymous author of the Vita Ceolfridi, in addition to Bede himself, who preferred to think of their nation as ‘Angle’. In an important article published in the Festschrift for Wallace-Hadrill in 1983 Patrick Wormald argued that Bede’s use of the term ‘Angle’ looked back to Gregory the Great’s usage, and that the pope had adopted it following his period of residence in Constantinople, for Angloi was the standard term used in Byzantium of the Germanic settlers in Britain, while in the West the invaders of Britain were usually referred to as Saxons.88 Nor was Bede alone in picking up the papal terminology: as we have seen, it is already present in Boniface’s writings.89 This is certainly a persuasive line of argument, although it does not address the problem of why Wilfrid and his circle should have used the word ‘Saxon’ rather than ‘Angle’. If adoption of the term ‘Angle’ was above all an indication of an affiliation with Gregory the Great and Rome, Wilfrid would have been as likely to have picked it up as did the anonymous author of the 84 Stephanus, Vita Wilfridi, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, chaps 2, 3, 7–8, pp. 4–9, 14–19; Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, iv.19, pp. 390–97. 85 Vita Cuthberti, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, iv.1, p. 110. 86 Bede, De temporibus, ed. by Jones, chap. 22, pp. 607–11. 87 Karkov, ‘Whitby, Jarrow and the Commemoration of Death’, pp. 130–31. 88 Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, p. 124; Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 13–14. 89 Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, p. 122.

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Life of Gregory or as Bede himself. One might argue that Whitby’s adoption of the term ‘Angle’ came as a result of the community’s links with Archbishop Theodore,90 and that the enmity between him and Wilfrid was enough to lead the latter to prefer the term ‘Saxon’ to ‘Angle’. But Theodore was certainly not the only figure who is likely to have championed papal usage. Nicholas Brooks, following Wormald, has pointed to Canterbury influence more generally.91 Yet we should also remember the figure of Benedict Biscop, founder of Wearmouth, who not only went to Rome six times, but also served as a guide for Theodore and Hadrian on their journey to Britain, and acted as abbot of the monastery of Sts Peter and Paul in Canterbury during the period that Hadrian was detained in Francia.92 Like Wilfrid, he could boast a privilege from Pope Agatho, which no doubt called the Northumbrians Angli.93 Biscop is as likely a figure to have championed the papal usage as anyone — and, as we have seen, Bede’s first deployment of the Angle/angel pun comes in his description of the founder of Wearmouth.94 The best that we can say is that in the late seventh and early eighth centuries Northumbrians, even those with a strong adherence to Rome and the papacy, were divided over how to identify the people to which they belonged. It may well be that the reason for Bede’s preference for the term ‘Angle’ was simply that it was the word used by Gregory the Great.95 The fact that it was not adopted by Stephen of Ripon (despite Wilfrid’s Romanizing concerns) or by Hwaetbert (in his letter addressed to Gregory II, despite the dedication of the Codex Amiatinus), however, suggests that papal usage on its own is not enough to explain Bede’s choice — even if we may conclude that the triumph of the definition of the Northumbrians as Anglian is a reflection of the influence of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History after his death. 96 But we may be able to hypothesize a little further in order to understand why the anonymous Whitby author, Ceolfrith, Bede (at least by 716), and those after him, preferred to see Northumbria as Anglian. Perhaps the pun over the words ‘Angle’ and angel, 90

Thacker, ‘Memorialising Gregory the Great’, pp. 75–78. Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, p. 125; Brooks, Bede and the English, p. 19. 92 Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 3, pp. 26–29. 93 See Stephanus, Vita Wilfridi, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, chap. 53, pp. 108–15. 94 Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 1, pp. 22–25. 95 Wormald, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, p. 124: Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 13–14. 96 Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 20–22. 91

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which is at the core of the story of Gregory the Great in the marketplace,97 is enough to explain why the term ‘Angle’ became more attractive than ‘Saxon’. The name itself suggested the salvation of the people, as indeed the story of Gregory in the marketplace makes abundantly clear. Moreover the Angle/angel pun is not confined to the Historia ecclesiastica and the Life of Gregory. Bede implies a link of Angli/angeli not only in the story of Gregory and the slave boys, but also in his comments at the start of the Historia abbatum on the life of Benedict Biscop, founder of Wearmouth, where the abbot is presented as a member of the gens Anglorum who wished to merit the consortia angelorum.98 Perhaps Bede learnt the marketplace story from the Life of Gregory, which was written no more than twelve years before the History of the Abbots,99 but it may be that the pun existed quite separately from the story. This salvation reading may have been especially attractive for those who were doubtful about the religious standards of the Northumbrians (an opinion expressed by Bede himself most forcibly in his letter to Bishop Ecgbert).100 It may have been equally attractive to those who doubted that God was supporting the Northumbrians in their conflict against the Britons and the Picts, especially when the latter in particular also opted to align themselves with the Catholic Church, and thus shook themselves free of the stigma of heresy.101 Recent scholarship has brought home quite how fearful Bede was of the North Britons, as no doubt were many others.102 Although we know with hindsight that the British threat would fade, that was not obvious in the early eighth century. Indeed Bede, in his Commentary on Samuel, written in the years 716–17, speculated that the Philistines rather than the Israelites were the gens salvanda, and, since he seems to have associated the Philistines with the Britons (because of their heretical beliefs) and the Israelites with the Northumbrians in his own mind, this conclusion must have been rather alarming.103 If the Northumbrians did not reform themselves, they might be deserted by God, who had already 97

Vita Gregorii, ed. and trans. by Colgrave, chap. 9, p. 90; Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, ii.1, pp. 122–35. Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 19–20. 98 Bede, Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, chap. 1, pp. 22–25. 99 Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. xliii–xliv; Brooks, Bede and the English, pp. 19–20. 100 Bede, Epistola ad Ecgbertum, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. 124–61. 101 Bede, Historia ecclesiastica, ed. by Colgrave and Mynors, v.21, pp. 532–53. 102 Stancliffe, Bede and the Britons; Thacker, ‘Bede, the Britons and the Book of Samuel’. See also Trent Foley and Higham, ‘Bede on the Britons’. 103 Bede, In I Samuhelem, ed. by Hurst, xxvii.1–28.2. See Wood, ‘Who Are the Philistines?’.

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turned from the Israelites, and, indeed more recently, from the Britons, according to Gildas, whose reading of fifth-century events Bede had taken over directly. In the light of such concerns the notion that the Northumbrians were Angles, or rather, in Gregory the Great’s interpretation, angels, may well have been a rather comforting piece of wishful thinking. The angels in Bede, like the monsters in Beowulf, matter.104 There is a case for thinking that it was the crisis years of the second decade of the eighth century that provided the context for Bede’s adoption of the term ‘Angle’. He was not the first person to use it: as we have seen, it was common in papal documents; it is also present in the Vita Gregorii. In 703, probably shortly before the composition of the Life of Gregory, however, Bede was still referring to ‘Saxons’.105 Moreover, he was probably not the first member of the Wearmouth-Jarrow community to have adopted the term ‘Angle’: it is likely that it appeared in Agatho’s privilege for Wearmouth, and may thus have been the word preferred by Benedict Biscop. It is certainly already in the dedicatory verses to the Codex Amiatinus, which must antedate the Historia abbatum by some months. Further, although the author of the Vita Ceolfridi, who preserves the verses, was following Bede, his work is independent in many ways, and he was quite prepared to take a different line when he wished.106 He, therefore, is a third figure who deliberately used the term ‘Angle’ around 716/17, a period which saw a major British threat as well as the murder of Osred: indeed the latter was on campaign against the Britons when he was killed. This was also the time in which Bede was writing the Commentary on Samuel.107 The atmosphere of crisis around the time may well have underlain the preference for ‘Angle’ to ‘Saxon’. Regardless of how many incomers there may have been from the Continent, the descriptor which came to be used above all others to identify the people of Northumbria would thus seem to have nothing to do with any Continental origins, or indeed with biological ethnicity. Of course there were Continental incomers, who may or may not have included the ancestors of the Deiran and Bernician dynasties, and some may have come from south Jutland, the supposed land of the Angles, but they were certainly not the numerically dominant group in Northumbria. If there were such incomers the Northumbrians themselves did not remember them. Unlike the peoples of southern England, 104 105 106 107

Tolkien, ‘Beowulf’. Bede, De temporibus, ed. by Jones, chap. 22, pp. 607–11. Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. lxi–lxiv. Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Grocock and Wood, pp. xxxix–xliii.

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the men of Kent, Sussex, Wessex, or East Anglia, the Northumbrians did not develop an origin legend which involved a sea crossing: Ida went to Bamburgh, but where he came from was not a matter of significance. In fact, there would seem to have been lots of ways of defining the people, or rather peoples, of the Northumbrian kingdom. Among them there were those who were identified by the Celtic terms Deiri and Bernicii (which probably more accurately reflects the origins of a substantial proportion of the population): there were the men of Elmet and those of Rheged. The term Northumbrian itself was (like these Celtic terms) a geographical descriptor: originally there had been men of the Humber, then of the Humber zone, and then, after the loss of territory, those of the lands to the north of the Humber. That one supposedly ‘ethnic’ term won out, and that that term was Angli, would, however, seem to have more to do with salvation history than with biology. The Northumbrians were Angles, because they were like angels, and that was a reassuring message: it was also a message that was stated at length in the Historia ecclesiastica, where Bede presents a picture of the British Eden, lost by the sinful and, more important, heretical Britons, and won by the AngloSaxons. Yet there was an ongoing possibility that, like the Israelites, the Saxons might lose the support of God, and that the Philistines, aka the Britons, might become the gens salvanda: with that possibility in mind it was reassuring to think that a pope had identified the Northumbrians not as Angles but angels. A term which would seem initially to have been championed to advance an image of salvation history became established as the standard ‘ethnic’ descriptor for the peoples of the North of England.

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Works Cited Primary Sources Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, ed. and trans. by Christopher Grocock and Ian  N. Wood, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 2013) Aneirin, The Gododdin of Aneirin: Text and Context from Dark-Age North Britain, ed. and trans. by John Thomas Koch (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1997) Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. and trans. by Dorothy Whitelock, David  C. Douglas, and Susie I. Tucker, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: A Revised Translation (London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1965) Bede, In I Samuhelem, ed. by David Hurst, Beda Venerabilis: Opera exegetica 2, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 119 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1962) —— , Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. by Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969) —— , De temporum ratione, ed.  by Charles William Jones, Beda Venerabilis opera, vi: Opera didascalica 2, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 123B (Turnhout: Brepols, 1977) —— , De temporibus, ed.  by Charles William Jones, Beda Venerabilis opera, vi: Opera didascalica 3, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 123C (Turnhout: Brepols, 1980) —— , Epistola ad Ecgbertum episcopum, ed. and trans. by Christopher Grocock and Ian N. Wood, in Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 2013), pp. 124–61 —— , Historia abbatum, ed. and trans. by Christopher Grocock and Ian N. Wood, Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 2013), pp. 22–75 Boniface, Epistolae, ed.  by Michael Tangl, Monumenta Germania Historica: Epistolae selectae, 5 vols (Berlin and Weimar, 1916–52), i: S. Bonifatii et Lulli epistolae (Berlin: Weidmann, 1916) Gildas, De excidio Britonum, ed. and trans. by Michael Winterbottom, Gildas: The Ruin of Britain and Other Documents (Chichester: Phillimore, 1978), pp. 13–79, 87–142 Historia Brittonum, ed.  and trans. by John Morris, in Nennius: British History and the Welsh Annals (London: Phillimore, 1980), pp. 9–43, 50–84 Ine’s Law, ed. and trans. by Frederick L. Attenborough, in The Laws of the Earliest English Kings (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922), pp. 36–61 Stephanus, Vita Wilfridi, ed. and trans. by Bertram Colgrave, The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1927) Vita Ceolfridi, ed. and trans. by Christopher Grocock and Ian  N. Wood, in Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, Oxford Medieval Texts (Oxford: Clarendon, 2013), pp. 77–121 Vita Cuthberti, ed. and trans. by Bertram Colgrave, Two Lives of Saint Cuthbert (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940) Vita Gregorii, ed. and trans. Bertram Colgrave, The Earliest Life of Gregory the Great by an Anonymous Monk of Whitby (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968)

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Secondary Works Bidwell, Paul T., and Stephen Speak, Excavations at South Shields Roman Fort, Newcastle Society of Antiquaries Monograph, 4 (Newcastle: Society of Antiquaries, 1994), i Budd, Paul, and others, ‘Investigating Population Movement by Stable Isotope Analysis: A Report from Britain’, Antiquity, 299 (2004), 127–41 Breeze, Andrew, ‘The Origin of the Name “Deira”’, Transactions of the Yorkshire Dialect Society, 29 (1997), 35–39 —— , ‘The Battle of the Uinued and the River Went’, Northern History, 41 (2004), 377–83 —— , ‘The Name of Bernicia’, The Antiquaries Journal, 89 (2009), 73–79 —— , ‘633 and the Battle of Hatfield Chase’, Northern History, 51 (2014), 177–82 Brooks, Nicholas, Bede and the English, Jarrow Lecture 1999 ( Jarrow: St Paul’s Rectory, 1999) —— , Anglo-Saxon Myths: State and Church, 400–1066 (London: Hambledon, 2000) Coates, Richard, ‘On Some Controversy Surrounding Gewissae/Gewissei, Cerdic and Ceawlin’, Nomina, 13 (1990), 1–11 Cramp, Rosemary, ‘The Northumbrian Identity’, in Northumbria’s Golden Age, ed. by Jane Hawkes and Susan Mills (Stroud: Sutton, 1999), pp. 1–11 Dailey, Erin Thomas  A., ‘The Vita Gregorii and Ethnogenesis in Anglo-Saxon Britain’, Northern History, 47 (2010), 195–207 Darby, Peter, Bede and the End of Time (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012) Dark, Ken, ‘The Late Roman Transition in the North: A Discussion’, in The Late Roman Transition in the North, ed. by Tony Wilmott and Peter Wilson, British Archaeological Reports, British Series, 299 (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2000), pp. 81–88 Eagles, Bruce  N., The Anglo-Saxon Settlement of Humberside, British Archaeological Reports, British Series, 68, 2 vols (Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, 1979) Esmonde Cleary, A. Simon, ‘Summing up’, in The Late Roman Transition in the North, ed. by Tony Wilmott and Peter Wilson, British Archaeological Reports, British Series, 299 (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2000), pp. 89–94 Foot, Sarah, ‘The Making of Angelcynn: English Identity before the Conquest’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6 (1996), 25–49 Goffart, Walter, The Narrators of Barbarian History (A.D. 550–800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988) Groves, Sara E., and others, ‘Mobility Histories of 7th–9th Century AD People Buried at Early Medieval Bamburgh, Northumberland, England’, American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 151 (2013), 462–76 Higham, Nicholas, King Arthur: Myth-Making and History (London: Routledge, 2002) —— , (Re-)Reading Bede: The Ecclesiastical History in Context (London: Routledge, 2006) Hope-Taylor, Brian, Yeavering: An Anglo-British Centre of Early Northumbria (London: HMSO, 1977) Hunter Blair, Peter, ‘The Boundary between Bernicia and Deira’, Archaeologia Aeliana, 27 (1949), 46–59 (repr. in Peter Hunter Blair, Anglo-Saxon Northumbria, ed. by Michael Lapidge, Variorum Collected Studies Series, 192 (London: Ashgate, 1984), V)

