The Dark Ages Return to Fifth-Century Britain. the Restored Gallic Chronicle Exploded

8/12/2019 The Dark Ages Return to Fifth-Century Britain. the Restored Gallic Chronicle Exploded

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The Dark Ages Return toFifth-Century Britain: The 'RestoredGallic Chronicle ExplodedBy R.W. BURGESS

I t is an unfortunate fact that historians of the Later Roman Empire are forced to derivemuch of their chronological material from chronicles and consular fasti. I sayunfortunate, for chronicles are not nearly as accurate as modern historians would likethem to be. This is because they were an exceptionally difficult type of history to compile,prone to error at every turn, from the gathering of sources to the copying of the final text,and because most chroniclers were essentially 'amateurs', having little experience in doingresearch, thinking or writing historically, and usually separated by considerable time andspace from the events they were describing. These facts constantly rankle with modernhistorians, and some who have had to rely heavily on chronicles rather than attemptmethodological or historiographical explanations of why they believe particular entries inchronicles are incorrectly dated, have often taken the easy way out and tried to solve theirproblems by emending them away: they alter the texts themselves, offering as excuses theassumptions (usually only implicit) that the chroniclers were skilful historians with access toreliable sources, that they were able to present their information accurately and carefully,and that the texts as we have them now were corrupted by ignorant and careless medievalscribes. This is such a shocking approach to a primary source that one could hardly imaginethat serious scholars would adopt it; yet perhaps the most persuasive case in this regard wasmade in 1951 by no less a scholar than Christian Courtois for the chronicle of Hydatius.And up to now his arguments have been completely accepted by all who read them,including Alain Tranoy, the author of the 1974Sources chretiennesedition of Hydatius, andthe editors of PLRE II.1One could, in a way, forgive Courtois and the others because Hydatius is generallyhighly-regarded as a chronicler and such attempts to correct perceived errors are at least

understandable, given his reputation. But more recently this approach has been directedtowards ano ther text which has rightly never been w ell-regarded at all, theChronica Gallicaad annumCCCCLIIor the Gallic Chronicle of the year452.In a recent article,2Michael E .

' Christian Courtois, 'Auteurs et scribes: Remarques sur la chronique d'Hydace', Byzantionxxi (1951), 23-54.See now Chapter Three of ray forthcoming critical edition of Hydatius which exposes the errors of Courtois'approach to the text. An attempt similar to Courtois' was made by Eduard Schwartz with regard to the Chronicicanones of Eusebius; on this, see Alden A. Mosshammer, Th eChronicle ofEusebiusand Greek ChronographicTradition(1979), 54-6. Historians of the earlier periods of Greek and Roman history will also be familiar with thisapproach but on a much smaller scale; for a recent example, see Edwin M. Carawan,TAPAcxviii (1988),211,whorepeats the rule for texts I quote below.2 'The Gallic Chronicle Restored: A Chronology for the Anglo-Saxon Invasions and the End of RomanBritain',Britanniaxix (1988), 367-98.


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18 6 R.W. BURGESSJones and John Casey, in an attempt to unravel the secrets of the Gallic Chronicle's twofamous entries on the Saxon invasions and conquest of Britain, have fallen into what I callthe 'inerrancy t ra p' . Like Courto is, they have forgotten one of the cardinal rules for dealingwith ancient texts - that one must never assume errors of the scribe to correct the failings ofthe author - and claimed that their source was originally perfect, or at least above the sortsof errors which exist in the manuscripts.The basic approach of the authors is simple: in order to remove the difficultiessurrounding the dating of these two important events in British history, assume that thecompiler wasflawlessand tha t ram pant Carolingian corruption is responsible for the aspectsof the text which scholars have previously used as a basis for dismissing the chronology ofthe work as a whole. Further, assume that this corruption does not affect the entries inquestion and that it can be detected wherever else it occurs. How is this done? Anythingwhich is not 'correct' must be 'corruption' or 'interpolation'; this is either 'corrected' orexcised, thus restoring the Chronicle to its 'original' form. Oth er aspects which cannot be sotreated are suppressed. The result of this exercise produces a Chronicle perfect in all itschronology, including (and especially) its entries on Britain: Quoderatdem onstrandum.

