APPENDIX C
EXCURSUS
1. The Home of St. Patrick (Bannauenta)
Confession, 357₅: qui (may refer either to Calpurnius or to Potitus) fuit [in] uico Bannauem taberniae. uillulam enim prope habuit, ubi ego capturam dedi. We are justified in inferring that the uillula or farmhouse was on the estate of Calpurnius, and that he resided permanently here or in the neighbourhood. The analysis and identification of Bannauemtaberniae (or Bannauemtaberniae[358]) have caused great difficulty. In the first place, the question arises whether it represents the name of the vicus, or is the name of the vicus (in the ablative) followed by a genitive representing the region or district. Now it has been observed (by Mr. Haverfield, Eng. Historical Review, v. 711, and Mr. Nicholson, Academy, May 11, 1895) that in the Itinerarium Antonini Bannaventa appears as the name of a station on Watling Street, probably three or four miles from Daventry. The idea that this Bannaventa is the place designated by Patrick has one considerable difficulty. For the only early evidence we have as to the situation of Bannauemtaberniae is inconsistent with it. Muirchu states that Bannauemtaberniae was haut[359] procul a mari nostro (495₉), and his next words show that in his time a distinct view was current as to its identification: quem uicum constanter indubitanterque comperimus esse uentre.[360] Muirchu’s indication that the place was near the Irish Channel is the less lightly to be neglected, since it would best accord with the circumstances of the capture of Patrick, though of course it is not impossible that the Irish invaders might have penetrated to Northamptonshire. I therefore think that probabilities are distinctly against the Daventry theory unless it can be shown to involve a satisfactory explanation of the mysterious bernie or burnie.[361] But that Bannaventa is the name there can, I think, be no doubt,[362] and there is no objection to supposing that there was another Bannaventa near the sea-coast. The recurrence of place-names needs no illustration. Of the two parts of this compound name, we have more than one Venta in Britain; and Mr. Haverfield has drawn attention to Banna (loc. cit.), “an unidentified spot in the north, probably a dozen miles east of Carlisle, near the Wall.” berniae, however, remains unexplained. It must represent the name of a district (or perhaps river), added to distinguish Bannaventa from other places of the same name.
Muirchu’s statement that the vicus was in or at Nentria (if this is the authentic reading) does not help us. But we can hardly doubt that he means by Nentria the same place which the Hymn of Fíacc means by Nemthur: l. 1, “Patrick was born in Nemthur.” This name might correspond to an old Celtic Nemetoduron (a name preserved in Nanterre near Paris).[363] This British Nemetodurum was, we may presume, in the same region as Bannaventa.
The glossator in the oldest (eleventh century) MS. of the Hymn of Fíacc identified Nemthur with Ail Clúade, the Rock of Clyde, at Dumbarton. We are ignorant of his authority for this statement, which does not appear in any earlier source. The fact, however, that it is not inconsistent with the direct statements of earlier sources has procured credence for it. But it is inconsistent with the probabilities of the case. Patrick’s father was a decurion, and he must have lived in civilised Britain. We have no evidence that there were Roman towns with municipal constitutions in Strathclyde. The truth is that north Britain was little more than a large military frontier. It is generally supposed that Theodosius in A.D. 369 restored Roman rule, which had fallen back in the north as far as the Wall of Antoninus, and that the district which he recovered (recuperata provincia, Ammianus, 28, 3, 7), and which was renamed Valentia (by Valentinian, in compliment to his brother Valens), included the country between the Walls of Hadrian and Antonine. There is, strictly speaking, no direct authority for this conclusion; Ammianus does not indicate the position of Valentia. The supposition that it was in the north, and that Theodosius restored fortresses as far as the line of the northern wall, is, however, not improbable. But there is no probability that it was colonised[364] or became in the last half century of Roman rule anything more than a military district. The Rock of Clyde, at the extreme end of the Northern Wall, is the last place we should expect to find the uillula of a Roman decurion; and the opinion that the home of Calpurnius was in that remote spot cannot be accepted without better evidence than an anonymous statement which we cannot trace to any trustworthy source.
But it is not likely that the identification offered by the glossator was his own invention; it is much more probable that it was an idea of considerably older date, and we cannot avoid asking the question how it could have arisen. It might be conjectured that the idea of connecting Patrick personally with north Britain arose there, naturally enough, as a consequence of the influence of the Irish Church on north Britain. But whether the idea first arose there or in Ireland, a delusive support for it might have been found in Corot. 375₂₃. Patrick’s expression there, civibus meis, in speaking of the soldiers of Coroticus, might have suggested that he belonged to the same place as Coroticus, and it was known that Coroticus was King of Ail (Clúade). Hence a narrow interpretation of Patrick’s expression civibus meis was sufficient to generate the theory that Patrick’s British home was there, and that Nemthur was identical with Ail Clúade.
This is the case against the vulgar view. On the other hand it might be argued that some things in the Letter of Patrick against Coroticus—especially his quotation “a prophet has no honour in his own country”—have more point if he was a native of that part of Britain which the letter concerns, namely, Strathclyde. It might be said that the existence of some small towns, fora or conciliabula, with municipal councils, in the province assumed to be Valentia, is not impossible, and that the existence of “Roman citizens” and Christian communities in Strathclyde is proved by Patrick’s Letter for the middle of the fifth century. And it might be suggested that bernie could be readily explained as a corruption of Berni<ci>e (remembering Bede’s description of Whitern in Galloway as ad provinciam Berniciam pertinens, iii. 4, which, though referring to the political geography of his own time, may correspond to the original extension of this obscure name).
Nevertheless, in the absence of any trace of a Bannaventa (or a Nemthur) in north British regions, we must, I think, give decisive weight to the general probabilities of the case and suppose that Bannaventa was south of the Wall of Hadrian, somewhere in western Britain, not very far from the coast. See further, Preface.
2. Irish Invasions of Britain
(1) Pacification and fortification of Britain by Theodosius, A.D. 368, 369. Chief source: Ammianus, 27, 8, and 28, 3, who mentions five enemies; Picti and Attacotti; Scotti; Franci and Saxones (27, 8, 5). Two passages in Claudian illustrate the campaigns of Theodosius. In the Panegyric on the Third Consulship of Honorius (A.D. 395) we read, vv. 54-6:—