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—— , ‘The Northumbrians and their Southern Frontier’, Archaeologia Aeliana, 26 (1948), 98–126 (repr. in Peter Hunter Blair, Anglo-Saxon Northumbria, ed.  by Michael Lapidge, Variorum Collected Studies Series, 192 (London: Ashgate, 1984), IV) Karkov, Catherine E., ‘Whitby, Jarrow and the Commemoration of Death’, in Northumbria’s Golden Age, ed. by Jane Hawkes and Susan Mills (Stroud: Sutton, 1999), pp. 126–35 Lucy, Sam, ‘Changing Burial Rites in Northumbria’, in Northumbria’s Golden Age, ed. by Jane Hawkes and Susan Mills (Stroud: Sutton, 1999), pp. 12–43 —— , The Anglo-Saxon Way of Death (Stroud: Sutton, 2000) McCarthy, Michael, ‘Rheged: An Early Historic Kingdom near the Solway’, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 132 (2002), 357–81 Merrills, Andrew H., History and Geography in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) O’Brien, Colm, ‘The Emergence of Northumbria: Artefacts, Archaeology and Models’, in Finds from the Frontier: Material Culture in the 4th–5th Centuries, ed. by Rob Collins and Lindsay Allason-Jones, Council for British Archaeology Research Report, 162 (York: Council for British Archaeology, 2010), pp. 110–09 Oppenheimer, Stephen, Origins of the British (London: Robinson, 2006) Orton, Fred, Ian N. Wood, and Clare Lees, Fragments of History: Rethinking the Ruthwell and Bewcastle Monuments (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2007) Phillips, Derek, and Brenda Heywood, Excavations at York Minster, i, From Roman Fortress to Norman Cathedral, ed. by Martin Oswald Hugh Carver (London: HMSO, 1995) Reynolds, Susan, ‘What Do We Mean by “Anglo-Saxon” and “Anglo-Saxons”’, Journal of British Studies, 24 (1985), 395–414 Richter, Michael, ‘Bede’s Angli: Angles or English?’, Peritia, 3 (1984), 99–114 Roberts, Brian K., ‘Northumbrian Origins and Post-Roman Continuity: An Exploration’, in Finds from the Frontier: Material Culture in the 4th–5th Centuries, ed.  by Rob Collins and Lindsay Allason-Jones, Council for British Archaeology Research Report, 162 (York: Council for British Archaeology, 2010), pp. 120–32 Schütte, Gudmund, Our Forefathers: The Gothonic Nations: A Manual of the Ethnography of the Gothic, German, Dutch, Anglo-Saxon, Frisian and Scandinavian People, trans. by Jean Young (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1933), ii Stancliffe, Clare, Bede and the Britons, Fourteenth Whithorn Lecture (Whithorn: Friends of the Whithorn Trust, 2007) —— , ‘Dating Wilfrid’s Death and Stephen’s Life’, in Wilfrid, Abbot, Bishop and Saint: Papers from the 1300th Anniversary Conferences, ed. by Nicholas Higham (Donington: Paul Watkins, 2013), pp. 17–26 Thacker, Alan, ‘Memorialising Gregory the Great: The Origin and Transmission of a Papal Cult in the Seventh and Eighth Centuries’, Early Medieval Europe, 7 (1998), 59–84 —— , ‘Bede, the Britons and the Book of Samuel’, in Early Medieval Studies in Memory of Patrick Wormald, ed.  by Stephen Baxter and others (Farnham: Ashgate, 2009), pp. 129–47 Tolkien, J.  R.  R., ‘Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics’, Proceedings of the British Academy, 22 (1936), 245–95

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Trent Foley, William, and Nicholas Higham, ‘Bede on the Britons’, Early Medieval Europe, 17 (2009), 154–85 Turner, Sam, Alex Turner, and Sarah Semple, Wearmouth and Jarrow: Northumbrian Monasteries in an Historic Landscape (Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press, 2013) Wilmott, Tony, ‘The Late Roman Transition at Birdoswald and on Hadrian’s Wall’, in The Late Roman Transition in the North, ed. by Tony Wilmott and Peter Wilson, British Archaeological Reports, British Series, 299 (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2000), pp. 13–23 Wood, Ian N., ‘Before and after the Migration to Britain’, in The Anglo-Saxons from the Migration Period to the Eighth Century, ed.  by John Hines (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1997), pp. 41–54 —— , ‘Augustine and Aidan: Bureaucrat and Charismatic’, in L’Église et la mission au VIe siècle, ed. by Christophe de Dreuille (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 2000), pp. 148–79 —— , The Origins of Jarrow: The Monastery, the Slake and Ecgfrith’s Minster ( Jarrow: Bede’s World, 2008) —— , ‘Monasteries and the Geography of Power in the Age of Bede’, Northern History, 45 (2008), 11–25 —— , ‘Concluding Remarks – Some Comparative Observations’, in Antike im Mittelalter: Fortleben, Nachwirken, Wahrnehmung, ed. by Sebastian Brather and others (Ostfildern: Thorbecke, 2014), pp. 443–48 —— , ‘Who Are the Philistines? Bede’s Readings of Old Testament Peoples’, in The Resources of the Past in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Clemens Gantner, Rosamond McKitterick, and Sven Meeder (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), pp. 172–87 Wormald, Patrick, ‘Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Origins of the Gens Anglorum’, in Ideal and Reality in Frankish and Anglo-Saxon Society, ed.  by Patrick Wormald (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983), pp. 99–129 (repr. in Patrick Wormald, The Times of Bede, 625–865: Studies in Early English Christian Society and its Historian (Oxford: Blackwell, 2006)) Yorke, Barbara, ‘Anglo-Saxon Origin Legends’, in Myth, Rulership, Church and Charters: Essays in Honour of Nicholas Brooks, ed.  by Julia Barrow and Andrew Wareham (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), pp. 15–30

Historical Writing in the Lombard Kingdom: From Secundus to Paul the Deacon Walter Pohl

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ompared to the relative wealth of historiographical and other narrative texts produced in Merovingian Gaul or (post-)Visigothic Spain between the late sixth and the late eighth centuries, the contemporary Italian evidence is rather scarce.1 While Bruno Krusch edited seven MGH volumes of the Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum (SRM), the one volume of the Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum predominantly consists of texts written after 800 (although, unlike the SRM, it mostly does not contain the hagiography written in Italy before that date).2 However, we should not take this as proof for deficient literacy under Lombard rule — laws and charters, for

1 Like this volume as a whole, my own research profited greatly from the SFB F 42-G18, ‘VISCOM’, funded by the FWF, and from my research environment at the Institute for Medieval Research at the Austrian Academy of Sciences and at the History Department of the University of Vienna. For an overview of the historical context of Lombard historiography, see Pohl, ‘Memory, Identity and Power’. 2 MGH Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, ed.  by Krusch and Levison, 7  vols; MGH Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum, ed. by Waitz. The Italian hagiographic production of the Lombard period is significantly smaller than that of Merovingian Gaul, but also less known because it lacks a comprehensive edition. See Everett, ‘The Hagiography of Lombard Italy’; Vocino, ‘Looking up to Rome’.

Walter Pohl is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Vienna and director of the Institute for Medieval Research at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Historiography and Identity II: Post-Roman Multiplicity and New Political Identities, ed. by Gerda Heydemann and Helmut Reimitz, CELAMA 27 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 319–349 BREPOLS PUBLISHERS 10.1484/M.CELAMA-EB.5.118570

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instance, were issued regularly and are quite well preserved.3 But it has become a commonplace that without Paul the Deacon’s Lombard History, written after the fall of the Lombard kingdom in the late eighth century, we would have relatively little to rely on for the history of the Lombard kingdom.4 Thus, a work of Carolingian convergence is our main platform from which to assess post-Roman multiplicity in Italy.5 Paul incorporated the two most important shorter historiographical texts written in the first century of Lombard rule into his work: the Historiola by Secundus of Trento, which is otherwise lost, and the Origo gentis Langobardorum. He repeatedly refers to Secundus, who wrote his Historiola for Queen Theodelinda at the beginning of the seventh century.6 Secundus was a monk from Trento who became the queen’s advisor in matters of church policy and baptized her son Adaloald. He is very likely also the Secundinus ‘servus Dei inclausus’ who in 599 wrote to Pope Gregory the Great about the Three-Chapters Controversy. Gregory would hardly have responded to a humble monk with a long letter full of excuses for not sending the requested dossier about the Three Chapters; his efforts only become understandable if this letter exchange took place in the context of the pope’s negotiations with Theodelinda to obtain a truce with the Lombards.7 It is tempting to attempt a reconstruction of Secundus’s lost work from Paul’s text.8 From what we can guess, it may have resembled the roughly contemporary chronicles of John of Biclaro or Marius of 3

Everett, Literacy. Geary, ‘Longobardi’. 5 See Reimitz, Kramer, and Ward, eds, Historiography and Identity, iii. 6 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed.  by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.29, p. 108: ‘Secundus, qui aliqua de Langobardorum gestis scripsit’. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.40, p. 133: ‘Sequenti quoque mense martio defunctus est aput Tridentum Secundus servus Christi, de quo saepe iam diximus, qui usque ad sua tempora succinctam de Langobardorum gestis conposuit historiolam’. Judging from Paul’s excerpts, his work ended in c. 610/12. He must have died soon after, for in his role as Theodelinda’s monastic adviser, he was replaced by Columbanus, who already in 613 wrote a letter to the pope about the schism at her request: Columbanus, Letters, ed. and trans. by Walker, 5, pp. 36–55; see also Columbanus, Letters, ed. and trans. by Walker, pp. xxxvii–xxxix, for dating and commentary. On Secundus, see Pohl, ‘Secundus’. 7 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.27, p. 125; Gregory the Great, Registrum epistolarum, ed. by Norberg, ix.148 (599), ii, 698–704. Pohl, ‘Heresy in Secundus’; Mores, Invasioni d’Italia, pp. 241–72. 8 Heath, The Narrative Worlds, pp. 185–87, attempts a reconstruction, and ascribes twelve of Paul’s chapters in the third book, and thirteen in the fourth book (p. 201) to Secundus. 4

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Avenches, and could well have had an annalistic structure: Paul’s frequent use of ‘eodem tempore’, ‘hoc anno’ and similar expressions in the chapters probably taken from Secundus suggests a rather firm chronological grid, from which Paul omitted the dates.9 Christopher Heath was very cautious about ascribing Paul’s passages to Secundus; but for many cases which he excluded, there is no convincing alternative source. For instance, I would include the panegyric statement about the reign of Theodelinda’s first husband Authari among the traces of Secundus’s text: And that was indeed wonderful in the Lombard kingdom: there was no violence, no plotting and deceit; nobody extorted unjust services from another, nobody took spoils; there were no thefts, no robberies; everybody arrived where he pleased, secure and without fear.10

Theodelinda advocated a policy of peaceful integration of the Lombards into Italian society, which Secundus supported. At that time it apparently still seemed feasible that the Lombard kingdom should grow to become late Roman: in 604 Adaloald, Theodelinda’s infant son, was raised to the kingship by his father Agilulf in the circus of Milan in Byzantine fashion.11 The Origo gentis Langobardorum presents a rather different historiographical model.12 It starts with the origin myth: Gambara, the wise woman who leads the Vinnili, intercedes with the goddess Frea before a fateful battle against the Vandals. Frea persuades Wodan to grant victory to the Vinnili, and Wodan also gives them a new name, ‘Langobardi’ (Longbeards), when he sees their women wearing fake beards on the battlefield. The text continues with a Lombard kinglist including brief narrative passages, ending with King Perctarit’s accession in 671. I have argued elsewhere that its main redaction may well have been connected with Queen Gundeperga, who was Theodelinda’s daughter and 9

John of Biclaro, Chronica, ed. by Mommsen, trans. by Wolf; Marius of Avenches, Chronica, ed. by Mommsen. For an annalistic structure of Secundus’s work, Gardiner, ‘Paul the Deacon’. 10 Paul the Deaon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.16, p. 101: ‘Erat sane hoc mirabile in regno Langobardorum: nulla erat violentia, nullae struebantur insidiae; nemo aliquem iniuste angariabat, nemo spoliabat; non erant furta, non latrocinia; unusquisque quo libebat securus sine timore pergebat’. Heath, The Narrative Worlds, p. 186, does not ascribe this chapter to Secundus (but to which other source?). The same applies to the praise of Theodelinda in Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.5–6, pp. 117–18 (iv.6 is certainly not from the Origo gentis Langobardorum as Heath claims). 11 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.30, p. 127. 12 Origo gentis Langobardorum, ed. by Waitz; or ed. by Bracciotti; Pohl, ‘Origo gentis Langobardorum’; in general, Pohl, ‘Narratives’.