The weaknesses of this approach, especially with regard to a text which is so manifestlynot 'perfect', are obvious. At the risk of producing a paper which may seem somewhatincoherent to those who have not read the article to which I refer, I wish nevertheless tofollow the arguments in the order in which they are presented by Jones and Casey, so thatreaders m ay comp are the two sets of arguments with one another easily. I shall be relativelybrief, for detailed refutation is not complicated and a systematic discussion will appear inmy forthcoming critical edition of both the Chronica Gallica adan. CCCCLHand ad an.DX1?The authors begin with a statement which is fundamental to their entire approach: allsurviving manuscripts of the Chronicle are derived from British L ibrary Add. 16 974 (p.367). The statement is necessary for their theories of corruption and has no other basis,since an examination of all the manuscripts shows, in fact, that they can be divided intothree groups, L, BM and S,4 a fact explicitly stated by Momm sen in the introduction to his1892 edition of the Ch ronic le.5As a result, all of the authors' arguments which explain theformat of the Chronicle as derived from supposed alterations to L fall to the ground (seebelow), since there is, in fact, a common archetype from which the three groups havedescended (and in some respects L is not the most accurate witness to this archetype). 6

3Note that on p.367Jones and Casey cite the name of the chronicle incorrectly: Chronica Gallica aCCCCLH(i.e. the 'Gallic Chronicle from 452'). This is only one instance of a number of difficulties with Latin; cf. forexample, p.371,where'diem obiit',which just m eans 'died ', is translated as 'died on hisdiesimperil ,and p. 397,where imperiiRomanipotentiam deieciCis translated as 'overthrew the power of the Roman empire', i.e. causedthe fall of the Roman empire.4L is the British Library Add itional m anuscript 16 974, ff. io gr -u ov ; B is Bamberg Staatsbibliothek Patr. 62(olimE I II 18), ff. 53V-55V; M is Munich University 6, ff. 38r~4ov; S refers to the two dozen or so manuscripts ofSigebert of Gembloux's Chronographiawhich are based on theeditio Aquicinensis of 1112/3, since these have amedial L/BM version of the Chronicle appended at the beginning. For my critical edition I have used LBM andthree of the earliest twelfth-century manuscripts of theStradition: Cam brai, Bibliotheque Municipale Classee 965.ff. 52v-55r (Bethmann Bi); Douai, Bibliotheque Municipale 799, ff. 54r-56r (Bethmann B5); and Paris.Bibliotheque Nationale 1793, ff. 92v-94r (Bethmann C3).5Chron. min. I (= MGH: AA IX ): 620, 623, 625.6The authors also claim that L is made up of 'single parchment sheets' (p. 367). Medieval codices were neverbound in this way and L is, in fact, bound inqualerniones, that is, quires of four parchm ent sheets, folded in themiddle to make eight folia or sixteen pages. The section which contains the chronicles (57r-i 13V), however, is a bitunusual in that the firs t quire (ff. 57-63 ) is a folium short and another (ff. 96-7) is just a bifolium (for a total of 57folia).


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18 8 R.W. BURGESSA startling attem pt to confirm the accuracy of the Gallic Chronicle comes in the authors'computation of regnal years. For instance, they state 'The Gallic Chronicler . . . accuratelycredited G ratian with six regnal years from August 378 to . . . August 383' (p. 370) and'Theodosius came to the throne in January 379 and died in January395.His participation inthe imperial college was thus for sev enteen years, exactly the pe riod given by the last entryfor his reign in the Gallic Chronicle of 452' (p. 371). Yet even an elementary fingercalculation will show that Gratian was emperor for five years and Theodosius for sixteen,thus proving that the Gallic chronicler was in fact wrong.10When they do no t fudge their m athematical problems, the authors emend them away. Onp. 371 they say, 'Theodosius thus ruled asS enior Augustus over a term of twelve regnalyears. . . . This figure is so close to the eleven regnal years recorded in G.C. 452 that wemay with confidence claim that a scribal error has converted the numeral of the last entryfrom XII to XI, a simple enough m atter.' 11T his kind ofad hocemendation is carried to itsgreatest extreme in the case of the regnal years of Honorius, who in the Chronicle is giventhirty two years from 396 to 424 (since 395 is counted as the last year of Theodosius andHonorius is given the one-year interregnum between his death on 15 Aug. 423 and

