Landolfus Sagax or Landolfo Sagace (sagax meaning "expert" or "scholar") was a Lombard

Lombards

The Lombards , also referred to as Longobards, were a Germanic tribe of Scandinavian origin, who from 568 to 774 ruled a Kingdom in Italy...

 historian who wrote a Historia Romana in the last quarter of the tenth century or beginning of the eleventh.

When his Historia was first published by Pierre Pithou

Pierre Pithou

Pierre Pithou was a French lawyer and scholar. He is also known as Petrus Pithoeus.He was born at Troyes. From childhood he loved literature, and his father Pierre encouraged this interest. Young Pithou was called to the Paris bar in 1560...

 in Basel

Basel

Basel or Basle In the national languages of Switzerland the city is also known as Bâle , Basilea and Basilea is Switzerland's third most populous city with about 166,000 inhabitants. Located where the Swiss, French and German borders meet, Basel also has suburbs in France and Germany...

 in 1569, due to its varied content and sources, Pithou gave it the title Historia Miscella. The manuscript from the Palatine Library at Heidelberg

Bibliotheca Palatina

The Bibliotheca Palatina of Heidelberg was the most important library of the German Renaissance, numbering approximately 5,000 printed books and 3,524 manuscripts....

 (Pal. lat. 909) preserved in the Vatican Library

Vatican Library

The Vatican Library is the library of the Holy See, currently located in Vatican City. It is one of the oldest libraries in the world and contains one of the most significant collections of historical texts. Formally established in 1475, though in fact much older, it has 75,000 codices from...

 is written in Beneventan script

Beneventan script

Beneventan script was a medieval script, so called because it originated in the Duchy of Benevento in southern Italy. It was also called Langobarda, Longobarda, Longobardisca , or sometimes Gothica; it was first called Beneventan by palaeographer E. A...

 and shows evidence of having been committed to parchment under the supervision of Landulf himself.

The Historia, an expansion and extension of Paul the Deacon

Paul the Deacon

Paul the Deacon , also known as Paulus Diaconus, Warnefred, Barnefridus and Cassinensis, , was a Benedictine monk and historian of the Lombards.-Life:...

's eighth-century Historia Romana, contains a list of Byzantine emperors until the then-living Basil II

Basil II

Basil II , known in his time as Basil the Porphyrogenitus and Basil the Young to distinguish him from his ancestor Basil I the Macedonian, was a Byzantine emperor from the Macedonian dynasty who reigned from 10 January 976 to 15 December 1025.The first part of his long reign was dominated...

 and Constantine VIII

Constantine VIII

Constantine VIII was reigning Byzantine emperor from December 15, 1025 until his death. He was the son of the Emperor Romanos II and Theophano, and the younger brother of the eminent Basil II, who died childless and thus left the rule of the Byzantine Empire in his hands.-Family:As...

 (d. 1028) and another of empresses from Fausta

Fausta

Fausta Flavia Maxima was a Roman Empress, daughter of the Roman Emperor Maximianus. To seal the alliance between them for control of the Tetrarchy, in 307 Maximianus married her to Constantine I, who set aside his wife Minervina in her favour. Constantine and Fausta had been betrothed since...

 to Eudoxia

Eudoxia

Eudoxia, or Eudokia is the English language transliteration of the Greek feminine personal name Ευδοκία...

, wife of Michael IV. There are exhortations to a princeps, perhaps implying that it was written at court, but which court is disputed. Some scholars, like Traube, have favoured Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

 and others, like Amedeo Crivellucci, Benevento

Benevento

Benevento is a town and comune of Campania, Italy, capital of the province of Benevento, 50 km northeast of Naples. It is situated on a hill 130 m above sea-level at the confluence of the Calore Irpino and Sabato...

, where a prince was then reigning. Surviving manuscripts are littered with marginal notes, many of Landulf's authorship.

Landulf was probably a layman, as his chronicle does not manifest an interest in ecclesiastical affairs and he included a copy of De Re Militari

De Re Militari

De Re Militari , also Epitoma Rei Militaris, is a treatise by the late Latin writer Vegetius about Roman warfare and military principles as a presentation of methods and practices in use during the height of Rome's power, and responsible for that power...

, an expressly secular work.

Sources

• Caravale, Mario (ed). Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani: LXIII Labroca – Laterza. Rome
  Rome
  Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
  
  , 2004.