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also the wife of the promulgator of the first Lombard law-code, King Rothari (636–52).13 She owed her position to descent in the female line from an earlier Lombard dynasty. Unlike many other early medieval king-lists or brief chronicles, the Origo gentis Langobardorum consistently mentions each ruler’s queen(s) and the name of the dynasty, also a relatively unusual feature.14 Gundeperga’s Frankish connections because of her descent in the male line from the Frankish family of the Bavarian dukes could also explain why a version of the myth is contemporaneously found in Fredegar.15 The Origo is a puzzling text: a seemingly straightforward and unrefined statement of ethnic identity, without direct reference to classical history or ethnography, and with an exclusive interest in the emergence of the gens Langobardorum. It displays none of the educated baggage of longer works with a similar focus: Jordanes’ Getica with its heavy load of Scythian, Getic, and Dacian identifications; Isidore’s Gothic history that swiftly places the Goths both in a biblical matrix (Gog and Magog) and in a post-Roman/post-barbarian Hispanic context; or the Liber historiae Francorum with its Trojan lore and early history of Frankish–Roman confrontations.16 The seemingly archaic narrative has usually been taken as proof of the Origo’s authentic ‘Germanic’ character. But the text does follow the classical model of origo gentis, and claims a Lombard origin from the ‘vagina nationum’ of classical ethnography, Scandinavia. Francesco Borri has argued that the Origo, similar to Rothari’s edict, artfully constructed the barbarian otherness of the Lombards, in a clear break with Theodelinda’s policy of integration.17 This is an attractive hypothesis; the seventh century was a time when actual cultural differences eroded and the Lombard elites may well have felt the need to assert their distinctiveness. On the one hand, the Romans in Northern Italy had lost touch with their classical high-cultural models, and on the other hand, the Lombard elite gradually adapted to the post-Roman cultural koiné in the former provinces of the Western Empire, as evidenced, for instance, by the disappearance of lavish grave-goods from burials. But we should not conclude that the Origo is simply a pseudo-barbarian fake. Its information can be cross-checked for events reaching back to the end of the 13

Pohl, ‘Gender and Ethnicity’. Pohl, ‘Genealogy’. 15 Fredegar, Chronicae, ed. by Krusch, iii.65, p. 110. 16 Jordanes, Getica, ed. by Mommsen, pp. 53–82; Isidore, History, trans. by Wolf, prologue and 1–2, pp. 81–83; Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Krusch, 1–4, pp. 241–44. Pohl, ‘Narratives’; Yavuz, ‘From Caesar to Charlemagne’. 17 Borri, ‘Romans Growing Beards’. 14

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fifth century, and its descriptions of even earlier events contain material that could hardly have been made up by educated Romans. If it is unlikely that the seventh-century Lombards still faithfully conserved the memory of events and locations from more than half a millennium ago, as older scholarship assumed, it is as unlikely that they lived in Italy completely oblivious of their barbarian past, as it has become fashionable to believe.18 The impact of the Origo gentis Langobardorum is difficult to assess. It is remarkable that in the two southern Italian manuscripts transmitting the Origo, the narrative breaks off with Perctarit; only in a copy of the lawbook compiled by Lupus of Ferrières for Duke Eberhard of Friuli in Modena does the line of kings proceed up to the death of Charlemagne.19 The king-list therefore does not seem to have been continued regularly after Perctarit, but to have been added by a Carolingian compiler. All three manuscripts of the Origo have survived in Lombard lawbooks.20 This suggests some sort of official function for the text, although other manuscripts of Lombard law do not contain it. Paul the Deacon wrote that he, too, found the text in a law codex and copied the origin myth into his history despite branding it a ‘ridicula fabula’.21 It is possible that the rather barbarian vision of the Origo lost its appeal soon after it had been compiled in its extant form, and in any case the extended version in Paul’s history superseded it. In the early ninth century a shorter, Christianized origin narrative, the Historia Langobardorum codicis Gothani, competed with it, and was integrated into another version of Eberhard’s lawbook, now in Gotha.22 The Origo was most successful in the Lombard south, where Paul wrote his History, and where two of the Origo’s three surviving manuscripts were preserved. After the end of the kingdom in the north, the principate of Benevento studiously maintained its Lombard traditions, and once again the barbarian past became a sign of distinction. 18

On Lombard oral traditions in the HL, see Ghosh, Writing the Barbarian Past, pp. 121–40. There may be literary influences on some stories that he regards as oral (for instance, the story of Moses for the birth of Lamissio, p. 128), but they can hardly all be explained away. 19 Pohl, Werkstätte, p. 129. 20 Two of them are eleventh-century copies from southern Italy, one of them probably compiled at Montecassino in the years after 1000 (Cava, BdB, MS 4), the other one later in the century in Byzantine Bari (Madrid, BNE, MS 413). The third witness comes in a copy of the comprehensive lawbook compiled by Lupus of Ferrières for Eberhard of Friuli in the ninth century (Modena, Biblioteca Capitolare, MS O.I.2). See Pohl, Werkstätte, pp. 117–29; Origo gentis Langobardorum, ed. by Bracciotti, pp. 57–84. 21 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, vii–xi, pp. 52–53. 22 Historia Langobardorum codicis Gothani, ed. by Waitz, pp. 7–11.

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Another short seventh-century historiographic text, adding to Prosper’s continuation of Eusebius/Jerome, was edited by Mommsen in the context of the Consularia Italica under the title Auctarii Havniensis extrema; it was written in the seventh century, most likely in connection with the Lombard court, for it contains a copy of a funerary inscription in a church in Pavia.23 It begins with a garbled account of the end of Ostrogothic rule and ends with the usurpation of the exarch Eleutherius in 619,24 the death of King Agilulf in 616 and the reign of his son Adaloald under Theodelinda’s guidance. It also contains material from the first redaction of Isidore’s Chronicle which was finished in 616/1725 and later additions on the reign of Heraclius in the East, obviously compiled in the thirtieth year of Heraclius, 640/41.26 At that point, the Eastern Empire still provided the fundamental timeline; and both Isidore’s Chronicle and scraps of correct information from Constantinople were available in Pavia.27 Secundus and the short chronicle in the Copenhagen manuscript are the last exponents of a long-standing late antique tradition of smaller-scale historiography that could attach itself directly (as in the Copenhagen manuscript) or indirectly to earlier ‘chains of chronicles’, thus locating the Lombard kingdom within the fading framework of the empire.28 No historiographical texts are known from Lombard Italy in the second century of its kingdom apart from Paul the Deacon’s early work, the Historia Romana, based on Eutropius and written in the later 760s.29 There is no indication in Paul’s Lombard history as to where he had obtained material about the period between the end of Secundus’s Historiola and the death of King Liutprand in 744, when his history ends. Yet his narrative must have relied on lists of the kings and dukes with some substantial information about their deeds in Pavia, Cividale, and Benevento. Had there been a more accomplished work of history at his disposal, he would probably have mentioned it, just as he introduces Secundus’s Historiola and the Origo as his sources. Paul also had reliable 23

Auctarii Havniensis extrema, ed. by Mommsen. For the date, see Kaegi, Heraclius, p. 93. 25 See the introduction in Isidore, Chronica, ed. by Martín, p. xxxiv. 26 Auctarii Havniensis extrema, ed. by Mommsen, p. 339. 27 For East–West connections in the early seventh century, see Esders, ‘Kingdoms of the Empire’. 28 Ian Wood, ‘Chains of Chronicles’. 29 Goffart, Narrators, p. 337, quite plausibly dates it to 770; it may also have been written in the late 760s. In the dedication, Duchess Adelperga had three children, while she had only one in Paul’s 763 poem for her, and had five that were grown up in 787. 24

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material about the succession of rulers in Byzantium and the Frankish realms at hand. It is likely that such information was available in Pavia, perhaps also in Benevento. From a remark in the Historia Langobardorum we know that there were grammarians at the court in Pavia; around 700, King Cunincpert held Felix in high esteem, who was the uncle of Paul’s teacher (praeceptor) Flavianus.30 This illustrious line of preceptors, or other court scholars whose names have not come down to us, may well have built up such resources as Paul would have required for his history. As he professed his intention to continue the Historia Romana in 763, he probably already collected material at that point. Paul, a leading scholar of his age, wrote his Historia Langobardorum towards the end of his life, and after the conquest of the Lombard kingdom by Charlemagne.31 The Historia is thus as much a work of Carolingian erudition (to which Paul contributed significantly) as of post-Roman ‘barbarian’ culture.32 This transitional position is also relevant for the constitution of the Latin text in the edition. Remarkably, the Latin of the oldest manuscripts (the Assisi Palimpsest and St Gall 635, both dated to c. 800) is quite unclassical, with marked influences of spoken Latin.33 Later manuscripts are grammatically and orthographically more correct. Should this particularity be attributed to the copyists? The St Gall codex, perhaps originally from Verona, certainly is not a high-quality manuscript and was written by ten different scribes, but it had clearly also been corrected with the source in hand.34 Waitz commented: ‘Bethmann refused to ascribe to the author what the manuscripts presented’, 30

Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, vi.7, p. 167: ‘Eo tempore floruit in arte gramatica [sic] Felix, patruus Flaviani praeceptoris mei; quem in tantum rex dilexit, ut ei baculum argento auroque decoratum inter reliqua suae largitatis munera condonaret’. 31 I use the MGH edition by Bethmann and Waitz. There are two more recent, slightly revised editions: one is the Latin/Italian edition by Lidia Capo; the other is a Latin/German edition by Wolfgang F. Schwarz, who relied much on Capo. Several further Latin/Italian editions of the Historia Langobardorum have appeared in past decades, which documents the importance of the text in the canon of Italian history. 32 Cf. Hen, Roman Barbarians. 33 See the online facsimile of StiBSG, MS 635 at [accessed 1 September 2019]; Waitz’s MS F1, Historia Langobardorum, ed.  by Bethmann and Waitz, p.  35. According to Waitz, Assisi (Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, p. 28) and St Gall ‘gehören einer Classe an, die durch auffallende Orthographie und grammatische Uncorrectheit sich vor den anderen hervorthut’, Waitz, ‘Überlieferung’, p. 559. 34 Waitz, ‘Überlieferung’, p. 547. For details, see von Scarpatetti, Die Handschriften, i, 247–48.

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and used the later Cividale manuscript as the basis of his edition (A1).35 Dante Bianchi, however, condemned Waitz’s choice of a manuscript that still contained mistakes as contradicting the ‘spirit’ of Paul the Deacon: ‘Waitz’s is not the critical edition of the Historia Langobardorum, but of its two most incorrect remnants’.36 Lidia Capo was of a similar opinion, and sought to correct at least some of the unclassical Latin found in the manuscripts.37 Indeed, we know that Paul was a leading grammarian of his time, knew classical Latin well, and contributed to the Carolingian reform of Latin.38 Capo therefore believed that the ‘errors’ must be copyists’ mistakes. The task of a future edition, she argued, would be to ascertain where Paul used a classical form in another of his writings and to correct the Historia Langobardorum accordingly. That, however, assumes a homogeneity of written language that was only established in the nineteenth century, and then projected back onto medieval languages in many philological disciplines. Michel Banniard has detected five different registers of written Latin between classical and spoken language in texts from the Carolingian period.39 It is perfectly possible that Paul used registers in the Historia Langobardorum that differed from his grammatical or other writings. In southern Italy after 774 (perhaps also in the North), he may have written for an audience unconvinced by the Carolingian reform agenda which he had catered to in Francia. We should not forget that Caroline minuscule was also slow to gain ground in Northern Italy, and was never adopted in the south. An edition should not obscure complex linguistic traces by purging the ‘bad’ Latin of the manuscripts. We know a fair amount about Paul’s life from his own writings, although a number of contentious issues remain.40 For instance, only by a combination of weak hypotheses and mistakes did his death date become fixed to 799. 35

Waitz, ‘Überlieferung’, p. 560. ‘Quella del Waitz non é l’edizione critica della Historia Langobardorum: sibbene l’edizione critica dei suoi due più scorretti manenti’. Bianchi, ‘Per il testo’, p. 135. 37 Capo, ‘Introduzione’, pp. xlix–l; similarly, Schwarz, ‘Einleitung’, at pp. 103–09. 38 For the reform of Carolingian Latin, Wright, Late Latin; Wright, ed., Latin and the Romance Languages; McKitterick, The Carolingians and the Written Word, pp.  10–20; for Paul as a grammarian, McKitterick, The Carolingians and the Written Word, p. 18; Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur, i, 264–65. 39 Banniard, Viva voce; see also Wright, Early Ibero-Romance; Wright, A Sociophilological Study. 40 About Paul’s biography, see Goffart, Narrators, pp.  333–47; Capo, ‘Introduzione’, pp. xviii–xxix; Leonardi, ‘La figura’; Heath, The Narrative Worlds, pp. 24–33; Pohl, ‘Paul the Deacon’, pp. 111–13; Capo, ‘Paolo Diacono’. 36