Valentinian's accession as Caesar on 23 Oct. 424) rather than 28: 'Demonstration of thissequence of scribal errors and a restoration of the Chronicle to its originally correct stateare easily accomplished' (pp. 372-3).12 These are indeed 'simple matters easilyaccomplished', but they are also contrary to proper palaeographical and editorial method.They are based on nothing more than an assumption that the compiler had accurateinformation and knew what he was doing (what is the proof that the Chronicle was'originally correct'?), yet the evidence of the manuscripts, the only evidence we possess,shows quite plainly that he did not.The errors of the Chronicle are real and are not the result of scribal corruption. 13 Thesimplest proof of this is the text which Mommsen calls the NarratiodeimperatoribusdomusValentinianaeetTheodosianae,an epitome based on a source very similar to , if not the same

as, that used by the G allic chronicler and contained in a completely different manuscripttradition.14 Like the Gallic Chronicle it gives Gratian six years, Theodosius eleven andHonorius thirty two.15 Quite obviously, these figures in LBMS were not created by10Most othe r Western sources also give Gratian six years and Theodosius eleven, for a total of seventeen years(counting 395), including the Gallic chronicler's two major sources, the text also used by the compiler of theNarratio (see below, n. 14) and Rufinus'Historia ecclesiasticaXI.34, but some do correctly give him sixteen years(cf., e .g., the G allic Chronicle of 511). There is no question of'inclusive reckoning' or anything of that na ture. Ihave studied over a score of regnal year lists and chronicles, and every one counts regnal years as I have described.11See also note 6, pp. 371 -2. This total ofsix(for G ratian) and twelve (for Theodosius), would, of course, thengive Theodosiuseighteenyears in total (not seventeen as the chronicler states), but strangely this does not seem tobother the authors.12 As can be seen from the Appendix below, the authors' 'restoration' of the last years of Honorius (p. 373)shows that they do not understand the alterations m ade by the chronicler to fit the supposed twenty eight years ofHonorius' reign from 396 to 424 into thirty two regnal years.13 On the methods chroniclers used for determining and presenting regnal years, see R.W. Burgess, CP82(1987), 340-5, and my forthcoming historiographical study of the Chronicle of Hydatius.14For this text, seeChron. min. I: 617 and 629-30, and my forthcoming edition of the two Gallic Chronicles.One of the manuscripts which contains the Narratio, Biblioteca de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid 134,was copied from a now-lost Visigothic exemplar which can be dated from surviving folia to the eighth or ninthcentury; this predates the Gallic L by about one hundred years. On this manuscript, see Chapter Two of myforthcoming critical edition of the Chronicle of Hydatius.15 No source I have found other than theNarratiogives Honorius a total of thirty two years. I am inclined tobelieve that this figure arose from a correction made to the total by the compiler of the original source of theNarratioand the Gallic Chronicle. Most sources give Honorius and Arcadius twelve or thirteen years together, andHonorius fifteen after Arcad ius' death, for a total of twenty seven or twenty eight years for Honorius. How ever, it


