The Element Encyclopedia of the Celts. Rodney Castleden

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      AMBIANI

      A Celtic tribe in Gaul, with its main center at Samarobriva (later Amiens). In 57 BC, the year of Julius Caesar’s campaign against the Belgae, the Ambiani were said to be able to raise 10,000 armed men to fight. They joined the great Gaulish rebellion against Rome.

      AMBIORIX

      The chief of the Eburones tribe in Gaul at the time of the Battle of Alesia (see Places: Alesia).

      AMBROSIUS AURELIANUS

      The battle leader, or dux bellorum, of the British in their struggle against the Anglo-Saxons. He was the leader who succeeded Vortigern (and may have been responsible for ousting him from power) and immediately preceded Arthur. It is odd that he is mentioned by the sixth-century historian Gildas, then in the eighth century by Nennius, but by no other historian until the Middle Ages. He nevertheless existed. Gildas describes him as a modest man, which is a surprising quality in a battle leader.

      He appears to have been a Celtic nobleman and it has been suggested that the “Ambros” place-names may represent the stations of the units that he raised and led, styled Ambrosiaci. This is an attractive idea, but it is unclear how Amberley, deep in West Sussex and very close to the south Saxon heartland, could possibly have functioned as such a base for Celtic troops.

      The Latinized form, Ambrosius, of the Celtic name Ambros or Emrys may have been given by a chronicler, or adopted by Emrys himself as a badge of formal respectability, something that many other British noblemen did (see Aircol). It does not prove, as some have proposed, that he was a member of a Roman family who stayed on after the Roman troops left. He represents a class of post-Roman native British aristocrats who clung to an older order of things and disapproved of Vortigern’s reckless politicking with the untrustworthy Germanic colonists.

      It is likely that Ambrosius was a focus for dissent among the Britons over the way Vortigern was leading the confederation to disaster.

      Gildas describes how Ambrosius’ leadership marked the beginning of a more successful phase for the British:

       When the cruel plunderers [the Saxons attacking the British in about 460] had gone back to their settlements, God gave strength to the survivors [the British]. Wretched people flocked to them from all directions, as eagerly as bees when a storm threatens, begging burdening heaven with unnumbered prayers that they should not be destroyed. Their leader was Ambrosius Aurelianus, a gentleman who, perhaps alone of the Romanized Britons, had survived the shock of this great storm [the Saxon invasion of Britain]; certainly his parents, who may have worn the purple, were slain in it. Under him our people regained their strength and challenged the victors to battle.

      After this the British started to win battles, and they were eventually rewarded with the overwhelming victory at Badon.

      Another view of Ambrosius comes from Nennius’ Miscellany. There Ambrosius is “the great king among all the kings of the British nation.” This may mean only that his reputation grew steadily after his death, that he was promoted by history, rather as Arthur would be a little later. It may alternatively be a genuine reflection of Ambrosius’ status as dux bellorum.

      Interestingly Cynan of Powys was later to be called Aurelianus, which may have been another title of the dux bellorum.

      Although СКАЧАТЬ