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Starting with Mabillon, scholars often observed that there was no mention of Charlemagne’s rise to emperorship in the Historia Langobardorum. This is not a strong argument, because Charlemagne is not mentioned at all in the Historia, which ends in 744. Yet it was used to argue that the text must have been finished in 799 at the latest. Many also believed that the Historia Langobardorum had remained unfinished because it was not taken up to 774, which is not unlikely.41 Most scholars then concluded that Paul must practically have died pen in hand. In this way, the hypothetical death date of 799 crept into the handbooks. This, in turn, was seemingly confirmed with the help of the edition of the Necrologies of Montecassino; the manuscript only gives the day of death, 13 April. The next step was a publication by Angelo Pantoni, a monk and scholar in Montecassino, who combined the attested day with the hypothetical year into the seemingly exact date of 13 April 799.42 Indeed, two large conferences on the occasion of the supposed 1200th anniversary of Paul’s death were held in Italy in 1999.43 At one of them, I argued that the Historia Langobardorum must have been written before 796, because Paul says about the Gepids that they ‘groan even up to the present time in bondage to a grievous mastery, since the Huns possess their country’.44 This ‘grievous mastery’ collapsed after the Frankish attacks in 795/96, which provides a clear terminus ante quem for the publication of the Historia Langobardorum.45 Paul spent his life at or in the orbit of the ducal courts of Friuli and Benevento, at the Lombard royal court at Pavia, and a few years in the magnetic sphere of Charlemagne’s court in Francia. But his learning and political experience were never matched by the kind of career he had hoped for, and he ended his life a monk and deacon at Montecassino, not always able even to afford his scribe.46 For Paul, poverty was not only a spiritual condition that he shared with all Christians,47 but a real issue. From some remarks in the Historia Langobardorum we may infer that at some point his ambition had been to hold a responsible 41

Goffart, Narrators, p. 344; contrary opinion in Heath, The Narrative Worlds, p. 116. I Necrologi Cassinesi, ed. by Inguanez, i; Pantoni, Introduzione, p. 100; used, among others, by Corbato, ‘Paolo Diacono’; Luiselli, ‘La società longobardica’. 43 Chiesa, Paolo Diacono; Paolo Diacono e il Friuli altomedievale (secc. VI–X), i. 44 ‘Usque hodie Hunnis eorum patriam possidentibus duro imperio subiecti gemunt’, Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, i.27, pp. 69–70; trans. by Foulke, p. 72. 45 Pohl, ‘Paolo Diacono’, pp. 413–26. 46 Paul the Deacon, Carmina, ed. by Neff, xxxi, p. 129. Pohl, ‘Paul the Deacon’, p. 117. 47 Goffart, Narrators, p. 337. 42

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position at St John the Baptist, Theodelinda’s foundation in Monza; he attributed no less than the fall of the Lombard regnum to the fact that unworthy clerics at that church had squandered the saint’s protection of the kingdom.48 The patchy patronage of the Lombard court at Pavia may help to explain why, after a few years of misgivings about the regime change in 774, Paul opened up to the broader perspectives of Frankish rule. After a lifetime of changing political constellations, Paul balances a number of options and possible identifications in his Lombard History. The work’s diverse interpretation in modern scholarship is perhaps the best indicator of its plurality. Paul has been variously depicted as a Germanic nationalist, a Lombard patriot, a devout Catholic, a partisan of Charlemagne, or even an advocate of a Byzantine takeover. In fact, Paul carefully balanced all these identifications in his work, and it is possible to analyse some of the subtle textual devices and strategies of truth that he used to ease the resulting contradictions. Because of his careful management of multiple identifications, Paul offers a particularly interesting case for studying historiographical constructions of identity. As shown at greater length in my first contribution to this volume, most nineteenth- and earlier twentieth-century scholars regarded early medieval historians as rather unsophisticated compilers of any texts that happened to be available. By implication, this meant that early medieval historians could be treated as reliable witnesses to the material their histories contained. If they mostly used texts that could also be found elsewhere, their histories were deemed of little worth. If they transmitted fragments of works otherwise lost, they were valued for that. Those whose accounts could not be traced back to any recognizable earlier work were scrutinized for evidence that their narrative was based on oral traditions, which were per se considered ‘authentic’. This was certainly the case with Paul the Deacon, who was credited with having preserved ‘the original narrative tone (ursprünglicher Erzählton) of Lombard legends’.49 In Italian research, debate on Paul’s Historia was most vivid in the postwar period, but most scholars emphasized his Lombard patriotism and the largely Germanic orientation of his work. Piero Silverio Leicht (1953) called him a ‘teutone arrabbiato’ (furious Teuton), but without a ‘profound sense of 48

Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, v.6, p. 147. The unprocessed addition of his sources, ‘das unverarbeitete Aneinanderfügen seiner Quellen’ gave access to the ‘ursprünglicher Erzählton’: Hampe, ‘Paulus Diaconus’, p. 398; this assessment was adopted by the handbooks of Wattenbach, Levison, and Löwe, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen, ii, 224; and Brunhölzl, Literatur, i, 264; similarly, Jacobi, Die Quellen der Langobardengeschichte, p. 3. 49

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a Germanic community’ because of his thirst for revenge against the Franks.50 Dante Bianchi (1954) found him ‘proudly Lombard’.51 Raffaello Morghen (1974) regarded him as ‘proud to belong to the German race’.52 Lidia Capo saw the Historia Langobardorum as a reaction to ‘violent papal anti-Lombard polemic’, and as the ‘only comprehensive testimony’ of Lombard ‘global Germanic culture, carried by a people as a whole’.53 It is surprising to read that this assessment is based on the observation that ‘the narrative is rigorously centred on the Lombards’.54 According to the calculation by Christopher Heath, 54 per cent of the work is devoted to the Lombards alone; the rest deals with non-Lombard Italy, Byzantium, the Franks, and other matters.55 Gustavo Vinay pioneered a more aesthetic and existential view of Paul, and defined the Historia Langobardorum as ‘un mito per sopravvivere’, a myth for survival.56 Indeed, at the time when Paul was writing, the Lombard kingdom, at whose royal court he had been educated, had passed into the hands of the Franks. Those wishing to preserve their status as Lombards after 774 were faced with a choice of three options: rebel, join the winners, or retreat to Benevento. Paul the Deacon’s brother chose the first option and joined the revolt of Hrodgaud in Friuli in 776; after its defeat, he was deprived of his possessions. Paul wrote a poem to Charlemagne in 782 in which he asked for forgiveness and the restitution of his family’s estates.57 The second option was to transfer one’s loyalty to Charlemagne, who had now become rex gentis Langobardorum (and who was the first Lombard ruler to use that title in his royal charters).58 This is how Andreas of Bergamo described it a hundred years later in a lively dialogue among Lombard nobles:

50

Leicht, ‘Paolo Diacono’, pp. 70–71 and p. 73. Bianchi, ‘L’epitaffio’, p. 58. 52 Morghen, ‘La civiltà dei Longobardi’, p. 17. A rather ‘Germanic’ interpretation of Paul can also be found in Cingolani, Le storie dei Longobardi. 53 Capo, ‘Introduzione’, p. xvii. 54 Capo, ‘Introduzione’, p. xxix. 55 Heath, The Narrative Worlds, p. 124 and pp. 122–23 (table). 56 Vinay, ‘Un mito per sopravvivere’; on Vinay, see Mores, ‘Come lavorava Paolo Diacono’. 57 Paul the Deacon, Versus Pauli ad regem praecando, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, pp. 15–16; Carmina, ed. by Neff, xi, p. 54. 58 Pohl, ‘Gens ipsa peribit’. 51

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‘What shall we do? How can we resist them? We have no leader. The king of our comfort has been defeated. Let’s go, fealty to them will be good for us’. As he wished, they did. And Charles preserved their honour.59

As we know, Paul also ultimately made his peace with Frankish rule when he travelled to Francia and accepted commissions for a number of works (among them the Deeds of the Bishops of Metz, which include the earliest known genealogy of the Carolingians).60 Based on this, Rosamond McKitterick has argued that Paul’s commission to write the Historia Langobardorum came from the Carolingian court at Pavia.61 Similarly, Alheydis Plassmann argued that Paul’s goal was to legitimize Frankish rule, not least by subverting existing feelings of identity among the Lombards, for instance by distancing himself from the ‘ridicula fabula’ of the Lombard origin myth.62 Indeed, the new elites of the Lombard kingdom of the Franks were a likely audience for a history of this kingdom and its people, as the transmission of the text clearly suggests, with a good number of ninth-century copies produced in Northern Italy or elsewhere in the Carolingian realm.63 This was in fact McKitterick’s main argument, because no manuscripts of the Historia Langobardorum have been preserved in southern Italy, and particularly in Montecassino, where Paul probably wrote the Historia Langobardorum. However, its use is widely attested in and around Montecassino in the ninth and tenth centuries, with one continuation and many references to and quotations from it, as well as instances of stylistic emulation to be found in the Chronicon S. Benedicti Cassinensis, Erchempert’s History, the Chronicon Salernitanum, and other texts.64 In fact, Paul does little 59

Andreas of Bergamo, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, 4, p. 224, or ed. by Berto, 7, p. 38: ‘“Quid faciemus? Quomodo eorum resistere possumus? Capud non habemus. Regem confortationis nostrae iam devictus est. Eamus, eorum fidelitate bene nobis erit”. Ut obtabat, fecerunt. Et tamen eorum Carolus servavit honorem’. Berto has: ‘Eamus eorum fidelitate, bene nobis erit’ (which is also plausible), and translates ‘giuriamo loro fedeltà, sarà meglio per noi’; however, the text says nothing of an oath of loyalty. I also prefer to translate ‘honor’ as ‘honour’ (which implies aristocratic status), rather than as cariche, offices, as Berto p. 39 does. The very simple and colloquial Latin sounds almost like a caricature of the defeated Lombard nobles flocking around the Carolingians. 60 Paul the Deacon, Liber de episcopis Mettensibus, ed. and trans. by Kempf, pp. 1–39; Pohl, ‘Genealogy’, pp. 244–45. 61 McKitterick, ‘Paul the Deacon and the Franks’; McKitterick, ‘Paolo Diacono e i Franchi’. 62 Plassmann, Origo gentis, p. 240. 63 Pani, ‘Aspetti’; Chiesa, ‘Caratteristiche’. 64 See Pohl, Werkstätte, p. 59–60, and ‘Historiography of Disillusion’.

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either to gloss over the fact that the Franks were the enemy in the first books, or to praise and glorify the Carolingians in the final one. The third option, then, was to support the last surviving autonomous Lombard polity, the duchy (and, after 774, principate) of Benevento. There is ample evidence that Paul, who was a monk in Montecassino, did so both before and after 774, in the form of poems, epitaphs, letters, and the Historia Romana dedicated to the princess Adelperga. Karl-Heinz Krüger therefore forcefully proposed a ‘beneventanische Konzeption’ of the Historia Langobardorum.65 Walter Goffart, too, argued in the Narrators of Barbarian History that Paul’s association with the Beneventan court was key to interpreting his works. Goffart argued that the ‘central purpose’ of Paul’s Lombard History was to ‘edify and instruct’ Prince Grimoald III of Benevento and to give him a political sense of direction.66 For this reason, the ‘Christian hero’ King Grimoald I is presented as a ‘saviour’ whose ‘model reign’ should provide guidance to the young Beneventan prince.67 If this was the case, however, why was Paul’s posthumous assessment of Grimoald so subdued? ‘He was very strong in body, foremost in boldness, with a bald head and a heavy beard and was adorned with wisdom no less than with strength’.68 If we compare this to Paul’s obituary for Luitprand — ‘a man of much wisdom, very religious and a lover of peace, shrewd in counsel, powerful in war, merciful to offenders, chaste, modest, prayerful in the nightwatches, generous in charities, ignorant in letters indeed, yet worthy to be likened to philosophers, a supporter of his people, an increaser of the law’ — it becomes clear what Paul’s benchmark for a ‘Christian hero’ was.69 Or should the young prince emulate his namesake Grimoald I’s conquest of Forum Populi on Easter Sunday, where the latter ‘made so great a carnage of men slain that he killed in the sacred font itself even those deacons who were baptizing little infants’?70 If the deacon Paul had intended to present a didactic ‘model rule’, he could easily have omitted this isolated and hardly edifying episode. There is a lot to say for a Beneventan perspective in Paul’s history, and that the Historia Langobardorum was intended to be dedicated to Grimoald III remains an attractive hypothesis. However, regarding this as a ‘central purpose’ able to account for the entire design of the Historia Langobardorum can easily 65 66 67 68 69 70

Krüger, ‘Zur beneventanischen Konzeption’. Goffart, Narrators, p. 407. Goffart, Narrators, pp. 407–12. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, trans. by Foulke, v.33, p. 236. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, trans. by Foulke, vi.58, p. 306. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, trans. by Foulke, v.27, p. 233.