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THE RESTORED' GALLIC CHRONICLE EXPLODED 18 9Carolingian corruption, they are the result of inaccurate sources. Indeed, the closecorrespondence of text layout and struc ture in L and B shows that Carolingian scribes couldbe very meticulous indeed when copying their m anuscripts, and even the discrepancies in Mand S are not very great, being chiefly a result of copying on to a smaller page size.In a further attempt to enhance the apparent reliability of the Chronicle, the authorsclaim that the chronicler was privy to certain obscure constitutional practices which heaccurately represented in the Chronicle. They claim not only that he understood theconcept of junior and seniorAugustusand used only the regnal years of the seniorAugustusfor his chrono logy,16 but also that he understood that emperors only reckoned their regnalyears from the time they became seniorAugustus and that 'protocol demanded that earlierjunior imperial years ^e discounted in documentary and legalistic formulae' (p. 370). Thelatter assertion is, however, not supported by any evidence and is based solely upon theassignation of regnal years in the Chronicle itself. Emperors always counted all of theirregnal years from theirdies imperiiand they usually even included time spent asCaesar;thisis amply proven by their vota, coins and imperial correspondence.17The regnal years seenin the Gallic Chronicle are simply a useful shorthand employed by chroniclers such asJerome and Hydatius and had no substance in reality.With regard to the former alleged p ractice, we can see that the Gallic chronicler used theregnal years of Gratian, Theodosius, Honorius, Theodosius II, and Valentinian andMarcian. This is obviously no t a list of senior Augusti, who were, in fact, Gratian,Valentinian II, Theodosius, Arcadius, Honorius, Theodosius II, Valentinian III, andMarcian (only from 17 March, 455). The authors' attempts to prove that in spite of thisobvious lack of correlation the Chronicle is still 'constitutionally' correct (pp. 371-2) andthe statement that Theodosius 'created two states' upon his death which made Arcadius andHonorius equal in seniority (p. 372) are disproved by, among other things, the superscrip-tions to the contemporary laws of the Codex Theodosianuswhere imperial protocol wasalways strictly observed and w here in both Eastern and W estern laws Valentinian II alwaysprecedes Theodosius, and Arcadius always precedes Honorius. The choice made by theGallic chronicler of whose regnal years to follow was completely arbitrary and had no basiswhatsoever in imperial constitutional practice and no validity outside of the Chronicleitself.There is no reason to suppose that the chronicler knew anything about who was or was notseniorAugustusor even that he thought that he was following the regnal years of the seniorAugustus;he was just following the names of the most prom inent mem bers of the college ashe remembered them. It is, on the contrary, the Gallic chronicler of5 who understandsand accurately acknowledges the seniorAugustus in his use of regnal years. Hydatius, onthe other hand, is more like the chronicler of 452 in simply following whomever heconsidered to be the most important and memorable emperors.

isobvious from both G allic Chronicles that this original source had a reference to Honorius'tricennaliaof422(452:89;511:575). Although this celebration was actually calculated from Hon orius'dies imperiion23Jan. 393, theoriginal compiler assumed that it was counted from the death of Theodosius (Hydatius does the same thing), yet inhis source Honorius was only credited with twenty seven years (twelve with Arcadius and fifteen with Theodosius ).Thus, assuming a simple scribal erro r, the compiler changed the 'X V ofhissource to 'X X' (as it now appears in theNarratio)in order to get a thirtieth year for the celebration, in the process crediting Honorius with thirty two nottwenty seven regnal years. As can be seen in both Chronicles (and H ydatius) thetricennaliais dated to Honorius'thirtieth year from the death of Theodosius, not from 393.16The authors have mistakenly used the terms junior and seniorAugustusas if they were contemporary titles(luniorandSeniorAugustus).17For the vota, see R.W . B urgess, Numismatic Chroniclecxlviii (1988), 77-96. There are also coins ofTheodosius II which note his regnal years (ibid., 86-7) and a number of imperial letters where the emperors listtheir regnal years (for two examples, see R.W. Burgess, ZPE65 (1986), 218, n. 32).


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19 0 R.W. BURGESSOn p p. 375-6 the authors claim to offer a list of interpolations. Only the first two (a. andb.) are correct, the extended regnal list and the attribution of the text to Prosper,18thoughthe regnal list referred to actually app ears in the third year of Theodosius II , not 'at the endof the reign of Arcadius and Honorius.' The fourth (d.) concerns the years of Abraham andthe Olympiads, which I have dealt with above. This leaves the regnal year summaries, and

the papal and patriarchal lists (c. and e.).Nowhere do the authors explain why these are branded as interpolations, but a carefulreading soon reveals the answer. The regnal year summaries do not agree with the authors''corrections' of the regnal years themselves, so they must be later interpolations. The datingof the bishops of the East and of Rome are interpolations because the Gallic chroniclersupposedly never made an error; yet, as can be seen in the Appendix below, the dates areincorrect. The Gallic chronicler obviously had no dated information concerning theaccessions of these bishops. His early material was copied from Rufinus' Historiaecclesiastica (as Mommsen makes abundantly clear at the foot of his text) which has nochronological framework, so the chronicler had to guess, based on what Rufinus said. Forthe later entries concerning the popes, he knew many (but not all) of their names, but didnot know when they became pope, so he recorded their names at what seemed to himplausible dates. Leo is the most accurately dated (out by only one year) because he was themost recent. There is nothing odd or peculiar about this. The authors themselves probablywould not fare any better listing from memory the names and dates of the British PrimeMinisters or Archbishops of Canterbury of this century, though the Gallic chronicler didnot have the modern advantage of sequential numerical dates to help him.The problem over the dating of the fall of Carthage (129) is a peculiar one, since it isobvious from pp. 377-8 and 397 that the authors themselves cannot make up their ownminds about what is going on.19 Once again the authors' apparent lack or knowledge ofpalaeography or editorial technique leads them astray, and since BMS do not derive from Lbut a common ancestor, the entire argument is without foundation anyway.Let me recapitulate their argument for those who are unfamiliar with it. The authors

