up their camp there some distance away on the plains. In this place the messengers of the emperor came to them announcing that his army was at hand to aid them and saying: "After three days we will come with them, and this shall be the signal to you; when you shall see the houses of this country-seat which stands upon the mountain burning with fire, and the smoke of the conflagration rising to heaven, you will know we are approaching with the army we promise." But the dukes of the Franks watched for six days, according to the agreement, and saw that no one came of those whom the messengers of the emperor had promised. Cedinus indeed with thirteen dukes having invaded the left side1 of Italy took five fortresses from which he exacted oaths (of fidelity). Also the army of the Franks advanced as far as Verona and after giving oaths (of protection), demolished without resistance many fortified places which had trusted them suspecting no treachery from them. And the names of the fortified places they destroyed in the territory of Tridentum (Trent) are these: Tesana (Tiseno), Maletum (Malè), Sermiana (Sirmian), Appianum (Hoch Eppan), Fagitana (Faedo), Cimbra (Cembra), Vitianum (Vezzano), Bremtonicum (Brentonico), Volaenes (Volano), Ennemase (Neumarkt) and two in Alsuca (Val Sugana) and one in

1 The eastern side.

2

Hodgkin (VI, 30) identifies these places: Tesana and Sermiana on the Adige, ten or twelve miles south of Meran; Maletum, in the Val di Sole; Appianum, opposite Botzen; Fagitana, between the Adige and the Avisio, overlooking the Rotalian plain ; Cimbra, in the Val di Cembra on the lower Avisio; Vitianum, west

Verona. When all these fortified places were destroyed by the Franks, all the citizens were led away from them as captives. But ransom was given for the fortified place of Ferrugis (Verruca), upon the intercession of the bishops Ingenuinus of Savio (Seben) and Agnellus of Tridentum (Trent), one solidus per head for each man up to six hundred solidi.3 Meanwhile, since it was summer time, the disease of dysentery began seriously to harass the army of the Franks on account of their being unused to the climate and by this disease very many of them died. Why say more? While the army of the Franks was wandering through Italy for three months and gaining no advantage-it could neither avenge itself upon its enemies, for the reason that they betook them

of Trent; Bremtonicum, between the Adige and the head of Lago di Garda; Volaenes, a little north of Roveredo; Ennemase, not far south of Botzen.

1 Close to Trent (Hodgkin, VI, 32).

'Not far below Brixen on the Eisach (Hodgkin, VI, 32, note 2).

This chapter is a specimen of Paul's way of dovetailing his authorities together. The campaign of the three dukes is given in the main in the words of Gregory of Tours. Then comes a passage from the history of Secundus not agreeing with what had gone before, as it enumerates thirteen fortified places instead of five, and then, after telling of the ransom, Paul here resumes his text from Gregory (Hodgkin, VI, 31, note 1).

Hodgkin gives the price of ransom at twelve shillings a head, or for all, three hundred and sixty pounds sterling. The language seems to indicate that the garrison were six hundred in number or it might mean that the ransom varied from one solidus for a common soldier to six hundred for a chieftain (Hodgkin, VI, 32, note 4).

selves to very strong places, nor could it reach the king from whom it might obtain retribution, since he had fortified himself within the city of Ticinum (Pavia)-the army, as we have said, having become ill from the unhealthiness of the climate and grievously oppressed with hunger, determined to go back home. And while they were returning to their own country they endured such stress of famine that they offered first their own clothes and afterwards also their arms to buy food before they reached their native soil. '

I

CHAPTER XXXII.

It is believed that what is related of king Authari occurred about this time. For the report is that that king then came through Spoletium (Spoleto) to Beneventum (Benevento) and took possession of that region and passed on as far even as Regium (Reggio), the last city of Italy next to Sicily, and since it is said that a certain column is placed there among the waves of the sea, that he went up to it sitting upon his horse and touched it with the point of his spear saying: "The territories of the Langobards will be up to this place." The column

1The Byzantine account of this campaign of the year 590 is given in two letters written by the exarch Romanus to Childepert, stating that before the arrival of the Franks, the Romans had taken Modena, Altino and Mantua, that when Cedinus was encamped near Verona they were upon the point of joining him and supporting him by their light vessels on the river, intending with him to besiege Pavia and capture king Authari, and that they were amazed to learn that Cedinus had made a ten months' truce with the Langobards and had marched out of the country (Hodgkin, V, 271-274).