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obscure the complexity of this text. If Goffart exaggerates the role of Grimoald as Lombard ‘saviour’ and a model for Grimoald III, this is due to his goal, inspired by post-war literary theory, to establish unity of conception and of purpose in Paul’s text. Paradoxically, Goffart thus defends a purely ‘Lombard’ focus of Paul’s history and in a sense its ‘national’ agenda. It was Walter Goffart’s achievement to teach us how sophisticated Paul was as a writer; he might also have acknowledged that Paul was too sophisticated to gear his entire history towards a single ‘central purpose’. I have argued already in earlier publications that the outlook of the Historia Langobardorum was far more open and deliberately balanced. It artfully integrated Roman and barbarian, Lombard and Frankish, Western and Byzantine, episcopal and monastic perspectives. Paul’s history is full of tensions. As I put it elsewhere, he combines a clear Lombard perspective with a scorn for their pagan past and their endless inner conflicts. In spite of his distinctively Catholic world view, he repeatedly displays a lenient attitude towards Arianism and the Three-Chapter heresy […]. He writes as a monk but lacks interest in Italian monasticism apart from St Benedict and Montecassino […]. Most of the story he had to tell was about conflicts between Lombard kings, dukes of Friuli and of Benevento, and Frankish kings; he had served all of them.71

Paul did not only have to resolve the contradictions in the history he had to tell, but at the same time the tensions and losses in his own life. It is his achievement to have established a subtle balance between his allegiances. There is no exclusive Lombard focus in the narrative at all. The emperor Tiberius II and the Frankish king Guntram are presented as model rulers as much as any Lombard king. Nor did Paul exclude embarrassing stories that threatened to upset the balance, and only occasionally distanced himself from ‘ridiculous fables’ of Lombard tradition. This is remarkable for a historian working in a period in which writing history often entailed a mere affirmation of the Carolingian regime.72 And it required conscious choices between alternatives and a skilful arrangement of the material, far beyond the ‘naive compiler’ of older research.73 71 Pohl, ‘Paul the Deacon’, pp. 113 and 115. See also Pohl, ‘Paulus Diaconus’; Pohl, ‘Paolo Diacono’. For an extended discussion of my approach to Paul, see Capitani, ‘Paolo Diacono e la storiografia altomedievale’. 72 McKitterick, History and Memory. 73 Goffart, Narrators (2005), p. xxxi, objected to my, as he rather polemically put it, ‘vision of a Paul who weaves and squirms, turning where his sources turn, but without firm sympathies’. This is not at all what I argued in Pohl, ‘Paulus Diaconus’; Pohl, ‘Paolo Diacono’. Paul certainly

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Paul used an impressive number of sources in the Historia Langobardorum; Christopher Heath lists forty-five texts still known to modern scholars.74 We are therefore in several cases able to examine Paul’s subtle reworking of his sources in the Historia Langobardorum in detail. Gregory of Tours’s Historiae provide a good example.75 Paul’s choice as to what to include from Gregory’s material was often pretty straightforward. Where he copies longer passages from it, Gregory’s text is reproduced almost verbatim. This, in turn, renders any deliberate changes introduced by Paul the more striking. For example, unlike Gregory, Paul describes the position of Caesar Tiberius under the emperor Justin II as a mayor of the palace (‘qui eius palatium gubernaret’) on two occasions.76 Similarly, instead of being elected Caesar by the people, as in Gregory’s work, in Paul’s text Tiberius is chosen by the emperor.77 When Tiberius later succeeds Justin II and himself becomes Augustus, Paul replaces Gregory’s ‘imperium’ with ‘regnum’.78 This creates an implicit parallel between Tiberius and the Carolingians, who also rose from mayors of the palace to kings. Tiberius is one of Paul’s model rulers; he enhances Gregory’s favourable assessment by the statement: ‘and what matters more than all else, he was a most true Christian’.79 did not turn ‘where his sources turned’, but arranged them subtly according to his complex world view. Goffart does acknowledge at this point, however, that although Paul had a central focus (Benevento), he also advocated friendship with the Franks. 74 Heath, The Narrative Worlds, pp. 127–30 (some with a question mark; the number steadily declines from the first to the later books). 75 Heath, The Narrative Worlds, pp. 180–85; for the examples cited here, see Pohl, ‘Creating Cultural Resources’. 76 Where Gregory writes that Justin adjoined himself Tiberius as Caesar ‘ad defensandas provintias suas’, Paul rephrases ‘qui eius palatium vel singulas provincias gubernaret’: Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed.  by Krusch and Levison, iv.40, p.  172; Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.11, p. 97. He later repeats that point when Tiberius becomes emperor: Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.12, p. 98 (‘sub Iustino adhuc Caesar palatium regeret’); Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, v.19, p. 225. 77 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, v.19, p. 225: ‘populi Tiberium caesarem elegerunt’. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.11, p. 97: ‘Hic Tiberium ceasarem adscivit’. 78 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.12, p. 99: ‘cum immensis laudibus in regni est gloria confirmatus’, cf. Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, v.30, pp. 235–36: ‘cum inmensis laudibus imperium confirmavit’. 79 Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, v.19, p. 225: ‘utilem, strinuum atque sapientem, aelymosinarium inopumque optimum defensorem’. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.11, pp. 97–98, leaves out the defender of the

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Describing the accession of Maurice, Paul adds that this new emperor was ‘primus ex Grecorum genere’, the first Greek on the imperial throne.80 This serves to emphasize that Tiberius was the last Roman emperor in Constantinople, an impression reinforced by the mention of gold coins sent to Chilperic by Tiberius bearing the legend ‘Gloria Romanorum’, a description that Paul inserts at this point but took from a passage occurring much later in Gregory’s narrative.81 These examples demonstrate that Paul was a shrewd copyist of his sources, who occasionally reinterpreted political circumstances of the past in the light of contemporary situations. Placing a neat break between Roman and Greek emperors in 582 allowed him to distinguish between ancient Rome and contemporary Byzantium and thus to emphasize the distance between Italy and the empire of the Greeks at the time when the Lombard kingdom was re-established in 584. This subtext of the Historia Langobardorum was summed up pithily in the introductory sentence of a summary of the Historia Langobardorum that was added later as a seventeenth book to the Historia Romana: the Roman Empire had ceased among the Itali, and had gone over to Greek jurisdiction, the ius Pelasgum.82 On the other hand, Paul continued to use the term ‘Romans’ to denote representatives of the Byzantine state in Italy, whereas he ceased to use the name for the Roman population under Lombard rule after c. 600.83 The complex structure of identifications and non-identifications makes Paul’s work an excellent example to reflect on how identity can be constructed in a work of historiography. But how can we assess it? So far, scholars have largely taken Paul’s Lombard identity for granted, and only differed in their assessment of its significance. Today there seems to be some consensus that the ‘warm love for his people’ that older scholarship detected in the Historia Langobardorum was not the only driving force in his writings.84 Christopher Heath’s cautious poor and adds: ‘in iudiciis aequum, in victoriis clarum, et quod his omnibus supereminet, verissimum Christianum’. 80 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.15, p. 100. 81 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.13, p. 100, picked from a longer account in Gregory of Tours, Historiae, ed. by Krusch and Levison, vi.2, pp. 266–67. 82 Paul the Deacon, Historia Romana, ed.  by Crivellucci, xvii.1, p.  239; Maskarinec, ‘Who Were the Romans?’, p. 339; for the underlying tendency in the Historia Langobardorum, see Maskarinec, ‘Who Were the Romans?’, pp.  344–47; Cornford, ‘Paul the Deacon’s Understanding of Identity’. 83 Pohl, ‘Introduction: Early Medieval Romanness — a Multiple Identity’; Maskarinec, ‘Who Were the Romans?’, pp. 325–35. 84 ‘Die warme Liebe zu seinem Volk’: Brunhölzl, Literatur, i, 264; similarly Langosch, Mittellatein und Europa, p. 17; ‘affetto sincero per il suo popolo’: Leicht, ‘Paolo Diacono’, p. 74.

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conclusion that Paul was ‘a writer who was not necessarily motivated by ethnic allegiances alone’, would meet with general acceptance, though it adds little to our understanding.85 Still, Heath sees in the Historia Langobardorum ‘a desire to promote a Lombard identity’, and observes that ‘the very act of creation of a Historia Langobardorum, soon after the end of its [the Lombard kingdom’s] independence, is both provocative and indicative of a desire to sustain an identity now forcibly and uncomfortably submerged within a Frankish hegemony’.86 One approach to detecting constructions of identity in a work of history is indeed to assess which community serves as the main point of reference in the text, and what its significance is.87 In the Historia Langobardorum, the focus is quite clearly on the Lombards in a number of ways. In this case, the work’s title (in contrast to that of Gregory of Tours’s Histories) is relatively well established, although it only occurs in some of the manuscripts.88 Clearly, if Paul wrote a ‘History of the Lombards’, by title and content, the Lombards must have mattered to him. This was a far from obvious choice. None of his contemporaries in the Carolingian kingdom, and indeed no one since the Liber historiae Francorum, which was finished in 727, composed a ‘History of the Franks’, or one of the Bavarians, Alemanni, or any other gens. Even though Frankish annals generally contain a much higher percentage of information on the Franks and their kingdom(s) than Paul offers on the Lombards, there is a thread running through Paul’s narrative that starts with the Lombards’ origins and ends with the death of their greatest ruler. If Carolingian writers wanted to provide an overview of Frankish history from its beginnings, they compiled a set of different texts, usually working with one of the accounts by Merovingian historians — Gregory of Tours, Fredegar, or the Liber historiae Francorum — and continuing them with later annals, chronicles, and other material.89 There was in fact a tradition of Lombard historiography in Italy: it started in the seventh century with Secundus, whose work Paul characterizes as ‘de Langobardorum gestis’,90 and the Origo gentis Langobardorum.91 After Paul, it 85

Heath, The Narrative Worlds, p. 17. Heath, The Narrative Worlds, p. 22. 87 See Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity — Methodological Perspectives’. 88 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, p. 45. 89 A good example is the Viennese codex ÖNB, MS cvp 473; see Reimitz, ‘Ein fränkisches Geschichtsbuch’; Reimitz, ‘The Social Logic’. 90 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iii.29, p. 108. 91 Origo gentis Langobardorum, ed. by Waitz, p. 2. The title is attested in the MS Madrid, BNE, MS 413, fol. 1v, and Cava, BdB, MS 4, fol. 2v. It is illegible in Modena¸ Bibliotheca Capitolare, O.I.2. 86

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continued with the brief Lombard history in the Codex Gothanus (c. 810), which begins with the Gambara story and ends with the glorious integration of the regnum Langobardorum in the Frankish kingdom, and with some exploits of Charlemagne.92 The ‘History’ of Andreas of Bergamo (after 877) carries no title in the manuscript, but starts with a reference to (and an extensive summary of ) Paul’s ‘Longobardorum gesta’.93 There is no rubric in the only medieval manuscript of Erchempert’s History (after 889) either, but in the prologue, he describes his work as ‘Ystoriola Langobardorum Beneventi degentium’. 94 These ninth-century works took their cue from Paul and/or the Origo.95 That Paul should sit down and write a History of the Lombards, however, does not seem to have been quite his original plan.96 What he promised to the princess Adelperga was a continuation of his Roman History up to the present: ‘ad nostrum usque aetatem eandem historiam protelare’.97 It is rarely noted that (unlike in Jordanes’ Romana) the word ‘Roman’ never occurs in the title or the dedicatory letter; Paul just mentions that he had revised and augmented the history of Eutropius, a fourth-century text known as the Breviarium.98 The Historia Langobardorum certainly is the announced sequel. In spite of its modified focus, it did not stray far from continuing a general history with an Italian focus from Justinian’s reconquest of Italy to the present.99 Another common feature of the two histories is how eclectically Paul inserted basic facts about the Christianization of the empire — regardless of the promise in his dedication of the Historia Romana to make Eutropius’s History ‘compatible with the most holy history’, ‘eam sacratissimae historiae consonam reddere’.100 For instance, he preserved Eutropius’s information about Constantine’s deification, but did not 92

Gotha, UFB, MS Memb. i 84, p. 335. Historia Langobardorum codicis Gothani, ed. by Waitz. Andreas of Bergamo, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, pp. 220–23. 94 Erchempert, Historia, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, 1, p. 235 (reading ‘Beneventum’). See Pohl, Werkstätte, pp. 33–34, and BAV, MS Vat. lat. 5001, fol. 106v. 95 Pohl, ‘Historiography of Disillusion’. 96 See Mortensen, ‘Impero romano’, who attributes Paul’s change of plan to a lack of sources for a more general history from Justinian’s time onwards. 97 Paul the Deacon, Historia Romana, ed. by Droysen, Dedicatio, p. 2. 98 Eutropius, Breviarium, trans. by Bird. 99 See also Goffart, Narrators, p. 340. Interestingly, the diffusion of the Roman History was initially much more limited than that of the Historia Langobardorum: Mortensen, ‘The Diffusion of Roman Histories’. 100 Paul the Deacon, Historia Romana, ed.  by Droysen, p.  2. See also Pohl, ‘Creating Cultural Resources’, pp. 22–26. 93

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add anything about his conversion to or his patronage of Christianity, although his main source, Orosius, clearly provided this information.101 This is in line with his only moderate interest in the Lombards’ conversion and its problems in the Historia Langobardorum.102 There is a second announcement of a sequel in a mild sort of cliff-hanger at the end of the Historia Romana: Paul would say more about ‘the fortune of Justinian’ in a following book.103 In spite of its wide horizon, the choice to start the sequel to Paul’s augmented Eutropius not with Justinian, but with Lombard emigration from Scandinavia, makes a considerable difference; where and when a narrative begins is a fundamental choice for works of history.104 Perhaps it seemed to matter more to frame the recent past as Historia Langobardorum after 774 than it had done in the late 760s, when he wrote the Historia Romana. Identities often become a topic when they threaten to dissolve. The regnum Langobardorum had created a relatively stable conjunction of political, ethnic, and legal identity that gradually expanded to the initially non-Lombard population, particularly as the linguistic divide became more and more blurred, and Lombards became fluent in late Latin. After 774 the political side of this composite identity, which entailed a privileged social status, had eroded, and even the future of Benevento had become insecure. Paul repeatedly remarks in the Historia Langobardorum on the dire consequences of the loss of a kingdom for a people.105 He was not the only historian to write the history of a state and people after its demise: the Hellenized Egyptian Manetho, the Romanized Jew Flavius Josephus, and the Roman Goth Jordanes all wrote during a crisis of identity after the fall of the polity in which they had grown up. Typically, they rehearsed its past glories, but in nuanced ways. And they rarely pursued their narratives to the bitter end. Flavius Josephus wrote a separate book on the Jewish War, Jordanes stopped in the middle of the Gothic war at the Goths’ first submission in 540 and then sub101

‘Inter divos meruit referri’: Paul the Deacon, Historia Romana, ed.  by Droysen, x.8, pp. 85–86. See Kretschmer, Rewriting Roman History, p. 249; Pohl, ‘Creating Cultural Resources’, p. 25. For Paul’s Roman History, see also Cornford, ‘The Idea of the Roman Past’; Maskarinec, ‘Who Were the Romans?’. 102 Goffart, Narrators, pp. 387–88. 103 ‘Quia vero restant adhuc, quae de Iustiniani Augusti felicitate dicantur, insequenti deo praesule libello promenda sunt’: Paul the Deacon, Historia Romana, ed. by Droysen, xvi.23, p. 135. 104 Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity — Methodological Perspectives’. 105 Heruls: Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, i.20, pp. 57–59; Gepids: Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, i.27, p. 69: ‘Gepidorum vero ita genus est deminutum, ut ex illo iam tempore ultra non habuerint regem’.

