Groans of the Britons

The Groans of the Britons (Latin: gemitus Britannorum) is the name of the final appeal made by the post-Roman population of Britain for assistance against foreign invasion. It describes a people in extreme danger and was an attempt to persuade the remnants of the late Roman Empire to send troops across the English Channel to help defend its former subjects.

Dated to c. AD 446 the message is recorded by Gildas in his De Excidio Britanniae , and later Bede, as being a last-ditch plea for assistance to Aetius, military leader of the western empire who spent most of the 440s fighting insurgents in Gaul and Spain. Rome had withdrawn troops from Britain around 407 and the civilian administration had been expelled by the natives a little later, leaving the inhabitants to fend for themselves during increasingly fraught times.

The plea as recorded by Gildas reads:

To Agitius [Aetius], thrice consul, the groans of the Britons... the barbarians drive us to the sea, the sea drives us to the barbarians, between these two means of death we are either killed or drowned.

Barbarians refers to the Saxon settlers who has been living alongside the Britons since the 430s. The reference to being pushed back from the sea may refer to Pictish and Scottish raiders who were attacking the former imperial possession. These attacks continued and no military assistance was ever sent. A visit by Germanus, a former Roman general and by then Bishop of Auxerre in around 446-7 may have constituted Aetius' response.

The reference to Aetius' third consulship however is useful in dating the increasing strife in Britain during this period. That Gildas' mention of the appeal is a minor part of a much larger religious polemic however, means that the image described may be more hyperbolic than realistic especially as his sources were probably derived from oral tradition. The traditional picture of society in post-Roman Britain as being besieged and chaotic is also being increasingly challenged by archaeological evidence.

Traditionally, the barbarian Saxons were settlers, invited by Vortigern to aid him in battling the Picts but by 442 the Britons had lost control of their guests and Romano-British society was finally breaking down. Germanus had led the Britons to a great victory ten or fifteen years earlier and it may have been that he was sent by Aetius in lieu of troops, to provide military and spiritual guidance to the Britons on how to defend and govern themselves.

The Saxon troubles continued for many years until the Battle of Mount Badon in the late fifth century which ushered in two generations of peace.

See also

• Roman Britain