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Introduction

The Origo Gentis Langobardorum is a short, anonymous text, which presents an account of the mythic and historical origins of the Langobard (or Lombard) people [gens], and their migration into Italy. Walter Pohl examines the interconnections between the Origo and Queen Gundeperga or Gunperga (born in 591, died after 653), who was first the queen of Arioald (reigned 626-36), and afterwards of Rothari (reigned 636-52) in whose name the first written Langobard law-code, the Edictus Rothari  was issued in 643. Pohl also argues that the Origo was probably written in relation to the conflict between two Langobard kings, Grimwald (reigned 662-71) and Perctarit (reigned 661-62 & 671-88); the Origo concludes with the statement that following Grimwald’s nine year reign, Berthari [Perctarit] reigned (Origo, §7), but without giving a duration which suggests that it was composed while he was still king. Just as the precise author of the text is unknown, so is the location (presumably) within Italy where it was first written, as there is no internal evidence to confirm the location. While the Origo reflects onto the distant past, and perhaps incorporates oral traditions handed down over the years, these were undoubtedly revised and made current each time they were told, and further re-written and updated to suit the needs of the seventh-century contexts in which it was first disseminated. Likewise, each later witness of the Origo as much reflects the needs and interests of the people producing and using the manuscript as the point when the text was first composed.

Paul the Deacon used the Origo in the late eighth century as a source for his Historia langobardorum, but considers it to be an integral part of the prologue to the Edictus Rothari, and that this “little history” [historiola] can be read alongside the law in “almost all of the codices” (Book I, chapter 21). Sadly, only two manuscripts of the Langobard laws now survive from the period of Langobard rule in Italy, and neither includes the Origo as a part of the prologue. However, all three extant manuscript witnesses of the Origo, written from the ninth to eleventh centuries, are indeed found alongside the laws: the north Italian manuscript, probably produced in Modena in the mid-to-late-ninth century, Modena, Biblioteca Capitolare, MS O. I. 2, starting on fol. 5 and finishing (without mention of Perctarit) on fol. 7r, l. 10 but continuing directly into the list of King’s and Rothari’s ancestors from the prologue to the Edictus Rothari and then adding the Langobard kings from Grimwald to the last, Desiderius, and concluding with Charlemagne and the Carolingian conquest of the kingdom of the Langobards (fol. 7r, l. 10 - 7v, l. 3); the south-Italian, tenth or eleventh-century Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, MS 413, fols 1v, l. 1 - 5r, l. 14; and the south-Italian, manuscript, dating to ca. 1005, Cava de’ Tirreni, Biblioteca della Badia, MS 4, which begins with a full page illustration on fol. 2r, depicted the mythic scene of the naming of the Langobards, and with the text itself beginning overleaf, fols 2v, l. 1 - 5r, l. 19.

The Origo gentis Langobardorum

Origo, §1 begins by recounting that a “small people” [parva gens] called the “Winnile” lived far to the north in a place called “Scanlan”, a word that it classifies means “destruction”, and emphasises the great number of people that dwelled there. This seemingly places the origins of the people in Scandinavia, although as Herwig Wolfram and others have noted, this is a primarily a literary topoi found throughout early medieval origo gentis style texts, a motif that does not necessarily include (or exclude) past reality. Before the Winnile leave Scanlan, the story begins with a mythic scene, in which the god Godan ends up giving them a new name, “Langobards” - that is “long beards” - on account of the disguises employed by the Winnile women, who have also gathered on the battlefield to face off against the much larger army of the Wandals, and with their long hair arranged in front of their faces to look like beards. This story, a version of which is included in Paul the Deacon’s Historia langobardorum, and dismissed by him as a “ridiculous fable” [ridiculum fabulam] (Book I, Chapter 8). The naming myth seems to have originated in the seventh century, presumably in Queen Gundeperga’s circle, or possibly that of her mother, Queen Theodelinda (born 570, died 627), who had earlier commissioned Bishop Secundus of Trent to write an, unfortunately no-longer extant, history of the Langobards, that may also have been a source for the later Origo as well as for the Historia langobardorum. It ties the name of the “Langobardi”, which was first attested for a people in the first century, to the early medieval explanation of its meaning, as offered in the sixth-century Etymologies of Isidore of Seville, who says they are commonly called this on account of their long beards (Book IX, Chapter 2.95). As Pohl argues, the myth takes the scope of who could be a Langobard on the basis of a male secondary sexual characteristic and expands it to also include the women. As such, it forms a strategy for ethnic identification that encompasses the potential for both men and women to see themselves as Langobards.

Next, Origo §2 recounts the early phases of Langobard migration, through mythical or at least unidentifiable and unmappable locations, for which no more than names are given: Golaida, Anthaib, Bainaib and Burgundaib. In this mythical past and mythical places, the Origo also names their first kings, beginning with Agilmund.

