drove the Goths out of Gallia, and fix'd his seat at Paris, where it has continued ever since. And this was the original of the present kingdom of France.
7. The Kings of Britain were, A.C. 407 or 408, Marcus, Gratian, and Constantine successively; A.C. 425 Vortigern, 466 Aurelius Ambrosius, 498 Uther Pendraco, 508 Arthur, 542 Constantinus, 545 Aurelius Cunanus, 578 Vortiporeus, 581 Malgo, 586 Careticus, 613 Cadwan, 635 Cadwalin, 676 Cadwallader. The three first were Roman Tyrants, who revolted from the Empire. Orosius, Prosper and Zosimus connect their revolt with the irruptions of the Barbarians into Gallia, as consequent thereunto. Prosper, with whom Zosimus agrees, puts it in the year which began the day after that irruption. The just time I thus collect: Marcus reigned not many days, Gratian four months, and Constantine three years. He was slain the year after the taking of Rome, that is A.C. 411, 14 Kal. Octob. Whence the revolt was in Spring A.C. 408. Sozomen joins Constantine's expedition into Gallia with Arcadius's death, or the times a little after; and Arcadius died A.C. 408 May the 1st. Now tho the reign of these Tyrants was but short, yet they gave a beginning to the kingdom of Britain, and so may be reckoned the three first Kings, especially since the posterity of Constantine, viz. his sons Aurelius Ambrosius, and Uther Pendraco, and his grandson Arthur, reigned afterwards. For from the time of the revolt of these Tyrants Britain continued a distict kingdom absolved from subjection to the Empire, the Emperor not being able to spare soldiers to be sent thither to receive and keep the Island, and therefore neglecting it; as we learn by unquestionable records. For Prosper tells us; A.C. 410, Variane Cos. Hac tempestate præ valetudine Romanorum, vires funditùs attenuatæ Britanniæ. And Sigebert, conjoining this with the siege of Rome, saith: Britannorum vires attenuatæ, & substrahunt se à Romanorum dominatione. And Zosimus lib. 6. The Transrhenane Barbarians invading all places, reduced the inhabitants of the island of Britain, and also certain Celtic nations to that pass, that they fell off from the Roman Empire; and being no longer obedient to the Roman laws, κατ' ‛εαυτον βιατευειν, they lived in separate bodies after their own pleasure. The Britons therefore taking up arms, and hazarding themselves for their own safety, freed their cities from the imminent Barbarians. In like manner all Brabant and some other Provinces of the Gauls imitating the Britons, freed themselves also, ejecting the Roman Presidents, and forming themselves into a sort of commonwealth according to their own pleasure. This rebellion of Britain and the Celtic nations happened when Constantine usurped the kingdom. So also Procopius, lib. 1. Vandal. speaking of the same Constantine, saith: Constantine being overcome in battle, was slain with his children: Βρεταννιαν μεν τοι Ρωμαιοι ανασωσασθαι ουκετι εχον· αλλ' ουσα ‛υπο τυραννους απ' αυτου εμενε. Yet the Romans could not recover Britain any more, but from that time it remained under Tyrants. And Beda, l. 1. c. 11. Fracta est Roma à Gothis anno 1164 suæ conditionis; ex quo tempore Romani in Britannia regnare cessaverunt. And Ethelwaldus: A tempore Romæ à Gothis expugnatæ, cessavit imperium Romanorum à Britannia insula, & ab aliis; quas sub jugo servitutis tenebant, multis terris. And Theodoret, serm. 9. de curand. Græc. affect. about the year 424, reckons the Britons among the nations which were not then in subjection to the Roman Empire. Thus Sigonius: ad annum 411, Imperium Romanorum post excessum Constantini in Britannia nullum fuit.