cannot accept that the Chronicle mentions the fall of Carthage to the Vandals under 444when it actually fell in 439; since the chronicler did not err, this must be an example of latercorruption. They find the source of this corruption in 118 (under 'Theod. XIII' = 436)where the scribe of L wrote 'Burgundionum Bellum contra gentem' instead of 'BellumcontraBurgundionum gentem'. They claim that this error (somehow) caused the loss of theentry on Carthage which had originally appeared where 122 now stands (under 'Theod.XVI' = 439; 122 is claimed to be an interpolation). Later, the scribe, noticing that he hadmissed the entry on Carthage, stuck it into a blank space after 128 (under 'Theod. XXI' =444) because this entry mentioned the Burgundians. This is claimed to be an example of a'saut du meme au m em e' (p . 378), a process better known to palaeographers and editors ashomoeoteleuton and homoearchon. If this had in fact occurred, the scribe, while copying,would have jumped from 'Burgundionum' in 118 to 'Burgundionum' in 128, thus omitting

18The parag raph between 'FINIT CRhONICA EUSEBIV (sic)and 'hucusque Hieronimus quae secuunturProsperdigessif,which the authors claim is 'an interpolated bridge between two originally independent works . . .explaining that the preceding source was continued by Jerome and falsely attributing the next source' (p. 376), isactually a version of Jerome'ssupputatio from the end of his chronicle, and far from explaining anything aboutsources, it simply lists the num ber of years between key Biblical and historical events. It should also be noted herethat the Gallic Chronicle was never 'an independent work,' but, in fact, always followed Jerome.19 The reader is here advised to consult Chron. min. I: 660. Part of the initial plausibility of the authors'arguments derives from the fact that they never explain the actual set-up of the text at this point, a lapse whichmakes this section highly misleading for those unfamiliar with the text.


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THE 'RESTORED' GALLIC CHRONICLE EXPLODED 19 1everythingbetween the two w ords, not just the en try on Carthage. But all that hashappened is that in 118 the scribe wrote 'Burgundionum' instead of'Bellum',20 realized hismistake and then copied out the rest of the entry correctly, noting the spot after'contra'where 'Burgundionum' belonged with double dots (:). This trivial and momentaryconfusion could not have caused the complete loss of an unrelated entry seven (or perhapsfive) lines lower down on the p ag e.21 The a uthors say that the scribe added the missed entryon Carthage in the wrong place 'because the second reference to the Burgundians acted as afalse signal to his eye] (pp. 377-8). But since there was absolutely no connection in theoriginal between the entry on the Burgundians (118) and that on Carthage (supposedly at122), what sort of 'false signal' could there possibly be? In order for this to be an evenfaintly possible explanation, the entry on Carthage would have to have appeared immedi-atelyafter the entry on the Burgundians (at 119) in 'Theod. XIII' or 'X IIII' , i.e. 436-7(which is still not 439, the correct da te). In the end it must be accepted that there is, in fact,nothing which could possibly account for the entry on Carthage slipping down from 122 to129;its position must therefore be original and must be accepted as it stands, in its contextand without presup positions. It is, in fact, simply a diachronic recapitulation of the gradualloss of Africa to the Em pire beginning with the capture of Carthage (439) and end ing withall of Africa under Vandal con trol (after 442); it is not an attempt to date any single even t,and certainly not the capture of Carthage, the date of which, it is quite obvious, thechronicler did not know or even hazard a guess about.