Origo, §3 recounts Odoacer’s (Audochari) campaign against the Rugians, the killing of their king and the taking of captives back to Italy. It then details that the Langobards moved into their vacated territories - although it should be noted that, beyond naming the area as “Rugiland” [rugilanda], the Origo itself gives no further information to delineate its location, let alone its border .

The next part of the Origo (§4) recounts further kings as well as battles and interactions with other gens, and the movement of the Langobards to “Feld”,  another place which has been subjected to some discussion as to its location - the Origo again gives only the name - but is usually reckoned to be the Tullnerfeld, that is the region stretching to the north of the Danube between Krems and Korneuberg in modern-day Austria. Origo, §4 continues to expands the focus from just naming of kings, to give a more detailed discussion of King Wacho, his three wives and their children, including the daughters of his second wife, who both married to Frankish kings, and although not mentioned directly in the Origo, his daughter Walderada was Theudelinda’s own mother and Gundeperga’s grandmother. Arguably, the establishment of genealogy and family ties and networks here, serves to legitimise both Theudelinda and her daughter, as well as the line through Theudelinda’s brother, Gundoald, whose grandson was Pecterit. The emphasis on specific ancestry here in the Origo, then, ties their specific family to the (rule of the) Langobards as a whole.

The next section, Origo, §5 begins with the Langobards moving from Feld to Panonnia under the then king Audoin (reigned 547-60), then the attention turns to his son, Albion (reigned ca. 560-72/3), who led the Lombards into Italy in 568. Here the Langobard conquest of Italia is described as events taking place over three years, beginning with them leaving Panonia at Easter in the first year, plundering Italy in the second, and with Alboin becoming the lord [dominus] of Italy in the third. The Origo presents the conquest in straightforward terms with little resistance - a perspective which Paul the Deacon underscores in Book 2 of his Historia Lanogbardorum, saying that outside of the three-year siege of Pavia, most of the rest of northern Italy was quietly subdued. Recently, Patrick Geary has argued that when reading the historical sources without the accounts in Paul the Deacon or the Origo, the migration looks more like the Langobards were refugees fleeing Panonnia into Italy, and their occupation met little resistance in the wake of the Ostrogothic wars and plague of the previous decades. This passage also narrates the political and personal events surrounding Alboin, beginning with his leading the Langobards to defeat the Gepids gens [people], and in doing so killing their king Cunimund and capturing Cunimund’s daughter Rosmaunda, and - with his first wife Flutsuinda having already died - marrying Rosamunda and making her his queen. Origo, §5 ends with what is surely the most dramatic event in the history, with first Rosamunda’s conspiracy leading  to the death of Alboin, and then, when the Langobards will not make her co-conspirator, Hilmichis, king, they instead flee to Ravenna, along with the treasury and Albsuinda, Alboin’s daughter (by Flutsuinda). Rosamunda then plots with the prefect of Ravenna, Longinus, to kill Hilmichis and marry him instead., Rosamunda gives Hilmichis poison to drink, but realising that the drink he has consumed will be fatal, he compels Rosamunda to drink also, and both die. Afterwards, the prefect Longinus sends the treasury and Albsuinda by ship to the emperor in Constantinople (modern day Istanbul).

Origo, §6 recounts the following kings, including the almost twelve year interregnum following  the reigns of Clef (reigned 572-74) up to the re-establishment of the kingship, Authari (reigned 584-90). Amongst the political events outlined in this section are the details that Authari married Theudelinda. After his death, Theudelinda married Agilulf (reigned 590-616) and names Gundeperga as their daughter, but no mention is made in the Origo of their son, Adaloald (reigned 616-26). Instead, the next kings named are Arioald (reigned 626-36) and then Rothari, in whose name the Edictus Rothari was issued (reigned 636-52), and while Queen Gundeperga was married to both, this connection is not mentioned in the Origo. Instead, this penultimate section of the Origo concludes by detailing Rothari’s military campaigns and the expansion of the Langobard regnum to include the Ligurian coast in the west, and in the east to the city of Ubitergium [Oderzo] and in the vicinity of the river Scultenna [river Scoltenna, Emilia-Romagna].

The conclusion of the Origo (§7) begins by recounting that Rothari’s reign had lasted seventeen years, omits the almost six-month reign of his son (by his first wife) and immediate successor, Rodoald, and goes on to name the kings following, Aripert (653-61) then, omitting Perctarit’s first period of rule (661-62), going straight to Grimwald (662-71). The Origo then mentions that Emperor Constans II (reigned 641-68), invaded Italy, then turned back to Sicily where he was killed by his troops. Finally, it concludes with the statement that Grimwald’s reign had lasted for nine years, and then - in all but the Modena manuscript of the Origo - concludes with the statement that Percterit [Berthari] then ruled next.