A.D. 409.
Gerontius invites Barbarians to invade Empire.
Termination of Roman Empire in Britain.
Constans had, in the meantime, been sent back to Spain, and took with him Justus as his general. This gave great offence to Gerontius the Briton, who probably only waited for a pretext to endeavour to overturn the government of Constantine; and, having gained over the soldiers in Spain, who, being principally Attacotts, were probably more accessible to the influence of their countrymen, he incited the Barbarians in Gaul to revolt, and invited those beyond the Rhine to enter the provinces. The latter ravaged them at pleasure, the main attack having been upon those of Britain. This took place in the year 409, and that part of the Barbarians who were thus invited and encouraged to attack the provinces of Britain were, we know from other sources, their old enemies, the Picts, Scots, and Saxons. The civil government of the Romans still continued in Britain, but Honorius, being unable to afford them assistance, wrote letters in the following year to the cities in Britain, urging them to look after their own safety. This was equivalent to an abandonment of the imperial authority over Britain; and the provincial Britons, who, no doubt in common with the inhabitants of the other provinces, groaned under the intolerable weight of the Roman civil government, rose against them, and having, by one unanimous and vigorous effort, freed their cities from the invading Barbarians, drove out the Roman prefects likewise, and shook off the Roman yoke.
In the following year Honorius, finding that the existence of the opposing tyrants, Constantine and Gerontius, had prevented him from opposing the Barbarians, and led to the defection of Britain and Armorica, resolved to make an effort for their destruction, and sent Constantius into Gaul with an army, who shut Constantine into the town of Arles, took it, and slew him. Gerontius, at the same time, no doubt aiming at the possession of Britain for himself, followed up his proceedings by slaying Constans at Vienne, and setting up Maximus, said by one author to have been his son, in his place. Gerontius was shortly after slain by his own soldiers, and Maximus, stripped of the purple, fled into exile among the Barbarians in Spain. The death of Gerontius thus prevented him from reaping the fruit of his designs, whatever his object in precipitating the Barbarians again upon the provinces of Britain may have been.
No attempt was made to recover Britain. It no longer formed a portion of the Roman Empire, and the Roman legions never returned to it. This great and momentous change in the political and social condition of the island took place in the year 410; and thus terminated the Roman dominion in that island, which, for good or for evil, had so long endured, and so powerfully influenced the fortunes of its inhabitants.
Such is the narrative of the Roman occupation, so far as it affected the northern portion of the island; such the knowledge the Romans had attained, and the record their historians have left us, compressed in few facts, and accompanied by meagre details of the position, character, and habits of the northern tribes occupying the barren regions of Caledonia, who, though often assailed, and sometimes with temporary success, preserved their independence, and remained in hostility to the Roman government throughout the whole period of their dominion in the island.[[101]]
[55]. The author has felt himself obliged to enter somewhat into detail regarding the Roman geography of Scotland, as the subject has been so much perverted by our best writers, owing to their unfortunate adoption of the spurious work of Richard of Cirencester. It is time that the credit of Ptolemy should be restored, and it is impossible for any one to compare his statements with the actual face of the country, without being struck with their general accuracy. Between the Solway and the Tay the country is distorted and the distances thrown out of proportion by the unfortunate mistake which turned the north of Scotland to the east. The effect is to increase some of the distances to a little more than double their proper length, and proportionally to diminish others. The whole country being placed in too northern a latitude does not affect the distances, and the smaller degree of longitude would be taken into account in laying down the positions; but it must be kept in mind that Ptolemy uses no smaller division than one-eighth of a degree, giving a possible variation to each place of seven miles in one direction and five in another. Taking all this into account, however, the distances between the leading features of the country, which it is impossible to mistake, are wonderfully correct.
The Latin editions of Ptolemy are the earliest, and are greatly to be preferred to the Greek. They were printed from a translation into Latin by Jacob Angelus, and consist of an edition at Bologna bearing the date 1462, but which is believed not to be the true date; one at Vincenza in 1475, which is really the earliest edition; that of Rome, 1478, the first with maps; Ulm, 1482 and 1486; Rome, 1490 and 1507; Venice, 1511; Strasburg, 1513, 1520, and 1522, in which the text is compared with an old Greek MS.; an edition in 1525, which bears to be a correction of Jacob Angelus’s translation by I. de Regiomonte, and in which the principal changes introduced into the later Greek editions first make their appearance; and the two editions by Servetus in 1535 and 1541. The principal Greek editions are those of Erasmus in 1533 and 1546, Montanus in 1605, and Bertius in 1619. A recent edition has appeared, by Dr. F. G. Wilberg, in 1838, from a collation of nine mss. with the editions of 1482, 1513, 1533, and 1535, and with a ms. at Milan, another at Vienna, and two Latin mss. collated by Mannert. The author has himself collated for this work the Latin editions of 1482, 1486, 1520, 1522, 1525, 1535, with the Greek editions of 1605 and 1619, and with Wilberg’s edition, and he agrees with Mannert in giving the preference among the early editions to the Ulm edition of 1482, and the Strasburg editions of 1520 and 1522. In the so-called corrected edition of 1525 he has no confidence. The variations occur both in the names and in the latitudes and longitudes. In cases where all the editions agree, there can be no doubt as to the genuine text used. When they differ, he has laid down the positions according to the variant readings, and selected the one which best corresponded with the appearance of the country. The agreement is mainly in the position of the towns, and the variations in the features of the coast, and are, therefore, more easily corrected.
[56]. The Vedra might more naturally be supposed to be the Tyne, but an altar found at Chester-le-Street, on the Wear, on which the name Vadri occurs, indicates the Wear as the river, to which indeed the name bears a greater resemblance. There is no variation in the position of these two places.