Recently I posted on a remarkable new archaeological discovery in Britain, namely the find of a Roman villa site in Margam, Wales, which seems to be the precursor of a great medieval monastery. I promised then that I would reveal the secret identity of the family that owned the site, and I was semi kidding, but only semi. (These are topics I have been interested in for a great many years). Did it belong to Eternalis Vedomavus?
That area of Wales is very rich in the stone monuments of early Christians, mainly from the years 400 through 900 or so, and these contain a lot of historical and genealogical information. If we find a monument in a particular place, it is reasonably certain that the person commemorated was strongly connected to that era, commonly as a king or warlord, or perhaps a holy individual.
Margam in its day was the center of a larger administrative and social area, and nearby there stood a monument commemorating a certain Bodvoc. It actually became the center of a terrific body of folklore, which would make wonderful folk horror story. Witness William Camden writing in 1610:
In the very top of an hill called Mynydd Margan, there is erected of exceeding hard grit, a monument or gravestone, four foot long, and one foot broad with an inscription, which whosoever shall happen to read, the ignorant common people dwelling there about, give it out upon a credulous error, that he shall be sure to die within a little while after. Let the reader therefore look to himself, if any dare read it, for, let him assure himself that he shall for certain die after it.
The stone is usually placed in the general period “late sixth to early seventh century,” but my own sense of the lettering and general style would put it early in that range, probably closer to the mid-sixth century. I’ll explain why that matters.
Undoubtedly, from the language and setting, Bodvoc was a king. As such, this is by far the earliest direct evidence we have of a royal individual connected with the Margam area, as opposed to the larger regions of south Wales, of Gwent, Glywysing, or Morgannwg. (We find lots of evidence about the wider region from charters and genealogies). The fact that he was buried at this location strongly suggests that Bodvoc had a royal center or residence in the vicinity.
As with other such inscriptions, the account of his descent and parentage is meant to identify him, but more particularly to assert the lineage claims by which his family held authority. That mattered above all to the heir who erected the stone, for whom this was a very public declaration of landownership and legitimacy as well as personal prestige. The actual burial site in such instances was usually chosen for maximum visibility from the heavily inhabited regions below, and from the roads passing by Decades or centuries later, anyone asking about the legitimacy of that regime would be pointed to the stone that recalled a founder or early hero of the continuing dynasty. Just look up there!
Bodvoc, then, was the son of Catotigirnus, which is a good Celtic name that roughly translates as “lord of battles.” And then we read something odd, which is that he was the pronepos, the great grandson, or Eternalis Vedomavus. That pronepos word is very rare indeed in such contexts, and it invites an obvious question, which is, why are we missing out the intervening generation? Where, in short, is grandad? (In fairness, the word pronepos does occur on one other famous Welsh memorial, namely the ninth century Pillar of Eliseg).
The Wicked Grandfather Theory
There is one explanation of this grandfather mystery that is sometimes offered of that mystery, and let me say at the start that this is not something I accept personally. Basically, it all revolves around a Wicked Grandfather. Briefly, post-Roman Britain was ruled or at least dominated politically by a man called Vortigern, who left just a dreadful historical reputation because he invited in the Germanic mercenaries, the Anglo-Saxons, who rebelled and destroyed the British kingdom. I did a blog on this whole story some years back, so you can check this out here.
But here is the point. Vortigern, whatever his real story, was credited with a son called Catotigirnus, who redeemed the family reputation as a tough warrior. So assume for the sake of argument that the Vortigern story is true, and now move on imagine later in time, to the age of Bodvoc. The local people want to commemorate Bodvoc as the noble son of the noble Catotigirnus, but definitely do not want to mention his father, He Who Must Not Be Named, so they hark straight back to the great grandfather.
Now, I don’t believe this because of chronology. If Vortigern existed as reported, he was around in the 420s and 430s, so his son would have been active around (say) 470, and that absolutely does not work for the framework we see for the Bodvoc stone. The structure would be wrong by almost a century. It is a different Catotigirnus – and that kind of name, with similar elements, was very common in that era. Hence, I don’t believe in the Wicked Grandfather.
