The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Эдвард Гиббон

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СКАЧАТЬ critic has deduced the Merovingians from the great Maroboduus; and he has clearly proved that the prince who gave his name to the first race was more ancient than the father of Childeric. See the Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xx. p. 52-90, tom. xxx. p. 557-587.

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      This German custom, which may be traced from Tacitus to Gregory of Tours, was at length adopted by the emperors of Constantinople. From a MS. of the tenth century Montfaucon has delineated the representation of a similar ceremony, which the ignorance of the age had applied to King David. See Monuments de la Monarchie Françoise, tom. i. Discourse Preliminaire.

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      Cæsaries prolixa . . . crinium flagellis per terga dimissis, &c. See the Preface to the third volume of the Historians of France, and the Abbé Le Bœuf (Dissertat. tom. iii. p. 47-79). This peculiar fashion of the Merovingians has been remarked by natives and strangers; by Priscus (tom. i. p. 608), by Agathias (tom. ii. p. 49 [i. c. 3]) and by Gregory of Tours, l. iii. 18, vi. 24, viii. 10, tom. ii. p. 196, 278, 316. [For the short hair of the other Franks cp. Claudian’s detonsa Sigambria (in Eutr. i. 383) and Sidon. Apoll. Epist. 8, 9.]

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      See an original picture of the figure, dress, arms, and temper of the ancient Franks in Sidonius Apollinaris (Panegyr. Majorian. 238-254); and such pictures, though coarsely drawn, have a real and intrinsic value. Father Daniel (Hist. de la Milice Françoise, tom. i. p. 2-7) has illustrated the description.

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      Dubos, Hist. Critique, &c. tom. i. p. 271, 272. Some geographers have placed Dispargum on the German side of the Rhine. See a note of the Benedictine Editors to the Historians of France, tom. ii. p. 166. [Greg. ii. 9 (p. 77, ed. M.G.H.). The site of Dispargum is uncertain. Cp. Longnon, Géogr. de la Gaule, p. 619. Some identify it with Duisburg.]

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      The Carbonarian wood was that part of the great forest of the Ardennes, which lay between the Escaut, or Scheld, and the Meuse. Vales. Notit. Gall. p. 126. [Cp. Longnon, op. cit. p. 154.]

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      Gregor. Turon. l. ii. c. 9, in tom. ii. p. 166, 167. Fredegar. Epitom. c. 9, p. 395. Gesta Reg. Francor. c. 5, in tom. ii. p. 544. Vit. St. Remig. ab Hincmar, in tom. iii. p. 373.

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      ——— Francus qua Cloio patentes

      Atrebatum terras pervaserat. ——

      — Panegyr. Majorian. 212.

      The precise spot was a town or village called Vicus Helena [ib. 215]; and both the name and the place are discovered by modern geographers at Lens. [Longnon suggests Hélenne. Sirmond sought the place at Vieil-Hesdin.] See Vales. Notit. Gall. p. 246. Longuerue, Description de la France, tom. ii. p. 88.

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      See a vague account of the action in Sidonius, Panegyr. Majorian. 212-230. The French critics, impatient to establish their monarchy in Gaul, have drawn a strong argument from the silence of Sidonius, who dares not insinuate that the vanquished Franks were compelled to repass the Rhine. Dubos, tom. i. p. 322.

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      Salvian (de Gubernat. Dei, l. vi.) has expressed, in vague and declamatory language, the misfortunes of these three cities, which are distinctly ascertained by the learned Mascou, Hist. of the Ancient Germans, ix. 21.

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      Priscus, in relating the contest, does not name the two brothers; the second of whom he had seen at Rome, a beardless youth, with long flowing hair (Historians of France, tom. i. p. 607, 608). The Benedictine Editors are inclined to believe that they were the sons of some unknown king of the Franks who reigned on the banks of the Necker; but the arguments of M. de Foncemagne (Mém. de l’Académie, tom. viii. p. 464) seem to prove that the succession of Clodion was disputed by his two sons, and that the younger was Meroveus, the father of Childeric. [Of Merovech, Gregory says merely that, according to some, he was of the race of Chlojo (de hujus stirpe).]

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      Under the Merovingian race the throne was hereditary; but all the sons of the deceased monarch were equally entitled to their share of his treasures and territories. See the Dissertations of M. de Foncemagne in the sixth and eighth volumes of the Mémoires de l’Académie. [Cp. Waitz, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte, ii. i. 139 sqq.]

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      A medal is still extant, which exhibits the pleasing countenance of Honoria, with the title of Augusta; and on the reverse the improper legend of Salus Reipublicæ round the monogram of Christ. See Ducange, Famil. Byzantin. p. 67, 73. [Obverse: D.N. Ivst. Grat. Honoria P.F. Avg.; see Eckhel, Doctr. Mum. 8, 189.]

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      See Priscus, p. 39, 40 [fr. 15, 16]. It might be fairly alleged that, if females could succeed to the throne, Valentinian himself, who had married the daughter and heiress of the younger Theodosius, would have asserted her right to the Eastern empire.

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      The adventures of Honoria are imperfectly related by Jornandes, de Successione Regn. c. 97, and de Reb. Get. c. 42, p. 674, and in the Chronicles of Prosper and Marcellinus; but they cannot be made consistent, or probable, unless we separate, by an interval of time and place, her intrigue with Eugenius and her invitation of Attila.

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      Exegeras mihi, ut promitterem tibi Attilæ bellum stylo me posteris intimaturum . . . cœperam scribere, sed operis arrepti fasce perspecto tæduit inchoasse. Sidon. Apoll. l. viii. epist. 15, p. 246.

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      —— Subito cum rupta tumultu

      Barbaries totas in te transfuderat arctos,

      Gallia. Pugnacem Rugum comitante Gelono

      Gepida trux sequitur; Scyrum Burgundio cogit:

      Chunus, Bellonotus, Neurus, Bastarna, Toringus,

      Bructerus, ulvosâ vel quem Nicer alluit undâ

      Prorumpit Francus. Cecidit cito secta bipenni

      Hercynia in lintres, et Rhenum texuit alno.

      Et jam terrificis diffuderat Attila turmis

      In campos se, Belga, tuos. ——

      — Panegyr. Avit. 319, &c.

      [The Bellonoti are unknown. Cp. Valer. Flaccus, vi. 160: Balloniti.]

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      The most authentic and circumstantial account of this war is contained in Jornandes (de Reb. Geticis, c. 36-41, p. 662-672), who has sometimes abridged, and sometimes transcribed, the larger history of Cassiodorius. Jornandes, a quotation which СКАЧАТЬ