Night of the Long Knives (Arthurian)
Encyclopedia
The Night of the Long Knives is the name Geoffrey of Monmouth
gave to the (possibly apocryphal) treacherous killing of native British
chieftains by Anglo-Saxon
mercenaries
on Salisbury Plain
in the 5th century. The event came to be known as Brad y Cyllyll Hirion ("The Treachery of the Long Knives") in Welsh
, and became a prominent symbol of Saxon treachery.
, who has become the high king of the Britons in the wake of the Roman withdrawal from Britain, allows Anglo-Saxons under Hengist and Horsa to settle on the Isle of Thanet
. He offers them additional provisions in exchange for their service as mercenaries against incursions by Picts
and Scots
. The settlers, however, manipulate Vortigern into allowing them to increase their numbers and granting them more land, eventually including all of Kent
.
. The story is known from the Historia Brittonum, attributed to the Welsh historian Nennius
, which was a compilation in Latin of various older materials (some of which were historical and others mythic or legendary) put together during the early 9th century, and surviving in 9th-century manuscripts – i.e., some 400 years after the supposed events. According to John Morris
's textual analysis of the Historia, this tale derived from a north Welsh narrative which was mainly about Emrys (Ambrosius Aurelianus
), which the compiler of the Historia incorporated into a framework drawn from a Kent
ish chronicle, together with details from a Life of Saint Germanus
.
This is a literal translation of the Latin from the L. Faral (Paris 1929) edition of the text (sections in square brackets [thus] supplied from T. Mommsen
's 1892 edition):
by Geoffrey of Monmouth
, who wrote during the early 12th century and presumably used Nennius as his main source for the story. According to him, the incident took place at a banquet in modern-day Wiltshire
, ostensibly arranged to seal a peace treaty
, which may have been the cession of Essex
and Sussex
in exchange for intermarriage between Rowena, the daughter of Saxon chieftain Hengest
, and Vortigern. The story claims that the "Saxons" — which probably includes Angles and Jutes — arrived at the banquet armed with their long knives (seax
es) hidden on their persons. During the feast, on a given word of command, they pulled their knives and killed the unarmed Britons sitting next to them. Vortigern himself was spared, but all his men were butchered, except Eldol, Earl of Gloucester
, who escaped. The historical existence of any of these events or persons is conjectural.
, the term Brad y Llyfrau Gleision
('The Treachery of the Blue Books') was coined to refer to the report of the English commissioners on education in Wales, published in parliamentary blue covers in 1847, which was widely seen as an attack on the Welsh language
and a slur on the Welsh people. One of the effects of the report would be the exclusion of the Welsh language from Welsh schools for several generations and a consequent fall in the number of Welsh speakers.
The name Night of the Long Knives
was later used for a violent political purge in Nazi Germany
, as well as British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan's dismissal
of seven members of his cabinet and also the assassination of Alexander Burnes
in November 1841 in Kabul, Afghanistan.
In Canada
the term was used by Quebec
premiere René Lévesque
in reference to the repatriation of the Canadian Constitution in 1981. (Before that time, the final constitutional authority for Canada resided in the United Kingdom
). Initially eight of the 10 provincial premieres were opposed to repatriating the constitution. A compromise was hammered out in Lévesque's absence, and 9 of the 10 (only Quebec dissenting) agreed to it.
Geoffrey of Monmouth
Geoffrey of Monmouth was a cleric and one of the major figures in the development of British historiography and the popularity of tales of King Arthur...
gave to the (possibly apocryphal) treacherous killing of native British
Britons (historical)
The Britons were the Celtic people culturally dominating Great Britain from the Iron Age through the Early Middle Ages. They spoke the Insular Celtic language known as British or Brythonic...
chieftains by Anglo-Saxon
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
mercenaries
Mercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
on Salisbury Plain
Salisbury Plain
Salisbury Plain is a chalk plateau in central southern England covering . It is part of the Southern England Chalk Formation and largely lies within the county of Wiltshire, with a little in Hampshire. The plain is famous for its rich archaeology, including Stonehenge, one of England's best known...
in the 5th century. The event came to be known as Brad y Cyllyll Hirion ("The Treachery of the Long Knives") in Welsh
Welsh language
Welsh is a member of the Brythonic branch of the Celtic languages spoken natively in Wales, by some along the Welsh border in England, and in Y Wladfa...
, and became a prominent symbol of Saxon treachery.
Legendary context
According to the tradition, VortigernVortigern
Vortigern , also spelled Vortiger and Vortigen, was a 5th-century warlord in Britain, a leading ruler among the Britons. His existence is considered likely, though information about him is shrouded in legend. He is said to have invited the Saxons to settle in Kent as mercenaries to aid him in...
