Professor Rob Collins

So

And that's it.

We don't have any other great texts, any great documents.

If we compare that to, say, 5th century Gaul, there's this whole fantastic flourishing of late antique authors, the last bouquet of aristocratic Roman authors.

We've got

The Letters of Sidonius and, you know, Gregory is coming in later.

Gregory of Tours.

Gregory of Tours, yeah.

So we have these authors that are giving us more information about the 5th and 6th century in Gaul that we just don't have for Britain.

So we also will sometimes then look to those Gallic sources for these little snippets about what's happening in Britain.

But a key thing here is to think about that geography of the world.

And sadly, Hadrian's Wall is not on the radar of those Gallic writers.

It's not really on the radar of St.

Patrick in the 5th century, which is a shame.

Gildas does talk about Hadrian's Wall.

But when we look at how Gildas writes about Hadrian's Wall, it's already almost, if not a myth, its historical fact is already obscured or forgotten.

Yeah.

And so what's really interesting with Gildas, and Gildas is a great place to start, because according to Gildas, the monument we call Hadrian's Wall, and maybe the Antonine Wall, depending on how you want to read it, he associates those monuments with the end of Roman Britain.

He doesn't see them as ancient monuments.

He sees them as a final bit of work by the Roman army to help protect Britain.