find that Ætius, offended at what the author who has pre- Athelstan. served the incident calls the insolence of the proud region, had commissioned Eocharich, the ferocious king of the Almanni, to attack them for their rebellion. The interposition of St. Germain appeased the storm. 13 Three or four years afterwards they revolted again, and Eocharich then fulfilled his mission with all the cruelty of barbarian avarice. 14 The same author describes the Armoricans as an excitable and undisciplined people; and another, after marking their locality as confined between two rivers, characterises them as fierce, stern, light, petulant, rebellious, and inconstant; perpetually inconsistent, from their love of novelty; prodigal of words, but sparing of deeds. 15 IN 452, they assisted in the defeat of Attila. In 477 we read of this province being again subdued by Littorius, who led his forces against the Visi Goths. 16 From all these circumstances, though we cannot accredit the system of Du Bos, who erects an unshaken republic in Armorica, from the period of its revolt to the successes of Clovis 1, yet we may perceive that its subjection to Rome was not constant, nor were its liberties destroyed with impunity. ABOUT the year 500, the Armoricans were fighting for the empire against the Francs. This rising nation was then conducted by Clovis, the founder of the French monarchy, who reproached the Armoricans for deserting the liberty of their ancestors. They maintained their struggle with successful bravery against the Salian king, who at last proposed to them an alliance and a connubial connection. On the conversion of Clovis, the proposed incorporation took place. 18 13 Lobineau, p. 3. 14 Constantius vita S. Germani, cited by Mascou in his history, v. i. p. 476. This author wrote in 488, 3 Gibbon, 274. 15 Erricus Mon. Vit. Germ. 1. 5. cited by Gibbon, p. 274. 16 1 Mascou, 477. 17 Du Bos, l. p. 224. Montesquieu, in attacking Du Bos's opinion that the Francs did not hold Gaul by right of conquest but by invitation, takes occasion to intimate a disbelief that the Armoricans, during all this period, formed a particular republic. Esprit des Loix, 1. 30. c. 24. 18 Procopius de bell. Got. 1. 1. c. 12. The consent, almost unanimous, of Athelstan. THESE sketches of history relate to the Armorican Celtæ. In the commencement of the sixth century they received a new colony of British Celta: and it is this event which gives us peculiar interest in the history of the fortunes of Armorica. THAT Armorica, and the opposite district of Britain, had very anciently a friendly intercourse, is declared by Cæsar, and this may have continued during their Roman subjection. THE actual emigration of Britons has been dated from the year 383, when Conan Meriadoc and his followers are reported to have left Britain with Maximus. 19 But this fable must be rejected from true history. It has been discarded by the best historian of Bretagne, whose reasons are decisive. 20 the learned has approved of the substitution of Apμopuxo for Apcopuxa in the passage of Procopius. 19 There is a curious traditional account of Meriadoc in an old Latin parchment MS. in the British Museum, Faustina, B. 6. It is intituled, "Vita Meriadoci Regis Cambriæ." This life is in direct contradiction to the Jeffry Chronology of Conan's accompanying Maximus. According to this MS. Meriadoc was the son of Caradoc, a king in Wales, whose seat was penes nivalem montem qui Kambrice Snaudone resonat. Caradoc was assassinated by his brother. Meriadoc and his sister were sent away to the wood Arglud to be killed. The king's huntsman found them alive, and brought them up secretly. Urien, the northern king, travelling with Kaius, one of Arthur's household, saw the children. They were afterwards brought up with Arthur and Urien. Arthur punishes the assassination of Caradoc. The MS. ends with an account of Meriadoc's expedition to the continent. I mention these particulars, merely to remark, that this MS., which is full of fables, yet places Meriadoc not in the fourth, but in the sixth century, his true æra; for it makes him a boy when Arthur and Urien were men. 20 Lobineau declines the insertion of it because it is incompatible with the real expedition of Maximus, which disembarked at the mouth of the Rhine, and not in Armorica; with the state of Gaul and Armorica, under Theodosius and his children, after the defeat of Maximus and Eugenius; with the Notitia of the empire, which places Roman garrisons not only in Rennes, and Vannes, but even about Brest; with the Armorican revolt in 406, and the punishment inflicted by Ætius in 436, and 439; with the aid given by the Armoricans against Attila in 452; with the government of this district given to Exuperantius, before 419; with what Gildas and Bede state of the true passage of the Britons; and with the existence of Judichael, king of the Britons in 630, and of all his ancestors up to Ruval; whose lives are authenticated by all the French authors of the seventh century, and by every thing that can be collected from the British legends. WHILE the Anglo-Saxons were prevailing in Britain, Athelstan. several assemblages of the natives quitted their paternal soil, and established themselves in Armorica. 21 Their new settlements were in general named Llydaw 22; but each particular district received its appellation from the insular principality or residence of the general of the colony. THE few cities which, in the authors of this period, are mentioned on this coast, warrant the belief, that a large part of Llydaw was uninhabited. 23 This supposition accounts for the selection of the spot, and for the ease with which the Britons effected their establishments. THE regions which the Britons colonised were literally Llydaw, or on the sea-shore. Dol, St. Malo, St. Brieux, Treguier, St. Pol de Leon, Brest, Quimper, and Vannes, which now appear along the peninsula of Bretagne, mark the districts on which the Britons first disembarked. their population and power increased, they stretched into the interior of the country to Rennes, and southward to Nantz. 