The geographer of Ravenna, who wrote in the same century in which the work which bears the name of Nennius was originally compiled, reports the tradition thus:—‘In the Western Ocean is the island which is called Britannia, where the nation of the Saxons formerly coming from ancient Saxony, with their chief Anschis, are now seen to inhabit.’[155] Finally, Bede, in the succeeding century, the historian of the Anglic nation, gives us the traditionary history in the following shape. He repeats in very much the same terms the account given by Gildas of the incursions of the Picts and Scots beyond the southern wall; the letter to Aetius asking assistance, which, he adds, he was unable to give on account of the war with Blaedla and Attila, kings of the Huns; the great famine; the efforts made by the more warlike part of the Britons; the return of the Irish plunderers to their own home,[156] and the quietness of the Picts in the extreme part of the island; the great plenty which followed; the alarm of renewed invasion, when ‘they all agreed with their king Vortigern to call over to them and from the parts beyond the sea the Saxon nation.’[157] Bede then proceeds thus:—‘In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 449, Martian, being made emperor with Valentinian, and the forty-sixth from Augustus, ruled the empire seven years. Then the nation of the Angles or Saxons, being invited by the aforesaid king, arrived in Britain with three long ships, and had a place assigned them to dwell in by the same king in the eastern part of the island, that they might thus appear to be fighting for the country, whilst their real intentions were to enslave it. Accordingly they engaged with the enemy, who had come from the north to give battle, and obtained the victory; which, being known at home in their own country, as also the fertility of the country and the cowardice of the Britons, a more considerable fleet was quickly sent over, bringing a still greater number of men, which, being added to the former, made up an invincible army. The new-comers received from the Britons a place to inhabit among themselves, upon condition that they should wage war against their enemies for the peace and security of the country, whilst the Britons agreed to furnish them with pay.’ Bede then tells us that those who came over were of three nations, the Saxons, the Angles, and the Jutes; and that from the Angles came all the tribes that dwell on the north side of the river Humber, and the other nations of the English, and that the two first commanders are said to have been Hengist and Horsa. He then says—‘In a short time swarms of the aforesaid nations came over into the island, and they began to increase so much that they became terrible to the natives themselves who had invited them. Having on a sudden entered into a temporary league with the Picts, whom they had by this time repelled to a distance by the force of their arms, they began to turn