, who has become the high king of the Britons in the wake of the Roman withdrawal from Britain, allows Anglo-Saxons under Hengist and Horsa to settle on the Isle of Thanet
Isle of Thanet
The Isle of Thanet lies at the most easterly point of Kent, England. While in the past it was separated from the mainland by the nearly -wide River Wantsum, it is no longer an island ....
. He offers them additional provisions in exchange for their service as mercenaries against incursions by Picts
Picts
The Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...
and Scots
Gaels
The Gaels or Goidels are speakers of one of the Goidelic Celtic languages: Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx. Goidelic speech originated in Ireland and subsequently spread to western and northern Scotland and the Isle of Man....
. The settlers, however, manipulate Vortigern into allowing them to increase their numbers and granting them more land, eventually including all of Kent
Kingdom of Kent
The Kingdom of Kent was a Jutish colony and later independent kingdom in what is now south east England. It was founded at an unknown date in the 5th century by Jutes, members of a Germanic people from continental Europe, some of whom settled in Britain after the withdrawal of the Romans...
.
Historia Brittonum
There is no specific account of this event in the 6th-century writings of GildasGildas
Gildas was a 6th-century British cleric. He is one of the best-documented figures of the Christian church in the British Isles during this period. His renowned learning and literary style earned him the designation Gildas Sapiens...
. The story is known from the Historia Brittonum, attributed to the Welsh historian Nennius
Nennius
Nennius was a Welsh monk of the 9th century.He has traditionally been attributed with the authorship of the Historia Brittonum, based on the prologue affixed to that work, This attribution is widely considered a secondary tradition....
, which was a compilation in Latin of various older materials (some of which were historical and others mythic or legendary) put together during the early 9th century, and surviving in 9th-century manuscripts – i.e., some 400 years after the supposed events. According to John Morris
John Morris (historian)
John Robert Morris was an English historian who specialised in the study of the institutions of the Roman Empire and the history of Sub-Roman Britain...
's textual analysis of the Historia, this tale derived from a north Welsh narrative which was mainly about Emrys (Ambrosius Aurelianus
Ambrosius Aurelianus
Ambrosius Aurelianus, ; called Aurelius Ambrosius in the Historia Regum Britanniae and elsewhere, was a war leader of the Romano-British who won an important battle against the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th century, according to Gildas...
), which the compiler of the Historia incorporated into a framework drawn from a Kent
Kingdom of Kent
The Kingdom of Kent was a Jutish colony and later independent kingdom in what is now south east England. It was founded at an unknown date in the 5th century by Jutes, members of a Germanic people from continental Europe, some of whom settled in Britain after the withdrawal of the Romans...
ish chronicle, together with details from a Life of Saint Germanus
Germanus of Auxerre
Germanus of Auxerre was a bishop of Auxerre in Gaul. He is a saint in both the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, commemorated on July 31. He visited Britain in around 429 and the records of this visit provide valuable information on the state of post-Roman British society...
.
This is a literal translation of the Latin from the L. Faral (Paris 1929) edition of the text (sections in square brackets [thus] supplied from T. Mommsen
Theodor Mommsen
Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen was a German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician, archaeologist, and writer generally regarded as the greatest classicist of the 19th century. His work regarding Roman history is still of fundamental importance for contemporary research...
's 1892 edition):
It happened however after the death of VortimerVortimerVortimer is a figure in British tradition, a son of the 5th-century Britonnic ruler Vortigern. He is remembered for his fierce opposition to his father's Saxon allies...
, son of King Vortigern, and after the return of Hengist with his forces, they called for a false Council, so that they might work sorrow to Vortigern with his army. For they sent legates to ask for peace, that there might be perpetual friendship between them. So Vortigern himself with the elders by birth of his people [considered the matter and carefully thought over what they might do. And the same] opinion was with them all, that they should make peace, and their legates went back and afterwards called together the conference, so that on either side the Britons and Saxons (Brittones et Saxones) should come together as one without arms, so that friendship should be sealed.
And Hengistus ordered the whole of his household that each one should hide his knife (artavum) under his foot in the middle of his shoe. 'And when I shall call out to you and say "Eu nimet saxas" (Hey, draw your swords!), then draw your knives (cultellos) from the soles of your shoes, and fall upon them, and stand strongly against them. And do not kill their king, but seize him for the sake of my daughter whom I gave to him in matrimony, because it is better for us that he should be ransomed from our hands.' And they brought together the conference, and the Saxons, speaking in a friendly way, meanwhile were thinking in a wolvish way, and sociably they sat down man beside man (i.e. Saxon beside Briton). Hengistus, as he had said, spoke out, and all the three hundred elders of King Vortigern were slaughtered, and only he was imprisoned, and was chained, and he gave to them many regions for the ransom of his soul (i.e. life), that is Est Saxum, Sut saxum [, Middelseaxan, with other districts under his control which they named.]