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limated this defeat in the ephemeral Amal-Anician marriage union, and Paul left out the last thirty years of the Lombard kingdom, whether deliberately or not. In all these works, nostalgia for the past blends with a keen awareness that not all had been well in a history that ultimately led to defeat. Constructing identities does not necessarily require their positive affirmation; that is a general point that can be made here. Uplifting and motivating stories about the past surely play a role in affirming social identities, whether they describe collective endeavours (like the victorious battle of the Lombards against the Vandals, or the defence of Benevento against Emperor Constans II) or heroic deeds and foundational acts by individuals acting in the name of the group. But shared memories need not be positive. Most origin stories are in fact quite ambiguous:106 Moses leads the people of Israel out of Egypt, but a troubled history of forty years in the desert follows before they reach the Promised Land. The catastrophe of Troy stands at the beginning of the Roman and Frankish origin myths.107 The foundation of Rome by Romulus is directly linked with his fratricide and with the collection of ‘an obscure and humble multitude’ that he attracted into his asylum.108 Timeresistant identities, and the historical precedent that inspires them, are needed most in times of conflict and hardship, not in triumph. Shared memories of defeat, suffering, and oppression can create a stronger sense of community than a series of larger-than-life ancestors. It may be debatable whether, for instance, Gildas’s ferocious critique of the Britons of his day did much to uphold British identity; but the very urgency of his diatribes only makes sense within a strong and fateful sense of allegiance with his people, a new Israel on the way to hell.109 Insistent moral critique may, up to a point, be regarded as one of the modes of group identification. In that sense, the much milder but still critical assessment of Lombard history in the Historia Langobardorum is a record of accepting a rather ambiguous Lombard past as one’s own history. The question of identity not only entails a consideration of text and context, but also the question of the author’s identifications. Paul the Deacon’s identities, as they emerge from his numerous writings, in particular the Historia Langobardorum, his letters and poems, appear to have been manifold.110 Paul’s life and work are full of contradictions. He is a Lombard with a Latin/biblical 106

Pohl, ‘Narratives’. Yavuz, ‘From Caesar to Charlemagne’. 108 Livy, Ab urbe condita, ed. and trans. by Hillen, i.8.5, i, 28. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum; Pohl, ‘Romanness — A Multiple Identity and its Changes’. 109 For Gildas, cf. Higham, English Conquest. 110 I have treated this question in detail in Pohl, ‘Paul the Deacon’. 107

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name, and (as a cleric) is the only one in his family to have one. He supplies details of his Lombard lineage but writes of the Lombards and their language in the third person: ‘them’ and not ‘us’, ‘eorum lingua’ and not ‘ours’.111 One option, therefore, is to trace who is denoted by ‘we’ and ‘them’ in his writings. The first person plural can represent his family — Lopichis is called ‘noster proavus’ in the context of Paul’s family legend in a chapter in which, as he announces, he interrupts the narrative to tell ‘privatim’ about his own ancestry, ‘propria genealogia’.112 ‘Our’ can be used geographically, to refer to his homeland, Friuli.113 Paul also uses it for the community of Montecassino, both in the Historia Langobardorum and in his letter from Francia to Abbot Theudemar; but in the same letter, the monastery can also be ‘yours’, ‘vestrum’.114 In this letter, Charlemagne is called ‘noster rex’, our king, and the monks are asked to pray ‘for our lords and army’.115 At its most inclusive, the first person plural can refer to nos catholici who believe in the Trinity.116 Remarkably, Paul never explicitly calls himself a Lombard. However, this corresponds to a literary convention. One’s own people usually appears in the third person plural in early medieval historiography — exceptions to that rule require particular attention. Even where Paul speaks of his progenitor Leupchis, he says that he came ‘ex eodem Langobardorum genere’.117 Only once, in his epitaph for Ansa, the wife of Desiderius who died in exile in Francia, does he — if somewhat indirectly — refer to the Lombards in the first person plural (‘protulit nobis…’) when he speaks of her son Adelchis, who had escaped to Byzantium, as ‘holding the sceptres of the kingdom’ and as representing the 111

Van der Rhee, Die germanischen Wörter, p. 274; Everett, Literacy, pp. 110–14. Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.37, p. 131. For this and the following, see Pohl, ‘Paul the Deacon’. 113 ‘Our, that is the Adriatic Sea’: Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed.  by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.37, p. 131. 114 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, vi.2, p. 165, about the relics of St Benedict: ‘Sed certum est, nobis os illud venerabile et omni nectare suavius’. Epistola ad Theudemarum abbatem, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, p. 16, or Carmina, ed. by Neff, xiv, p. 71 (‘nostri patris Benedicti’). However, immediately afterwards he goes on: ‘ad conparationem vestri coenobii mihi palatium carcer est’. 115 Epistola ad Theudemarum abbatem, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, p. 16, or Carmina, ed. by Neff, xiv, p. 72 (Charles); p. 73 (‘ut effundatis preces pro nostris dominis eorumque exercitu’). 116 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.42, p. 134 (nos autem catholici, as opposed to the Arians). 117 Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, iv.37, p. 131. 112

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highest hope for the Lombards.118 This seldom-cited poem also demonstrates that after 774 Paul had remained loyal to the Lombard royal family and supported the exiled pretender Adelchis — at that point, his ‘spes maxima’ (highest hope) obviously was not Benevento, but a restoration of the monarchy. Of course, panegyrics and epitaphs rarely express the poet’s true opinion. However, in the years after 774 Paul’s oppositional stance towards the Carolingians can hardly have been opportunistic, on the contrary. It rather corresponded to that of his rebel brother who, however, unlike Paul chose to fight it out. Paul the rebel, who even plots to kill Charlemagne but is pardoned by the king because of his unique erudition, only became the stuff of legend later in southern Italy.119 These stories were clearly exaggerated, but they seem to have had some basis in fact in Paul’s attitude during the years between 774 and his journey to Francia in 781/82. Paul had a strong sense of Lombard political (perhaps rather than purely ethnic) identity that for some time made him an opponent of the Franks and their rule. Only gradually did he learn to accept Carolingian dominion over the Lombard kingdom, so that the Paul of the Historia Langobardorum seems to have advocated a policy of appeasement towards the Franks. In spite of his Lombard identity Paul, like other authors steeped in their knowledge of the past, could cast a cold eye on the fates of nations. It was ‘the art of truth’, as Helmut Reimitz has called it, which allowed an author to distance himself from the routines of belonging. Early medieval histories are rarely streamlined to fit a single identity. Rather than an author’s supposed main purpose, it is the tensions in his work that are worth exploring. Authors employ numerous strategies to deal with these tensions: explicit debate, moral or political judgement, a rhetoric of reconciliation, implicit juxtaposition, the omission of embarrassing elements, deliberate silence, and many others.120 Paul was aware of a wide range of political, ethnic, or religious identifications. In his own life and writings, he had fashioned himself according to some of them: the proud Lombard, the deacon frustrated in his ecclesiastic career ambitions, the guardian of Roman cultural traditions, the pious monk, the indigent poet, the 118

Paul the Deacon, Carmina, ed. by Neff, ix, p. 47, ll. 9–11: ‘Protulit haec nobis, regni qui sceptra teneret, | Adelgis magnum, formaque animoque potentem, | In quo per Christum Bardis spes maxima mansit’. 119 Chronicon Salernitanum, ed. by Westerbergh, 9–10, pp. 9–13; Chronicon Vulturnense, ed. by Federici, i, 202; Pohl, Werkstätte, pp. 59–60; Taviani-Carozzi, ‘Le souvenir et la légende de Paul Diacre’. 120 For Paul’s silences, see Bartolini’s introduction ‘I silenzi del diacono’, in his edition of the Historia Langobardorum.

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Frankish court intellectual.121 His Lombard History created a kind of middle ground in which some of these social roles could be traced back into the past and weighed against each other. His narrative of historical actions implicitly or explicitly tested whether they corresponded to rather general ‘visions of community’. But that does not mean that Paul placed himself beyond identifications. It was still a Historia Langobardorum, written by a man who in his later years felt at home in a southern Italy which remained firmly Lombard. His history offers a profile of Lombard identity well-embedded in a wider frame of identifications. It was an identity with moral conditions and political limits. Paul’s Lombard History was a great success, and survives in well over a hundred medieval copies. Like other early medieval histories, it reflected and negotiated the integration of the respective gentes into a larger social whole, a Christian world of Latin kingdoms; these texts contributed to giving Goths, Anglo-Saxons, and Lombards a significance that would long outlast their independent rule.122 These were histories of integration: ‘barbarian’ histories that pointed to a more inclusive Christian political landscape. Like other authors, Paul carefully faded out the barbarian, pagan, and heretical past of the Lombards in the course of his narrative. But that does not mean that he obliterated their ethnic identity and its political significance. In his view, the Lombards as a gens were entitled to rule Italy, and their claim was legitimized by their Christian beliefs and veneration of saints. Without a dominion of their own they risked servitude, just as Paul’s family faced loss of nobility when its property was confiscated in 776.123 Social status, ethnic identity, and political sovereignty depended on each other, and had come to be firmly embedded in a Christian universe. What makes the post-Roman histories of peoples and polities — and Paul’s Historia Langobardorum in particular — so interesting is not so much that they promoted a particular ethnic or political identity, but how they placed it in a much more complex set of concerns.

121

Pohl, ‘Paul the Deacon’. Pohl, ‘Historiography and Identity — Methodological Perspectives’. 123 Stated in the poem to Charlemagne asking for the liberation of his brother, Paul the Deacon, Carmina, ed. by Neff, xi, p. 54: ‘Iamque sumus servis rusticitate pares. | Nobilitas periit, miseris accessit egestas’. The verb ‘perire’ is the same as in the hermit’s prophecy to Constans II about the end of the Lombard kingdom in Paul the Deacon, Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Bethmann and Waitz, v.6, p. 147: Pohl, ‘Gens ipsa peribit’. 122

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Works Cited Manuscripts Cava de’ Tirreni, Biblioteca della Badia, MS 4 Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, MS Vat. lat. 5001 Gotha, Forschungs- und Landesbibliothek Erfurt/Gotha, MS Memb. i 84 Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, MS 413 Modena, Biblioteca Capitolare, MS O.I.2 St. Gall, Stiftsbibliothek, MS 635 Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, MS cvp 473

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Gregory the Great, Registrum epistularum, ed. by Dag Norberg, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 140–140A, 2 vols (Turnhout: Brepols, 1982), ii (1982) Historia Langobardorum codicis Gothani, ed. by Georg Waitz, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum (Hanover: Hahn, 1878), pp. 7–11 Isidore of Seville, History of the Kings of the Goths, trans. by Kenneth Baxter Wolf, in Conquerors and Chroniclers of Early Medieval Spain, Translated Texts for Historians, 9, 2nd edn (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1999), pp. 79–109 —— , Chronica, ed.  by José Carlos Martín, Corpus christianorum, series latina, 112 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003) John of Biclaro, Chronica, ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1877–1919), xi: Chronica minora saec. IV. V. VI. VII. (ii) (1894; repr. 1981), pp. 211–20 —— , Chronica, trans. by Kenneth Baxter Wolf, Conquerors and Chroniclers of Early Medieval Spain, Translated Texts for Historians, 9, 2nd edn (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1999), pp. 57–77 Jordanes, Getica (De origine actibusque Getarum), ed. by Theodor Mommsen, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi, 15 vols (Berlin, 1877–1919), v.1: Iordanis Romana et Getica (Berlin: Weidmann, 1882), pp. 53–138 Liber historiae Francorum, ed. by Bruno Krusch, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Formulae: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, 7 vols (Hanover and Leipzig, 1884–1937), ii: Fredegarii et aliorum chronicae (Hanover: Hahn, 1888), pp. 215–328 Livy, Ab urbe condita, ed. and trans. by Hans Jürgen Hillen, 11 vols (Munich: Heimeran and Düsseldorf: Artemis & Winkler, 1978–2007), i: Buch i–iii (1987) I Necrologi Cassinesi, ed. by D. Mauro Inguanez, Fonti per la storia d’Italia, 83 (Rome: Reale Istituto storico italiano, 1941), i: Il necrologio del Cod. Cassinese 47 (1941) Paul the Deacon, Epistola ad Theudemarum abbatem, ed.  by Ludwig Bethmann and Georg Waitz, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum (Hanover: Hahn, 1878), pp. 16–17 —— , Historia Langobardorum, ed. by Ludwig Bethmann and Georg Waitz, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum (Hanover: Hahn, 1878), pp. 12–187 —— , Versus Pauli ad regem praecando, ed. by Ludwig Bethmann and Georg Waitz, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum (Hanover: Hahn, 1878), pp. 15–16 —— , Historia Romana, ed. by Gustav Droysen, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, 81 vols (Hanover, Leipzig, and Berlin, 1871–2016), xlix: Pauli Historia Romana (Hanover: Hahn, 1879; repr. Munich: Weidmann, 1978) —— , Historia Langobardorum, trans. by William Dudley Foulke, History of the Langobards (Philadelphia: Department for History, University of Pennsylvania, 1907) —— , Carmina, ed.  by Karl Neff, Die Gedichte des Paulus Diaconus: Kritische und erklärende Ausgabe (Munich: Beck, 1908) —— , Historia Romana, ed. by Amadeo Crivellucci, Fonti per la storia d’Italia, 51 (Rome: Tipografia del Senato, 1914)