Attempts to save the chronicler with respect to astronomical evidence also fail (pp.378-9). The 'sign like a column', dated to 'Theod. VII' (391), is a comet dated byMarcellinus comes, the Fasti Vindobonenses Priores, the Excerpta Sangallensia, andChinese annals to 390.22The eclipse of 402 is dated to 403 (the authors claim 402) and theeclipse of418is dated to421(the authors claim scribal corruption). The 'extraordinary signin the sky' dated to 422 is dated by theExc. Sang,and H ydatius to419.23Thus in every casethe chronicler has misdated these events.So whatca nwe say about the Saxon entries in the Gallic Chronicle? The first entry (62:'Britanniae Saxonum incursione deuastatae') is unlikely to have any historical valuewhatsoever. First ofall, Britain had long suffered from devastating attacks from the Saxons,since perhaps the early third century. It was to help defend the island against constantSaxon incursions that the Saxon Shore forts were first erected in the late third cen tury. T husthe historical fact of a Saxon attack or raid sometime around411 can hardly be doubted, butthe date has no historical significance since, given the contemporary situation, one couldplug in any date and it would probably be just as valid. The chronicler therefore must havehad some known event in mind when he dated this entry to 410/11.It is obvious from theNarratio that the common source shared by these two texts contained a list illustratingexamples of 'Romanorum uires attenuatae',and that this list closely linked the loss ofBritain to the Empire in 409 with the sack of Rome (410) and the barbarian invasions of

2 0 This is a n e x a m p l e o f h o m o e a r c h o n s i n c e t h e scr ibe ' s e ye ha sgon e f rom B- ' ellum' to B-'urgundionum'.2 1 It isseven l ines lower i n B ,five in L. Judging f rom t h ese r ious compr es s ion a t t em pted h e r e b y t h escr ibe of L,the a r che type is mor e l ike ly t oh a v e h a dsev en tha n five.22 Chron. min. I I : 62 a n d I : 298 , a n d H o P e n g Y o k e , ' A n c i e n t a n d M e d i a e v a l O b s e r v a t i o n s o f C o m e t s a n dN ovae inChinese Sou r ces ' , Vistas inAstronomy 5( 1962) , n o .178,p . 160, dated 7 ( o r22) A ugu s t t o 17 S e p t e m b e r .Philos torgius , HE X . 9(Die Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller, (1981) , 129-30) descr ib es t h ea p p e a r a n c e ofthis com et ingr ea t de ta i l , b u tas soc ia tes it wi th Theod os iu s ' s t ay inR o m e of13 Jun e to 30A ugu s t 389 , though th i sm ay b e t h efaul t of h ise p i t o m a t o r , P h o t i u s .23 Chron. min. I : 300, an d 65 (of my ne wed i t ion ; 73 inMo mms en ' s ) . This event , da ted 25Ju ly , is a p p a r e n t l ynot th ec o m e t of 17F e b r u a r y , 4 1 9 ( H o , o p . c i t . ( n o t e 22 ) , no . 192 , p . 162 ) .


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192 R.W. BURGESSGauland Spain (406-11). Thu s,the source whichtheGallic chronicler was using probablyjust containedan entry which no tedthelossofBritaininmuchthesame way as theNarratiodoes, Brittaniae Romano nomini in perpetuumsublatae' (thechroniclerof511, 602,hadsomething very similarto thisin hissourceaswell;seebelow).The Gallic chronicler tookthis bare notice and added the Saxons to explain why Britain was lost to the 'nomenRomanum', basedonwhatheknewto be theresultin c.441,24justas henotedtheSuevicoccupationofth e Hispaniarumpars maxima'twenty years beforethe Sueves wereathreatto more than just a fewcities in Gallaecia, whenhissource probably onlyhad ageneralreference to theinitial invasionof409-11.25Inreality, therefore, entry62 is only datingthelossofBritain to theEmpirein 409 and cantellusnothing about theSaxons.On the other hand, the second entry (126:'Brittanniae usquead hoctempus uariiscladibus euentibusque lataeindicionem Saxonum rediguntur'),dated to441, does haveasolid basisinfifth-centuryhistorical experience. We do nothaveacorresponding passageintheNarratio for this entry (sinceitends with thedeath of Honorius),but we dohavetheGallic Chronicle of511 which isalso, as I have mentioned above, closely related to 452.Although thechroniclerof511 combined bothofthe British entriesin hissource into one -BritanniaeaRomanis amissaeindicionem Saxonum cedunf (602)- itdoes confirm thedate of441, i.e., three years after the appearanceof the Codex Theodosianus, twoyearsafter the accession of Leo and nine years before the death of Theodosius II, thusestablishing tha tthe datein theChronicleof452is free from corruption. So what does 126tellus? It is anoteofwhenthe chronicler's source (who- orwhatever that was, writtenororal) believed that the Saxons had conquered Britain. That this date is an accuratereflection of contemporary Gallic beliefs can hardly be doubted. However, given thegeneral isolationofBritainin the440'sand450's, especiallyforsomeone likethechronicler(and his source?)who was probably living in Provence, and given that such aneventinreality could hardly be specifically dated to any one year, how much this entry reflectsanythingofwhatwasactually goingon inBritainat thetimeis another matter altogetherand is, in myopinion, unknowable, at leastin theabsolutely exactwayJones andCaseydemand.26 And so in the end, these temporary beacons of certitude, rescued from arestored Gallic Chronicle, have been snuffed out, and the darkness of uncertainty againrolls across theface of early Saxon Britain.

