| Summary |
The purpose of this thesis is to investigate three texts that record the same set of historical concerns in fifth-century, post-Roman Britain: the termination of Roman sovereignty, the subsequent effects of Anglo-Saxon invasion and settlement, British history before the adventus Saxonum, and English history after the "Saxon hegemony." These three works, collectively known as the "fall of Britain texts," are De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae by Gildas, Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum, and Historia Brittonum, attributed to Nennius. Each man's assessment of God's design in the history of Early Britain differs due to available information, respective geographical location, cultural allegiance, chronological distance from Roman Britain, and personality as well. Gildas imposed a form on British historiography, one which Bede and Nennius used with modifications because of their national directives. When the Briton Gildas wrote in the late fifth century, Christian conversion was not a certainty. However, during the centuries that separated Gildas and Bede, Saxon overlords settled in much of Britain, and Bede's Anglo-Saxon church unified much of eighth-century England although native Britons remained entrenched in Wales and Cornwall. In roughly 829 or 830, the Welshman Nennius imposed his tradition on this same benchmark event in British history. The legacy of Early Medieval historiography forced Gildas, Bede, and Nennius to reconcile Christian, Roman, and barbarian pasts into their own people's national histories. By analyzing the topos of divine judgment in each work, this thesis determines (1) the common historical focus of the fall of Britain, revising long-accepted accounts; (2) the method used by each author as he applied this topos; of divine judgment; and (3) the forces that shaped these three Early Medieval historians and the related historiographical elements present in their texts. This study concludes that the concept and intent of "nation" varies with each author, and the role of divine judgment is modified accordingly. In particular, the carefully manipulated omissions and indirections these narrators devised tell us more about the fall of Britain than the information gleaned from their texts. |