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Scarpatetti, Beat Matthias von, Philipp Lenz, and Stefania Ortelli, Die Handschriften der Stiftsbibliothek St. Gallen, 3 vols (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2003–2014), i: Beat Matthias von Scarpatetti, Abt. IV: Codices 547–669: hagiographica, historica, geographica, 8.–18. Jahrhundert (2003) Schwarz, Wolfgang F., ‘Einleitung’, in Historia Langobardorum, ed. and trans. by Wolfgang F. Schwarz, Paulus Diaconus: Historia Langobardorum — Geschichte der Langobarden (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2009), pp. 7–109 Taviani-Carozzi, Huguette, ‘Le souvenir et la légende de Paul Diacre’, in Haut moyen âge: culture, éducation, société: études offertes à Pierre Riché, ed. by Michel Sot (Paris: Publidix, 1990), pp. 555–73 Vinay, Gustavo, ‘Un mito per sopravvivere: l’Historia Langobardorum di Paolo Diacono’, in Gustavo Vinay, Altomedioevo latino: conversazioni e no (Naples: Guida, 1978), pp. 125–49 Vocino, Giorgia, ‘Looking up to Rome: Romanness through the Hagiographical Evidence from the Duchy of Spoleto’, in Transformations of Romanness in the Early Middle Ages: Regions and Identities, ed. by Clemens Gantner and others (Munich: de Gruyter, 2018), pp. 197–216 Waitz, Georg, ‘Über die handschriftliche Überlieferung und die Sprache der Historia Langobardorum des Paulus’, Neues Archiv der Gesellschaft für ältere deutsche Geschichtskunde, 1 (1876), 531–66 Wattenbach, Wilhelm, Wilhelm Levison, and Heinz Löwe, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter: Vorzeit und Karolinger, 6 vols (Weimar: Böhlau, 1952–1990), ii: Die Karolinger vom Anfang des 8. Jh. bis zum Tod Karls des Großen (1953) Wood, Ian N., ‘Chains of Chronicles: The Example of London, British Library ms. add. 16974’, in Zwischen Niederschrift und Wiederschrift: Historiographie und Hagiographie im Spannungsfeld von Edition und Kompendienüberlieferung, ed. by Richard Corradini, Max Diesenberger, and Meta Niederkorn-Bruck, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 15 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2010), pp. 68–78 Wright, Roger, Late Latin and Early Romance in Spain and Carolingian France (Liverpool: Francis Cairns, 1982) —— , ed., Latin and the Romance Languages in the Early Middle Ages (London: Routledge, 1991) —— , Early Ibero-Romance: Twenty-One Studies on Language and Texts from the Iberian Peninsula between the Roman Empire and the Thirteenth Century (Newark: Juan de la Cuesta, 1994) —— , A Sociophilological Study of Late Latin (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003) Yavuz, N.  Kıvılcım, ‘From Caesar to Charlemagne: The Tradition of Trojan Origins’, Medieval History Journal, 21.2, Special Issue: Narratives of Ethnic and Tribal Origins: A Eurasian Perspective (2018), 192–221

Index

Abraham: 18, 81, 127, 167 Achilles: 169 Adam: 18, 74, 127, 248 Adelchis, Lombard king: 339–40 Adoloald, Lombard king: 320, 321, 324 Adrianople: 84, 129 Aeneas: 169, 242–43 Aëtius, patricius: 136, 298 Agatho, pope: 308, 311, 313 Agilulf, Lombard king: 321, 324 Alani/Alans: 137 Alanoviiamuth, father of Jordanes: 122 Alcuin: 31 Aldfrith of Northumbria: 299 Alemanni: 222, 335 Alexander the Great: 132 Alfred the Great: 297 Amali: 122 Ambri and Assi, Vandal leaders: 50 Ammianus Marcellinus: 284 Anacharsis, Scythian man: 104, 109 Anastasius, emperor: 85 Andag, son of Andela: 122 Andreas of Bergamo: 329, 336 Angles/Anglians: 27, 50, 298, 303, 305–08, 313–14 Anonymus (Magister P.): 31 Antes: 89 Antiochus I Soter, king of the Seleucid Empire: 86 Arbeia/Urfa, Roman fort: 300–01, 304 Aregius, bishop of Nîmes: 285–86

Argebadus, bishop of Narbonne: 286 Argives: 187 Aristobolus, Jewish philosopher: 87 Armorica: 155 Arnulf, bishop of Metz: 188–89 Arverni: 170 Assyrians: 81, 87, 151, 157 Astacades, king of Assyria: 86 Athalaric, king of the Ostrogoths: 14 Athanaric, Gothic/Thervingian king: 134 Athenians: 187 Audoin, bishop of Rouen: 183–84 Augustine of Canterbury: 298, 306 Augustine of Hippo: 86, 127, 239, 241, 243, 246–47, 251–54 Augustus, emperor: 77–78, 81–82, 85, 87–88, 127, 138–39 Aurelian, emperor: 83 Austrasians: 16, 214–32 Austures: 78 Authari, Lombard king: 321 Avars/Rouran: 42–43, 48, 220, 222 Avranches: 148 Babylonians: 157 Bamburgh: 303, 314 Bari: 323 Basiliscus, Nestorian usurper: 84–85 Basques: 287 Bavarians: 222, 335 Bede: 16–17, 27, 30–31, 34, 38, 40, 52–53, 59, 127, 147–48, 152, 155–58, 193, 297–302, 305–14

Index

352

Benedict Biscop: 300, 311–13 Benevento: 323–25, 327, 329, 331–33, 337–38, 340 Beowulf: 54, 313 Berig, king of the Goths: 97–98, 101 Bernicii: 302–05, 308, 314 Berossus: 30 Berthoald, dux of the Saxons: 192 Birdoswald: 304 Bohemians/Czechs: 30 Boniface/Winfrid: 306, 309 Braulio of Saragossa: 250, 256–57 Britannia/Britain: 17, 59, 128, 147–52, 154–58, 193, 298, 301–02, 306, 310–11 British Isles: 18, 147, 158, 297 Brittoni/Britons: 78, 147–49, 152, 155–57, 298, 302, 312–14, 338 Brunhild, Frankish queen: 185–86 Bulgars: 89 Buruista/Burebistas, Gothic king: 110, 112, 133 Byzantium: 43, 156, 172, 310, 325, 329, 334, 339 Caesar: 32, 79, 126, 128, 133–34, 169 Caesarius of Arles: 174 Caligula, emperor: 82 Cambrai: 191–92, 195 Canaanites: 192 Candac, Alan leader: 122 Cantabres: 78 Cantuari: 301 Cappadocia: 85–86 Cassiodorus: 14–15, 20, 46, 50, 72, 76, 95–96, 101, 105, 117, 123, 126, 133 Cassius Dio: 50, 126, 132 Catalaunian Plains: 79, 136 Cato: 169 Catterick/Catraeth: 305 Celsus: 109 Ceolfrith, abbot: 300, 307–11 Ceolwulf, king of Northumbria: 299, 301 Charibert, Frankish king: 169 Charlemagne: 53, 323, 325, 327–29, 336, 339–41 Childebert I, Frankish king: 174–75, 188 Chilperic I, Frankish king: 170–71, 177, 181, 185, 215, 217, 226–29, 334

Chintila, Visigothic king: 282 Chlodio, Frankish king: 191–92 Chlothar I, Frankish king: 174–75, Chlothar II, Frankish king: 182–83, 192–94, 223, 226, 229 Chrodinus, Mayor of the Palace of Austrasia: 215–16, 218, 224, 230–31 Chrodobert, bishop of Tours: 183–84 Chunni: 43 Cicero: 169 Cividale: 324, 326 Cleopatra, queen of Egypt: 87 Clermont: 162, 170 Clovis I, Frankish king: 174, 214 Clovis II, Frankish king: 163, 188, 196, 229 Connachta, dynasty of Ireland: 154 Constantine I, emperor: 79, 82–83, 135, 166, 168, 336 Constantinople: 20, 71–73, 121–22, 124, 134–35, 140, 310, 324 Constantius II, emperor: 83 Cosmas of Prague: 30, 52 Cunibert/Kunibert, bishop of Cologne: 188 Cunincpert, Lombard king: 325 Cuthbert of Lindisfarne: 309–10 Dacia: 98, 103, 112 Dacians: 132 Dagobert I, Frankish king: 183, 192, 220–21, 224, 226, 229–30 Dál Riata: 155 Dalimil: 30 Danes: 30–31 Daniel, prophet: 81, 127, 241 Decius, emperor: 130, 134 Deiri: 302–03, 305, 308, 314 Dekaineos, sorcerer: 110–12, 116 Deogratias of Carthage: 251 Dicineus, Gothic advisor: 79, 98, 103, 110–15, 132–34 Diocletian, emperor: 83, 135, 168 Diodorus of Sicily: 28 Domitian, emperor: 82 Donatus: 153 Dudo: 30, 52 East Anglia: 298, 306, 314 Eberhard, duke of Friuli: 323 Ecgbert, bishop: 299, 301, 309, 312

Index Ecgfrith, bishop of York: 299–300 Ecgfrith of Northumbria: 299–300 Edwin, king of Northumbria: 157, 305, 308 Egypt: 86–87, 108, 110–13, 153, 338 Eleutherius, exarch: 324 Eligius, bishop of Noyon: 183–84 Elmet, British kingdom: 303, 314 England: 17, 20, 31, 59, 297, 301–03, 313–14 Éoganachta, dynasty of Ireland: 154 Eosterwine, second abbot of WearmouthJarrow: 300 Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis: 88 Erchempert: 30, 330, 336 Eusebius: 12–13, 29, 81, 127, 148, 150, 161, 166–68, 187, 191, 324 Eutropius: 80, 83, 248, 257, 324, 336–37 Faramundus/Pharamond, early king of the Franks: 190 Felix, bishop of Nantes: 177–79, 183 Féni: 153–55 Fénius Ferrsaid: 153–54 Festus: 78, 80, 127, 257 Filimer, king of the Goths: 98 Flavianus, praeceptor of Paul the Deacon: 325 Flavius Josephus: 30, 337 Florus: 76–80, 127, 248 Francia/Frankish kingdom: 31, 33, 56, 59, 156, 174, 187, 189, 190, 311, 326–27, 330, 336, 339–40 Franks: 8, 16, 27, 43, 46, 52, 55, 57, 162–63, 174–75, 181, 186–87, 189–93, 213–15, 225–26, 232, 274, 286–88, 291, 329–31, 333, 335, 340 Frea: 321 Fredegar: 10, 16, 38, 46, 49, 51, 54–55, 59, 163, 166, 191, 197, 214–32, 322, 335 Fredegund, Frankish queen: 177 Fructuosus of Braga: 254 Gallaecia: 255–56 Galli: 78 Gallienus, emperor: 130, 134, 168 Gallus Anonymus: 31 Gallus, emperor: 135 Gambara: 321, 336 Gaul: 9, 12, 20, 55, 59, 169, 171, 173, 175, 178, 180, 182, 184, 190, 270, 319

353

Geoffrey of Monmouth: 31 Gepids: 327, 337 Germani/Ancient Germans: 32, 45, 48, 51, 78, 106, 112, 114 Germanus of Auxerre: 298 Germanus Postumus: 125 Getae: 97–100, 102–04, 107–16, 128, 132, 137 Gildas: 147–52, 155–57, 298, 306, 313 Gog and Magog: 322 Gogo, Mayor of the Palace of Austrasia: 215, 231 Gothia: 137 Gothiscandza: 98 Goths: 15, 27, 45, 47, 51–52, 58, 72, 79–80, 84, 95–108, 112–17, 121–22, 124–38, 140–42, 240, 287, 322, 337, 341 Gratian, emperor: 134 Greece: 3, 104, 130 Greeks: 3, 28, 81–82, 87, 96, 98–99, 102–04, 106–09, 112–13, 115, 129, 132, 242, 334 Gregory the Great, pope: 253, 298, 306, 310–13, 320 Gregory II, pope: 311 Gregory of Tours: 9–10, 12–13, 16, 27, 30, 34, 38, 40, 51–52, 54–55, 57–58, 161–63, 165–86, 189, 191, 194–95, 197, 213–19, 226–28, 230–32, 333–35 Grimoald the Elder, Austrasian Mayor of the Palace: 230 Grimoald I, Lombard king: 188, 331–32 Grimoald III of Benevento: 331–32 Gumildus, bishop of Maguelone: 277, 285–86 Gundeperga, queen of the Lombards: 321–22 Gunthigis/Baza, magister militum: 122 Guntram, king of Burgundy: 177, 228, 332 Hadrian I, pope: 311 Hector: 169 Hengist and Horsa, Angles duces: 50 Heraclius, emperor: 230, 324 Hermanaric, Gothic ruler: 79 Herodotus: 3, 28, 97, 99–104, 106, 108–12 Hildericus, count of Nîmes: 277 Hovingham: 305 Hrodgaud of Friuli: 329