The Old Eternalis Place?
Even if that whole Vortigern connection was true, none of this is necessarily relevant to the Bodvoc story, so let’s look again at that stone, which is an undeniable and very tangible reality. Bodvoc was born perhaps in the early sixth century, let’s say in 510. His father Catotigirnus would then have been born in 480, which would place the birth of that Eternalis Vedomavus two generations earlier, say around the 420s. All those dates are flexible within a decade or two.
I should say that I am trusting the makers of the inscription to be using the word pronepos correctly, and not in a generic sense of “a few generations back,” in which case Eternalis’s birthdate might be still earlier.
A word about “Eternalis” as a name. It does not appear frequently in Roman inscriptions, and it can on occasion signify “eternal” as in “of the eternal House,” Domus eternalis. But it is recorded as a personal name, for instance among the Batavians of what we call the Netherlands, and I think a personal name is vastly more likely in the context of that Bodvoc inscription. I really don’t think anyone is talking here about “the Eternal Vedomavus” (!) Seriously, I have not seen that word used as an adjective in the context of an individual. Am I missing something?
That is all fairly solid, but now let me move on more into the really speculative. Bodvoc held power of some kind in the Margam area around (say) the 550s. Is it not reasonable to believe that the ancestors cited in the memorial text were also locally famous, or why else mention them on the stone?
So assume we have this man Eternalis Vedomavus coming to adulthood around the 440s, as a wealthy, powerful and presumably noble person in the general vicinity of Margam. Is it pushing the bounds of probability to suppose that the newly discovered Margam villa had been his home, and for all we know, that of earlier generations of the Eternalis clan? There is no other obvious candidate for such an elite home in the immediate vicinity.
My suggestion, then, is that the villa they are now finding was “The old Eternalis place.”
From Villa to Monastery
The chronology of villas is a very lively topic of research in Britain, and particularly how long they continued functioning as economic going concerns. In years gone by, people assumed that the whole Roman world had evaporated around 410, with the official withdrawal of imperial power. More recently, we have reported finds of British villas undergoing quite major development and refurbishing well after that, probably into the mid-fifth century. We know that fifth century Britain had a sizable cohort of rulers, tyrants, warlords, and (who knows?) kings, and they must have based themselves somewhere. There is no particular reason to believe that they all headed for the hills, or for restored hill forts, immediately in 410.
So what happened at Margam? When was it abandoned as an elite settlement? Or did it transition directly to become a monastic house? It will be fascinating to find out. It was far removed from any Anglo-Saxon challenge until well into the seventh century; but in contrast, it would have been very vulnerable to Irish coastal raiding.
Following the example of many other villas in Latin Western Europe around that time, that villa then transitioned to become a monastery which lasted for several centuries. Maybe the memorial stone was erected at the instructions of a king, but the actual writing would have been done by monks from that house, who were just as anxious to see the name of their noble founder Eternalis given full credit and visibility, and literally set in stone.
Do note incidentally the mixture of names here. Eternalis Vedomavus was certainly of local British descent, but he also took the Roman family name. As the fifth and sixth centuries wore on, the purely Celtic names came back in full force. Hence Bodvoc, who took his name from one of the Celtic chieftains (of the Dobunni people) who confronted the Roman invasion in the first century AD. It really is harking back to ancient heroic times. From that same era, the great hero of anti-Roman resistance was Caratacus, whose name also survived into much later times in the form of Caradoc, or its variants. Historical memory and/or mythology must have been very strong.
Would I go to the stake for those claim? No. And I know of no conceivable way that it can be tested or verified. But it is surely worth considering, and the logic seems sound to me.
I will observe reports of the Margam excavation with huge interest, and especially any signs of fifth century continuity to an early Christian monastic house. Watch this space.
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