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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture On Thu, 26 Dec 2002 22:40:22 -0000 Brenda Cook wrote: >Saint Alban (beheaded according to some reckonings in 208AD) > >He is honoured - and has been since at least the time of St Germanus of >Auxerre - as the first (known) Christian martyr in the land which is now >England although at the time, of course, it was the Roman province of >Britannia. Or perhaps the Roman provinces of Britannia Superior and Britannia Inferior. Roman Britain was divided into two provinces about the same time as the conjectured date reported above for Alban's death. But just as we don't known when Alban suffered martyrdom, so we also don't know when this division took place. The leading candidate is ca. 213, in the reign of Caracalla; the often unreliable historian Herodian places it in 197, under Caracalla's predecessor, Septimius Severus; there are other conjectures. For discussion and some review of the literature, see Pat Southern, _The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine_ (Routledge, 2001), pp. 37 (where "208" must be a slip; Geta did not succeed until 211) and 48-50 with notes 39 on p. 292 and 62 on pp. 297-98; Southern's own preference for an early date is revealed on p. 165. Verulamium was the name of the Roman city which was the >forerunner of the present-day city of St Albans. In Britannia Superior (the southern province; Roman onomastic practice in this regard followed the model of the two Germaniae, with Superior always being closer to and Inferior farther from Rome) until Diocletian's further division of the provinces around the end of the third century put it in the newly created Maxima Caesariensis. Best, John Dillon ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html