GILDAS AND THE SCHOOLS OF CIRENCESTER

The life of Gildas by an eleventh-century Breton monk mentions his education at ‘Iren’. Though often taken to mean ‘Ireland’, this is more probably a corruption of ‘Cerin’, the Old Welsh name of ‘Corinium’ or Cirencester. If so, it implies the survival in sixth-century Britain of traditional Roman schools. Gildas, the sixth-century controversialist, is in the twenty-first century as controversial as ever. Most disagreement comes from his unreliable account of Roman Britain; but questions on his origins, dates, education and theology still prompt dispute.1 When so much is uncertain, hard evidence becomes vital. This paper hence discusses one particular crux, on his schooling. It occurs in an eleventh-century Vita Gildae by an unknown monk of Rhuys (near Vannes in south Brittany), who, after describing Gildas’s education by St Illtud at Llantwit Major, in the Vale of Glamorgan, gave this passage: Now, St Gildas, having tarried for the space of some years under the instruction of St Hildutus [5 Illtud], and having been excellently taught by him everything that the divine goodness had entrusted to him, both in secular writings, as far as the subject demanded, and in divine writings, bade farewell to his pious master and his venerable fellow-disciples, and proceeded to Iren [Iren perrexit] that, as a diligent enquirer, he might also ascertain the views of other teachers both in philosophy and divinity. When, therefore, he had passed through the schools of a great number of teachers, and, like a most sagacious bee, had collected the juices from various flowers, he hid himself in the beehive of the Mother Church, so that, in the suitable time, he might pour forth the mellifluous words of the Gospel to call back the people to the celestial joys.