Geoffrey of Monmouth
The Night of the Long Knives is also described in Book 6 of the Historia Regum BritanniaeHistoria Regum Britanniae
The Historia Regum Britanniae is a pseudohistorical account of British history, written c. 1136 by Geoffrey of Monmouth. It chronicles the lives of the kings of the Britons in a chronological narrative spanning a time of two thousand years, beginning with the Trojans founding the British nation...
by Geoffrey of Monmouth
Geoffrey of Monmouth
Geoffrey of Monmouth was a cleric and one of the major figures in the development of British historiography and the popularity of tales of King Arthur...
, who wrote during the early 12th century and presumably used Nennius as his main source for the story. According to him, the incident took place at a banquet in modern-day Wiltshire
Wiltshire
Wiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers...
, ostensibly arranged to seal a peace treaty
Peace treaty
A peace treaty is an agreement between two or more hostile parties, usually countries or governments, that formally ends a state of war between the parties...
, which may have been the cession of Essex
Essex
Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...
and Sussex
Sussex
Sussex , from the Old English Sūþsēaxe , is an historic county in South East England corresponding roughly in area to the ancient Kingdom of Sussex. It is bounded on the north by Surrey, east by Kent, south by the English Channel, and west by Hampshire, and is divided for local government into West...
in exchange for intermarriage between Rowena, the daughter of Saxon chieftain Hengest
Hengest
Hengist and Horsa are figures of Anglo-Saxon, and subsequently British, legend, which records the two as the Germanic brothers who led the Angle, Saxon, and Jutish armies that conquered the first territories of Great Britain in the 5th century AD...
, and Vortigern. The story claims that the "Saxons" — which probably includes Angles and Jutes — arrived at the banquet armed with their long knives (seax
Seax
Seax in Old English means knife or cutting tool. The name of the roofer's tool, the zax, is a development from this word...
es) hidden on their persons. During the feast, on a given word of command, they pulled their knives and killed the unarmed Britons sitting next to them. Vortigern himself was spared, but all his men were butchered, except Eldol, Earl of Gloucester
Eldol, Consul of Gloucester
Eldol was the Consul or Count of Gloucester, who was the sole British leader to escape from the massacre of Salisbury in Geoffrey of Monmouth's circa 1136 work Historia Regum Britanniae . Hengist invited all of the British Leaders to a peace treaty...
, who escaped. The historical existence of any of these events or persons is conjectural.
Modern significance
As Brad y Cyllyll Hirion, the event had, and still holds, a potent symbolism in Welsh national consciousness. In 19th-century WalesWales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
, the term Brad y Llyfrau Gleision
Treachery of the Blue Books
The Treachery of the Blue Books or Treason of the Blue Books was the name given in Wales to the Reports of the commissioners of enquiry into the state of education in Wales published in 1847. The term Brad y Llyfrau Gleision was coined by the author R. J...
('The Treachery of the Blue Books') was coined to refer to the report of the English commissioners on education in Wales, published in parliamentary blue covers in 1847, which was widely seen as an attack on the Welsh language
Welsh language
Welsh is a member of the Brythonic branch of the Celtic languages spoken natively in Wales, by some along the Welsh border in England, and in Y Wladfa...
and a slur on the Welsh people. One of the effects of the report would be the exclusion of the Welsh language from Welsh schools for several generations and a consequent fall in the number of Welsh speakers.
The name Night of the Long Knives
Night of the Long Knives
The Night of the Long Knives , sometimes called "Operation Hummingbird " or in Germany the "Röhm-Putsch," was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany between June 30 and July 2, 1934, when the Nazi regime carried out a series of political murders...
was later used for a violent political purge in Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
, as well as British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan's dismissal
Night of the Long Knives (1962)
The epithet Night of the Long Knives is given to July 13, 1962, when the British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan sacked the following members of his Cabinet:*Lord Kilmuir — Lord Chancellor*Selwyn Lloyd — Chancellor of the Exchequer...
of seven members of his cabinet and also the assassination of Alexander Burnes
Alexander Burnes
Captain Sir Alexander Burnes was a Scottish traveller and explorer who took part in The Great Game. He was nicknamed Bokhara Burnes for his role in establishing contact with and exploring Bukhara, which made his name.-Early life:He was born in Montrose, Scotland, to the son of the local provost,...
in November 1841 in Kabul, Afghanistan.
In Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
the term was used by Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
premiere René Lévesque
René Lévesque
René Lévesque was a reporter, a minister of the government of Quebec, , the founder of the Parti Québécois political party and the 23rd Premier of Quebec...
in reference to the repatriation of the Canadian Constitution in 1981. (Before that time, the final constitutional authority for Canada resided in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
). Initially eight of the 10 provincial premieres were opposed to repatriating the constitution. A compromise was hammered out in Lévesque's absence, and 9 of the 10 (only Quebec dissenting) agreed to it.