To conclude:the chronologyof theGallic Chronicleof452 isoften amessand it was sofrom the day itwas first written. Thereisnothing that will change that factandwe shall justhaveto learn tolive withit, justas weshall havetolearn tolive withoutanexact dateforthe Saxon conquestofBritain, whichwas more than likelya long drawnoutprocess,not asingle, datable event. W hatever thehistorical truthoffifth-century Britainmayhave been ,we shall not be getting any closer to uncovering it by rewriting the text of the GallicChronicle in the twentieth century.

24 Structurally, it is important for this entry to mention the Saxons since it provides a focus of chronology andpathos for the first part of entry 126, the final Saxon conquest (see below).2 5 T h eNarratio s t a t e s 'Galliae Hispaniaeque a barbaris nationibus Wandalis Suebis Alanis excisae funditusquedeletae sum .26 Jones and Casey appear to accept the first restriction (To contemporary observers in Gaul, some significantportion of Britain passed into Saxon control in A D . 441 , p. 396), but they obviously do not understand that thisneed not have had any bearing on what was actually going on in Britain at the time, since they then immediately goon to state as an historical fact what they had just admitted was merely a Gallic observation ( Within the span of asingle generation, A D . 410-441, the Saxon invaders moved from defeat to victory and the rule of a significantportion of Britain , p. 397). As for the actual period of the Saxon conquest, since Bede s dates are of no value,coming as they do from Gildas, we are left to fall back on Nennius 66 and archaeology.


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THE RESTO RED ' GALLIC CHRONICLE EXPLODEDAPPENDIX

193

THE CHRONOLOGY OF THE GALLIC CHRONICLE OF 45227()indicates regnal year insertedfor chronological expansionREGNAL. YEAR (a)A.D. EQUIVALENT(b)ADJUSTED (c)(a )

GRATIAtIIIIIImiVVI

(b )I

379380382383384 '

THEODOSIUS IIII

IIIIIII

VVIVII

385386

38738 8

38939391

XI 395

c)

VIIIvimX392393394

25-26 .28 .29 .

ENTRY NUMBER, EVENTANDTRUE DATE

1. Death of Valens (378)2. Accession of Theodosius (379)5. Restoration of the East (382)

8. Ambrose sDe fide (378-9, 381)Ambrose sDe spiritu sancto (381)9. Death of Gratian (383)

11. Maximus recognized (384)12. Execution of Priscillian (385)13. Justina and Ambrose (385-6)14. Discovery of the relics of Gervasius and Protasius (386)15. Hymns of Ambrose (386)16. Valentinian flees to the East (387)17. Conversion of Augustine (386)18. Death of Maximus (388)19. Death of Justina (388)20. Thessalonica massacre (390)21 . Origins of Apollinarianism (374-5)22. Defeat of the Arians (381)23 . John of Lycopolis (388)24. Siricius bishop of Rome (384)

Timothy bishop of Alexandria (381)Theophilus bishop of Alexandria (385)John bishop of Jerusalem (386)Flavianus bishop of Antioch (381)Contentio among the bishops (381)Portent like a column (390)Destruction of Serapeum (391)Death of Valentinian (392)Usurpation of Eugenius (392)30 . Theodosius crosses into Italy (394)31. Defeat of Eugenius (394)Death of Theodosius (395)

27This appendix follows thecorrected chronologyof myforthcoming edition inwhich nine entries have beenredated (28,50, 77,81,88, 102, 106, 107, 126). It is notmeantto be an authoritative listofaccepted datesandevents, simply whatI felt couldbe dated reasonably from independent sources.