Between the death of Constantine and the reign of Vortigern was an interregnum of about 14 years, in which the Britons had wars with the Picts and Scots, and twice obtained the assistance of a Roman Legion, who drove out the enemy, but told them positively at their departure that they would come no more. Of Vortigern's beginning to reign there is this record in an old Chronicle in Nennius, quoted by Camden and others: Guortigernus tenuit imperium in Britannia, Theodosio & Valentiniano Coss. [viz. A.C. 425.] & in quarto anno regni sui Saxones ad Britanniam venerunt, Felice & Tauro Coss. [viz. A.C. 428.] This coming of the Saxons, Sigebert refers to the 4th year of Valentinian, which falls in with the year 428 assigned by this Chronicle: and two years after, the Saxons together with the Picts were beaten by the Britons. Afterwards in the reign of Martian the Emperor, that is, between the years 450 and 456, the Saxons under Hengist were called in by the Britons, but six years after revolted from them, made war upon them with various success, and by degrees succeeded them. Yet the Britons continued a flourishing kingdom till the reign of Careticus; and the war between the two nations continued till the pontificate of Sergius A.C. 688.[2]
8. The Kings of the Hunns were, A.C. 406 Octar and Rugila, 433 Bleda and Attila. Octar and Rugila were the brothers of Munzuc King of the Hunns in Gothia beyond the Danube; and Bleda and Attila were his sons, and Munzuc was the son of Balamir. The two first, as Jornandes tells us, were Kings of the Hunns, but not of them all; and had the two last for their successors. I date the reign of the Hunns in Pannonia from the time that the Vandals and Alans relinquished Pannonia to them, A.C. 407. Sigonius from the time that the Visigoths relinquished Pannonia A. C. 408. Constat, saith he, quod Gothis ex Illyrico profectis, Hunni successerunt, atque imprimis Pannoniam tenuerunt. Neque enim Honorius viribus ad resistendum in tantis difficultatibus destitutus, prorsus eos prohibere potuit, sed meliore consilio, animo ad pacem converso, fœdus cum eis, datis acceptisque obsidibus fecit; ex quibus qui dati sunt, Ætius, qui etiam Alarico tributus fuerat, præcipue memoratur. How Ætius was hostage to the Goths and Hunns is related by Frigeridus, who when he had mentioned that Theodosius Emperor of the East had sent grievous commands to John, who after the death of Honorius had usurped the crown of the Western Empire, he subjoins: Iis permotus Johannes, Ætium id tempus curam palatii gerentem cum ingenti auri pondere ad Chunnos transmisit, notos sibi obsidiatûs sui tempore & familiari amicitiâ devinctos—And a little after: Ætius tribus annis Alarici obses, dehinc Chunnorum, postea Carpilionis gener ex Comite domesticorum & Joannis curopalatæ. Now Bucher shews that Ætius was hostage to Alaric till the year 410, when Alaric died, and to the Hunns between the years 411 and 415, and son-in-law to Carpilio about the year 417 or 418, and Curopalates to John about the end of the year 423. Whence 'tis probable that he became hostage to the Hunns about the year 412 or 413, when Honorius made leagues with almost all the barbarous nations, and granted them seats: but I had rather say with Sigonius, that Ætius became hostage to Alaric A.C. 403. It is further manifest out of Prosper, that the Hunns were in quiet possession of Pannonia in the year 432. For in the first book of Eusebius's Chronicle Prosper writes: Anno decimo post obitum Honorii, cum ad Chunnorum gentem cui tunc Rugila præerat, post prælium cum Bonifacio se Ætius contulisset, impetrato auxilio ad Romanorum solum regreditur. And in the second book: Ætio & Valerio Coss. Ætius depositâ potestate profugus ad Hunnos in Pannonia pervenit, quorum amicitiâ auxilioque usus, pacem principum interpellatæ potestatis obtinuit. Hereby it appears that at this time Rugila, or as Maximus calls him, Rechilla, reigned over the Hunns in Pannonia; and that Pannonia was not now so much as accounted within the soil of the Empire, being formerly granted away to the Hunns; and that these were the very same body of Hunns with which Ætius had, in the time of his being an hostage, contracted friendship: by virtue of which, as he sollicited them before to the aid of John the Tyrant A.C. 424, so now he procured their intercession for himself with the Emperor. Octar died A.C. 430; for Socrates tells us, that about that time the Burgundians having been newly vext by the Hunns, upon intelligence of Octar's death,
