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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 June 2012
The progress of Archæological discovery in France, elucidative of the Merovingian period, though always most important and interesting in itself, becomes yet infinitely more so when considered in connection with the advance we also have been able to make in the study of the remains of our own coetaneous Anglo-Saxon epoch. I therefore feel happy in being able to lay a few details on this subject before the Society, chiefly with reference to the Frankish cemetery at Envermeu, now under investigation by the Abbé Cochet in pursuance of his official duties.
page 223 note a As “Inspecteur des Monumens Historiques pour le department de Seine Inferieure.”
page 224 note a Analyses de plusieurs Produits d'Art d'une haute Antiquité. 2e Mémoire, par J. Girardin, Professeur de Chimie de la Ville de Rouen.
page 225 note a Germanische Todtenlager bei Selzen. Mr. Akerman has before alluded to this anomaly in his “Remains of Pagan Saxondom,” p. 22.
page 226 note a “Domicilia cuncta curatius ritu Romano constructa.” Ammian. Marcel, xvii. 1.
page 226 note b At the funeral of Pallas, Virgil, Æneid. xi. 93,
—— versis Arcades armis.
At the funeral of Germanicus, “præcedebant incompta signa, versi fasces.” Tacit. Ann. iii. 2. So, too, Albinovānus Pedo,
“Quos primum vidi fasces, in funere vidi,
Et vidi versos, indiciumque mali.”
Eleg. in Liviam, 142.
page 226 note c Oberlin (Museum Schœplini, p. 22, pl. 2, fig. 1, Argent. 1773) gives an account of a triumphal Roman monument found at Niederbron, where the remains of a fortified camp (stativa) were visible. It is a bas-relief, and represents a captive following an equestrian figure bearing a francisca. The learned Oberlin ascribes this monument to either Magnentius or Julian; more correctly, perhaps, to the latter. The victor's form is juvenile, and Julian had thrice crossed the Rhine and triumphed over the Alemanni and the Franks before he became Augustus (Amm. Marc. xvii. c. 1 and 10, xviii. c. 2). There is no inscription, and the distinguishing emblem is the national weapon of the vanquished, borne in triumph by the victor. “Securis, vel bipennis,” says Oberlin, “qua armatus comparat eques, cum bipenni, sive franciscâ Francorum e Merovingica stirpe regum, optime convenit.” But if the monument is to be ascribed to Julian, it commemorates the use of the Frankish weapon nearly a century before the time of Meroveus. The francisca so sculptured is not quite of the usual form; but an example resembling it, found at Parfondeval, exists in the museum of Neufchâtel.
page 227 note a “II parait qu'à l'époque Mérovingienne, où les arts de I'antiquité étaient en décadence, on ne savait plus faire le beau bronze Grec et Romain, et que le plomb était substitué, soit partiellement, soit même en totalité, à l'étain.” (Analyses, 2e Mémoire, par J. Girardin, p. 19.)
page 227 note b Leg. Salicæ, tit. xvii. lviii. Leg. Ripuariæ, tit. lvi. lxxxvii. Leg. Longobard. Roth. tit. vi.
page 227 note c Epist. 1 Johan. II. ad Cæsarium Arelatensem, Concil. Ant. Galliæ, vol. i, p. 237, ed. Sirmond.
page 228 note a Agath. Hist. lib. ii. chap. 5.
page 229 note a We have the direct testimony of Vegetius, lib. iv., that the bipennis was a real weapon, and used by the Romans. “Bipennis est seouris habens ex utrâque parte latissimum et acutissimum ferrum.”
Corippus Africanus, also, in his vivid account of the court of the younger Justin, speaks expressly of this weapon. The troops who bore it were probably Teutonic mercenaries.
“Et lævâ, dextrâque acies adstare videres
Multaque ancipites splendescere luce bipennes,
Terribiles, ætate pares.”
De Laudibus Justini Aug. Min. 1. iii. b. 177.
page 229 note b The Parfondeval cemetery was also accidentally discovered in cutting a new road, and examined by the Abbé Cochet, who opened 150 tombs there. Parfondeval is a hamlet in a deep valley, as the name implies, branching out of the Valley de l'Eaulne.
“Videre Rhæti bella sub Alpibus
Drusum gerentem Vindelici, quibus
Mos unde deductus per omne
Tempus Amazonia securi
Dextras obarmet, quærere distuli.”
Hor. Carm. lib. iv. 4, 17.
page 230 note a Procop. De Bell. Goth. 1. ii. 25.
page 230 note b Vol. xxx. p. 248.
page 230 note c Lib. iv. epist. 20. Archæologia, vol. xxxv. p. 51.
page 230 note d Herodot. Clio ccxv.