[152]. Invitabo filium meum cum fratrueli suo, bellatores enim viri sunt, ut dimicent contra Scottos et da illis regiones, quæ sunt in aquilone, juxta murum qui vocatur Guaul. Et jussit ut invitaret eos et invitati sunt Octha et Ebissa cum quadraginta ciulis. At ipsi, cum navigarent circa Pictos, vastaverunt Orcades insulas, et venerunt et occupaverunt regiones plurimas ultra mare Fresicum usque ad confinia Pictorum. Some MSS. connected with Durham add after ‘mare Fresicum,’ ‘quod inter nos Scottosque est.’ The author understands Nennius to mean that this body of invaders arrived on the east coast, went round the island, ravaging the Orkneys on their way, and entered the districts about the wall and on the north of the Firth of Forth by the west.
[153]. A tempore quo primo Saxones venerunt in Bryttanniam usque ad annum quartum Mermeni regis computantur anni ccccxxix. This account is in the Vatican MS. only, and has obviously been added in an edition compiled in 821. It corresponds with an old Welsh chronicle in the Red Book of Hergest, which commences thus:—‘From the age of Guorthegirn Guorthenau to the battle of Badwn are 128 years.’—Chron. Picts and Scots, p. 161. The date of the battle is 516, and deducting 128 years gives us 388 as the beginning of Guorthegirn’s reign, and the fourth year when the Saxons came 392.
[154]. Guorthigirnus autem tenuit imperium in Brittannia Theodosio et Valentiniano consulibus et in quarto anno regni sui Saxones ad Brittanniam venerunt, Felice et Tauro consulibus, quadringentesimo anno ab incarnatione Domini nostri Jesu Christi.
Nennius appears to have reckoned 27 years between the incarnation and the passion of Christ. We should probably read ‘a passione’ for ‘ab incarnatione,’ which makes the year equal to 427 or 428.
[155]. In Oceano vero occidentali est insula quæ dicitur Britannia, ubi olim gens Saxonum veniens ab antiqua Saxonia cum principe suo, nomine Anschis, modo habitare videtur.
[156]. Bede quotes the passage thus:—‘Revertuntur ergo impudentes grassatores Hiberni domus,’ which shows the reading of the text in his time.—B. i. c. xiv.
[157]. Placuitque omnibus cum suo rege Vortigerno ut Saxonum gentem de transmarinis partibus in auxilium vocarent.—B. i. c. xiv.
[158]. Tum subito inito ad tempus fœdere cum Pictis quos longius jam bellando pepulerant, in socios arma vertere incipiunt.—Bede, Hist. Ec. B. i. c. xv.
[159]. Bede, Hist. Ec. B. i. c. xv. In his Chronicon, written apparently two years earlier than his History, Bede narrates the incursions of the Picts and Scots and the final departure of the Romans under the year 429, and the landing of the Angles or Saxons in 459. The true date of the accession of Martian to the Empire in conjunction with Valentinian is 450. Lappenberg, in his History of England, has clearly demonstrated the legendary character of this narrative; and Kemble, in his Saxons in England, takes the same view. Nevertheless, Mr. Freeman, in his Old English History, appears to accept both dates and narratives as history; and Mr. Green, in his History of the English People, describes the landing of the Saxons under Hengist and Horsa in 449 in the island of Thanet as if he had himself witnessed the event.
[160]. Tribunus Cohortis Primæ Novæ Armoricæ Grannona in Litore Saxonico.—Not. Imp.