354

Hungarians: 31 Huns: 130, 136, 327 Hwaetbert, abbot of Wearmouth-Jarrow: 309–11 Iamblicus: 75 Ibor and A(g)io, Lombard leaders: 50 Ida of Bernicia: 303, 314 Importunus, bishop of Paris:183 Ireland: 17–18, 147, 150, 152–55, 157–58, 301, 303 Isidore of Seville: 18, 30, 38, 50, 54, 127, 130, 154, 237, 239–40, 250–52, 254–60, 322 Israel: 152, 157, 167, 190, 193, 275, 338 Italy: 12, 14–15, 20, 33, 48, 117, 124, 137, 140–42, 156, 178, 242–43, 252, 319–20, 322–24, 326–27, 329–30, 334–36, 340–41 Jericho: 191–92 Jerome: 11–12, 29, 81–84, 86–88, 127, 134, 136, 161, 168, 170, 186–87, 191, 324 Jews: 79, 86–88, 101, 273, 277 John of Biclaro: 174, 320 Jonas of Bobbio: 182, 225, 227 Jordanes: 13–16, 20, 27, 29–31, 38, 40–41, 45–46, 49–51, 53–54, 58, 71–89, 95–110, 112–17, 121–42, 322, 336–37 Judaea: 151–52 Julian, emperor: 83 Julian of Toledo: 19, 250, 258, 269–92 Justin II, emperor: 333 Justinus/Pompeius Trogo: 97, 99, 105–07, 115, 248 Justinian I, emperor: 71–73, 75–76, 80, 85, 88–89, 123–25, 137, 142, 336–37 Kadłubek: 31 Kent: 298, 306, 314 Lacedaimonians/Spartans: 102 Lamissio: 323 Langres: 177, 300 Latins: 187 Leander of Seville: 254–55 Leinstermen: 153–54 Licinianus of Cartagena: 253 Limnis, village: 85

Index Liutprand, Lombard king: 324 Livy: 75–76, 126 Lombards: 15, 27, 30, 50, 52, 320–23, 329–30, 335, 337–41 Lopichis: 339 Lupicinius and Maximus, duces whose heinous behaviour led the Goths to rebel: 129 Lupus of Champagne, dux: 169 Lupus of Ferrières: 323 Macedonia: 132 Macedonians: 132, 187 Maeotis Palus/ Maeotian Swamp: 98 Magog, Japheth’s son: 128 Manetho: 30, 337 Marcellinus Comes: 84, 86, 139–40 Marcian, emperor: 84 Marius of Avenches: 12, 161–62, 174, 320–21 Mars Gradivus/Ares: 100, 103 Mars: 100, 103, 169 Martin of Braga: 253–54, 256 Massagetae: 99, 111 Maurice, emperor: 334 Maximian, emperor: 84, 135 Maximinus Thrax, emperor: 77, 130, 136–38, 142 Medea: 102 Medes: 81, 87 Melantias: 140 Mercia: 298, 302, 306 Merovech: 217, 230–31 Míl, ancestor of the Irish: 154–55 Modena: 323, 325 Moesia: 140 Montecassino: 323, 327, 330–32, 339 Monza: 328 Moses: 18, 86–87, 101, 323, 338 Mysia: 98, 103 Narbonne: 269, 286 Nero, emperor: 82, 168 Nestor, see Primary Chronicle Neustrians: 214–16, 219–20, 225–28, 232 Normans: 30 Northumbria: 147, 152, 157, 297, 301–04, 306–07, 310–11, 313 Novae: 140 Numa Pompilius: 77, 86

Index Odoacer, king: 138–39 Oise, river: 189–90 Oium (Scythia): 98 Orderic Vitalis: 30 Orestes: 169 Origen: 86, 109 Orosius: 18, 76–77, 99, 126, 136, 154, 168, 239–52, 254, 257, 260, 337 Osred I of Northumbria: 300, 313 Oswine, king of Northumbria: 300, 305 Oswiu, king of Bernicia: 157, 305 Paria, grandfather of Jordanes: 122 Paschasius of Dumium: 256 Patrick, saint: 155, 157–58 Patroclus: 169 Paul, Visigothic dux: 269–70, 272–75, 277–82, 284–92 Paul of Léon, saint: 152 Paul the Deacon: 15–16, 27, 30–31, 38, 40–41, 49, 51, 53–54, 57–59, 127, 320–21, 323–41 Paulinus of Pella: 243 Pavia: 324–25, 328, 330 Pepin I/Pippin I, Austrasian Mayor of the Palace: 188–89, 230 Persia: 108 Persians: 81, 83, 85, 130–31 Peter and Paul, apostles: 82, 311 Philip II, king of Macedonia: 132 Philip the Arab, emperor: 82–83 Philistines: 312, 314 Picts: 149, 155–56, 298, 302, 312 Polemius of Astorga: 253–54 Pompey: 87 Praetextatus, bishop of Rouen: 185 Primary Chronicle (Russian): 31 Prosper of Aquitaine: 161, 324 Ptolemy/Ptholomeus I Soter, king of Egypt: 86 Pythagoras: 108, 110, 113 Quentin, saint: 52, 184 Quinotaurus: 46 Radulf, dux of Thuringia: 221–22, 224, 230 Ranimirus, abbot: 277, 286 Ranosindus, duke of Terraconensis: 280, 284 Raos and Raptos, mythical Vandal leaders: 50

355

Ravenna: 95, 137 Reccared, Visigothic king: 287 Recceswinth, Visigothic king: 270, 274 Regino of Prüm: 56 Rheged, British kingdom: 303–04, 314 Rhine, river: 190–92, 222–23, 227–28 Romans: 45, 55, 74–82, 85–87, 89, 100, 110–11, 115, 121–22, 124–29, 131–36, 141–42, 149, 152, 156, 186, 190, 192, 298, 322–23, 334 Rome: 9–10, 18, 43, 75–77, 80–83, 87–88, 127, 138–39, 162, 167, 169, 172, 242, 246, 298, 300, 307, 309–11, 334, 338 Romulus Augustulus, emperor: 84–85, 138 Rothari, Lombard king: 322 Rugians, Rugi/Rugius: 139 Rugini: 301 Salonius and Sagittarius, bishops of Embrun and Gap: 177 Samo, Slavic leader: 221 Saxo Grammaticus: 30–31 Saxons: 6, 8, 27, 30, 155–56, 192–93, 223, 298, 301, 305–07, 309–10, 313–14, 341 Scandza: 96–97, 108, 129 Scipio: 169 Sclavi/Sclavini/Slavs: 89, 220–22, 226 Scotti/Scots/Irish: 18, 149, 152–57, 298, 302, 308 Scythians: 51, 97–109, 111–12, 114–16, 128 Secundus of Trento: 320–21, 324–25 Seine, river: 189–90 Senones: 78 Septimius Severus, emperor: 137 Sesostris/Vesosis, Egyptian king: 99, 105 Sidonius Apollinaris: 162, 170 Sigibert I, Frankish king: 169, 215–16, 218, 226–31 Sigibert III, Frankish king: 221–22, 224, 229–31 Simois, river: 170 Simon of Kéza: 31 Sisebut, Visigothic king: 252 Sitalkes, Thracian king: 104 Skyles, Scythian man: 104 Soissons: 184, 189, 193 Spain: 18, 20, 154, 239–40, 250–51, 255, 257, 274, 319

Index

356

Spani/Hiberes: 78 Stephanos, jurist: 75 Stephen of Ripon: 308, 310–11 Strabo: 97–98, 100, 106–13, 126 Suehans: 129 Sulla, dictator: 132–33 Sulpicius Severus: 168, 246 Symmachus: 88, 123, 138 Tacitus: 32, 105, 114 Taio of Saragossa: 256 Tanausius, Scythian king: 105 Targitaos, Scythian king: 101 Telephus, son of Hercules: 96 Theodelinda, queen of the Lombards: 321 Theoderic the Great, Ostrogothic king: 14, 123, 134, 142 Theodosius I, emperor: 84 Theophylact Simocatta: 43 Theudebert II, Frankish king: 175 Theudemar, abbot: 339 Theuderic II, Frankish king: 141, 222–23, 229 Thiudimer, Gothic/Amal king: 131 Thorismund, Visigothic king: 136 Thracia: 98, 137 Thuringians: 223 Tiberius II, emperor: 332–34 Toledo: 252, 272–74, 276, 278, 282–83, 291 Tomyris, queen of the Messagetae: 99 Torcilingi: 139 Trajan, emperor: 168–69 Troy: 46, 102, 155, 190, 242–43, 338 Tyne: 300, 302, 305 Tynemouth, monastery: 300 Uar: 43 Uictarii: 301 Ulmerugi: 98 Ulstermen: 153–54

Valens, emperor: 84, 129–30 Valentinian, emperor: 83 Valerian, emperor: 130–31, 134, 142 Vandals: 46, 84, 321, 338 Varchonites: 43 Venantius Fortunatus: 55, 169, 171, 178–79 Vigilius, Pope: 72, 75 Vinnili: 321 Virgil: 75, 100, 114, 169–70, 186, 241–43, 245–46 Volusianus, emperor: 135 Vortigern, Romano-Britain warlord: 157 Waltharius/ags. Waldere: 54 Wamba, king of the Visigoths: 19, 269–70, 272–92 Wearmouth-Jarrow: 31, 300, 307, 309, 313 Wessex: 298, 305, 314 West Heslerton: 303 Widukind: 30, 155 Wilfrid: 308–11 William of Jumièges: 30 William of Malmesbury: 31 Willibrord: 301, 306, 309 Witmer: 300 Wodan: 321 Yeavering: 304 York: 31, 299, 302–04 Zalmoxis, king of the Getae: 98, 103, 108–10, 112 Zeno, emperor: 85–86, 134, 139–42 Zeuta Gothic sage/king: 98, 103, 112–13

Cultural Encounters in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages All volumes in this series are evaluated by an Editorial Board, strictly on academic grounds, based on reports prepared by referees who have been commissioned by virtue of their specialism in the appropriate field. The Board ensures that the screening is done independently and without conflicts of interest. The definitive texts supplied by authors are also subject to review by the Board before being approved for publication. Further, the volumes are copyedited to conform to the publisher’s stylebook and to the best international academic standards in the field. Titles in Series De Sion exibit lex et verbum domini de Hierusalem: Essays on Medieval Law, Liturgy, and Literature in Honour of Amnon Linder, ed. by Yitzhak Hen (2001) Amnon Linder, Raising Arms: Liturgy in the Struggle to Liberate Jerusalem in the Late Middle Ages (2003) Thomas Deswarte, De la destruction à la restauration: L’idéologie dans le royaume d’OviedoLéon (VIIIe-XIe siècles) (2004) The Jews of Europe in the Middle Ages (Tenth to Fifteenth Centuries): Proceedings of the International Symposium held at Speyer, 20–25 October 2002, ed. by Christoph Cluse (2004) Christians and Christianity in the Holy Land: From the Origins to the Latin Kingdoms, ed. by Ora Limor and Guy G. Stroumsa (2006) Carine van Rijn, Shepherds of the Lord: Priests and Episcopal Statutes in the Carolingian Period (2007) Avicenna and his Legacy: A Golden Age of Science and Philosophy, ed. by Y. Tzvi Langermann (2010) Writing ‘True Stories’: Historians and Hagiographers in the Late Antique and Medieval Near East, ed. by Arietta Papaconstantinou, Muriel Debié, and Hugh Kennedy (2010) Carolingian Scholarship and Martianus Capella: Ninth-Century Commentary Traditions on ‘De nuptiis’ in Context, ed. by Mariken Teeuwen and Sinéad O’Sullivan (2011)

John-Henry Clay, In the Shadow of Death: Saint Boniface and the Conversion of Hessia, 721–54 (2011) Ehud krinis, God’s Chosen People: Judah Halevi’s ‘Kuzari’ and the Shī‘ī Imām Doctrine (2013) Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann (2013) Post-Roman Transitions: Christian and Barbarian Identities in the Early Medieval West, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann (2013) Between Personal and Institutional Religion: Self, Doctrine, and Practice in Late Antique Eastern Christianity, ed. by Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony and Lorenzo Perrone (2013) D’Orient en Occident: Les recueils de fables enchâssées avant les Mille et une Nuits de Galland (Barlaam et Josaphat, Calila et Dimna, Disciplina clericalis, Roman des Sept Sages), ed. by Marion Uhlig and Yasmina Foehr-Janssens (2014) Conflict and Religious Conversation in Latin Christendom: Studies in Honour of Ora Limor, ed. by Israel Jacob Yuval and Ram Ben-Shalom (2014) Visual Constructs of Jerusalem, ed. by Bianca kühnel, Galit Noga-Banai, and Hanna Vorholt (2014) The Introduction of Christianity into the Early Medieval Insular World: Converting the Isles I, ed. by Roy Flechner and Máire Ní Mhaonaigh (2016) Motions of Late Antiquity: Essays on Religion, Politics, and Society in Honour of Peter Brown, ed. by Jamie kreiner and Helmut Reimitz (2016) The Prague Sacramentary: Culture, Religion, and Politics in Late Eighth-Century Bavaria, ed. by Maximilian Diesenberger, Rob Meens, and Els Rose (2016) The Capetian Century, 1214–1314, ed. by William Chester Jordan and Jenna Rebecca Phillips (2017) Transforming Landscapes of Belief in the Early Medieval Insular World and Beyond: Converting the Isles II, ed. by Nancy Edwards, Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, and Roy Flechner (2017) Historiography and Identity I: Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of Community, ed. by Walter Pohl and Veronika Wieser (2019) Inclusion and Exclusion in Mediterranean Christianities, 400–800, ed. by Yaniv Fox and Erica Buchberger (2019) Leadership and Community in Late Antiquity: Essays in Honour of Raymond Van Dam, ed. by Young Richard Kim and A. E. T. McLaughlin (2020) Pnina Arad, Christian Maps of the Holy Land: Images and Meanings (2020)

In Preparation Historiography and Identity III: Carolingian Approaches, ed. by Helmut Reimitz, Rutger Kramer, and Graeme Ward Historiography and Identity IV: The Writing of History across Medieval Eurasia, ed. by Walter Pohl and Daniel Mahoney Historiography and Identity V: The Emergence of New Peoples and Polities, 1000–1300 CE, ed. by Walter Pohl, Francesco Borri, and Veronika Wieser Historiography and Identity, VI: Competing Narratives of the Past in Eastern Central Europe, 1200–1600 CE, ed. by Pavlína Rychterová, with the assistance of David Kalhous Minorities in Contact in the Medieval Mediterranean, ed. by Clara Almagro Vidal, Jessica Tearney-Pearce, and Luke Yarbrough