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19 4 R.W.BURGESSREGNAL YEAR a)A.D.EQUIVALENT b)ADJUSTED c) ENTRY NUMBER, EVENTANDTRUE DATE(a) (b)HONORIUS

c

IIIIIIIIIIVVIVIIVIIIvimXXIXII

XIIIXIIII

XVXVI

XVIIXVIIIXVIIII

XX

396397398399400401402403404405406407

412413414

415

40240340 4405406

408 407409 408

410 409411 410

411412413

33-34-35-36 .38.39-42 .43-44-45-46 .48.49-50 .52.53 -545556575863-64 .65-66 .67 .68.69.70 .73-75-X X IXXII

XXIIIXXIIIIX X VXXVIXXVIIXXVIIIXXVIIII

41 641 741 841 94 2 04 2 142 242 3424

()()()41 841 94 2042 1

7778

8283848588

Fire in the sky atC polis (396)Death of Rufinus (395)Claudian (395-404)Rebellion of Gildo (397)Defeat of Gildo (398)Innocent bishop of Rome (401)Paulinus of Nola (409-431)John Chrysostom (398-404)Death of St. Martin (397)Pelagius (411-418)Synod at Alexandria (400)Solar eclipse (402)Severus Life of St . Martin (396)Barbarian invasions of Italy (401-11)Invasion of Radagaisus (405)Defeat and death of Radagaisus (406)Death of Arcadius (408)Caelestinus bishop of Rome (422)Invasion of Gaul (406-7)Portent in the Forum of Trajan (408)Death of Stilicho (408)Nestorius (428-31)Barbarians in Gaul (406-9)Constantine in Gaul (407-411)Sueves occupy Spain (438-456)Sack of Rome (410)Death of Constantine (411)Goths cross the Alps (412)Iovinus usurper (411-13)Dardanus and Athaulf (412-13)Deaths of Sallustius and Sebastian (413)Aquitania ceded to the Goths (418)Heraclian (413)Placidia is married first to Athaulf and then to Constantius (414,417)Murder of Athaulf (415)Goths repulsed by Constantius (414-5)

Solar eclipse (418)Xystus bishop of Rome (432)Portent (419)Maximus usurper (419?)Accession and death of Constantius (421)Valentinian eight years old (two)


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THE RESTORE D' GALLIC CHRONICLE EXPLODED 195REGNAL YEAR a)A.D.EQUIVALENT b)ADJUSTED c) ENTRY NUMBER, EVENTANDTRUE DATE(a)XXXXXXIXXXII

(b)425426427

c)422423

THEODOSIUSIIIII

IIIIIIIVVIVIIVIIIVIIIIXXIXIIXIIIXIIIIXVXVIXVIIXVIIIXVIIIIXXXXIXXIIXXIIIXXIIIIXXVXXVIXXVII

428 424429 425

430 426431 4274 428433 429434 43435 431436 432437 433438 43443944044144244344444544644744844945045i452453454

435436437438439440441442443444445446447448449450

89 . Honorius tricennalia (422)90 . Exile of Placidia (423)91 . Death of Honorius (423)92. Usurpation of Iohannes (423)

96 . Sigisvult in Africa (427?)97 . Death of Exsuperantius (424)99 . Defeat of Iohannes (425)100. Aetius returns to Italy (425)101. Valentinian made Augustus (425)102. Aries freed from Goths (425)103. Placidia as regent (425)104. Cassian s Institutes(c. 426)

Cassian s Conferences(c. 429)106. Defeat of Iuthungi (430)108. Vandals cross to Africa (429)109, i n . Aetius and Boniface clash (432)112. Aetius flees, then returns (432)115. Aetius returns to power (433)116. Death of Rugila (post Nov. 435)

120. Codex Theodosianus (438)122. Leo bishop of Rome (440)123. Peace in Gaul (from 439)

129. Vandal expansion in Africa (from 439)131. Murder of Bleda (445)

134. Death of Hilary of Aries (449)135. Death of Theodosius (450)136. Death of Placidia (450)VALENTINIAN ANDMARCIANIII 45545 6 45 1452 139-140.141.

InvasionPortentsInvasion

of Gaul(452)of Italy

byby

HunsHuns

(451)(452)

University of Ottawa

Documents

The Dark Ages Return to Fifth-Century Britain. the Restored Gallic Chronicle Exploded