24 It is not known with what degree of violence they effected their occupation of the country. As soon as the first colonies had settled, new adventurers were incessantly arriving. The names of Devonshire and Cornwall, which some of the emigrants imposed on the districts they seized, are evidences that a large portion of the colonists were from these counties in Britain. 25 THE leader placed at the head of the earliest emigrants is Ruval, who settled himself in all the north part of the 21 I have mentioned the authorities for adopting the year 513, as the year when the Britons arrived in Armorica, in the first volume, p. 162. I cannot assent to Lobineau's date in 458. It is much too early. 22 Llydaw implying, as it is said, the sea-coast, is little else than a synonyme dam Galliæ regionem tunc autem a Britannis a quibus possidebatur Letavia 23 Lobineau, p. 6. Cotton 24 Lobineau, p. 1. and 7.; and Adelmus Benedictus, in the Corp. Franc, Hist. p. 396. 25 Lobineau, p. 6. Athelstan. province, from Leon to Dol.26 In the time of Gildas, we also find Conomer, a British king, in the upper regions of Bretagne 27; and Weroc, who governed at Vannes. 28 When Gildas followed his countrymen to Llydaw, he passed a solitary life in the island of Houath. Grallon, a British prince, is then mentioned, who built a monastery for Gildas. 29 THE pestilence denominated the yellow plague, from the colour of its victims 30, raged in the British island at the æra of the Anglo-Saxon successes, and accelerated the Armorican emigrations. 31 The British chieftains were the most conspicuous among the crowding exiles. Fracanus, of noble descent, the cousin of Cato, a British king, went at this period with his family to Armorica 32, the region where safety and tranquillity seemed then to reside. 33 He found unoccupied a tract surrounded with wood and bushes, which had been fertilised by an inundation of the adjoining river. In this spot he fixed his habitation. 34 GRALLON is mentioned with the epithet of the Great. 35 26 Lob. 6, 7. 27 Vita Gildæ, p. 456. Gregory of Tours calls him Chonobri, 1. 4. c. 20. 28 Vita Gild. ib. After 530, Eusebius is mentioned as a king of Vannes, Vita S. Melanii. Acta Sanct. Boll. Jan. 331. 23 Acta Sanct. 2 Jan. p. 954. The writers of these lives who lived near the times they speak of, though no authority for the facts of their legends, yet often preserve some curious historical traits. 30 Pestis autem illa flava vocabatur eo quod flavos et exangues universos quos invasit efficiebat — sæviente enim in hominibus et jumentis ille peste. Vita S. Teliavi, Ap. Bolland. that Teliau went to Armorica. 1 Feb. 308. It was to escape this plague 31 Tandem ob pestis late grassantis luem atque etiam irrumpentem hostium vim coacti incolæ ac precipice quidem nobiles alienas petivere terras. Life of S. Winwaloc, and Armorican MS. printed in Boll. Act. Sanct. 1 Martii, 256. 32 This emigration is worth noticing in its particulars, as a probable specimen of many others: "Vir in prædicta insula perillustris Fracanus Catonis regis Britannici consobrinus - per id tempus quo grassaretur pestis exuit de terra et de cognatione sua cum geminis suis natis Guethenoco et Jacobe cum uxore sua quæ Alba dicebatur; conscensa itaque rate contendit in Armoricam." Vit. Winwaloc, 256. 33 Ubi tunc temporis alta quies vigere putabatur. Ib. 34 Fundum ibi quendam sylvis dumisque alte circumseptum reperit qui ex inundatione fluvii cui nomen sanguis locuples est. Hunc habitare cœpit He governed in that part of Bretagne called Cornwall. 36 Athelstan. tropolis. 38 mind. 39 During his government, the city of Ys, near Quimper, is said to have fallen a prey to the invading waters. 40 ABOUT the same time that Grallon and the other British princes in Armorica are mentioned, we also hear of Budic, a king in these regions. It is indeed obvious, from the tenor of the fragments of history and tradition which have come down to us on this subject, that the British settlers in Armorica reached it at different periods, and remained at first disparted into many petty, but independent sovereignties. 41 GRALLON is mentioned with so many epithets and allusions which imply conquests, that it is probable that his contemporaries felt the effects of his power. 42 In the middle of the sixth century, a British king, who 36 Regem occiduorum Cornubiensium. Ib. 259. 37 Solum Cornubiense non procul a Brestiensi tractu. MS. of Utrecht, Ap. Bol. 1 Mart. 139. 66 Vit. S. David. 38 The editors of the Acta Sanctorum (1 Feb. 305.) remark, that part of Armorica was called Cornwallia; they state (1 Mart. 246.) that the bishop of the district is still intituled, Episcopus Cornugalliæ vulgo de Cornoaille." In Feb. 1. 602, they express that some call Grallon, "Regem Cornubiæ cujus ditionis metropolis est Quimper Corentin." He adds, Gradlon. 39 So the life of S. Winwal. 254. 40 Argentre Hist. 114. "Et encore aujourd'hui les habitans monstrent les ruines et le reste des murailles si bien cimentes que la mer n'a peu les emporter." My authority must be responsible for the circumstance. 41 It has been asserted by some, that these Bretons were never under independent sovereigns, but always subjected to the Frankish kings. The passages of Gregory of Tours on this subject are rather contradictory. Valesius, who considered the question maturely, decides, that the Bretons, though often subdued, yet were never subject to the Merovingian or Carlovingian families, by any certa imperii confessione. See the note in Bouquet's Recueil, v. iii. p. 205. I cannot avoid Their governors are called kings oftener than duces at first. coinciding with Valesius. 42 The Vita Winwal. says of sibi duces subduxerat," p. 259. Grallon, "Qui post devictas gentes inimicas him Grallonus Britonum, rex qui tunc temporis illius gentis monarchium |