Not many years after it had thus fallen under the power of the Arabs, the Holy Land was visited by a French bishop named ARCULF, whose narrative stands at the head of the present volume. The French antiquaries have not been able to discover of what see Arculf was bishop, or when he lived; and all that is known of him is the statement of Adamnan, who wrote down his narrative, that on his return from the east he was carried by contrary winds to the shores of Britain, and that he was received at Iona. We learn from Bede[3], that Adamnan visited the court of the Northumbrian king Aldfrid, and that he then presented to the king his book on the Holy Places, which he had taken down from the dictation of bishop Arculf. The visit to king Aldfrid is generally placed in 703, but by an apparent misunderstanding of the words of Bede, and it is probable that it occurred at least as early as 701[4]. The pilgrimage of Arculf must thus have taken place in the latter part of the seventh century. In relating a miracle concerning the _sudarium_ or napkin taken from the head of our Saviour (which has not been thought worth retaining in the present translation), Arculf is made to speak of "Majuvias, king of the Saracens," as having lived in his time[5], and the character of the story leaves no doubt that the king referred to was Moawiyah, the first khalif of the dynasty of the Ommiades, who reigned from 661 to 679. I am inclined to think that Arculf's visit to Jerusalem must be placed not long after this khalif's death. Arculf's travels, having been reduced to a sort of treatise by Adamnan, do not always present the exact form of a personal narrative, and we cannot trace his course from his native land as we do those of most subsequent travellers. He seems to have followed in the steps of the more ancient pilgrims, and his visit to Egypt, with the avowal of his voyages up the Nile, can only be explained on the supposition that he also went to visit the Coptic monks of the Desert, who had been allowed to remain there, tributary to their Arabian conquerors. He either derived little satisfaction from this visit, or Adamnan considered it as having no interest for his countrymen; and we find no allusion to the Egyptian monks in the later pilgrimages. Arculf speaks of no difficulties he had to encounter, and his narrative is of especial interest, from the circumstance of his visiting the country when all the buildings of the Roman age were still standing. The narrative of bishop Arculf, besides its intrinsic value as a minute and accurate description of localities and monuments at this interesting period, is of especial importance to us, because, through the abridgment made by Bede, it became the text book on this subject among the Anglo-Saxons, and led to that passion for pilgrimages with which they were soon afterwards seized, and which was not uncongenial to the character of that people whose adventurous steps have since been carried into every corner of the world.